Transcription

Connor
You’re listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun and practical ways.

Jeff
Man. Chris, it is so good to be back in the studio with you today.

Chris
It is even better for me, Jeff, to be in your presence as well.

Jeff
I can imagine how good it is for you. It must be like, oh, finally, yes, finally.

Chris
I waited all week for this moment.

Jeff
You jumped out of bed. Yeah. So excited. Yeah, yeah.

Chris
Today is coronation day. What movie? What? Today is coronation day. I have.

Jeff
No idea.

Chris
Of course, it’s a Disney princess, but it’s frozen.

Jeff
Oh, frozen.

Chris
Okay. Yeah. She woke up and she’s excited about the day.

Jeff
Super excited. I had in my mind. Kind of like, you know, the role in on like a, like a 80 sitcom. Yeah. Where the kid throws back his covers and then the the wind or the thing comes up. That’s what I’m thinking, is that you’re just so excited, like.

Chris
Full House or something. Just so.

Jeff
Excited about coming to see me.

Chris
Today. Where are you? Look. Yeah, yeah. So, hey, so this morning we’re going to actually talk about mailbags, mailbags, mailbags and Mailbags. Actually, in this particular case, somebody actually mailed in a fun question for us.

Jeff
Okay. Oh that’s.

Chris
Fun. Which, by the way, is not that common, right? Are a lot of comments. Right. But I think fun questions are fun. So yes, I found.

Jeff
Yes. That is could you say hang on let me write that down. Let me type it. Fun questions are fun.

Chris
Slow down Copernicus while I write this. So if you have a fun question, we would love to use it. So just send all your fun questions to our email, which is info at the Bible guides.com. That’s correct. And so here’s Carol L’s question. Hi, Carol.

Jeff
Carolyn.

Chris
Carol.

Jeff
Carolyn. No.

Chris
Carol. Oh you’re right, you’re right.

Jeff
Carolyn L right.

Chris
Dude, what is the worst fashion trend that you’ve ever participated in?

Jeff
And I’m cutting edge all the time, so I don’t know that it’s probably got to be you.

Chris
That is not true at all.

Jeff
No, I have never been cutting edge. Let me let me say it that way.

Chris
Oh, there you go. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I have one immediately that comes to mind. Okay. Do you remember Miami Vice? Do you remember Don Johnson? And for a while there it was the big, long white jackets that pushed your sleeves up. You had to push your sleeves up. And for some reason, the whole nation bought these things. Yeah, yeah. And by the way, that big poofy shoulders. Yeah. Yeah. And that was a style pretty much for Miami. Yeah. Right. Like you know like, you know, you just sort of saw that in the 80s, you know, in warm weather or whatever. But here we are in Ohio pushing your sleeves up in January. So anyway, I just I actually had a white long jacket. Wow.

Jeff
Miami Vice jacket.

Chris
Yes. And it was you know, I think it lasted for, I don’t know, a couple of months. And then everybody just sort of threw that in the back of the closet and said, that was a dumb trend.

Jeff
Wow, wow. So my worst one. So I never was, you know, super trendy. I wore a lot of suits and ties in high school. So that was my thing. You know, the skinny ties and the. Yeah, yeah, tie bars, all that kind of junk, like Footloose. Yeah, sure. But my worst one probably was. And this wasn’t my own choice. This was my mom’s choice. And if you’re listening, mom, it’s your fault. But I had hair past my shoulders. Nice. And my hair, when it gets long, gets really curly. So I got big curls like that. Like like a little girl in all my photos.

Chris
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, back then, long hair was the stuff of the.

Jeff
70s, man. It was like 74, 75. Yeah, yeah.

Chris
Oh, wow. You were just five years old. Yeah, yeah.

Jeff
Yeah, that’s what I’m saying.

Chris
Okay. All right, let’s take your grandson. Yeah. Yeah, okay. I had I didn’t have long hairs and long hair until the 80s. I had the mullet thing. Oh, did you?

Jeff
And the mullet.

Chris
Oh, yeah.

Jeff
For sure. But you’re calling your Miami Vice jacket your worst decision?

Chris
Well, I mean, it said fashion trend. Not not hair.

Jeff
Trend.

Chris
Okay, okay.

Jeff
Not hairstyle.

Chris
So. But, you know, I actually have a couple of them. Like I actually had one of those Michael Jackson thriller jackets with 100 zippers on it. Oh yeah. Yeah I actually had one of those.

Jeff
I didn’t have one of those.

Chris
I wore that for. They bought me for Christmas. And then in the, in the, in junior high, the Chinese symbols. Oh, it was really popular. I had a bunch of those. I had parachute pants.

Jeff
Yeah, I had parachute pants. I still don’t feel like those were a bad choice. Those were great. Except when you’re going too fast, you can melt them, right?

Chris
Right, right right.

Jeff
Right right right right. Well, so what’s the one thing you could wish you brought back? What was the coolest thing in the trends that.

Chris
Oh, adding on to Carolyn’s question.

Jeff
Yeah. Well now I’m super excited about this.

Chris
Okay, so the coolest thing that I wish I could bring back. Is actually something that’s not for me. It’s well, it is for me, but it’s not. It’s not. The thing that I would do is I actually like ladies 80s hairstyles. So let me, let me, let me say it, let me say it a different way. Whenever I look for.

Jeff
You, you liked it when you’re your wife.

Chris
I’m saying I prefer it. Yes. So like, for instance, when I look back at pictures of my wife right now, I use my wife as an example. But quite honestly, anybody like if I see a picture, like.

Jeff
Stay back with your wife.

Chris
Yeah. Okay, let’s go back to the wife.

Jeff
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Chris
When I see a picture of Liz in the 80s, my kids will go, oh my goodness, look at that hairstyle. And I think that’s when you were most attractive, but not because you were 18, but because of the hairstyle. I just liked the hairstyle. I just love the hairstyle. Yeah. So whenever we see old 80s movies and it’s the same thing, you know, and I’ll say, oh my goodness, that’s that’s so pretty. Yeah. And my kids are like, what? Yeah, what? And I’m just like, I’m like, I prefer.

Jeff
Great big bangs. And it’s all the hairspray up to here like this. Yes. It’s like a big satellite dish.

Chris
Well, there’s a big difference between like overboard. Oh yeah. Right. So like, the overboard ones are the ones that we see now. Right. But if you go back and look at the yearbooks, most of them weren’t that overboard.

Jeff
No, no.

Chris
Right I agree so but it’s funny I like the puffy. You like that 80 hair. So if you could.

Jeff
Bring that back, that’s what you’d bring back.

Chris
Honestly. Absolutely.

Jeff
I think the coolest I ever was is I got a pair of original Jordans. Oh wow. I wish, I wish I knew how valuable they were going to be because I would have never worn them.

Chris
I was going to say, you should have grabbed those suckers and put them in a box.

Jeff
I wore them out. Yeah, yeah.

Chris
Yeah, put that box in another box. Yeah.

Jeff
So that was cool. And we were broke. Right? So we were so poor.

Chris
So that was a big sacrifice.

Jeff
Well, I had a paper route when I was 12. Okay. Yeah. Me too. I kept saving up, saving up, saving up, saving up like 100 bucks back then. Yeah. Right. And so to go get a $100. You bought him yourself? Yeah. Good for you. Almost all my fun stuff like that I bought for myself like that. My clothes, my. Yeah, yeah, a lot of my fun toys stuff. Yeah. So that’s fun. Well, cool. Man, that was a great question, Carolyn. Thanks, Carolyn. Yeah, that was fun.

Chris
So we’re going to jump in today about the disciples arguing.

Jeff
So I would pay money to see you in Miami Vice jacket with a mullet. That would be.

Chris
I might have a photo.

Jeff
Oh please. We got to post that. Yeah.

Chris
Yeah, I might have one.

Jeff
Okay, so today we have a really great conversation. Jesus is engaging with his disciples, and they’re trying to figure out who’s going to be the greatest. Yeah. And then they’re upset because other people also like Jesus and it’s.

Chris
Making a mess. It’s really hard for me to determine the motive behind this. Like, it’s so easy for us to sit and condemn and say they were so, you know, all about power in themselves, you know? But it could have been a better perspective than that. Like, you know, you know, that whole philosophy of like, believing the best versus assuming the worst. Yeah, yeah. So on the worst end, they’re like, I’m so important. But on the best end, they were just simply trying to rank themselves to.

Jeff
Be valuable with.

Chris
Humility.

Jeff
Right. Well, that’s what we’re going to talk about today. So he’s Chris and I’m Jeff and we’re the Bible guys.

Chris
Hey everyone. If you’re listening on one of the audio platforms like Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or Spreaker, would you do us a favor? Would you take just a moment and follow us? Because I’m worth following and Jeff is along with me, so, you know, you could follow him, I guess too, by proxy, but or just share it, you know, because people need to be introduced to the Bible guy and his companion named Jeff.

Jeff
So today we’re going to start. We have five passages but they’re all short ones right. And we’re going to start in Matthew chapter 18. And we’ll read the first five verses of that. And then we’ll go to Mark nine and then Luke nine. So here we go. It says about that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Jesus called a little child to him and put the child among them. And then he said, I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the kingdom of heaven. So anyone who becomes as humble as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And anyone who welcomes the little child like this on my behalf is welcoming me. And then Mark nine, verse 33, it says, after they arrived at Capernaum and settled in a house, Jesus asked his disciples, what were you discussing on the road? But they didn’t answer because they’d been arguing about which of them was the greatest. He sat down. So I think that defines what you were just saying a minute ago. Yeah. He sat down, called the 12 disciples over to him and said, whoever wants to be first must make must take the last place and be the servant of everyone else. Then he put a little child among them, and taking the child in his arms, he said to them, anyone who welcomes the little child like this on my behalf welcomes me. And anyone who welcomes me welcomes not only me, but also my father who sent me. And then Luke 946 it says, then his disciples began arguing about which of them was the greatest. Jeff
But Jesus knew their thoughts, so he brought a little child to his side. Then he said to them, anyone who welcomes a little child like this on my behalf welcomes me. And anyone who welcomes me also welcomes my father who sent me. Whoever is least among you is the greatest. So very profound. And then they pivot just a little bit. Mark chapter nine, verse 38 says.

Chris
Just to be clear, it’s this. This verse 38 picks up after Mark 37.

Jeff
That’s correct.

Chris
And then the Luke one that you’re about to read is actually just the next verse of the Luke you just read. That’s correct. I don’t know why we just didn’t read them.

Jeff
That’s that’s really profound in that 38 always comes after 37. I thought, I.

Chris
Don’t think people pay attention to the numbers. That’s why I said it. All right. Go ahead.

Jeff
So it says John said to Jesus, teacher, we saw someone using your name to cast out demons. But we told him to stop because he wasn’t in our group. Don’t stop him, Jesus said, no one who performs a miracle in my name will soon be able to speak evil of me. Anyone who is not against us is for us. If anyone gives you even a cup of water because you belong to the Messiah, I tell you the truth, that person will surely be rewarded. And then Luke 949 it says, John said to Jesus, master, we saw someone using your name to cast out demons. But we told him to stop because he isn’t in our group. But Jesus said, don’t stop him. Anyone who is not against you is for you.

Chris
Oh, I know why she had this. Read that separately. There’s two different things entirely.

Jeff
Two different events.

Chris
Yeah, completely.

Jeff
But I think they’re connected. Yeah. So really I was making fun of 38 comes after 37. But the reality is I think the reason they were arguing about who was greatest was because they had been offended by somebody who’s casting out demons. I think they’re talking about. Yeah. Well, when I was on the trip evangelism trip, I led a bunch of people to Jesus, and I cast out these kind of demons. And that’s what I think was happening, was that they were they were probably exchanging their stats of how well they had done for Jesus in response to the fact that they were mad about these other guys who are doing stuff in Jesus name, and they’re not even part of the team. Yeah.

Chris
And it could have been it could have been connected for sure.

Jeff
Because those are literally back to back ideas. And there’s no there’s no real division in the conversation at all.

Chris
Did you hear the way this is read or this is worded. It says we told him to stop because he isn’t a part of our group. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Hey hey hey hey! Stop it! Hey hey, hey, you’re not a part of the group.

Jeff
That’s right. You don’t even know the secret handshake, right?

Chris
And so. So, yeah. I mean, like, again, it’s just one of those things where. When it says they were arguing on who’s the greatest. We all know that James and John, the sons of well, we don’t all know, but most of us have heard that the James and John the son of Zebedee. There’s an instance where the mother comes to Jesus and says, can my sons sit on your right and your left? Remember that? Yeah, yeah. And so that is clearly a family discussion about my sons are awesome, right? Yeah. Like I think my sons. Hercules. Hercules. Yeah, yeah. Hercules. Hercules. And that’s exactly right. That’s so funny. And the. But but this never says that. They were arguing about themselves. They were arguing who’s the greatest among themselves. Yeah. So. So I always like to believe the best. And so there was a part of me that always thought better than me. Chris. No, no, no, not that like me saying to you, dude, Peter’s the guy. Yeah. How could you ever think you’re the guy? Peter’s the guy, right. So you could be arguing amongst yourselves about somebody else. So, like, who’s to say that they were putting themselves at the top of the list? They could they could have just been arguing about rank in general. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Just rank in general and like a disciple draft.

Jeff
Yeah.

Chris
Maybe so. Yeah. But what I’m saying is like, I just you just you just don’t know. And so there is a, there’s a pendulum swing on this and it never says your hearts are evil. He never looks at you. He never looks at the disciples and says, gosh, man, you know, you guys really, really need major correction here, right? Right. So so I just I always like to just inject a little bit of believing the best. And maybe, perhaps they were arguing on somebody else’s behalf. You know, you know how like people do sometimes they’re like, you know, oh well you every.

Jeff
Week you’re mad. You’re mad about something. On behalf of all the rest of us. Yes, yes, yes, yes. So you’re taking the noble angle on this. These people are noble.

Chris
Hey, hey, by the way, by the way, this would be a fun thing for our listeners to hear. So just yesterday, Jeff and I were having a meeting with somebody that happened to go to our church, and they were they were talking to all of us. There was like a group of us standing there and this woman said, Jeff, she goes, my brother thinks you are the best pastor ever. And then I leaned forward and I go, has he even heard me? Yeah. And of course, everybody’s laughing, right? Everybody’s laughing. And you’re like, you’re like, please say that again. I’m going to record that. Yeah, yeah.

Jeff
Could you say that again real quick? Send it as an email to Caesar at Heritage church.com.

Chris
Right. Yeah. So yeah, it’s just really funny but but but but it could have it could have been I’m just trying to give the disciples grace here. It could have been that you’re like, oh man, come on. Like James is the guy. And James is like, no, no, no, man, I’m not the guy. I think. I think, you know, Peter’s the guy. No, no, no, I think, you know, they could have taken that posture, right? Yeah. But the idea of rank. Yes, the idea of rank is what Jesus was rebuking. Yes. Right. So it doesn’t have to be necessarily them thinking they’re the best.

Jeff
There’s a I’m happy with that. I’m not sure. I think that’s exactly it. But I’m content to say, hey, that could be a thing. There is an element in here that sometimes, you know, this was all written originally in Greek. Yep. And it’s very difficult to get an exact translation from one language to another language. Right? You know, like if you’re trying to translate from Spanish to English, our adjectives and adverbs are in the wrong spot for that, right? So word for word, it doesn’t make sense. Well, all you.

Chris
Have to do is use Google Translate and realize how bad it is.

Jeff
Right? Right. So it can be hard. Now. Now world class experts have translated the Bible in, you know, into the various languages around the world. And I really do believe that what we’re looking at is the Word of God. Not that it contains the Word of God, but it is the Word of God. But it’s beneficial to have multiple translations because you get different things from different, different translators and so on. This he says a couple different times, like in verse five on Matthew chapter 18 one through five, he says, anyone who welcomes a little child like this on my behalf is welcoming me, right? The original language he says, in my name. Right. And it’s the same thing in Mark chapter or yeah, Mark chapter 937. Luke 948 so if we had read anybody who does this in my name is welcoming me, you would say, what is in my name mean? And we would say, it means on my behalf, right? Right. But now that it says on my behalf, I think it’s important for us to say in Jesus name, right? Because sometimes Christians do good deeds and just leave it at the fact that it was a good deed, right? Right. I represent Jesus in the world, and so I’m just doing a good deed. I think it’s important for us to do our good deeds in Jesus name, that we’re making sure that what we’re saying is, I’m not doing this because I’m a good person. I’m doing this in Jesus name, and maybe the best one in the world right now that I think does that on a global level. Samaritan’s purse, run by Franklin Graham. They even in their in their statement, I mean their first ones in in catastrophes and wars and all kinds of horrible things. Jeff
But in their, their, their statement, in their little slogan, it talks about, you know, making a difference in the world in Jesus name. Name. Right. And he has a book called The Name, talking about how the world doesn’t seem to take offense when you say you’re doing it for God. They take offense when you say you’re doing it for Jesus.

Chris
Because God’s God’s a blanket for a lot of different denominations and religions and. Right.

Jeff
But but we are not guardians. We’re Christians. Right, right, right. And so doing it in Jesus name is really, really important that we wear his name. You know, that song and that we we are I don’t.

Chris
What are you talking about?

Jeff
What song? Well, we wear his name by Newsong.

Chris
I don’t know that song.

Jeff
You know that song? It’s on the same one as People Get Ready and all that stuff. Oh, you’ve sung it before anyways. So the. So we wear his name and we need to wear it proudly. So in this one, if it had said in my name, we would have said on his behalf, right, right. But because it says on his behalf, now we need to clarify what he means is on his behalf in his name, not our own name. Well, the.

Chris
Coolest part that I thought you were going to mention about the Franklin Graham thing is that a lot of countries would say, well, come on in and come on in and do good, do good. Just don’t do it in Jesus name. That’s right. And he says, no, right, right. And he says, no, we’re going to do everything in Jesus name, right? Which is awesome.

Jeff
But they’re so well positioned all around the world. Then the countries who say, well, then you can’t come when there’s a disaster, a crisis.

Chris
Let’s say, okay, come.

Jeff
Okay. Come on.

Chris
We change our mind.

Jeff
Samaritan’s purse is first ones in most time.

Chris
Come, come in any name.

Jeff
Come and build the hospitals. Come and take care of the orphans, all that kind of stuff. Right. And so, you know, on the front end, it feels like it costs you a little bit when you do something in Jesus name. But people begin to recognize they really need they really need that help. Right? And so stick to your guns. Do it in Jesus name. You know, it doesn’t have to be a preachy thing, but then it’s in that context, he says. If you just give a little cup of warm water or cold water in my name, right? You know, it’s like you’re welcoming me. And then they go, hey, so we found out people were casting out demons in your name, and we told them, stop it. So that’s why I think all these things are so connected is they’re arguing about who’s greatest because they saw these guys who were doing really great things. And so they’re going, no, no, we’re even better than them. And then so it could have been that it didn’t have to be that they were asking, Is John greater than James? It could be. Are we greater than those guys casting out demons in Jesus name?

Chris
Yeah. There you go. Right. That’s a new.

Jeff
Thought, right? Because what they’re doing is they’re judging this other group of Jesus followers and they don’t like it. Right? Right. So he says he talks about his name, and then they talk about his name. And I think it’s all one big, long conversation that they’re having.

Chris
I think I think another extension of that thought is, is that we have to keep in mind now, we know today in 2023 that there are millions, millions, if not billions, right over billions of people who can ascribe to Jesus’s name.

Jeff
Yeah, 2.6 billion people on the planet claim to be Christians.

Chris
There’s the number. Yeah, but back then this was sort of a new thing, right? So like Jesus chose the 12, right? Right. And there were and then there were, of course, you know, followers. But everybody sort of recognized the ones that Jesus chose. And so, you know, it’s we have to give a little bit more grace. Again, it’s that grace thing where we have to understand, like, this isn’t an abnormal conversation probably back then as much as it would be today. Right, right, right. Like we would get territorial, like a church would get territorial today.

Jeff
Denominationalism.

Chris
Yeah. Yeah. You know, you know, we’re better than the denomination down the street, blah, blah blah. But it’s like but back then there were literally 12 of them. Yeah. You know, and there weren’t billions of people on the planet. There were, you know, probably hundreds of thousands.

Jeff
Millions. So I think that the, the UN and the US Census Bureau both say that there are about 300 million people on the total on the whole planet at zero.

Chris
At that time.

Jeff
Yeah, at one ad.

Chris
At one ad. Okay. So 300 million. Wow. Well, first of all, that’s that’s more than I thought, but.

Jeff
There’s 8 billion now. So it was just a fraction of what’s on the planet today. Right?

Chris
Right, right. But anyway, all that to say, I think that there’s a little bit more grace that we can give our disciples here in this conversation. And not only that, but they sort of didn’t know the rules.

Jeff
Yeah, I was going to say Jesus hadn’t said, hey, it’s okay that other people are doing this right. So they felt like the initiation was walk with Jesus for three and a half years. I would say this too. You know, sometimes we think we can’t do a thing for God because we haven’t gone through some kind of formal process. Right. And Jesus is not saying there is a formal process. It’s are you doing it in my name? Right. And so there’s something to that. I was with Pope Tawadros of the Coptic Church in Egypt, and he told me at one point we were exchanging pleasantries as we were leaving a meeting, and he said. I thanked him for leveraging his influence to protect other Christians. And he said, the names on our church signs only serve to tell other Christians why we disagree with each other. But the blood of our martyrs is mingled. And good gravy. Yeah. Isn’t that isn’t that a phenomenal statement? Yeah. Wow. And so he says, so say.

Chris
Say that again for a minute.

Jeff
He said the names on our church signs only serve to tell other Christians why we disagree with each other. But the blood of our martyrs is mingled. And he goes on and he said back then ISIS was killing people. And he said, so when ISIS goes to cut a man’s throat, does not say, are you Coptic or Baptist or Catholic? He asks, what do you believe about Jesus? And then cuts his throat. And he said so. And he teared up a little bit, and he said, so I’m going to give all of my influence to protect anybody who names Jesus. Yeah, right. And so that’s the defining thing, whether you’re Baptist or Methodist, those only people who don’t know Jesus don’t even know what any of those things mean. Right. It’s only Christians know what all the little titles we have on our church signs. So really the question is, are they for Jesus? Right? Are they for the biblical Christ? If they are the Jesus we see in Scripture, then man we should be for them. We should. We should fight less and support each other more. Wow. Yeah.

Chris
That is amazing. Well, that is a great place to end, I think. And we will see you next time on The Bible Guys.