Bible, Bros & Brew
Bible, Bros, & Brew is all about helping you navigate your relationship with God in practical, real-life ways. Hosts David and Phil dig into scripture—'chopping up the word'—and bring it to life with insights you can actually use every day. And while they’re at it, they share their favorite 'brews'—don’t worry, it’s not booze! Just a solid lineup of classic coffees and teas to keep the conversations flowing.
Bible, Bros & Brew
Breaking the Cycle of Sin (part 2) | Six Hindrances to Freedom | Bible, Bros & Brew
Repetitive sin is one of the most spiritually destructive patterns a believer can fall into, and while no sincere believer would intentionally fall into a sinful lifestyle, sometimes subtle hindrances exist that are deceptively effective at keeping us trapped in unproductive behaviors. In this episode, David, Lynn, and Phil dig into the scriptures to uncover some of the most notorious hindrances to our freedom, including ignoring conviction, believing the worst of yourself, and a lack of community.
gotbrew@biblebros.net
Hey everybody, and welcome to this episode of Bible Bros and Bro. Tonight we're going to continue our conversation about things that keep us in the cycle of sin. We've been talking about this whole concept of sin in the church and sin in the Christian community and our need to do something about it. Tonight we're going to take it a few steps further Up next on Bible Bros and Bro. All right, everybody, we are so glad that you joined us for this episode of Bible Bros and Brew. I'm David With me tonight, none other than the Philip Rich who is here with us tonight, as usual, and our great, great guest host tonight is the one and only Lynn Nestor.
Speaker 1:She is the one and only because she is an individual like no other. She is incomparable to anyone else out there. So we officially assign her the one and only to anyone else out there. So we officially assign her the one and only. As you heard, tonight we're going to continue talking about the things that keep us in the cycle of sin, but before we do that, I think we need a little beverage to go along with the conversation. So, lynn, I'll start with you again. What's?
Speaker 2:in your cup. So Lynn, I'll start with you again what's in your cup, what's left in my cup, is in this beautiful Walmart cup. Yet again, I love it this time of year is spiced apple cider, so I made some over the weekend. Had a little bit left over and that's what I've got.
Speaker 1:What about you? I'm just a little bit jealous on that one there, but I'll let it go how about you, john?
Speaker 3:what's in your cup, dude, I had tonight. I had to stick with. Uh, all faithful, all reliable, old, old miss, never let you down. The Black Rifle Coffee Company, the Espresso Mocha, this thing you've heard me say it before it'll get you out of that ditch that you've been stuck in for the last couple of days. This isn't the first time I'm drinking it, but this is the first time I'm cracking it open on camera.
Speaker 4:Live tasting right in front of us.
Speaker 3:It will never let you down.
Speaker 1:Can we just have a conversation, because you've had that a couple times now and each time you've had it you've talked about this proverbial ditch. John, is there something you want to talk about?
Speaker 3:I believe we're talking about it tonight, but I'm not going to get ahead of myself, because we're amongst friends and it's safe.
Speaker 1:Yes, in a safe space, it's perfectly okay, Absolutely no it's.
Speaker 3:I might not always be in the ditch, but it feels like you were in the ditch once you get on the high that this thing takes you. This will get the job done, that's for sure.
Speaker 1:We're going to turn it around.
Speaker 3:We're safe, we're all right, all right.
Speaker 1:Philip, what's in the cup?
Speaker 4:Dude. I went with, of course, peregrine. This is the Brazil Bom Peregrino. Yes, I had to put the accent on there. It is milk chocolate, almond biscotti and dried apricot tasting notes. Believe you me, this is a good cup of Joe, as we would call it. Yeah. So not mad at this at all, man. I'm very, very pleased with this new offering from Peregrine. So shout out to my peeps.
Speaker 1:The almond biscotti is the one that gets me on that one. That's a unique thought process for a flavor. It's not just almonds, but it's almond biscotti Exactly.
Speaker 2:I think avocado is so odd, for it. I can't eat almond biscty love no chocolate.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, and you know that when we talk about a lot of fruity flavors, that means your coffee is more acidic. Oh, so there's a little coffee knowledge for you for tonight. Thank you, yes, yes little coffee knowledge for you for tonight, thank you. Yes, in my cup tonight I am drinking an old oldie but goodie. It's not old, but it's an old favorite. I'm drinking Red Barn's Butter Pecan.
Speaker 3:Oh yes.
Speaker 1:Again a very nice and smooth flavor. I believe in smooth coffee. Yeah, I need my coffee to go down and at times when it may come up because of something I eat, I need it to be equally smooth on both ends. Oh, this is disgusting.
Speaker 3:I am not right and I recognize it and I'm okay. I'm okay, so cheers to everybody out there.
Speaker 1:don't you swing by the the comment section if you would, and feel free to share with us what you're having as part of your coffee, your drink, as we listen to this episode All right. I'm sorry, I was not expecting that dude I wasn't expecting it either.
Speaker 1:It just kind of happened, oh boy, all right, we're going to get into our subject, for tonight, as I said, we've been talking about what causes us to stay in the cycle of sin, and last week what started this whole series off is we've been talking about really sin in the church, and whether that be sin in the church, as in the pulpit, or whether that's sin in the church, which is the pews and what's going on with people. We recognize that we're living in a time where people are living sin-filled lives and they're believing the lie that it's okay. And if you look at we've been looking at Jude, chapter 3 and 4, and in Jude, chapter 3 and 4, it says something very interesting in it, john, if you could throw that up for me, it says I'm urging you to defend the Dear friends. I had been eagerly planning to write to you about the salvation we all share, but now I find that I must write about something else urging you to defend the faith that God has entrusted once for all time to his holy people. I say this because some ungodly people have wormed their way into your churches saying that God's marvelous grace allows us to live immoral lives. The condemnation of such people was recorded long ago, for they have denied our only Master and Lord, jesus Christ. And if we look back, just one slip, john, what kind of has really stuck out to us is this concept that ungodly people have wormed their way into your churches and the message that they're communicating is that God's grace allows us to sin and allows us to live immoral lives. So God is a God of morality and all morality, all moral law comes from God. So if it's immoral, then it is of Satan, it's of this world, it's of the devil.
Speaker 1:And so when you have people who are sneaking into the church and when I say sneak in, they're not just kind of, you know, do, do, do, do, do, no, they're just, they're walking in your back doors. They're walking in your side doors, they're taking positions of leadership, they're sitting in your pews next to people, and they have their own agendas and objectives and what they're doing and why they're there. There are some that are there to fatten their own pockets. There are some that are there if you look at 2 Timothy, chapter 3, where it talks about how perilous times well, really, starting in chapter 1, where it says perilous times would come, it talks about the wolves in sheep's clothing and how they would come and deceive the silly women.
Speaker 1:So there's a purpose of deception. Some would use it for sexual needs and pleasures. But all of these types of sins and stuff are going on in the church and the Bible makes it clear the source of them and it makes it clear what the source is saying, and it's leading people astray. And so now we live in a world where people are just out there, living, doing anything and saying, well, god's okay with me because I'm forgiven, I live in grace, god shows me grace, and they're using the grace of God as a lie. They're mishandling the grace of God altogether and then saying that they can live immoral lives. So, as we've been talking about that, last week we came upon this concept of what is it that keeps us in the cycle of sin, because we realized that we're not just talking about one-off sin right now.
Speaker 1:We're not just talking about. You know, you're a Christian, you've been walking with the Lord, you have sinned and you got to get back on the right track we're talking about. What really turns into deep sin is when it becomes repetitive, habitual sin, and that's the sin that undoes us, and so we can quickly repent when we've gone wrong. But when we start living a life where we normalize sin, there's a huge problem. And so what is it about that? Well, last week we covered ground with two of them.
Speaker 1:The first thing we said was we talked about how sin begets more sin. In other words, you know, there's a proverb that says that talks about how the dog returns to his vomit. Right, and it's this concept of as a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his foolishness, and it's this concept that you know. As long as you keep going back to the same foolish things I didn't just smoke weed once Now I'm in this thing where I've kind of got a little kind of need a little bit and I go back to it and we now keep going back or one sin opens the door for another type of sin, and now you've got a cycle of sin going. The second thing that we talked about was biblical illiteracy and biblical ignorance, and we talked about the difference that illiteracy says. What's the difference between illiteracy and ignorance?
Speaker 4:again, philip Illiteracy is when you haven't, so illiteracy is when you haven't. Well, ignorance is when you simply don't know something you know. Bottom line ignorance simply means not knowing. But illiteracy is not bothering to read and find out, not bothering to get into the or dig into the knowledge or the information that's out there and find out if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'm going to tell you that, even though we're not doing these in a particular order, I think biblical ignorance and illiteracy is high up there on the board, because the reality is, most of us have the ability to read, most of us have the ability to get a nap and listen to the Bible.
Speaker 1:There's so many ways that you can consume the Bible that it's as if all of your excuses are being removed from saying why you couldn't, so that you have no excuse Because eventually we're all going to stand before that judgment seat and you can't say to God I couldn't read the Bible because I didn't know how to, but you knew how to use your phone and listen. You had ways to use and to partake in this word and to not become a fool. Nonetheless, when we are ignorant and illiterate, we become like the fool. We become like so many of the negative stereotypes and Proverbs lays out so many of them of people who are foolish and ignorant of the word. So tonight we've got four more that we want to cover, starting with ignoring your convictions. Right, y'all this is a big one and it's like I don't know, lynn, where do you want to start with this one, ignoring your convictions?
Speaker 2:I think that we've got to maybe put it together that ignoring your convictions is lack of wisdom, and I think you broached it very well a second ago when you said it's all throughout Proverbs. You can just go online and do wisdom scriptures and it's going to bring so many of the Proverbs to you so that you can begin to learn wisdom. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and if you look for wisdom and the fear of the Lord Proverbs promises you wisdom will not go away. James tells us that all we have to do is ask. God liberally gives us wisdom. So I think when we talk about ignoring convictions, we've purposely decided not to be wise. That's good. That's good. That's good. What do y'all think about that?
Speaker 4:That's good, lynn. That's a good tie-in to what living by the wisdom of God is all about. In my humble opinion. It's like if you ignore God's wisdom, you're you're. You're automatically setting yourself up for some level of uh, destruction or some level of uh I don't know what to call it Like. Just things will not go well. I'll put it that way. There's a scripture in Job and I wish I could remember what I think is Job 11, maybe, but it says who has ever hardened himself against the Lord and still prospered?
Speaker 4:You know who do you think you are, that you could go against God's ways, the things he's plainly stated, and think that it's going to turn out well? It probably will not. And there's a scripture in Proverbs 1 that talks about what happens when you ignore the wisdom of God. And I don't know, john, if you there it is, I'm glad you had it ready. It says for they hated knowledge and chose not to fear the Lord. I think the next verse I don't know if you may not have put that up on there, but the next verse basically says that because they did that, then calamity came and hit them. There it is.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it says they hated knowledge and chose not to fear the Lord. They rejected my advice and paid no attention when I corrected them. This is what happens when you begin to ignore God's wisdom and his ways. Therefore, they must eat the bitter fruit of living their own way and choking on their own schemes. And it says for simpletons, turn away from me to death. Fools are destroyed by their own complacency, but all who listen to me will live in peace, untroubled by fear of harm.
Speaker 4:So you've got a contrast between deciding to go your own way and thinking that you know better than what God knows, versus just doing it how God said to do it, which actually boils down to humility and boils down to being wise. The more you try to do your own way, the more into pride you go. But the more you try to do it God's way, the more you're submitting to his wisdom, and that is humility to submit to God's way and God's wisdom.
Speaker 2:Mm. Hmm, I mean, looking at what you've just said, if you read Romans 1, looking at what you've just said if you read Romans 1, and it talks about how we gave ourselves over away from God, we chose not to follow and believe him, and it just puts you on a downward spiral of one thing leads to the next, who leads to the next, sort of like what we talked about last week, with sin begetting sin. But that's what happens and that's one of the New Testament guidelines of it. But it also says in Genesis that every man did according to what they wanted to do and God searched to try to find one person who wouldn't. He found Noah, who took hundreds of years to build the ark, and then the world was destroyed.
Speaker 2:So, not practicing the wisdom that you're talking about with God, we do guarantee destruction in our lives and if, as a church and a people, we continue that path, we guarantee destruction of our communities, our country. And I mean God gives us the remedy for that in 2 Chronicles, where it talks about if my people, called by my name, would repent and humble themselves and you mentioned humility Then God would turn his face back on us as a people and as a nation. So you know, it's more than just me what I do when I try to live that lifestyle sin that David talked about earlier. It doesn't just affect me, it affects my husband, it affects my church, it affects my family. So anybody I'm in a relationship, it affects them yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I think you're on mute, david, I'm sorry sorry guys, I was trying to hide a cough, but you make a great point there and I think it's a point to worth stopping and making. One of the reasons that we continue in sin is because we say I'm not hurting anyone else and that's the excuse that we use. This is just me, and that's so true when you're dealing with pornography, particularly because people think that's a sin of one. You know, sometimes drugs are treated that way and some other things. But just realize, you know, I started this whole series off talking to you about some of the situations that I'm seeing and praying for and working on locally, where I'm seeing churches and relationships falling apart. And you know what I can tell you in one of those situations, that person, that individual, thought it was just about him.
Speaker 1:But he never thought about the fact of getting caught by his wife. And so then it didn't just affect him, it affected him. It affected his wife, which then affected his children, which affected her family, which affected his family and, oh, by the way, his dad's pastor at a church. So now the whole church family is involved, and that thing that you said was only a sin of one really has a huge ripple effect.
Speaker 2:It does, it does.
Speaker 1:And I think that's part of the devil's deception in the whole. Thing to make you think it's only about you and what you're doing right there, and that's why it's okay.
Speaker 1:But, when the cover is pulled back on that thing and then all the other parties start coming into play, then it's like, oh my gosh, Look at these churches who have they're finding out their pastors were embezzling and doing all of these things. See, at that time that pastor may have thought it was just about him, but now his whole family's turned upside down. The church has turned upside down, the staff has turned upside down. The community is turned upside down, the staff is turned upside down, the community is impacted. It's just. It's an endless line. It's an endless set of ripples that go out through the pond. And so if you're believing the lie right now that this is just about you, man, in the name of Jesus, I just break that lie over your life and I pray that God revealed to you the truth.
Speaker 1:I pray that you dream and you see what the ripples will look like when the wool is pulled from over your eyes and over the eyes of others and they find out what you're doing so that you'll be motivated more to stop doing what you're doing. We've just got to stop it. We can't believe that lie.
Speaker 2:We were talking earlier about different points we wanted to make tonight, and one of them was believing the worst about yourself. When you are thinking, if this only affects me, it's easy to get to that place where you're thinking I'm too bad If I acknowledge this, if I bring it forward, if I repent about this and somebody finds out about it. I couldn't stand that. So you dig yourself deeper and deeper and think worse and worse about yourself. Many people committed suicide as a result of thinking they're the only ones that feel this way or do these things. And that's a whole bigger ripple that we're talking about when people think there's no redemption and for the Christian that's not true, because we have. I mean it's in 2 Corinthians 5, where it talks about we're new creations Because Jesus died. We're new creations.
Speaker 1:You can read it. Let me just say this real quick, lynn, that we're going to go on to the next one, which is believing the worst of yourself, keeps you in the cycle of sin. Keep going, lynn.
Speaker 2:Okay. So in this scripture we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. At one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view and think about Peter, how they always believed that he was coming to set his kingdom up, and how differently he knows him now. And this is Paul's perspective too. So when we move on to the next, this means that anyone and that's the one of you who thinks I'm in such sin by myself that I can't do anything it means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person, that old life is gone and a new life has started here. You've got to stand on that promise, and all of this is God's gift to us. He brought us back to himself through Christ, and God's given us the task of reconciling people to him as well, when we understand that we're a new creature.
Speaker 2:All those half lies that Satan has told us because, honestly, Satan doesn't tell us out now lies. For the most part we don't believe those, but he gets that little bit of a hook in oh yeah, I did that. And then he tells you the other part, that God can't love you anymore. And that's the half truth. But it's a complete lie, and it's up to us to recognize that.
Speaker 2:I have chosen to live somewhat of a lifestyle of sin, even though I claim to be a Christian. But the fact is I'm a new creation. If I just go to the Father and repent, he is going to give me the strength to say it. It might be hard to stand, but he will give you the strength to move away from that thing and I think that's an important weapon that we have. For us to just repeat scripture and say wait, I know I've done those things, but I am a new creature and I will go to my father. That's what the prodigal son did. He did not quit being the son. He lived a lifestyle not pleasing to the father, and the father will come to him back with open arms.
Speaker 1:That's good. What's so crazy about the prodigal son is he said my father's servants are treated better than how. I'm living now. I'll just go back and be a servant to my father, but all the while, the father never stopped looking for and at him as his son. That's how the father sees us. Once we give our lives over to Christ, we are his sons and daughters, and he looks at us as sons and daughters, and he looks at us as sons and daughters.
Speaker 1:We sometimes are guilty, especially when we see ourselves and believe the worst of ourselves. Oftentimes that's precipitated by how we see the things that we have done and are doing. We say we're not good enough, we say we've failed in the past, we've sinned before, I'm in sin now, and you think all of those things disqualify you and you're hard on yourself. I don't know. Sometimes even being hard on yourself is false, because God's not that hard on you. He's already forgiven you. So you have to ask the question why won't you forgive yourself? And so we've got to agree with God, even in how we see ourselves and what we believe about ourselves. But again, I'll tie two pieces of this tether together. And that is because we lack biblical knowledge. We don't even truly know how God sees us in order to know what to hold on to. That's good. What's your thought, philip? Are you about to jump in?
Speaker 2:Well, if you don't mind, real quick, I was just going to say it takes us back to that Jude scripture that you read earlier today about how people have warmed their way in and saying that we have the license to sin because we're Christ. And we're agreeing with Jude. We're not saying that if you've fallen into that you've got to repent and it's because of our love for Jesus that we don't want to live that way. It's not a I don't know how to say it well, but we agree definitely or I agree definitely with that passage about Jude that we don't have the license to sin, but we have the ability to repent if we fall into sin. I'm sorry, thank you for letting me jump in there, phil.
Speaker 4:You're fine. You're fine. I was just just thinking, when David said that, about the lack of biblical knowledge has caused us to not view ourselves properly. And I think about that in terms of how many different scriptures in the New Testament talk about who we are in Christ. And if you ever want to do a fascinating study, just go through all of the New Testament letters and look up any place where it says in him or in Christ and then just look at what it says, Like in Colossians, I think Colossians 3, it says you are complete in him, who's the head of all principalities and powers. It says in Romans 8, you're more than a conqueror through Christ, you know. In Romans 6, it says that we are dead, indeed, unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ. All over the New Testament there's all these things about who we are because we're in Him, and one of the biggest ones in my mind that really just blew me away when I first started kind of reading up on it is Ephesians 1, I think verse 6, when it says that God has made us accepted in the beloved or in Christ. And the fact that it says he has made us accepted, you know, that means that he has decided to accept us, not because of our own merits or our own ability to keep the law or keep rules or be awesome, but because we're in Christ.
Speaker 4:And I think about something I read a long time ago. It was a book You're all familiar with Watchman Nee. He was a Chinese evangelist. He wrote several books, but some of those books are amazingly rich.
Speaker 4:But one of the books he talked about he said if you took a dollar bill and you put it inside of a book, he said, and then you burn the book, what happens to the dollar bill? He says it gets burned up. Too right, he said. Well, in other words, the experience of the book becomes the experience of the dollar. You know, and it's the same thing with being in Christ. You know, whatever Jesus did for us on the cross, that becomes our own experience, our own standing in the eyes of God, because he did it on our behalf. You know, it was what they call a substitutionary sacrifice, meaning what he did was for us. He definitely didn't have to do it for himself. There was no reason for him to do any of that for himself. He did it all for us. And so when you think about it in those terms, even just the idea that God himself would decide to take on the form of a human being and come down and experience all the garbage that we have to deal with.
Speaker 4:You know, hebrews 4 talks about how we don't have a high priest who can't be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He was tempted in every way, just like we are, but he didn't sin. You think about the experiences that he purposefully, willingly took himself through, including getting killed by his own creation, which is nuts when you think about that. But he did it all to completely rescue us from that cycle of sin, the cycle of spiritual death and spiritual disconnection from him. And then now, because we are in him and anyone who believes in Jesus, anyone who has accepted him as Lord, you are in Christ now. So you have all the benefits of what that means. And so again, I just without me going way too long with this I encourage you go through the Bible. Look at all the different places in the New Testament where it says in Christ or in him or through him, and you'll see all of the things that he bought and paid for that now belong to us as believers. It's really a mind boggling thing. It's really a mind-boggling thing.
Speaker 1:Now you kind of I love that. You said that Jesus went through everything he did not just for our redemption but so that we could break the cycle of sin in our lives, which tells me that, because of what Christ did for me, I have the ability in him to break the chains.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 1:Now that Tasha Cobb song hits a little different, because when you're hearing break every chain, it actually means something to you. It means something to you.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I want to introduce another one. Anybody want to add anything to that one?
Speaker 1:no, I'm good I want to introduce another one to you that is, um, I think is interesting because it's very specific, but another thing that keeps us in the cycle of sin is youthful lust. Now, don't don't think of this as a. I'm going to come to you with this one, philip first, but don't think of this as just the lust of the young, because, while that can be true, some of you have been playing games with some of the sin in your life since you were a kid.
Speaker 1:And you're grown adults, now in your 50s and 60s, and you're still toying around and playing with sin that you should have let go a long time ago. But Philip when this talks about youthful lust. What are we talking about here?
Speaker 4:It's fascinating. I think it's from 2 Timothy 2. I don't know. Yeah, there it is. Run from anything that stimulates youthful lusts. Instead, pursue righteous living, faithfulness, love and peace. I think it's 2 Timothy. Oh yeah, enjoy the companionship of those who call on the Lord with pure hearts.
Speaker 4:I looked up the word youthful and what it means. It actually means juvenile and if you think about it in those terms, it basically means immature. You know, when you're a juvenile you're immature, you can't help. But it's just part of the process of growing up. You don't learn that until you look back on it and go, wow, I really didn't know a whole lot like I thought I did.
Speaker 4:But when it says youthful lust, it's not just like you said, david, not saying just lust that young people have. It actually means lust that immature people have, and you can be 65 years old, 80 years old, and be an immature believer. You could be saved for 40 years and be an immature believer, because the mark of spiritual maturity is how much of your life you've submitted to the Word of God period. Are you still out there doing stuff just to please your flesh? You know that's an immature lust. No matter how old you are, You're still doing things that cater to your flesh. That's immaturity Bottom line, because all you're concerned about is how you can please you, you know, and it says, oh gosh I think it's in First Peter four, maybe it says it says that just like, oh gosh, could you pull that up for me? First Peter four. I know I'm totally putting you on the spot, but I wanted to check on something. The spot, but I wanted to check on something, because it's talking about how you got to get away from the things that you did back when you were just an immature person or back when you didn't know any better. And in 1 Peter 4, it talks about how you got to move on. Yeah, here we go. 1 Peter 4, 1.
Speaker 4:So then, since Christ suffered physical pain, you must arm yourselves with the same attitude he had and be ready to suffer too. Now, what he's talking about is suffering. That the suffering that he's referring to here is talking about resisting those fleshly temptations, bearing up under the pressure that gets put on your flesh when you're tempted to sin. That is that suffering, because when you really want to do something, your flesh really wants to do something and you know it's not right for you to do when you don't do it, when you finally decide I'm not going to do this, but you still feel all the feelings. That's suffering, you know your flesh is crying out because it just wants that thing, whatever it is, and you're denying your flesh. That is a form of suffering, believe me. But it says.
Speaker 4:It says, for if you've suffered physically for Christ, you've finished with sin. He's like. You know. You're not going to just yield to sin anymore. You're going to actually decide to not do that. You won't spend the rest of your lives chasing your own desires, but you'll be anxious to do the will of God.
Speaker 4:And in verse three you've had enough in the past of the evil things that godless people enjoy their immorality and lust, their feasting and drunkenness and wild parties, their terrible worship of idols.
Speaker 4:And in verse four of course, your former friends are surprised when you no longer plunge into the flood of wild and destructive things. They do so. They slander you, and that's something that's like insult to injury, dude. Not only do you get persecuted, for not only do you have to deal with the pressure of resisting those fleshly things that you used to just yield to with no problem, you also now that the same people used to hang out with. Now they make fun of you for not wanting to do those things anymore. He says remember in verse five, but remember that they will have to face God, who stands ready to judge everyone, both the living and the dead. And so that really kind of brings us back around to what I think. What you started with David, it's like. Ultimately we're going to have to answer to God one day for how we live, and it's not going to be pretty if we decided to just live by our flesh.
Speaker 1:The whole time. Yeah, there's a verse in there, john. If you'll pull that back up. I love verse 3, and it's a reminder for us all. Verse 3 says You've had enough in the past of the evil things that godless people enjoy their morality and lust, their feasting and drunkenness, wild parties and their terrible worship of idols. In other words, you've done this stuff already. You've had enough of it. It's time to enough of it. It's time to live past it. It's not good living, and.
Speaker 1:I think, that one of the things that people might say about us, lynn, is that it's such a wild thing to say what I'm about to say. But I do believe that there are people out there who believe it, who would say, well dang, if I can't do any of that stuff, it's just no fun to be a Christian, and you know it's like, what do you do with that? I mean, is that that's wild, lynn? That's wild.
Speaker 2:But that really depends on your definition of fun. You know. That really depends on what you find important. First, john talks about the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life and how we follow the world and want that. And commitment with the world and love with the world means that there's no love for the Father. So if those are the things we love and that's what fun is then being with the Father isn't fun. But you know, that seems really small. Fun for me is when I'm driving down the road. Then all of a sudden I see the most incredible sunset. I mean it does my heart so much good, and just a little. I was talking about this to a friend the other day.
Speaker 2:Years ago we got to go to Austria, switzerland, on a vacation in the winter. We were going from Austria on the train down to the city in Switzerland and I was looking out. It was cloudy, it was ugly. Here I am a full-grown adult thinking I'm about to see the Alps. I was so excited because I told God in fourth grade I wanted to see them and me being the muttering little person I was being at that point, I was like, well God, I'm never going to know if it's any taller than Kennesaw Mountain. And for those of you who don't know Kennesaw Mountain, it's like one mile up and one mile down. It is really. People laugh when they talk about mountains and we call Kennesaw Mountain, but I'm like I'm never going to know and I fell asleep. When I woke up it was the brightest, bluest, most beautiful skies. Eight inches of fresh snow had fallen in the path that we were going to be walking in.
Speaker 2:And it was just like God's little. You're complaining but you have no idea what I'm doing. It was sort of like you know it's their birthday and nobody's saying happy birthday and then they show up at a surprise party and it was just like the most wonderful thing because God sees us and loves us and it depends on what you want to call fun. And if I want to love the world but then ask God to support that, that's almost like a spouse asking the other to hey, give me money to take my girlfriend out on a date.
Speaker 3:You know that's not going to apply.
Speaker 2:It's just not and you know you've got to decide is it going?
Speaker 1:to be the wife or the girlfriend. You know that's also if you think back about it and you look at the Old Testament. That's where the children of Israel always got in trouble. They wanted to be like their neighbors around them, right and have gods they wanted to have other idols around them, just like their neighbors did. They wanted to worship like their neighbors did and they were always trying to bring that thing in when god is like I'm doing something different here that's right something new and something better yeah.
Speaker 1:None of the neighbors had this, you know cloud by day, fire by night.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:None of them had water coming out of a rock. None of them were being fed by manna.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:They were looking at their neighbors as if they were missing something. And that's, I think, part of our problem in this world that we keep looking. We keep looking at the world and we think that there's. You know what music could be better than Beyonce's. You know what could? What could be more fun than spilling the tea with so-and-so? And you know gossiping all about and whatnot, and you know what? You find out a lot of interesting things about people and things in this side of the world as well.
Speaker 1:It's what you do with that information that matters so much more because we find out things about people and we take it to God in prayer, not our neighbor, and continued spreading.
Speaker 2:Right and we just.
Speaker 1:You know, I don't have to go to the club to dance. I can crank up the tunes right here and tear my kitchen apart.
Speaker 3:And I have. And they're like well that's no fun.
Speaker 1:You want to be. Remember the real reason we kind of like the club is not just so we can dance, but we want to be dressed a certain way so we can be seen, People can see us and recognize us, and we want people to acknowledge us. You just think about some of the things that you so desperately desire. There's a psychosis that's connected to those things and a reason why you want to be involved in that thing. It has nothing to do with God and everything to do with the condition of your heart.
Speaker 2:And you know, david, you were talking about talking about people. This first thing we're discussing about youthful lusts. Before and after it it talks about being in ridiculous arguments and just wanting to be right. So you know, at the beginning and end of that chapter, youthful lusts are also those pride things of where I've got to be right on this topic and you're wrong.
Speaker 2:That's not a goodly approach. So it's more than when. Usually when I read youthful lusts, I'm thinking of the physical lusts, but it's bigger and more than that. Anything the earth has to offer us is considered lust to God.
Speaker 1:One thing I will tell you all, as it relates to this and just all said eventually as it relates to this and just all said eventually you will truly begin to appreciate something when you have it, and that's called peace and you'll appreciate the peace in your life and the absence of sin as you grow and walk with Jesus. You'll be glad I'm not doing that anymore.
Speaker 3:That's true.
Speaker 1:I'm not in that anymore, because when you have God's peace at work in your life, there's nothing like it, right?
Speaker 1:There's nothing like the peace of God. John, will you pull that 1 Timothy 2.22 back up? Or was it 2, timothy? Because I want to bring you into the last one we're going to talk about tonight, the youthful lust one. John, sorry If you'll go to the next verse. For me, the last thing that keeps us in the cycle of sin is a lack of community, and I noticed at the end of this verse one of the things that Paul admonishes Timothy to do is to enjoy the companionship of those who call on the Lord with pure hearts.
Speaker 3:But when?
Speaker 1:we lack community around us with pure hearts, but when we lack community around us, then we honestly, sin truly tries to isolate us. Yeah, that's the truth. So it is trying to eliminate community. The only people that are allowed into a sinful community is other sinners. Those perfectly welcome. Anybody that can keep you going in the wrong direction is a welcome tool of the enemy. Paul encourages Timothy to have relationship and companionship with other believers. Philip, when you hear this talk about a lack of community, what are you hearing? What stands out to you?
Speaker 4:I think, about a lack of community. What are you hearing? What stands out to you? I think one of the biggest things, one of the most helpful things about being in that type of community, is that you have accountability there and I think a lot of times we may think that we're okay. But if all we have to judge ourselves by is ourselves, that can get really wonky pretty quick.
Speaker 4:And I was thinking about that scripture in Proverbs 27, where it says iron sharpens iron. And there's another translation I forgot exactly which one it's in, but it says just like iron sharpens iron, one person sharpens the condition of another. And I like that. I like the way that was put. But that's what it makes me think of. It's like if you don't ever have anyone to sharpen that iron with, you may not even know how rusty you are or how dull you are. How rusty you are or how dull you are, you know you may not realize it. Part of staying spiritually sharp is having a community of believers, that you know like-minded people that you can bounce stuff off of and also, you know, deal with things as well. You know it could be just something you're struggling with or something that you're you know, you're having issues or problems with you know they can give you some biblical counsel on it.
Speaker 4:They can show you where maybe you're not seeing something that you should see. Because, if we're being honest, you know, all of us have blind spots, we all have things that we don't realize we're not seeing about. Whatever the situation is, it's easy to get into this place where you just kind of think you know that your own lens looking at life is the way life actually looks and it may not actually be like that. You may have to get an outside perspective to help you really get a fuller view of what you're dealing with. So yeah, yeah, I'd say that's a super important thing is have that community of people to help you kind of stay sharp spiritually.
Speaker 1:I'm reminded of the fact that when Jesus sent the disciples out, he sent them out two by two.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:So even when they went out to do the work of the Lord, they didn't go out alone, they went out together. We've got to do a better job of our togetherness. A real quick scripture, lynn, and then I'll forward to you Hebrews chapter 10, 24 and 25. Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works, and let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near. This feels like a very, very now type of verse.
Speaker 1:I know that when they wrote Hebrews at that time, they believed that the day of his return was drawing near as well. But we see so much of it happening and we've got the benefit of having prophecy come to pass that points us to his imminent return. And so what does he say, Even as the day of his return draws near? What should we do? We should meet together. We should think of ways to motivate one another in acts of love and good works.
Speaker 1:Why? Because the opposite of that is, again, it's isolationism. And when we're alone, it's a bad thing for us to be alone, because we're left alone to our own thoughts and without anyone or anything to intervene in. Bad thinking, stinking. Thinking man, it can go wrong quickly. Thinking man, it can go wrong quickly. And that's why you see, like, um, this week, for you, for those who don't know, this is the 23rd of October, and earlier this week, um, we find out that one of the members of I forget name of One Direction committed suicide. Oh yeah, I heard about that.
Speaker 1:But in order to do so, I wonder how much time he spent alone, left to his own thoughts, with no one there to intervene. And even you have to think about this is the sickness that is Hollywood, and it's even the sickness that is our world is that people will leech off of your fame until you die, and then they'll find someone else to leech off of, even if that means leeching off of your death, until they find someone else to attach to you.
Speaker 1:It's an ugly, ugly situation, but we can't let ourselves be left alone to be picked apart by the devil, because remember what Lynn shared with us a couple of weeks ago, and it's the path to sin, it's what happens and ultimately, it leaves you, you to yourself, and the wages of sin is death. Lynn, what are your thoughts?
Speaker 2:I think all the things that y'all shared is completely true and we need those times. But that scripture I know it better with King James Version Forsake not yourselves the assembling together as some started to do.
Speaker 2:You know, we get in our minds that that's the organized church and while that's true, it is the organized church, but it's us together here. It's me and my family, it's me and the small groups I'm a part of or some of my friends. So I don't think that scripture and a lot of people put that formal definition on it and I don't think that should be attached, because those are also the people like I shared with y'all the snowfall and the Alps, how special that was to me, how special that was to me. But I've shared other things that encouraged me or I've shared things that confused me.
Speaker 2:In Scripture and being able to go to different groups of my people. They're able to help me. Scripture, and I don't know where it's found, but it's rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn. You know that's the family you come to when you're hurting and when you're happy. Nobody else can rejoice with you and understand unless you've got that kind of foundation put together. And I could go to a group like I mean people at the club. Let's say you know you have a superficial relationship with people there and you tell them this thing that is so deep and happy for you. Oh, that's nice. But you go to your family, the one that God's put you together to assemble with, that are part of him and they really rejoice with you. So I think that it gives you the full spectrum of emotions and experiences when you're with the family of God experiences when you're with the family of God.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll share something with everybody. You know Philip has lived in another state for the last several years. To my chagrin, lynn lives not far away from me.
Speaker 1:Ryan, who's co-host with us sometimes, john lives nearby, but for the first time in forever, we were all able over this weekend that just passed to get together and it still is the highlight of my week so far, because we got together, we talked about the things of the Lord, we ate, we drank, the kids were in the other room playing games, laughing, we were enjoying each other's company and there was no pressure, there were no specific rules, there was nothing except just come together and let's enjoy each other's company. And that does so much for you. You just are willing to come together and connect. It builds up the body, it helps everybody to feel reconnected again, it can energize you, it can help you to really pull things together. But I tell you, it's so critically important to choose good Christian friends.
Speaker 1:You can't just willy-nilly pick everybody Because, again, remember what Jude told us there are those who have crept in unawares. So now that we know that we're responsible for that knowledge and we have to be using a little bit of biblical discernment to recognize who God's leading us to connect with and who God may not be leading us to connect with. But then, when you do connect, take the opportunity. Forget about your own personality, things where you don't really like to go out and hang out with people and all of that personality things where you don't really like to go out and hang out with people and all of that. Forget about all of that and take the opportunity to connect with other believers. Good things come from those connections. Agreed, agreed. Think about that again, everybody. Here's the six.
Speaker 1:We fail to break out of the cycle of sin because sin begins more sin, our biblical illiteracy and ignorance, because we ignore our convictions, because of youthful lust, because we believe the worst of ourselves and because we lack community. If there's a quick seventh one, I'd say it's a lack of discipline in our lives, because breaking the cycle of sin requires us to be disciplined. Once we decide that we are no longer going a certain way we need, it's going to take you putting feet to the ground and putting feet to the plan to ensure that that doesn't happen. Phillip and Lynn, any final thoughts, as we put a bookmark here.
Speaker 4:I am. I am good. Enough said I'm everybody to again look up the scriptures that we went over tonight and just really think on these things, Review the different points we talked about, because if you just take the time to kind of soak it in and really think on it and then see how you can implement it for your life, it's only going to be a good thing, it won't be a bad thing, It'll be very productive, I believe I could have said it better.
Speaker 1:That sounds like we've come to a conclusive bookmark. Before we go, philip, I want you to pray for people and, if you would, let's pray for people to break free from the cycle of sin that they might find themselves in.
Speaker 4:Okay, okay, praise God. Father, thank you for this podcast and for what you shared through the Holy Spirit, and we just pray right now for everyone who's listened to this podcast and who will listen to it. Lord, you know the things I struggle with. You said in your word you know our down sitting and our uprising. You know everything about us, lord. You even know the thoughts we think before we even think them.
Speaker 4:So, father, we ask you to just to move on the hearts of people, reveal things to them that they need to know, show them keys that will help them unlock what they need to do to be able to walk free from whatever bondage or whatever sin. They feel ensnared by Father. You said in your word that whom the Son sets free is free indeed, and you also said that when we know the truth, the truth will make us free. So I pray, father, that they will come to the knowledge of the truth, that each person listening, whatever they're dealing with, that you would reveal the specific truth to them that they need to know and that by knowing that truth, they can be made free. They will be made free according to what your Word says, and we just give you praise for that, father, because you don't want any of us to be in bondage. You don't want any of us to be slaves to things that are only meant to hurt us or harm us.
Speaker 4:Father, you want us to walk in true liberty, which means walking in obedience to your ways, because the best way to live is in submission to your will and your way. Father, we just give you praise for that. We pray that you'll remove any and all deception, any and all falsehoods from people's thinking, from their thought lives, whatever they might be dealing with or believing that is wrong or that is not accurate. Lord, show the truth to those things, reveal truth to them. Father, we pray and we just thank you for this, lord. We know that only from you comes freedom, only from you comes liberty, because where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty, and we thank you for all these things right now, in Jesus' name, amen.
Speaker 2:Amen.
Speaker 1:Amen. Well, thank you everybody for joining us for this episode of Bible Bros and Brew. We're glad you came. We hope you got a little bit of inspiration, lord, as well as information that's going to help you to walk out your strongest Christian life. Yet Don't forget that you can connect with us on social media. You can find us on Instagram, at Bible Bros and Brew, and you can find us on Facebook and YouTube. We'll be out in X eventually here.
Speaker 1:I know I keep teasing it. It's coming and it will happen soon, just as soon as I've fixed my fingers to set it up. So that's coming soon too, but make sure that you like that. You subscribe to the channel, like our videos. If you're on Instagram, make sure you like our channel and then, if you would, as we post, we share stuff about the podcast through and throughing the week throughout the week, not throughing throughout the week. So we hope that it's just more encouragement and reminders to you that will help you as you walk out things with the Lord. And then, finally, if you want to talk with us, you can comment in any one of the applications that you are watching or listening on and you can send us a note. You can send it to gotbrew at biblebrosnet. That's gotbrew at biblebrosnet. That's gotbrew at biblebrosnet. Until next time. I'm David, he's Phillip, she's Lynn and we are out of here.
Speaker 2:Bye, thank you.
