Hey everybody. Welcome back to another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Hello. Good morning. And we are midweek. We are Wednesday morning. So, we're turning the corner, we're on the way down, and this is already the last week in February. We are coming up quickly on the month of March. That's right. Yeah, it went fast. Yep. Did you know next year, not this year, but next year, Easter is actually in March, so it's super early next year. That is interesting. Yeah. How do we. Get that number. How do we get that date? I don't know. What's that based off of the Gregorian calendar. The lunar calendar, something like that. Yeah. I don't know. March 28th. Next year is Easter Sunday. So that's. Fast, man that's super early. I feel like we're still catching our breath from Christmas and everything. No kidding. But this year, Easter Sunday is not gonna be that date. It's gonna be in April. April 5th. And like we talked about, I think on yesterday's episode or the day before, we're moving to two services on that Sunday. We announced it this past Sunday at church and it was well received by our people. That was encouraging up Rory's applause. Yes. Yes, with calls for three or four, five services, I heard seven as many as 12. Someone said everybody gets their own. It'll just be me and one family. Singular service. Alright, we have a question. Okay. And I think this is a good one. In fact, we didn't. Answer it, but we should have anticipated it. Okay, here's what they say regarding textual variations. This was a popular when people have had questions. Follow up questions from this one. The next question that's been asked is, if God is the author of the Old and New Testament, why isn't it perfect? Can't God produce a perfect document and can't he perfectly preserve it? They write since it's God who desired us to have his word in the first place, why wouldn't he make it perfect for us? Yeah. And the answer to that question is the Old Testament and New Testament were perfect in their original in the autographs. And, uh, we mentioned autographs. Last time we talked, I believe, on this issue, the autographs being the original documents. The one that, that wrote it when it was first given by the Lord at that point, they were perfe perfect. They were without. Any imperfections, they were without any flaws or errors. It was what God wanted. Now the process of manuscript transmission that takes place after that involves a lot of different people in many different areas that are taking the manuscripts and they're copying them downward for word. And what we need to understand is what we have being as accurate as it is, is evidence of the fact that God has been behind the process of preservation. So even though we can't say that the English state aversion is. John Tittle letter. Perfect to what the original was. We can say this is as close as you're going to find essentially with any other document. And as far as the doctrine, as far as the theology, as far as what is the content of these books communicating, we can have great confidence that it, they're communicating exactly what God wanted communicated so. Part of it is at the end of the day too our trust and our confidence. We're not here to worship a book. We're not here to worship a document. We're here to worship the God of the book, the God of the document. And so as human beings took these things and wrote them down naturally, and there's a lot of, when you get into text criticism, there's a lot of explanations for what can happen. But naturally there's going to be errors because it's fallen. Men that are recording these things. But what God has done is he's preserved his doctrine, he's preserved the gospel, he's preserved the, the number of books canonically for us down through the ages. And he's preserved in them the content that is authoritative for us. Yeah, this is such an interesting question 'cause I understand the idea here, if God is perfect, why wouldn't he preserve it perfectly? And I guess part of it has to do with how you think about perfection. God would call his word. Perfect. Even though we don't have the precise jot and tittle manuscripts from the originals, I think God would still say his word is perfect and he has by and large preserved it to the degree that we could say, this is the word of God. We can say that with confidence, not because we're measuring it against a number, but because God has preserved it so. Precisely. Now again, I have to remind is we operate from a very different mindset than our ancestors did. We describe perfection as in no megabyte, no terabyte is lost. All of the data is there in perfect tact, right? We even understand this now, probably more so than we used to be. 'cause we stream our music now in, in ways that are considered. Lossless, you can get the original song that the artist intended and have the whole file. You're not missing any spectrum of frequency there. You're getting the whole thing. So we naturally will take that same idea and say, well, am I getting the lossless file from heaven? And the answer is, it's yes. No. Yes you are, but not in the same way that you're thinking you are. We bring our modern day sensibilities to an ancient text, and I would argue that God has given us his perfect word not perfect, as in without any transmission issues. Clearly, we've pointed out several, but they're not so large or so disruptive that we can say, we don't have the word of God anymore. We're hopeless. No, we do have it. I think part of this is a philosophical thing. It's interesting that God does this with us. God is perfectly contented to use imperfect means to deliver his perfect word. And all you have to do is just look at your local pastor. Your pastor is no doubt, a sinful man, but he's used by a perfect God to deliver the message that he wants and that doesn't always mean word perfect accuracy. In fact, even on this podcast, we use ums and ahs and there, you know, verbal hiccups that we present to you. But we're trying not to. We're trying to be as perfect as we can. Even still, God uses these things and so this is a roundabout answer to your question, but I would argue we do have God's perfect word, although not perfect. And to the extent that we describe it today, I don't apply a modern standard of perfection or precision to an ancient text. I let the text speak for what it speaks, and God just, God says this is his word. It is his perfect word. Yeah. And there are other things that we've talked about in scripture where the scripture talks about the sun standing still in the sky and the biblical author's understanding of things like planetary orbit, things like that, that are not necessarily perfect in the sense of what we know to be true as, as far as science and discovery and things like that today. But you're gonna find those same things. For example, in the Quran, you're also gonna find inconsistencies in the Quran. You're gonna find the Quran referring to I believe it's in Surah 20 versus 85 through 88. We find out there that they're gonna say that there was a Samaritan that led the people of Israel into error during the golden calf incident. The problem with that is the golden calf incident was 1440 bc. The city of Samaria and Samaritans didn't come around until eight 70 bc. So there's going to be errors that we're gonna find in some of the other books. So when you have somebody say, well, my book is perfect, and your book has errors that's an inconsistency. That's not true. When we hold the Bible up to scrutiny. Scrutiny as far as. Textual criticism and things like that go. It's verified. It's validated, it's proven true time and time again without anybody being able to say, look at, here's the error, and this defeats the claims of Christianity. Yeah. I'm gonna noodle on this a little more, but I do think. The principle that I see at work is that God is okay using imperfect vehicles to deliver his perfect message. I see the church imperfect vehicle, his, in fact, Ephesians five husbands are called to love their wives as Christ loves the church, which means your marriage is a vehicle to communicate God's connection and relationship to the church. If you're looking in the mirror you notice that you're not doing it perfectly, and yet God's okay. He's contented with saying that's the message. That's the goal. That's the goal you're supposed to communicate. Perfection in that there's just so many areas where God seems to be okay with making concessions to humanity and still utilizing humanity for his noble purposes, including and scripting his message. Yeah, I guess the one pushback being our marriages aren't. Ever said to be God-breathed, right? They're never conveyed with that level of authority as far as the revelation of God. And so I think with scripture we do have to hold it to a different standard to say, even though yes, there's going to be errors, grammatical errors, or word left out here during the transmission that now we can look back when manuscript script copies and find out what. What the actual reality was. We're gonna be willing to concede that yes, there are those types of errors, but we're not gonna concede that this book is somehow anything watered down as far as being the God-breathed word of God the authoritative word of God that we can teach and say thus says the Lord in this carries the authority of the Lord. Fair Sounds good. Just meaning I, the, the imperfections? I don't think the imperfections, I think the imperfections of us and humans and even the church and marriages are more glaring than the imperfections that we find in scripture. I don't think we find those. I think what we have in scripture is the authoritative word of God. Mm-hmm. I, I think it's, it hold, it's on a different, I think we have to hold it to a different standard than we do, for example, marriage or pastors or the church. Being that it's contents are directly from him and imbued with his direct authority. Sure. Yeah. Yes, I would agree with that entirely. The point I'm trying to make is that God clearly is okay with utilizing human instruments Sure. Which are inevitably fallible. Sure. And you see that fallible nature in the communication of his scripture. Yeah. So I think I'm trying to say I see something in the way that God interacts with humanity that gives me pause to say, is my expectation the correct expectation given the way that he has historically worked with humans? Okay. And again, based on a 21st century idea of perfection and precision. Right? Does that make sense? Yep. Yeah. I'm not trying to say anything about the word. I love the word. I think the word is perfect, which is what I was trying to communicate. Perf perfect in God's eyes, although not perfect in our eyes as we, again, we're using a different standard. We're we're appealing to this from a 21st century position, which is not God's position, timeless. I'm tracking. Understand. Alright, numbers 14 and 15 and then Mark six, one through 32. So numbers 14, the spies have come back. We talked about that in chapter 13, and they've reported that the giants are in the land and the land is good, but. You know what? I don't think we can do it. And in number chapter 14, the people are gonna grumble. And here comes the desire to go back to Egypt again. And they are complaining to the point of saying, Hey, let's appoint somebody and go back. Let's go back to Egypt. Um, let's choose a leader and let's choose another Moses, the anti Moses to go back to Egypt instead of saying here. And then, uh, after this, Moses and Aaron in their meekness, they fall on their face before the Lord because they know this is not gonna go well. And this is where, uh, Joshua and Caleb stand out. And they come to the forefront and they tell the people that this is wrong. What they're doing is wrong. That they need to instead be bold and courageous. They need to go in and take the land they need to not rebel. So in the face of the people's faithlessness, we see the faithfulness of Joshua and Caleb who are going to take their stand and say, no, we're gonna go do this, and we need. To do this and the Lord is gonna respond as well. We find out in verse 11, uh, the Lord is gonna say, how long is this people going to despise me? And how long will they not believe in me? Uh, and he's even going to hint at and allude at the undoing of the Abraham at covenant, though he's not going to set it aside completely. He says in verse 12, I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them and I'll make of you a nation greater and mi greater and mightier than they so. Not completely abrogating the Abrahamic covenant, but, but basically threatening again as he's done multiple times. Alright, Moses, you're the new Noah. I'm starting over with you. And by implication I think we can understand that Aaron would be included in that as well as Joshua and Caleb. But, um, God is unhappy with the response of the people here to say the least man that is putting it mildly. Numbers 14 is a turning point for the people of Israel. This, in fact, is going to be the nail that seals their coffin that and guarantees they're gonna wander the desert for the next 40 years. Yep. And you'll notice that what happens here, it begins with grumbling. It begins with A, a complaining against God really against Moses and Aaron, but really at ultimately against God. I want you to notice how devastating Discontentedness can be, especially as it relates to the providential arrangement of God's plan for your life. They weren't happy with what? With what God gave them. And in fact, what God was trying to give them was a promise to be fulfilled, a promise for them to fight, for, to take and to enjoy by his grace. And yet they, they instead responded with fear, which is irrational by the way, did you notice, I mean, we didn't point it out in the last. In the last chapter, but the people were trying to find any reason not to obey God. Fear lies to us. Fear is irrational and that hasn't changed. Human nature still remains the same. We love to let fears justify our inactivity, and here it's no different, but notice how God responds. This is not gonna go well for them. Their fear is an inherent lack of faith, and because of that, they're gonna be in a really bad spot going forward in this one bad decision. Ruins the next 40 years of their lives. It does. Yeah. And that's the the consequences. God is gonna be merciful. In fact, Moses intercedes and God is going to say, I will be merciful. Moses intercedes, even by appealing back to Exodus 34, when he quotes the name of the Lord. The Lord is slow to anger, bounding, steadfast love, forgiving iniquity. So he's recalling the way that God even revealed himself to him. And he's gonna ask for mercy. And God says, I will be merciful, but here are my consequences. And his decision is all those 20 years old and upwards who had been. With Moses and, and had heard God's promises about entering the promised land, they were gonna die in the wilderness. They weren't gonna get to, to enter into the Promised land. And, and we notice here, God even keeps count. He says, they have put me to the test these 10 times. And so God is, is tracking. God is aware of even how many times the people have grumbled and challenged his promises about bringing them into the promised land. So he says they're gonna. Fall, they're not gonna make it. And the rest of you are gonna wander in, in this period of, of waiting for this generation to, to die off. It's gonna be 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, and that's gonna match one day for every or one year, for every day that the spies had gone into Spy out the promised Land. Uh, as a result of. Their faithlessness as well. The, the spies, aside from Joshua and Caleb, they're gonna die as well because God is going to strike them directly. He's gonna say, these ones I'm taking out immediately. And so they are going to end up dying as of a, uh, the result of a plague here in verses 36 through 38. Yeah. And what's interesting to me is that he isolates those who are guilty to those who are 20 years old and up. I don't know why God chose that number, because in those days, someone who was a young teenager could still be considered, you know, a contributing member of society. They could have married, we think Mary was pretty, pretty young when she, when she was betrothed to Joseph, but God chooses a number and that's the number that he is the cutoff line for whatever reason. I just noticed that that was something interesting to me. But this is in fact a mercy of God, not to destroy them all in one fells. What he could have. In fact, you might remember he threatened to do that and say, Moses, I'm gonna start over with you. And he says, no, please don't do that. And, and yet here he's going to let them live and he's going to continue to provide for them and care for them through these next 40 years, which is another mark of God's grace where he could have just obliterated them. Instead, he sustains them. He protects them, and he cares for them for the next 40 years. Yeah, it's, it's fascinating 'cause in Deuteronomy we're gonna read where God is gonna say, the ones that are allowed to go in is your, your children who today have no knowledge of good or evil, they shall go in there. So I think they're, yep. We're dealing with two separate groups. I don't think. Moses is saying, or God is saying that a 19-year-old has no knowledge of good or evil. So it does, that's true. Yeah. There is some extra dispensation of, of mercy that he shows here to those that are old enough to, but maybe it's because they, the 20 years and old, older, were those fit for war. Those fit for battle and so maybe the, those younger than that didn't really have a say in whether or not they were gonna go in and take the promised land because they weren't a fighting age. Maybe that's why. That's a good point. But, um, later on, he's gonna excuse the, the children specifically, well, Israel doesn't like this, and they kind of say ooey on God, and, and they want to do it anyways. And so they, they muster themselves. They say, nevermind, we're gonna go do this. And, and Moses warns them by God, don't do this because God is not going with you, and they're gonna end up. Facing the Amalekites and, and facing a, a great defeat, uh, against them when they try to enter into the promised land without God's blessing there. And so, uh, this launches the wilderness wanderings the 40 years at this point. And in verse or in chapter 15, uh, the, the author continues, Moses does with. Some more of, okay. As you wander, here's some of what this is gonna look like. The laws that he is gonna get into, uh, here are going to be for their wandering, but also for when they get into the promised land, how they should go about bringing their offerings for unintentional sins, for intentional sins. Uh, some, some repeated material from some of what we've already read in the books of, of etiquette, Exodus. Atticus, Atticus, Exodus, and Leviticus. Let's just rename it. I, I just wanna point out to you guys as we think about this here, the, the, the splash effect or the fallout effect of your personal sins and decisions never, never only isolated to you and yours or your life. Other people suffer because of our faithfulness. And you have to see that other people are gonna suffer because of our sin. That's what happens here. That's what, that's what this is all about. And yet in chapter 15, I, I think the reason God puts us here, 'cause it doesn't make sense to me. Why put chapter 15 after 14, they had totally blown it. And yet chapter 15 is like, well, but when you get to the land, um, which is what verse two says, I think, I think what's happening here is that God is showing his just. Punishment in chapter 14, but also his incredible mercy and grace in chapter 15. In other words, you're, you're not done. I'm not done with you. We're not done with this thing. When you get to the land 40 years from now, when you get there and it's not gonna be you, it's gonna be your kids. Here's what I'm gonna expect. So I think this is here for the express purpose of giving them a sense of hope. God. God still not done with them. Yeah. And then also one of the things that we see towards the end of chapter 15, I think you asked the question a while back. We were in the New Testament talking about the tassels on the garments, and here we see the reason given for the tassels on the garments in numbers chapter 15. They were there to be a visual reminder for the people to prompt them to obedience and worship. And I think that's really cool. Um, they can become. Misused and that's what they had become for the Pharisees. They were wearing them extra long and showing how godly they were because they had these extra long tassels that they could could point to. But having visual reminders that cause you to love God more or to to spur you on towards obedience to the Lord, those are good things. We were talking just before hitting and record on the podcast about how journaling can even be that it's not necessarily a visual reminder, but when you look back on journaling entries from a year ago or two years ago. Those can be reminders of God's faithfulness to you that prompt you to worship him, to prompt you, to obey him in the present as well. Yeah, that's one of my favorite, one of my favorite methods of reminding myself of what God is, is doing, has done, continues to do. Uh, but I do, I do think that something about physical reminders is such a good thing for us. And in a world of digital media, you know, you got digital watch, a digital phone, a digital screen in front of you at all times of the day. Having physical reminders that are tangible can be a really powerful tool to remind you, for instance. If our, if our lead senior pastor wanted to wrap his car with the Compass logo, see where you're going there, no one would be like, no one would be upset by that. I, everybody would be blessed and encouraged to see that and be like, man, that pastor cares about his church. That's what we would all say. Well, you know what, let's jump over to our New Testament reading in Mark chapter six. Alright, mark, chapter six. Uh, Jesus is, is preaching there. He's preaching in Nazareth, which is significant because this is. One of his home areas, right? Capernaum is where he was doing a lot of ministry. Nazareth was where he grew up, and he's, he's preaching and he's serving and is ministering there. And the, the people's response here when it says is this, not the carpenter, the the son, the carpenter's son, and the son of Marian, the brother of James and his. And this is not the same way when like you see some of your parents' friends when you're growing up and, and you get a little bit older and they're like, oh, look at you. You're so sweet. And I remember when you were kneehigh to a grasshopper, this is cynicism that's being expressed here. They're coming at Jesus going, who do you think you are bringing your teaching like? This, we watched you grow up. We know who you are. You're the son of the carpenter. You're the son of Mary James is your brother. And so Jesus levels this charge of them and says, A prophet is not without home honor, except in his hometown, among his relatives, in, in his own household. And it says he could do no mighty work there except that he laid his hands on a few people and healed them, and he marveled because of their unbelief. That always stands out to me anytime God marvels, uh, that, that's shocking to me because this is the omniscient God, right? And so he. Knows all things. In fact, we know in John chapter two that Jesus, even in his humanity, knew the hearts of men because he did not entrust himself to those who were initially following him because he knew the hearts of men and needed no man to bear witness about what was in them. And so Jesus, even here, I think, is just stressing and emphasizing how hard hearted the people of his hometown were in, in their cynicism towards him. Verse three, uh, tells us that Jesus. Well, verse three tells us that Mary was not perpetually a virgin because she has at least six other children besides Jesus. Now, I found out recently that the historic church, the, the early church thought and, and ascribed to Mary, um, a perpetual virginity because of a desire to honor her and a desire to honor Jesus. It wouldn't make sense, you know, how could divinity share a vessel with other humanity? That kind of thing. Uh, well intentioned. But I think the plain reading of scripture here tells us that Jesus had a family. And there was at least six other siblings. He had four brothers that are listed here, and then sisters plural. So there's at least two other girls in the family and I think we should take it as what it is that they were, in fact, his actual in the flesh siblings. Yeah, I'd agree. And many of them will reject him for a long time until. Probably after his resurrection where they finally come around and decide, okay, okay, we believe you. Now he's who he says he was. The rest of chapter six, we have John the Baptist, and uh, John the Baptist was, was a man of, of great courage and we find that in his confrontation. Verse 18, John had been saying to Herod again, Herod was a powerful man, as is seen by what happens to John. But John's not afraid to, back to, to stand up to him. He's not. So afraid that he's willing to back down. He says, it is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife. He's telling Herod what you're doing is wrong, Herod, and he's gonna end up in prison. He's gonna end up in jail. And this woman that Herod was with is gonna be so upset with John and so petty and petulant that she's going to. Orchestrate, uh, his eventual murder, and he, she does so by this request that comes from the her daughter and Herod. Then because he had made this vow before, his party guest has to follow through with it. So John the Baptist, a faithful servant of the Lord, one whom Jesus said there is none greater among what. Those born to women except for, than John the Baptist. He's the greatest of all. Save, obviously Jesus himself. But this is his end, which is somewhat shameful, and yet at the same time, not because of how he goes out, he goes out as a man of integrity and boldness here. Yeah. So this, this whole section here tells us about John the Baptist, who, or he's a unique fellow on in, in the New Testament timeline. He's called the Greatest to live before RB. Yeah, before the New Testament. In the end of the Old Testament, he's a unique character. He's the forerunner of Christ, and yet he. He received a very inglorious death, which tells us for someone who's so honored and esteemed in God's sight, in Jesus' sight, if he can be let go in this way, if I'm, and I'm using euphemistic language, I don't think any one of us can say, well Lord, I wanna die in this particular way. Yeah. Uh, I want to, I, I, I don't want to be morbid, never my intention, but I do want to be realistic about what we should expect from the Lord. It's good that we live in north Texas. We have great healthcare. We have all these things, but we need to be okay with the fact that God has a way to dispatch his people. That may not be the way that we prefer. I, I, I would wonder if. John would prefer to go out this way. Yeah. Being beheaded actually was, was kind of a merciful way to go. Yeah. It was fairly quick. They could have done it in a lot of other ways, but beheading was, was pretty nice. All things considered. Yeah. But notice here, he's the honored John the Baptist. Jesus commence him and yet this is how he goes out. Interesting. In glorious. And yet this was God's plan for him. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's pray and then we'll be done with this episode of the Daily Bible Podcast. God, we know your plan is perfect and none of us know how we will leave this earth and enter into your presence. Some of us may face more Inglorious methods of departure than others, and yet we know in the end that our confidence needs to be in you no matter what. We need to be willing to say what the apostle. Paul, to live his Christ, to die His gain, and even to be able to get to the place with the Apostle Paul saying, to depart and be with Christ is far better than even remaining here. And so, Lord, give us such a desire to be with Jesus, that we're willing to be faithful to you, even to the end here, knowing that the end here is simply the beginning of our time with you. And we pray that you would make us a church strong in our faith towards that end. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. Keep reading those bibles to y'all and tune in again tomorrow for another edition of the Daily Bible Podcast. Please and thank you. Bye.

Thank you for listening to another episode of the Daily Bible Podcast. We’re grateful you chose to spend time with us today. This podcast is a ministry of Compass Bible Church in North Texas. You can learn more about our church at compassntx.org. If this podcast has been helpful, we’d appreciate it if you’d consider leaving a review, rating the show, or sharing it with someone else. We hope you’ll join us again tomorrow for another episode of the Daily Bible Podcast.