Everybody, welcome back to another edition of the Daily Bible podcast. Happy Saturday. Happy Saturday indeed. In te Technology, I'm feeling deja vu. Deja vu. Yeah. Maybe 'cause we just did this and then it stopped recording on us. If we had ai, if we had implemented in this process, then they, it could just take over and do it for us. Here's the thing I was talking about it before the. Computer rudely just deleted everything. I'll just give you the short version. There's a book called 2084 by John Lennox. I commend it to you. It's available on, Kindle Unlimited. If you've got that for free, you can read it there. Yeah, he's a believer and he writes about the implications of AI from a broad spectrum. But you were saying before I rudely cut you off because everything disappeared. There's this thing called a GI, artificial general Intelligence, which is this idea that somehow AI is gonna get to the place where it no longer needs human interference of any sort. That it can replicate itself, continue to progress. And you were saying, I don't think it'll ever get there because of the fact that that's something that belongs to the image of God. Right? Yeah. And, I do think that AI is gonna be able to do incredible things. I do think and I'd be curious to read this book that you referenced, to see some of these ideas of the implications of it. I do think it's gonna do incredible things for good and for bad, but one of the things that a lot of people suggest that it's gonna be is sentient. And I think from a biblical worldview, that is not a possibility. And I think that goes all the way back to the creation account in Genesis and the Imago day that we're made in the image of God. God is sentient and he makes us in his image and we are sentient in a unique, special way. No computer program from a biblical worldview is going to be able to do that technically. You know, I don't know all the details, but I'm gonna argue that I have enough ground to say that just from scripture alone. Again, it's gonna do some crazy things. Even my car, you know, drive, drive around, you don't drive. No, I don't drive. I don't drive. Your car drives you. It does everywhere you go. Yeah. On my way to men's Bible study tomorrow, my car is going to just to ferry me over there and like it connects to your calendar you were saying, so you don't even have to tell it where to go. It's like just sit back. It makes assumptions about where I'm gonna go. And loads it in. I can change it. I can change it. It's not Well now you've, eventually, now I can change it. Eventually Elon's gonna be like, no, don't touch that. I know where you're supposed to go. But yeah, it assumes where I'm gonna go and loads it in and I just push a button and off we go. That's wild. Yeah. And yet your wife's car's not like that. So when you drive Julia's car, do you ever get in it and you're like, oh yeah, I've gotta, actually, I've gotta push the pedals. It is actually weird. It is, it is actually weird to switch to fossil fuel and all that stuff, you know? Yeah. Well, I mean, I've got the electric car, so I'm not on the fossil fuel train, but my car does not drive me where I need it to go. If I got in my car, I was like, go home. It would be like, you go home, I'm not going home. I don't even know what you're talking about. Yeah. My car even has ai, so I can talk to it with, uh, with like the LLM Yeah. Is is in the car so I can talk to it and actually tell it. I can actually speak. Go home, take me home. And it will and it will, it will actually do that, dude. Okay, so we need to talk about ai something else. Have you seen the meme going around and I tried it and it's, it's legitimate where if you ask an AI agent with the voice component of it to tell you how many Rs are in the word strawberry. Yes, I am seeing that. Mark. How many Rs are in the word strawberry? Uh, let me ask my AI real quick. Yeah, yeah. It, it's amazing how many of them kick back. Two. Yes. Right. And and the one that I've seen it the most with is the chat GBT AI voice agent. So, and it sticks to it. I try. It's, it's, you, you can like, be like all I think you're wrong. And it will, it will, it will accuse you of being wrong. Right. I won though. I, so I did it with chat GT. And, and it, I eventually got it to admit, oh yeah, no, there's three. And I said, well, that doesn't gimme a lot of confidence since you're supposed to be the superhuman intelligence. Like that's a pretty basic mistake for you to make. Uh, and it was like, well, you know, I'm, I'm sorry, but, uh, this is still a learning curve for us. So then I tried it with perplexity, uh, which is another AI agent. Same thing. Two. So you should feel good though, because I did try it with grok. Grok was the only one that I tried it on that got it right from the outset, and it was like, there's three, what are you talking about? So that's, that's good. I have more confidence that I'm gonna make it home. If you need to get off on like Strawberry Lane, your car's gonna know how to do that. That's good. Yeah, that's good. Is there a strawberry lane around here? Probably not, but you know, I could say I'm really hungry from some, for some strawberries. Yeah, please take me. Yeah, to somewhere I can get them and it would do that. It it seriously though y'all, if just open up gr chat GBT to the voice agent and just ask it. How many RSS are in the word strawberry? I don't know if it's still doing it or if they've updated everything, but it's fascinating to hear it go. There's two. And then what I did after that, I was like, spell strawberry. And it did with all three Rs in it. And I was like, how many Rs did you just say? He was like two. I said, look, again, like. I mean, I've got five kids at home, right? And my younger ones are in the spelling and phonic stage. Like they would've given, gotten it right. They would've been like, there's three dad. What are you talking about? Anyways, yeah. Now what are we even talking about? We're talking about the Bible. So let's get into it. Genesis chapter 41, only one chapter in Genesis today. Little bit longer one, a little bit longer, and then half a chapter of Matthew chapter 13. Uh, man. Yeah. So chapter 41 it is a little bit of a longer chapter, however I, it's pretty straightforward. I mean, again, we mentioned it at the end of yesterday's podcast that, or middle of the podcast. Joseph spends two more years in jail before Pharaoh has this dream. The cut bearer who was restored to his position as Joseph had told him he would, as God told him he would through Joseph, he remembers Joseph. At that point, and Joseph is called up and here's Pharaoh's dream. He's, I've got these seven cows, they're lean, here comes seven or seven plump cows. Here comes seven lean cows. The lean cows eat the plump cows. And then you've got the grain and the sheaths of grain as well. And Joseph says, okay, here's your interpretation. Now, Joseph, being a man of God is clear to make sure that Pharaoh understands that this is an interpretation that is coming from God. In fact, look at verse 25. It says, the dreams of Pharaoh are one God has revealed to Pharaoh what he's about to do. And then Pharaoh tells him about the seven years of famine and the seven years of plenty that are coming after this Joseph's Council follows where he says, you need to put somebody in charge who's going to be able to help Egypt get through this famine time. And that really paves the way. 'cause Pharaoh says, well, who is gonna be wiser than you are? Nobody else could interpret these dreams. You've done this Joseph, you're gonna be the guy. And Joseph's story in chapter 41 really is the rags to riches story right now. He goes from the rags of the prison to the riches of being second in command of, or. All of Egypt, second in command in Potiphar's house, second in command in jail to second in command over all of Egypt. And there's a background that's going on here as well. So as much as we look at this and go, oh man, God is showing favor to Joseph, this is good. There's also something that's taking place here that's going to set up what's going to happen in Exodus because as. Egypt is facing this decimating plague or famine rather. The Egyptians are basically going to yield and seed all of their power to Pharaoh such that by the time we get to Joseph or to Moses' era, that's how Pharaoh has so much power over the Egyptians and why they all fear him and while why Israel is gonna be oppressed by him and why he has so much clout there. Because of this time where Joseph is saying, I'm going to help the nation get through there. Well, in this process, we're gonna see, he's gonna buy up everything from the Egyptians. And all of that's gonna go to Pharaoh. So interesting things going on in God's sovereignty in Chapter 41. And I think that goes to some of the themes that we've seen throughout Genesis of Egypt. I guess I should say, throughout the whole Bible of Egypt being a place of false salvation, this account of Joseph is obviously positive right then, and in some sense, in very true sense, Egypt saves Israel right through the. The food that's provided because of Joseph and because of God working through Joseph. But yeah, this actually doesn't end up being a good thing. I mean, obviously God is sovereign. Obviously God is watching out for the people of Israel. But to your point, because of these things that happen, it's actually not a permanent s solution. It's not true ultimate salvation that the people of Israel really need. And again, we see that theme of Egypt being a place of false salvation. And I think that's where we see that theme reoccur here. Yeah. Yeah, I would agree. Yeah, I think you're right there. But man, yeah, this is an amazing story of God blessing Joseph, and I think blessing Joseph's godliness. You look back to the situation with Potiphar's wife. If Joseph had compromised and given in there, then this is a totally different story. He might be dead. He might be dead, he might be dead. And yet at the same time, we might say, well, yeah, but God's sovereign over all of it. He's sovereign over all of it, but we're living it out in real time. I was just having lunch with somebody this week and talking to them about prayer in that regard. Like, yes, God is sovereign, and I wholly understand that and believe that. And yet at the same time, he sovereignly ordains us to pray for things that he's going to use the answer to those prayers in the accomplishing of his will. So God was sovereign. Joseph was never gonna give it into Potiphar's wife. But he still had to resist in the moment to Potiphar's wife. And so God is rewarding his faithfulness here. He's bringing him to this point. Time note there in verse 46. Joseph's 30 years old, so he's still a young man at this point when, all this has taken place. Yeah. Amazing. And even in verse 46, right? It says Joseph went out. From the presence of Pharaoh, and then he went through all the land of Egypt, to your point, right. God is sovereign, but he then does what he needs to do, right? He goes, and then he executes this plan, it. It's not that he just then goes and feasts and relaxes and says, oh God, sovereign and he's gonna take care of these things. Right? He's acting as an actual agent in God's plan, which is amazing. And it's also true for us today too. I mean, we don't have these narrative accounts of the Exodus and some of these amazing things that the prophets do. But don't discount that God is sovereign over every aspect of your life. He's sovereign over every little tiny thing that happens, every decision, everything, but at the same time, he's calling you to. To faithfulness. He's calling you to do things to act. Yeah. and we can't oversimplify, his sovereignty, and just say, oh, well, that means we don't have to do anything. Yeah. Joseph, notice Mary's an Egyptian I think it's She's a priestess. Mm-hmm. Right? She's the daughter of pot of Farah, the priest of on. So this. Pagan False God. Yeah. Yeah. This pagan priestess Joseph marries her, and from her come to half tribes of Israel, Manas and m uh, manas is going to be referenced in the Bible. Ephraim is gonna come to significance. M is gonna be basically the standin for the northern kingdom eventually, and even for all of Israel for that matter. So, later on we're gonna see that when Jacob gets here, he's gonna save these two. Hey, Joseph, these two are mine. Any of the other kids that you had after them? They're yours, but these two are mine, which is always interesting to me. I wonder, you know, kind of the thought process there, but they become half tribes of Israel. Why are they half tribes? Because they're not directly related to Jacob. Jacob by his lineage. They're through Joseph. So that's why they're the half tribes. Yeah. And again, I know you already mentioned this, but just don't miss the fact that this. This whole thing is stunning. I mean, remember that when Joseph's brothers show up, they can't even eat at the same table, right? Because, because shepherds, because people who are not Egyptians are just so despised and looked down on this. This is a stunning rise from. Somebody who's in jail incarcerated and is the lowest of the low all the way to the second in command. And I think we see what God is doing and in part he's fulfilling the promise that he gave to Abraham that through. His family. Mm-hmm. He would be a blessing to all the earth. In verse 57, it says, all the earth came to Egypt. Mm-hmm. To Joseph to buy grain. I mean, obviously that's not the final and greatest fulfillment of that, but I think we're getting hints and fortas of how Abraham's family is indeed going to bless the whole earth. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Well, let's jump over to Matthew chapter 13, and we are gonna be in verses one through 32. And what we find here are the parables. And these are gonna be again, a familiar portion of Jesus's teaching in the gospels. Some of these are, sometimes people say, these are some of the favorite portions of Jesus's teaching here. But I think what we see in the parables is actually the mercy of Jesus shown. In teaching in a veiled form or fashion here mercy on two fronts, mercy to those that come around to understand, because it's a, it's a, maybe it's a grace to them in that they get some confirmation from the Lord that because you have ears to hear and eyes to see, that's a sign that you get it that you're on the right path. But it's a mercy to those that don't understand because the Bible also teaches us that to whom much is given, much will be required and. For the end believer, the more exposure they have to the word of God and to the things of God the greater level of accountability they're going to have when they stand before God someday for rejecting Christ. If you think back to Jesus saying, woe to you, Capernaum, woe to you Corzine because if the work's done in you had been done in Tyra inside and Sodom Gomorrah, they would've repented in sackcloth. But you're gonna have a strict judgment. And so it's kind of that idea here that I think leads Jesus to teach in parables so that. All of these crowds that are gathered around him won't be accountable necessarily for extra that that otherwise they would've had, they heard what he said plainly and then rejected it and walked away. I think you're right. I would add though, I do think it's mercy to those groups, but I do think it's also judgment to the Pharisees. Sure. Jesus is fully capable of making anybody understand anything to. A perfect degree, and it says, I'm skipping. We're jumping over the parable of the solar, which I'm sure we'll wanna talk about a little bit, but right in, in the purpose of the parables as the ESV titles, that section, it says to you, it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. And again, Jesus. Could make them understand. Right. Jesus could explain these things to the Pharisees but he is specifically saying it has not been given to them. And so I think he speaks in parables, partly in judgment of the Pharisees, because to them it hasn't been given. I think you're also right though that it is a mercy to, to those other two groups. Yeah. Yeah. And. You mentioned the parable of the sower. We have the parable of the sower explained. We've got the parable of the weeds, the parable of the mustard seed, and the parable of 11. What is a parable? I guess that's a good place that we should probably hit on or start with. And that is it's a story with a point. It's a story with a moral and a lot of times what Jesus was doing, why we read a lot of agricultural parables is because that's the context in which Jesus was talking. If Jesus showed up here in prosper and came to our church, uh, well. I mean, we'd have a lot of things to say about that, but if it was today, Jesus wouldn't be using agrarian terminology, at least not in this context, because that's not our bread and butter. He would use different things, so he's going after them, and this is what any good illustration should do. It should be understandable. It should be accessible. If you're using an illustration with somebody and they don't understand that they've got no frame of reference to understand where you're at, then your illustration's gonna fall short. And so Jesus is using an illustration. They would understand. They've all either planted seeds or known somebody who has, they've been around this, and so that's why he uses that agrarian example in both the parable of the sower and the parable of the weeds, and even the mustard seed in the lemon here in the context. So why on Sundays do you preach a sermon? Why not just get up behind the pulpit and tell some parables to us? Well, because I'm called to preach the word of God, right? And that's Paul Sharjah, Timothy, preach the word in season, outta season. Be ready. And this is what we are there to do. I'm not there to stand up and tell a story from my own life that is gonna be on par with anything that I could preach from the word of God. Now, as a faithful preacher, I need to be. Giving illustrations. I need to be giving examples, word pictures. But that's always gonna be different from when I'm saying, okay, look at the Bible. Look at what the word of God is saying right here. Let's read the words together of what it's saying. That carries a different weight than when I say it's like this. Lemme tell you a story about my kids, right? Lemme tell you a story about my marriage. Lemme tell you a story about this. And so the reason I don't do this is because the thing that is most authoritative and profitable on a Sunday morning is the word of God not the word of man. Yeah. And Jesus is the word of God. Right? Right. So this is the word of God, very much inaction here. Yeah. And so yeah, we don't do parables on a Sunday in the same way that Jesus does because we're not the word of God. Yeah, yeah. A couple notes on these parables in the parable of the sower. If you look at this and then you look over at the parable of the sower explained I think there's really only one genuine salvation here, and that is the good soil and everything else is not genuine. And even those that might argue with that and say, but there, there was some life in some of these other soils that life didn't last. And what we understand from scripture is genuine. Genuine salvation does last. It perseveres, it endures to the end. And I think that's the consistent testimony of scripture over and over again. For example, in Ephesians chapter one, when it says, when you heard the word of faith, the gospel, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit as a guarantee of your inheritance. First Peter, chapter one, as we, we talked about, you're being guarded by God's power through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last times. So the consistent testimony in scripture is that once you are genuinely saved you're saved. You're not going to fall away. That implies then that these other soils were those that did fall away and they never were truly saved. This is not somebody who loses their salvation because we don't believe you can lose your salvation. Yeah and this is really tough in practice. I imagine many of you. Had somebody who you cared about or loved deeply who claimed Christ and then walked away. We need to be saddened by that. Yes. I don't think we should be callous towards that. Don't percent. I don't think we should be. We should be disinterested in that we should be saddened, but. Because Jesus has given us this parable. We shouldn't be surprised when there are people who claim Christ, but then these effects happen to them again, don't we? We need to maintain a true despair over those things not ultimate despair, but we need to be. We need to be saddened by that, and it needs to motivate us to more evangelism and more love for those people. But we also shouldn't be surprised when this happens in our life and it will, it will happen in your life to people that you know. And don't write them off. If you see somebody who professes faith in Christ and then they end up walking away, don't be like, oh, well you're the rocky soil, so see ya. There's nothing that says that's a permanent state here. Yeah. Now I wanna caution that with Hebrews chapter six, which does say that there are some that are going to reject Christ at some point, and then it's impossible to renew them again to a state of repentance. So we don't know if that might be the case, but until we do know, until it's abundantly clear to us, which really often is not gonna. Happen this side of eternity. You have an opportunity to still go back to 'em and say, Hey, I know you walked away. Help me understand why you walked away. Well, I walked away because I thought my life was gonna be easy, and then I ran into trials, or I ran into persecution, or I walked away because I thought, you know, I didn't realize I was gonna have to give up this thing that I love so much and be patient with them, pursue them, help them work through that. There may be an opportunity to still see that heart. Turn into that good soil. Remember your role in this too. I mean, it makes me think of one Corinthians three, right? Where Paul talks about how he planted and Apollos watered and God gave the growth. Mm-hmm. Would like to think that he's thinking of this parable when he uses that analogy, remember that God gives the growth, but you are called to be the one who plants and waters and to your PA point, pastor pj. Yeah, don't give up on those people. And, but also don't be surprised when people reject Christ. Yeah. Real quick here, the parable of the weeds is just a reminder to us that anytime that we are around a group of believers in or around the church in general, at least we should expect. The fact that there are gonna be unbelievers in the midst as well. And that's what the parable of the weeds is about. That, that there are gonna be some that are gonna be here with us that are professing believers, just like we just talked about, that aren't in the good soil. And it may be that, that they're not revealed to be such until the very end. And that's Jesus' point here is he says, eventually it will be seen in what is true, in what is false. And so it's a good reminder to us of that. And that's why it's wise for us to be looking out for the testimonies of others and listening carefully and making sure that we hear. The components of the gospel that should be there. And if not that we're, you know, not challenging in a fruit police kind of a way, but saying, Hey, you know, are you sure you understand? Like, do what are you trusting and what are you hoping in when you die and you stand before the Lord? What's your confidence in there? We need to be doing things like that and caring for one another because there are gonna be weeds in the midst of the weed as well. And so that's something that will persist as long as the church is here and Christ doesn't come back yet. It makes me think of baptism services. You know, there's nothing in the Bible that requires there to be a testimony given publicly and the way we do it at Compass Bible Church and you might make the accusation that the expectation that we have that you do that is legalistic it. Except for the fact that we are trying to be careful about this. We want to make sure that people have genuine testimonies. And one of the ways that's helpful to do that is to have people tell their testimony to the church. Yeah. Yep. And that's a good check. That's a good check for you. That's a good check for our church. And we want as few weeds amongst. The true grain as possible. Yeah. We don't want any weeds. We don't want any, yeah. Yeah. Not that we're saying, Hey, leave. We're saying we want you to be wheat, not weeds. Right. So, well, let's pray and then we'll be done with this episode. Lord, we thank you for the fingerprints of your sovereignty that we see all over the life of Joseph. And just a reminder that just as you were sovereign over his life, your sovereign over our lives as well, even though we can't necessarily see it as we walk through the trial or as we walk through the struggle that we're going through, we need to remember that Joseph. Had a trust in you that we can have as well. And Joseph didn't know how it was gonna work out for him when he was in jail. He didn't know how it was gonna work out for him when he was resisting Potiphar's wife. He didn't know how it was gonna work out for him when he was standing before Pharaoh saying, Pharaoh, you've got a famine coming on the land and yet he trusted you. Help us to trust you, likewise, no matter what comes our way. And to know that you are a good God who is sovereign and in full control. And we wanna be a church that trusts you that way as well. In Jesus name. Amen. Why keep with it. Keep on pressing on. You're doing a great job and we are making our way through. The Bible. This is such a good investment. Like we talked about at the end of last year. This is the best investment you will make in 2026. So keep on going with us. Yep, keep it up. We'll see you tomorrow. Bye bye.

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