Hey everybody, welcome to Tuesday's edition of the daily Bible podcast, March 17th, March 18th, 2025. Yep. Yep. See, we record these freshly. Do you guys know that they know that we record these freshly? We could just say, at one year we're just going to record them all generically without reference to days or seasons or times or peoples and just put them on repeat. We don't do that. Why not? We want to stay fresh. We want part of our vision for our church is that we would be a church that is engaging the culture. And we feel like this allows us to every single year bring fresh insights to the word as it applies to today as you're listening to this. It's not that's a wrong to have a podcast in the can that you can always go back to and listen to the same things. That's fine. But part of our desire in doing this is not just to make you more intellectually knowledgeable about the passage, but to know. Okay. What does that passage mean for what we're going through right now? And this keeps us dynamic and flexible to be able to adapt as a church. And yeah I've thought to myself, man how long are we going to do this? And I don't have a clear answer to that question, but we're doing it today and we're doing it. We're finishing up this year, a hundred percent. And my guess is we'll go for another year, but. We're five or 10 or five or 10 20. Yeah. Who knows? Eventually you will clone my voice by via AI and you will just make me say whatever you want me to say. That's true. I won't need to be here. You'll agree with me on everything. Maybe you've already done that. There's a mistake. What if you've already done that? And I'm not even here. And this is just disagreeing with me. If you weren't disagreeing, people would know that there's something up or vice versa. If I'm not disagreeing with you and I'm just saying, dude, that's so good. Preach it, bro. Go off King pop off. Yeah. Hey, we do have our open house this Friday at our office, 291 South Preston road. Please join us. Yeah, we would love to have you here from the hours of nine to four, nine to four. Yeah. Don't join us the whole time. Yes. That'd be awkward. Don't stay the whole time but do come sometime in that window. I want to show you our office. It's your office. You'll be here for counseling appointments perhaps, or if you're going to get baptized on the fly. You might be here on the fly. Maybe during the open house, you need some of that counseling. We'll close the doors. We'll have a conversation. But yeah, this is our place. We're really proud of it. We're excited for it. We want you to celebrate with us. And so we'd love for you to be here. Yes. Yeah. So join us Friday. That's coming up 9 AM to 4 PM. We're going to have some treats here too. So come for the family and stay for a treat. Man, we don't, we didn't take advantage of the crumble cookie next to our old office, but we don't have crumble cookie next to our office anymore. We have Andy's frozen. We do, which is custard. I'm not a huge custard fan. I think custard is amazing. It's too eggy. Sure. It's, it tastes fine. It's just, I can't eat whatever. Rich. This has nothing to do with it. It's rich and so delicious. That's, I hit my mic. I did what you do. Normally, you're the one punching your mind's further away today. It is. Anyways, let's let's jump into our Bible reading. Deuteronomy 21, 22, 23, only three chapters today, not four, just three but chapter 21. Here is a chapter dealing with more justice and civil laws. What to do, for example, with an unsolved murder. And this is interesting. The whole idea of, Hey, find the closest town and have them come out and offer a sacrifice and wash their hands over the sacrifice to symbolize that they're innocent, that they didn't witness this, that nobody in their city has done this. And so that's an interesting way to go about this. But God cares about unsolved murders. Notice that it, this doesn't lead to the, a light bulb over the person that did it. It's not like there's a promise of resolution to this, but this is just a way to say, at least for the town nearest by we didn't have anything to do with this. So just know that. And so unsolved murder and justice there, how to handle marrying a foreign woman. That's there too. And that's interesting because our conversation yesterday, what about? How do we handle this? And I've always looked at this as this is somebody that's from outside of the promised land territories, that if there's a, somebody from the trans Jordan or from another area that ends up the Israelites come across them, that this is part of the rules for. It's not a schedule. It's process. So we have a great release. This is on live streaming, which is going to be around and also on the afternoon in April. So you're going to see it. It's going to be on live streaming on the afternoon. So you're going to see it. It's going to be on the afternoon of May 30th on live streaming on YouTube at or it's going to be a little bit of a trailer from the end of the week. So I think people are going to be excited. Execution as well, not just for the rebellious son, but just in general. This is interesting. The rebellious son one is fascinating. And I was reading some commentaries about that because it does result in the death of that child. And it seems okay, that's, I'm sure those listening to us if you're a parent, you've had a rebellious child. And so you probably going. This seems extreme. And in foreign nations, that son or daughter was disinherited if they were rebellious, but in Israel there to be executed and the commentary that I was reading on this, and I tend to agree PR, I'd love to get your thoughts said the reason being is the connection of obedience with the parents to obedience to the Lord, that this was not just about the rebellion against the father, but it was ultimately about rebellion against God because God had placed them under the authority of the father. Absolutely. And part of the keys to that is the verbiage. So you shall purge the evil from your midst and all Israel shall hear and fear. So who are they fearing? What are they fearing? Of course, they're fearing their Lord. That's ultimately the golden desire. And I just wanted to insert something because we just read about marrying female captives and that seems a bit weird and a little icky and perhaps could offend our modern sensibilities. I have to remind you, remember that you're reading something that is. It's thousands of years old and their context and their culture made this made sense. So even if you're reading it and it gives you the, a certain feeling in your stomach where you're like, man, that does not feel right. How could God do that? Why? Why would God allow that? God will always do right. And God is just and he, what he does is justice. He doesn't conform to an external standard. Like we mentioned a podcast ago or so he himself does justice, period. He defines it. So here, what we're seeing is God take care of the woman. You might not read it that way. You might see it as Oh, I can't, this is so egregious. He's sending us a misogynistic and all these things. You're reading it with a modern lens. You got to read from the original audience's understanding and then eventually do the work to bring it into our modern context. So I just want to affirm. Affirm our position here, read the Bible with eyes that look to the Lord, deferring to him that time, that context. Yeah, man that's hard to do, but it's important. It's a discipline we need in, in approaching the text. So I need a good commentary, multiple commentaries, even that help you do that because it's hard. No one's expecting you to go start digging up old books and say, okay, how do they think So you can get a good commentary. Even a good ESV study Bible, a good MacArthur study Bible will help you with some of these things. And I have the theological study Bible. That was a good one too. Yeah. Yeah. And the Zonervan international Bible background commentary. Again, I've been talking about that a lot. The 500 commentary series you wanted to buy? It's good, man. And that's what it is. Bible background commentary is giving you a lot of the color to the culture that you don't necessarily see in the context. All right, I'm going to buy it. And if I don't like it, I'm asking it. I'm asking for a refund from you. Done. Done. Yep. Yep. It's good, man. It's worth it. Notice also real quick end of the chapter. Don't want to miss this. The man hanged on a tree is cursed. This is about execution and notice the parallel here that the way that Paul takes this at least and applies it to Christ Galatians three, he became a curse for us. And this is what it's talking about. And he quotes this curse. It is everyone who's hanged on a tree. And that's from Deuteronomy 21, 23. So here we see an allusion to the death of Christ at the end of this chapter not as a guilty criminal, but as innocent dying in our place, who were the guilty ones. And so we see that messianic connection there in the end of chapter 21, chapter 22. Then the opening, this chapter contains various laws, including laws about sowing two types of seed, plowing with a donkey and a cow wearing a garment with mixed threads. But the majority of the chapter focuses on sexual sin and what to do in various situations where a charge of immorality is leveled against a person. or persons, how justice is to be administered or applied there quickly. Talk about the fact that people will point this out to us and say, look, you guys are hypocrites. You accept the, you accept the commandments that talk about sexuality, but you don't accept these. Yeah. Yeah. This one, that's a tough, that's not a quick answer. Because mostly this is, people are divided as to why. These laws existed commentaries are going well, it could be this it could be this and there's some whack a doodle Answers that are out there. Honestly, this has been perverted by some to suggest Look, this is God saying that races should stay within races as far as marriage is concerned because you're not supposed to blend You're not supposed to mix and that's what God is implying here That's an abuse of the text. That's not anywhere stated in the text. That's taking things way too far. So Why was it this way? And again it's God is consecrating his people, setting them aside. And so this is not a moral issue. This is God saying, this is what I want you to do and so you're gonna do it. And so this is not something that we would follow through. It's not repeated in the New Testament versus a lot of the sexual morays and values are repeated in the New Testament. So we've talked about that before as far as the Old Testament loss saying, we're gonna observe and obey those things that are reiterated new. New Testament, and certainly sexual purity is championed in the New Testament. So we're going to hold fast to that. Whereas Jesus doesn't say, Hey Peter, don't wear a tunic of mixed threads when you go out fishing. Yeah. And you might recall that scripture says that we're to rightly divide the truth, which says that there is a right way to cut it and there's a wrong way. Remember that the law can be divided up into several civil ceremonial and moral and understanding it rightly means understanding the context, understanding the. The import. And to your point, that's not always easy. Commentators are divided about what these actually mean, but what you can do generally speaking with some degree of safety is okay. What's the principle? What does this teach me about God? And we can see again, God is orderly. God is kind. He's compassionate. God is organized. It doesn't mean that there should not be mixtures between races, but God was trying to create distinction in his people. And that's always a good thing. New Testament does repeat that we are to be different. In fact, it does repeat Leviticus 19, we're to be holy to the Lord. So that's part of our job and that's, I think what's being suggested here. You're to be a holy people that look different from the surrounding cultures. Yeah, totally. And even just maybe some of the parallel of you're getting ready to go into a an atmosphere where I'm calling you not to mix. I'm calling you not to, to wed. with foreigners. I'm calling you not to intermingle and not to be what is ecumenical? Not ecumenical, but what's the other word for inclusion? Yes. Thank you. Not to be syncretistic when it comes to your worship practices there. So maybe this was, Hey, I'm going to remind you that with the clothes that you wear only have clothing of one material. Don't And don't join two different types of animals together when you apply your field. And even in those things, a reminder to the people to say, okay, we're called to be separate. We're called to be distinct. We're not called to compromise or be syncretistic when it comes to our practice of religion. What about this bird thing here? Keep the mother alive. Take the eggs. Yeah, I think, we talked about this just on the text thread with you and I and Mark and Lewis last week, just about God's view of animals. And I do think God does care for those that he has created. It's not the Imago Dei, it's not the image of God. So it's going to be different. But I think this is a matter of saying, Hey, don't be unnecessarily cruel. Take the food that you can get from the eggs. Enjoy that. But but leave the leave the mom alone and and let her go about her business two cents on that. Yeah, I agree with that. I think that's fantastic. And several of the commentaries talk about protecting their food source. Yeah. So don't be short sighted and just eat the whole family. It's like, where'd all the food go? How about a cross dressing here? What about that? Yeah. And that's something that is, is clearly prohibited. It's an abomination. And that is something that is, is not to be done. God takes it very seriously to the point of, Hey, you're going to be executed if you do this. And so I think that is not not necessarily strictly repeated in the new Testament. I think that does fall under the Leviticus 19 holiness blanket. I do think that falls under the natural relations of men, man and woman together. I think we can tuck that under there and that certainly is reiterated in the new Testament. And so I think there's grounds for that to be. Obeyed and observed as well. Do I need a fence around my roof? No. No, but you should be wise about your property. If you've got a trampoline in the backyard, you don't wanna be an idiot and not have insurance to cover something that's gonna happen there. That's, I think that's the idea there. Hey, just be smart. If you've got a roof and there people are going up on that, you don't put a fence up, somebody could fall off and seriously injure themselves or die. And that's, you should care enough life about life enough for that and also be wise to, to care about your own wellbeing. What should happen to you if something like that took place? Yeah. I think the, probably one of the principles is protect life, protect and preserve life as best as you can within reason, protect and preserve life. Yeah. Those are, that's really helpful. And I think that's a really good example of what it looks like to take the ancient texts and say, okay, what's the 2025 application. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. So chapter 23, then here we open with a section on who may or may not be permitted into fellowship with the Lord. Also a section on keeping the camp holy during battle, which Pastor Rod has a unique comment on. And the majority of the chapter contains laws pertaining to the operation of civil society there within Israel. Again, a lot of kind of scattershot seemingly scattershot, but it's important because they're prepping Israel to enter in and take the promised land. You're just going to skip that whole second half of. Chapter 22 second half of chapter 22 where they talk about women in the field and Whether she cries or doesn't cry. I mentioned these are focused on sexual sin what to do in various situations of things People are gonna question about that. They're gonna question Just feels like I think the text says what it says. It does. It does. And I'm not trying to say that we should justify God. I'm just saying, okay, people are going to wonder why, why does she have to yell? Cause she not come later and perhaps she's traumatized or, something like that. Yeah. Yeah. I think the heart of it is. If the implication is if the woman's complicit in it if this is consensual in our modern day terminology, then there, there's no guilt there, as, as far as that's concerned. But if it's the R star P word, then it is a problem in God's eyes. And so I think rather than looking at this going, wait a minute, let's nitpick and find the injustice here. I think God is providing the instructions for protecting the woman from being victimized in that regard. And I think that's what that. And that's a great word. Protection. This is exactly what God is doing. Again, you're, if you read it and you're offended by it because of your modern sensibilities, you just got to read it with the awareness that God is actually protecting the woman in this case, even though she ends up having to marry the guy or vice versa, he has to marry her because of his sin. He's going to protect her. He has to now cover her and take care of her for the rest of his life. This would prevent a man from wanting to do this in the first place, but this would also protect her because nobody would want to marry her after she had this done. No fault of her own but that's the reality. And so God protects her by saying, look, if this does happen, he's going to pay the fine and he's going to have to take care of her for the rest of his life. Yeah. Think of we see this in action with Absalom and Tamar. There's other problems there as well, but that's basically what happens afterwards. She says don't shame me. Don't send me out. Like you've got an obligation now to me and he rejects that and she ends up living as a single widow for the rest of her widow, for lack of a better term, a single person for the rest of her life. And it's, yeah, it's a tragedy and that's what we see laid out in the law here. Yeah. Yeah. Chapter 23 though, deals with the things that I was talking about. So who's allowed in, who's not allowed in? No it's interesting here. No one born of a forbidden union may enter the assembly. So foreigners or a immoral union, the people, some commentaries suggest this is a relationship between two people that shouldn't be having that sort of relationship. We'll just put it that way that their offspring are not allowed to enter. You've got eunuchs implied there in verse one that they're not allowed to enter. And even the Ammonites are the mobile bites in verse three there that they're not allowed to enter to the 10th generation. And that's interesting because. One of the commentaries I was reading said it seems like there were some exceptions because you do have Ruth, who's a Moabitess, and she's in the line of Christ, the line, right? So I don't think this is a blanket prohibition across the board, but that there were some apparent exceptions in some of these situations. We'd have to say evidently not. This is clearly what God intended, even though we're reading it and it has a certain flavor. We do get a lot of understanding from the fact that we read how they applied it. And Scripture could easily say, and Israel sinned by bringing Ruth, the Moabitess, into the family line. You don't read that. What you read when you read the whole of Scripture, which is a big, exegetical, important step. You have to know the whole of Scripture. If you're going to interpret a passage rightly, you have to have a good handle on the rest of the canon. Scripture speaks of that event positively. Ruth gets her own book. Yeah, that's a good thing. So when we read this section, we have to realize, okay, there are clear exceptions being made. So when I read this, I need to understand that what God is intending to communicate is that ordinarily, if they are Ammonites and Moabites that are still doing their own pagan thing, they're not allowed even to the 10th generation, which probably means forever, right? If they become converts, if they are grafted into Israel then that's a different story. That's a different story. Yep. I think that's a great way to look at it. Yeah. Did you want to comment on the holiness of the camp during battle? I wanted to ask what you thought or why you thought God says, Hey, cover up your stuff in a hole. Yeah. I think it's being careful in how one approaches the worship of God. The writer of Ecclesiastes talks about that. He says, let us be careful when we go to worship the Lord. Now he's talking about not making rash vows and with our words and things, but I think the idea of the flippancy and listen, the excrement thing, man, I think most people would say that the circle of people, that they would feel comfortable doing that around. is very small. Probably the matter of you in the mirror, right? So in that instance, I think if there's shame to do that in front of other people, shouldn't there be shame with regards to doing that in front of the Lord? And someone will respond isn't he? He says here, interestingly enough, that he's walking in the camp, right? That must mean that there's a special presence that God is communicating to them, usually evidenced by the tabernacle and the arc of the testimony, those kinds of things. But it says here he's walking in the camp and he doesn't want to see anything indecent, which is so fascinating to me because he's the maker, he created everything and yet he's calling this particular and granted, he does that with foods and other things as well. I just find this so fascinating. Yeah, no. And it is, except that I think in being so intentional to be careful about this, it's almost, this is weird. It almost becomes an act of worship because you are being deferential to the Lord's character by not being cavalier about even this part of your daily routine. And yeah it's, Habakkuk says you're, you are of eyes that are too pure to even look on evil, right? So Habakkuk says that, and yet God looks on evil all the time because he is omnipresent. He's omniscient. He's all knowing, right? It's not like God is turning a blind eye and not knowing what's going on in some corner of the world. When you think about what's going on in Syria, like I talked about on Sunday right now with the murder of these Christians, that's. It's horribly wicked and evil, and God is very much aware of that. And so for Habakkuk to be able to say, you who are of eyes that are too pure to look on evil, I think there's a sense in which there's looking upon something as condoning it or thinking that this is something acceptable and the awareness that God has of all things. Is there any modern application that we could take from something like this? I think we need to be careful. Yes, we have access at any time to the Lord, right? We can draw near to him to find grace and help and mercy to help in time of need. But I also think we should be careful about how we approach him and thoughtful about how we approach him. So that's, that's a flanking act. Approach to this text, but I think we could take away, we want to approach him in a way that honors him and not in a way that in any way treats him as common or dishonors him or would bring shame upon ourselves in how we approach him in that regard. That's a really good word. I like that. Careful, thoughtful. We don't treat him as common. I think the idea here then is for us to say, insofar as your understanding of decency is informed by scripture, we should seek to have a decent. Interaction with the Lord, which I think does come is communicated by the way that we dress by the way that we approach him The words that we use to talk about him When and where we're talking to him now granted there is an everywhere ness to God where we have access, right? That's what hebrews chapter 10. I think 10 access to the throne of grace We can go anytime to the father and he's willing to receive us But as we get more mature we ought to think about those very same kind of things. I man I just think about the reformers and what luther said I can't okay So Luther said, you know what he said, I know where you're going with this. Maybe I won't ask it then maybe I won't ask Okay Decency, it's it is informed in large part by our culture But yes insofar as your idea of decency is formed by scripture. You should apply that. I'm gonna just go with That's a good word That's a good word. All right. Let's pray on that note and then we'll be done with this episode of the daily Bible reading. God, we thank you so much for your word and for his truth. We just pray that you'd give us again, wisdom to understand it. And we want to be those that love justice and we want to be those that carry out justice when it's in our power to be able to do that. Lord, we also want to be those that That are careful in our approach to you. And so help us to approach you in a way that is, is thoughtful in a way that brings you honor and certainly does not dare approach the realm of a flippancy or being overly casual with you or somehow bringing you down from your lofty position. So we've talked about that. I feel like before, Lord, but help us to find that balance of approaching you as your sons and daughters and yet also approaching you as the Lord of the universe to the ideas that are not competing at all. But two ideas that hold weighty applications for us as your children. So God, we need your spirit to help us to understand how to go about that. And we pray this in Jesus name. Amen. Tune in again tomorrow for another edition of the daily Bible podcast.

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