Episode Transcript
[00:00:15] Speaker A: You can't live the Christian life very long until you start running into questions about authority. Who gets to lead and make decisions in the church?
Why do they get to do that? Who has the authority to lead in the home? Who gave them that authority? How should a Christian think about the government? Is any government authority good? Some? All?
How do we know the answers to those questions? Welcome to Word and Flesh podcast. Those are some of the questions we're going to be talking about today. Thanks for joining us. Podcast from Riverview Baptist Church for Riverview Baptist Church and joined today by our elders. I'm Nathan Bechtold and joined by Elder Michael Bean. Yep.
[00:00:54] Speaker B: Ryan Anderson.
[00:00:55] Speaker A: Ryan Anderson. So I said your name at the same time as you. That was awkward. Do you want to do it one more time? Say Michael Bean?
[00:00:59] Speaker C: Just Michael Bean.
[00:01:00] Speaker B: That was good.
[00:01:01] Speaker A: Nice. Nicely done. If you're watching today, you'll notice that we were wearing the exact same clothes as in the last episode. I'm sure that that was your first thought. If you're listening, you didn't notice that, of course, but if you're watching, you did. And my only response to that is, get used to it, because these are the only clothes we have. I can't, actually, because we decided to record a set of episodes and we wanted to, for this episode, talk specifically about authority, which is an interesting topic, a challenging topic. Challenging, because I think, and we were talking about this earlier, everyone.
Well, I mean, like, basically everyone, there's some, like, true, like, lunatics that we'll exclude from this. But everyone agrees in the way that they live their life that there has to be authority.
Like, you would not be able to live a coherent life without having a sense of authority. But the problem then comes when we go, well, who gives authority? Who has authority? When is authority good? When is it not good? Or being abused or misused. Right. And we even address that, that sometimes. And even part of what makes this conversation important, but also sensitive in some ways, is that authority does get abused.
[00:02:20] Speaker C: Absolutely. And I do think that there's no doubt, obviously, that's happened in the church. And so, you know, even as we speak about authority this morning, I think that's one of the things that we'll just admit that, hey, there are places where Christians have misused and abused authority, but that doesn't mean that all authority is bad.
[00:02:39] Speaker A: Right, right, right. And then the other thing that I think it's good to address right off the bat is, and we said this too earlier when we were talking about how to go about this episode, Was to go, why pick this as the first topic? I mean, other than our intro episode. Why pick the topic of authority? Because it would be easy to go, oh, great, they're just gonna set it up so that we just have to listen to everything that they say and that's it. And they're the final authority on all matters. And it's like, well, no, that's not like the primary reason. I mean, that's my main reason. But, you know, I'm just kidding, so. But why pick.
[00:03:10] Speaker B: We'll edit that part out.
[00:03:12] Speaker A: Why pick the topic of authority as a starting point for how we sort of go through this podcast? Why do that?
[00:03:20] Speaker B: I can jump in here.
I think that one of the reasons that we're starting here is one, because even as you listen or watch, you can probably something's happened in you that's made you realize, well, yeah, that is a hot button issue. Everybody's thinking about it. But more than that, I'm convinced that all the issues downstream from where you place your authority either lead to a chaotic and crazy life or the good and beautiful life. Where your authority is placed, matters for your anxiety. Where your authority is placed, matters for the rootedness of your day to day, who you trust, who you listen to, who your counsel is, what you commit to, what you spend your time doing. Everything downstream of that either leads to chaotic, disoriented disillusionment, or it leads to peace, joy, the good and beautiful life.
[00:04:10] Speaker A: That's actually a really good point because I think that what that illustrates is that sometimes folks put or assign authority, maybe almost without realizing it, to certain people, like to, again, not that we're beat this topic to death, but to a podcaster or to a YouTuber or to somebody, you don't think of them as like, well, they have authority over my life and they tell me what to do. But you assign their words and their influence a kind of accidental authority, maybe as a way of thinking about that. And that what happens is that starts to shape your thinking, right? It starts to shape your reactions. Somebody had sent me a podcast episode a while back, and they were like, you know, I don't agree with everything these guys say, but listen to this. It's kind of interesting. And my response was, I do think those guys, I'm not going to say what the podcast was, but have some interesting things to say. But I'm a little concerned that listening to them very much will actually start to infect my brain with some things that I think they're very wrong about. And so I Think that that's a kind of giving authority implicitly, like, not explicitly. Right. So I'm just riffing off of what you were saying there, which is that how we live our lives actually flows downstream from what we give authority to, either on purpose or sometimes on accident.
[00:05:20] Speaker B: Right. The reality is, to illustrate your earlier point, every person believes in authority. They either are their own authority downstream of that chaos, disillusionment. They either grant authority of their lives to, say, the YouTube podcaster or the coach, whatever.
[00:05:36] Speaker A: Yeah, right.
[00:05:37] Speaker B: Or they grant authority to people who care and love and weep over their souls. And so I do think it's an important conversation for us to have.
[00:05:45] Speaker A: Good. Okay, so that's kind of some of the why we thought this would be good to dive into as a first topic. Yeah, let's go with a definition, because got to define your terms. Right. So what is a faithful definition of authority, interestingly, has the word author in it. Right. So there's some interesting etymology there. Right. So what's a good definition of the word authority? And then biblically speaking, where does authority come from? How does it get allocated? Like, help us out with that.
[00:06:16] Speaker C: Yeah, well, you know, biblically, we'll start with just the definition of authority and, you know, full transparency. There is no verse you can turn to in the scriptures that would say, hey, here's God's definition exactly of authority. And yet we can get to a really, I think, helpful understanding of what the biblical authors had in mind when it comes to authority. When we look at, you know, again, the original languages, and we look at how was this word used very broadly in the Greek culture?
And so generally, the word exousia carries the idea of a drop some Greek on us. Huh?
[00:06:52] Speaker A: Dropping the Greek.
[00:06:53] Speaker B: That's right. Let's go.
[00:06:54] Speaker C: But that's the common word. When. When we translate authority and you see that show up in the Bible, in the New Testament, that's the word generally that's being used. And that word carries the idea of essentially a rightful type of rule, a rightful ability to command or to expect that someone would follow you. And so that is the idea then, that I think generally the Bible has when the word is used. And then the other piece of that is, where does it come from?
Romans 13:1 tells us very plainly there is no authority, except from those that are established by God, that the authorities, every authority that exists, even those that we might call evil. And that's a whole different topic in and of itself. You had to go there that God would allow them to exist for some reason. And Again, even as I make that statement, what we're saying is then God is totally free, totally sovereign, and the ultimate authority in every way so that no authority does not come from Him.
[00:07:56] Speaker B: Yeah, I'll jump in here. I think also in these kind of conversations, you can almost spend the whole time saying, here's what we're not saying. I think there's a helpful distinction made in a book called Authority, actually by Jonathan Lehman, about two different kinds of outworkings of authority. One is an authority of command and one is an authority of counsel. Authority of command is, I say this, you do it. Governmental, parental.
Those are commands. You do it. If you don't do it, there's consequences. The authority of counsel is the authority of a pastor. Hey, here's what we're encouraging you and telling you to do based on what we believe is true in God's word. The consequences are either your conscience is bound or you're disobedient, whatever. But it is different than if you don't do this. For example, like our Roman Catholic friends might say, the eternal Savior soul's in question because you didn't listen to the church. That's not the kind of authority we're talking about.
Talking about authority based on God's word, doing our best to apply the wisdom of Scripture to life. Here's what we're telling you you should do.
[00:08:57] Speaker A: Why would God create authority? I mean, why not? Like, in other words, why would he not just make every person their own authority autonomous, Right? Like, I rule my life and I answer to God, maybe, like, let's go that route.
God is my authority, and beyond that, it's me, and I answer to me like, why not do that that way? Because that seems like that would be pretty clean, right? Then you wouldn't have all these messy hierarchies and stuff and things, right? It'd just be like, it's just God's my authority and it's just me. So why create that that way?
[00:09:27] Speaker C: Well, I think ultimately the issue of sin is an authority issue. That when we think about the sinful human heart, our number one. And so even as you're saying that, I'm sitting here thinking, yeah, that sounds nice.
Sounds really good.
[00:09:44] Speaker A: That's why I said it.
[00:09:44] Speaker C: Yeah. And so the point is, every human heart wants that. And that actually points to our problem.
We want to be God, and so we will not be, or we want the authority of God at least. And we will not be honest with ourselves. Our hearts are deceitful above all else. Who can know it you know, Jeremiah 17. And so we're not going to be honest even in our own relationship with God at moments. And we need the community, we need the people of God around us to help us see our sin, help us identify blind spots, all of those things. And so God in his incredible wisdom has given us the church, the family, the government, and they all have a role to play.
[00:10:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Amen. I would also just add that all that we experience in the sacred is an exercise in learning God's character.
[00:10:36] Speaker A: Okay, what do you mean by in the sacred?
[00:10:39] Speaker B: Meaning? Like, I think it's dangerous to say that if you're doing something sinful, you're going to experience God's character. You will in his grace.
That's what I'm saying. So in this conversation, I think, why did God create authority? Well, upstream from that, he's a God of order. He's eternally existed in a relationship of three persons, eternally in communion, ordered relations.
[00:11:03] Speaker A: There's authority. There's authority in the Trinity.
[00:11:05] Speaker B: Yes. There's a whole different conversation there and a whole complicated conversation that we're not going to get into, but we can at least all agree there is some kind of order in the Godhead.
[00:11:16] Speaker A: Okay, I'm going to interpret what you just said the other way. So without authority, you have a kind of disorder or chaos.
[00:11:22] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:11:23] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:24] Speaker B: Yeah. I think. Look around. I mean, I think we have honestly, very tragic recent experiences of that in the American life where authority was either not there at all or there and terribly misused. And thus what happened was absolute disorder and chaos. Right. I lived in Chicago in 2020. I mean, I saw this with my own eyes. Right. But I think that.
So if you take God's character as being a God of triune order, eternally God, this is in order. You go immediately to the first pages of Scripture and you see it on full display. Adam is given authority before the fall to work and to keep.
What is that work there? I think we all understand the keep there is to in some ways exercise your leadership to build new Edens outside of this one.
[00:12:11] Speaker A: Right. I mean, he sets up Adam as a. As a king underneath him. Right. Like God owns it. God made it. And then God sets up Adam and then Eve ultimately. Right. Made from Adam's side, but he sets up Adam and says rule it. Tend to keep it as my. Basically like my ruler under me over this. And so, yeah, creates a kind of authority. I think that's a good. I was going to say analogy. It's more than an analogy. It's A reality. Because folks can imagine, I think, a ruler that you would call like a tyrant, right. Who rules really poorly, who exercises their authority really poorly. And we talked about that a minute ago. And I think that a lot of times, I think we live in a culture. You're not gonna disagree with me on this. We live in a culture that balks against very much authority and stuff. And so I think a lot of times when we think about Adam being set up to rule over creation, about a husband being the authority over his wife and in his household, right. A lot of our. I think this has just been like, just. Just pounded into us from day one in this culture is to kind of rankle at that a little bit, to kind of be like, ah, right. Like, surely there's a better way. Right? Because all we can think of is tyrants or, you know, abusive authorities or whatever.
And it's like, well, but God actually, like, you're saying God put Adam there to rule over the earth, to rule it. Well, because it was actually. It would be better than it was without him ruling over it.
[00:13:39] Speaker C: Right.
[00:13:40] Speaker A: If he rules it. Well, the way God set him up to, it'll actually improve it. It cultivates it. Yeah. You know, so anyways, I think I'm just trying to build off what you were saying there.
[00:13:49] Speaker B: I mean, just consider the fundamental problem. In the garden. He's called to use his authority. Well, to maintain the perfect splendor of the garden. Someone interrupts that, who becomes the authority? It's an authority issue from the beginning with, is God's word the true word, or is Satan's word the serpents, whatever you want to call it. I also was thinking of 2 Samuel 23. These are David's last words. When one rules justly over men ruling in the fear of God, he dawns on them like the morning light, like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning, like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth. Good godly authority leads to life. Bad misused authority leads to death.
But good godly authority makes you sprout like grass from the earth.
[00:14:35] Speaker C: And I would just add to that, you know, Judges 21:25 famously ends, the book of Judges is essentially, everyone does what was right in their own eyes. And it's a statement of condemnation that every person being able to do what they want to do is actually a very dangerous way for society to operate.
[00:14:53] Speaker A: Yeah, it was a very disordered society.
[00:14:55] Speaker B: And then just read the whole book. It's craziness.
[00:14:57] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, in spite of the Fact that they have kings that come after them that do some really awful things. Like there is a sense in which having actual authority is better for them.
Again with the caveat that some of those kings do some really make some awful decisions.
And then we have Matthew 28:18.
[00:15:16] Speaker B: Right.
[00:15:17] Speaker A: Jesus saying, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. And that's something that you were hitting on a second ago, Ryan. Yeah.
[00:15:25] Speaker B: Just again, the idea that whatever Jesus understanding of authority, his relationship with the Father is, we can at least say there is a clear authority structure there. I do the will of my Father.
[00:15:37] Speaker A: Right. Authority has been given to me.
[00:15:39] Speaker B: And so it's a very dangerous thing for us to say, well, even though Jesus understands the Father to be eternally authoritative in all matters of faith and doctrine and practice, but then for us to say, well, because there's been some bad examples of authority, it's all bad. We're actually just refuting the character of God and the clear teaching of the Trinity.
[00:15:57] Speaker C: Yeah. And, you know, I think one of the other things about Matthew 28:18, if that's true, that all authority belongs to Jesus, again, we do live in a culture that is skeptical of authority, and I think that's our postmodern influence, that everything is treated with an air of suspicion, especially those that I don't like. But Jesus is essentially saying then that authority, all authority, is on loan to each of us from him. And so that matters in a government context, that matters in a parental context, that matters in the church context. And so even as pastors, we don't sit around this table or walk up onto a pulpit and to prepare to preach and say, we have an authority in and of ourselves.
No, it is on loan to us from Jesus. And if we disqualify ourselves, we can lose that authority.
[00:16:53] Speaker A: Okay, so this is good. And that's a lot of word. That's a lot of conceptual there, which you got to do, because we got to work it out.
Let's do flesh for a second. Okay, how does that. And we're going to dive into this. We're going to dive into this, into some future episodes a little bit more granular, like, how does that play out in the church? How does that play out in the family and stuff, but at least we can touch on it for a few more minutes. Is what are some, like, real concrete ways, maybe even stories or instances or ways that you go, okay, this is what it would look like for someone to be. For godly authority to be authority to be playing out here in the right way. I don't know. Give me some examples. Because we've been sort of defining authority and we've been talking about the idea of it, but the rubber meets the road and, you know, somebody's got authority at work and they've got authority at home, and they've got authority in the church. And then they got to figure out maybe whatever their level of authority is in various spheres of life. Right. So I don't know.
How does that work itself out in good ways?
[00:17:59] Speaker C: Well, I think to me, three major categories that the Bible says and kind of delineates as very, very clear authorities.
Number one, that's what marriage and the authority of the home is granted by God, that's instituted by God and created by God.
Number two, the church, and then number three, the government. Those three realms are very clearly outlined in scripture. And so I think the most natural one and probably where many of us wrestle, is the home. And so I think we could just kind of start to talk about that for a moment is, okay, what does it look like to display good authority in the home and how does it align with God's word? So, you know, I'll actually turn that over to you guys, and then I'll jump in with my own thoughts here in a second.
[00:18:49] Speaker B: Yeah. I think, Nathan, you were asking about specific examples of how it looks like in the church.
[00:18:53] Speaker A: Do you think we're talking about any of those? Yeah, I want to put some meat on the bones a little bit because we kind of did some definitional stuff, but I want to make sure we flesh that out for a minute. What does that look like? Home, church? Any of those?
[00:19:05] Speaker B: No, I think in the home, I secretly. Well, not so secretly. I actually just hate the phrase my wife's the boss. I know what people mean by that, but I think it is that's something we should just take out of our vernacular. It's not helpful. Right.
[00:19:20] Speaker A: Like when people go, well, I'll talk to the boss. I mean, people say too, generally. Yeah, but I know what you mean.
[00:19:25] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, right. It was like, well, how about you say, yeah, we'll talk about this together. Anyway, I think there should be no illusions to anybody who's looking at your home life of who is the clear leader, tone setter, frankly, decision maker, not in solo, but in partnership with your wife. I think the way that this often plays out, where the authority structures in the home are dismantled is in parental discipline. You know how many times we say to our kids, hey, if you don't do this, this is going to happen. I believe in grace. Okay, let me say that said thing happens and the can of discipline is kicked down the road over and over and over again.
And when you don't have consistent, clear, grand grace filled discipline in your home, what you're communicating to your kid is that actually self rule is good. You're ruling yourself and I'm not going to help you bend yourself back outward. I'm going to let you be in charge of yourself and I'm not actually going to discipline you in any reasonable consistent, grace filled way. I'm not advocating for just lose your mind. That's not what I'm saying.
But I think that good authority in the home looks like often good consistent grace filled discipline.
[00:20:40] Speaker C: And I would just add in terms of that I actually think there's another step a little more upstream which is we are not going to build our home around our children.
And so that mom and dad, we're not, I'm a big believer in we're not going to share the bed with the kids for a really long time.
Why? Because it communicates. There's a level of intimacy and there's a level of I think genuine love, devotion and priority that that relationship should have. And it's communicating in a very physical way.
Kids come first. The kids need to be before that. Now again, I had my six month old sleep with us in the bed for a season. But I'm just saying at some point I've heard stories of kids sleeping with parents and they're 10, 11 years old and it's like hey guys, that's not okay. At some point you're building your home around your children, not around a God ordered structure of authority and priority.
[00:21:43] Speaker B: That's a great application.
I'll share one quick story. I know we gotta wrap up. I'll share one quick story. You know, we are very young parents and my friend Chat Bettis, he wrote a book called Disciple making a Parent. And actually his main argument of his book is we need to get away with do away with the child centric home where our kids are in charge. And when you're parenting an infant and you're parenting a baby, you don't really think about like you're not really thinking about how can I exercise good godly authority of this infant. But one of the things my wife and I had a conversation about, as every young parent does, is what are we going to do about this kid's sleep? Well, we went to a conference and Chap was there and Chap kind of was seeing how we Were doing it like, hey, we're going to try and keep a schedule, but we're not going to be a slave to the baby's schedule. I never thought about that as an authority issue, but Chap looked at my wife, I wasn't around, and Chap said, I want to commend you. Your baby is not in charge of your life. I thought, man, I didn't realize it started so early. Like, thank you for the encouragement. We ain't doing it perfectly, but I think those little things, they sneak in and often what sin and the dismantling authority does is actually convinces us that the baby sleeping in the bed, the kids sleeping in the bed is the honorable thing to do, when in fact, it is actually not right.
[00:22:56] Speaker C: And I think then it becomes a very slippery slope and very natural to say, well, yeah, then of course, we would naturally build it around their education, around their extracurriculars. Like, the way that our home operates is, what do the kids need and want?
[00:23:10] Speaker A: Well, yeah. And I mean, man, that is like such a fruit of our culture is. Because our culture has inverted the. In terms of order of importance, for sure. Yeah. I mean, you know, across media and all those things. Youth and youthfulness. Right. And I'm not saying anything particularly new.
Those things are venerated and lifted up and old folks. Right.
Things that have endured, old things even. Right. Are scoffed at generally. I think I'm seeing some pushback on that, actually, currently, which is there's a reason you're seeing some pushback, because people are going, wow, this did not work at all. But I think that you're right that some of those accidental relinquishings of authority, again, often happen because the culture, like we've been saying already, the culture kind of just, you're born in the water, you're swimming in. You know what I mean? I didn't mean that as a birth analogy exactly. But, you know, but, you know, wherever you're born into, you're kind of like, they're all up in the middle of it. And we don't realize until. I mean, Kate and I have recognized certain things, even very recently, where we've gone, oh, man, we have not done a good job with our children. And, you know, we've had children for 15 years now and recognizing areas.
And I swiped your Bible real quick, Michael, because just the other day I was reading, just reading the proverb of the day. It was the 23rd, and it's Proverbs 23:13. Do not withhold discipline from a child. I don't I mean, I know I've read that proverb before, but it kind of hit me and I thought there are definitely moments when I withhold discipline. Again, there can be appropriate times for like showing mercy or grace in a situation. Right. But that's not really what this verse is saying. It's saying, don't be the kind of person that doesn't discipline your kid. And then I like, I mean, the second half of that, if you strike him with a rod, he will not die. Yeah, yeah. Now again, I actually believe in, you know, like spanking. Right. But I also think that that's broadly also just saying if you discipline him in a way that hurts, which if it doesn't hurt, does it count even?
[00:25:17] Speaker B: That's what I think about often. Like, does. Does taking away the game count?
Is that kind of discipline that hurts?
[00:25:24] Speaker A: Right? I don't know. I think the question has. I think actually, I think what that verse is getting at is it does need to sting. Like, I mean, maybe not physically. I mean, sometimes physically, but also sometimes it just whatever the discipline is, it has to sting. And the point of it is he ain't gonna die if you strike him with the rod, literally, you know, spanking or something. You know, they're not gonna wilt. Yeah, they're not gonna die. It says then verse 14, if you strike him with the rod, you will save his soul from sheol death. Right. So in other words, it goes, don't withhold discipline. You're not gonna kill him. In fact, you're gonna save him from being killed your child.
[00:25:59] Speaker C: So we're gonna. I'm just gonna say something then that is a little controversial.
[00:26:03] Speaker A: Please do.
[00:26:04] Speaker C: But what we're, I think saying very clearly is gentle parenting is not faithful.
[00:26:10] Speaker B: I was going to go there.
[00:26:11] Speaker C: I'm glad you did. That's, you know, that's, I think, a radical thing.
But I would just say if you look at the scriptures again, what is our authority?
[00:26:20] Speaker A: Gentle parenting, by the way, can define that.
[00:26:22] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. When I say gentle, just the adjective
[00:26:24] Speaker A: gentle, it's like, well, we, you know, need to model.
[00:26:27] Speaker C: When I say gentle parenting, I'm talking about a particular parenting philosophy that, that would say my kids emotions, my kids behaviors, my kids desires need validation from me at almost every level.
And that is actually the way to produce a healthy individual. Biblically, that cannot be verified, it cannot be supported, it cannot be justified.
We are called to confront sin and sometimes confront it ferociously.
And so as a part of leading our homes. And man, I'm talking to you. In particular, you are called to take the lead on discipline. It is not your wife's first role, it's your role.
And so if someone has to be the bad guy, it better be you. And I think that's a. Again, that's a controversial thing in some ways. I think biblically, there's no way around it. You are the head of the household. You set the pace. And, and yes, you should listen to your wife. You should make sure that you're united and on the same page about what that looks like.
But it better not be on her in terms of enforcement, leading, faithfulness, consistency, all those things.
[00:27:38] Speaker A: Good. That is like a great.
[00:27:40] Speaker B: I think what we also have to say on the back end of that is, yes, absolutely, unequivocally agree that men need to be in charge, but it doesn't mean our wives, when we're not around, get the get out of discipline free card.
[00:27:51] Speaker C: Of course, I'm taking that for granted.
[00:27:52] Speaker B: Okay. Yes.
[00:27:53] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:53] Speaker B: Right. They have to enforce the rules of the home. Yeah.
[00:27:56] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:27:56] Speaker B: I would also say one of the other things that gentle parenting says that's insidious is that my kids problems are actually my parenting problems. Yeah.
It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, when did we forget along the way that our kids are sinners and we're called by God's grace and the help of the spirit to bend their wills away from themselves and back to the father for the first time? Not. Oh, I've been too harsh. So you were disobedient. That's baloney. Does that happen sometimes? Well, maybe.
[00:28:29] Speaker C: Of course.
[00:28:29] Speaker B: Of course it does. Anyway.
[00:28:31] Speaker A: Good. That's some meat on the bones right there. Yeah, that's some flesh, baby. That's meat on the bones. And I think, again, that helps us zoom out to, like, we looked really specifically at children just kind of, because that's where we went. But it helps us zoom out to going, good discipline from good authority is good. I just said good a lot. Sorry. But the Bible tells us this. Don't regard lightly the discipline of the Lord. Right. It's a good thing. Just like a father disciplines or should discipline the child he loves, so the Lord disciplines us. Right. So when it stings that discipline, it's for our correction, it's for our life that we would experience that. So anyways, we're going to get into more of how God set up authority in the family, how we work that out. Tough questions around that in a future episode, but I think this was good to kind of like dip in and go, hey, here's some flesh, here's some meat on the bones, a little bit of what we think about maybe some ways already where the culture has gone just off the rails when it comes to authority.
[00:29:31] Speaker C: Well, and real quick, I know we need to wrap up, but I just want to clarify this as we wrap up again, the Christian life, a part of what it is to follow Jesus is a constant reordering of authority and understanding. I don't always relate to it correctly. And so when I follow Jesus, he calls me daily, take up your cross and follow me. There are certain things that I'm not going to want to pick up, and there are certain things I'm not going to want to lay down. And so again, if something I've said today offends you or bothers you, my admonition to you would be, hey, search the scriptures, like, look and study and let's see what Jesus says, not how does this make me feel as a parent? Or what do I think my friends are going to say? Or whatever the case may be.
And so James 4:7 Submit yourselves therefore, then to God. Like, submit to God in your parenting. Submit to God in the way that you interact with your wife. Submit to God. And that's where real joy is going to be found.
[00:30:35] Speaker B: Amen. Good.
[00:30:35] Speaker A: All right, well, this is going to be to be continued because there's a lot more to be said, but good start, and I hope this has been edifying for y' all who have been listening and hope you continue to tune in, share this with other folks around Riverview and further up and further in. We'll see you next time.
[00:31:02] Speaker B: Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.
