“Ruined It for Everybody”
EPISODE 234
Turn Your Life Over to God
Ready for a difficult discussion about repentance? We’re into Square One session 7 exploring how life changes when we get closer to a relationship with Christ. It’s about living a new life in faith by shedding old, destructive, and unhealthy habits. How does the prodigal son’s story teach us about repentance and God's joy in our return to him? We consider personal life changes, the struggles of taming the tongue, and the importance of continually aligning ourselves with God's will. And why certain foods make us a little … uncomfortable?! Get ready for some real talk on transformation and faith!
Takeaways
The Big Idea: The life change God wants for you begins with your decision to follow Christ.
This Week's Challenge: Draw a line down the middle of a piece of paper. On the left side, make a list of all the hard, hurtful, and wrong things you're ready to break with and let go. Leave the right side blank for now.
-
Bryan: the taste of coconut, but it's that texture-- it's like eating hair.
It's not-- never a good thing growing up, but
Ryan: You just ruined it for everybody.
Introduction and Episode Overview
Bryan: Well, hello everyone and welcome to the Bible Geeks podcast. This is episode 234. I'm Bryan Schiele.
Ryan: I'm Ryan Joy.
Bryan: And thanks so much everyone for tuning in. We are into session 7 here of our Square One series, but before we get into that, before we ask a really important question, we're going to follow up from the last discussion that we had.
And if you'll remember, that was the conversation where we fell in love
Reflecting on Friendships and Support
Bryan: with Jesus there in session 6. And we had this challenge for the week. Consider if you could ask a friend to help you with something important in your life, what would it be? And Ryan, how'd you do with that?
Ryan: I was thinking about all the most important friendships in my life. The thing that is the heart of what I treasure the most. Whether it's, you know, with you and a group of guys that I was texting this week about some stuff I was through. And asking for prayers.
With my wife. With all the friends in the church. Everybody that I really treasure. It's about talking together about life and praying together. I mean, like, that's the heart of the thing for me. if you could ask a friend to help with something important in your life, what would it be? Yeah, it's not like, pick me up from the airport or, you know, help me repaint my house.
I don't know. It's... it's the friendship stuff that is most important. What about
Bryan: I was reading a book and it had a discussion about this band of brothers idea, how helpful it is to find a group of people who you can talk with on a regular basis who will sharpen you,
Specifically this book was talking about like ways to incite feedback and help shape your preaching and your teaching and I just thought that was such a cool idea to cultivate a targeted group of close people in your life who could help you grow in some very specific ways the point of this challenge was really to see how Jesus fulfills those things for us, like how important it is to be sharpened by Jesus, to look to His example, to grow in all the ways that He wants me to grow as a disciple I just thought it was cool to think of a band of brothers being something that I can lean on for guidance in some way.
Ryan: Jesus... Hebrews says, "Jesus is our brother." Right? He's our creator, but he is... he has become like us. And... and considers himself to be a friend and a brother. And,
who can challenge you more and grow you more? As a... as iron sharpens iron. There's no iron like... like what Jesus offers to help us be who we want to
Bryan: Alright, so that was the challenge from the last discussion.
The Importance of Repentance
Bryan: Let's get into session seven here on this episode. We're gonna talk about this really important question, "How will my life change?" Now, the more we develop a relationship with Jesus, how's my life gonna change?
we're getting into the difficult work of following Him and, of course, this is the "take up your cross" kind of work here where we follow the Lord and leave our old man of sin behind and the whole idea of this conversation is about breaking up with the past, repentance, walking new way.
We'll get to the walking part of it in a couple of episodes, but focus is really like looking backwards and seeing where we've been and how bad it was back there and taking a new stand to walk with Jesus.
Ryan: it's the hardest thing to do, I think. I heard a preacher say that once, you know. The hardest thing to do is this act we're going to talk about, which is repentance. And it's certainly the fundamental change that everything else comes from.
Bryan: It's such an important conversation and we're gonna start it out in a very unimportant way by talking about our hook here and getting into a little bit of an icebreaker question. So we'll pause here and we'll get into that.
Square One - 7: This is square one. How will my life change? Did you ever get grossed out by the mere mention of a specific food? Brussels sprouts, beets, or maybe lima beans? Maybe your loved ones encouraged you to try them again and again, possibly even relaying that old wives' tale that your taste buds change every seven years.
But then one day, you tried them roasted with some amazing sauce or a little bacon, and bam, suddenly, they're your new favorite food. They say people don't change, but in small ways and big ways, even our tastes evolve over the years. And the same goes for our old habits and ways of thinking. When we decide to follow Christ, we begin a total transformation.
So have you ever grown to love a food you once hated?
Bryan: Okay, so Ryan here, have you ever grown to love a food that you once hated?
Icebreaker: Foods We Hated as Kids
Ryan: There... there are many. I... my parents used to, like the story in... in our... our starter there talks about, "Have me try lots of things over and over again." The two that I hated the most that my parents loved and was always there on a Sunday afternoon lunch are coleslaw and beets. Like pickled beets.
Bryan: hold on, you didn't like coleslaw?
Ryan: I hated coleslaw. I hated it. And it was like forced on me every... my... my... My dad had the belief, "You'll like it eventually. Just keep trying it." And that proved to be true with coleslaw. It did not prove to be true with pickled beets. It's the only food that I can think of in life that I don't like, that I truly hate, is...
is beets. But I did come to love coleslaw with the right meal.
It's... it can be really good.
Bryan: like the terrible Kentucky Fried Chicken coleslaw is-- it's pretty good.
Ryan: yeah. It's not bad.
Bryan: I was, as a kid, very open to trying new foods. My grandma was like hardcore Southern, all the vegetables on the table and like I was-- I was eating squash and radish and beets and just everything as a kid.
One thing that I just never got into though was coconut. don't know what it was, I think it was a texture thing and I don't usually have a texture thing, but like coconut was terrible growing up. I hated it so much and then slowly it started growing on me. It's still not like my favorite, favorite food, the taste of coconut, but it's that texture-- it's like eating hair.
It's not-- never a good thing growing up, but
Ryan: You just ruined it for everybody. [laughs] Well,
Bryan: I
mean,
Ryan: You... you are eating... having lived in Hawaii, right?
Bryan: oh yeah,
Ryan: old, stale coconut when you eat, like, the shredded hard stuff. Like, the good stuff, you go to a farmer's market, they chop off the top and put a straw and a lime in it, you drink it, and then you bring it back and they take their machete and cut it open, and they give you part of the coconut to use as a spoon, and then you scoop out this soft meat from the rest of it.
Yeah, it is really good, and it's totally different texture. I get... I get what you're saying about that kind of hard, stringy texture. This is so fun to talk
Bryan: from coleslaw to eating hair, let's get into our next section here, our part two, where we get into it a little bit deeper-- We're gonna get into the purpose here, something that Jesus said. We'll highlight the big idea and then we'll come back and talk about our reach-out question.
Square One - 7: Let's get into it and
Discussing Life Changes and Challenges
Square One - 7: see the need to turn your life over to God. As we've seen, Jesus cared about us so much that he suffered a horrible death on the cross, but he rose from the grave. As we let that love sink in, his call to follow him becomes more and more compelling.
But what does following him look like? Simply put, he wants us to die to our old life of sin and begin a new life of faith and obedience. Paul described his changed life this way. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.
That's a lot to digest, but let's think about what it means to die to our old life. Paul taught the believers in Ephesus to stop callously walking in mindless sin like the rest of the world. He argued that when you've learned Christ, you know to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds and to put on the new self created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
When we hear about Jesus and believe in his authority, our life choices change. He talks about putting off and putting on like we're wearing Jesus after having taken off filthy old clothes. We put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh to gratify its desires. So here's the big idea.
The life change God wants for you begins with your decision to follow Christ. Breaking up with the past is a lifelong journey to leave behind a broken life with its unhealthy patterns. Things don't all change overnight. But as Paul asked, how can we who died to sin still live in it? Every day we try to grow and learn new ways to act and think like him.
But the decision isn't progressive, slow, or easy. It's an all in, count the cost and rip off the band-aid kind of commitment. So what life changes do you think you need to make? And what change concerns you most?
Bryan: what life change do you think you need to make? What change concerns you most? I think, Ryan, about this time we have really hit the deep, squishy, reach-out style questions here.
Ryan: Yeah, we're in the contemplating life, contemplating life change, and, to die to something and come alive to new territory that Christ wants to bring alive in us. I've been thinking a lot about my prayer life and working on that, and really I have found new...
ground in that, but one that I... think that I need to take some big steps forward in is my boldness. Boldness
to, you know, confront certain issues, and it's something that I've... thought about and taken steps in the past, and I see, like, a gap there that I need to really take a...a leap in, whether it's in evangelism, as we've talked about, or, in my teaching and preaching, that's something I've really focused on.
The change that concerns me most, I don't like living in conflict with people, having, just people that are, you know, likethe... Psalms in David's writings where he talks about, judge between me and them, and you vindicate me," so having those confrontational conflicts that are necessary have been challenging to me to allow someone to just hate me or badmouth me or whatever it is.
so, anyway, that's something that is hard and concerns me, but I embrace it, as we must do with repentance, and step into the path that the Lord is directing me to. What about you? What life changes do you think you need to make, and what change concerns you
Bryan: I feel like for me a lot of the change that I need to make centers around my speech, you know, it's the taming the tongue and those kinds of things. Just saying things, you know, not in the most salted and thoughtful way possible sometimes, but then also I think on the other side of it, sometimes not speaking up,
Sometimes it's easier to just stay quiet and I do that sometimes where I just don't say anything and when really I probably should. finding that balance there of really making a concerted effort in what I say or when I say something versus when I don't. I'm still working on it all the time and
Ryan: He is a perfect man, as James says.
Bryan: it, but I think, you know, this whole conversation that we had here is kind of highlighting that fact that repentance is something that we do, when we come to the Lord initially but it is something we are always doing.
Like we are just constantly, putting off, putting to death. It's a regular ongoing thing that we do check ourselves and be committed to staying on that right path. Oh yeah,
Ryan: Yeah,
in one way, it is death to your old self and life that is new, because you are a new person before God, you are not the same.
There was a moment of true transformation before God, but at the same time, it's an ongoing transformation, and, you know, as Paul says, "I die daily." There's this ongoing, "I'm controlled by the love of Christ as He directs me and guides me towards the right way." I think it's an important distinction, because you kind of need to hold on to both truths, or people can get discouraged or confused about things.
The Parable of the Prodigal Son
Bryan: All right, so we've been in the book. We're gonna get into the book even deeper as we go into Luke 15 here in our next section and then we'll talk through this reading together.
Square One - 7: Once, when people complained about Jesus eating with sinners, he told a trio of stories about the tragedy of losing something.
Of course, it was about much more than misplacing the remote. He knew that some of us were lost in our sins and missing from where we belong with God. A shepherd leaves his flock to rescue one wandering sheep. A woman rejoices when she finds a lost coin. And in his last story, a son leaves his father and eventually hits rock bottom.
So read Luke 15 verses one to 32 together to see how God wants us to return from the shadows and darkness of sin to the warm embrace and celebration of safety. After reading, take some time to discuss it. What do you notice about the lost son's decision to finally come home? And what do you learn about God from the father's reaction?
Bryan: All right, so Luke 15 verses 1 to 32 as we've done here previously, we're gonna read through this together and then we'll talk about the reading. Beginning in verse 1, Luke says, "Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to him and the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled saying, 'This man receives sinners and eats with them.'
So he told them this parable, 'What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he has found he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.'
Just so I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.'
Ryan: what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.' Just so I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who
Bryan: And he said, 'There was a man who had two sons and the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of the property that is coming to me.' And he divided his property between them. Not many days later, the young son gathered all that he had and took a journey into a far country. And there he squandered his property in reckless living.
And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate. And no one gave him anything.
But when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger. I will arise and go to my father and say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.'
And he arose and came to his father. While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed
Ryan: the son said to him, ' Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his servants, ' Bring quickly the best robe and put it on him, and put a ring on his hands, and shoes on his feet, and bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate, for this son was dead and is still alive.
He was lost and is found.' And they began to celebrate. Now his older son was in the field, and he came and drew near to the house. He heard music and dancing, and he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. The servant said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.'
But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, 'Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command. you never gave me a young goat that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him.' And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead and is alive.
He was lost and is found.'"
Bryan: Jesus. I love these stories so
Ryan: Ugh,
Understanding Repentance and God's Forgiveness
Bryan: what do you notice here about the lost son's decision to finally come home? What do you learn about God from the father's reaction here?
Ryan: I read something a while ago, and I wrote a sermon around it about the idea of using the word "missing" instead of just the word "lost" the way we sometimes like shorten it down to thinking about " lost" like it's gone, like it's dead to you, which is also here.
But the idea also of "missing" - it's a missing sheep, it's a missing coin, it's a missing son. Like when you have a missing child, or remember that one time that you and I went around putting posters up of a missing dog that was somewhere in our neighborhood? Yeah. so whenever something you love or treasure is missing, then you go and you seek it.
And so the father doesn't allow the son to even finish his speech. He starts running to him, and whenever he starts the speech, he cuts him off and says, "Go and kill the fatted calf! Bring the best robe!" You know, it's just like, "We're moving on. You don't have to convince me. You returning to me is what I wanted."
And so you learn a lot about the father and how eager he is to receive, and I think that's important for people to hear and understand, for all of us to recognize God has no delight in the consequences of our sin. He just wants to bring us back alive and into His blessing and into His fellowship.
So yeah, there's a lot to learn about God and about what it means to come back to the Lord here. What did you see in the story about those things?
Bryan: I feel like this story reminds me a lot of Jonah in the belly of the fish, you know, as he's basically like, he thinks he's dead.
It may have actually happened. He may have actually died in there. Who knows? But you know, he's talking to himself, praying in this fish. You know, talking about how his soul is in Hades and how he's basically just in the pit. He's done. He's hit rock bottom. And it was his disobedience, it was his rebellion that got him into that pickle.
But as soon as that fish spit him out onto the beach, I mean, he moved on and he went and did what God wanted him to do and God was with him. God enabled him and was right there, you know, working through him. Now, Jonah's story is unfortunate because he clearly decided that he actually really didn't like working for God in this way.
But it just reminds me of how a father wants so badly to forgive. And he forgave Jonah as he allowed him to live and go continue on his work. But obviously then Jonah squandered that forgiveness and acted a fool at the end of the chapter there in Jonah 4. But
I feel like the burden is on us here and the burden was on this young man in the story. It was his fault that he'd squandered everything, that he was off in a foreign land. But he knew enough about the father to know that the father was going to at least welcome him in as a servant, as a hired slave.
And obviously the father was willing to forgive far and above even that. But that's what God wants. God wants us to come back and he's wanting to forgive us even after all we've done. And that's just such an encouraging thing to think about but also a sobering thing to think about that we don't want to take advantage or not appreciate what he's done for us in that way.
Ryan: and I
love you bringing up the end of the story with Jonah where the Ninevites are the prodigal and Jonah is the other brother, right? And he says it at the beginning of chapter 4, "I knew it. I knew you were going to do this, Lord. Isn't this what I said you would do? That is why I made Haste to flee to Tarshish, for I knew you were a gracious God."
This is not praise of God. This is a complaint against God. "You are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster. You are the worst God," is what he's saying, "because you are so gracious." Like, it's so awful, right? This is what the book of Jonah shows us.
This is someone who is denigrating God for his grace and because he receives back a wicked people who repent. And that is what God is going to do for us.
And we should be happy not only that he receives us back, but that he receives others back and direct them back to rejoice with God, with as all of these stories end with, we are rejoicing with heaven that these sinners have come back to the Lord.
Bryan: Well, I think that sums up the reading here pretty well. Let's get into our next section where we go a little deeper with some heavy words where we kind of unpack this whole idea of repentance and what it means and then we get into our big question.
Square One - 7: Ready to go deeper? As we've previously seen, the Bible describes our broken condition before Christ with some heavy words like iniquity, transgression, and sin. But it also explains our response to God graciously sending Jesus to die on the cross with another power-packed word that you might not be used to when God urges people to repent.
So what does repentance mean? It's about turning, a total about-face in the opposite direction. Peter called his listeners to repent, therefore, and turn back that your sins may be blotted out. You may have heard the story about Jonah and the big fish, but imagine how you'd feel if God told you to preach salvation to one of your enemy nations.
After Jonah ran away, got swallowed by a giant fish, and then spit out onto a beach, he decided to listen to God's instructions. His message to Nineveh? Yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. Hearing his message, that whole wicked city turned from their evil way. And when God saw how they repented, he turned and relented of the disaster that he said he would do to them, and he did not do it.
So what do we need to do? It's the same question a bunch of Jewish people asked John the Baptist, Jesus' cousin in the wilderness of Judea. He told them to bear fruits in keeping with repentance. In other words, talk is cheap. Show that you've changed. So they asked him multiple times, what shall we do? His answer covered a broad range of everyday changes, like whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise.
He told them to collect no more than you are authorized to do. And he said, do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation and be content with your wages. But why should we make a break from our old life? Paul describes godly grief as that which produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret.
God uses sorrow alongside his grace to motivate us to turn from sin. True repentance involves both this inner sorrow and a tangible change in behavior away from sin, like impurity and sensuality. Knowing that it was our sins that sent Jesus to die, it should develop within us an earnest desire to follow God.
So repenting isn't the sadness of our sin, but it's motivated by that sadness. It isn't our behavior change, but that's what comes from it. In between the sorrow and the changed life comes this decision to turn to God. That act of our heart and will is the hinge of a Christian's life. That is repentance.
So here's the big question. Are you ready to make a break with your past and start to become who God wants you to be?
Preparing for Baptism and Transformation
Bryan: Alright, so the big question here that we asked, "Are you ready to make a break with your past and start to become who God wants you to be?" I think both of us are gonna answer yes but let's add some little details on to that
Ryan: Yeah, yeah, let's do that because there is a lot to think about here
Bryan: I think of repentance as, as it says there, the hinge of a life. We talk sometimes about the truth that we will be judged for our works or the things that we do in the body, which is a very important biblical truth in 2 Corinthians 5.10, Romans 2, 4 through 12 or so.
Ryan: You know, it talks about this idea in Romans 2 that we will answer for what we've done, for our deeds, our works, our actions. But the most important, the one that switches everything up is repentance. Like you could have two people that both had similar works in some ways, but one of them repented and the other didn't.
And that makes all the difference. That is the act, you know, to do true repentance, which means to have faith and to turn in obedience to God, then your deeds that you're going to answer for are going to be different because that, this is what Romans 2 says, all of God's kindness was meant to bring about repentance, which changes your whole story.
And so, will see next time as we go through this, how repentance leads to baptism, which leads to, this new life. Baptism is really the only one-time act that we're going to do as a Christian. We're going to continue to have faith. We're going to continue to hear his word. We're going to continue to repent.
We're going to continue to confess. We're going to continue to, you know, walk in faithfulness and obedience. But repentance is not a one-time hinge. There's that. But then if we fall again, which is, you know, going to happen, then we turn again. Over and over again, we keep turning back to God and saying, "Lord, I'm sorry I did the wrong thing.
I see what that sin is. I'm turning to align myself with your ways again." And so it's not a one-time hinge. It's like we flip back to death and the wrong way and to the wrong path. And we turn back to
Bryan: think it's something about that sorrow that we talked about there that helps me understand the need to break with the past. I appreciate the focus on godly sorrow here in this discussion because I feel like that is a really big motivator. Why am I wanting to change? Why is that such an important thing for me to do?
It's because I'm so sorry that it's those things that I've done that sent Jesus to the cross and I realized that those are the things, those are all the sins that he took to the cross with him and I don't want to disrespect the sacrifice that he's made and make light of it in any way and I want to appreciate what it is that he's done for me by not continuing to stay in sin like that.
Ryan: the idea of that sadness, that sorrow, sometimes we get all these things twisted up and think, "Well, I was sorry. Isn't that enough?" And the sorrow is really important because until you see your sin—this is why we started with the bad news in the first session all the way back— until you see your sin, see what it is, see the price that was paid for it, see the consequences of it, then the repentance isn't properly informed to have the kind of commitment it needs.
The repentance isn't the sorrow, it brings it about. So appreciated that distinction of these three pieces—sorrow leading to this decision, this commitment to God, to repent, and then which leads to the life change.
that's the process, and it's not going to be easy, and that's important to get to. So there's like the big change that we talked about. You died, you're new, and then there is this ongoing work. And again, that's helpful to distinguish. Yeah,
Conclusion and Next Steps
Bryan: so let's wrap this thing up and we'll get into our challenge and look ahead to the next conversation and offer a closing blessing here.
Square One - 7: As we consider the brokenness of life, it's not hard to see things that we'd like to change and put behind us, which leads to our challenge. Draw a line down the middle of a piece of paper and on the left side, make a list of all the hard, hurtful and wrong things you're ready to break with and let go.
Leave the right side blank for now. As you start the next conversation, take a moment to talk about what you noticed. We started the discussion asking the question, what does following Jesus look like? We've talked about imitating his death by dying to our old life of sin, but then as Jesus was buried, we're called to follow him there too.
How does that work and what does it look like? That's a lot like the questions a religious teacher named Nicodemus asked Jesus when he told him the same thing. Here's a hint, we're talking about burial in water, that is baptism. But until then, may you have the courage from the Lord to see your old life of sin clearly and turn away from it.
Bryan: Okay, so the challenge that we had there, we will get into that on the next conversation but we've encouraged people to do something a little bit more, I don't know, arts and crafts?
To grab a piece of paper, draw a line down the middle, write all the stuff that's hard, hurtful, or wrong on the left-hand side and leave the right side blank. I appreciate this challenge specifically because I think just putting it all out there on paper, the stuff that we don't want to do anymore is tough, really, and I think it's gonna be useful, hopefully, for everyone taking part of that.
Ryan: you and I are both list makers. We find
Bryan: are.
Ryan: lists very helpful.
Bryan: So let's get into here a closer look on our thoughts for leading this discussion.
Bryan: Okay, so thinking about leading this study, we have this goal in mind, which is session 10. It's our third checkpoint. That's the point where we're hoping that somebody will be confronted with all the evidence they need and to make a decision. Somebody makes a decision before that, they want to be baptized at the end of this discussion or maybe at the end of the next one, perfectly fine.
Obviously, there's water. What prevents me from being baptized? Make it happen. But the goal here is focused on death, uniting with Christ in his death. And then the next conversation is focused on baptism, uniting with Christ in his burial.
And then the third conversation is focused on rising up from those waters of baptism to be born again, born of the Spirit, and to live a new life. It's about resurrection. And so these three discussions, kind of starting with this one, moving on to eight and nine, will sort of build a larger case that I think is really going to be helpful in explaining why all these things are important.
You know, it's not just a checklist of like, "Change your life, then be baptized, then do this for the rest of your..." Like, it's not that. And the whole purpose of these episodes, these conversations, is just to explain like, why is it that we want to be like Jesus in these ways? As we lay down our lives in sacrifice, as we go down into the waters of baptism, and as we rise again to live a new life?
Ryan: Because it is respecting the kind of change that is going to be required, right? Not that someone can't be in a chariot and read a passage and hear on a chariot ride what they need to know and start their life and go on as a disciple. That's great. But there is value in the deeper teaching to try to work through the meaning of all of these things so that whenever someone orients themselves properly and fully to what they're being told to do and why they're being told to do it by the Lord, then they fully understand it, they have no doubts or concerns later on, and they're able to do it wholeheartedly.
Bryan: Yeah, and so we started off this conversation, part one, with this discussion of foods and, you know, changing our taste buds and these things. The meat of this conversation, I guess no pun intended, is they say people can't change. It's a challenging thought to put into somebody's minds.
Like, can you change? do you think you can change? Have you ever known anybody who's changed? Have you ever changed? to start introducing that seed into somebody's mind that change is possible, because so often we resist change. Like, I can't change. that's the way I am. And,I think we need to chip away at that and show, "Yeah, we do change."
Ryan: I think we all have tried to change something and had a hard time with it. Those things are sometimes stubbornly resistant to change, whether it's a habit or a way of thinking or something like that. And so we do have to get to that heart of it because that will be a barrier to conversion for some people.
Bryan: Now, the purpose is that we turn our lives over to God, leading to this big idea that God wants us to begin in our decision to follow Christ making this change.
And, you know, breaking up with the past, as we said there, is a lifelong journey and really starting to think about these changes that we need to make in our lives. what is it in this reach-out question we have? What is it that you need to change? What change bothers you to make? And, maybe somebody's not gonna be open enough to share specific details with you, and I think that's perfectly fine here.
When you're leading this conversation, don't pull too much if they're not willing to share. Like, we're gonna get to the challenge where they're writing a lot of these things down on paper in a, safety of their own, private space where they can think about these things on their own. But, like, generally speaking,
I feel like this is a good opportunity to connect with somebody where you can really just start looking at the actual honest changes you think you need to make in life.
Ryan: And we introduce an idea there with just a short phrase, "Count the cost," without really developing that, just so that the person who's leading it knows. We are going to, in session 10, have a reading around, a thinking around that idea where we're going to look at what Jesus says to count the cost. So if you feel like you need to say something, you know, to help them know, well, Jesus said to think about how much the commitment is going to be.
The idea here is an ongoing change again, but also a decision. And the focus of this big idea is all about the decision to follow Christ is a life-changing decision because it leads to everything
Bryan: And so we get into part three here where we read Luke 15, this great trio of parables here, where really I think the focus is gonna be on the parable of the lost son at the end. But I do feel like the parable of the lost sheep and the coin just highlight the celebration that the one who finds this missing item has over its return, and that obviously goes to speak about how God loves us so much and wants us back.
And so I think in this reading that we can do together, it's a little lengthy, but hopefully it's highlighting this idea that God wants us back, you know, we should want to change. He wants us to change. He wants us to return. And as bad as we might feel about it, Father, I have sinned before you."
God is going to be the one rejoicing as we come back to Him.
Ryan: hopefully by this time, you have gotten into the rhythm of reading chunks together, whether that's you reading and, both of you having a Bible in front of you or taking turns reading or letting them read based on what their comfort level is. The habit and the pattern of, hey, we open to the Bible and hear what Jesus specifically said is going to keep paying dividends for the rest of their life.
And in this case, the two small stories set up the big story that we're really going to talk about that the question at the end deals with.
Bryan: All right, so part four then, we get into this heavy word and these heavy phrases, I think, here,talking about repentance and turning and all of the things involved in repentance. deep, thought-provoking section here. I know we wrote it, and I'm not patting myself on the back, but like,
Ryan: The ideas in the Bible are the deep
Bryan: absolutely. And you really just start to think about, what is repentance? And then are you ready to make this change? And, thinking about the godly sorrow there, thinking about this idea that, we need to make this change, we want to make this change. We've talked about our answers for this section, but, leaving this question just to hang, like, are you ready to make a break with the past and start becoming who God wants you to be?
Like, is this something you're ready to do? we're not calling for an action now, although that's fine if that's the point where they're at, but I do feel like this is a, check-in like these big questions tend to be. Just, where are you at? take the temperature, see where they're at.
Are they starting to see the need for change? And that's gonna become important as we move into a discussion about baptism in the next conversation and then about walking in the Spirit.
Ryan: if they say yes, what does that look like? By all means, get into it. Let's flip over part four of number 10. Andabsolutely, if they are starting to think about it and they are starting to be ready, then that is just going to seed that future commitment when they understand everything that it means. So
is a balancing act that everyone who leads any study with a potential new convert is going to have to work through no matter which process you're working through.
Bryan: And the blessing at the end, it says,
"Until then, may you have the courage from the Lord to see your old life of sin clearly and turn away from it." That is what we're asking for in this session, hopefully, those changes are on the horizon for the person you might be talking to. Repentance is not always the fun topic to discuss, you know, putting to death our old selves on the cross and taking up our cross daily and following Jesus, but boy, it's so important.
It's just, you know, the hinge on which a lot of this rests.
Ryan: if you don't get repentance, you don't understand what it means to come to the Lord from the beginning.
I mean, this is not just a new covenant thing. Repentance has always been, along with faith, at the heart of what it meant to come and begin to walk with the Lord.
Bryan: All right, so this has been episode 234 of the Bible Geeks podcast. You can find us on our website at biblegeeks.fm. You can find show notes for this episode in your podcast player of choice, or there at biblegeeks.fm/234. There's also all of these sessions on our website as well. You can send us a message, you can get in touch with us, you can even send us a question that we could include on an upcoming episode.
And until next episode, everyone, may the Lord bless you and keep
Ryan: Shalom.