Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:20 Hello, friends. And welcome back to unnamed Christianity, where we seek to reconcile our human experiences with God and his word so that we can love from a pure heart, a good conscious and sincere faith. We are in the middle of a three part series that I, that have just recently started on discussing. What does it mean to image God? And how do we image God in a world of chaos and sin when we ourselves are struggling with sin and just kind of in general, looking at what is the gospel and how does the Bible frame the gospel? Is it helpful to frame the gospel solely as humanity is headed for hell Jesus came so that we could go to heaven with him, if you would like to support this podcast and, and the work, the best way to do that is to become a member of unpaid Christianity at Patreon.
Speaker 1 00:01:15 As a member, you get access to exclusive content such as deep dive essays that go deep into a topic like aggression or a pro a piece of biblical interpretation, like first Corinthians 11, you also get access to expanded versions of our podcast interviews. If you would like to become a member, go ahead and check out www.whitmer.com/member. In this, in the last episode, we discussed the question, what does it mean to image God? And we looked at how God created mankind in his image. And we discussed how Jesus is the image of God. Man is made according to the image of God. And so we image God essentially, ultimately by conforming to Jesus. And we conform to Jesus as we learn how to care for earth and animals. As we developed certain cultural possibilities that reflect the goodness and the beauty of God as we live in a loving communion with each other, with other image bears.
Speaker 1 00:02:20 And ultimately, as we conform to Jesus in suffering and death, which is the ultimate example of self giving love. In this episode, we're gonna dive deeper and look at the question, how do we reflect God when we ourselves struggle with sin? So as we discussed in the last episode, humanity was made to reflect the goodness of God and his creation, but humanity rebelled. And they decided to define for themselves what is good and evil. And this led to chaos, this led to sin, and that's why we have a sinful chaotic world today. That's why we have drunk drivers who Ram into people at 60 miles an hour and kill them. That's why we have people cheating one another. That's why we have broken relationships where, where it's unreconciled is because sin is unleashed in the world. And now the process of being reconciled back to God is when those of us who are part of the race that rebelled now willingly surrender and choose to be conformed to Jesus, who is the image of God.
Speaker 1 00:03:29 And we now in the midst of this chaotic world begin reflecting God's goodness and beauty in imaging God, again in creation. Well, how do we do that? When we, even though we've repented, we're filled with the spirit of God, continue to struggle with sin, whether it's habitual sin, or maybe just every now and then have this issue of bitterness or anger that we're dealing with. How do we reflect God when we're still sinful? Even though we're bought with the blood of Jesus, we're our eternal destiny is secure. How do we reflect God in this broken world? When we struggle with sin, that's what we're gonna dive into in this episode. So
Speaker 1 00:04:33 If you followed my work for long, you know, that the, the book that I've written is on sexual purity, sexual freedom. And you're, you're probably familiar with my journey into sexual addiction, sexual failure, and out of that into freedom, uh, live free, making sense of male sexuality. That's the title of my book, if you're new, to new to me. But one of the things that I talk about in that book, which I have found to be true of any major sin that I'm dealing with. So I genuinely have a level of freedom sexually that I did not have 10 or 12 years ago. And I praise God for that. I'm grateful for that. But I, I experience struggles with sin now that have to do with patience, impatience, and, and maybe a quick tempered ness, where if things aren't going my way, then I quickly feel anger.
Speaker 1 00:05:29 That's still sin. And it's something that it comes I'm, I'm on the phone with someone it's a customer relation sort of thing. I'm the customer they're, they're trying or should be trying to get my business, or maybe I'm in a business and they're not being very helpful. I, I can feel myself get very impatient very quickly. And that's sin. That's not godliness. That's, that's not what we are called to as people who are to image God, particularly be conformed to Jesus whose patient and loving and long suffering. And I feel the same thing that I felt when I was really struggling with sexual sin. And, and that is, it, it, it, it just felt a part of me. I couldn't, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't stop it. And how do I like, I, I repent of it. I'm sorry. I believe I'm saved.
Speaker 1 00:06:22 I don't think I'm headed for hell because I'm not living in this willfully, but I'm not reflecting or imaging God when I'm, whether it's sexual sin or getting upset at people because things don't go my way. And so we, as Christians, as we try to follow God, as we try to image him in this chaotic world, we're still no matter how much we want to image God, we're, we still feel this struggle where we end up kind of acting like the rest of the world. And I'm sure some of you have even wrestled with faith. And is this even real? Because you look at other Christians and it, it looks like they're just as bad as wrong and sinful as people in the world. And so is Jesus actually real? Does he actually change lives? That can be very disillusioning, very disconcerting for those of us wrestling with our faith or those of us struggling with the sin.
Speaker 1 00:07:22 And so this, this question is real. I'm sure I'm sure you've had it. How do we experience transformation? Because it couldn't it, I think we all know that one of the most beautiful things to the world would be to, for them to see us be transformed. And then they'd be like, wow, what's going on. But if you're like me, you can, you can spend several years struggling with this thing. And no matter how many prayers you prayed through, no matter how many doors of the past, past sin, past things you were involved with, you pray through and repent of you still kind of struggle with this and that's not giving glory to God. Is it? I think something we have to be careful too, is, is some branches of Christianity can, can, we can find ways to push the blame on something else, generational issues, what our, what we saw growing up, what our parents saw growing up habits that are passed down through generations.
Speaker 1 00:08:22 Like that's a real thing that's, but that doesn't mean our parents are to blame for the issues. And another thing that can sometimes be discussed is, is this notion of like generational strongholds that maybe a family member years ago opened themselves up to a stronghold that the devil has taken advantage of. And now has that throughout and generations. And I think we need to be very careful with that kind of philosophy. And partly because it's not super clear in scripture that that's even a thing. Uh, we think of Exodus 34, where God says he will visit the iniquities to the third and fourth generation. That's simply meaning that he's going to, to the third and fourth generation, when there is sin, continuing, he's gonna continue to visit and, and bring a level of punishment. And because punishment is the doorway to reconciliation, it's the doorway to redemption, and he wants his people to be freed.
Speaker 1 00:09:18 And so he's not gonna let the generations just continue in sin. He's going to come and punish them and invite them to turn to him. Um, and, and some people think that means that there's, I may be struggling with a sin because of something my grandpa did years ago. And I think that has a way of shifting blame. And I know from conversations I've had with people that, that, that can actually turn people off to God because it's like Christians always have an excuse for their problems, right? I, they need Jesus. But when, when, and, and I'm speaking as if like I'm my secular friend or whatever, it's like you say, I need Jesus, but when I point out issues in your lives and you have some excuse for it. And the reality is that as the human race, we are sinful and we need to live in a, in an attitude of repentance at all times, cuz we do still sin.
Speaker 1 00:10:14 Even those of us with the first fruits of the spirit. And I at point to Romans eight, if you want a reference for that specifically in Romans eight 18 through the end of the chapter, but specifically through verse 30, Paul is talking about how the all of creation is subjected to futility because it's being held in bondage, corruption and so mean it's gonna waste away. We're gonna die. The earth is, is wasting away because it's, God's grace, we've unleashed sin in creation and we're no longer imaging the goodness and glory of God. And so God decides that this is gonna be temporary because he wants to restore all things and unite all things in Jesus Christ. But he talks about this groaning in itself because of the bondage of corruption. And, and as we see in verse 23, and it says, Paul says not only the creation, but we ourselves who have the first fruits of the spirit grown inwardly, as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies for in this hope we are saved.
Speaker 1 00:11:20 Now hope that is seen is not hope for who hopes for what he sees. That's we know that to be a reality, but if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patients. And that means that we, we are waiting for this redemption. We don't feel it. We don't see it, but we're hoping for it. And one day, even those of us filled with the first roots of the spirit, feel this groaning. And one day we're going to be fully conformed to Jesus as he goes on to say in, in verse 29. And so we need to be careful that we don't push a blame. We even filled with the spirit of God are gonna struggle with sin. Now we may have taken on the habits that we saw passed down throughout generations, but we still, as sinful beings took that on.
Speaker 1 00:12:12 But this brings us back to the question, how do we begin to reflect God when we are continuing to struggle with sin? And I'd like to show us something. So we looked at creation in the last episode where we discussed being made in the image of God. Well, as we ended, we aren't imaging God, we're creating chaos. Sin is unleashed things. Don't look very good. So God enters a covenant with people. When we think of the gospel, we need to start with creation. And then we should think of covenant that God has covenanted with his people. Now, if you think in this, I, I recently heard this analogy that, that I really like. And that is if you think of the work of Jesus in redeeming humanity in, in redeeming creation, think of a child cotton quick sand. Now, if, if a child is in quick sand, he's not gonna be able to get himself out.
Speaker 1 00:13:15 He, he tries to dig himself out. He only gets in deeper. If someone comes along and tries to pull them out, sometimes that can be hard too. You it's, it's hard to get good leverage and the way to get out of quicksand. And the, the person using this illustration had just had this happen to their child. And so they were like, wow, that's a good analogy for what Jesus does is you gotta get in, you pick the child up, wrap them into your arms. And then you, as the bigger adult who can handle this, this little spot of quick sand, carry the child out. And so if we think GE of Jesus as being the, the adult, the parent who comes to grab us, the kids and pull out of the quick sand and quick sand, which is corruption and sinfulness and, and just the sin that is unleashed because we chose to define good and evil for ourselves instead of trusting God and imaging him and creation.
Speaker 1 00:14:14 If you think of Jesus as the parent entering the quick sand and then wrapping us to his body, taking us in and then carrying us out, that process is the covenant, God making a covenant with his people, a covenant with creation. And this is how he's going to bring about redemption. I'm not gonna walk through specific passages in this episode, but I would like you, I would encourage you to look up Genesis 12. So as we looked at, in the last episode we discussed how creation is Genesis one and two. And then in three through 11, it just shows the, the fall and how man decided not to image God, man, man, decided to choose for themselves. What is good, evil, and end up reflecting themselves. But actually also reflecting the beast almost more than anything. And sin is unleashed and Genesis 12, the whole story shifts. And now God shows up. And this man named Abram shows up and God enters this covenant Genesis 12 through 18. You'll see the process of calling Abraham, defining the covenant and then entering the covenant. And God's covenant with Abraham demonstrates his desire for all peoples to be blessed. He says, I'm going to raise you up to be a blessing to all nations. And that in you, all the nations, all peoples will be blessed. God's covenant with Abraham reveals human's need for God to restore them.
Speaker 1 00:16:01 And if you think of God's covenant with Abraham, just think with me as the whole story of the Hebrew, people from Genesis 12, where God calls Abraham, he calls the family, the Jewish family. It's not called Jews at that time, but later becomes the people of Jacob and eventually Jews. This special family is called to demonstrate the covenantal relationship with God that God wants to have with all people. But what we see in this family is that even though they know what they're supposed to do, and even though God is with them in their presence and they have access to him through the tabernacle, they continue to sin. They continue to reflect the evil of the beast. They continue to just image themselves and fail to image. God, obviously they don't conform to Jesus. They don't even really realize they need a Messiah. And it's through the covenant with Abraham that, that we see humans need Jesus, humans need God to restore them.
Speaker 1 00:17:11 And specifically we see this in Genesis 15, where God goes through the ritual that is very common in the ancient near east to enter covenants with each other. You cut animals and birds in half and you lay 'em on either side. And then you enter down through and you say, if I fail to keep my side of the covenant, may me and my people become like these animals here may me and my kingdom be destroyed just like this. And in Genesis 15 only God does the ritual. He does not ask a Abraham to go through that ritual as so God from the very onset is saying, you know what? I know that you cannot restore yourself. I'm gonna restore you. And this is how committed I am to restoring you. And as we alluded to earlier, God's covenanted people show the cosmic struggle of whether or not we trust God.
Speaker 1 00:18:09 That's the old Testament story, right? You read the, the story of Joshua judges first and second, Samuel, you all the prophets. We see that the people of Israel continue to rebel against God. They choose to go their own way when they're pinched, when they're back in a corner and when they really need God, then they're committed to God. But when things are going well, and you know, it seems like they have the leverage to kind of choose for themselves. They do whatever seems wise in their own eyes. And that's the story of humanity. That's the cosmic struggle that we as humans are dealing with. As we navigate, we're told we are commissioned. We're created to image God and creation, but we're constantly struggling with this conflict of whether or not we trust God. And when we choose, when we don't trust God, we end up imaging ourselves and just kind of living in sin and reflecting the beast.
Speaker 1 00:19:05 Then in Jeremiah, we get a picture of something new that God is gonna do. He's been alluding this. Isaiah alluded to it as well, but God is gonna make a new covenant where he writes his laws on the people's hearts. And he's gonna do something new where everyone who look on him and believe in him, can experience relationship a covenanted relationship with him. And that's the new covenant that is through Jesus Christ. We see when Jesus, inaugurates the Lords supper. He says, this is the new covenant of blood in Luke 22, verse 20. Not only is Jesus giving us peace with God, Romans five one, but he's also showing us what it looks like to image God. Now we have before us, the person of Jesus, of the, the one who gives and cares for those who cannot care for himself, who cannot care for him in return.
Speaker 1 00:20:07 The one who joyfully does the father's will the one who enacts justice and peace in the world around us, who cares for the most vulnerable instead of taking advantage of them, the one who proclaims the way of the Lord and then walks in the way of the Lord. We see in the person of Jesus, what it looks like to reflect God and through Jesus, because of what he did for us in pulling us out of the quick San, enabling us to walk in the way of the kingdom. We can image God. Again, we reflect God by coming into covenantal relationship Jesus, walking in a trusting relationship with Yahweh. And now here's what I really want you to catch learning to image God. When we ourselves are struggling with sin is not about becoming perfect so that we aren't sinful anymore, that we don't demonstrate sin.
Speaker 1 00:21:12 Imaging. God, when we're still struggling with sin is learning to rewire our trust mechanism. Are we gonna trust ourselves or are we gonna trust God? This means that when we have sinned, we repent. We don't hide behind our reputation. We don't try to present, but, but we repent because we trust that through repentance, we can be restored and, and, and there will be a blessing and a freedom that comes. And so I repent. I will fully repent. I don't wait until I'm caught. I repent. Or the, the community of God's covenanted people through Jesus Christ should be a community that regularly repents when repentance is no longer happening in your church, you should be nervous. You should question whether you're imaging God, or are you guys kind of imaging yourselves or kind of trying to gesture the way of Jesus without the power of Jesus, because we are sinful people.
Speaker 1 00:22:12 It's like our kids, our kids are gonna see us in our sin, even though we may try to hide even to them, but especially to the rest of the world, that somehow we're not sinful. We are a sinful people and people looking in, they can tell that we're not really fooling anybody. We might be fooling ourselves, but the, the people of God ought to be a people of repentance. I think of Jesus in Luke five where he said, I have not called, I have not come to call the righteous, but I've come to call sinners to repentance later on in that book in chapter 15, he says there is more joy in heaven, over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous people and what Jesus is doing. He's trying to depict that. Just, just repent, like be a person of repentance is think of the parable that of the, of the SCR, the people, the two people who went to prey, you had the, the tax collector and the Pharisee and the tax collector is banging his chest.
Speaker 1 00:23:14 Oh God have mercy on me, a sinner. And the described as standing there praying self righteously, ultimately, as we conform to Jesus, we're gonna become righteous people. And so Jesus is not saying I don't care about righteousness. Jesus is saying the way too true righteousness is through repentance. Not self-righteousness not gesturing as if we're righteous people, but we're not actively repenting. We are a sinful people. We're not better than the people of Israel. And they repeatedly rebelled against God. And so the path towards reflecting God in the midst of a broken world is through repentance. We cannot do that. We cannot reflect God when we're still struggling with sin. We cannot reflect God without a habit and a rhythm of repentance. God have mercy on us. We are sinners. Think of first Corinthians, uh, second Corinthians seven, where Paul says godly grief produces repentance. That leads to salvation without regret.
Speaker 1 00:24:22 So sometimes we may be feeling guilt. Uh, I let God down or I let someone down. And so we, we repent. We say, I'm sorry, that might look like repentance, but we're trying to just quickly fix everything and make it right. But true conviction, godly grief is gonna lead to a, a true repentance where we walk in the way of the king. And, and there's no regret. Our conscience is clear and we, we don't have to worry about whether I got all, all the things that I did wrong towards people. Are they holding that against me or whatever? Like we're just living in a state of repentance and somebody brings up an issue. We don't try to defend ourselves or become too self righteous, but I mean, maybe we'll have a dialogue about it and try to understand, but ultimately that we live with an attitude of repentance. And this leads to the second thing that I would like to point out. That is the story of humanity throughout the biblical narrative is not a story of their success. It's actually a, a story of continual failure.
Speaker 1 00:25:36 The story of humanity is a story of God's glory and wisdom in his plan to reconcile all things. And if you wanna sit just in a passage that unpacks that further, go read Ephesians one through three, we show God's goodness and wisdom by our progress. Just to bring this home a little bit more I'd I'd like to take you to first Timothy chapter three, where Paul talks about the qualifications for church leaders in the next chapter in chapter four, he's given some final exertion to Timothy. He says command and teach these things. Everything that he's been teaching, the, the, he frames his qualifications for church leaders, but are really what the whole community of God's people should be pursuing. He says, let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers. In example, in your speech and conduct and love and faith and purity until I come to vote yourself to the public reading of scripture, to exoration to teaching, do not neglect the gift that you have, which was given you by prophecy.
Speaker 1 00:26:42 When the council of elders lead their hands on you, practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress. Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching persist in this for, by so doing, you will save both yourself and your hears notice. Paul did not say practice these things immerse these yourself in them so that everyone would see your perfect example and be drawn to God. Rather. He said, so that all may see your progress. Compare that to Hebrews five, where the author of Hebrew set is talking about the high priest who can deal gently with the ignorant in the wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness. So there's a picture being given here that even the, the people who are to be an example to the believers they're leaders, but their example is not to be in some gesturing of perfection, but it's to be an example of the progress of being conformed to Jesus.
Speaker 1 00:27:48 You see, we reflect God and we reflect as goodness, not by being God right now. We're not God. We are his created beings. We reflect God when we ourselves are struggling with sin, by the progress we make in conforming to Jesus. As we live lives of repentance and a willingness to suffer, denying ourselves, following Jesus, I made the most progress in sexual freedom. When I began to view freedom and victory, not as how many days I go without sin, but rather just being settled in the fact that Jesus is sinless. Jesus has gone eternity without sin. And so I rest in the work that Jesus did for me. And now I am learning to pattern my life and my way of thinking after Jesus, so that I begin to look like him. Some of us will have breakthrough moments where it seems like we overcome a sinful habit overnight, and that's amazing.
Speaker 1 00:29:01 That's wonderful. That's beautiful. But some of us, we will continue to struggle over and over and over again. And sometimes what angers us. If you're like me, what can anger you is just the fact that you continue to struggle. And what I'm learning to rest in is that my kids who are now seeing me struggle with patients and I a quick tempered nest, when things aren't going quite right, they're going to see God not they're. They're not gonna see him more by if dad is, is just perfect. And there's no problem because that can end up creating self-righteousness. They're going to see God if dad is repentant and when dad can see the sin and repent of it and to demonstrate and model and just invite as a family that we come before, the throne of God and grace, and we are needing Messiah. If get, if dad is confronted with people and he humbles himself and repents, they see that.
Speaker 1 00:30:04 And then as there's repentance, there is a genuine freedom and a deepening piece. And, and over the life span, I think we all can think of people, hopefully who have modeled that where they, they pro they progressed in their faith and in their lifestyle as they lived humble repentant lives. I think of second Corinthians three 18, where Paul says we all with unveiled face beholding, the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image. Jesus, from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord who is the spirit. It's a spiritual work that happens from the inside out. And it happens not by trying to get our behaviors just right. It happens by beholding the glory of the Lord and resting in what he has done for us. Not as an excuse, we take full responsibility of what we're doing, and we repent of it regularly with a regular rhythm, but a repentance leads us to worship and worship is that posture of beholding the glory of the Lord.
Speaker 1 00:31:23 And it is through that process that we begin to image God again, in the middle of chaos, God's not looking for perfect people. He's looking for repentant people for humble people, whom he can show himself strong through, and then everyone else will look and see the progress and they'll be drawn to that. And that's how we image God again. And there's a lot of specifics about being like Jesus. As we relate with our neighbors, as we relate in marriage relationships or other family relationships, as we relate with work, people we work for, or people who work for us, Jesus has modeled how to demonstrate what it looks like to live, to live out justice and righteousness in a world where we really kind of, without Jesus are trying to get everything for ourselves, but we can't do that. We can't genuinely enter a state of being where we are becoming like Jesus, without regular repentance.
Speaker 1 00:32:28 In the next lesson, we're gonna look at how Christians are called to make disciples not converts. I think in this conversation, we can focus. So often sometimes on making converts, making new people. We can add new numbers to the church or to our, our list or whatever. And we forget that we're actually not called to make converts. We're called to make disciples. And discipleship is a long, messy process, and there's gonna be struggle. There's gonna be that inward groaning and realizing our continual sinful nature. There's gonna need to be a rhythm of repentance. If there's converts. We, you know, we don't, we have these new lives, we kind of switch these new lives. And then we just kind of claim our new state in Jesus. And we just, I guess, ignore like the, the, the fallen brokenness of ourselves. But when we think in terms of discipleship, all of a sudden we're thinking like, man, I'm I don't, I look so far from Jesus. Why is that
Speaker 0 00:33:37 Here?
Speaker 1 00:33:39 It brings us to repentancy invites us, gives us the opportunity to repent. And that's this concept of kingdom. The gospel is about creation. God's good design. And then covenants, how he is redeeming creation. And then the kingdom who is the collective people who live out life, where they are fully committed to Jesus.
