Speaker 1: You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Speaker 2: Competition, just like any other aspect of life, can be
Speaker 2: either healthy or unhealthy depending on the application. Make no
Speaker 2: mistake about it. Competition is at the heart of the
Speaker 2: human experience, and that's a good thing. The desire to
Speaker 2: press on, to push forward. That competitive spirit is definitely
Speaker 2: of God. But as a Christian, it must be applied
Speaker 2: to your life in a godly fashion. If not, it
Speaker 2: can take a hold of you. It can be become
Speaker 2: something altogether different in your life, something that becomes problematic,
Speaker 2: even harmful. Competition is certainly in the air today, and
Speaker 2: you can feel this excitement as millions of Americans and
Speaker 2: people from all over the world really gather around their
Speaker 2: TVs with this anticipation of their team securing the win. Now,
Speaker 2: the very definition of competition means a contest in which
Speaker 2: a winner is selected from among two or more entrants.
Speaker 2: So this means by that definition that there will there'll
Speaker 2: be a winner, and of course they'll be a loser.
Speaker 2: So in a case like the Super Bowl, competition is
Speaker 2: that propellant. It propels each member of the opposing team
Speaker 2: to train, to work hard so that they may excel
Speaker 2: in their performance for this particular big game or any game.
Speaker 1: This oftentimes.
Speaker 2: I know that athletics can go down an unhealthy path
Speaker 2: at times, but more often than not, this is a
Speaker 2: healthy display of the competitive spirit, that spirit that does
Speaker 2: push you, that does propel makes you want to be better,
Speaker 2: not so you're better than the other person in some
Speaker 2: sort of state of judgment that they're actually less than you,
Speaker 2: but that competitive spirit, that ability to push on and
Speaker 2: push forward and build your muscles stronger, make yourself quicker,
Speaker 2: be able to be more accurate when throwing a ball,
Speaker 2: when catching a ball, That all these things are about
Speaker 2: training your body by way of discipline, to do beneficial things. So,
Speaker 2: if you're involved in sports, and today's obviously a huge
Speaker 2: sports day, that many of you watching the Big Game
Speaker 2: are really focused on the fact that this is a
Speaker 2: place where athletes come together to push themselves beyond normal
Speaker 2: limits to achieve a goal. That's the competitive spirit in
Speaker 2: a healthy place. But there is an unhealthy side to
Speaker 2: competition as well, one that drives people by way of
Speaker 2: jealousy and envy that only leads to despair and destruction.
Speaker 2: This is not the competitive spirit, but the spirit of
Speaker 2: pride and conceit. The Father certainly does not approve of
Speaker 2: this kind of competition, James four to six says, but
Speaker 2: he gives more grace. Therefore, it says, God opposes the proud,
Speaker 2: but gives grace to the humble. Giving that grace to
Speaker 2: the humble is showing that there there is a place
Speaker 2: for you to be competitive, but to still be in
Speaker 2: that that that place of humility, knowing that you're pushing
Speaker 2: your limits, knowing that that as a creation of God,
Speaker 2: that I designed you to desire to propel yourself and excel,
Speaker 2: but to also be of a humble spirit. Because when
Speaker 2: you latch onto pride, when you get to that place
Speaker 2: of pride, you invite ugliness, that jealousy, that justice. It's
Speaker 2: not even it's not even competition. It's just you wanting
Speaker 2: to push others down, to push yourself forward. Says if
Speaker 2: you would lie, cheater steel to get to that place,
Speaker 2: it doesn't even matter how you get there. And to
Speaker 2: the real athlete, to the real individual with the proper
Speaker 2: competitive spirit, you want to do things right, you don't
Speaker 2: do it the right way, it doesn't count. These two
Speaker 2: different paths or patterns of competition can be seen throughout
Speaker 2: all kinds of walks of life, not just in athletics.
Speaker 2: But you can see where people tried to even apply
Speaker 2: athletics in a positive way, when when even the world
Speaker 2: itself was teetering from wars and arguments and ugliness. The
Speaker 2: original Olympics were abolished in three ninety three a d.
Speaker 2: But if you look and see the timeline, you'll see
Speaker 2: that about fifteen hundred years later, in the eighteen nineties,
Speaker 2: a young Frenchman actually set out to revive the Olympics,
Speaker 2: and he used this pitch. Let us export our oarsmen,
Speaker 2: our runners, our fencers into other lands. That is the
Speaker 2: true free trade of the future, and the day it
Speaker 2: is introduced into Europe, the cause of peace will have
Speaker 2: received a new.
Speaker 1: And strong ally.
Speaker 2: This young visionary saw the importance of replacing the negative
Speaker 2: the inter country competition of war, with a new, healthy
Speaker 2: inter country competition centered on athleticism, a tradition that continues
Speaker 2: with the Olympics even to this day. This points to
Speaker 2: someone who desired a healthy form of competition. This young
Speaker 2: man saw that the competitive spirit had moved from a
Speaker 2: place of learning, of discipline, of growing in understanding, and
Speaker 2: had become this jealous or prideful excuse for war. He thought,
Speaker 2: instead of countries actually fighting against each other, tearing each
Speaker 2: other down, why not compete in a healthy way, propelling
Speaker 2: one another by way of competition. God wants you to
Speaker 2: have a healthy competitive heart, one that pushes you to win,
Speaker 2: but also to win righteously, to be in a place
Speaker 2: where you win at all costs, and that it's really
Speaker 2: not about the challenge itself, but it's more about putting
Speaker 2: yourself on a pedestal, making yourself look better than someone else,
Speaker 2: putting someone else down. How is God going to How
Speaker 2: is God going to bless that? Why would God bless that?
Speaker 2: You hear stories of sportsmanship, good healthy sportsmanship, and you
Speaker 2: hear stories of ugliness. There's even penalties on the field
Speaker 2: in all in all types of sports because of bad
Speaker 2: sportsmanship or not playing by the rules. That's why the
Speaker 2: referees are there right to look on the judge the
Speaker 2: movements on the field to see who is winning fairly,
Speaker 2: because that's what should dictate whether the win is worth anything.
Speaker 2: So you have this competitive spirit you want God to bless.
Speaker 2: But if you go about pursuing the things you want
Speaker 2: in life, pushing yourself in a way that is healthy.
Speaker 2: God will be there by your side the entirety of
Speaker 2: the way, coaching, instructing, encouraging. However, if you push the
Speaker 2: rules aside, only being in that place of pride, only
Speaker 2: desiring this so called win, that is when it becomes
Speaker 2: an ungodly spirit of competition. Lisa, Welcome to the Jesus
Speaker 2: Christ Show. Thank you.
Speaker 3: My question is should Christians pat through their bodies?
Speaker 1: Well? Should they? Or can they? Should they?
Speaker 3: Into scriptures?
Speaker 1: Should they? Should they?
Speaker 2: Is going to be an individual choice because there's nothing
Speaker 2: in the Bible that says they cannot. There is Leviticus
Speaker 2: nineteen goes through some religious laws that some people get
Speaker 2: confused about. That says, in verse twenty eight, you shall
Speaker 2: not make any cuts in your body for the dead,
Speaker 2: nor make any tattoo marks on yourselves.
Speaker 1: I am the Lord.
Speaker 2: The verse there is actually talking about a practice. As
Speaker 2: a matter of fact, most of these in Leviticus are
Speaker 2: talking about a practice that the Pagans were doing that
Speaker 2: our Jewish brothers and sisters didn't want to be associated
Speaker 2: with and wanted us to look as different as possible
Speaker 2: from them, And this would fall into the same.
Speaker 1: Category.
Speaker 2: Now, people that have problems with it, would have problems
Speaker 2: with other parts of it too, because just above it
Speaker 2: it says you shall not round off the side growth
Speaker 2: of your head, nor harm the edges of your beard.
Speaker 2: So if you shaved, you'd be falling into the same
Speaker 2: category of tattoos. Then also, the word used for cut
Speaker 2: would be the same that you'd use for pierce. So
Speaker 2: any woman that pierces her ears would now have problems.
Speaker 2: So any man that shaves, or any woman that pierces
Speaker 2: her ears would now have a problem, not just the tattooing.
Speaker 2: So really, when it's speaking about tattooing here, it's not
Speaker 2: it's speaking about a process that was done to the
Speaker 2: dead or for the dead by Pagans, and that it
Speaker 2: should not be brought to pass by Christians. But having
Speaker 2: a tattoo for a Christian is not inherently wrong. It
Speaker 2: depends on the content, of course, but it's not inherently
Speaker 2: wrong for a Christian to have a tattoo.
Speaker 1: All right, thank you, you're welcome.
Speaker 2: How come I got the impression that maybe that's not
Speaker 2: the answer she was looking for. Sometimes pick up on subtleties,
Speaker 2: tiny little subtleties.
Speaker 1: That's kind of what I do here.
Speaker 2: But the Bible is filled with many things, and the
Speaker 2: best advice I can give you is to see that
Speaker 2: the entirety of the Bible and understand that there's a
Speaker 2: difference between prescription and description. These are two very important
Speaker 2: principles I want you to hear, and I want you
Speaker 2: to understand the difference between a difference between prescriptive language
Speaker 2: and descriptive language. Descriptive language is Jesus woke walked up
Speaker 2: a hill. Now if I walked up a hill, I
Speaker 2: walked up a hill. There's nothing really to be done.
Speaker 2: It's describing something that happened. If it's prescriptive, there's an admonishment,
Speaker 2: there's a statement of understanding, this is what you should
Speaker 2: or this is what you should not do. And with
Speaker 2: the Christian it gets even more difficult because now you
Speaker 2: are looking into what you refer to as the Old Testament,
Speaker 2: and you're seeing things in there that are based on
Speaker 2: context of things that were going into the lives of
Speaker 2: our Jewish brothers and sisters, and they were trying to
Speaker 2: abolish appearing to look like your average every day he
Speaker 2: then who did whatever. There most certainly are rules to
Speaker 2: live by, and scripture is filled with them filled with plenty,
Speaker 2: oh polenty. There's more than ten commandments. Let me assure
Speaker 2: you it's not just ten. There are over four hundred
Speaker 2: commandments in scripture, and to hear those and to respond
Speaker 2: to them is wonderful. However, don't get lost. Don't get
Speaker 2: lost in some of the statements, some of the descriptions
Speaker 2: of things going on, and assume them to be prescribed
Speaker 2: telling you you must because there is a difference, and
Speaker 2: there's some that have been pulled over through the entirety
Speaker 2: of scripture. The context is going to be important in
Speaker 2: those places as well. That's the key, Jack, Welcome to
Speaker 2: the Jesus Christia. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Hi, I just got a quick question about this thing
Speaker 3: called lordship salvation and non lordship salvation, where the lordship
Speaker 3: salvation guys believe that genuine saying faith includes the Williams
Speaker 3: repent from one sin and submit to the lordship of Christ.
Speaker 3: And then the non lordship guys say they don't see
Speaker 3: repentance from and the willingness to submit to Jesus's lordship
Speaker 3: is essential for salvation. And that I got into a
Speaker 3: conversation with the guy and he said that that by
Speaker 3: me telling someone or by Christians telling someone to repent
Speaker 3: from their sins and submit to the lordship of Christ.
Speaker 3: That's adding works to the Gospel. So I want to
Speaker 3: ask you what your thoughts were on that.
Speaker 1: No, it's not adding works to the Gospel. Here's the thing.
Speaker 2: And a lot of people get confused based on what
Speaker 2: happened versus what had to happen. For instance, people talk
Speaker 2: about Judas. Should it be put on Judas. Here's this
Speaker 2: major plan, this big plan. It's going to go down,
Speaker 2: it's going to put me on the cross, it's going
Speaker 2: to cover the sins of the world, and everything's going
Speaker 2: to be taken care of. So why would people look
Speaker 2: down on Judas? He just helped it along. Well, because
Speaker 2: Judas as an individual, specifically decided to jump in and
Speaker 2: to participate in a specific way, and it really felt,
Speaker 2: you know, kind of whittled down to the fact that
Speaker 2: he wanted things to be done sooner. So when it
Speaker 2: comes to things that are going to be done, there's
Speaker 2: a difference between somebody who is trying to create fire
Speaker 2: by flapping their wings versus the passing along of a torch.
Speaker 1: And really, when you're going.
Speaker 2: To spread the gospel or share about any of that
Speaker 2: you're just passing the torch. But it's the flame of
Speaker 2: God always, and it's not something it's not a work
Speaker 2: that you yourself can build upon. You can't bring somebody
Speaker 2: to the salvation of Christ.
Speaker 1: You can't.
Speaker 2: Right God does, and God will use you in that process.
Speaker 2: So when it says that no man should boast, it
Speaker 2: means there's no bedposts that you can put those notches
Speaker 2: of how many people you share the gospel and who've
Speaker 2: come to know the gospel through because they're not yours.
Speaker 2: They're not yours. So there is no works in that context. Now,
Speaker 2: the lordship salvation, uh has you know, some nooks and crannies.
Speaker 2: In the basic line of things, it comes down to,
Speaker 2: you're receiving God. It's not about you the things you've
Speaker 2: done wrong. It's about how good God is.
Speaker 1: It's not about.
Speaker 2: Anything that you've done. It's not even about what the
Speaker 2: good you've done. It's about who God is. And that's
Speaker 2: that's the simplicity of it.
Speaker 3: When you talk about repentance, right, yes, a lot of
Speaker 3: people get confused. I get confused on it. But as
Speaker 3: repentance more like a change of a heart, it's not
Speaker 3: really necessarily an act always so, so like we're saved
Speaker 3: when we get saved, we're saved from half sins, present sins,
Speaker 3: and future sins. Is that right?
Speaker 1: Yes, of course, but so.
Speaker 3: So these lordships are the non lordship guys go, well,
Speaker 3: it's impossible not to sin. Is you're gonna sin until
Speaker 3: you get into heaven. But that doesn't give you a
Speaker 3: license to sin. So there's like a fine line there
Speaker 3: or or do you understand what I'm trying to get across?
Speaker 2: Of course, they were arguing in the in this in
Speaker 2: two Timothy, I mean it's it's not new. The whole
Speaker 2: point is are you a good guy?
Speaker 1: You good guy?
Speaker 3: Jack?
Speaker 2: And I don't mean in the biblical sense. I mean
Speaker 2: you don't go out murdering and raping in any of
Speaker 2: those things? Right, No, okay, so that's just not who
Speaker 2: you are. So I come to you tomorrow and I say, hey,
Speaker 2: I'm doing this thing. We're gonna shut down any any
Speaker 2: access to law enforcement tomorrow in your area. There's gonna
Speaker 2: be no video cameras, there's gonna be no way for
Speaker 2: them to find out. And I just wanted you to know.
Speaker 2: And you found that out, Are you going to go
Speaker 2: out raping and pillaging because you're not gonna get caught.
Speaker 1: No, no, because it's not your nature.
Speaker 2: There's no such thing as a as a get out
Speaker 2: of jail free card. The whole point here is the
Speaker 2: assumption of the world is, oh, you're gonna you've got
Speaker 2: this high life now and you can do whatever you want,
Speaker 2: and God's gonna love you. God's always loved everyone, right,
Speaker 2: That's always been the theme that hasn't changed. Now the
Speaker 2: reconciliation is different. The reconciliation knows that get to heaven
Speaker 2: is different. So those that have this so called free
Speaker 2: they do whatever they want just as long as they
Speaker 2: believe they wouldn't misuse it. By the very definition of
Speaker 2: what it is. If a kid goes out and gets
Speaker 2: new cars from his family and every single time crashes
Speaker 2: it and goes, oh, well, not only does that kid
Speaker 2: not appreciate that car, that kid does not have any
Speaker 2: feelings for his family, right, And that's different than just
Speaker 2: a family going you crash the car, It's bound to happen.
Speaker 2: At least you're okay, come on, let's take care of
Speaker 2: you and then we'll talk about the car.
Speaker 3: There.
Speaker 2: It's a matter you've got either allegiance, which is going
Speaker 2: to be bumpy allegiance because because you're human, you're going
Speaker 2: to stand versus rebellion, which is you specifically ignoring the Gospel,
Speaker 2: ignoring the word of God, the will of God, and
Speaker 2: doing whatever you want. And they're two different things, and
Speaker 2: trust me, they have two different endings. You can't rebel
Speaker 2: yourself away from the knowledge of God. You can ignore
Speaker 2: what He has for you to the point of death.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of ways to reject. But as a Christian,
Speaker 2: it's not about you. It's about God, right, and not
Speaker 2: how bad you are, but how good God is. Every
Speaker 2: other religion, every one of them, Jack is always focused
Speaker 2: on man. Oh man is going to receive christ consciousness,
Speaker 2: or man is going to receive total consciousness, or man
Speaker 2: is going to be so high he's gonna These are weird,
Speaker 2: wanna be God things. Christianity is the only one that
Speaker 2: says nah and man, even good man doesn't do it
Speaker 2: very well. So God is going to send his son,
Speaker 2: and his son's going to step in and be the bridge.
Speaker 3: So someone could be saved and still struggle with sin.
Speaker 2: Right of course, okay, of course, what the perfection is
Speaker 2: going to be in heaven when it's washed away finally.
Speaker 2: But there, of course you're going to have sin. There's
Speaker 2: not one preacher, not you know, one Bible thumper, one
Speaker 2: Bible reader. There's not one that isn't struggling. And there
Speaker 2: isn't one in the Bible either.
Speaker 3: These are the same guys. They'll bring up Matthew seven
Speaker 3: to one. You know about not judging, and I go,
Speaker 3: I told the guy, so, well, you can judge actions,
Speaker 3: but we can't really judge the heart. Is that a
Speaker 3: correct statement.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, it's a you know what you tell me
Speaker 2: someone that is upset because you said they looked good, Hey,
Speaker 2: you look really nice tonight. That's a judgment. Not one
Speaker 2: person goes, don't judge me, They go, ah, thanks, right,
Speaker 2: judgment is fine judgment. What in scripture, the judgment that
Speaker 2: they did not want was met with this newfound understanding
Speaker 2: of who God was and how it interacted with their life.
Speaker 2: They didn't want them running around saying I am better
Speaker 2: than I am somehow closer to God than you, And
Speaker 2: that was what was wrong. Trying to read men's hearts,
Speaker 2: that's what was vulgart. That was the problem, not saying, hey,
Speaker 2: that whole pipe you have in your mouth. Yeah, the
Speaker 2: one you're smoking crack with. That's bad. Don't judge me.
Speaker 2: I will judge you plenty. Louis Welcome to the Jesus
Speaker 2: Christ Show.
Speaker 3: Yes, I have.
Speaker 4: I'm confused when I go to Mass and I listened
Speaker 4: to the Apostle Creed where it indicates Jesus descends into Hell,
Speaker 4: and I'm confused, and I don't understand rightly.
Speaker 1: So it is a little confusing.
Speaker 2: And really what it has to do is that there's
Speaker 2: many words that are translated as Hell, but they do
Speaker 2: mean different things depending on how they're used, one of
Speaker 2: which is Shiol. Sheol simply means the place of the
Speaker 2: dead or the place of the departed souls or spirits.
Speaker 2: In the New Testament, it's well, in the New Testament,
Speaker 2: the equivalent of Shiol is actually Hades, So Hades is
Speaker 2: the place of the dead, and that's what's being spoken about,
Speaker 2: not Hell's. But it often gets translated Hell, so it
Speaker 2: can be quite confusing to hear that and think that
Speaker 2: that's where Jesus went. But that's not the case. He
Speaker 2: went to Hades, which shall also refers to the place
Speaker 2: of the dead. Other scriptures of the New Testament would
Speaker 2: talk about the same thing and refer to shiol or
Speaker 2: hades as a temporary place where souls are kept as
Speaker 2: they wait for their final resurrection and judgment. You find
Speaker 2: out more at Revelation twenty eleven fifteen. So it's really
Speaker 2: one of those things that it's like heaven. If you
Speaker 2: think of heaven, it often refers to the layers of heaven,
Speaker 2: and the layers of heaven really are not layers of
Speaker 2: heaven at all. It's different heavens. So they talk about
Speaker 2: the first heaven. The first heaven is the sky that
Speaker 2: you see if you're standing on the Earth and you
Speaker 2: look up and you see blue sky, it's the first heaven.
Speaker 2: Second heaven would be space. You see space, that's when
Speaker 2: the atmosphere drops and changes, the sun goes down, you
Speaker 2: actually get to see the stars in the heavens. That's heavens, right,
Speaker 2: So that's number two. Number three heaven is actually the
Speaker 2: domicile of God, and that's different. So it depends how
Speaker 2: it's used as well, and sometimes they have different references
Speaker 2: and people get confused based on those. So they're going, well,
Speaker 2: was he in heaven or was he not in heaven?
Speaker 1: Where did he go?
Speaker 2: So, yes, it can be confusing. It's because those words
Speaker 2: are often mistranslated into hell. But if you get a
Speaker 2: good lexicon and you want to do some word studies,
Speaker 2: you can go back and forth and you can see
Speaker 2: which word was used where, even for the word hell,
Speaker 2: which word was used, how.
Speaker 1: It was defined.
Speaker 2: Those types of things that might give you some clarity
Speaker 2: and understanding that otherwise might be lost. And that's not
Speaker 2: the first and only time that happens. Things like that
Speaker 2: do get tossed in there. It's not necessarily a bad translation,
Speaker 2: it's just a confusing translation if you're not familiar with
Speaker 2: every other word that's going on in conjunction with it.
Speaker 2: So if you're just looking at that, you've kind of well,
Speaker 2: I know what hell is and I know what heaven is,
Speaker 2: and I've kind of put those into their own category,
Speaker 2: and you keep going.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you might miss exactly what's going on. KFI AM
Speaker 1: six forty on demand