Wrong about the gift of prophecy: 10 Qs with Mike Winger (Ep 44)

Summary

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BibleThinker Podcast Ep. 44

Episode Title: Wrong about the gift of prophecy: 10 Qs with Mike Winger
Host: Mike Winger
Date: February 8, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Mike Winger tackles ten listener-submitted questions, engaging primarily with controversial and practical issues in Christian theology. The main theme centers on the biblical nature of prophecy—specifically, whether New Testament prophecy must always be positive and encouraging (a common teaching in some charismatic circles, such as Bethel Church). Mike addresses recent teachings, examines biblical evidence, and branches into additional questions about Christian practices, doctrinal issues, and interpretations of key Scriptures.

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Main Discussion: Must Prophecy Always Be Positive?

[00:00–32:00]

Key Points

• Context & Importance:
  Mike opens with a question: Is the gift of prophecy always supposed to be positive? He connects it to approaches like those of Chris Vallotton (a teacher at Bethel Church), who asserts prophecy should never be negative.

• Quote – Chris Vallotton on Prophecy:

  “New Testament prophecy encourages and builds up people. It doesn’t condemn or speak negatively to them. We should never allow people who are ministering in the gift of prophecy to speak negatively into the lives of others… the goal of the gift of prophecy is to bring out the best in people.”
  — [03:40]

• Mike’s Response:
  Mike argues this is an “extra biblical rule” not actually found in Scripture, emphasizing that prophecy in both Old and New Testaments often included warnings, calls to repentance, and conviction of sin. False positivity, he warns, can lead to harm (as in Jeremiah’s day).

• Biblical Evidence Against “Only Positive” Prophecy:

  • Old Testament Examples:

    • Isaiah pronounces judgment for the purpose of upbuilding and restoration, though the words are “negative.”

      “These negative words are for their upbuilding, encouragement and consolation. It is meant to restore them.” — [13:10]

    • Nathan confronts David with his sin through a prophetic story (2 Samuel 12).

    • God’s word to Eli via Samuel in 1 Samuel 3:13 is distinctly negative—judgment for the sins of his house.

  • New Testament Examples:

    • Book of Revelation:
      Prophecies to churches include stern rebukes—e.g., “you have fallen from your first love” (Rev 2, Ephesus); warnings of judgment if there is no repentance (Pergamum, Thyatira, Jezebel).

    • Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 4–5):
      Peter’s prophecy exposes their sin; they die as a divine judgment.

      “You don’t get much more negative than ‘you’re going to die right now.’” — [27:00]

    • 1 Corinthians 14:24–25:
      Prophecy brings conviction and disclosure of secrets, not just comfort.

• Why Does Bethel/Charismatic Teaching Insist on “Positive Only”?
  Mike suggests (strongly) that this creates a falsely “safe” and affirming environment, but at the cost of authenticity and actual accountability; it also paves the way for faked prophecy, as described in Bethel’s documented practices.

• Memorable Quote:

  “When you muzzle prophecy, you muzzle the Holy Spirit. Unless you’re faking prophecy…”
  — [25:40]

• Illustrative “Positivity Gone Wrong” Story:
  Mike recounts an incident where students, instructed to always give “positive prophecies” to strangers, accidentally encouraged someone to persist in behavior (becoming Wiccan) that directly contradicted biblical teaching.

  “When you combine this spaghetti-against-the-wall... and always positive, you create monsters.” — [31:20]

Conclusion

Prophecy is not biblically required to be always positive. Sometimes God’s most loving rebuke is negative; withholding honest confrontation leads to harm.

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Other Listener Questions & Insights

2. Is Praying Over Houses or Objects Superstitious?

[32:00–35:30]

• Is it biblical to dedicate houses/objects in prayer, or is this superstition?
  • There is some biblical precedent (e.g., temple dedication), but not a prescribed formula. Don’t make it into ritualism or superstition (like burying statues or using “holy” oil arbitrarily).
  • Quote:

    “Just don’t be weird. My advice… Just don’t be weird.” — [35:20]

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3. Time vs. Money: Can I Give Time Instead of Tithing?

[35:30–42:40]

• Is it okay to give time instead of money to the church, especially if giving money causes debt?
  • The 10% tithe is not a New Testament rule; giving is about generosity and proportionality.
  • Providing financially takes priority if your pastor is full-time. Volunteering time is valuable, but not equivalent to meeting financial needs.
  • Provide for your family first—don’t become “narcissistic” about lifestyle, but balance sacrifice with basic responsibility.
  • Memorable Moment: Mike describes youthful sacrificial giving (“I gave $1 out of my $10 lunch money…”), stressing that God honors giving in proportion to means, not amount.

    “Jesus gave us the story of the widow’s mite… our giving is seen in ratio to what we have.”
    — [41:40]

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4. Parable of the Wedding Feast (Matthew 22:1–14)

[42:40–51:00]

• Mike unpacks the parable:
  • The Father (God) prepares a wedding (salvation in Christ), but the invited guests (Israel) refuse, mistreating messengers. The invitation then goes to all (Gentiles).
  • The man without the wedding garment represents those present for the benefits, not a genuine relationship with Christ, paralleling the “wheat and tares.”
  • Quote:

    “There may be some who are not really Christians. They’ve come for the feast, but not for the wedding.”
    — [50:10]

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5. Should I Get Re-Baptized After Falling Away?

[51:00–58:00]

• If a Christian fell away and returns, should they be baptized again?
  • If first baptism was not genuine/understood, a second is appropriate. If it was real, trust in Christ’s reconciling work—re-baptism is unnecessary.
  • No strict biblical rule against it, but local church leaders should help discern.
  • Quote:

    “Unless you can say the first baptism was illegitimate, I wouldn’t recommend getting baptized again.” — [56:30]

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6. Is God Selfish? (Psalm 106:8 / Motive for the Cross)

[58:00–01:06:00]

• Some object that everything God does seems ultimately self-exalting.
  • God has self-concern but is not selfish in the human, carnal sense—He acts from love, and glorification is a byproduct.
  • The Trinity distinguishes Christian understanding—God exalts the Son, the Son glorifies the Father; it’s relational.
  • Quote:

    “Never has God been given an ounce of glory that He did not fully deserve. Yet I have...” — [01:04:58]

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7. Does Belief That Baptism is Required for Remission of Sins (Acts 2:38) = Heresy?

[01:06:00–01:18:40]

• Is it heretical to think baptism is required for forgiveness, per Acts 2:38?
  • Mike argues from Acts 10–11 (the salvation of Cornelius): Cornelius and his household receive the Holy Spirit before baptism, proving baptism follows, but doesn’t cause salvation.
  • The teaching is a mistake, not a damning heresy if someone believes, so long as they’re not trusting works for salvation.
  • Quote:

    “It is not something that you have to do or else you aren’t saved... That is not a biblical teaching.” — [01:15:30]

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8. Are Vows Made in Sin Still Binding? (Ecclesiastes 5:5)

[01:18:40–01:23:00]

• In general, “let your yes be yes,” but if a vow itself is wicked (“I vow to leave my wife”), fulfilling it would add sin to sin; don’t fulfill evil vows.
  • Examples: Jephthah’s foolish vow (Judges 11), Old Testament provision for nullifying certain vows (Numbers 30).

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9. Is Isaiah 14 about Satan or the King of Babylon?

[01:23:00–01:27:50]

• The taunt begins against the king of Babylon, but due to the grandiose, “fallen from heaven” language (v.12: “O Day Star, son of dawn”), it may also symbolically refer to Satan.
  • Mike is open to both views, but accepts that it likely also references the spiritual power behind Babylon.
  • Quote:

    “Symbolically, the discussion of the King of Babylon has transitioned into a discussion that applies to Satan.” — [01:27:10]

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10. Did David Violate Deuteronomy 24 by Reuniting with Michal?

[01:27:50–01:31:30]

• Deuteronomy 24: if a man divorces his wife, and she remarries, he can’t take her back. In David’s case, he never divorced Michal—she was given away by Saul, so the law may not strictly apply.
• Alternatively, it could have been a violation and, if so, David was wrong. The situation is ambiguous.

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “Discernment isn’t just the ability to see the difference between right and wrong, but between right and almost right.” — [11:00]
• “[Prophecy] is not always positive… Sometimes the most life-changing moments are when I am called out for something I’ve done wrong.” — [16:30]
• “You can’t tell the Lord what He’s allowed to say, that’s why [prophecy isn’t always positive].” — [31:40]
• “Just don’t be weird.” (advice on spiritual practices) — [35:20]
• “Jesus is the Judge: if you haven’t put your faith and trust in Him, you need to.” — [47:20]
• “If you haven’t been baptized and you’re a Christian, you need to go do it.” — [53:30]
• “Never has God been given an ounce of glory that He did not fully deserve.” — [01:04:58]
• “When you muzzle prophecy, you muzzle the Holy Spirit. Unless you’re faking prophecy…” — [25:40]
• Story of positive-only prophecy accidentally affirming someone’s entry into Wicca — [31:00]

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Episode Flow (with Timestamps)

• 00:00 – 32:00: Main Topic—Is Prophecy Always Positive?
• 32:00 – 35:30: Question 2—Praying Over Houses/Objects
• 35:30 – 42:40: Question 3—Giving Time Instead of Money
• 42:40 – 51:00: Question 4—Parable of the Wedding Feast
• 51:00 – 58:00: Question 5—Re-Baptism After Falling Away
• 58:00 – 01:06:00: Question 6—Is God Selfish?
• 01:06:00 – 01:18:40: Question 7—Baptism for Remission of Sins
• 01:18:40 – 01:23:00: Question 8—Vows Made in Sin
• 01:23:00 – 01:27:50: Question 9—Isaiah 14 & Satan
• 01:27:50 – 01:31:30: Question 10—David and Michal

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Tone & Style

Faithful to Mike’s forthright, biblically-rooted style—he is direct, careful not to caricature opponents, and quick to emphasize grace and charity even with strong disagreements. He peppers the episode with practical advice, historical insights, and personal anecdotes, always steering listeners back to Scripture over extra-biblical rules.

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Summary Prepared by Podcast Summarizer AI – For listeners who haven’t caught the episode, these notes present the full breadth and key details of Mike’s teaching and advice in Ep. 44.

Transcript

[A]

So give me just a second. I'm starting the stream a little bit late. It was necessary. All right. My name is Mike Winger. I'm here to try to help you learn to think biblically about everything. And that means tackling every question that we can tackle from the perspective of, hey, does scripture inform us on this? Does God speak to this topic? And can we fallible humans? Try to understand that and it'll help us be better. So the first question for today is the topic of prophecy. Let me read it to you. Is the gift of prophecy always supposed to be positive? Is it always supposed to be a positive, uplifting type thing? When you share somebody something that you believe God has showed you a word of knowledge, a word of wisdom, something prophetic, anything in that category, is it always supposed to be positive? Now, the reason why I bring this up is for a few reasons. One, I do believe that there is such a thing as the Holy Spirit giving somebody a word. Now, there are Christians, real Christians, my brothers and sisters in Christ, who disagree on this varying levels. It gets kind of complicated. And they're like, well, maybe you got can, but generally doesn't things like that. There's different views. So let's just grant from the New Testament perspective, if you were in the first century, if you were in Corinth when the Holy Spirit was for sure doing these things in the church, was it always positive? That's the question. Because then for those who are continuationists and they believe the gifts continue on right now in whether they think it happens a lot in church or sometimes the Lord does that, whatever. The point is, whatever their like measure is of how much their expectation is, is it supposed to be positive? All right, First Corinthians 14, 3 is the reason why people say this and they teach others about it and they use it as a rule for testing prophecy, not whether it's true, but whether it's positive. And this is actually. It's not that verse. Hold on. This is it right here. This is Chris Valatin talking about it. He is like from Bethel. Chris Valatin is the prophet of Bethel. I'll be talking a lot about Bethel in the future in a future video. Some very concerning things. But this isn't about that. Well, it's connected. The wrong teaching on prophecy is connected. So, guys, I've just come from like some really intense phone calls and stuff on some research and prep and talking to a number of people who are victims of abuse or misuse or problems from their Christian leadership. So I've been having some stuff like that. So my mind is, like, wrapped around that stuff. I'm trying to pull myself onto the page of what I was going to discuss today. Let me read to you from Chris Valatin, the prophet of Bethel, who says that this rule exists, and many other charismatics will say that it exists. Here we go. On his website, he says New Testament prophecy encourages and builds up people. It doesn't condemn or speak negatively to them. Catch that? Chris says New Testament prophecy does not speak negatively to people, which is a very broad category speaking negatively. He goes on, we should never allow people who are ministering in the gift of prophecy to speak negatively into the lives of others. As we have said many times before, the goal of the gift of prophecy is to bring out the best in people. You don't have a verse for that. It's nice. I like the idea of it. But it is an extra biblical rule about the very nature and goal of prophecy. If we see negative things in someone's life, Chris says that we are ministering to. We are to ask the Holy Spirit to give us the answer to the problem that we discern. Then we prophesy the answer, not the problem. And then he gives an example. So you can understand how this plays out and you can see how it would create a positive environment. The question is whether that's biblically true. Because there can be false positivity, false positive encouragement. That's a possibility as well. The prophets in Jeremiah's time were very guilty of this. They offered a lot of false positivity in the name of prophecy, and God rebuked them for it and sent Jeremiah to give them a bunch of negative words. But let's look at the example. For example, Chris says, if we're ministering to someone and discern that they are struggling with pornography, the Holy Spirit will often give us a prophetic word for them, such as, God is calling you to a new level of purity and holiness. In this way, we have prophesied the answer without speaking about the problem. This releases grace to break the bondage of pornography in their lives. I'm not asking if you like this. I don't care if you like it right now. That's not the question. The question is, is that true? Is that a biblical rule? So let's look at 1st Corinthians 14:3. That is the verse. On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to people first for purpose of prophecy. They're upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. And so this is taken as a rule. This is how prophecy works. So Anytime you have a word from God, if it doesn't build up, if it doesn't encourage, if it doesn't bring consolation, comfort to somebody, then it's not from the Lord. Is that true? Discernment, it's been said, is not the ability to see the difference between right and wrong, but the ability to see the difference between right and almost right. And I think there's a lot of wisdom in that. It helps us to realize. Ah, let's have some nuance here. Yes, prophecy is upbuilding and encouraging and consoling. But the rule that Bethel has and the rule that many charismatics have had over the years, not all. Certainly not all. There's plenty of charismatics who are like, dude, scripture refutes this. Prophecy is not always positive. That's just not a biblical rule. There's plenty who say that there's also a large number who are the opposite. And the thing that they've done is they've added the word only into 1 Corinthians 14:3. Right. Prophecy speaks to people only for their upbuilding, encouragement and consolation. That that is not. That is not the case. That it's only. It's also, they're assuming something about this text which is that it's not upbuilding to tell somebody that they're in sin and they have to repent or God will judge them. That actually is upbuilding. So in Isaiah, we read the book of Isaiah and it gives these examples of Isaiah calling out nation after nation, including a lot of times Israel, and calling them out for the sin in their midst and for failing to, like, I don't know, defend the weak people among them who are being abused or hurt by the people who have power among them. That is something that is very much God cares about. I'll be talking more about that in the future. These are accusations, these are negative words that Isaiah is bringing. But if you read Isaiah, you'll realize these negative words are, are for their upbuilding, encouragement and consolation. It is meant to restore them. And so he says, hey, the whole head is sick. You know, I've been punishing you for your sin and I've been reaching out to you with these negative words. But it's for the sake of your upbuilding. In other words, saying that something, a prophetic word, every word you say has to be positive, not negative, is not the same as actually doing everything prophetic for the benefit of other people. So sometimes the most beneficial thing for a person is to just call them out sometimes. The most life changing moments for me have often Been when I am called out for something that I've done wrong and held accountable for it. And if it was only positive. Stop mistreating your wife, Mike. No, no, no, I don't want to say that. I want to say God's calling you to a new level of self sacrificial love for your wife. The problem is that me as the listener, I will never compute that I've actually done something wrong. Right. When you say this sin has to be confronted in a way that shows you that it's wrong. This often happens Old Testament, this happens all the time. God will have the prophet speak in a way to help them see how bad their sin is. Because they don't see it. Nathan does it with David prophetically comes, hey, David, I got a story for you. There was a guy, he had a sheep. It was his only sheep. There was a rich dude, had a bunch of sheep. The rich guy stole the guy's only sheep and he killed it. And David gets irate. I'm so mad. And he goes, you're the man, David. You did this with Bathsheba. This was you. And now David realizes how bad he is and it's a negative word. But Chris is saying, the New Testament is different. Okay? Because the Old Testament, you can't even argue about it. The Old Testament, there's too many negative words to count. Let me give you another example. First Samuel, chapter 13. Sorry, chapter 3, verse 13. First Samuel. This is where Samuel gets his first prophetic word from the Lord. And it's God telling Samuel to take a message to Eli, the priest, the current high priest. And he's like, I got a message for the man of God, the high priest. And I declare to him that I'm about to punish his house forever for the iniquity that he knew because his sons were blaspheming God and he did not restrain them. Therefore, I swear to the house of Eli that the iniquity of Eli's house shall not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering. If this New Testament rule was projected onto the Old Testament, we would be cutting pages and pages and pages out of our Bibles. This rule that Chris has, this muzzle he has put upon the Holy Spirit that you cannot speak negatively. I'll talk at the end here before I take your guys questions from the live chat. I'll talk about why I think this rule exists, why it's important for them to have a rule like this. It's not a good reason. It's a very bad reason, actually. But Bethel would Reject this. If someone in their own fellowship came with a word like Samuel's, they would say, no, that's New Testament time. God doesn't do that anymore. Strange, but that's what they would say in the New Testament. I won't even read through them all, but just scan the page if you want. This is God speaking, Jesus offering prophecy to the churches through John, the Apostle John. And he's like, hey, yeah, look, you've fallen. You have fallen from your first love. He tells them this in the church in Smyrna. They got pretty much just good news there In Pergamum they've got some positive news, but. But I have a few things against you. You have some there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel so they might eat food, sacrifice to idols, and practice sexual immorality. And then he's like, if you don't repent, I'm going to come and war against them with a sword of my mouth. And he's like, I am. This is a very negative word. He talks in Thyatira. He gives discussions about Jezebel. It's probably not her real name, right? She's is probably representative of how she's like this woman in the Old Testament, Jezebel. And too many people today call people Jezebel for dumb reasons, but this is a legit one. And she is encouraging people to practice sexual immorality as Christians and to compromise religiously and spiritually in their lives. Eating food, sacrifice to idols. And he says, hey, if she doesn't repent, if she hasn't repented, I'm going to throw her into a sickbed. Talk about a negative word. And those who commit adultery with her, I'll throw into the Great Tribulation, I'll strike her children dead. Her children here are not little kids. Her children are her followers. And so he's going to strike them dead. Like that's a pretty negative word, right? From Jesus. And it's about as late in the New Testament as you get Book of Revelation. This is not a biblical rule. Now, they could come up with justifications. Well, you're not Jesus, Mike. Yeah, but when you muzzle prophecy, you muzzle the Holy Spirit, not me. That's what you're muzzling here. Unless you're faking prophecy. Unless you're faking it. And then you're muzzling people. Unless you're faking it. Are you faking it? That's why this rule exists. This rule is a rule for how to how to have a positive environment in the midst of faking prophecy, which is something Bethel has for decades encouraged. That is my assessment. I have a video on Bethel from years ago where I'll link it below, where I go through evidence that they've encouraged people to fake prophecy and still do. Yeah. So that's the New Testament. Let's. Let's look at this other one and consider what Chris said compared to Scripture here, because we should test. This is not some private teacher I'm picking on. This is a public teacher who's hugely influential in the prophetic movement worldwide. He trains people on how to do prophecy. This is very relevant to discuss openly. If you disagree with me, doesn't mean we're not brothers, but it does matter. So let's look at 1 Corinthians 14, 24 and 25. It describes the effect of prophecy happening in the midst of this early church setting. If all prophesy and an unbeliever or outsider enters, he's convicted by all. He's called to account by all. The secrets of his heart are disclosed. And so falling on his face, he'll worship God and declare to you that God is really among you. This is a very embarrassing moment. He's convicted. That means he's aware of some guilt. He's called to account by all. That's mean. They're like saying, hey, we are now holding you accountable for the life that you are living. And it's prophetically revealed information that's negative. And so falling on his face, what does he do? His heart secrets are disclosed. Now let's look at Chris's formula and apply that to the New Testament and say, ha. Chris would not allow this. At least I don't think he would. Maybe he'd spin it. Maybe I've misunderstood. I don't think I have. But here's what he says. For example, if we're ministering to someone, the bottom paragraph here, and discern that they are struggling with pornography, the Holy Spirit will often give us a prophetic word for them, such as, and he puts the words together for you. God's calling you to a new level of purity and holiness. Is that revealing the secrets of his heart? No. Is that calling him to account? No. Is that even convicting him? Not really. In this way, he says, we have prophesied the answer without speaking about the problem. This releases grace to break the bondage of pornography in their lives. Is that what scripture does? If you have this kind of prophecy, if the Holy Spirit does this in your church or In a moment when you have something you want to share with somebody, this is what it looked like. This was like not just positive words, refusing to admit, like oh, the Lord showed me that this guy has been embezzling money from his work and he's been cheating his workers. And so he comes in and he's like, I'm going to call it out. The Lord show me this about you and he's calling you to repent of this and he wants to forgive you and show you grace. But you need to stop hiding this thing. That would be an example of what we read in 1 Corinthians, but not Chris's rule, which is not just Chris's rule. Many, many people believe that. Let me give you one more example from the New Testament, Acts chapter four, and there's a big section here. I'm not going to read all of it but you guys know the story, most of you. Ananias and Sapphira, they were the first liars in the early church right after Pentecost. They were the first hypocrite fake Christians putting on a religious front and it not being real. And God made an example out of them for us to learn from today that God doesn't want you to do that. You need authentic, authentic Christianity, not the appearance of authentic Christianity. When Ananias heard these words, he fell down, breathes his last. This is where. Sorry, you know, I just have to read more. So Ananias and Sapphira sold a piece of property and with his wife's knowledge he kept back for himself some of the proceeds and brought only a part of it and laid it at the apostles feet. The impression is that here's what they were doing. The early church in Jerusalem. A bunch of people get saved. They want to stick around and hang out and hear the apostles teachings, but they live elsewhere. This is my understanding of it. They live elsewhere. They've traveled for Pentecost to Jerusalem temporarily, then they're going to go back home. But they want to stay and sit under the teaching of the apostles. So they actually start selling homes and combining their resources to have like a community and live together. This was a beautiful thing. It was a wonderful thing. Ananias and Sapphira cheated the system. They sold the house, they kept a whole bunch of money and they gave only some of it to the community. But yet they were going to be in the community benefiting from everybody who gave everything. So this was them cheating everybody and it was wrong. So Peter said, ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to Lie to the Holy Spirit. Now he seems to have a divine revelation. I would think so. Prophetically. And he gives some bad news, exposes him to keep back part of the proceeds. While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? Why is it that you've contrived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to man, but to God. When Ananias heard these words, he fell down and breathed his last. Now, I would think this is a negative word that Peter brought, that Chris would have been like, peter, what are you doing? This isn't how it works in the New Testament, but let's read on, because I think it gets stronger. I think I can make a stronger case with what happens with his wife. Great fear came upon all who heard of it. It says the young men rose and wrapped him up and carried him out and buried him. God takes it very seriously. After an interval of about three hours, his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. And Peter said to her, he tests her, gives her a chance. Tell me whether you sold the land for so much. And she said, yes, for so much. So they're lying about how much they sold it for. And Peter said to her, how is it that you've agreed together to test the spirit of the Lord? And now comes what is absolutely, clearly, undeniably a prophecy. And it is. Is this a negative prophecy? Do you think so? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out immediately. She fell down at his feet and breathed her last. You don't get much more negative than you're going to die right now. There's a lot that can be said about this passage about God's. Now, if He. If he held everybody to the same immediate accountability of Ananias and Sapphira, a lot of us would be dead. But I think he uses them as an example. When they left Egypt, they came out of Egypt into the wilderness. The first rebellion is judged very strictly, the golden calf. It's very harsh. Very strictly. When they enter into the promised land, the first rebellion is judged very strictly, the whole AI thing. And when God does a new thing and starts a new movement within scripture, it does happen in a number of times where the first time impurity enters into the movement, it is judged very strictly because God is setting an example for us all. And by his incredible grace, he doesn't do it every time because what would be left? I hate to say that, but, yeah, we are people are the way they are. So prophecy is negative. It can be negative. It can be negative. That's pretty clear in scripture. This is an unbiblical rule. And when you have positive only prophecy, you get weird situations where you say things you shouldn't and you encourage people you shouldn't. So Proverbs says, whoever says to the wicked you are in the right will be cursed by the peoples and abhorred by nations. When you encourage people who are actually needing to be called to account, you're not actually building them up in a biblical way. You're building them up in an unhealthy way, in an ungodly way. So there's a story I heard of this happening, which I think I have permission to share, so I'll share some of the details. There was a group of people going out doing prophecy. I think they call it prophecy. Bingo. But they would go out and they. No, it was called prophecy. Something else. It was like a Mad Libs type. Anyway, I have no idea what I'm talking about. Just ignore that part because I can't remember the details. But they were going out and offering prophecy to strangers. They were fabricating prophecy and pretending God was speaking when they were just saying things to see if it sticks. Like throwing spaghetti against a wall. This is like the prophetic method of some charismatics. Not all. Not all. There's some who are responsible and thoughtful and God honoring and some who throw spaghetti against the wall, just throw that at you. Tell me if it sticks. Whatever, we'll see what happens. So they go and they throw a prophecy at this guy. They're like, hey, God's telling you, Total stranger. God's telling you that he loves what you're doing. These are some students in this school of supernatural ministry somewhere, somewhere near reading. And they go to this person who is on a bridge or something and they're like, God, whatever you're doing, this next thing you're doing, God's really in it. And God's going to bless it and like encouraging him. And the person turned and was like, wow, that's so amazing. I'm so excited to hear that because I just started and I think it was becoming Wiccan, started to become wicked. And I'm like, that's what happens when you combine this spaghetti against the wall. Let's just say stuff. Maybe it's God, maybe it's not. Let's just say it, pretend it is. And you also say, and always positive. And you combine these two together and you create monsters. So it's A big deal. Prophecy is not always positive. Why? Because you can't tell the Lord what he's allowed to say, that's why. So maybe that just means you need to prophesy a lot less, and that's okay, too. All right. A little riled up today, I admit it. Let's go to question number two, and give me a second to get there. This is from Leticia Frenette, who says, what are your thoughts on praying over a house or object? Is that superstition? Is that superstition? So scripture can answer this. I mean, I get why it feels like superstition. And I mean, I'm with you on that. There's sometimes where people do things and you're like, that seems kind of weird. That just seems kind of weird. You know, is that just a superstition thing? But there is some biblical precedence for this. And we have it with the. With the temple. You know, Solomon builds the temple. It's meant to be this, like, house of God, this amazing, amazing place where before it was a tabernacle, right? And the tabernacle was anointed, everything was sprinkled, and there was a whole ceremony that went on. It was symbolic, but it was also something God commanded them to do. And then when the temple comes, there's not only anointing and things like that. There's also this prayer that we get and we read about it where Solomon prays, God, let your name dwell in this house, and let this house be this and such and such, and all these wonderful prayers about the temple. You know, when we turn here to pray, receive our prayers. And the temple is a special place. It's not any place. It's not like I pray over this. This mouse so that everything, it clicks would be led by the Lord. Like, I think you're getting weird at that point. Let's just be real. It's strange. But you can't discount the idea that you can pray over a building. In scripture does do this, and that seems relevant, but we don't see scripture praying over building after building after building after building after building. Like, it's this sort of mantra, this sort of ritual that they do. Yet I think that I would never fault a Christian who's like, they buy a new home and they pray, lord, I pray that you protect this house and protect us while we are in it, that your favor will be upon us here. I think that's a fine and fair prayer. I just wouldn't turn it into a formula, personally, because I don't see that formula in scripture. And when we start building policies and rules and formulas that don't come from examples that God has inspired, we do end up getting weird very often. It just does happen. It's not the end of the world. But it can be a little strange. You do have other things, other ways of being extra biblical in an unhealthy way. Even where I live, it's not, as I understand it, it's not terribly uncommon for people to take a statue of a saint and dig a hole in their yard and bury it in their yard as a way of like seeking protection from the saint. And I think that's a great example of. That's weird. That's really strange and weird. This is not just God's provision and protection and favor. This is like, oh, I got this special oil that I got shipped in from whatever country and it's this special oil and I'm going to anoint my house with it. And I think that this is an unnecessary thing. Unnecessary because God, there is the use of oil, but it's also commanded, it's also demanded by God. It's not just something you hijack and treat almost as a lesser thing because you're going to use it for whatever you want. In fact, they were even told they couldn't make, say, the incense for the temple. They weren't allowed to use that same combination for other things because it was not meant to be just this anoint everything policy. Anyway, I think more can be said about this. I appreciate the heart a lot of people have when they do these things. Just don't be weird. My advice, my counsel to you as a fellow believer and some scripture that weighs in on it. Let's go to the next question. This one comes in from an anonymous question. This says, is it ever okay to give time instead of money to a church? How do we balance giving versus saving, especially if giving might cause debt? And then you have a few verses you give here Mark 12, a few verses there, and Romans 13, some there. And you say, I also have a family to provide for. Yeah. So this is a tough one to handle because we have these biblical principles we're juggling. We're trying to figure out how all these principles work in the complicated situations that you may be experiencing in your life. So one of those principles is not 10% belongs to your church. I don't think that's a biblical principle. I have videos on that. You could look it up. Maybe I'll link something below afterwards. I don't think that's a biblical principle. But we do have other biblical principles that we have to juggle, which is those who minister to us spiritually, we want to try to take care of. That especially applies on the local level. Don't apply that too liberally online. Someone like me online, who can minister to this massive number of people, I do not need. There's a fraction of a percent of people who enjoy the content would need to support the ministry for us to stay, to keep doing what we're doing. You know, we don't need that much. Plus, I keep my ministry very small as far as the back end of what we do. Big reach, hopefully. But small organization, it's very small. It feels weird to even call it an organization, but yeah. So being generous, especially providing for, you know, like, your pastor's putting in 40, 50 hours a week. And imagine if a guy did my plumbing and I didn't pay him for it. That would be weird, right? But imagine if the pastor's like, oh, he does counseling and he's taking care of these needs over here, and he's organizing these events that are very important to us as the body of Christ, and he's teaching and he's doing all the study and prep. It'd be weird. Now if he's working three hours a week, fine, Little bit volunteer on the side, no big deal. But if he's working a lot, yeah, he should be. So, okay, he needs to be taken care of. And so me volunteering time doesn't do that. My volunteering of time does not help provide for him in any way. I'm like, blessing the body in a generalistic sense, which is helpful and nice, but I'm not actually helping this guy eat food or pay for his kid's medical bill or something like that. So then it's not equivalent working. Pragmatically speaking, it's not equivalent. Like, imagine if your boss was like, hey, I owe you $1,000. I'll pay you 500. But then I will volunteer a number of hours of my time to help bless you in some other way. You might be okay with that. But there's a good chance you're like, this is not the same thing. Just for us to understand, they're not identical. Now, you're juggling other things, too, so don't. That's not my whole answer. You have to take care of your family. That is a priority. And you providing for your kids is a greater priority than you providing for your pastor. That's true. That's a reality. You have to put food on their table. I was going to say food over their heads and a roof on their table. You have to put food on the table and a roof over their heads. And that seems like a higher priority. And scripture, I think, instills this in us by showing us like, a man can't even serve in ministry if he's not taking care of his own household. And the man who won't take care of his own household, it says, worse than an unbeliever. That's strong words, man. Those are strong words. And if that's true, then if I'm like, look, we're like, poverty level. I'm at the stage where it's like, feed and take care of my family or give back to the community and the church and help the spiritual people who are blessing my life and help serve the kingdom in that way and all the different things the church does and needs funds for. Then you feed your kids. Now, there's another thing to juggle. What's the difference between having enough for your home versus becoming narcissistic, where it's like, well, I got to provide for my family, and I got a $2 million house, and everybody in my house has their own car. And you're kind of like above and bey providing for your family, but then using that as an excuse to never support those who you should support financially in your church. So that's another thing you got to juggle. Like, where's the contentment level? Okay? Where's the level at which you go, that's enough. That's enough. I can give some. And then there's the juggling of sacrificial giving. Sometimes you do make sacrifices. Now, I don't think you're supposed to just be sacrificing other people. That's not sacrificial giving. When I give money away and my kid starves, that's not a sacrifice I make. I'm making him sacrifice, which is not the model I'm trying to set. Help your kids to offer sacrificially, but don't just offer them sacrificially in that sense. Don't take that the wrong way. That's another thing to juggle there. So all of these things put together, I just say, life is complicated. My simple answer, juggling all these different biblical principles and ideas, is make sure your family's provided for up to a level in which you should be biblically content, be willing within that even to sacrifice to some degree. You know, when I was 18, or not 18, but 16, and I was getting $10 a week. And that was my lunch money for school. And I gave a dollar to the church, which you can tithe. I just said, you don't have to. You can give 10%, you can give 12%, you can give 20%, you can give 5%. I don't have that rule for you on that. But I would give, like, a dollar to the church out of that 10. That was like a sacrifice for me, but I was still okay, but it was a dollar. But still the Lord respects that and appreciates that and honors that. I love the fact that Jesus gave us the story of the widow's mite 2000 years ago to help us understand that our giving is seen in ratio to what we have and not in ratio to just, like, a dollar amount. That's amazing. I hope that helps. Those are some different things you're juggling there. Yeah, we can fall on both sides. I knew a guy who could have donated. He had the money to donate, but he also served and did ministry. And he thought, I don't need to support. But yet he was being ministered to by his pastor every week and by the children's ministry who provided for the kids. And he's, like, not helping to pay for the air conditioning in the building or the carpets that need to be cleaned or the pews that have to be replaced, or for that leader who was spending countless hours preparing and ministering, and he thought, yeah, but I serve in children's ministry, so fine, right? And I'm like, yeah, I don't want to be too quick to say something like that. All right, next question. This is from Rebecca Molina. Molina. I know that name for some very, very old guy. Old dead guy. In Europe. Anyway, it's a theological debate issue. Molina. Anyway, love your ministry. Thank you very much. Rebecca, can you please explain the parable in Matthew 22, 1:14? I don't understand the meaning. I might be able to. Let's walk through it together. And if I don't, I guarantee you the comments section is going to have a bunch of explanations for it, and probably some of them will be very good. That didn't mean that to be as cynical sounding as it sounded. Probably a lot of them will be very good, probably the majority. So Matthew 22. Here it says, and again, Jesus spoke to them in parables saying, the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast. Now already we're getting what I believe would be the king would be the father. The wedding feast would be the marriage of the bride and Christ. And the Son, of course, is Christ, and the bride, of course, is the church. Now, there are some anomalies or interesting things in the parable that we'll try to unpack or at least address, at least acknowledge, if nothing else. But let's consider that at least, that's my working paradigm, is that you've got the father, the Son, and the bride. So he sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come. So these guys were already invited, and he's calling them to come. And so they're already in a place of having been invited, but haven't showed up when the call went out. Like, it's time. The wedding feast has arrived. Begin. So this is one category. He sent other servants saying, tell those who are invited, see, I've prepared my dinner. My oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered. This sounds like weird language to us, but to them, this is like. This is like, hey, guys, the barbecue's ready. Like, we got our casserole and Jean made her really yummy pies. Like, he's just saying, like, it's time. Like, let's do this, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast. But they paid no attention and went off. One to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. Okay, now this is elevating situation a lot. When people invite you to a wedding and you're like, rsvp not attending, you don't like, shoot the people who invited you. Typically, you don't do that stuff to them. Because this is not about a wedding in the traditional sense. This is ultimately about God. Through scripture and through time, has been preparing salvation for mankind. And the appearance of the son, the appearance of Christ, God with us who would finally deal with our sin because we can't do it. Even the sacrificial system couldn't do it. Nothing I can do can absolve me or get rid of my guilt. Jesus finally does it, and then he's built up to this. God has built up to this for hundreds and hundreds of years, Calling Abraham and then through Isaac and then Jacob and then David, and then it just kind of continues down this sort of genealogy leading us to Jesus. And then these pictures where God paints with people's lives. He paints the story of Christ over and over again. You've got Moses, who is rejected in his first appearance to Israel as something like a deliverer. And Then finally he goes out and he has a following among others. And then he comes back and now they receive him. This sort of almost first, second coming thing. Moses, who becomes a mediator who prevents God from destroying the people. You have Joshua, who leads them into the promised land. You have David, who is attacked by Saul, goes out, collects a gentile following, actually, and then comes back and is finally received by the people of Israel. You've got these pictures of Jesus throughout all these different people in Scripture. You have Ezekiel, who's like the son of man, who bears the iniquity of the people of Israel, the way that Jesus, the son of man, bears the iniquity of the people of Israel, just like God has been preparing this stuff. And then Jesus shows up and it's like, boom, now it's the time when he comes. He calls himself the bridegroom. He says, ah, Jesus, why aren't your people fasting? You know, we fast, and John the Baptist's followers were fasting, but your guys aren't fasting. And he goes, they're not going to fast when the bridegroom is with them. So this isn't the wedding, the full wedding feast. It's not fully happening in Jesus first coming, but he is the bridegroom showing up. And there is an offer and a confrontation that's. That's happening there. So this is a picture of them, of the people of Israel rejecting the prophets, rejecting the messengers of God. They were the ones invited to the wedding. They were the ones who had the scripture. They were the ones that God had given the promises to, and they were invited to the wedding. This is the in crowd. Now, the Gentiles would always be invited eventually, but it started with the Jews, because God's making sure that we know the truth of salvation is tied to scripture and to what God has done through Abraham and Moses and all of the authors of Scripture. But they reject them. They're constantly being attacked. Jeremiah is attacked. For instance, we have prophets being killed and being persecuted, being rejected. This stuff happens a lot. Jeremiah got us to tell them, don't be afraid of their faces. You're going to tell them some hard stuff and they're going to hate you for it. They burned Jeremiah's book. The first time he presents it to them, they destroy it. So they mistreat, they seize. They treat them shamefully, even killing some of them. They even do this finally with John the Baptist, who sort of represents all the prophets up until that time. So the king was angry and he sent his troops and destroyed those Murderers and burned their city. That's the destruction of Jerusalem. They finally kill Jesus even, and he's mad. And he destroys their city, destroys the murderers, burns their city. Then he said to his servants, the wedding feast is ready. But those invited were not worthy. You know, Jesus came to the Jews, but the Jews did not receive him. He came to his own, but his own did not receive him. And so he tells the disciples, first go out to the lost tribes of the house of Israel. Don't go to the Gentiles. Don't go anywhere else. Go to the Jews. This is in the Gospels. Right? At the end of the Gospels, the shift happens, because now the Jews have had their opportunity to receive Christ. Many of them did, but not as a whole. And so many of them stay in the dark on the issue of Jesus. And then the Gospel goes out to not only Jerusalem and Judea, but to the uttermost parts of the earth. The Gospel goes everywhere and to Gentiles. And so you see in the Book of Acts, it's the gospel going out into all over the place. Gentiles get saved people around the world, at least the known world at the time, and continue even today around the world to accept the Gospel of Christ, even though they have not originally been invited. We're not Jewish. So he says, go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find. And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found both bad and good. It's just indiscriminately. God's just inviting everybody to know Christ. Doesn't matter what you've done in your past, doesn't matter how bad you have been. And that's actually. I mean, that so many people were like, I wouldn't go into a church because the roof would fall down on me. And you're like, you don't understand the Gospel, man. Jesus invites all. So the wedding hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in to look at the guests. Now there's a new spin in the story. He saw there a man who had no wedding garment. Hmm. And he said to him, friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment? He's not dressed in the right garment. And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness, which is a connection to final judgment. That phrase, outer darkness, that's. This is representing final judgment. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, a phrase Jesus uses to talk about judgment. For many are called, but few are chosen. So that even those who are. This is something Jesus talks about. Other times, even those who are in the church. Yet there may be some who are not really Christians. They've come for the feast, but not for the wedding. Does that make sense? Didn't wear the wedding garment. So he's not there for the wedding, to be joined in matrimony as the bride of Christ to the Lord to know him. He is instead there for the food, for the benefits of Christ, but not the lordship of Christ. And that's a danger for all of us. Jesus also told the parable of the tares in the wheat. And that, I think connects to this idea as well, that there's that final day of judgment where even amongst those who name the name of Christ, there will be an assessment by the Lord whether they're legitimate or not. A scary and sobering thing, but a necessary thing. And so we do well to make sure we put our trust genuinely in Christ. I hope that that was helpful for you. A quick overview of that wonderful, wonderful parable. Let's go to the next question. This is question number five, and it comes from him. What a great name. I fell out of faith years ago and recently came back and feel like I should get baptized again. Is there anything for or against this in the Bible? Thank you for your ministry. That's a challenging question. Timothy first stoked that you came back, that you've come back, and that the grace of God is enough for you and that you can be welcomed with open arms. And that's a beautiful, wonderful thing. There's so many people right now who've fallen out of faith and for various reasons, and some are complicated reasons. Some reasons you go, ah, gosh, yeah, I see why you took that path doesn't make it good, doesn't make it wise. It's destructive and harmful to abandon faith in Christ. But they can come back, and I'm grateful for that. So baptism re. Baptism. I want to acknowledge ahead of time, before I try to answer this question, that this is an issue that is very close to the heart of Christianity and very close to the hearts of a lot of Christians. Baptism is a very, very important thing. And the idea of being baptized again raises up interesting and important questions, like what are you saying about the nature of baptism when you require it again or when you reject people from being able to do it again? There are those who think that baptism regenerates and that it's actually part of a necessary thing you have to do in order to be Saved. And they don't usually call it a work. They don't think you're in baptism, you're performing a work that earns you some grace of some kind. They don't usually think that. Usually they're just thinking it's a necessary thing you have to do, which they will not call it work. And they're often going, I think those people are usually going to lean on. You got baptized, you were already baptized. That's it. Because the action of baptism is very much emphasized, the actual ritual of the thing. Then there are those who think baptism is not salvific. That is, you don't have to be baptized to be saved. And that is, I would say, very strongly. That is very much the biblical position. Look into the details of Cornelius in Acts, chapters 10 and 11. I think it is. And I think it strongly proves that baptism is not necessary. It's important and it ought to be done. Every single Christian should be baptized. That's a very, very important truth. If you haven't been baptized and you're a Christian, you need to go get baptized. You need to do this. But you're not unsaved. If you fail to, it's just a major glaring error on your part and you should go do it. I don't care if you've been a Christian for 15 years and you're like a pastor in a church, you still need to go do it even more. So you need to do it. But the idea that baptism is not required for salvation, I think this leans people towards being open to a second time of being baptized, because they don't look at it as somehow, when they look at it as not necessary for salvation, they tend to be open, not agreeing with. When I say open to, I don't mean that they agree with. They're open. Like, they're like, let's think about it maybe. And they'll probably approach it case by case basis. And I am more in that category. And the way that I usually process this is very not. It's not theological, it's more pastoral. And it usually is. I assess the person and I'm like, look, if I can bolster their confidence in that initial baptism they received, I'd rather do that. I'd rather do that. But if this is like going to be a failed operation, like they're going to say, I got baptized when I was 10 years old. I didn't really understand what I was doing. I didn't know what was going on. And I just don't feel like it was A legitimate baptism. I feel like there was something illegitimate about my initial baptism. Then I'm going to probably say, okay, let's resolve this. Let's just get you baptized in a way that is legitimate and is honoring the Lord. It's not going to hurt them to do so. I don't believe. And then that's pastoral. It's not theological. Because in Scripture you do not have examples of multiple baptisms, except for the one I can think of in Acts where it's not quite the same. This group was baptized not by John the Baptist. They were baptized by people who told them about John the Baptist. And they're in a different city. They're not even in Israel. Right. And they get baptized from, like, secondhand the teachings of John the Baptist. And Paul goes and sees them and he goes, have you guys, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you were baptized? He's kind of feeling out their theology. And they go, we haven't even heard there is a Holy Spirit. Like, what are you talking about? So they had like a very, very shallow, an incomplete theology, like, dramatically incomplete, like, whoa, what's wrong? So Paul actually does have them baptized in the name of Jesus. So then this is perhaps a case for if upon your baptism, you're like, I didn't understand salvation. I didn't understand the very nature of why I was doing this. Then there's a case for getting baptized legitimately. It's not even again, exactly. It's more like, do it legitimately now. But if you're thinking, but I was legitimately baptized, serious, committed, genuine, understood the gospel. And then I had this falling away time. And then now I'm back with the Lord and I feel like to restore me to God, I need to get baptized again to kind of get me right with God again. That I would actually counsel against. Personally, I think you're misunderstanding the reconciliation of Christ. You're misunderstanding the forgiveness and grace of God. God in some way. And my encouragement pastorally would be, Jesus is. It's the cross alone that does this work. Unless you can say the first baptism was somehow illegitimate, I wouldn't recommend getting baptized again. But I can honestly see if someone's just plagued with psychological stress over this that I would probably just say, let's just baptize you, solve this for your sake. Because I also don't see a prohibition against it in Scripture. There's a statement in Scripture, there's one baptism. That doesn't mean there's only one time someone can be baptized, although it should be that way. Generally, but it means that there's a unity in that we're all experienced the same thing when we got baptized. There's one ritual of baptism. It means this one thing. It's the only verse I can think of that might weigh in on that hope that helps him. I defer you to the pastors and leaders in your local fellowship. Get counsel from them. Ask them what they think you should do. If this is something you're still working through, and get their advice. Please be involved in your local community to work this out. You can even talk to multiple people and say, hey, I'm wrestling with this. What do you think? Don't just take my advice because sometimes, because there's. Oh, there's a subscriber counter. Because people respect me from stuff they've received, benefit from the things I've done. They can take my word as if it's like the law. Work it out a little bit more in your own local church also. I encourage you to do that. All right. Number six. Liam Baker says, do you believe that God is selfish in everything he does? Is God selfish in everything he does? It seems even his selfless acts are done for his own sake. And you have a verse here, Psalm 106. Eight dying on the cross for his own glory. Would that motivation be wrong? Let's look at the Psalm 108 passage. And this is a question that I think would offend a lot of people. I'm not offended by it. Partly you're dealing with a limited character space. I realize how you have to punch out. You have to really zero in on exactly the heart of your question very quickly because that's all the space you got for your question in the live chat. But also, I appreciate Psalm 106. Sorry, verse 8. I appreciate these kinds of questions because other people are asking them too, and answering them in a fair context really helps people. So just take it as a sincere. Not I'm questioning God, but a sincere question about God. All right, here we go. Psalm 106, 8. It says, yet he saved them for his name's sake that he might make known his mighty power. There is a self motivation that is in there and God's saving. Let me back up a little so people can know what we're talking about here. What is he saving? Praise the Lord. O give thanks to the Lord for he's good for his steadfast love endures forever. Who can utter the mighty deeds of the Lord or declare all his praise? Blessed are they who observe justice and who do righteousness at all times. Remember me, O Lord, when you show favor to your people. Help me when you save them, that I may look upon the prosperity of your chosen ones, that I may rejoice in the gladness of your nation, that I may glory with your inheritance. Both we and our fathers have sinned. We have committed iniquity. We have done wickedness. This is, this verse I just. Total side note. At some point in your life, you hit not everybody, but a lot of us. We hit an age where you become very critical of your parents. You first you think they're superheroes, then you think they're big losers. You get a little bit older and you start to think critically and think they're not just like outdated, like, ooh, they're really flawed. My fathers have sinned. My mom sinned. You eventually grow to a maturity. Maybe it's when you're 30, 40, 50, 60, where you add me to Both we and our fathers have sinned. We have committed iniquity, We've done wickedness. There's a verse that says, like, I'm no better than my fathers, which is a sad state of reality that a lot of us end up experiencing and realizing. And then you go, yeah, God, I need your grace. I need your grace so bad. Verse 7. Our fathers, when they were in Egypt, did not consider your wondrous works. They did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love, but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea. So God at the Red Sea. Where when they left Egypt, they were rebelling. They were not trusting God, they were not believing, they were having rebellious hearts, yet he saved them for his name's sake that he might make known his mighty power. He rebuked the Red Sea and it became dry. And he led them through the deep as through a desert. So he saved them from the hand of the foe and redeemed them from the power of the enemy. And then it goes on to describe more of those things and then they soon forget his works because they go through the same cycle. All right, clearly God has a self exalting motive. And we see this self exalting motive that is present in his salvation of them at the Red Sea. We also see it in even the cross and the resurrection when you put them together, that God is glorifying himself, he is being glorified by himself. You have the Father and the Son and Jesus is like, hey, glorify me with the glory I had with you before the world was. And Jesus says, I have glorified you on earth. Like he has accomplished the task of bringing glory to the Father. So his time on earth was bringing glory. One of the agendas behind it was that there is this self concern that is in God. And Scripture doesn't try to eliminate all self concern. That's almost more like Buddhism to eliminate all self concern, to just like not care about anything and not even have like a sense of self identity. And the Bible doesn't do that. You do have a self and you should have self concern. You should just not think more highly of yourself than you ought. And the question is, here's a few things we can add into this. Now God has other motives too. So it's not just he just does whatever he wants for his own glory, for his own exaltation in some sense. It's also that what he does is, is sometimes the opposite of what you would think would be his own interests. And so when the sun comes to the earth and suffers and takes on humanity and is treated with contempt and poorly and goes through all kinds of pain and unpleasantness, you can't just act like this is the act of a selfish being, because it's not. Now it brings God glory because God is good. God is holy and loving and just. And when Jesus does this, it reveals God's loving, selfless character. And in revealing his own selflessness, there is a exaltation or an awareness people have of how wonderful he is. But that doesn't mean that it was only done for the purpose of making you think he's good. Like an appearance thing, like a manipulation appearance thing. It was done out of an abundance of desire to know you and love you and forgive you. That God does this in that he's also glorified. None of his actions are ever inconsistent with bringing him glory in the big picture because he always does what's wonderful and glorious. We also have other factors to consider. God is triune. This is an explanation that has power within Christianity but nowhere else. To my knowledge, no major religion where God is triune like this, where Jesus doesn't just glorify himself, he comes and says, I have glorified you, the Father, I have glorified you, I brought you glory. There's a sense in which. I'm getting a spam call. Hold on, let me take it. Now there's a sense in which the triune nature of God shows that even when God is bringing glory to Himself, it's an act of like love. There's a selflessness that's kind of baked into it. So when the Father brings glory to The Son or the Son brings glory to the Father, the Holy Spirit brings the glory to the Son or something. There's a selflessness built into this in the same sense that when I say, I so appreciate my wife, she is my best friend. She's a wonderful, wonderful companion and partner. And the longer I'm married, the more grateful I am. You could be like, well, Mike, in saying those things which I believe are true, in saying those things, I'm bringing this, like, glory or exaltation or something, right? Like, I wouldn't call it glory, but I'm bringing this attention, this positive attention to my wife. And because of our marriage relationship. That lifts me up too, doesn't it? But it's not a selfish thing that I'm saying that now. I could say it selfishly. There's plenty of guys who do say positive things about their family just as a way of puffing themselves up. I just don't think that's what's happening with God. God is doing it in the right way. He's doing it in the positive way. He's doing it in the selfless way. And in the ways that he's glorified is like he takes weak people, broken people, sinful people. He redeems them, he saves them, he forgives them, he washes them, he restores them, he uses them. The way in which God is glorified, he's glorified through things that are not selfish and carnal. In that negative sense, he's glorified in wonderful things. He's also glorified in judgment. He's glorified when he punishes sin, when he rains down wrath upon the wicked. But that's the same sense in which a judge is doing the right thing. My opinion of a judge goes up when he drops the gavel down and he sentences someone who is truly a wicked criminal to a legitimate and fair consequence. That I go, yeah, that's good job, Judge. And it's not bad for me to think, good job, Judge. He's being brought glory not just for the sake of glory. Think about this. He's being brought glory because it's the natural byproduct of him doing what he does, which is always right and always good. So hopefully some of those factors come in there. It's not this carnal selfishness when it comes to you caring about yourself. Scripture says, love your neighbor as yourself. There's an assumption of a self love, but you don't want to take it too far where you have self love that exalts yourself above other people. And why can God exalt himself above people when I can't? Well, because you are people. Like he's God. This is a no brainer for me. At least God is genuinely glorious. Never has God been given an ounce of glory that he did not fully deserve. Yet I have been given glory I don't deserve. You have been given glory or attention or exaltation you didn't deserve. But that's because we're so much less than Him. Him. When God glorifies himself, he's effectively speaking truth. It's always true. He is just that glorious. For me, I have to be a lot more, a lot less. I'm a lot less glorious. All right, let's go to the next question, which is number Craig Y says Is believing that baptism is for the remission of sins Based on Acts 2:38 heresy is someone who is thusly baptized then not saved. Interesting. This comes up because I was just talking about baptism and Cornelius and that connects to this verse, Acts 2:38. Maybe I'll show you guys the Cornelius thing since I was talking about it. Let me read your question one more time. Is believing baptism is for the remission of sins Based on Acts 2:38 Heresy? I've struggled with this a little bit myself. There are those who take it like this and Peter said to them, repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you'll receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. So that they are the baptism itself is accomplishing the forgiveness of their sins. That's how some take this. And then that I believe is incorrect. I believe they're misunderstanding the use of the word for and I think they're also misunderstanding the full context of Acts 2 along with Cornelius in Acts 10 and 11. Maybe I'll take you to some of those verses today. The I think it's a silver bullet. I really do. I think it's the most important section of scripture on the topic. But is it let's say that they're wrong. Is it heresy? I think that I want to be as gracious as I can to people as I can reasonably and honestly and say I think it's just an error. I think that a person who thinks you have to be baptized to be saved, if they died right before they got baptized, they'd be with the Lord and they would just be like, oh, I guess I was wrong. I think that's that. I think it can cause a bunch of problems and issues, but I wouldn't call it like the kind of thing that damns a soul to hell. Because you believe in Jesus, you believe in his death and resurrection. You believe that you are saved by grace, yet you think baptism is necessary. Usually those people are going to qualify it by going, but it's not a work. You're not earning anything in baptism. You're not meriting anything in baptism. Now if they start saying you're meriting, you're doing a righteous deed, and that righteous deed is adding to your salvation through meriting things, then you have an issue that's not really about baptism. It's about your concept of your own righteousness and your own good works. That's very scary. Most people will not. They won't go down that road. They'll just say, I don't know how to explain it. Baptism is necessary. How do you explain it? I don't know. Maybe God just makes sure that everyone who is really saved always gets baptized. Or maybe God makes these super rare exceptions and they'll come up with other justifications that I don't think it falls into the rank of heresy. So Acts 2. 38. Peter gives us formula, hey, repent, be baptized and you'll be forgiven. So you have to do those things. Repent, be baptized, be forgiven. Now, if you take away. I'll be careful with my fingers here. If you take away baptized, that was flipping anybody off. If you take away the word baptized there and say, what if they just repented and believed in Jesus but didn't get baptized, Would they have received the forgiveness of their sins? And the answer is, well, Cornelius did. And so you could. Let me see if I can find some of the relevant verses that you kind of. It's kind of a two chapter study to go through it all. Peter goes to this guy Cornelius. Cornelius has not been baptized. He has not heard the gospel really, and he wants to hear the Gospel. Peter has this vision. You won't be able to read this, sorry, unless you pause a lot. I'm in Acts, chapter 10. I'm just scrolling through. Cornelius has this request to hear the Gospel. Peter has a vision. And then God brings them together. So he goes over to Cornelius, to this Gentile. Peter's like, should I even really go to the Gentiles? And the question is, can this Gentile really, really, truly, truly be saved? Can he really be saved? So Cornelius then expects Peter. Peter shows up and he bows down before Peter. I'll start in verse 26. Peter lifted him up, saying, stand up. I too am a man. As he talked with him, he went and found many persons gathered, and he said to them, you yourselves know how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate with or visit anyone of another nation. But God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean. When he says unlawful here, he doesn't mean it's against the Old Testament law. He means it's against the traditions. Sometimes they use the. The New Testament will use the word law to include the traditions of the Pharisees. Doesn't mean it's God's law. It was man's laws. Okay, that's kind of a whole can of worms. But moving on. So when I was sent for, I came without objection, right? Because God showed him not to call them unclean. I asked then why you sent for me? And Cornelius said, four days ago, about this hour, I was praying in my house. And the ninth day, at the ninth hour, and behold, a man stood before me in bright clothing and said, cornelius, your prayer has been heard and your alms have been remembered before God. Do you wonder what would be like if Cornelius wasn't praying at that time? If he just skipped prayer that day and said, cornelius, your prayer has been heard. Verse 32. Send therefore to Joppa or Joppa, and ask for Simon, who is called. Who is called Peter. He is lodging in the house of Simon. A tanner by the sea. It's already trippy that Peter's hanging out with a tanner for other reasons that are interesting. A tanner. So I sent for you at once, and you have been kind enough to come. Now, therefore, we are all here in the presence of God to hear all that you have been commanded by the Lord. Okay, so now he's ready to hear the Gospel. We're just going to read a big section of Scripture because. Why is that a bad idea? All right, so Peter opened his mouth and said, truly, I understand that God shows no partiality. Jew and Gentile can be saved. But in every nation, anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. As for the word that he sent to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all. You yourselves know what happened through all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. And he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. Now, this is probably a shortened version of Peter's message, but if you catch it, he's giving them the contents of the Gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. He's like, start at John's baptism, Galilee, Jesus, going about preaching and healing and power. This is Peter basically giving them the contents that later became the Gospel of Mark. Because Peter is probably the main eyewitness behind the Gospel of Mark. There's a cool idea. I have a video on that. Who wrote the Gospel of Mark and how it ties into Peter, and I'll link it down below. It's really neat stuff. And we are witnesses of all that he did, both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree. But God raised him on the third day and made him to appear not to all the people, but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be the judge of the living and the dead. How many gospel presentations include the idea that Jesus is going to judge everybody? Maybe more of them should. It's true. And it's helpful and incentivizing for people to realize there's an urgency to receiving Christ. If you're listening to this and you've not yet put your faith and trust genuinely repented and believed in Jesus, you need. You need to. He is the Judge, verse 43. To him, all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name. And boom, there's like the big moment, okay, when he says this while he's still talking, something amazing happens to show that Cornelius and his fellow people there are saved and they have not yet been baptized. I'll tie into Acts 2:38 in a second. But it says repent and believe. Yeah, we'll come back to that. So to him, all the prophets bear witness. Everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name. He doesn't mention baptism while Peter was still saying this. These things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the Word. And the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were among amazed because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles. And that's a huge clue. It is not just some random working of the Holy Spirit is the gift of the Holy Spirit, that thing that Peter talks about in Acts 2 that accompanies salvation. Repent, believe and be baptized, and you will be forgiven, but you will also receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. And that's the exact same thing that Cornelius and his group receive, and they have not yet been baptized. Salvation for sure is in this passage. And Acts 11 makes it even more clear, for they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter declared, can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit? This is a big deal, just as we have. This isn't some lesser version of the Holy Spirit. This isn't some non salvific reception of the Holy Spirit. It's the same reception that they did they got in Acts 2. It's the same reception of the Holy Spirit that Peter has received. It's salvific. And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days. Now this causes turmoil in the early church because there are those who are like, I don't think these Gentiles can be saved unless they first get circumcised, unless they basically become Jews. They need to do all the Jewish stuff. They can't just believe in Jesus. Now the apostles and the brothers who are throughout Judea, heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God. So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, now he goes into an entirely Jewish context. The circumcision party criticized him. The circumcision party doesn't. It sounds like a really unpleasant party to attend. It's a group of people who think that everyone has to be circumcised if they're going to follow Jesus. And they have to observe the law of Moses. And they're basically under the law, right? Which is not biblical. Now you can be circumcised and follow Jesus or uncircumcised and follow Jesus. You can't make it a rule. You went to uncircumcised men and ate with them. They're upset. He shouldn't even eat with them. But Peter began and explained it to them in order. These guys would have evangelism go like this. You. You send a letter to somebody, say, I'd like to tell you the Gospel, but first you need to get your family circumcised. You got to start observing the law of Moses. We got feasts, we got rules about Sabbath and all these things you got to do. And then I'm going to come and have a really good message to share with you. That would be their version of evangelism. Church would be dead. But Peter began and explained it to them in order to. I was in the city of Joppa praying and in a trance Listen to how he describes it, because it connects to Acts 2:38 explicitly. I was in the city of Joppa, praying, and in a trance. I saw a vision, something like a great sheet descending, being let down from heaven by its four corners. And it came down to me. And he tells us this dream. It was like a parable for him about accepting the Gentiles. Looking at it closely, I observed animals and beasts of prey and reptiles and birds of the air. And I heard a voice saying to me, rise, Peter, kill and eat. And there's unclean food, unclean animals that it's not supposed to eat. But I said, by no means, Lord, for nothing common or unclean has ever entered my mouth. But the voice answered a second time from heaven, saying, what God has made clean, do not call uncommon. It's not that the food was never unclean, it's that God has made it clean. This is the effect of the Gospel on the Gentiles, makes them clean. This happened three times, and all was drawn up again into heaven. So he had this trance, this vision. It wasn't a literal. I think it was something he saw in his perceptions. Verse 11. And behold, at that very moment, three men arrived at the house in which we were sent to me from Caesarea. And the Spirit told me to go with them, making no distinction, even though it was going to Gentiles. These six brothers also accompanied me, and we entered the man's house. So Peter has a whole bunch of witnesses about what happened at Cornelius, and now he's going to tell it to them, and he's going to make the case that proves baptism is not necessary for salvation. It's important you need to do it, but not, or else you're unsaved. You need to do it to obey the Lord, to glorify Christ. And it is a wonderful, amazing privilege. We just last Sunday I was at a baptism at my church. We had a baptism service there, and we watched two people get baptized. It was beautiful and wonderful. This is not to devalue baptism in any way, shape or form. And he and he told us how he had seen the angel stand in his house and say, send to Joppa and bring Simon, who's called Peter. He will declare to you a message by which you will be saved, you and all your household. And as I began to speak, listen to how Peter describes it. The Holy Spirit fell on them, just as on us at the beginning. What's the beginning? That's Acts, chapter two. He's telling this the us he's talking to the Circumcision party. He's talking to these Jews who, who had received initial salvation at Pentecost. And it says, and I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, john baptized with water, but you'll be baptized with the Holy Spirit. So they were baptized, they were given the Holy Spirit. And it's the same as what happened to Peter and them in Acts 2. And then he goes on, if God gave them the same gift that he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God's way? They were actually saved. Now let's look back at Acts 2, 32, 38. Sorry. And Peter said to them, repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins. And what will happen? You'll be forgiven and you'll receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. It's kind of a sign that their forgiveness was real. For this promise of the Holy Spirit is for you and your children and for all who are far off. These are the exact same concepts, the gift of the Spirit, the forgiveness of sins that Peter is talking about to them in Acts 2. It's the same thing he talks about in Acts 10 and 11 that already happened prior to baptism. Baptism in the early church was the normal thing that would happen at the moment of salvation or very, very near the moment of salvation. It's tied to salvation conceptually and chronologically, but it is not something that you have to do or else you aren't saved or that you fail to be saved until the moment you've done it. That is not a biblical teaching. That is a church teaching that has happened throughout history because we have a way of taking things that the church does and making them more necessary than they actually are in Scripture. They're important, but we can make the church's involvement more necessary because I have a theory about this. It's in the self interest of the leaders that they make themselves more important than they are anyway. If you disagree with me on that, please don't. Please separate that from the rest of my analysis here, because I think this is very solid. I think this is irrefutable proof that baptism is not required for salvation and that it's understandable that the church just. In church history, that Christians often get this wrong, because baptism is incredibly important. We just take it from incredibly important to necessary, and that's even needful in a sense, but not necessary for salvation. All right, let's go to the next question. I know I answered A lot more than your question, but I thought it was a good idea. Number eight. Anglican. Your name is Anglican Wingaling. That's really funny. I blame David Wood. Are vows made in sin or amidst sinful circumstances still binding in the eyes of God? Ecclesiastes. Let's read the verses you gave me. Well, I'll read one verse you gave me because the other ones you gave me were full chapters. I'm not going to read three more chapters because I don't offhand know why you referenced those chapters, but Ecclesiastes 5:5 says, it is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. You could put it this way, as let your yes be yes, let your no be no. Jesus says this. James talks about this. Honor your vow. Scripture says that a good man keeps his word, even to his own harm, even to his own Harry. Is that an unbreakable rule? There are some examples of bad vows in scripture. One of them would be in the. In the Old Testament law, if a woman made a vow, her father could overrule it. Right? A young lady makes a vow, her father has the ability to overrule it. That there is a sense in which it was like, hey, you're a young lady, you make a vow. But then he has a role of authority in her life and he can actually overrule this thing. And this is a healthy thing. This is actually a protective thing. I think for her. There's an example of a vow that can be made where it was not going to be fulfilled. Interesting. Now, if you had vowed, you say the vow was made potentially in sin. I mean, I don't know what that means. That's a very broad category. But let me give you a different, more specific one. The vow itself was sinful. That's different. I vow to leave my wife would be a sinful vow. If someone were to say that, that would be a sinful vow. It would be a sin to vow it. It would be a sin to fulfill it. It's sin all the way down. You cannot keep your word there because your word is evil. You cannot continue in that path. You have to repent of it. But we don't want to create easy ways out of people getting out of. Oh, I committed with my friend to start this business, and as soon as it got a little difficult, I quit and bailed on him. And I've left him with a bunch of debt. And it's like, well, you know, that's probably an integrity issue. Depending on the circumstance. Maybe there's a legitimate reason because of whatever happened? I don't know. But we find ways out of vows because they're not in our own self interests. There can be a righteous way out of a vow, perhaps because the vow itself was wicked and never should have vowed that. And I can't do it. I think Jephthah is a good example of this. Jephthah in the Book of Judges makes a vow, lord, if you give me victory when I go out to war, the first thing that comes out of my house to greet me, I will sacrifice to you. And then there's a huge debate on this. Does Jephthah mean humans? Was he thinking an animal would come out of his house to greet him? What was he thinking here? And I've heard people go, well, they did keep animals in the house. And he was just thinking that whatever pet came out to greet him because maybe when he came home, the pets would come out to greet him or something. And his daughter comes out to greet him. And then there's another huge debate on this. It says that she fulfilled her vow or he fulfilled the vow, but it's unclear whether she stayed a virgin or if he actually sacrificed a human. Which is something that God says, you cannot do this. In which case that would be a vow he should not have obeyed. He should have said, I repent. I never should have made that vow. That vow was evil. Fulfilling the vow would be adding more sin on top of the vow itself. That's a no brainer. You shouldn't do it. Maybe she stayed single as a virgin and that was like somehow the fulfillment of the vow. I'm a little skeptical that that's what actually happened. I think that in the context of the Book of Judges, it's showing heroes who fall short. Jephthah is one of those. He's a hero. God raises up, but he falls short. Shows you how much you need Jesus. Gideon falls short, Samson falls short. Over and over and over and over again. People just fall short. Barak falls short. Deborah, she did great. There's very few that do good. Deborah's actually one of the best. But yeah, people who fall short, I think it's showing flaws in him, not, oh, good job, Jephthah, you honored your vow. So, yeah, generally speaking, you keep every vow and you don't fail to keep a vow for selfish, carnal reasons. Trying to spiritualize it. But don't keep a vow. If keeping the vow is a sinful act, that's a good rule because I'm only adding sin to What I never should have vowed in the first place. I think that we can safely say that I'm sure there's more scripture. I just can't think of what weighs in on it right now. So I'll go to the next question, which is number nine, and it comes from Jordan, Filar, who says, hi, Pastor Mike. Hi, Jordan. Is Isaiah 14:3, 20 about Satan? And so this is the passage that I have always thought is about Satan. There's plenty of people who disagree with me on that, and they're my brothers and sisters, and that's fine. Not a major theological issue to get upset about, but a disagreement. We can look at the passage together, but you ask more, you say, is it about Satan? It says it is to the king of Babylon. But I've heard verse 12 to 14 used in reference to Satan. Just curious about your thoughts on it. Thanks for all you do. Yeah. Can we legitimately see behind a statement to a king or to a prince or something like that, that it could start being. Talking about some king of Babylon, but then shift to Satan or an angelic being? Well, we know that in Daniel, the Prince of Persia, not the video game, y', all, the Prince of Persia is a spiritual being, it seems, not the actual prince of Persia, but there is a spiritual being. Paul talks about principalities and powers of the air and this sort of thing. We know that Jesus says, I think it's. Is it to pergamum that Satan's throne is there. He has like this throne, this royal authority, spiritually speaking, in that location. And so I don't understand exactly how to put all this together because it's an invisible world to me. But I do know that there are these terminologies of both royalty, language, talking about even evil spiritual beings, like an angel or fallen angel or something like that, that are. They're given royal language and they're assigned locations. Prince of Persia, throne of Satan in this specific location. So that would seem to lay the groundwork for at least the potential of the Bible talking about a king of or a spiritual power behind an empire or behind a city that is Satan's agent in that area. Okay, let's just read the passage then and see why some people see it that way. And I won't make the case against it because I don't think that that's accurate. But we'll at least walk through it together and talk about some points. Isaiah 14:3. You're welcome to research it, find someone else's case against it. Maybe they'll convince you. I'm okay with that. When the Lord has given you rest from your pain and turmoil and the hard service with which you were made to serve, you will take up this taunt against the king of Babylon. Okay, so who's it against? The king of Babylon. And typically when Isaiah gets a taunt or, you know he's going to rant against different kings, he has lists of different leaders or nations he goes against. It's usually in the natural. Okay? Not like a supernatural being. So we would be fair to assume it starts that way. But if we read it, this is what we read, how the oppressor has ceased, the insolent fury ceased. The Lord has broken the staff of the wicked, the scepter of rulers that struck the peoples in wrath with unceasing blows, that ruled the nations in anger, with unrelenting persecution. The whole earth is at rest and quiet. They break forth into singing. So this is like a taunt. This is like a, hey, you were bad. You oppressed everybody. You hurt everybody. You controlled nations all around you, and it was bad. And everybody's singing because you've been stopped. Verse 8. The cypresses, those are trees, rejoice at you, the cedars of Lebanon, saying, since you were laid low, no woodcutter comes up against us. Now this is. Trees are representing people, representing individuals, representing communities and stuff like that. Sheol beneath is stirred up the grave, or where a soul goes after death. It could be either one of those or both. Sheol beneath is stirred up to meet you when you come, it rouses the shades to greet you. All who were leaders of the earth, it raises from their thrones all who were kings of the nations, all of them will answer and say to you, you too have become as weak as we. You have become like us. Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, the sound of your harps. Maggots are laid as a bed beneath you, and worms are your covers. It's describing death in vivid descriptions. And it's like, that's the weakness. And having been stripped of his power, this king of Babylon. And we read on, then it gets a little bit grandiose, like it's already been a little bit grandiose. But it gets very grandiose, the language here. How are you fallen from heaven, O day star, son of dawn? How are you cut down to the ground, you who laid the nations low? And this is where some people go, I think this is talking about Satan. And maybe it's not, but you can see how the terminology here. O Daystar, son of dawn, fallen from heaven. It's definitely talking about the King of Babylon as if he is this sort of like, supernatural figure who has been brought down low. And that fits the description of Satan. It's possible that Babylon, with its incredible influence, that Satan was in fact behind that and all the idolatry and the wickedness and all the destruction that was being brought, that Satan is in fact behind the King of Babylon and can be spoken of this way. Verse 13, you said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven, above the stars of God. I will set my throne on high. I will sit on the mount of the assembly, and the fourth far reaches of the north, I will send ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will make myself like the most high. This is again, very, very grandiose language that would fit actually more easily as a description of Satan than it would of the King of Babylon. I think that that's understandable for people to see that and to know that Ezekiel seems to talk about this too. It shifts over suddenly to some demonic thing behind. Behind Tyre. And not just the humans. Ezekiel 28. So Isaiah 14, we read on verse 15. But you are brought down to Sheol, to the far reaches of the pit. Those who see you will stare at you and ponder over you. Is this the man who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms, who made the world like a desert and overthrew its cities, who do not let his prisoners go home in the end, Satan is not like the big dog in judgment. When he is finally brought down low, they will look upon him and see a weak and defeated being. And symbolically, the discussion of the King of Babylon is, I think, now transitioned into a discussion that applies to Satan. All the kings of the nations lie in glory, each in his own tomb. But you are cast out, away from your grave like a loathed branch clothed with the slain. Those who pierced those pierced by the sword, who go down to the stones of the pit like a dead body trampled underfoot, you will not be joined with them in burial because you have destroyed your land, you have slain your people. And Satan brought destruction to everyone, including whoever follows him. So I think that this passage, you can make a pretty good case that this is referencing Satan. I'm open to being persuaded otherwise. I'm definitely open to it. The grandiose language just seems to lend itself to that. There's plenty of smart, intelligent, thoughtful believers who would disagree with me on that, and I haven't heard all of their reasons. So maybe, maybe there's something very convincing they have I'm open to it. All right, number 10. Anonymous question. How was David able to take Michael? That was the female McCall. I don't know how I'm supposed to pronounce her name. Really. M I, C H A L. How is he able to take her back as his wife? Isn't that a violation of Deuteronomy 24? And does that apply today? Yeah, it's complicated. Yeah. Deuteronomy 24 has this rule about. It's actually really interesting. I got to talk about a little bit because you guys will find this very interesting. Laws concerning divorce. When a man takes a wife and marries her, if she finds no favor in his eyes because he has found some indecency in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it into her hands and sends her out of his house. Okay, that's all ifs. This is not something God commands them to do. It's something that if it happens and she departs out of his house and she goes and becomes another man's wife and the latter man hates her and writes her a certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand and sends her out of his house, or if the latter man dies, who took her to be his wife, then here's the part. Her former husband, who sent her away, may not take her again to be his wife after she's been defiled, for that is an abomination before the Lord. You shall not bring sin upon the land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance. Under this Old Testament law. In particular, under the Old Testament law, you can't go back to your first husband after you have married a second. Why is this. And people Westernized, we read this and we often do. We just assume this is somehow oppression towards women. You just assume it without even really being able to explain it. A few of the things that it requires. First off, there's an actual certificate of divorce. He can't just send her away. That's actually a safety for the woman. The best theory I've heard on Deuteronomy 24, and I have read a bunch on it, the best theory I've heard on it personally would be the idea that something that still happens today in Middle Eastern countries, a man will. I want to be careful with my words here. He will loan out his wife for inappropriate things with another man. And he will do this by, in some communities, saying, I divorce you. I divorce you. I divorce you. We're divorced. Now go do this thing to this guest in the house that I want to Let you have this time with. Because. Because people are creeps and weird or whatever. And so then he brings her back and he's like, all right, marry you, marry you, marry you. We'll marry you now. And so then this becomes a kind of prostitution of a woman by her husband. And this passage would have stopped any of that kind of thing from happening because it's like, look, if you're going to do that, you can't take her back. That can't be allowed. This would be a safety for her, I think, and a good thing. That, to me, is the best theory I've heard for why this was in place, why this has to be in place now. How does it apply to David? David is married to Michael. Michael, she. He's running from Saul. He's fleeing from Saul. And if I remember the details right, and please correct me if I get any of this wrong, because I don't know, I'm afraid I may misstate some of it. I should refresh myself on it. But it's. There's a lot of context we'd have to read. So she goes away, or he goes away, fleeing from Saul. Saul doesn't like that. He gave his daughter over to David, who he now sees as a usurper and a threat and a danger. And so he gives his daughter away to another man. David never divorced Michael. Catch that. She never divorced. He never divorced Michael. He comes back and is like, oh, she's got this other guy. So he takes Michael back. Now, later on down the road, there's the whole thing about David dancing and stuff. And then Michael, it seems that him and her never were together intimately in the future after that. And so there's this weird situation where you're like, what is their relationship exactly? Technically, she didn't get married or she didn't divorce him. I don't think. Maybe I'm missing something there. He didn't divorce her. I'll put it that way. And so was this not just an extended adulterous affair that she had with this other man in this particular setting? Would it not perhaps be the case that this man was. That this other relationship was just invalid because there was no actual real divorce? Maybe that's the case. I'm not 100% sure. Another explanation could simply be David took her back and it was a violation of Deuteronomy 24, and that this was actually wrong. And I'm perfectly content to have that as the explanation. I don't have a problem with saying that David did something wrong. He did Some things that were wrong, as you all know. So, yeah, there's. There's a few thoughts on it. That's a tentative answer. Just trying to think it through. This is a great question. Next time I read through the whole story of David and his interactions there, I will pay more attention and perhaps I'll have a better answer for you. So let's go to question number 10, 11, which is a bonus question. Sometimes my assistant Sarah will send me these bonus questions. She's the one going through the chat, pulling out questions and sending them to me. I never read them until I'm reading them live on camera. So I don't even know what this is yet. Okay, let's read it in an old video. You said you liked to do accents. Please do your best accent. Oh, God. I have decided to try to not do too many accents. Okay. Especially because back in the day, I would do accents. I was like doing youth ministry or something. And it's like a small community. I do an accent. Everybody's. Some people laugh. Couple. Two people laugh in the room. And as I did online ministry, I realized that it's reaching out to so many people that doing goofy accents too much can actually. It is perceived differently in different communities now. Everybody's different. Like, I love it when I hear a foreigner do an American accent. I don't know why. I find that really funny. Okay. They think it's funny too. I get a big kick out of it, but I don't know. But I don't have a good accent. I just do goofy voices and stuff sometimes, so. And whatever I do, I end up transitioning into Irish on accident. Some sort of weird, obnoxious, like, over the top Irish type accent. But, I mean, I'm my. You know, my family was Irish going back, so maybe. Maybe that's just ancestral influence. No, I don't know. I'm just making stuff up. Yeah, I'm not going to do an accent for you because that's way too embarrassing for me. Jamie. Maybe one will pop out in the future on accident. On accident. Accentedent. Accentedentally. All right, well, I gotta go. Let's close in prayer. Father, we thank you for your holy word. We thank you that in the midst of all of our questions in life, you not only intellectually answer them with scripture, but scripture answers so many of our heart issues. I just pray for everybody listening now and who will be listening to this video in the future that you'd help them to realize that the heart problems of mankind are answered so well in the word of God better than I could ever express, just right there in the text of Scripture. May anybody who's struggling right now, who's going through real hardship and loss and pain and anguish that they don't even know how to explain and that they never could have anticipated and that they feel they have no solution for, may they find aid and salve and help direction and nourishment in your word. In Jesus name, amen. Amen.