Q&A Genesis 23-25

Hey, everyone. Thanks again for listening to Q&A with the Pastor, where we sit down every week with the preacher and ask questions from his sermon the week before, week by week. This week, Keith preached on Genesis 23 through 25. And Keith, thanks for talking to us again. I see that you wore the exact almost same thing that I wore today. How did that happen? Did you call one of my friends or did you? come early this morning and go home and change? What was that all about? I looked in my closet and this was the first shirt in the row of shirts in my... to be picked. That was a random circumstance. So you'd say, providentially, you were trying to be like me. Maybe the Lord wants me to be more like you. Alright, let's try this then. Okay, Keith, you talked briefly about prescriptive and descriptive ways of looking at scripture, and we see, especially in this part of Genesis 23 through 25, where if we take things literally, especially within dating or marriage or death, we would probably have to change so much of what we do in a daily living. Talk to us a little bit about what it means to read the Bible prescriptively and what it means to read the Bible descriptively. One of the best examples of thinking through this is the book of Acts. How much is Luke describing what God did then to manifest his glory to promote and spread his gospel and how much of it is in prescribing what the church should always do. So, Pentecost, descriptive or prescriptive? Well, it seems that it's mainly descriptive because it is fulfilling a prophecy from the Old Testament and it's looking forward to the New Testament where we'll all be gathering as one again. It doesn't seem very prescriptive. Now, there's other parts that are descriptive. Acts 2.42, the church was committed to the apostles teaching and to fellowship. I think that is descriptive, but you can obviously see the implication has a clear prescriptive aspect to it. Even though Luke, as a historian, is describing what they were doing, that's clearly easier to prescribe. I made the joke in the Genesis passage, you know, yes, because Abraham's in his servant, we should all get servants and they should find wives for our children. Obviously, that's kind of taken the descriptive side and making it prescriptive where it shouldn't be. So, narrative is just more difficult, and that's the basic issue there. The letters of Paul, they're easy because you have to know a little bit of the context, a little bit of the culture, and then the prescription just really flows right out. Whereas the historical narratives, They are more difficult. You have to do a little bit more work to think, what is God doing? What is he doing then? What is he doing now that's similar? It takes a bit more work. It's more of a warning to say, don't jump so quickly to say everything that was happening then must continue to happen now. that makes your analysis of how to break up sections and preach from them change week to week? I mean, we see in your 1 John series, you were going paragraph by paragraph, sometimes verse by verse. Within this Genesis series, you're going chapter by chapter. And in this case, you go three chapters throughout the sermon. How does the narrative change based on the descriptive versus the prescriptive, make your sermon selection within the passages of Scripture? Yeah, sermon selection is one of the things that I find most difficult. Finding the exact text. Where is the beginning and the end? Even in Paul with the letters, because they flow. A prescription will flow right out of the prayer. So, say you take the Ephesians, there's all the theology up front, and then all the application out back, and they have to be connected. So, it's actually hard to even disconnect those at times. But here the Genesis, I have wrestled with it. Genesis 1, 2, and 3, and Genesis 12, those were all fairly easy to break up. They're clear literary units. This section was probably the most difficult to really figure out. Do I take Sarah's death by itself? Do I take Sarah's death and Abraham's death and then do one sermon and then actually leave out chapter 24 for a whole other sermon? In the end, I just said, look, this seems like just a clear transitional section. The wife's death, the son's marriage, and then the father's death. All that together seemed to flow together. in the literary function as a transition from the first patriarch to the next. That's how I chose it. Now, what made it that difficult, I think, in the sermon was that there was just a lot of information. There wasn't the one message as you're supposed to preach. There's so many facts within that. Well, there's, you know, how to mourn death, how to celebrate marriage, how to pursue marriage. Yeah, I felt like it was a little bit of everything for everybody. But I pray the Lord will use all those parts to encourage everyone. But the one thing that, you know, this particular sermon lacked was a clear, this is it. Other than, you know, God is faithful and He provides us. That's all we see in our Genesis. Welcome to Genesis, yeah. Within the sermon you talked briefly about how we're called to be different people as sons and daughters of God. And you said we're to avoid ungodliness and pursue godliness. So it's not that we're just trying to avoid the world, but we are supposed to Pursue God even within the world. How does that practically play out? Huh? I mean there are so many circumstances where I should avoid ungodliness and pursue Christ likeness But is there a framework to avoid ungodliness within a fallen world? being around fallen friends and also our hearts longing for Fleshly desires outside of the illumination of the spirit I Yeah, that's a hard question because it really would look different for each person. In the sense that everyone has their own worldliness, everyone has their own heart that takes them in a certain direction. The simple answer would be that God has provided clear things to set your mind upon. that keep you from having your mind drift towards the worldliness. So, as sojourners, what's supposed to make us different is that we have experienced God's love, we love God above everything else, and out of that, we love others, even our enemies. And that's what's supposed to make us so different, is we are compelled by the love of Christ to live a different life. And so, I mean, the simple answer that's still fairly vague, more vague, I think, than what you're looking for is, because we have Christ as the son of the right hand of the Father who has loved us, we should set our mind on the things above. And as you look at things in this world, you have to ask yourself, if I set my affections on that kind of a TV show, that kind of a movie, that kind of music, that kind of dating scene, that kind of practice, that kind of business, that kind of self-promotion, whatever that is, is that going to promote me and my lust and my sin, or is that going to promote a greater love for God? So, let's just take the two circumstances that you talked about in the sermon. You talked about death twice, and you talked about marriage and relationship in the middle of those. How do I avoid ungodliness within the pursuit of marriage or within marriage? How do I avoid ungodliness while pursuing godliness? I mean, there are so many things, but are there some items that we can do that within marriage or within relationships with other people? Yes, so the pursuing godliness in the midst of pursuing a spouse or a partner. You know, I gave certain parameters. Obviously, you're not going to date someone who's not a Christian if you're a Christian. You're not going to date someone who tempts you to sin. I think one of the other pieces of advice I would give is don't dwell on what you don't have. Trust God in His sovereignty. that you don't have that partner you long for yet in His goodness. That's another thing that we just constantly see in Genesis. He is good. He has declared what is good, good. He's made what is good, good. And He is good and trustworthy. And I think one of the things we can lead into ungodliness is to start saying, I don't have what I want. Woe is me. And start questioning the love of God, the goodness of God. And that can lead to ungodliness. Um, it's talking a lot about, you know, our contentment within what God has already given us. I think a lot of people see contentment as me just accepting the fact that God isn't blessing me as much as I want him to, rather than God is blessing me as much as I can handle or that I need right now. Yeah. And I think one of the ways you need to be proactive in saying not just sit back and stoically accept the facts. But to say God has given me singleness right now, whether you're a widow or you're a young lady who's still waiting for Mr. Right. I would say use your time well. As a married man and with a child now, I realize my time is very limited. There's many things that single people can do that married people cannot. And God can use you in great ways to encourage the body and spread the gospel. One of the best things I would say you could do is Don't dwell on what you don't have. Look at what God has given you in freedom to how you can serve Him now and serve Him faithfully. Because if you're just going to sit at home and watch TV and eat bonbons and not prepare yourself and not use this time well, you're not being faithful. And that's what's going to lead to more ungodliness. I would assume that's the same within marriage. We're always tempted by something that we don't have. I'm not going to place you in the position of confessing, but you may once married think, should I have married someone else? Or what if my wife had the qualities of that person? Or what if I had five kids instead of just two? Or what if I had two instead of just five? It seems like that lack of commitment is not focusing on what God has given you, but is pursuing ungodliness in the escape of what's not really there? Well, no. I mean, I'll... You know, I wanted... Lisa and I both, we wanted children earlier. And because of health issues, we've had to wait. And it's something that I've wrestled with contentment. And God has been good. I have to constantly remind myself that in His goodness, He saved me. In His goodness, He has given me what I have. In His goodness, He has used what I have to do other things other than give me children. So, yeah, it's difficult. A big part of it is just looking and saying, how big of a God is God? How powerful is God? This reminds me of a question that somebody else asked after the sermon. I stated fairly boldly that, men, you are to love your wives no matter if you think They're the person you're supposed to be with or not. It's your responsibility to love your wife, and you have to believe that if you married her, God didn't keep you from marrying her. A brother very wisely said, well, what about Solomon? He had so many wives. Why didn't God keep him from those? Well, God does permit evil. God clearly was doing something with Solomon there and permitting him to go after other women that are other gods, to divide the kingdom, to bring judgment, to show that Actually, I think it's more to prepare our hearts for the true son of David who is going to come and save us, you know, in the bigger theological framework. I don't think that... makes null the trust that a monogamous man should have that his wife is his wife. What I was trying to go after was basically get over this idea that you need to constantly be falling in love with your spouse. Life gets hard. Life gets difficult. Your responsibility is to set your affections intentionally on your spouse. Okay. Now just going with the next circumstance within death. How are we to live separately from the world, even within the world, in mourning properly, or dying properly, or knowing that our lives will come to a physical end here on earth? Yeah. Again, it goes back to, especially when a young person dies, why didn't God present this? Are you questioning and challenging God for his goodness and how he brought things about? This is difficult not to do. The first question is, why did God allow this to happen? Most people aren't going to say, why did God make this happen? Why did God allow this to happen immediately? Why do bad things happen to good people? I think you have to immediately just look and say, may God use this death to glorify Him. It's the main focus of your life. Is the main focus of your life to love God with all your heart and to glorify Him above all things? Is that your chief end? Or is it for you to keep everything that makes you happy? One of the biggest things to look at death, I mentioned in the sermon, look at it as the way to face the real consequences of the curse. Look at it in a way that lets you see how bad and evil and destructive sin is. And let that really sink in. That's a problem, I think, in America. We typically just want to say, oh, they're not with us, they're in heaven. Let's not act like this really isn't painful. This is painful. This is difficult. The death of a loved one, someone you love, you lose them. That's supposed to be a horrible reminder of the world we live in. The fallen world that is corrupted by sin. I think we need to let that have its proper effect. And that proper effect will lead us to trust God. The God who says, I am the resurrection. Going into just kind of leaving the circumstances, but talking a little bit about prayer, you mentioned that We should pray for our daily needs. We should pray through supplication as well as thankfulness and repentance and praise. In what ways do we practically pray for specific things? Should I get up every morning and pray that I will have food for breakfast or that I won't crash as I drive to work? that, you know, I'll be safe throughout the day, or I won't hurt anyone's feelings. I mean, how specific? I would assume that we could get into so many long prayers, and we also compare that with what is the Lord's Prayer that He gave us, and it doesn't have a tremendous amount of specifics in it. Yeah, that's a good question. While the Lord's Prayer doesn't have a lot of specifics, it does carry every, it does touch every part of life. physical needs, spiritual needs, theological needs, forgiveness. Let your will be done on earth as in heaven. I mean, the Lord's Prayer generally does flow in every sphere of life. So, I mean, immediately when he asked the question, my mind went to Paul's command to pray without ceasing, which says, yeah, every single part of your life should be going to God. So, when you pull out your cereal, there should be a general thankfulness. I can eat today. That would be a real radical way of looking at all of life. Everything that comes to you is a good gift from God. But it wouldn't be proper. I think it would be the ideal. So that everything you get, you don't just take it and consume it. You pray. thank you i mean even if i mean your mind is always so on god that every time you get something you're thanking god yeah or every time you're about to do something you're about to go make a visitation you're about to go home and lead your children through prayer about to do devotions every responsibility you're praying that god would give you success every gift you receive you're giving him thankfulness that would be the ideal life. That's a life that's committed to thinking and dwelling upon God with your entire affection. I know that you said within the sermon that your prayer reveals your dependence and longing for God's continual mercy and blessing on your life. It's very convicting because I knew that I pulled cereal out and thought, I love the cereal that I bought. This is mine. I have dominion over my breakfast, and still I'm living in the light of God's blessings. So that was very hard to take in. Yeah, Lucky Charms, you really like those, right? I can't get enough of them, frankly. So if there's one good thing that God gave us outside of his son, it's Sam's that makes things in bulk for breakfast. Yeah, I went there. You know there's a place called the Chi Shop just south of Williamsboro, and you can buy just the marshmallows at the Lucky Charms. Is that where heaven is? As I long for heaven? That's where the end of your rainbow is. My double rainbow. Okay, one last thing before we get totally out of hand. You brought up, you basically revealed that you're a fan of Jane Austen and her literature. Okay. Now give us the picture that you were trying to paint. and how you, in my opinion, beautifully translated that picture into our hope in the gospel and our hope for Christ's return for us, Brian. Yeah, I have to admit that the only way I would have ever thought about Jane Austen is because my wife's uh... has made me watch the movie and there's been a back from the uh... fascinating so i i i have been you watch the british movie or the more recent i have no idea was it six hours five to six hours? no it must have been the shorter one this is a while back but that scene always stood out to me it's a hilarious scene where Mr. Darcy is going uh... and he knocks on the door and all the Bennett girls and this very peculiar mother who's trying to push her daughters out onto the Richmond They're literally just laying on the couch eating bonbons. The scene is just beautifully frantic and they have to present themselves well and I don't know if it's because I was preaching during that season or not. But that just always stood out to me, as I watched it, as that's what Christ is going to do. That's what it's going to look like when Christ returns. For many, we're sitting around entertaining ourselves with the things of this world, and we're going to try to frantically get things in order. And it's too late with Christ. As soon as you hear the trumpet blast, It's done. There's no knocking on the door in a moment to prepare yourself. It's supposed to be somewhat of a fearful meditation. But yeah, it's my wife's fault. I hope you're content with that. I am, I am. I long for godliness. My machoism would not have allowed me to I don't volitionally choose such a means of entertainment, but I'm very thankful for my wife who recommended it. Reveals so many great things to you. Yes. All right. Well, good. Well, Keith, thanks for your time this morning. If those of you who are listening have a question from this week's upcoming sermon, please email us at congregation at jpbc.org. We will funnel those questions to Keith next week. Now, Keith, what are you preaching on this weekend? Isaac's children him being blessed by God to have children and then the the two twins the the red hairy one and the ankle grabber to two fantastic characters that will well should keep us on the edge of our seats as we read because I Well, yes. Enough said about those two. Yeah, yeah. That's a great teaser. Now, if you could sum this up, usually in one word, if you could sum this up in two words, what would it be? Gaudilex. Gaudilex, okay. What about just using adjectives? Red, hairy, hungry. That's about it. I don't know how those match gaudilex, but I guess I have to wait and see. Oh, well. Yeah, that was more described. You would describe the whole sermon as red, hairy. I love Esau. He's red, hairy, and hungry. That sounds like a title of the worst book ever written, basically. All right, well, Keith, thanks so much.