SPEAKER_01 0:35

Hi friends, my name is Mike. This is the Young Sunday Show. Welcome to my channel and welcome to my podcast if you're listening to this in audio. What is my goal in reading the Bible? This comment came in a few days ago and it really grabbed my attention because I really appreciated it and I've never been asked that before. Someone asked me, Well, what's your goal now in reading the Bible? And that really caused me to stop and think about it, to stop and think it through. And I started thinking about goals. I started thinking about reading the Bible as a goal and how that just has an academic ring to it. You know, that it's I'm reading the Bible as a goal, either a goal that's been set for me or one that I've set for myself. And the idea is to attain that goal, whatever that is. And reading the Bible, having that as a goal, is a goal that you never actually really attain. I found out. It just the goalpost keeps moving. You don't really get there. Let me show you. If you're watching the video, especially, you're going to appreciate this. Let me show you what I'm talking about. Millie's Cozy Cottage commented on that video that you see up in the top of this of the screen here. That video I entitled How to Study the Bible and Still Miss the Point. And in that video, I talked about my experience in studying the Bible and missing the point. I mean, you know, that's how it was. It was mostly academic because, you know, as getting trained in in Bible college, you know, that that little bit of training that I got in Bible college, and then, you know, being on pastoral teams for a number of years, the goal was always to amass more knowledge, to be able to articulate more clearly what we thought the Bible said, you know, and even though what we're articulating, you know, may have been totally different than what the church down the street was articulating, we thought we were right, they thought they were right. And so, you know, there's the whole dynamic that's set up. But look at Millie's question here, and this, I loved this. This was awesome. Thank you, Millie, for doing this. She said, So, Mike, what is your goal in reading the Bible now? I feel like we were taught that there's always an agenda when reading the Bible. Oh, yeah, we were. There's an agenda, absolutely. We're going to talk about that. This is hard to get away from, she says, after you've been taught that it's a study tool or a place for answers. Wow, that's exactly what I was taught. It's a study tool. It's a way to go to get answers, to win an argument, to be right, to be more solidified in what you're thinking. And so that you can articulate that better in conversations and arguments. We used to do a thing called theological colloquies, which was, you know, was code for you know theological smackdown for a better term. You know, get into a public theological argument, you know, where you come out the victor, you you feel good about yourself, you know, and uh that whole thing. But you're exactly right, Millie. You know, I was taught that it's a study tool, it's an end in itself. It's a study tool and it's a place for answers. But she says, so true to the world of way too much information these days, people have different opinions. Yes, they do. And that's a good thing. That can be a very good thing. The older I get, she says, the more I want to strip away everything and just have a simple relationship with Jesus. Millie, so do I. I love the way you put that. And guess what? We can have a rich, satisfying, simple, at the same time, relation with Jesus without reading scripture. I know a big shock, right? What's this guy talking about? Listen, religion has so trained us to approach scripture academically in order to glean information out of it, in order to data mine information from it, that we don't know how not to do that. And when we hear someone say that Jesus alone is enough, it gets us upset. Why? Why does it get us upset? Why would elevating Jesus above the Bible make us upset or make us uneasy? So let's talk about this. What's my goal now today in reading the Bible? Well, first of all, let's define what a goal is. I've got a couple definitions for you here that I looked up. I did do some research on this. We're going to talk about a lot of the research I did here in just a minute. But what is the goal? One definition is it's the result or achievement toward which effort is directed. So we've got this goal out there. You know, we've we've set this goal or somebody set it for us, and it's out there, and now we're going to exert our effort, we're going to be consumed, our effort's going to be consumed on obtaining that goal. And so the it's the result or achievement toward which effort is directed. And we're we're spending our energy to get there. And so, if Bible reading is a goal, then we're spending our energy to read more of the Bible, right? And I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing. It can be. I've seen it go really bad, but that's what it means to have a goal. And another definition that I have here is the terminal point of a journey or race, and also an aim or objective that you work toward with effort and determination. So it's something that's out there. It's it's a goal that's been set either by myself again, or someone or an organization has set the goal for me. You need to be reading your Bible, you need to be doing that every day, and it needs to be done academically, and you can't fail. If you fail, you know, then you're called into question, and you're not you're not in compliance. And so there's, you know, there's liable to be punishments for non-compliance and rewards for compliance in a religious setting. That's usually what happens. But we're given this aim or this objective that we're to work toward with effort and determination. I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna do this, whether my heart is in it or not, I've got to get through these five chapters of the Bible today so that I can meet my goal of reading the Bible through in a year. Been there, done that, and I know you have too. So there's an idea of a goal. And when it comes to reading the Bible, if we read it academically like that, wow, we get exhausted. That's exhausting, and it burns us out, it burned me out. I got very burned out on it. So let me ask the question: do I need to be reading the Bible as a goal? Do I need a Bible reading goal? Do you need a Bible reading goal? Again, goals are either self-imposed or they're assigned to us by others. And in in a church setting and religious settings, it's mostly the latter. Goals are assigned to us by others under the guise of what might be called spiritual disciplines. But let me let me tell you a little bit about what my Bible reading goals used to be. They're not this anymore, but they used to be. I've already alluded to this first one, and that was reading the Bible through in a year. That was my goal, and I got a confession to make. Did you read your Bible today? Oh, you didn't? Ooh, what's wrong? What's wrong with you? You see, it becomes an indicator of good spiritual health. Whatever good spiritual health means, and I don't even know what that means. What does that mean? I woke up this morning in good spiritual health. Why? Because Christ is in me and he's the hope of glory. Not because I had an intense Bible reading time. That had nothing to do with it. It has nothing to do with it. I didn't have an intense Bible reading time today. It's still morning here. I didn't have that. I didn't have that yesterday. More about that in just a minute. But we assume that reading the Bible indicates you've got good spiritual health, that there's nothing wrong with you. Well, listen, you know, by one sacrifice, Jesus has made perfect forever those who are being saved. There is nothing wrong with me. I'm completely accepted in the beloved, in Jesus. But the assumption is if I didn't read the Bible today, then maybe my spiritual health is starting to lag behind. Maybe my prayer life's lagging behind too. And you know, all this stuff that we just kind of package together and we assume because religion has convinced us through years and years that it's so, we assume that this package deal has to keep going in order for you to mature, whatever that means. We're gonna talk about that in a second, too. Stand by, we're getting there. But the assumption is it indicates good spiritual health. A second, a second, I'm losing my voice, I'm getting excited. A second assumption is that it makes me a stronger Christian. What does that mean? Think about that a minute. In your own mind, in your own life, think about that. What does that mean, a stronger Christian? You're able to win an argument? You're able to articulate your position better more frequently? You know, what does that mean, a stronger Christian? Wow, I don't have an answer for that. I don't know what that means. You either believe or you don't believe. God doesn't give his spirit by measure. I don't have more of the Holy Spirit than you do, and you don't have more of the Holy Spirit than I do. I guess in that sense, we're all strong Christians because we're being held by His power, not our own. My effort has nothing to do with my position in Christ, nothing at all. I was made righteous by faith. I was made perfect by his one sacrifice by faith. I was sanctified, I was made holy. I was given the righteousness of Christ. It was dumped into my account when I believed. I can't get any holier, I can't get any more sanctified, I can't get any stronger. Maybe we just simply mean fewer bad days, you know. I don't know. Fewer bad attitudes, I don't know. But that doesn't mean I'm stronger than you are. If I'm having an attitude, a bad attitude free day, you know, I'm not having an attitude today, and you are, it doesn't make me a stronger Christian. You know, there's there's that's a really poor assumption. That's a really bad assumption. A third assumption that we all all all the time, or you know, most of the time make is that reading the Bible on a regular schedule is evidence that God's approved of you. You know, this is where we take passages like 2 Timothy 2.15 out of context, you know, where it used to say, study to show yourself approved. That was the old, some of the old versions. Study to show yourself approved. And we thought, okay, well, this means, you know, knuckle down and bear down and you know, get your Bible in front of you and study, study, study. Thankfully, more more recent translations of that verse translate it correctly. To be careful to show yourself approved, to be diligent to show yourself approved. And the context is the is in the context of Paul writing to Timothy about avoiding arguments, avoiding arguing about what words mean, and getting down into these granular arguments that have no purpose and don't go anywhere. That's what he was talking about. He wasn't saying study the Bible, there weren't any. Think about that. No, that isn't what he was saying at all. He was saying be careful how you live with these people and be careful how, be careful to avoid arguments, empty arguments that go nowhere. Stay away from those. We're gonna talk more about that too in just a second. I got a lot of stuff here planned for you. This comment that came through really got me going. So we're gonna talk about a lot of stuff. A fourth assumption that we make about you know have being on a regular Bible reading schedule is that it validates our opinions. If I have an opinion about something and I haven't been reading my Bible every day, then my opinion is uh thought to be less less uh valuable, less validated, or completely unvalidated, because I'm not on a rigid Bible reading schedule, Bible reading course. But that's not the case at all. Here I think is the bottom line. In my Bible reading academics of yesteryear, before I crashed and burned out of performance-based Christianity, Scripture was the goal, not Jesus. Scripture was the goal. Remember in John chapter 5, Jesus said, You study the scriptures because you think that in them you have life. But they they testify about me. And so in that um, well, it's there on the screen, I guess. I left it up there on the screen. In that video that I made, and again, if you're listening to this on audio, you might want to go watch it on video. It's going to be more impactful, I guarantee you. When I did that video, how to study the Bible and still miss the point, it was all about academics. Scripture was the goal. Yay, I got through it. I read James. My wife memorized James. That was a hard year on multiple levels. Anyway, yeah, it was uh it was academic. And as long as I made the the academic goal, I was thought to be fine. I was thought, well, okay, you made it. And so you're in. This is uh this is this is you know the goal, and and congratulations, you met the goal and you did what you were supposed to do. Let me show you something. And again, this is where if you're not watching the video, go there. I'll have a link to the video in the description of the audio podcast. Go to the video and listen to it. Let's look at some some John Piper quotes. John Piper, I came across this while I was researching this, and I'll have a link to it in the description, a link to this website where I got these uh quotes and this information. He talked about the Bible and he talked about scripture and about reading scripture and how important it is. He gave 10 reasons why we should be reading the Bible uh regularly and constantly and daily, or you know, whatever. But let's start with a couple of quotes here just to kind of whet our appetite, okay? So look at this slide here. John Piper said this, and again, I'll have I'll have the link down there in the uh description. He said, I have never met a mature, fruitful, strong, spiritually discerning Christian who was not full of scripture, devoted to regular meditation on scripture, and given to storing it in the heart through Bible memorization. And that's not a coincidence. End of quote. Again, that's John Piper. What does he mean by he's never met a mature Christian, a fruitful Christian, a strong Christian, spiritually discerning Christian who wasn't full of the scripture? Listen, what does that mean? What's a mature Christian? Think about it. I'll let you ponder that a moment. I had to think about that. Does it mean that I'm able to articulate my point based on the group that I'm a part of and that I can reinforce what that group believes with my own beliefs? Is that mature? You know, fruitful. Isn't isn't fruit a fruit of the spirit? Can I be fruitful apart from reading the Bible? Or do I have to read the Bible to be fruitful? Which is it? Is the Bible necessary for fruit? What does that mean to be a strong Christian? Again, I want to ask that question. What does that mean? What does it mean to be a strong or a spiritually discerning Christian? How does that happen? Isn't discernment a gift of the Spirit? I think maybe it is. And so this was an opening uh quote of his on this website that really caught my attention because it got it got me thinking about that, you know. In this quote, you know, a strong, fruitful, mature Christian is one who is devoted to daily regular meditation on scripture. Listen, I like scripture. I'm not anti-scripture, not at all. We'll talk about that more here as I kind of open this up to you. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying I don't have to approach it academically, and it's not tied to my spiritual growth. When Paul exhorted those that he was writing to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus, he was talking about an experiential knowledge, a relationship knowledge. They didn't have Bibles. Nobody had the scroll of Isaiah tucked under their arm, going to church. That wasn't happening. That didn't happen for several hundred years later when the Bible was compiled. They didn't have that, and yet they were growing spiritually. They were discerning things spiritually. They were mature in their knowledge of grace. They're growing in grace, and not head knowledge of the Lord Jesus, but experiential knowledge of knowing Jesus and knowing his grace. Big difference. Let's look at the rest of his quote here. He's talking about those who you know are on a regular Bible reading schedule, and he says, it may seem obvious to them or to others, but it isn't obvious because he says, I know fairly well along Christians who don't do this, that don't, you know, aren't on a stringent Bible reading plan. They don't do this, and they've been Christians for years, and they're laxadaisical. Are they really? Maybe they're just burned out. Maybe they're burned out like I was burned out. Maybe they just had enough. Maybe they had enough of Scripture being weaponized against them and taken out of context so many times that they finally started to catch on. And slowly over the years since, it's been 17 years for me since I walked away from a religious setting. And slowly over those years, they start to put the pieces back together by the grace of God, and they see more clearly now than they've ever seen before how scripture gets taken out of context and used against you if you don't comply to the group think tank. At least that's how it was for me. Was that how it was for you? I'm not laxadaisical at all. I don't think I am. I'm just careful. I've spent 17 years trying to put scripture back in its context. And that's not easy to do. I don't ever want to read scripture out of context again, and I'm certainly not going to weaponize it against someone else. Ever. I'm never doing that again. And that's a big part of what happened to me when I was in performance-based Christianity. He continues in this quote, and he says they think it's optional, that is, Bible reading, because they know so much already, and they read so many other books. I don't regard that as a very good habit at all. I think it's dangerous. Yeah, again, that's John Piper. That's his end of quote there. But anyway, I don't want this to go too long, but so I'm going to move along here. He gave 10 reasons here again of why we should be reading Scripture daily and regularly and uh perhaps even academically. So I'm going to go through each one of these reasons one at a time and talk about them. Okay, here's reason number one. Scripture saves. That's John Piper, that's not me. Reason number one, Scripture saves. How does it do that? I thought Jesus saved. Let's take the word scripture out of there and let's insert the name Jesus. Jesus saves. Remember Paul and the Philippian jailer? Was it Paul and Silas? When you know the earthquake happened and they broke out of jail, and a Philippian jailer said, What must I do to be saved? Paul didn't say read the Bible. Get into scripture, man. Get into scripture, get scripture in you, and become part of a Bible reading plan. He didn't say scripture saves. He said Jesus saves. But that's Piper's number one reason to be reading Scripture. Scripture saves. Reason number two, Scripture frees from Satan. Really? I didn't know that. I thought Jesus did that. I thought Christ in me was the hope of glory, and I thought that in me there's no darkness because Jesus is in me. Hmm. I don't think Scripture frees me from Satan. I think Jesus has already done that. And he did that one time. And I'm never gonna lose that. It's not gonna go anywhere. And it had nothing to do with the Bible. Nothing at all. Reason number three the Piper gives is Scripture imparts grace and peace. I didn't know that. Scripture imparts grace and peace. What about when Paul would open many of his letters and he would say, Grace and peace to you from Scripture? No. Grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. To a group of people that didn't have Scripture, to a group of people written to a group of people that didn't have Bibles. And yet somehow the Holy Spirit brought them into the kingdom and matured them in grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus, apart from having a Bible. Again, I'm not dissing the Bible. I like my Bible. I enjoy my Bible. I use my Bible all the time. If you've been here on the Young Sunday show for any length of time, you know that I reference the Bible. I trust the Bible. I'm just not doing it as homework. I'm not doing it as an academic exercise. I'm not doing it so that I can be right and convince you of something. That's not why I'm doing it. Not at all. We'll talk about why I'm doing it here in just a moment. But that's reason number three that Piper gives is scripture imparts grace and truth, grace and peace. Listen, I've seen scripture abused and imparting and used to impart anything but grace and peace. I've seen it used out of context and weaponized to the point where it imparts and inflicts damage on someone's soul. I've seen that happen over and over and over again. Scripture can be taken out of context and used to say anything that we want it to say in any way we want it to say it. That's reason three, he gives. Reason four, scripture sanctifies. You know what sanctifies sanctify means? Makes you holy. Scripture sanctifies. Wow, really? I thought that was a work of the spirit. Again, I must have been wrong. I thought that was a work of the spirit. How can a book sanctify me? Well, you know, more often than not, we apply this to the work of the spirit, and we think it means scripture. We think that it's scripture's a job to do this, but really, is it? How does scripture do this? How does scripture sanctify me? How does scripture set me apart? How does scripture make me holy? When I believed, way back when, January of 1973, when I came to faith in Jesus, I didn't know diddly squat about the Bible. And yet I was sanctified. But in this quote or in this reason for that that Piper is giving here, he's talking about sanctification being progressive, that you slowly become holier and holier and holier, and that it's the Bible, it's your understanding and reading of the Bible that's making you holier, holier, holier. But that isn't what scripture says. The very scripture that they're using to say this is what happens says that that isn't what happens. That we were sanctified when we believed. We were made holy. There aren't levels of holiness, there aren't levels of sanctification, there aren't degrees of holiness. When you believed, you were made holy. You were sanctified, you were set apart, and you are holy. You were holy when you believed, and you're holy now. And there's not a progression of sanctification that somehow the Bible is doing to you. That's a misunderstanding of sanctification. I got that from the Bible. Wow, go figure. Reason number five that he gives, Scripture gives joy. It can, I guess, if you use it right, if you keep it in context, if you put it back in context, it can certainly add to your joy, but hey, joy is a fruit of the spirit. That's what my Bible says. I got that from Scripture too. Joy is a fruit of the Spirit. I've seen Scripture used to dismantle joy. Have you? I have. It's been used against me to dismantle joy. It can give joy. Again, if you keep it in context, if it's if you're not weaponizing it, I suppose it can be. It can enhance that. But again, joy is a fruit of the spirit. I can have joy apart from the Bible. Because it's a fruit of the spirit. Just like peace and love, what is it? Joy. I forget them all. You know them all. The fruits of the Spirit. Go look them up. That'll be good. That'll be a good exercise. Look them up in Scripture. Because again, we don't ignore Scripture. We want it in context. Reason number six that he gives Scripture protects us from destructive error. Again, it can, or it can be the source of that destructive error in the wrong hands. In the hands of a narcissistic leader or a false teacher, or in the hands of a wolf in sheep's clothing, it can become the source of destruction and the source of destructive error. That's been my experience in churchity. And again, I've spent seventeen years now trying to bring the pieces back together and put them back in context so that I can move away from that hurt, so that I can move beyond that hurt. Scripture, you know, that's not a blanket statement. I'm sorry, John, that's not. Scripture protects us from destructive error. Yeah, I don't know. I think the Holy Spirit does that. Here's number seven that he gives. Scripture is the hope of heaven. Again, I didn't know that. I thought Jesus was the hope of heaven. I thought God the Father on his throne and Jesus at his side were the hope of heaven. I thought that was my treasure. I thought that was my reward. Not the Bible. The Bible's the hope of heaven? How does that work? Where's that verse? Show me. And if you follow the link to this, which again I'm gonna have in the description, you know, he he talks about verses in here. I don't want to misrepresent him, but I think he's taking them out of context. And he's illustrating my point to varying degrees, in my opinion. So scripture isn't the hope of heaven, Jesus is. Wow! If scripture's the hope of heaven, now Jesus, Jesus died for my sins and your sins. The Bible didn't. We get Jesus. Yes, we do. Reason number eight that he gives, Scripture will be resisted by some. I suppose, you know, this is probably the point that I I probably agree the most with him because I've seen this happen. You know, scripture is resisted by some. Or maybe it's the wrong interpretation of scripture is resisted by some. Maybe we know better. Maybe the work of the Spirit in us giving us discernment, when we hear something wrong concerning scripture, when we hear something said or we read something written that's taking it out of context and is harmful, maybe our yuck meter goes off and we're able to identify that. And then for those who are just kind of blindly following the leader, they're thinking, man, you're being resistive to scripture. Maybe I'm being resistive to spiritual abuse that uses scripture to its own end. Maybe that's the case. It certainly was for me. Reason number nine of Piper's reasons to read the Bible every day. The right handling of Scripture is approved by God. The right handling of Scripture is approved by God. Again, we're getting back to the 2 Timothy two fifteen passage, aren't we? Look it up. Look at the context. The verse before it, Paul said something like, Avoid quarreling about words, avoid this turmoil, this stuff that goes on, and be faithful instead to the gospel. And it doesn't say study to show yourself approved. It doesn't say, man, hey, get out your Bible quick. Which, by the way, I love my Bible. I don't know if I said that. Get out your Bible now, open this thing up, and man, study, concentrate, focus, get into word studies. You know, do all that. And I can do that. I can get into word studies. I was trained in Koine Greek. I used to walk around my house speaking Greek. Oh, those were the days. It's a dead language that nobody speaks, and yet I was speaking it. But anyway, you know, it's that thing. I don't want to approach, I don't want to approach any of this academically at all. I never want to do that again because it ruined me. It really tore me up. It tore me down. And it it uh it had an effect on me that I quite honestly don't like to this day. Rightly handling scripture has nothing to do with 2 Timothy 2.15. Paul is saying, be diligent to show your show your be careful how you live in front of these people. That's what he was saying. The word isn't study, it's be diligent. Big difference. There were no Bibles, no one was studying the Bible because there weren't any. Finally, reason number 10, Scripture gives and sustains life. Really? Here we go. How does it do that? How does that Bible I just had in my hand that I put away already, how does that give me life? It's Christ in me that gives me life. Christ in me is the hope of glory. Christ in you is the hope of glory. Jesus said, You won't come to me that you might have life, but you're reading the scriptures all the time. We're going to look at that here in just a moment. In fact, let's look at that right now. John 5, 39 through 40, when Jesus is talking to the religious people of his day, you search the scriptures, he said, because you think that in them you have eternal life, and it is they that bear witness about me, yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life. In a lot of ways, I won't say in all ways, but in a lot of ways, we're right back to this verse again in our religious church culture. This is where we're at. We have returned to John 5.39. You search the scriptures because you think that they're an end in themselves, that in them you have life, that if you can articulate those things better, that you're spiritually strong, you're spiritually healthy, you're a strong believer, etc., etc. But Jesus is the point of the Bible, not the Bible. I think what we've done is we've deified the Bible. You've heard it before, I've said it a number of times before, I've heard it other places as well, that we've made the Bible the fourth member of the Trinity. And that's not good. That's not good. Because the Bible doesn't put itself in that position. We put the Bible in that position. So looking at his ten reasons, if we can summarize these, not summarize them, but look at them again. I've got them all up here on the screen. Do this as an exercise. Everywhere that it says scripture on these ten reasons, except for reason number nine, for obvious reasons, but everywhere where it says scripture, scripture saves, scripture free, scripture imparts, take out the word scripture and insert the word Jesus. And bingo, you've got it. Because Jesus is the center of our lives. Jesus is the center of who we are, not the Bible. And I'm I'm afraid that what we've done in church history, and what many of us have done, including me personally, is we have deified the Bible. We have made the Bible the fourth member of the Trinity. And that's an unhealthy place to be. Here's what I mean when I say, or when I'm talking about, let's see, how can I word this? When I'm talking about what what my goals are in reading the Bible today, to answer, let's go back to that. Let's go back to um Millie's question here. What is your goal now in reading the Bible? Well, first of all, here's what I don't mean when I'm talking about reading the Bible. I'm not on a Bible reading plan. It just doesn't exist. It's not a goal. I don't have it. Reading my Bible is not an academic goal. As I've already said, I got burned out on that. I got burned out reading my Bible academically, and I'm not going back there. I don't read my Bible every day. What? And yet you've got a YouTube channel? What are you thinking? I don't. I suspect many of you don't either. I'll read it on occasion, sometimes, but I don't read it as a goal. I don't read it to get information from it, to glean information out of it. That's not who I am anymore. That's not what I do. I did that for so long and burned me out. And I don't read my Bible every day. Instead, my mind is on Jesus throughout the day. And I can say every day, my mind is on Jesus. My authority isn't the Bible. Your authority isn't the Bible. Our authority is Jesus. Jesus said all authority had been given to him in heaven and on earth. And I don't think he's sharing that with a book. I just don't think that. My mind's on Jesus all day, every day. Comes and goes. I'm thinking about something, and when I'm thinking about Jesus, once in a while, I might open my Bible up or I might go to an online Bible and I might just look at something again, a verse that came to mind in order to, again, put it back in its new covenant context. What does this mean to me today? And then I'm encouraged by that. But I'm not reading through Bible out through the Bible academically. I'm not trying to get through the book of Leviticus in the month of October. Been there, done that. Not interested. Not going to do it again. But I do think about Jesus every day at different times throughout the day. Again, I want to put scripture back in context because it's been weaponized against me, it's been weaponized against many of you. It's weaponized in religion against those who don't comply. It's taken out of context because let's face it, you can do all things through a verse taken out of context. It's been used to inflict false guilt on people. And I left that environment 17 years ago. And when I do read portions of scripture on occasion, guess what? I'm reading it with new eyes. I'm reading it with fresh eyes. I'm reading it with eyes that have Jesus elevated to the position that he belongs in. And my Bible is there to tell me about Him, to show me the story of Scripture, to see the movement from old covenant to new covenant, to understand the gospel better, but not as an end in itself. Not so I can be prepared for an argument or a theological discussion, but so that I can know him better. So, Millie, we still have your comment up here on the screen. That's my goal in reading the Bible now. And I'm with you there at the end where you said, the older I get, the more I want to strip away everything and just have a simple relationship with Jesus. Man, I'm right there with you. And I think most everybody here that is a part of the On Sunday show experience and joins us on live streams and comments is with you as well. You're not alone in that. And that's a good place to be. Not always easy. It's not always easy in an environment that promotes the Bible over everything else, that elevates the Bible to a place that the Bible never elevates itself and deifies it and makes it the fourth member of the Trinity. Yeah. That kind of stuff can be hard. So hey, I'm going to wrap this up. We've been going 42 minutes here. 40 some minutes anyway. So I'm going to wrap this thing up. I really want to thank you for watching. I really do appreciate it. And I'll let you go. And until next time, y'all take care.

SPEAKER_00 43:08

Thank you for joining us on the Unstunday show. To be a part of this ongoing conversation, visit us online at unstunday.com.