Why Does God Have so Many Rules? | Table Talk S03 E08

As we continue our Hard Questions series, I thought it might. Well before we came. Before we came, and we were just in the break, there was a little debate that was going on here. A little discussion. Right. Pre cameras on discussion.

Gotcha.

Because the question we're looking at now is why does God have so many rules? And certain persons were objecting to the nature of the question because they said, well, God doesn't have so many rules.

Certain person.

Certain person. But then someone else protested and said, no, God does have lots of rules.

Someone else. Is that what you said?

Someone else. Another person.

Another person said that.

So I kind of had this idea that maybe we would bring in a cameraman. We'd bring in someone from the set and ask them what they think. We got to get a fifth voice at the table.

Bring him on.

Who wants to come? Randy, get over here. He's the closest one. And Yamile left me hanging.

This is none other than our beloved Randy.

Randy.

Bang.

Randy, we're going to put the question to you just does God have lots of rules?

I think, as Jeffrey said, you have to define your terms.

Here you go.

Oh, come on. That's question. Come on, yes or no?

This is hard questions. So I'm just putting it back on you guys.

So can I go get behind the camera? You want?

No, that's why he's behind the camera. What just happened? Get back over.

He's like a sage. Puts out here, puts it back onto the table. Okay, so let's ask the question then. Maybe the question. Okay, the question is, why does God have so many rules?

Let's start with this question presupposes that he does.

I was just gonna say let's start with this question, the one that Randy didn't want to answer. Jeffrey.

Why are you honing in on me?

Does God have lots of rules?

Many, many, many, many, many.

Me, me.

Pick me, pick me, Jeffries.

And yes, yes, God has lots of rules. Okay, there we go. I said it. God has lots of rules.

Okay, that's true.

Ty is Jeffrey correct.

See, the thing implies that that's a bad thing.

It doesn't imply that. It just says why does so many rules.

You implied that. It doesn't mean it's a bad thing.

Okay, so in answer to the question.

Well, how many precisely does he have? Can you give us a number?

But this is definitely. There is a way of thinking out there, both inside and outside of the church that would go something like this. Why would I become a follower of Jesus? Why would I start reading the Bible Why would I become a Christian person or a religious person? Because there's just so many, I want my freedom. There's so many. You tell me what I can do. You tell me what I can't do. You tell me what I can watch. You tell me what I can't watch, what I can't eat, what I can't drink, what I can't. All of that. I mean, let's be honest. That is a perception. We'll debate and discuss and dialogue about the validity of that here. But it's true to say I have two brothers and two sisters. I come from a family of five. And I know that, at least in the case of one of my sisters and one of my younger sister, my younger brother, I'm quite certain that if I were to say to Rob or Elizabeth, hey, what's the deal? Do you think God has lots of rules? I think both of them would say, well, sure, look at you. They would use me as an example. You can't and you don't and you won't and you're not allowed to. So this is a question that's out there.

It's huge.

Why does God say yes, no, yes, no, yes, no, no, no, no, no.

I'd like to suggest that this concept, this idea, actually, this fear that God has lots of rules.

It is a fear.

Yeah. I would like to suggest that it hails back to Genesis chapter three and the fall of mankind and one aspect of Satan's misrepresentation of God's character. Okay.

Yeah.

I think that what we see taking place in Genesis 2 and 3 is that God presented a vast horizon of freedom with minimum restriction. And that minimum restriction was specifically for their good. And then I think that the devil came along and presented vast restriction and minor freedom, if freedom at all.

And basically, it's almost implied that there is no freedom.

Basically communicated the idea that God is a killjoy. God is restrictive. God is against happiness, pleasure, freedom, even human advancement.

God knows that in the day you eat of that tree, you'll be better off.

So what we see taking place, just for a little bit of background. It's interesting that when God creates the human race, God by his design, puts them in a garden that God names Eden. That word either the garden of restriction, it's pleasure, not restriction. So God creates the human being to interface with their environment in a way that produces happiness, pleasure, freedom. Just the capacity for development and growth and everything that we associate with liberty. That's the environment that God put them in.

Yes.

So I would say it this way. I think that the Bible presents that at a fundamental level God is pro pleasure and anti pain. That God is pro liberty and anti restriction. That God is pro love and anti sin. So that's a way I think of articulating the situation that is borne out in Genesis 2 and 3.

Okay, I love all that. Can we just for cause we're assuming a background here from previous conversations from even previous seasons. What is the specific argument, text, accusation against God that suggests this vast panorama of restriction with just a narrow window of freedom?

Well, just compare these two verses. Genesis chapter two. Here's God's exact language. And the Lord God commanded. Yeah. Verses 16 and 17 of Genesis 2. The Lord God commanded the man saying, of every tree of the garden you may freely eat. Notice the language, notice the tone. Notice that God is saying you may freely eat other trees. There's a gajillion trees out there that you can eat from, enjoy, eat.

Research suggests about 1 billion, 1.1 billion trees.

Trees like what?

But then there's a qualification but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it because in the day that you eat of it, you will surely die. That was my point earlier, that God presented vast horizon of freedom, minor restriction for their good. Those are the three parts to the original.

Amen.

Okay, and then when you come to.

Genesis, I'm prepping here.

I'm prepping.

Then in Genesis chapter three, it's interesting that when Satan comes along and leads them in to his deception, he says to the woman, he says, has God indeed said, you may not eat or you shall not eat of every tree of the garden? Notice he flips the whole thing around now, basically saying, you can't eat anything around here.

Can a guy find a place to eat?

Yeah. What in the world? God has imposed all this restriction on you. And then as the conversation goes on, you can see that the devil is basically saying in so many words you need. I highly recommend that you break free from this restrictive God who is trying to hold you down. That's the storyline.

That is the storyline.

So I think God is fundamentally a God of liberty and freedom and that he's interested in our advancement, our development, our pleasure. That's where God lives. God lives in that beautiful place of liberty and pleasure and. And restriction is something that he's not really into. And the only thing he says no to, the only thing God says no to is that which is fundamentally for our own detrimental, detrimental to us.

Two verses I want to look at.

In this Great job, Ty.

Love that.

Yeah, you brought up a word and Ty affirmed that word. That word is pleasure. And then Ty closed with the idea that God wants us to experience pleasure except for the pleasure that is detrimental. That is not good for us. So two verses. The first one here is in Psalm 16:11.

And it simply says, here, thou will show me the path of life. In thy presence is fullness of joy. At thy right hand there are pleasures forevermore. Forever.

Okay.

So God built us and made us and planned for us to enjoy pleasure. That's why I think in Hebrews 13 it says, marriage is honorable and the bed is undefiled. Undefiled. Okay.

And then if you look In Hebrews.

Chapter 13, this is the second verse. I want you to notice here what happens.

Hebrews 13.

Hebrews 11.

Hebrews 11.

Yeah, I was just quoting from Hebrews 13.

Okay, gotcha.

But Hebrews 11 is the second verse. And this is a description of the faith of God's people down through the ages. And this particular verse talking about Moses, the context is that Moses, who was the son of Pharaoh, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh because he was looking ahead to his reward. He was looking at eternal realities, and he was comparing that to temporal benefit. And he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh. And then it says here, it says in verse 25, choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasure. There's the word again of sin. But what's the last phrase?

For a season.

For a season. The pleasure of sin is pleasurable, but it's seasonal.

I love this. New King James says, the passing pleasures of sin. Marginal reading. The temporary pleasures of sin.

So you've got pleasure forevermore, and then you've got seasonal pleasure.

Boy, that's a good comparison of text.

It's a great one.

And Satan is the one that introduced to us seasonal pleasure. He's the one with the lie. You won't surely die. And God is trying to somehow bring us back to understand that. No, I'm not against you having pleasure. I'm not restricting.

I made you for that. I made you for pleasure, but I.

Want you to have pleasure that's going to last forever.

Jeffrey, he's chewing. He's chewing.

Go. I still think we're operating on an assumption.

What's the assumption?

What's the assumption?

Well, everything you guys have said so far, a lot of, you know, I resonate with that clearly, that God is liberty.

Because you're obligated to. Because we quoted it all from the Bible, or do you resonate with it?

You quoted partially from Scripture, and I'm about to help you with the other.

Part that you brought. Okay, thank you.

Okay, Brain.

Hitherto for do not understand.

Come on, Jeffrey. Here it is.

The point is, the assumption is that too many rules. Too many rules are restrict. See, the assumption is that rules are restrictive.

Okay?

That's the basic assumption from which that argument takes off. No, no, no. God doesn't have any rules.

Look at the text.

He's freedom. He's against restriction. To which I would reply. Yeah, what does that have to do with whether or not God has a lot of rules? The assumption is that rules equal restriction. So.

I affirm the liberty part. But I think that rules don't necessarily equate to restriction. I think rules protect and enable liberty. So from that concept, it's a good thing that God has a lot. I'll continue. I affirm God has a lot of rules. I believe that. Now, clearly all of his rules can be summed up into basic principles.

Love.

Love is the rule.

Did you say two basic principles or just in basic principles?

Well, he meant love to God, love to human beings. Yeah. So love.

And then we can say even everything that there is to know about life and how to relate to one another and so forth hangs on these two principles. Love God and love your neighbor. That's true. But from that flows a whole, like.

World of a pantheon. Yeah.

Of rules.

For example, cornucopia.

Let me illustrate a multiplicity.

Anyway, keep going.

Relationships need to be protected. Essentially, God has as many rules as are necessary to protect the liberty which we enjoy in our relationship with Him.

That's a great way to say that.

If you look at the Ten Commandments, for example, like, I can just couch my argument in this sense. Are the Ten Commandments ten rules or are they ten promises? And I already know what you guys think about that. The Ten Commandments are ten promises. Right. I have liberated you, I've rescued you from Egypt from bondage, you're free, Therefore you shall not kill, you shall not steal, and so forth. We're familiar with this concept. So if you were to couch every rule in the Bible, every rule from God in that context, do you want God to have a lot of those or a little bit of those promises, you mean? Yeah, if his rules.

Good point, Jeffrey.

If his commandments are promises, do you want a lot of those or a.

Little bit of those?

I hate it when he makes sense.

That's a good one. That's good.

I want A lot of those.

I want a lot of those too.

I think it's mutually complementary, what we're saying.

Yeah. Basically you just agreed with everything that I said earlier, but you put it.

Not quite, but okay.

You know, my favorite thing, Jeffrey said a lot there, my favorite thing by far that you said, and I think it was a stroke of clarity and brilliance, is that God has as many rules as are necessary.

There's another way to articulate that.

Good for you.

That just flows right off the top.

Yeah, that sounds beautiful. How about this? God always says yes unless he has to say no, right?

That's right.

And there's scripture for that. What about Deuteronomy chapter 5, verse 29? Deuteronomy, chapter 5 and verse 29. This is an interesting thing that God has said to his people. And the backdrop is that there's been a lot that has been said to them. A lot of rules. We could say chapter five, verse 29. And this is God speaking. Oh, that they. That's God's people. Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear me and always keep all my commandments plural. So there's a lot of them that it might be well with them and with their children forever. So God is interested in our flourishing. God wants us to thrive. God is interested in us being well. Our well being is what he has at heart. And he's saying, oh, that you would obey my commandments so that your life would be elevated in quality, not diminished in quality. God's law isn't a prison that you have to pace in. God's law is a vast field of freedom where there are beautiful things to partake of within the parameters of his love, his righteousness, his law. So God's law is a good thing. It's a beautiful thing. One way that it's been helpful for me to view this is that there's the one and that's love. There's one rule that's right.

Yeah.

And that's love. But then the one.

Is manifested in what we could call the two. The two love God, love your fellow human beings. And then those, the 10. So are the 10 taking a sharp left or right turn away from the one or the two? No, they are a further enunciation of the two and the one. Right. And then you can go this far. Then there's, I don't know how hundreds. The Jewish rabbi said 613 laws that they had come up with from scripture. So then there's the hundreds. And what are those hundreds? Let's Just call the hundreds. The entire scripture. Yeah, the whole Bible. And Jesus came along and he said, all the law and the prophets are summarized in the two, which are summarized in the one. So does God have a lot of rules? Yes and no.

Yes and no.

He has. He has one rule that if you think it through and act it out in all your relationships, it's manifested in many. God has one, he has many. But all of those many are essentially one principle.

Yeah. Because the fundamental rule, if it's love, love is so profound, so grand that we don't have the capacity to really process it. And therefore, it necessitates help. We need help in processing what love looks like. So every single injunction, every single. Every commandment, every rule, every whatever in scripture is there. It's calculated to help us process what does love look like to God and to one another.

The way that I taught this idea to my children, it's fairly rudimentary, maybe even a little. It's for a child, is I explained to them that you have a body, you have a trunk. One trunk. And out of that trunk come your two arms, right? So you have. Here's the one, and here's the two arms. And then at the end of your two arms are the ten fingers.

I like that.

So I said, just remember this, boys. You were made to love. And we use our arms to love God with our hands, with our actions, to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul, and to love our neighbor as ourself. And in case you want to remember what those specific instances are, there's the Ten Commandments. This is how you love. This is how you love on the vertical level. This is how you love on the horizontal level. And that's just been very helpful as a sort of pedagogical device to say, hey, boys, is it the one? You know you're mistreating your brother. What's going on? Is something wrong with one of your arms? Or there was dishonesty? Is there something wrong one of your fingers? I just found that to be very helpful.

So as we conclude this first part of the conversation and take a break. I think we're on the same page, Jeffrey.

Well, at least we're in the same book.

We're in the same book. That's right. Let's take a break, and we'll come right back and continue.

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I'm under the distinct impression that God is primarily about liberty. But the sin problem has created a situation where he needs to put in place protective measures in order to bring us back into the kind of liberty that we need. Jeffrey had brought up in our previous conversation that when we were talking about the death of Christ on the cross that we needed to explore the nature of sin. I like that language. I like to suggest that we spend a few minutes talking about the nature of law, which is the opposite of sin, the nature of law, and more specifically the nature of freedom. What does freedom look like? Because David pointed out that if he were to talk to some of his family members who are unbelievers and ask them, is God restrictive? Does God have a lot of rules? They say of course he does. Just look at your life.

I mean, we've all heard that.

Yeah, we've all heard that. It's a prevailing idea out there that God is super restrictive. He has a lot of rules and if I give my life to God, it's going to cramp my style. It's going to lessen my pleasure, not increase my pleasure. So when I say we should talk about the nature of law and freedom, what I mean by that is when people are engaged, for example, in committing sin, is there capacity for pleasure and freedom lessening or is it increasing? It's lessening, it's lessening.

I'm speaking from our own experience.

It's actually lessening.

I was Addicted to sin. So I'm addicted to those actions that I know as the Holy Spirit is speaking to me, as we talked about. The conscience is speaking to me. I know and really want to be free from. I know that I shouldn't be doing these things, and I want to be free from doing these things. But I can't find freedom and liberty. I can't find whatever it is within me to be free from those things which at first I thought were actually a mark of freedom, an indication of liberty just to party and do whatever I wanted to do with my life. But now I find that those things are distasteful to me. The results, the environment, the amount of time and finance it takes to have that in my life.

I'm repulsed by it, but I find myself addicted to it.

We could go ahead.

I just wanted to follow up on your question, too. You asked.

Correct me if I'm wrong. You asked, in continuing to sin, is liberty increased or diminished? Or diminished? We can argue that liberty is diminished. Freedom is diminished because sin cripples our capacity to be truly human.

I love that.

I love that God created us. God created the human race, and he designed us in a certain way to function in a certain way to relate to life and to reality. As soon as sin comes into the picture, there are things introduced to the human experience that were never intended to be there. Fear, guilt, shame, so forth. And so every form of sin cripples our ability to be truly human in the way we were designed to be. And in that sense, sin is restrictive because we're being restricted, because there's two things there's freedom from and freedom to right. And what we're normally. Most people are familiar with. Freedom from right.

I'm free from such and such, but we rarely speak of.

I have freedom, too, and I think that's more powerful than this over here.

Let me speak directly to that on my Twitter account. Of all of the tweets. I've been doing Twitter now for, whatever a year. Of all of the tweets that I've tweeted that have gotten the most either favorites or retweets, it was this tweet.

You ready?

Freedom is not being able to do what you want to do. It's being able to do what you were created to do.

There you go. Beautiful.

In other words, the point is that is deeply resonant with people. They say, well, that's it. Freedom is not just getting to do whatever I want because you are free. Free to be enslaved. You were free to get addicted you were free to be enslaved. You were free. But if real freedom is understood in the context of the Ten Commandments as well as in the Garden of Eden, you are free to be what God created you to be. That's freedom. That's resonant.

People are like, well, think about it this way. Let's speak of specifics. Then. Imagine two scenarios. One person is conducting their business affairs and pursuing their career by dishonesty, lying. When they find it advantageous to their advancement through the company or through the profession that they're pursuing, people begin to pick up on that violation of the law of honesty. And what naturally happens, the people that that individual is endeavoring to do business with begin emotionally to shut down and to pull back for lack of trust. Okay, so trust is receding from this individual and he is increasingly alone in his pursuits for advancement in whatever his profession happens to be versus on the other hand, imagine a person.

Who, through devoted honesty, builds up in the relationships of their business affairs. The distinct impression that this guy can be depended on. This guy tells the truth, even to his hurt. Even if it's going to be to his disadvantage. This guy is not going to take advantage. People are leaning into that person. They're drawing close. They want to do business. So this guy begins to experience a larger horizon of business interactions by virtue of honesty, which produces trust. His freedom is growing.

This person, he's free to do business with more people than he otherwise.

This person is lessening those who trust him and therefore diminishing his capacity for doing business. Great point. Isn't that how it works?

That's great. I think that's exactly what is meant when the Bible says that God is not mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will also reap. Is that 6 Galatians 6 yes. Be not deceived. God is not mocked. It's saying if you almost. I want to be careful here, but it's almost like, not identical to you. But it's like the karma thing in Hinduism. You know, the karma thing says you do a good deed and then that comes back around through an actual karmic cycle. Now, we're not, of course, advocating that, but the idea that you can't just sow dishonesty and expect to reap trust and freedom and people's goodwill and positive relationships. But the converse is also true. If you do sow happiness, trust, freedom, generosity, kindness, compassion, you will reap. That's the fruit that you will eat. In other words, in some ways, the people that formulated, I'm sure going back millennia that formulated the basic idea of karma, said, hmm, we're noticing what goes around comes around. We saw he acted like this and then that came back and got him. And they're thinking, oh, this is a principle in the universe. And in that sense it is if you create an environment. Right? Okay. Like even the Garden of Eden. They created an environment where they ended up having fear, shame, and guilt by virtue of the seeds that had been sown in their life.

Yeah, yeah. Another example would be marriage. Okay, see if this makes sense. In the Ten Commandments, one of them says, you shall not commit adultery. Now, you can perceive that depending on how you're looking at it as a restriction that will lessen your capacity for pleasure. You can look at that and say, you mean one, One sexual partner, just one? I mean, that seems rather narrow minded. Or you can look at it like this, that sex is more than the passing pleasures of sin and that sex is more than the physical pleasure. There's an emotional component, there's a spiritual component. And if you stay with one person.

You cross certain thresholds where trust, security, you start to intimacy. Intimacy.

Knowing that this is a human and this is a person that is the mother of my children or the father of my. There's a.

Keep going.

I don't want to stop you, but I hear what you're saying.

No, you're adding to it. I mean, the fact is that the capacity for pleasure expands in monogamy. One man, one woman for life experiences transitions in their experience where they become more and more secure, more and more trusting, and they're just at peace in the relationship and they enjoy one another so much. Whereas what we're being told by social scientists is that the breaking point for most marriages is between seven and 10 years, people start to feel like they can't sustain the relationship and that it's going to fall apart. And if you end the relationship at the seven to ten year mark, you cut off your potential for pleasure you didn't even know was around the corner. Because if you get through the struggles together of identity and you continue to grow together, you'll cross a line where you've bonded on a deeper level because the conflicts gave way to trust. And, and you're under the distinct impression, you know what, you're gonna stay with me. I violated you, you forgave me.

I was unkind, I was impatient.

So now I trust you more and I'm more secure and it begins to reciprocate on new levels. So the pleasure quotient just goes off the charts. And you end up having an experience with another human being. And that's what God has in mind. God is saying, listen, the only reason I'm telling you to do this, that or the other thing is because within those rules, within those laws, there's greater capacity for peace and happiness and pleasure and satisfaction.

What I love about what you said. I love everything that you said there, Ty. But what I really love is I think there is a fundamental. Just take sexuality. This is not the only kind of pleasure in marriage. There's lots of pleasures in marriage. But let's just take that one. Because that is one that has been hijacked by culture. That's one that's been hijacked by the world in which we live. Hypersensual, hyper sexualized culture, the pornification of culture. That's the world we live in. And what to me, the greatest danger of porn, the greatest danger of this hypersexualization of culture is that it hinges on a fundamental lie that sex is primarily biological. It's bodily, it's physical. It's between one body and another body. That is not true. That is actually the dehumanization of the sexual experience. It's one person and another person and somebody that you just met in that bar or got hooked up with at this party or whatever. You don't know who that person is. What are their names, what are their fears, what are their struggles, what are their hopes, what are their dreams? What is all of that? And when you get to know a person and you realize this person loves me and I love this person, then you have, as you said, not just the physical element, which is a beautiful thing, but then you have the social element. You have the psychological element. You have the emotional element. You have this whole beautiful package. And then that's why you go through the checkout counters and they'll have Cosmopolitan magazine or Women's Health or Men's Health or whatever, and it's new sexual positions, new sexual pleasures, new. It's almost like, really, all of that. It's much ado about nothing because it's like they're eating the outside of the orange but never getting to the point. They're missing the point.

And the point is, what about the orange?

It's even worse than that. It's like addictive food. It's like the fast food. It's like the junk food that we eat. It's so addictive, and yet it's. It's so unsatisfying. It doesn't satisfy the deepest need. It doesn't give the body the nutrients it needs. It's been pulled so you don't get the nutrients.

So you need more. You need more. You need more, you need.

Everyone needs more. Of course we need more.

We need more.

We've got to have it.

We've got to have it.

We've got to have it because they're looking for something that can give you what you're looking for.

I still remember the day that I started eating whole wheat bread.

I used to love.

I used to love.

This is not what I thought he was going to eat. The ultimate transition.

I used to love white bread.

And I would take that Wonder Bread and I would just roll it up.

In a little ball, you know, I.

Just pop it up and pop, pop, pop.

And I remember when I started eating.

And I could eat.

I could eat half a loaf, a whole loaf.

I could just pop it down.

And I remember when I started eating whole wheat bread. I remember when I ate my first piece of whole wheat bread, which I.

Didn'T like at the time.

Now I love whole wheat bread. I can't stand white bread. But anyway, I ate that thing and.

I thought, man, this is dense, man. How long will I have to chew, guys?

And after I was finished, there was a satisfaction that I. I was like, I don't really need a lot of this. And I think that's the same way.

It's the real thing. It is threefold. It's too folded.

All the nutrients were there.

The nutrients were there.

All the components are there. And there's something satisfying about that that actually guards against the addictive desire for sex in these other areas.

I'm reading a book right now called Salt, Sugar, Fat. Fascinating book, highly recommended. Recommend it. Just want to say to the viewers as well, salt, Sugar, Fat. Read it.

Fascinating book. And basically what the book is about is how the food companies, the big food companies in the world today, are in the same place right now, the very same place that the tobacco companies were in 25, 30 years ago, where people began to say, hey, wait a minute, isn't there some culpability here with the tobacco companies? The research says that tobacco does this. We know that it's addictive, and these are the health problems that are resulting. And there was this gigantic. I can remember seeing those trials, the Senate hearings and others where the big tobacco, Philip JJ. Morris and RJ Reynolds, they're all lined up and they're saying, no, no, no. And the senators and the congressmen and others are asking the hard questions. And we know the outcome of that there's the labeling. There was billions of dollars in lawsuits. And not just that, but the sort of perception of the prestige that was associated with the, you know, the cigarette that just the image, it started to come down.

But also the chemicals that they were putting into the tobacco to make it addictive.

Right. So the food companies. The purpose of this book is to say the food companies are in that same place right now because they know that if they add this much salt, this much sugar, this much fat, they are creating a product that is two things. Addictive. There's a whole new study, a whole new science that food is as addictive. Certain foods can be scientifically engineered to be as addictive as cigarettes ever were and deeply harmful to the body. Obesity is epidemic right now. Diabetes is epidemic right now. The list goes on. Inactivity is epidemic right now. And the point of the book is basically this, that people are eating like you were saying. They just love their Oreos and they love their Doritos and they love this comfort food.

It's not even food, though.

Let's call it food, like substance.

It's food.

And quote marks.

It's food. Okay, well, then if that's not food, okay, are you ready for this? Then what's taking place in bedrooms all around the world? That's not sex.

That's not sex.

That's not God's ideal for sex. I don't know what that is. That's two bodies getting together, whatever. But that is not what scripture is speaking about when it says that a man and a woman will come together emotionally, psychologically, personally. That's the point. And that food will leave you fat. And that kind of pursuit of sexual satisfaction, that liberty. Getting back to Jeffrey's thing about how rules are their lots, that will leave you sexually obese. In other words, it will turn you into a person who is incapacitated.

You want more and more and more of what can't satisfy.

Broken.

Hey, before we take a break, I.

Don'T know how we're doing on time.

Can I read just to affirm everything you just said in James 1. I know we were all hoping to be the one to read this, actually, James, I wrote it down.

I wrote it down.

James, chapter two and verse 12 as we're familiar with and for our viewers, James, chapter 2, verse 12, where the powerful, powerful definition of the law or identification of the law, we're told here in verse 12, speak and do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty. That goes back to the point we've Been making from the beginning that the law of God, the commandments of God, the rules of God are calculated to allow us to access greater dosages of liberty.

To be more human. I love myself to be more human.

Yeah. To be at liberty. To be who we were created to be originally. And all of these counterfeit cultural things we see in society are actually providing the exact opposite. It's keeping people in a perpetual rat race.

This might sound. This might sound a little pedestrian or inconsequential, but I have a number of friends who expressed surprise at the fact that I don't drink coffee. I don't drink coffee. And they like coffee. And they like to go to the coffee shops and sit down and do all of that. I'll go with them, but I'll drink an herbal tea or whatever. And I sometimes get the sense that there's this almost.

You know, this contempt. Not an outright contempt, because these are good people, but there's almost like a, you know, poor guy. Poor guy. You know. But, you know, the thing is that I'm not. I'm free. I'm free to have regular sleep patterns. I'm free to not wake up in the morning with my eyes like, you know, the Garfield eyes halfway down and, oh, man, I need my morning cup of coffee. I'm free to wake up, drink a glass of water and hit the day. You see what I'm saying? So there's a rule.

You're free from extra yellow on your teeth.

I'm free from extra yellow in my teeth. I'm free from the diuretic. I'm free. There's a lot of things that caffeine is not. I read a book years ago called Caffeine Blues. So is that a rule? Well, I mean, I can't show you a text in the Bible that says you shall not drink caffeine. But the principle of health, the principle of putting into my body the things that are the most beneficial to my mental, physical, spiritual, social health. I can show you that where the eater drink. So I'm. That is a restriction. But it's a restriction that brings about liberty.

We have to take a break and then come back for our third segment. But I have one scripture I found and one that during the break you might be able to help me find, but I just can't put my finger on. But I think you're going to love it if we can find it. And I think those who are studying with us, conversing with us on this theme, will really like this verse. If we can find it. So let's take a break.

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I am absolutely loving this conversation. We're talking about the nature of freedom, the nature of love, the nature of law, the nature of, even to some degree, the nature of sin is restricted.

The nature of pleasure.

The nature of pleasure. I'm loving it. And I think that this view, I know this view is not widely understood as the Christian view. People looking from the outside into the aquarium are not seeing this view. And those of us that are living, as it were, in the Christian aquarium, we're not. I don't think we're doing as good a job.

We're not representing it as.

I'll tell you right now, I've been preaching for 17 years. Seventeen years, Pastor. I can tell you that for much of my preaching, I wasn't preaching it like this. I was preaching things like Saturday's the Sabbath and that's the true day and you need to keep it.

So get her done.

Get er done. And listen. Was what I was saying true?

Yes.

Yes, it is true.

It reminds me. That's correct. It reminds me of a website that I saw not too long ago. Maybe I've mentioned this before, but I think one of the cameramen, Yamile, actually showed it to me, or we were talking about it. There's this Christian ministry that. Not from my denomination, not my church, but a Christian ministry, reasonably large church. I don't know who the guy is, but somebody sent me a link and I thought it was so interesting. Here's the guy's resource page. Pastors of Church of 5 6, 7000 resource page and his sermons. He's been pastoring the church for like 16 years. And the sermons go back till about 2000, I think it was like 2006, 2008, something like that. And then there was a little. You'd click on anything before 2008. And there was a little. This is the link he sent me. It said, all sermons from before 2008 have been removed. Not for content, but for tone.

Wow.

All sermons have been removed. He went back as. I don't know who the guy is. I've never heard one of his sermons. But I love the fact that he went back and he said, you know what? That's true. What are you saying there? That's true. That's true. I wish that I could go back and remove not all, but some of my own sermons that I've preached. Not for content, but for tone, for emphasis. For emphasis, for perspective. It's not that I was saying things that weren't true, at least I hope I wasn't. But I sometimes did it. The other day, I'll tell you a story on my phone. I have an old, old, old voice memo from a sermon that I preached a long time ago. It was still on there. It was just back in the day where I had a little voice recorder. It was the first iPhone I ever got. So it's like going back about six years. And I just sat it on the pulpit and tried to record it, which doesn't work for me, as you know, because I'm wandering here, there and everywhere. It wasn't going through the sound system. I was just recording it on the spot. And I listened to that sermon and I thought, overall, it wasn't a bad sermon. But I thought, man, there are ways that I would say that now that I know are better.

David, there's something here that I think is really powerful. And this is what it is. You said that the tone. And I would say another word that's synonyms with that would be the spirit.

That's exactly happy with that.

And then we're talking about liberty and restriction. We're talking about the contrasting ideas that we have about sin and about the law of God. Now listen to this verse. And this verse just puts it all together. Just listen to this verse. You'll know it as soon as I start reading it, you'll know it. Now, the Lord is that Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is. If the Holy Spirit is preaching through us and teaching through us, we're preaching a message that is liberating. We're preaching a message of liberty.

Praise God.

That's the tone of our message. So this guy says from 2008 before, wrong tone. There's a way that Jesus Christ, when he came on this earth, there's a way that when he walked this planet, when the Greatest man that ever trod shoe leather, planet Earth. There was a way that he presented the same truth, Wasn't a different truth. It was the same truth, the same stuff. But there was a tone, there was a spirit. And he said, when he first started, he said, I've come.

To set the captives free. That's what he said.

They were like, oh, bring it on, please.

Yes, yes, that's right. That's powerful.

But not only tone and spirit, but also configuration. Because you can have two parts of an equation and overemphasize one part of the conceptual that would have been me puzzle to the minimizing or exclusion of the other part. You wouldn't just outright deny that other part because after all, there are Bible verses about it. So you're a little bit careful with that. So you know it's there. But the configuration, how you put the picture together is really, really important. And this subject, I mean, we're talking, believe it or not, we're talking about law. We're talking about rules right now, but we're talking about rules. We're talking about law, God's law. And we've painted a picture of liberty.

It's the law of liberty.

It's the law of liberty according to scripture. You remember before we took the break, I said there were two scriptures, and one of them I found, the other one I was trying to find, okay, this verse is amazing in Psalm 119, verse 32. And it's about the law of God. And notice how it's articulated. It says verse 32. David says, I will run in the course of your commandments, for you shall enlarge my heart. That's the new King James version. So let's begin with that. I will run. You have to have space to run, right? You can't run in a room that's 12ft by 12ft. You can't even get up momentum. You can't run in a cage. You have to have a horizon. You have to have some space to run. And he says, I'm running in the course of your commandments. God's law is a vast horizon. We've said of freedom. And then he says, for you shall enlarge my heart. Now that's interesting language. And that goes back to what Jeffrey said earlier when Geoffrey used the word capacity. Within the law of God, there is an enlargement of capacity for freedom. And within sin, there is a diminishing of capacity for freedom. Now, another ver. Yeah, go ahead.

You're leaving Psalm 119. Because if you don't?

No, I'm not leaving yet. I'm gonna tell you there's another version. There's another rendering of this that I think is Interact.

Okay. After that, I'm going to affirm you on the same chapter.

Okay, Watch this. I will run in the course of your commandments, for you shall enlarge my heart in another version. The version is the NIV says I will run in the course of your commandment. Something like that in this part. For you have set my heart free. You've set me free. In what context have you set my heart free? In the context of your law. Your commandments are. Are in fact the parameters within which I find all this freedom, this liberty.

That's exactly what it said. I just glanced down. That's exactly what it says in verses 44 and 45.

All right, bring us there.

I shall keep your law continually, forever and ever. Verse 45. And I will walk at liberty because for I seek your precepts. The fact that I'm seeking your precepts, your rules, your commandments, your statutes, allows me to walk at liberty. Ooh, that's good.

Jeffrey, do you have verse 45 there? The marginal reading? Do you have the marginal reading there for 45?

I don't.

Yes.

Listen to this, Ty, you'll love this. It's the very point you were just making. Back up in verse 32. Look at this. I will walk at liberty. Marginal reading. I will walk in a wide place at large.

Oh, is that verse 45 or 35?

Marginal 45. I will.

Wide Polish place.

Isn't that something?

That's the very point you were making. You can't run in a 12 by 12 room. You don't see lions running. They pace right in a lion in a zoo. But I'll tell you this, my favorite state in the United States of America. Now that I live in Australia, I have an increasing fondness for not only the US but this state. It's my state. It's the state I was born in. The state I was born again in. What state was that?

Wyoming.

Wyoming. And years ago, I read a book. Not a Christian book necessarily, but a book about some. Not a Christian book at all, in fact, but a book that was written by someone who was just praising Wyoming. It was just a book in praise of Wyoming. It's where I was born. It's where I was born again. My family's from there. My parents still live there. And the book was called the Solace of Wide Open Spaces.

Oh, nice.

And I tell you There is something about Wyoming. Even the old song says, give me a home where the buffalo, what do they do?

Roam.

They roam. And the deer and the ant they play. I've always loved when I go to a city. And don't get me wrong, I can visit a city. I can enjoy New York City for a day or two or three. But I feel, I start to feel confined. But man, I get out in Wyoming and I just see there's the mountains over here and here's this stream and the plains and I see the antelope racing across. I mean this.

That'S what the Bible is describing. James and I had an experience in Wyoming. We were preaching. I hope it was good. We were preaching at a camp meeting in North Carolina and I bought a car there right after the camp meeting. But we had another camp meeting we had to speak at in a matter of days in Washington state. So all the way from the east coast to the west coast. Okay, so you can't arrange that. You can't throw the car you just bought in your carry on luggage, get at home. So we flew out there, I bought that car and then James was willing to drive it back with me so that there could be no need for stopping at a hotel. No need for stopping. We could just. One of us is sleeping, one of us is driving. And we drove from North Carolina to Washington State in 32 to 3 hour. 33 hours in 32 hours across the United States. That's insane. Non stop. But the best part where we really gained somewhere was in Wyoming with those long straight stretches of open road and no police officers in you.

There's like a sheriff in Casper, there's like a sheriff in Cheyenne, there's like a sheriff in Jackson Hole.

I put that car to the test, man. Just 110, 120 miles an hour straight through Wyoming.

This just became a huge plug in for Wyoming all of a sudden.

Listen, I'm just telling you, it's this an endorsement.

It is with the mayor.

Go to the website. I'm just kidding.

So I said I had two.

All right. Okay.

The other one, I will walk in.

A wide open place.

Yeah. But I couldn't find it. But during the break I did find it. It's chapter two of Jeremiah, verse 13. And this scripture at first is a little bit elusive. Like what is this talking about? But notice this. God is speaking to his people who have been pursuing, let's just call it rebellion or let's just call it sin. They've been outside of the parameters of God's will. God's law, God's rules. Okay, and chapter two of Jeremiah, verse 13. For my people have committed two evils. Number one, they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters. So you have an image here of free flowing living waters. That's the first evil they've turned away from me, the fountain of living waters. And here's the second evil they have hewn for themselves. Cisterns. Broken cisterns that cannot hold water. This is a metaphoric description of containers that are broken. They have holes in them so that the water you're trying to contain cannot be contained. And there's just massive leakage. This is a description in scripture of the fact that God in his ways are free flowing and liberating. But sin is restrictive and it leaks. It's not sustainable.

Sustainable leaks.

It's not sustainable.

That's good.

There are unsustainable pleasures. James took us to Psalm 16. No. Where was that? The sin for a season. Hebrews 11, Hebrews 11:26. The pleasures of sin for a season. Basically a saying that sin, sin gives momentary pleasure. But the pleasure sin gives is not sustainable pleasure. It doesn't increase with exercise. It diminishes until you don't even have the capacity for pleasure anymore. But God's ways are ways of pleasantness, pleasantness and peace. There's a place in Psalm 37 where God says, if you come to me, you will drink of the rivers of my pleasures.

Oh, okay.

Rivers of pleasures.

Constant source.

Constant source. Never diminished, expanding pleasures. So broken cisterns, that's what the world is offering. Broken cisterns that cannot hold water.

By the way, Moses experienced that. Moses experienced that. Moses is an example of that reality. Because think about it, Moses chose to suffer with his people than to experience the pleasure of sin for a season. And today we know that Moses is in heaven experiencing pleasures at God's word.

Forevermore. Forevermore.

Now where would Moses be if he wouldn't have chosen to do that?

In a museum somewhere?

Yeah, we'd be paying big bucks to go see Moses stuff. Oh, look, there's Moses chariot.

Oh, check that out.

There's pleasures for a season.

Wow.

An illustration that comes to mind whenever we talk about these kinds of things. For me are the young people that make a bad choice because of peer pressure or whatever else, and they take that first drink of alcohol or they take that first puff of marijuana or that first pill or whatever. Just the other day I was talking to somebody. I was giving actually a devotion to the Adventist college where I'm at Tweed Valley Adventist College in Australia. And I said to the young people, the best way to guarantee that you never have a second drink of alcohol is don't take it first. The way to guarantee you do not become an alcoholic, you do not become enslaved. You don't to guarantee that you're not one of these people who's 22 years old, heroin addicted, overdose. You no longer can enjoy the pleasures of heroin or the pleasures of cocaine or the pleasures of drunkenness because you're dead. You will never taste a mango. I mean, we're getting ready. I'm going back to Australia and mango season is just around the corner. Do we need to talk about mango season?

Yeah, I love that.

You know what I'm saying? And just whether it's mangoes or the holding of a fresh baby or the catching of a wave or the walking on a beach with your wife or all of the pleasures, we could just start listing the things. James, what do you enjoy doing? You enjoy hitting a ball just perfect on that tennis racket. I love the way that feels myself. Ty has his pleasures. Jeffrey has his pleasures. I have my pleasures. And you don't enjoy any of that when you're dead? No.

And you don't enjoy any of that when you are plagued with mistrust and insecurity and guilt and shame and fear.

I just use the drugs as an illustration of, oh yeah, you're free. You're free to take that drink and you're free to put that in your veins. And you are also free to die prematurely or to live a life. Maybe you don't die, maybe you don't die, but you might as well get a scare tactic. This is not scaring people. That doesn't work. You say you shouldn't because this bad thing will happen. It's not the bad thing that happens. It's the fact that you don't get to experience the fullness of joy. I am come that they might have life and have it more abundantly.

The reason it's not scare tactics is because God's law describes the proper operations of life and reality.

Reality.

Yep. This is the way life works. There are certain protocols for any pursuit. And within God's law, there are inherent principles that expand. And within sin, there are inherent principles that contract.

So in a sense, in a sense, I don't want to open a can of awareness. And over most of the time, but in a sense, God's rules are restrictive. They restrict brokenness and sin.

Keep going, keep going. Don't stop.

They restrict all of the addiction, pain, suffering. They restrict all of these things from entering and encroaching into my life. So that's another way to look at it.

Exactly.

And they restrict us from viewing other people negatively, with suspicion, with distrust. God's laws free us to believe the best about those people around us. To hope. Love believes all things. Love hopes all things. Love endures all things. So at the end of the day, it's not just about God's law frees me for me and my end, that's true. But it also frees me to see the best in others. Jesus, he was a master of that freedom. He was a master of that.

So we began with a question. Why does God have so many rules?

You can answer it in one word. Love.

That's why.

That's why.

In love, every single thing that God says is an extension of the goodness of his character. He's longing for us to find, flourish and thrive. He doesn't want us in cages. He wants us in the open plains of Wyoming, experiencing. Experiencing the beauties of life. God's law is good because God is good himself.

Amen.

Yes, amen.

Sam.