Participants:
Series Code: AU
Program Code: AU000087S
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00:01 - You know, there are some pretty tough things in the Bible.
00:03 And some of them are really, really hard to explain 00:06 to a modern audience, like the mention of slavery. 00:11 So what in the world do we do about that? 00:13 That's our subject on today's episode of "Authentic." 00:17 [gentle wistful country music] 00:38 Today, we're gonna tackle one of the more unpleasant parts 00:40 of the Bible, but I think that if I'm gonna insist 00:42 that everybody should be reading this whole book, 00:45 well, then we can't just ignore the inconvenient parts. 00:49 And so, this is actually gonna be part five 00:52 of a series that I've been doing 00:54 that addresses the questions 00:55 an online skeptic said she would ask 00:58 if she had an audience with God. 01:00 And one of the most inconvenient parts of the Bible by far, 01:05 is the fact that it talks about the institution of slavery, 01:08 and it doesn't simply condemn it. 01:11 What you and I would expect to find 01:13 is an outright condemnation of slavery, 01:16 but you don't. 01:17 In fact, what we seem to find is a set of guidelines 01:21 on how to own and treat slaves, 01:23 which was the point this skeptic raised. 01:26 And of course, given the history of the United States, 01:29 slavery is an understandably touchy subject, 01:31 because back in the 19th century, 01:34 when there was a debate raging over the morality of slavery, 01:38 there were notable examples of supposed Christians 01:42 who actually used the Bible to justify what they were doing. 01:46 "Look at this," they would say, "look, Paul writes a letter 01:49 to a slave owner asking him to treat his slave with decency 01:53 and he never condemns the institution." 01:56 And what about the Old Testament, 01:57 which gives us guidelines for owning slaves? 02:00 How do you explain that 02:01 if slavery is really against the will of God? 02:06 So, of course some people then assume 02:08 that the Bible must be some kind of oppressive, 02:10 bronze-age document that actually promotes inequality 02:14 and bigotry. 02:15 If slavery is supported by the Bible, 02:18 then obviously we should get rid of the Bible, right? 02:21 It's an understandable opinion, 02:23 but it's also a little too hasty, 02:25 because the practice of slavery as you find it in the Bible, 02:28 was nothing like the slavery practiced 02:31 by plantation owners in the 19th century. 02:34 An institution, by the way, that was abolished by Christians 02:38 who knew it was contrary to the scriptures. 02:42 In fact, there were Christians 02:43 right from the birth of this nation who warned the founders 02:47 that the continued practice of slavery 02:49 was going to compromise what they were trying to accomplish 02:53 when they drafted the Bill of Rights. 02:56 So, it wasn't the Bible that led to the practice of slavery 03:00 here in America, even though the Bible was later used 03:03 by some people to try and justify it. 03:06 Even so, what should we do with those passages 03:10 where the Bible seems to confirm the idea 03:12 that you can own another human being? 03:15 Well, you should study it, is what you should do, 03:18 because it isn't at all what a lot of people think it is. 03:23 One of the most difficult tasks that you're going to face 03:25 when reading the Bible, 03:26 is to determine which parts of the Bible 03:28 actually represents God's ideal for humanity 03:31 and which parts are simply God's way of dealing with 03:34 our present, broken reality. 03:36 You'll find a good example of what I'm talking about 03:39 in Jesus' comments on the institution of marriage, 03:42 when the Pharisees asked him 03:43 to explain his position on divorce. 03:46 What they were trying to do 03:48 is trap Jesus into saying something 03:50 that would make him contradict Moses, 03:51 because they thought that would undermine his popularity. 03:56 "Is it ever permissible to get a divorce," they asked. 03:59 And Jesus answered by affirming what the Bible teaches. 04:02 Here's what it says: "He answered, 'Have you not read 04:06 that he who created them from the beginning 04:08 made them male and female and said, 04:10 "Therefore, a man shall leave his father and his mother 04:14 and hold fast to his wife, 04:15 and the two shall become one flesh." 04:18 So they are no longer two, but one flesh. 04:21 What therefore God has joined together, 04:23 Let not man separate." 04:26 So, what Jesus does is to affirm God's ideal, 04:30 his original plan, and that plan said that marriage 04:33 was supposed to last the rest of your life. 04:36 In fact, Jesus said that nobody has the right to separate 04:39 what God has put together. 04:41 And that's when the Pharisees pounce, because Moses taught 04:45 that divorce was actually permissible 04:47 under certain restrictive circumstances. 04:50 And that would seem to contradict what Jesus said 04:53 was the plain will of God. 04:55 So was Moses at odds with God? 04:57 Was Jesus actually calling his own status into question? 05:01 "Why then," the Pharisees asked, "did Moses command one 05:05 to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?" 05:10 And that's when Jesus presented us 05:12 with a very important concept, 05:14 the fact that God has a perfect ideal, 05:17 but he also has a keen awareness of the reality 05:20 of our broken existence. 05:21 And he allows certain things to happen, 05:25 even though they would never happen in a perfect world. 05:28 So here's how Jesus answers the question in Matthew 19:8. 05:32 "He said to them, 'Because of your hardness of heart, 05:36 Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, 05:38 but from the beginning it was not so. 05:41 And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, 05:43 except for sexual immorality, and marries another, 05:47 commits adultery.'" 05:49 In other words, what God allows in this world 05:52 is not necessarily what he wants. 05:55 And what he sometimes does is allow us 05:57 to chart our own course through life. 06:00 But at the same time, he sets up important guidelines 06:03 in order to mitigate the damage that we're causing. 06:07 So in the case of marriage, God tells us, 06:08 "Look, I understand who and what you are, 06:12 and that you fall a long way short of my perfect ideal. 06:16 So I'm going to allow this, 06:18 but only within these specific guidelines." 06:22 The same thing happened when the nation of Israel 06:24 demanded a king. 06:25 It was not what God had in mind for his covenant nation, 06:29 but he allowed it, 06:30 and only within certain specific guidelines. 06:34 So, when it comes to the issue of slavery in the Bible, 06:38 you've got to ask yourself, is servitude God's ideal 06:41 for the human race? 06:43 Or was it a response to the harsh realities 06:46 of living in a broken world? 06:48 Does God value every individual equally? 06:51 Or does he actually think that some of us 06:53 are less suited to a dignified life than others? 06:57 What I wanna propose is that the first option 06:59 is the right one. 07:01 God was addressing our broken reality. 07:04 I find it particularly interesting 07:06 that he laid out his rules for slave ownership 07:09 pretty much right after he gave his people 07:11 the 10 Commandments from the top of Sinai. 07:14 This was a group of people 07:16 who had just escaped Egyptian slavery, 07:19 and now God appears to be outlining 07:22 how they should treat their slaves. 07:25 And in a few minutes, we're going to explore that story 07:28 in a little more detail. 07:30 But before we do that, I think it's important 07:32 that we take off our modern 21st century glasses 07:35 and make an effort to read this 07:38 from an original perspective. 07:40 Unfortunately, our perception of slavery has been shaped 07:43 by the atrocities committed here in the new world 07:46 up to the latter part of the 19th century. 07:49 And so it's easy to think that this is the same thing, 07:53 and it isn't. 07:55 The Bible's not discussing an international slave trade, 07:58 where people were treated worse than animals 08:00 and herded into ships, where a lot of people died 08:03 before they ever actually made it to the slave market. 08:06 We're not talking about stripping away basic human dignity, 08:10 chopping off their feet if they try to run away 08:12 or separating families for the sake of a quick buck. 08:16 If we're going to understand what the Bible is getting at, 08:19 we're gonna have to suspend our current understanding 08:22 of slavery, and step back thousands of years 08:25 into a different time and place. 08:27 And what we're gonna find is that even in a bad situation, 08:31 God actually preserves human dignity 08:34 and always seems to be working towards salvation 08:37 and redemption, usually in spite of us. 08:43 Now, personally, I find it very telling 08:45 that American slave owners didn't want their slaves 08:48 to actually read the Bible, 08:49 because it might give them ideas about dignity, 08:53 freedom, and worth. 08:54 In fact, they produced this, 08:57 something we now call the Slave Bible. 09:00 It's a pared-back version of the scriptures 09:02 that deliberately left out all the parts 09:05 that might give people the idea 09:07 that they were being treated in a way 09:09 that God didn't approve of. 09:11 In fact, more than 50% of the New Testament 09:14 is missing in here, and 90% of the Old. 09:17 I'll be right back after this. 09:19 [gentle music] 09:23 - [Narrator] Here at The Voice of Prophecy, 09:24 we're committed to creating top-quality programming 09:27 for the whole family, 09:28 like our audio adventure series, "Discovery Mountain." 09:31 "Discovery Mountain" is a Bible-based program 09:34 for kids of all ages and backgrounds. 09:36 Your family will enjoy the faith-building stories 09:39 from this small mountain summer camp and town. 09:42 With 24 seasonal episodes every year, 09:44 and fresh content every week, 09:46 there's always a new adventure just on the horizon. 09:53 - If slavery is a practice ordained by God, 09:55 as some people say, if the scriptures really promote it, 09:58 then you have to wonder why American slave owners 10:01 went to so much trouble to keep their slaves 10:03 from actually reading the Bible. 10:06 In some cases, it was just a matter of basic literacy. 10:09 If you can't read, 10:10 you'll never discover what the Bible says. 10:13 And in other cases, they actually pared back the Bible, 10:16 cutting it down to the bits that wouldn't give readers 10:19 the notion that their rightful God-given state of existence 10:23 is liberty. 10:25 But of course, skeptics can still easily point 10:28 to parts of the Bible that seem to suggest 10:30 that God was in favor of what we were doing. 10:33 And that's where the confusing practice of slavery 10:35 in America, with the way the Israelites did it, 10:38 becomes a serious problem. 10:40 What the Bible describes is nothing at all 10:44 like what we were doing. 10:46 Let me show you what I mean. 10:49 And I think maybe the best place to start 10:51 is with the Bible's instructions for slavery 10:53 found in Exodus 21. 10:56 Now remember, this was given to a group of people 10:59 who had just escaped a life of slavery in Egypt. 11:02 And so what you'd expect to find is outright condemnation 11:06 of the practice, but you don't. 11:08 And that's because God was proposing something different 11:11 than the idea we have. 11:13 So here we go, in Exodus 21, starting right at the top 11:16 of the chapter where it says, "Now these are the rules 11:20 that you shall set before them. 11:21 When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, 11:25 and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing." 11:29 One of the first things we should notice 11:31 is the fact that there was an all-important cap on slavery. 11:34 It couldn't last more than six years. 11:36 And in the seventh year, you had to liberate your slave. 11:40 And that's because among God's people, 11:42 servitude was a way of handling economic inequality. 11:47 This is a clear case where God is permitting his people 11:50 to do something, even though it's obviously not his ideal. 11:55 One of the things that human beings have struggled with 11:57 since time immemorial is the unequal distribution 12:00 of resources. 12:01 No matter what we try, we always seem to end up 12:04 in a situation where some people become really, 12:06 really rich and other people end up living a life 12:09 of brutal subsistence. 12:11 It happens in free market economies, 12:13 and it also happens in Marxist economies, 12:16 which seem to produce even more poverty. 12:19 And on this side of the kingdom of God, 12:21 there is no solution in sight. 12:22 Even Jesus said, you always have the poor with you. 12:27 This is one of the hard realities 12:29 of living in a world populated by sinful and selfish people. 12:32 They will always, always, always put their own desires 12:36 ahead of somebody else's needs. 12:38 And it seems that no matter what measures we take 12:41 to mitigate the problem, we always come back 12:43 to the same situation. 12:45 On the one hand, we have those who tell us 12:47 that free markets are the ultimate solution. 12:49 A rising tide lifts all boats. 12:51 And to a large extent that's been true. 12:54 It is a system that historically speaking 12:56 lifted more people out of abject poverty 12:59 and granted more people personal liberty than anything else. 13:03 It's a system built on rugged individualism, 13:05 which is simultaneously both its strength and its weakness, 13:12 because while it certainly promotes self-sufficiency, 13:13 it can also demolish any sense of responsibility 13:16 for our fellow human beings, to the point where, 13:20 in Matthew 25, Jesus openly condemns those 13:23 who ignore suffering. 13:27 But then on the other hand, we have those who feel like 13:28 more government is the answer. 13:30 So they build a system they say will produce equality. 13:33 But the price for that is to strip people 13:35 of their individual worth, 13:37 treating them like wards of the state 13:39 instead of real flesh and blood human beings. 13:42 As Stalin, or in some versions, Lenin, was rumored to say, 13:46 "If you wanna make an omelet, 13:48 you're gonna have to break a few eggs." 13:50 And those eggs, sadly, were people. 13:53 Now, the quote is a bit of an urban legend 13:55 because it actually came from Robert Louis Stevenson, 13:58 but the attitude was there in the former Soviet Union. 14:03 So far, our human attempts to provide permanent solutions 14:06 to poverty have pretty much failed. 14:09 And while some of our so-called solutions 14:11 are clearly better than others, on this side of paradise, 14:14 I think we're gonna continue to meet with failure. 14:17 Of course, that doesn't mean we shouldn't try, 14:19 because Jesus clearly expects us to do something 14:22 about pain and suffering. 14:24 That much is clear in Matthew 25. 14:27 But in this side of the second coming, 14:29 we're not gonna find a permanent solution. 14:33 What we have in Exodus 21 is an honest recognition 14:37 of our brutal situation. 14:39 Some people in this broken world 14:40 are going to meet with incredible hardship. 14:43 And what you could do about your situation 14:45 back in those days was sell your labor. 14:49 You could actually sell yourself into servanthood, 14:51 becoming a full-time employee for somebody wealthy, 14:54 and that would provide sustenance for your family, 14:57 or even settle your debts. 15:00 This wasn't a case of people rounding up 15:02 unsuspecting victims and selling them as slaves. 15:05 This was a case of individuals 15:07 who needed to get their debt under control. 15:09 And that happened in one of two ways. 15:13 Either you were a criminal, a thief, 15:15 and you were required to make things right, 15:18 or you were a person who ran into financial trouble 15:20 and you needed some kind of escape valve. 15:23 Either way, selling yourself into servitude 15:26 became an emergency measure for somebody 15:28 who found themselves in some kind of financial free fall. 15:32 And from this point forward in the text, 15:35 you'll find a series of rules designed 15:36 to keep things neat and tidy. 15:39 If you sold yourself into slavery 15:41 and you were single, you would leave your master 15:43 still a single man. 15:45 In other words, there was a plan to keep the ledger balanced 15:48 so that nobody could complain that the period of servitude 15:51 was somehow unfair, or that somebody, 15:53 whether the purchaser or the servant, 15:56 had been taken advantage of. 15:58 There was even a provision that if the slave felt like 16:00 he'd like to stay, he could actually sign on permanently. 16:05 Here's what it says. 16:06 "But if the slave plainly says, 'I love my master, my wife, 16:09 and my children; I will not go out free,' 16:12 then his master shall bring him to God 16:14 and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost. 16:17 And his master shall bore his ear through with an awl, 16:19 and he shall be his slave forever." 16:23 So, what are we supposed to make of that? 16:25 Well, if he chooses to get married 16:27 during his time of indentured servitude, 16:29 he's supposed to leave his wife and kids behind, 16:32 because he agreed to labor for a set amount. 16:35 And by acquiring a family, 16:36 he's earning more than was agreed. 16:38 Again, it's a matter of keeping the ledger 16:41 balanced and clear. 16:42 So if he wants to stay, he can, 16:44 and that was a matter of personal choice. 16:47 And this is obviously one of the key differences 16:50 between this account in the Bible 16:52 and the atrocities we committed here in America. 16:55 There were clear rules designed to preserve 16:57 everybody's dignity. 16:59 And unless you were a criminal who couldn't pay your debt, 17:02 this was a matter of free will. 17:05 And above it all, you have God saying, 17:06 "I understand why you think you need to do this, 17:09 but listen, this doesn't last forever, 17:11 and I'm drawing a line in the sand, 17:13 this does not go past the seventh year." 17:17 So, maybe think about it in terms of a labor contract. 17:20 I will perform six years of labor in exchange for X, 17:25 which is what Jacob did when he wanted to marry Rachel. 17:27 Long before these rules were drafted, 17:29 he gave seven years of servitude to Laban 17:32 in exchange for his daughter. 17:34 Of course, we might not like it, 17:37 and we might have a lot of trouble not thinking about this 17:40 from our 21st century perspective, 17:43 but put back in its historical context, 17:45 and suddenly it seems a little more reasonable 17:48 than the brutal treatment of slaves in more recent times. 17:51 And again, this is not God's ideal, 17:54 this is not how he intended us to live, 17:57 but given the time and circumstances, 17:59 it starts to look more like a reasonable compromise 18:03 with a broken way of life. 18:06 Now, of course, I'm oversimplifying this 18:07 because some of you will already know that I haven't gotten 18:10 to the part where a man can sell his daughter into slavery, 18:14 which really complicates things by mixing slavery 18:17 with what appears to be the clear mistreatment of women. 18:21 Chapter 21:7 says, "When a man sells his daughter 18:25 as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do." 18:29 That would appear to be a huge ethical problem, 18:33 which I'll deal with as soon as we come back 18:35 from this break. 18:37 [gentle music] 18:40 - [Narrator] Dragons, beasts, cryptic statues. 18:45 Bible prophecy can be incredibly vivid and confusing. 18:49 If you've ever read Daniel or Revelation 18:51 and come away scratching your head, you're not alone. 18:54 Our free "Focus on Prophecy" guides are designed 18:57 to help you unlock the mysteries of the Bible 19:00 and deepen your understanding of God's plan for you 19:03 and our world. 19:04 Study online or request them by mail, 19:06 and start bringing prophecy into focus today. 19:10 - You know, it's one thing to sell yourself into slavery, 19:12 but what do we do with the guy who sells his daughter? 19:16 To the 21st-century mind, 19:18 it seems morally repugnant on a number of levels. 19:21 Not only are we dealing with selling people 19:24 against their will, 19:25 but we're treating women differently from men, 19:27 and it seems to be God's idea. 19:30 And for those who already believe 19:32 that the Bible is some kind of misogynistic document, 19:35 this can become fodder for criticism. 19:38 But again, what we're dealing with 19:40 is God accommodating himself to our reality, 19:43 the harsh reality that we created 19:46 quite apart from God's will. 19:48 And we're also reading this with Western eyes, 19:50 which creates all kinds of unnecessary friction. 19:54 When you go back and read it in the context 19:56 in which it was written, 19:57 it actually begins to make some sense. 20:00 Back in those days, when the world was mostly 20:02 an agrarian society, your fortunes were tied to the land. 20:06 And land was passed on to those most physically capable 20:09 of working it, which was the men. 20:12 Now I understand, 20:13 you and I would probably do it differently, 20:15 but again, we're talking about the world the way it was, 20:19 not the way we wish it was. 20:21 And honestly, you'll find God taking all kinds of measures 20:23 throughout the Bible to move the needle 20:25 in the right direction toward a better world, 20:29 all the way down to the moment 20:30 when he finally took on humanity for himself, 20:33 and lived here among us. 20:36 But as you and I wait for the restoration of all things, 20:39 the Bible reveals that God is patient and long-suffering. 20:42 And back when this was written, 20:44 he was dealing with a current reality. 20:47 Let's imagine a father is incredibly poor. 20:50 He's got nothing to offer his daughter 20:51 except a long life of hardship, or even a short life, 20:55 depending on how bad it is. 20:57 On the other side of town is a wealthy man 20:59 who could easily provide for your daughter, 21:02 and you hope against all odds 21:03 that he might show interest in your daughter and marry her, 21:07 an arrangement that would probably be a permanent solution 21:10 to her poverty. 21:12 It appears to be win-win. 21:14 There's a settlement for the family, 21:16 which helps curve their poverty, 21:18 and the daughter's placed with a rich family 21:20 where her lot is certainly better than it was at home. 21:23 And I know, the word we have in the English Bible is slave, 21:27 which implies harsh and regular mistreatment, 21:30 but that's a misunderstanding that you and I 21:31 are reading into the text. 21:33 You could think of this more like household chores. 21:37 If you read the passage carefully, 21:39 you'll discover that the intention with this arrangement 21:41 was actually marriage. 21:43 It says, "She shall not go out as the male slaves do," 21:46 which at first glance makes it look like 21:48 she doesn't have the same privileges and rights 21:50 as a male slave, but she does. 21:54 The Bible makes it clear that she also gets to leave 21:56 in the seventh year. 21:58 There is no difference in the way that she's treated, 22:00 except with regard to one thing. 22:02 She has the ability to escape servitude through marriage. 22:06 If the master likes her or the son likes her 22:09 and they marry her, she's free. 22:11 And she's to be treated, it says, 22:13 with the full honor of a real wife. 22:15 And even if the master or the son 22:17 goes on to marry other women, 22:19 she must never be treated as a lesser wife 22:22 because she used to be a servant. 22:24 It says, "If he takes another wife to himself, 22:26 he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, 22:29 or her marital rights." 22:32 And if he doesn't wanna marry her, 22:34 she goes back to her family. 22:36 Now again, you and I might not like this, 22:38 and you might still think the Bible is some outdated, 22:40 bronze-age document that promotes misogyny. 22:44 But then we're asking the world of 3,500 years ago 22:49 to be exactly like the world we live in right now, 22:51 and that's just not the case. 22:54 And if time should last, you could be sure 22:56 that the people living centuries from now 22:58 will look back at us and think we were barbarians, 23:01 no matter how enlightened we think we are. 23:04 And we're also assuming that all of this 23:06 was God's idea in the first place, and it wasn't. 23:11 I mean, just remember the words that God spoke 23:12 to Adam and Eve during the exit interview from Eden. 23:16 "Look," God said, "you had a perfect, painless existence, 23:19 but now that you've decided to go your own way, 23:21 I'm gonna let you. 23:23 But it does mean that life is going to be hard 23:25 and you're going to have to exist 23:27 by the sweat of your brow." 23:29 And from that point forward, God moves heaven and Earth 23:31 to accommodate our new reality, 23:34 to put clear limits around our ability to destroy ourselves. 23:39 He knew that we were going to be incredibly selfish 23:41 and make a huge mess, but he made sure 23:44 that there was a way to keep us 23:45 from just eradicating ourselves. 23:48 At the end of the day, poverty and suffering are our fault, 23:52 not God's. 23:54 And what you find in the pages of the Bible 23:56 is an unparalleled ethical code 23:59 that attempts to mitigate the damage that we cause. 24:04 The idea behind placing your daughter in a rich man's house 24:07 was to provide a way out of poverty, 24:09 which is hard for us to fathom 24:11 here in the modern, wealthy West, 24:12 where even the poorest among us 24:14 live better than most of our distant ancestors. 24:18 But I've got to tell you, 24:20 I continue to witness that kind of poverty 24:21 in other places on this planet. 24:23 Where a family with too many children is starving, 24:26 so they trust the person who comes along and says, 24:28 "Look, I have a work arrangement for your daughter 24:31 where she doesn't have to live like this." 24:34 Most of us here don't live with that kind of desperation, 24:38 so we don't understand. 24:40 But it is still happening, and I mean today. 24:43 There was no safety net 3,500 years ago, 24:46 except for the ones that God created. 24:48 We find him telling farmers to leave something behind 24:51 for the poor when they harvest the crops. 24:53 We find rules for getting out of crippling debt. 24:56 There was a prohibition on usury, 24:59 a practice that made poverty even tougher to escape. 25:02 And we had a win-win arrangement 25:04 where poor children had a shot at the good life. 25:07 And again, it might be hard for us to understand now, 25:11 but it wasn't back then. 25:13 I'll be right back after this. 25:16 [gentle music] 25:19 - [Narrator] Life can throw a lot at us. 25:21 Sometimes we don't have all the answers. 25:25 But that's where the Bible comes in. 25:27 It's our guide to a more fulfilling life. 25:30 Here at the Voice of Prophecy, 25:32 we've created the Discover Bible guides 25:34 to be your guide to the Bible. 25:36 They're designed to be simple, easy to use, 25:38 and provide answers to many of life's toughest questions. 25:41 And, they're absolutely free. 25:43 So jump online now or give us a call, 25:45 and start your journey of discovery. 25:49 - We could probably spend another hour 25:50 dissecting the provisions God made for escaping poverty, 25:54 but I think we've covered enough 25:55 to make a really important point. 25:58 This was a matter of God mitigating the damage we caused, 26:01 and not a matter of God instituting slavery 26:04 because he's cruel or vindictive. 26:07 I guess what I want you to do is just read the Bible, 26:09 read it broadly, read it honestly. 26:12 I think what you're gonna find is a God 26:14 who consistently moves the needle in his direction, 26:16 always pushing us toward a better, more authentic life, 26:20 without taking away our freedom to choose. 26:23 He always finds the middle ground between personal liberty 26:26 and social conscience, and he always preserves our dignity, 26:30 regardless of what we've done. 26:33 And while we're on the topic, 26:34 let me just spend half a second talking about 26:36 some of today's brutal realities, 26:38 and I wanna ask you to help. 26:40 The Voice of Prophecy sponsors a home for girls 26:42 rescued from human trafficking. 26:45 These are girls from very poor families, 26:47 and when someone promises work for their children, 26:50 these desperate families jump at the chance, 26:53 and then they never see their kids again. 26:55 These reprehensible people are putting these girls 26:57 in the sex trade. 27:00 So a few years ago, my wife Jean met a remarkable woman 27:03 who breaks into these brothels and rescues these girls, 27:06 and they need a place to go. 27:08 So here's what you could do. 27:09 We've got a home where these girls get a brand new life. 27:12 They learn important skills, and I could use your help. 27:16 You could turn someone's life around 27:17 for as little as say, a hundred bucks. 27:20 So please, head on over to vop.com, 27:23 click on the big orange "donate" button, 27:25 and then when you're asked what you're giving for, 27:28 click on the "Rescue Project" in the dropdown menu. 27:32 Here's what I know about the Bible, folks. 27:34 All of it, even the seemingly hard stuff, 27:37 even the stuff that we struggle to understand now 27:39 in the 21st century, it's all designed to redeem us, 27:43 to restore us to an authentic human existence. 27:47 Thanks for joining me again today. 27:48 I'm Shawn Boonstra, 27:50 and this has been another episode of "Authentic." 27:54 [gentle country music] |
Revised 2023-11-08