Participants:
Series Code: RQRA
Program Code: RQRA000019A
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00:01 I don't understand.
00:04 Why did this have to happen to me? 00:08 I feel like I just can't make sense of things. 00:12 I need answers. 00:15 Where is God? 00:21 Hello and welcome to Raw Questions Relevant Answers. 00:25 This is a program designed to answer your questions 00:27 whether it be about life, about God, about church, 00:30 any of these things, we want to hear from you. 00:33 And we're going to do that today. 00:35 We have questions that have been sent 00:36 in via Facebook, 00:37 and specifically today, 00:39 we're looking at the topic of Rules and Regulations. 00:42 My name is Michelle Doucoumes. 00:44 I'm a college professor, 00:45 so I hear a lot about rules and regulations 00:47 and what people like and don't like. 00:50 And I'd like you to meet my co-host. 00:52 This is Dee Casper, 00:53 who is a brand evangelist for ARTV. 00:57 And we also have Mark Paden, who is a freelance filmmaker. 01:02 And so, guys, we're going to dive 01:03 right into this big question right now, 01:06 and I want to ask you a question. 01:09 Why is it... 01:10 When we talk about rules and regulations in the church, 01:13 "Why doesn't the church teach us the reasoning 01:15 behind the rules that we currently have?" 01:18 This is sent in from a man, age 21, in Tennessee. 01:22 You want to start with this one? 01:23 Sure. 01:25 Yeah, I think there's a couple different ways 01:27 that we can look at this question. 01:30 I think the first thing is that oftentimes, 01:32 we don't, as a church, 01:33 don't always know the reasons for the rules that we have. 01:37 You know, God wants us to have a rational faith, 01:40 a faith in which we understand the principles 01:44 behind what He gives us. 01:46 But I think, the other thing too, 01:48 that I would say to this question is, 01:50 regardless of the church's involvement in their exposition 01:54 of the reason for the rules, 01:56 we need to know them. 01:58 As individual Christians, 01:59 we are going to be held individually 02:01 accountable to God. 02:02 And at the end of time, we can't say, 02:04 "Oh, but the church didn't teach me 02:06 the reasons for these rules." 02:07 You know, we have to go to God ourselves, 02:09 and ask him, "Lord, what is my duty? 02:12 What do You want me to do?" 02:13 And earnestly seek His Word to find those answers on that. 02:16 I would say that, 02:18 like when we use the word the church, in a general sense, 02:20 the people who are enforcing or teaching those things now 02:23 may not be aware of the discourse of the context 02:26 and why we, as a church, 02:27 originally adopted these positions 02:29 just to kind of separate the two like... 02:30 Right. 02:32 I wouldn't say that we aimlessly 02:33 came to these positions as a corporate body, 02:35 but that there were rationales behind it, 02:37 but it's because it's what we've done for so long, 02:39 that's just what we do. 02:40 Like, don't question that, 02:42 this is just who we are and what we do. 02:43 Sometimes, people may feel 02:45 that's the way that they're addressed, 02:46 but I just want to make it clear 02:47 that there is a rationale that goes into it 02:49 when we have these things to start. 02:50 I think something that could be done better, 02:52 at this stage, is communicating the why, 02:55 not just the what, 02:57 and even sometimes the how. 02:59 We may know what God expects, 03:00 but we don't know how to get there. 03:02 So I think that kind of helps 03:03 to give a context for these things. 03:04 But two, I think that it would be far more helpful 03:08 in the way in which we lead our children 03:09 whether it be as parents or as leaders or as mentors, 03:13 instead of just disciplining someone by saying, 03:16 you know, "Don't do that, that's bad." 03:18 It's very, very helpful to explain, 03:21 "This is the reason 03:22 why this isn't a good thing to be doing." 03:24 This is what the Word of God 03:25 says about this particular topic. 03:27 It makes a big difference. 03:28 But a lot of times, 03:29 the young people are just dealt with quickly of, 03:31 "Don't. That's bad. Moving on now." 03:34 And it is kind of leading to this bitterness 03:36 because they just feel controlled 03:38 as opposed to reasoned with. 03:41 One of the things we're told in some of our writings, 03:43 as a Church, 03:44 regarding how to raise children and education, 03:46 particularly in context of education, 03:47 is that we should bring them to a point 03:49 where they recognize 03:50 that what they've done is wrong, 03:52 and then enlist their will in its correction. 03:55 And I think the only way that's going to happen 03:57 is if we communicate why what has happened is wrong 04:00 so they understand. 04:02 Why this is an ideal way to live. 04:04 And then three, 04:05 inviting them to be part of the process of the solution. 04:08 I think this is an ideal answer 04:10 to mishandling of this in other contexts. 04:14 It's like a maturing 04:15 in the Christian faith then I guess. 04:17 You know, when a child is really young, 04:18 you might say, "Hey, just don't run in the street." 04:20 Right. 04:22 And they might be too young to fully understand, 04:23 but as they grow up, 04:25 they need to understand that context in order 04:27 to really be able to apply 04:28 that principle in different situations. 04:31 And unfortunately, 04:32 sometimes our churches have failed at that. 04:35 Maybe not knowing how to explain 04:37 or maybe even because, sadly, 04:41 some of us in the church may not have studied ourselves 04:43 why we do some of these things. 04:45 So I like what you said, Mark. 04:47 It is important that we study for ourselves... 04:49 We are the church... 04:51 And we do need to be able to know the reason 04:53 for what we believe and why. 04:55 And it could be a multi-generational 04:56 systemic failure that, 04:57 you know, our parents may not have been told the why, 05:00 and so they just told us the what, 05:02 and so that could be, 05:03 but the buck stops with me. 05:05 Yeah. 05:06 I'm going to be accountable to God 05:08 for the decisions that I make, 05:09 and I need to know for myself what I believe and why. 05:11 And I think that's a good answer. 05:13 It doesn't excuse the abuse of how it's happened before, 05:15 but we individually still have a role to play 05:17 in searching for ourselves. 05:19 That's a great point. 05:21 Here's another question, pretty heartfelt one. 05:23 This comes from a 15-year old young lady in Tennessee, 05:28 it says, "I want to go to heaven, 05:30 but I feel like I will never be good enough 05:33 or able to follow all the Christian standards. 05:36 And I don't even know if I want to. 05:40 I feel like God is too controlling 05:42 even though I realize it might just be people 05:45 making Him out to be that way. 05:48 But then I think, they're spiritual, 05:51 so maybe they're right." 05:53 What would you say to someone like that? 05:55 First of all, I just want to say 05:56 that I appreciate your transparency 05:58 and your honesty, 06:00 like the whole point of this program 06:01 is raw questions, not to be crass, 06:03 but it's best and helpful, 06:05 I think, for people to communicate 06:06 as honestly as possible. 06:08 I think one of the main issues at stake here 06:10 is that they have not been communicated within a way 06:13 that shows the value that they have, 06:15 for one, and two, 06:16 that God has no desire to control people. 06:20 God only operates under the tenets of love, 06:23 and His ideal situation is self-governance, 06:26 a well-informed person 06:28 exercising their will with the information 06:30 necessary to make right decisions. 06:32 That's the way that God operates. 06:34 But sometimes, when people fail us in this regard, 06:37 our assumption is, "This person claims to know God, 06:40 this person hurt me, 06:41 God must endorse what they did to me." 06:43 And that's not necessarily true. 06:45 There are many instances, we'll cover this, 06:47 I think, in a later episode, on the topic of bad religion. 06:49 There are many instances 06:51 in which people were hurt by religious folks, 06:53 and in the Bible, 06:54 and God literally distances Himself 06:57 from the behavior of those religious individuals, 06:59 and says, "I didn't do that, 07:00 I'm not like that, 07:02 and I'm having to clean up that mess." 07:03 And so maybe even if people are good, 07:07 that doesn't mean 07:08 that they have correctly represented God... 07:10 Yes. In every instance. 07:11 Yes. Yeah. 07:12 Here's another thing that I would say to this to. 07:14 You know, it's this... 07:17 One of the sentiments in this is, 07:18 "I feel like I can never get all of these right." 07:24 Amen. 07:27 We sometimes feel like 07:28 we have to be the ones to get it right. 07:30 But listen to the words of Christ to Isaiah, 07:33 "The whole..." And this is in Isaiah 1:5, 6. 07:36 "The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. 07:39 From the sole of the foot even to the head, 07:40 there is no soundness in it, 07:42 but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores." 07:45 This is our spiritual condition. 07:47 And in another verse, 07:48 I'm blanking on the reference right now, 07:50 but it says "Can the Ethiopian change his skin 07:51 or the leopard its spots? 07:53 Then may you also do good 07:54 who are accustomed to doing evil." 07:56 We cannot just change ourselves and love these things, 07:59 but the power is in... 08:02 Ezekiel 36, the God promises to transform our hearts, 08:06 to take the sinful polluted heart 08:09 that loves sin and hates righteousness, 08:11 and changes it into a heart 08:13 and a mind that is in love with the commandments of God, 08:16 that it finds its joy and the beauty of holiness 08:19 and loves to do all of God's requirements. 08:22 And then it's not about trying to find 08:24 the lowest possible standard for right 08:29 so that we can barely scrape by, 08:31 then it becomes our goal to go exactly 08:34 with what God wants us to be, 08:36 and that all has to start with a heart change. 08:38 So if you feel like, 08:39 "I just can't get all this right." 08:40 Praise God. 08:42 Yeah. 08:43 You know, I'd like to add something 08:44 to that that has to do with 08:46 how do we know if that's God saying those voices. 08:50 Well, something that's really helped me as remembering... 08:52 If that voice is causing me to say, "All right, 08:55 I need to go to Jesus. 08:57 I lack, I don't have this right, 08:59 I need to go to Jesus." 09:01 Then that that's the Lord, 09:02 that's the Holy Spirit that brings that conviction. 09:04 If the voice is saying, "You're never good enough. 09:07 You're not going to get it right. 09:09 You're just never going to make it," 09:11 that's the voice of shame and it's not of the Lord. 09:13 That's of Satan. 09:15 And so when it is God convicting us, 09:18 it'll be a voice that drives us 09:19 to the feet of Jesus to go to Him. 09:21 That's it. 09:23 When men see their nothingness, 09:24 then they're prepared to be close 09:25 with the righteousness of Christ. 09:27 We have to recognize our inability 09:28 to then put our full trust in His ability. 09:30 I think it's a great point. 09:33 Another big question, guys. 09:34 This comes from a 16-year old girl in Maryland. 09:38 "I am here, but I am not here, 09:42 in my place is someone who follows the rules 09:46 because I have to. 09:48 I put the right answers on my Bible quizzes 09:50 because I'll get an F if I don't. 09:53 If I ever had a chance, my school ruined it. 09:57 My teachers judge people who live differently than them, 10:00 and it makes me wonder how they would view me 10:02 if they saw me outside this place." 10:05 This strikes my heart as someone 10:07 who is a teacher myself. 10:10 But this is a big deal. 10:11 How do we deal with this? 10:13 I think it's super important, again, 10:14 to understand the principles 10:16 and the Spirit in which God intend, 10:18 and those things are found in the Word of God 10:21 as opposed to the misrepresentation 10:25 and the failed approach of someone meaning well. 10:28 First of all, these people in these positions of authority 10:31 in a majority, if not all the situations, 10:33 are as sincere as the day is long, 10:35 not intending to cause harm, 10:37 not intending to push people away. 10:39 "They have a zeal but not according to knowledge," 10:41 the Apostle Paul says. 10:43 And there were many people in his day 10:44 that practiced religion that looked just like that, 10:47 not understanding that the law was a means to an end, 10:50 not the end itself. 10:52 The whole point of rules or regulations or reforms 10:55 is to enhance our relationship with Jesus, 10:57 to remove the hindrances, 10:59 the things that kind of encumber the ground 11:01 and make our growth less easier and more difficult, 11:05 and they make it more difficult. 11:06 The whole point of those was to draw us closer to Him. 11:08 And so if we understood that God gave us these 11:10 because He loves us 11:11 and wants a closer relationship with us, 11:13 we would give Him the benefit of the doubt in the things 11:15 we don't understand initially. 11:17 And this is why we, as leaders, 11:18 need to take this one on the chin 11:20 and recognize that how I communicate 11:22 what God expects is just as important 11:25 as communicating what He expects. 11:28 And I just want to take a moment to apologize 11:30 on behalf of people 11:31 who have failed you in your life, 11:33 who should have given you a better picture 11:34 but didn't. 11:36 God doesn't operate that way. 11:37 God is reasonable, He's rational, 11:40 He's filled with love, 11:41 and His precepts only lead to pleasures evermore 11:45 when followed as He intended them to be. 11:47 And so I just want to make sure that that's clear. 11:49 You know, there's one other thing, too, 11:50 that I kind of want to touch on here, 11:51 and we were kind of talking about this a little bit before, 11:56 the fallacy fallacy. 11:59 In other words, if you're familiar with this, 12:01 with the different fallacies, 12:03 it's basically how things that... 12:07 Logical fallacies that don't actually work in reasoning. 12:10 So for instance, the fallacy fallacy states that just 12:13 because somebody's reasoning is fallacious or bad, wrong, 12:17 doesn't mean that their point is necessarily bad. 12:23 And this is something, too, 12:24 that I think really applies to us as Christians 12:27 just because an authority figure, a pastor, 12:31 a teacher treats us in a bad way, 12:34 doesn't mean that the God 12:36 that they represent is bad. 12:39 So I would just encourage you, 12:41 be intellectually honest with yourself. 12:45 Don't listen to... 12:48 I mean, I think all of us have been hurt 12:50 by some religious person at some time, 12:52 and like I've been hurt, right? 12:55 But that doesn't mean 12:56 that we have to push back against God, 12:58 against even maybe 13:00 what they were trying to tell us, 13:01 what it means is, 13:03 let's disambiguate God from the negative behavior 13:06 and seek earnestly, and say, 13:07 "God, what are You trying to teach me?" 13:09 And then, I think, we'll have a lot more clarity. 13:11 I think, on this question 13:12 we need to ask is, "Is it true?" 13:14 Not, "Do I like how it was done?" 13:16 Not, "Do I like how this person 13:17 went about it or what was said?" 13:18 "Is it true? 13:20 And I owe it to God to search that out for myself 13:21 before I reject it outright." 13:23 I love how the Bible says, 13:25 you know, calm now and let us reason together, 13:28 and that's another big thing, 13:29 it is God wants us to ask these questions. 13:32 And so I really love 13:34 how people are asking these questions. 13:36 If you're asking that, that's a good thing, 13:38 and God understands that, 13:40 and He sends His Holy Spirit to help us, 13:42 to empower us so that we can do the things 13:46 that otherwise we could not do on our own, 13:49 and that's the beautiful part. 13:51 And so thank you so much for joining us for this. 13:54 And I hope that as you continue to ask and seek the Lord, 13:58 that the Lord through His Spirit 13:59 will come in and lead and guide. 14:01 If you want to send your questions, 14:04 find us on Facebook, 14:05 Raw Questions Relevant Answers 14:07 or RQRA3ABN. 14:10 And we will see you next time. 14:12 God bless. |
Revised 2018-09-10