Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 993 | The Right & Wrong Way to Read the Bible | Guest: Tara-Leigh Cobble

Episode Date: April 29, 2024

Today, we sit down with Tara-Leigh Cobble, creator of 'The Bible Recap' and author of numerous books including, "The Joy of the Trinity." Her daily podcast, "The Bible Recap", guides listeners through a chronological 1-Year Bible reading plan. The podcast has over 330 million downloads and reached #1 on the Apple Podcast Charts in All Categories. Tara-Leigh details her personal journey with God and learning to love God through Scripture. She explains how the Bible is for us but not about us, and she explores some of the most pressing theological questions: What is the Trinity? Who is the Holy Spirit? What is the significance of Israel, beauty, and goodness? --- Timecodes: (00:46) Creating the Bible Recap podcast (21:12) What Tara-Leigh has learned during this process (25:40) Explaining the Trinity (32:19) The Holy Spirit (37:42) The joy of the Trinity (39:26) The beauty of Israel --- Today's Sponsors: Focus on the Family — the new podcast, "Practice Makes Parent" brings you real, practical, and biblical advice. Tune in every Wednesday on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcasting platform. Find the podcast here: https://podcasts.focusonthefamily.com/show/practice-makes-parent/?refcd=1674101&utm_source=blaze&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=relatable Good Ranchers — If you want to secure your best price on meat until 2026, go to GoodRanchers.com and use code ALLIE for 10% off your subscription, free express shipping and a price-lock guarantee until 2026!  Jase Medical — get up to a year’s worth of many of your prescription medications delivered in advance. Go to JaseMedical.com today and use promo code “ALLIE". EveryLife — the only premium baby brand that is unapologetically pro-life. EveryLife offers high-performing, supremely soft diapers and wipes that protect and celebrate every precious life. Head to EveryLife.com and use promo code ALLIE10 to get 10% of your first order today! --- Relevant Episodes: Ep 986 | Steven Furtick Gives a Master Class in Narci-gesis https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/ep-986-steven-furtick-gives-a-master-class-in-narci-gesis/id1359249098?i=1000652653436 Ep 977 | Will All Jewish People Be Saved? | Guest: Dr. Jeremiah Johnston https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/relatable-with-allie-beth-stuckey/id1359249098?i=1000651102936 --- Buy Allie's book, You're Not Enough (& That's Okay): Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love: https://alliebethstuckey.com/book Relatable merchandise – use promo code 'ALLIE10' for a discount: https://shop.blazemedia.com/collections/allie-stuckey

The Bible Recap is one of the most popular podcasts of all time, and the host Teralee Cable simply takes people through the Word of God every day. Tara Lee is here today to talk about the success of her podcast, how she got here, her testimony, as well as her new book, The Joy of the Trinity. This is an amazing, super encouraging conversation that you guys are going to love. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers. go to good ranchers.com. Use code Allie at checkout.

That's good ranchers.com. Code Allie. Terrily, thanks so much for taking the time to join us. Thanks for having me here. Yes. Okay, first I want to talk about the Bible recap because, oh my goodness, the success that it has seen in the past few years is amazing. And it's just been such an encouragement to me as a Christian to see the prominence

of a show that literally just leads people through scripture. Like, praise God. So talk about that. Why you started it? And did you imagine that it would. reach the success that it has. Oh, I had no idea that it would, my prayer was that 300 people would read the Bible with me. That's awesome. And that's the reason I started it was to help people read through scripture because I grew up in the church. My family prizes the word, loves the word.

We had family devotions around the breakfast table at 6 a.m. Private Christian school. All of the opportunities. My family even owns a Christian bookstore. I grew up surrounded by commentaries and all kinds of concordances and all the things that would help me understand the word. And I never really took full advantage of it. I've primarily found that when I was reading the Bible, I was accumulating confusion. So there were a couple safe spots that I felt comfortable in and I wanted to stay in those spots. And I understand this part. And oh, I love the Psalms and I love the Proverbs and I love the Gospels and Philippians and just those places that I'm like, okay, I get this.

I understand this. And it was daunting to me to venture out of those places, to go to the Old Testament, to go to Revelation. Those were scary spots. And the first time I actually read through the whole Bible, the only way that I finished it was because my pastor offered to answer my questions along the way. Okay. So every week, he would answer my questions, and I'm like, okay, I'm accumulating understanding, not just confusion and frustration. And that was a game changer for me. And were you an adult at this point?

Yes. You were an adult. And so that just goes to show. And I would say it's the same for me. You can be raised in a wonderful Christian home all around, as you said, different commentaries and insight and wisdom about the Bible. And yet something kind of has to click at some point in your faith. Typically, I think it's kind of young adulthood when someone who was raised a Christian says,

oh, wait, I know this and I can repeat this. which is important, but I don't know that I really understand it. And what a blessing that you were plugged into a church and had that kind of relationship with the pastor that he was able to answer your questions. Yes. Yeah. And I love that he really challenged me to stop just knowing God's secondhand. Don't just take my word for what I say on stage.

Don't just trust what other people say about God. Go get to know God firsthand because how else will you be able to measure what that pastor says or what that teacher says or what that worship song says or what that quote on Instagram says, are you going to believe it's true just because it uses the name of God in it? Right. And so he challenged me to get to know God firsthand. And it changed everything for me. And so I wanted that for everybody.

I want that for everyone because there's so much richness to a personal intimate relationship with God. And you only get that by getting to know him directly. You know, you're married. If all you ever knew about your husband was what other people told you about him and you never had a personal conversation with him, you probably wouldn't know him very well. Right. Right. And at that turning point, when you realized, okay, I want to know and understand God in his own words, what he says about himself, how did your method of studying the Bible change?

Oh, that's a great question. So the honest answer is the first time I read through scripture, my pastor's answering my questions along the way. I finished and you would think I would feel elated. Like I did it. I finished reading the whole Bible. Yeah. And I didn't. I was heartbroken because I read it cover to cover and believed it was true. All of it. I believe all of this is true. All this is God's word. This is God revealing himself to us. And I didn't like him. When I finished, I didn't like him. And my pastor said, okay, I have a new challenge for you. I've walked with you through the scriptures for a year. I've seen the kinds of questions you ask. I've seen the kinds of things you're looking for.

I know the lens you're reading scripture through. My new challenge for you is read it again and stop looking for yourself. Start looking for God. What does he love? What does he hate? What motivates him to do what he does? You're reading this book like it's about you. it's for you but it's not about you it's about god and so that was when things changed was on my

second trip through scripture and i was halfway through the old testament and i fell in love like i fell in love with the person of god and it was the lens that i was using to study scripture I had in me this desire to reading shripture the first time it was, okay, how do I check all the boxes? How am I good? And I was nailing it in the morality area. I was, you know, gold star. Just golden child, did everything right, didn't commit any of the embarrassing sins. If you read my diary, you would have been so pleased with me, you know. but it was all about how I can be a good person so that God will give me what I want. It was me using God as a means to an end.

And so when I'm reading through scripture and I see it doesn't quite work that way. Like Paul gets a no for the things he desires. David gets a know for some of the things he desires. And these are like God's gold stars, you know. And so when I see in scripture that Paul lives this very hard life and these horrible things happen to him in prison, And yes, we have this beautiful letter that he wrote to the Philippians. You know, most of his letters were written from prison. And so it's like, wow, things don't quite go perfectly, even for God's gold stars.

And so you say that in air quotes, God's gold stars, you know. So I learned that like, oh, living a good moral, upright life doesn't always end as beautifully as we want it to on this side of eternity. And, you know, I know you and your listeners and your viewers have experienced that. Like there are people who are out there thinking, they're like, why are things going so sideways for me? And when I have been my motivation, when God is a means to my desired end, that is not what a relationship with him looks like. And so getting to know him who he really is, it just changed everything for me. and it brought me so much joy to get to know the God I'm in relationship with. It's crazy that I can read the same book and have two different outcomes based on the lens I'm using.

Based on the lens. And what I think is so interesting about your analysis is that your me-centric lens, which I think all of us are guilty at some point, guilty of at some point in our walk, actually created resentment and bitterness in you, I guess, because there was a discrepancy between what maybe you thought that you deserved and what God seemed to be giving people who seem to deserve better, who seem to deserve as you said the gold star or the reward. And so at the end of it, you're like, what? This is what I get? Which is the temptation and the consequence for all of us when we read scripture thinking, well, what is God going to give me? Is he the genie in the

bottle that's going to grant me my three wishes if I do things the right way? And you're right, leads to a lot of discouragement and disappointment, which is why theology matters, right? So much. So much. A robust theology will dismantle all our entitlement. Okay. First, I want to let you guys know that we have a new installment of our subscriber-exclusive content out right now for Blaze TV plus subscribers. This is a relationship Q&A. It is out today. I am taking some very juicy questions that I didn't want to answer in a video that would be put up on YouTube or made available to the masses. These are questions that I was only comfortable answering for like the real ones, the Blaze TV subscribers. So if you subscribe blazestiv.com slash Allie, use code Alley.

You'll get $20 off your subscription. And when you subscribe, you get access to all BlazTV. TV content, which is really incredible. It's the kind of stuff that like we can't put on YouTube and on Apple Podcasts for fear that we will get censored. And so if you want that kind of stuff, subscribe blazTV.com slash Alley, use code Alley for that $20 off blazTV.com slash alley. And so when you started Bible Recap, you started it with the desire, okay, I want people to know God in his own words. And I want to look at this through the lens of who is God, as you said, what is he love,

what is he like, what is he hate? And so tell me just about the process of creating the Bible recap. What went into it in those early days? It was a lot of work, you know? Podcast is a lot more work than people anticipate. And a lot more work than I anticipated. I certainly approached it with, I don't know if it was naivety or ignorance or arrogance or what it was, but I thought it would take me about an hour a day.

Yeah. Because it's an eight-minute podcast, right? How long can that take? How long can it take? Except at that point, I had read through the Bible ten times and had done many studies and interviewed a lot of people and listened to a lot of teaching. And I'm trying to piece together the storyline of scripture. And in each day's reading, I'm trying to answer the questions that I anticipate that the reader might have.

And so you have to think like, okay, what would somebody who has been in church a lot? long time, assume about this text, but not realize. Like maybe there's something deeper that they, they might have some base level assumptions, but there's something deeper that I can get them to. And what would a person who's brand new to scripture? What would they not understand at all? What would completely throw them off? And even just questions like, well, where did Kane's wife come from?

You know, questions like that. You're like, oh, I need to insert this information in there. And so those are the kinds of things I really wanted to dig into. and then I also wanted to, if there was an area of theology that, like if you and I were to sit down over dinner and we were to talk about all of our doctrinal beliefs, there are going to be a large amount of them that we're going to agree totally on. And there are going to be a few that we're going to be like, oh, I see things a little differently. Like we practice that differently or we believe differently about that. And both of us could like seek the Lord's truth, love the Lord,

be able to back up our answers by scripture and just have to go, you know, I'm I don't know. I don't know. I don't know who's right. This is what I feel inclined toward. That's what you feel inclined toward. And that's okay. And we could both be attempting to honor God in those spaces. And so what I wanted to do was I wanted to scream where scripture screams and whisper where scripture whispers and not scream where scripture whispers or whisper where scripture screams. So if there is an area of theology that is clear throughout scripture, Jesus is God. Jesus is the only way to a relationship with God. I'm going to put my foot down on that. I'm not going to be like, some people think Jesus isn't God, and here's how they back that up. I'm just going to land the plane on Jesus is God. But if we're talking about something like methods of baptism, the baptism episode took me the longest to write, because there are different faith traditions that practice baptism differently, and I very much hold my opinion and can back my opinion up. It's not that I have no opinion. but I wanted to honor the fact that there are other people with varying opinions on this that still fall within Orthodox Christianity.

So I had to do the heavy lifting of like, I want to interview a pastor who believes this and I want to walk through with him, support your belief for me biblically. Like how did you get there? And be able to represent. And in the podcast, I'll say some people believe this and somebody believe this and some people believe this and some people believe this. and there are eight links in the show notes if you want to do further research. Right. That's a good way to kind of direct to them.

I want to teach them how to dig into the text to find their own conclusions. So if it's an area that God honoring, scripture-loving people might disagree on, I'm not going to land the plane somewhere. I'm going to, and so that takes a long time. Like eschatology, I can't imagine how long that takes to try to concisely explain the different variation

of what people think about the end times. Exactly. It's so difficult. And so what I like to do is I worked really hard for people not to be able to find out what my opinion is. To be able to write the podcast and the script in such a way that they aren't distracted by my opinion. Like, I'm very disinterested in my opinion. It's the least interesting thing I have to say. The most interesting thing I have to say is what I believe is clear in scripture.

And so that's what I really want to lean in on and encourage people to, and then, hey, go have these conversations in your family, in your church, with your pastor, with your mentor. So like go dig deeper on your own time. Don't listen to what I have to say, like, if it's an opinions matter. Like, there are other people in your life who should be far more influential than me. I mean, this could be, you could do like a two-hour podcast every day if you really wanted to get into it. And so I'm impressed that you take all of that information, which, you know, people have studied for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. I mean, really, this could be, at each day could be hours and hours or weeks

and weeks of just that subject. And yet you can dense it into eight minute bites. Is that in itself difficult? Like, do you ever have a really difficult time deciding what goes on the cutting floor? I think so. Yeah, there have been times that I really wanted to say more. But I know one of the things that keeps people coming back is that it's short. And my. goal is I really want them in the Word. And so if I'm taking up two hours of their day every day, that's less of a chance that they're going to be in the Word if they're just sitting there listening to me for two hours every day. And so if I can make it quick and accessible, so, you know, for those people out there listening or watching who don't know what the Bible recap is,

it's read through the Bible in a year. That's about 12 minutes of reading a day. It's about three chapters a day. If you're a slow reader, the Bible app will read it to you. You know, you can choose your accent. And you do your three chapters of reading. And then I recap what you just read, give it cultural and historical context, try to explain questions that you might have had and the answers. And then also the places that it feels like scripture might contradict itself, I try to show how that that actually doesn't contradict itself. You know, when Jesus says, blessed are the peacemakers. And then later he says, I don't come to bring peace, but to bring a sword. And you're like, wait, which is it, Jesus? Yes. So I try to show.

how those actually aren't in contradiction. And we try to do that in eight minutes a day, a podcast or YouTube, or two pages a day if you're, if you like a book. We have a book that does this and just two pages a day. Yes, that book has sold over 320,000 copies, which is a lot. That's a lot of copies of a book. And right now, I'm sure it's more than this. I'm not sure when we got this statistic. But the latest statistic that we have is that the Bible recap has garnered over 340 million downloads. It regularly sits at number one on the Apple podcast top overall charts, which is absolutely true, especially if you look at the beginning of the year.

It's like Bible Recap number one, which again is such an encouragement to me as a Christian. So you said that you started and you were like, I really hope that 300 people, which is amazing. I mean, that's a great goal. 300 people read the Bible with me. At what point in this journey did you realize, okay, wow, this is taking off. A lot more than I originally intended or planned. We launched on January 1st, 2019, and it was around 10 a.m. that day when I realized.

It was that fast. Yeah. Because I woke up to 300 emails. Yeah. From listeners. Okay. Got that. I got the 300.

Yeah. Real fast. So, yeah, I was like, oh, boy. Okay. And these are not. So I lead a network of Bible studies called D-Groop International. And I was primarily making this for D-Groop to listen to. for D-Groop members.

And we had about, I think, about 1,200 members at the time. And they're members on five or six continents. And so I made it to help walk them through scripture the way my pastor did for me. And hoped, for sure, I hoped and prayed that people outside of D-Groop would find it. But I'm like, I'm getting emails from India. I'm just like, wow. And it, just like you said earlier, Allie, it was the, it made me so happy to see that because this means people want to read and love and understand God's word. And this is a conduit for them knowing him.

This isn't a conduit for me to, like, I love that it's number one on the charts because that's about God. That's not about me. And that is people wanting to know the Lord. And so it makes me so happy. But just pretty quickly it was evident that God was up to something through this. And I mean, how fun to be along on that ride for what he's doing. Well, you were able to know from experience that reading the Bible by yourself is really daunting and really overwhelming. And everyone has wanted that person in their ear who has done all of the work kind of on our behalf to say, okay, here's a question that you might have. And let me answer that for you. And so even though the Bible recap is not about you and it's not about people following you, God obviously has used your specific skills because not everyone can do that.

Not everyone can communicate the way that you can and condense so many years of wisdom into eight-minute commentary. So I'm just thankful. I'm thankful for how he's used your talent. Me too. To advance his kingdom. It's really, it's just amazing. What would you say is one thing since the beginning of this launch in 2019, so five years,

what's one thing that you've learned in this? processor that surprised you. The first thing that came to mind when you asked that was when we hear the verse, your word is a lamp into my feet and a light into my path. When you look at those words in the original Hebrew, lamp and light are two different words. Lamp is this foot lamp that they would carry through the night. It basically would illuminate one step in front of them, just one step. And so your word is a lamp into my feet.

It shows me just the next step for my foot. And we all want that very precise, like, I need to know exactly what to help me guide my path, Lord. And he's like, my word does that for you. And then light is this blazing fire of a thousand suns, like it illuminates like when you turn on the lights at the football field. And it's just like, and everything lights up. Yeah. And so it is the bow.

the both and truth of his word. It is the little where is my foot going to fall, tarily cobble, making her way through every day. And it is, here is the global truth, the infallible word of God that is true across the board everywhere. It's not only the universal truth that guides the world and the universe. It is, where do I put my foot right now? Where do I put my foot right now? It's the both and. And I, that is, so comforting to me. Yes. That is just how beautiful that God sees the majestic and the minute. Yes. It's so funny. It's so funny that you say that because just yesterday, I don't know if you're friends and you send voice messages to each other like their podcasts. And so I was on a lock with

my baby and I was sending a voice message back to my friend and my friend who was trying to figure out something with her business. And I said that verse. And I didn't know the second part of what you said. So I'm so glad that you said that. And I didn't know everything that you just explained. But I said, you know, the verse that says, your word is a lamp into my feet and light into my path. If you picture a lamp, God is only showing you like one foot in front of the other. I mean, but I didn't think about the second part being kind of like the diffusive light that shows everything that illuminates. And that is such a comfort because when you think about darkness, think about being a little kid and you see that thing in the corner and you forget that it's just a shelf and you think that it's a monster.

Well, the thing that brings comfort is turning the lights on. When you're walking through a city street at night, it's a lot scarier because you don't know what's lurking around the corner. But when it's daytime, you see things as they are. And so I love that that insight has brought you a lot of comfort because it brings me a lot of comfort too. It dispels our fears. It dispels our confusion. but it also guides us just putting one foot in front of the other. Yeah.

So yes and amen. Speaking of God and how he works and the mysteries of God, which even someone like you who has studied scripture for so long, I'm sure that you would say there are still a lot of mysteries about God and who he is. And one of those mysteries is the Trinity, or at least something that we don't fully understand. Right. And you've got a book. By the time this comes out, it'll be, I believe, tomorrow.

So Tuesday, April 30th, that your new book comes out, right? The Joy of the Trinity. So just tell us why you wrote this book and what it's about. Oh, I wrote this book because, like you said, the Trinity can be very confusing. And most of us, when we approach that confusion, we try to do, we do one of two things. We either just like ignore it, pretend it doesn't matter. or we try to simplify it in such a way that we compare it to earthly things. And the reality is there's no other thing in creation that is like the God who is the creator.

There's no thing that he has made that replicates who he is as far as his triunity. So we try to compare God to the phases of water. Like, oh, there's steam and there's liquid and there's ice. Or the three, you know, things on a clover. the three leaves on a clover or an egg and we try to compare it like that or even to say something like well you are a daughter and a mother and a wife you have these three roles that you play out the trinity is like none of those things it's similar um but it's not those aren't great comparisons because they miss really important aspects of the triune god so all that to say what i do in

this book is i'm not going to ignore trying to learn about the trinity and I'm not going to try to simplify it and reduce its complexity. What I'm going to do is take that complexity and break it into aspects that make it more palatable and tangible for the average human. I feel like that's one of my giftings is taking big, complex ideas and making them understandable for a layman because that's what I'm a layman. You know, I'm just an everyday person. I haven't been to seminary.

I don't have any letters after my name. but God has given me this this brain that will digest big information and be able to talk about it in normal terms. And so we talk about each of the three persons of the Trinity, they each have their own chapter. And we talk about the fact that they are, and this might shock some people out there. It was a shock to me when I first discovered it. Jesus is all throughout the Old Testament. He's actually there at creation. And Colossians one and John one both tell us he's there at creation.

He's doing the manual labor of creation. He's the one doing the creating. The father gives the creation command. The son does the creating and the spirit is hovering over creation, sustaining, affirming, approving of it all. They all work in tandem toward the same goal. And so a lot of people when they're reading scripture, they say things like, boy, I'm reading through the Old Testament right now.

I can't wait to get to the New Testament. I just need some Jesus. Well, good news. He's all over the pages that you're reading. Jesus says the Old Testament testifies about him. He says the whole thing is about him. And then the other really cool surprise, we tend to think, and I say we in general, it is a common thought among Christians that Old Testament God is really angry until Jesus shows up on the scene and makes nice, you know? And so the father's the angry one. Jesus is the nice one and the spirit is the kind of weird or mysterious one. And what you find in a study of the Trinity, and when we talk about this, the unity and diversity, they're unified in their character and their personality and in their will and in their plan to rescue humanity. And they have different roles in how they go about that. So the father has a role, the son has a role, the spirit has a role in securing our salvation. But they all have the same plan and they all have the same character and personality. And so when Jesus shows up on the scene as a baby in Bethlehem,

he is there to reveal the character of the father. He is the image of the invisible God. So everything, listener, viewer, everything you love about Jesus, everything you love about the spirit, it serves to reveal who the father is. So if you have had a difficult relationship with your father or difficult difficult time understanding God as your father, as your true father, your capital F father,

everything you love about Jesus, everything you find endearing about the spirit is there to invite you into depth of relationship with the father. And those are just some of the cool things that we find in studying the Trinity that I hope this book will serve to help people do that. And the other cool thing is once you have a more robust understanding of the Trinity, it equips your relationships on earth to be more beautiful, your relationship in the church. Obviously, your relationship with God, it changes the way you pray. It is, it's transformative in a relationship with God to really get to know who He is, you know? And can you tell us a little bit more about the Holy Spirit? Jesus says it's better that I go because then the helper will be with you. And so that's a little

bit confusing to me, knowing that they are three and one. And yet, and kind of they're saying, okay, I'm going to go, this is going to come, but we are one. He obviously says, I and the father are one too, and yet he ascends to heaven to sit at the right hand of God. And so that distinction and unity can still be a little bit mind-boggling. But maybe just tell us a few things that you learned in this writing process about the Holy Spirit. Yeah. I love that we have the gift of the Holy Spirit when Jesus says it's better that I go away. So think about Jesus being embodied.

In his last days, before he's about to be crucified, there are some Greeks who come to Philip and they're like, hey, we want to talk to Jesus. And you would think that Jesus might go, okay, let's go to the Greeks and have a conversation with them. And he says, no, actually, I've got to die now. It's my time to die. A seed has to be buried so that it can bear much fruit. And so basically there's this idea that Jesus is this one, he's this one embodied person. And when he dies and resurrects, he can then bear fruit.

Like a seed makes multiple of whatever it carries, you know. So for the Holy Spirit, who is not embodied like Jesus, who is the Spirit of Jesus, the Spirit of Christ, he can go live in all believers everywhere. Jesus could be in one place, you know, when he was embodied. The Spirit can be in all of us. And so in that gift that we have, the Holy Spirit tells you, I do a couple things. Here are some of my roles.

I'm a teacher. I'm teach you the right things to do. I'm the reminder of the things Jesus said. I'm the encourager. He also, he is the seal and the guarantee of our salvation. So this deposit that God puts in us. You know, if you and I lived pre-resurrection, Jesus walks out of the room, Jesus is out of the room.

Now, yes, God has this omnipresence, but there is the special presence of the spirit dwelling in us that whispers to us reminders of who we are. So when I am in a situation where I'm really frustrated and angry and I want to lash out at someone, either, you know, the person I'm in a conversation with or the driver in traffic who has cut me off and I have this prick in my spirit and my conscience, I believe. that's the Holy Spirit doing his work to remind me of the dying to self loving others. Just those opportunities like, hey, this actually isn't eternal. This doesn't matter. You can let that person merge, you know? It's going to be fine. You can let them merge.

You inherit the earth. You can spare that 300 yards in front of you, you know? Yeah, that's good. So it's just these little reminders of who we are, reminders of eternal things. And the Holy Spirit does some of the things in scripture that are astonishing and like awe-inspiring. But the way he works in the everyday scale of the life of a believer is to speak truth to us about who he is and who we are. And interceding on our behalf. Yes.

When we don't have the words to pray. How incredible. Yes. What a gift, right? The fact that Jesus and the Spirit are both interceding for us. How incredible is that? Jesus, the mediator, and then we've got the intercessor. Yes.

And it is so amazing. And obviously, we've already been reconciled to God through Christ. And we get to approach his throne and access, his throne with confidence. And yet when we still don't have the words in like our human frailty to pray what we ought to pray, like we are given the spirit of God to give us those words. That's pretty amazing. Yeah. So you talk about, I mean, the title is the joy of the Trinity. What does that mean?

Why are joy and the Trinity so connected? So the Bible recap listeners and readers will know, I end every day with the phrase, he's where the joy is. And I'm after the joy. I like, I love a good time. I like to have fun. I like to laugh.

And that is, I think, what all of us deeply are drawn to. And whether we find our joy in accomplishment or relationships or what we're after joy. We're after what brings us happiness and joy. And Psalm 1611, David says, in your presence, there is fullness of joy. At your right hand, our pleasures forever more. And so I end every day of the Bible recap pointing to where we found the character of God in that day's reading and how that points us to deeper joy in him as a reminder that he's where the joy is. And so I want to invite people in to read this book about the Trinity as a conduit for their joy. The Trinity has joy and we have greater joy in drawing near to the Trinity.

Like one of the things I talk about in the introduction is, would it surprise you to know that God is happy? That God is happy. God has infinite joy. If in his presence is fullness of joy, right? Right? If you go into room somebody's miserable and angry and like spiteful, they're not, they're not the fullness of joy. Yeah. In their presence is misery. And that's not who God is. And his presence is fullness of joy. So the closer we get to God, the closer we get to that joy. Yes. Yes. That is amazing. And another book, another passion that you have, which is all wrapped up in this, is on Israel, you lead tours to Israel. That's something that your dad has done. for a long time to you. So you kind of followed in his footsteps. So tell us about that. And I'm going to show people also on my camera, just how beautiful this book is. Coffee Table Book, Israel, is real beauty, light, and luxury. Incredible. So tell us just a little bit about that following

your dad's footsteps. So my dad led trips to Israel before I was born and would talk about it. Like it was the greatest place on earth. Well, when I saw his pictures, I was like, that does not look like, that doesn't look like fun to me. That looks like sand and desert and brown and no No, thank you. Yeah. Right. I'm like, I would rather go to Hawaii. Yeah.

And it wasn't until I read through the Bible the first time that I thought, okay, I would like, I would like to go there. Yeah. I would like to check that out. And I had no idea how beautiful it was. I got there and I was like, people have been holding out on me. This is a Mediterranean paradise. Like people who don't even know and love Jesus should go here on vacation. Yeah.

And so I would try to get people to come on these tours with me. I started leading tours. I did a couple pilgrimage tours. to learn and I did a couple geopolitical tours to learn because I wanted to go back. I wanted to go back and I wanted to keep going back and learning more. And my dad said, you know, you could lead tours too. Here's the process for that. And so I started doing all that. And what I found was that my first few trips, nobody wanted to come. They had the same thoughts I had. I'd rather go to Hawaii. You know? And it's kind of scary because we're always seeing Israel in the news and they're always

embroiled in some kind of conflict. And I think a lot of people just think, Middle East. No thanks. That's kind of sketchy. Yeah, right. Yeah. So I've been 20 times and I've been every month of the year. I've been when there have been conflicts going on. I've been when it's been, quote, unquote, peaceful and there hasn't been a specific conflict going on. And it has become a second home to me. I have friends in the West Bank, friends in Israel. And I spent five weeks there shooting the pictures for this book alongside my photographer. incredible because my goal was I want to rebrand what people think of Israel. I want to show them what Israel is really like. Yeah. Because because not just for people to have a beautiful book to put on their coffee table, but also because when people are enticed to go to Israel and then they go to Israel and they learn about these, the things that happen in this space, that here is where Jesus healed, you know, this man who was, who was lame for most. of his life. Here is where this happened. Here's where this happened. And they fall in love with the word more. And then it makes them want to read the word more. And then they fall in love with the Lord more. So beauty is a conduit for truth in this instance. This book is, and we've, in that, we have put these beautiful pictures, but we also have these 30 little site devotionals about some of the biblical sites in scripture. So that as you're flipping through, and maybe you have it in

your home and you have a family member or a neighbor who isn't a Christian, they're flipping through, and they're looking for beauty and they're encountering Jesus. They just stumble into Jesus on the way. Yes. And so I love that people are getting to see how beautiful Israel is because I want them to see how beautiful Jesus is. Tell us about experiencing the Sabbath in Israel. It's so interesting. It's so interesting. I love that you ask that question. So we try to be in Jerusalem on Sabbath or Shabbat, as they call it there, if possible, which begins at sundown on Friday and ends at sundown on Saturday, which is one of the things that's kind of lost on us in Western culture.

You know, if you read Genesis 1, there was evening and there was morning the first day. There was evening and there was morning the second day. The Jewish day begins at sundown. It starts with rest. Right. And so when the sun is starting to set on a Friday, let's say it's 3 p.m. We usually try to go to this busy market that's there where all the locals are doing their shopping for bread and fruits and all the things that they need for their dinner that evening. And they are hustling through.

It is packed. It is busy. It is like we have got to get home and get out of the car and get the groceries unpack and get the food on the table before the sunsets. Because the sunsets, it's game over for 24 hours, 25 hours, actually, because they've added in an extra hour to make sure they don't break the law. You know, because they're living by that by that law. And so then the 25 hours that follow, it is, there are no cars on the street. There are no stores open. People are at home with their families.

And a lot of people will ask, like, isn't that boring, you know? But one of the things that they really aim to do is reconnect with it. It's not just about what you're unplugging from. It's about what you're engaging with. And so they are engaging with family. They're engaging with rest. They're engaging with the scriptures. They are reading.

They're playing games. They are resting. They are having long meals and long conversations. They don't turn on their electronics. They just, like, connect to the source. And there's something really beautiful about that. And there's something that I hope that the church will continue to learn how God has built rest into our system and how that opportunity to reconnect with who he is as the source.

source, there's really some beauty and joy in that. And it's really healthy for us. And there's some wisdom in the ways God built the Sabbath as a gift for us. I think so too. I'm not as, we're not quite as disciplined as I would like to be, but I have always admired that about my Jewish friends, about how uncompromising they are on it, of course, because it is a law that they are trying to abide by. But no matter what's happening in the world, no matter what's happening in the world, matter what demands are on their schedule, they prioritize that rest. And it's something that I would like to apply better to my life. It's so easy to give excuses for busyness and distractions and things like that. But you're right. God knows that we need that. And he modeled that for us

in creation. And if God modeled that, then it's still good for us today. It transcends. I would say Old Testament law, at least the principles behind it, right? The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. You know, this is a gift to us. And I love, you know, the origin of the Sabbath is you have the Israelites who've been under Egyptian slavery for 400 years. And Pharaoh is such a hard slave driver that he doesn't give them a day of rest. Their animals don't get a day of rest. And then God brings them out and rescues them. And he's like, his commandments are showing them what he's like, showing them what his values are, how to live in society in a way that honors him and each other.

And can you imagine the shock when he's like, you lived under the, the, the, the, the, hard labor of a false god and he valued your hard work and nothing else and i'm a god who values you and so i'm commanding you not to work but to rest i'm commanding you to rest like can you imagine the shock of like who is this god right who says we can take a day off right who is this god who and and in in some way we have built a society that teaches us to take up the hammer and and become our own slave drivers in that way yeah that we push ourselves when God's like, no, no, I can sustain the universe. Trust me. It can, it can continue without all of your hard effort. Yeah. How beautiful. I love what you said about that,

okay, we're going to inherit the earth. Like, I can get up this spot in like the carpool line or whatever it is. And it's not just that specific scenario. That's, I mean, how we can look eternally at all temporal situations. Like, if we believe what we say we do that we're, that We are co-ares with Christ and that we, like, we will lack in no good thing. Right. And that in his presence is fullness of joy, then the inconveniences and discomfort of our day or the sacrifice that's required with putting down our phone or our iPad or whatever and just resting is all worth it. And it is a picture of the gospel.

You're talking about this, like, radical message of being able to rest and not work constantly. It's a picture of the gospel because there are a lot of relationships. religions that can tell you how to get to God and how to work hard and prove yourself to God and make yourself righteous before God. And that's, of course, why and how Christianity stands apart. He says, actually, you can't, you cannot climb this mountain. You can't clean yourself up. You can't work hard enough to make yourself acceptable before me. I will descend because you can't us and you are dead in your sin. So you can't even, even if you wanted to. You can't do anything. and so it's beautiful.

It is, I love that you linked to that because that is the heart of it is it is this regular reminder that we can't accomplish what the Father has required of us. Like that the finished work of Christ on the cross, Jesus said it is finished. All that the Father requires of us, Jesus has accomplished. And so we don't do these things like read the Bible and let people merge and practice, you know, resting. We don't do those things to earn God's favor because all of His favor has. has been bestowed on us through the finished work of Christ.

We are adopted, beloved, accepted, not because of our righteousness, but because of his. And that sets a heart at ease. Yes, yes. And isn't it beautifully ironic that when you switch your lens from viewing scripture through what do I deserve to who God is, you actually see that you get much more than you deserve? So it's the best. It's the best.

Yes, yes. Well, thank you so much. And everyone, this comes out tomorrow, the joy of the Trinity. So if you've had questions about the Trinity like I have, you got to go out, you got to get this book. And if you don't listen to the Bible recap, go ahead and do it. Just jump in right now, right? They don't have to go back. I would encourage them to jump in, maybe start the New Testament.

That's a great place to start, you know. So you can start at day one or day 274. Okay. So really anywhere. A lot of times I hear that people who have never read the Bible before, kind of start in the book of John. That might be a good place to start, but you make it really bite-sized

and understandable no matter where someone wants to start. So thank you so much, Terley. Thanks for having me.