Unashamed with the Robertson Family - Ep 447 | Jase Tells a Funny Story About a Dean & Phil Learns About Virtual Reality from Jersey Joe

Episode Date: March 21, 2022

Phil tells about a friend named Jersey Joe who introduced him to the world of virtual reality. Phil calls it a counterfeit world. Jase shares a funny story about a dean and his fascination with numbers found in the Bible. Al and Jase take a look at the odd symbolism found in John 6, and Phil recalls a time when he unknowingly shared a roof with two murderers. And Jase shines a light on the way people pursue relationships through technology in order to avoid personal responsibility and risks. Sign up to watch the Unashamed overtime show, only on BlazeTV: https://BlazeTV.com/Unashamed - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I am unashamed. What about you? So we get a lot of listeners that send us different questions or musings. And a couple of them that came this last week. I was going to bounce off you all. One of them was from one of our listeners, Kathy. And she said, is this true? Was it at the subject line?

And then she had looked like she had taken a screenshot of something that she had found somewhere and I just kind of found it fascinating and my answer by the way cathay is i don't know because i don't have time to check this out but here's what here's what someone sent to her psalm 118 is the middle chapter of the entire bible is these people think of these i don't know but but it is pretty fascinating psalm 117 is obviously right before 118 is the shortest chapter in the bible that i know is true so only got two verses oh really yep Psalm 119 which is the one after is the longest chapter in the entire Bible. That has, let's see how many verses is, it has over 100.

These are facts that are only interesting. What do they actually say? Well, so there's a point. She's got 176 verses in Psalm 119. So the shortest, longest, 118 is right in the middle. These are interesting facts. The Bible has 594 chapters before. Psalm 118.

Okay. It also has 594 chapters after Psalm 118. So that's why it's the midway. Midway point. So if you add up all the

chapters except 118, you get a total of 1188. Right. So, and then this person says Psalm 118, verse 8, because 1188, 1188, 118,

118 8 is the middle verse of the entire Bible. And so, So the point is, here's what the verse says, which I thought is pretty good. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. That's the middle verse. That's top ten.

Most fascinating. I was fascinated. That's why I wanted to bounce that off of you. It was really interesting because most of it I can confirm. Now, one thing I will say, Kathy, is that you have to realize there are no chapter. Somebody came along and put chapters way after. The Bible wasn't really written in chapter form, so I don't know how much. But to her point, God still works today.

He does. That's exactly right. I mean, was it luck? Which it does fit perfectly that this verse, what did the verse say again? It says, it is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. And you know what is interesting. With our culture, with everything going on, there's wars, we're coming off this coronavirus scare, and people wondering, I mean, the news ratings are out the roof right now.

Everybody's watching the news and everybody's worried about what Biden's thinking and what Putin's thinking or what Biden's not thinking, depending on how you're reading it. But to me, in this one moment of unashamed podcast from a viewer, it's more important for you practically every day to be worried about or worried to be wondering what God is doing. What's God thinking? What's he doing?

Instead of, man, I think that verse is a very good contrast. We take refuge in God. What's he doing in my life? What's the plan for me in this situation? What can I take? What's being communicated to me about what I'm seeing in real time? You know, what's happening? So, Dad, it was interesting.

It got me to 118, and I looked up two verses before that. and I thought this was your, this is a verse for your, your new book uncanceled. The Lord is with me. This is 1186. The Lord is with me. I will not be afraid.

What can humans do to me? That's Psalm 118, verse 6, which is pretty powerful. They can kill you, and guess what? We're in the resurrection chapter. There's no killness. They can't kill you.

They cannot cancel you, which is kind of the point of your old in your book, Dad. So you remember that one, Psalm 118, 6. I read through these the other day. And people who research things like that, and when it comes to the Word of God and the promise is made there, other words, Paul in lieu of the, in the middle of the resurrection, proven the resurrection is a reality. In other words, if the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die.

Other words. Oh, I'm fixed to get into this. Don't worry about all that Bible stuff. well I would just say anybody that digs into it and shows what the letter was right there at least it's about Bible verses and about things God has said. Correct. That makes it worth something. It is.

Look, I got it handed to me when we, Al and I were in the school, because one of the, actually the dean, he was always obsessed with the numbers. And I was like, what is the guy in these numbers? It's like... I always said it was his favorite book in the Bible. Well, that's where I was going with this. Because he would like, he would call me sometime. When we had, I, there was a couple of years of my life where I had a, I was involved in a small group of people almost every night.

And he would call me every night and say, you didn't turn in your numbers. And I'm like, I didn't say this because I respected him and he was a pastor. But I was thinking, I'm staying up all night. I hate sharing Jesus with these people. Who cares? Yeah, I don't, you know, my apologies for not stopping and getting a head count so you can turn in the numbers and let everybody know how many people are assembling together in our hometown.

That's the way I felt the whole time. So finally, I, in a very courteous, respectful way, confronted him on that. I was like, look, I think we need to spend more time with what we're talking about in groups of people. instead of how many people is actually there. And he, without hesitation, and said, if God didn't care about numbers, he wouldn't have named a book numbers. And I thought, that's actually a really good point. So I got off that train.

I was like, okay, let's see how many people's here next time we meet. But my whole point for bringing this up is that when you look at the Bible in this totality, the the inner circles are there and the practical application is and there's been polls about this where or studies where if you have like five people in your inner circle that you can share anything with if they'll hold you accountable or you're you have a much more likelihood of succeeding and no matter what you do with your job with your ventures which is why bad company corrupt

you don't have corrupts character because who's in your inner circle I mean it's crazy because y'all didn't know have any idea that I was going to get into this I didn't know you were going to bring this up but I wanted to do a little bit

about inner circles because I do think it's important that Jesus picked an inner circle 12 individuals and even knowing that one of them would betraying, which I really think is interesting, and I wanted to. And they, in fact, lived with him.

They lived with him. But he chose them. That's why I think the power of small groups in a church setting is vital in a necessity. And they were all pretty different in their own way. Different. Well, we're all different. Well, we're all different. I mean, you have commercial fishermen, then you have tax collectors.

You know what I'm saying? Right. You know, it's how, why did he get him? Well, that's the power of what Christ offers. He's the head of a bunch of inner circles within a bigger circle of the church, where in the church at Corinth, they were divided. Their circles had become so autonomous that they didn't even love the other circle, and they were all believing in the same God.

Or care what happened to them. Yeah, they didn't care. And they didn't care. they offended you. So there's a thin line there between all these inner circles being a dividing block or being a power source for God to move among different communities and different people as we're all striving to glorify the father as members of the same. You know, I get asked a lot when I'm out doing Q&As and stuff.

And these are, you know, fans, but a lot of times people ask me, how did your friends? family stay unified and yet go through a phenomenon of becoming well-known. You're all over the country. You know, you're just people are treating you like you're better than you really are. How did that? How did you guys maintain that? Because they look at us on the back end of it and we're still here. We all live in the same town. Jeff was gone a little bit. He's moved back. And I always say, because we were our own inner circle. In other words, we trusted each other enough. And we had moments where we had to send a text. I'd say, hey, I'm not sure about this.

Have you thought about that? I mean, because that's what we were raised that way. So because Christ was at the center of everything and who we are, we had that together. And I realize not every family has that. But I mean, I'll tell them. So it's really not us. It's what God did. Exactly.

Well, so I had a thought. I had a thought. I'm running by y'all. So you remember after the spirit, you know, we talked about it. about last time, or I brought up that Peter's sermon about how powerful the resurrection was and Jesus couldn't see decay and it was impossible for him to die. He shared Jesus. They get to the people and they say, what do we do? And he's like, repent and be baptized. You'll receive forgiveness of sins and the Holy Spirit and this promise is for you and future generations and all

the children that are way off. And so 3,000 were baptized. The Lord added to their number. David. They weren't joining the church. He just added them from various backgrounds and all that. And so then that next little paragraph talks about this, the working of inner circles under one head, being Jesus as the church. It says in verse 42 of Acts 2, they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and to fellowship and the breaking of bread and to prayer. Because you got to remember, in the beginning, God gave a clue to success when he says, it's not good for man to be alone. It was the whole reason that he created a woman for the man, which resulted in a family, which eventually you're going to get to being part of God's forever family.

I mean, he's pro-family. He invented it. So everybody was filled with awe and wonders and miracles were being done to confirm that this was from God. and all the believers were together and had everything in common, selling their possessions and goods. They gave to anyone as he had need. Every day, they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes. So they had these small groups, which is where I was going, these inner circles,

and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor. And the Lord added to their number daily those who are being saved. So I got to thinking about this. So in our society, when you look at the contrast between what we have in Christ, this obviously being the ideal, how they were operating, which is what we're trying to do in our society. Nothing has changed. The same spirit is available for whoever will surrender. The same Jesus who died and was buried and raised, you know, he's the same yesterday to day for it. We're continuing exactly what's going on here. When you look at our society, what's the big contrast? Well, now the big thing is what they call the Metaverse.

Because what the cell phone did is it alienated everyone kind of in their own world. And it made a lot of our children socially inept. I mean, they can't have a conversation with a person. It's difficult to have. an inner circle because they'd rather just be sitting on their phone playing a video game. So I looked up the definition of Metaverse and, you know, if I can find it. Yeah, so listen to this. Now maybe y'all can help me, Al, you can help me define this or we can get one of these tech heads

because some of these terminology I don't even know what it means. The Metaverse can be defined as a simulated digital environment. that uses augmented reality, virtual reality, and blockchain, along with concepts from social media, social media, to create spaces for rich user interaction mimicking the real world. There's no joke here. I just read the definition from the internet.

And yet it's funny, because it's so ridiculous to me. So in a nutshell. Hang on, Jason. Let's take a break. What is that? Now, you say, where am I going with this? Did you know, this is why I looked this up.

I was looking up for, I'm speaking Friday night at one of the celebrate recovery places. Yeah. And I just happened to notice that the Greek word for repentance, you know what it is, is metanoia, which means, because meta is like self-awareness. So metanoia is you changing. So when he said in 38, repent, he said metanoia. He introduced the actual word that come out of his mouth was metanoia, which is kind of like here when we, they came up,

the world came up with metaverse. we're going to have a fake reality world that you can do by yourself and you can be anything you want to be in your mind and we're going to give you the pictures and the software and the buttons to make your world anything that you want it to be I just find it fascinating that the word for repentance is to change your world change your heart your soul your surroundings who you hang out with, what you do.

I mean, that can't be a coincidence. All for the better in the idea of repentance. But in the idea of Metaverse, not so much. Which, you know, I hadn't thought about it, Jay, the idea of Metaverse versus universe, which is the idea of a singularity. In other words, the universe is that which has been created, or people would say just Big Bang is out there.

But that's the idea of the singular existence that we all see, which is reality. So now you're talking about the reality of the universe versus the metaverse, which is your created reality. That's why. We need a shirt on this, by the way, too. Metanoia. Jesus changes everything for the better. Yeah.

There you go. Or changes my world. Our t-shirt guy will be listening. Just a little thought and all of that. And you wonder why I've never had a computer. Ever. Ever owned one. So yesterday.

I called two or three people, told them to contact. I said up to about seven or eight, I said, we have crawfish coming. They're already cooked. It's a meal. We'll just share the crawfish with each other as we share our faith with each other. You know, Jersey Joe was there from New Jersey. New Jersey. He had his little wife and his son.

He said, they're under all this. Phyllis, her husband, the artist, they're there. She had a little group there. But it was a small group, like Jay said, under the umbrella of what brought us all together, God, and we just had a meal. So that's, and then after the meal, we talked about spiritual things, personal things, interaction, small group. They leave until this week, we'll do that once, twice, three times. that's what's missing in these large churches and everything. They never interact with each other.

Yeah, many times that's true, especially it's just multiple roll-throughs. So Jay's, you've intrigued me. The church was meeting, but it wasn't like an appointed type. It was just having a meal. Right, and which is the simplest. Before you go on, let me ask them. Oh, I have more. I'm just getting started.

That was the introduction. So metanoia is repentance. Yeah. So in a sense, then when Jesus came and established the kingdom, you know, which the kingdom, you know, was us and understanding him, did he create a metaverse? Because now we're... But it's real.

But it's real. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, that's... So I think that Zuckerberg is... That's what I was saying. So Zuckerberg is Johnny come lately is what I'm saying. Yeah. So what I'm saying is when somebody says, oh, are you excited about the metaverse?

your response need to you need to say no i'm into metanoia they're like what i haven't heard of that oh they'll they'll jump on that and they're like what what is that well then there's your opportunity to share jesus yeah there you go repent yeah get out of the metaverse get into the metanoia but now i want to see somebody take a picture of a guy in an inner city with a sign that says metanoia yeah the end is near Yeah, Dan has told me the same thing Jay's just came up with.

Those type things are going on. He says they have these groups and they go around and they meet together via the computer. They don't do it personally, but they just meet together and they get this stuff he's talking about and that's all they talk about. Virtual world.

Oh, yeah. Basically, they got the idea of Star Trek when they had the little rooms what were they called? The holodex. The holodex. They call them holodex. He said it's in the 30s.

He's in his 30s. He said, you know, it's like younger groups. 30s on down to teenagers. Here's my point. Because you say, well, why are we doing this? Because you know what the problem is? It's hard to be vulnerable enough. And look, I'm going to confess my weaknesses and struggles.

I've always kind of been a loner. I just saying, you famously, you know, call me Long Wolf McQuaid, but because having relationships is bumpy. Yep. And it takes work. We all make mistakes. Yep. But I read that when I came to Christ, I thought, God said it wasn't good to be alone.

Right. So I'm going to need to work on this because I just soon go do my own thing and to heck with everybody else. I mean, that kind of was my approach because it's hard. And this came up. So this is an obscure passage, but I wanted to read it. And my only point is I got two points, I guess, that the reason the world goes to something that's fake and that you can do by yourself, it's just a form of self-gratification while you're just basically wasting time, accomplishing nothing on your way to a hold in the ground that has no hope.

Am I, is that not true? That's what we're doing. Yep. So meanwhile, we're out full of the Holy Spirit being used by God, sharing Jesus, saying, come join us to share Jesus because we're going to come back from the dead. Not in a virtual world? In reality, you said that while ago when you were reading 1st, Corinthians 15, you said the reality is that through the resurrection, we believe this is real.

This is really going to happen. Correct. And we're not going to live in some fake world for, 30 years more if you're lucky or even 10 or however old you are. If you're young, what, 70 years, maybe you can go live in a world that's not real by yourself and have a good time. I guarantee it's not going to bring joy or happiness. Then at the end you have nothing. But I think that's appealing because it's difficult to get along with other people. We're seeing this even in the church at Corinth. Jersey Joe brought it up yesterday and he said,

said when he was in New Jersey, he spoke of groups like he's talking about. Jersey Joe is a computer of whiz. Oh, he's the head dog for I don't know how many things. He's a 180 of you. He understands everything. Yeah, I have nothing to do with him. His whole life is built around him. He said they got these helmets they put on, Jace.

Yeah, like the facial. Oh, I know. They're like goggles. And it's virtual reality. That's not. That's the metaverse, Phil. That's what I'm telling me. And he said that they're hooked up in that.

And he said, you would not believe on how their mind is where their mind is. Exactly. Everything is a. Let me give you this example. Man-made dream. And this is all coming from what we talked about on overtime in the last podcast. So if you didn't hear the overtime, it's a good reason to. Right in the slap-dab middle of 1st Corinthians 15 talking about the resurrection,

because you got to remember, that's where the idea and concept of having a, forever family and having forever relationships. Yep. That without the resurrection, that dies. Right. But right in the middle of that, he says in verse 33, don't be misled. Bad company corrupts good character. Come back to your senses as you all and stop sinning.

Well, there's the metanoya. So I didn't just make, there's the repentance aspect right in the middle of the resurrection. And are some of you are ignorant of God. of ignorance of God, which was the whole point of the letter to Corinth. They had lost connection, the relationship aspect of being sons and daughters of God, brothers and sisters in Jesus, and drinkers of the Holy Spirit, which made them one in Christ. So I want to give you an example. I don't know what's coming out of their helmet.

Hold on. Let's take a break. But it's not these scriptures. Yeah, say that again. I don't know what's coming out of the helmet squares. They put the helmet in their head and their head going like, and they're in there in the back of the bedroom, and their buddies are there too, and everybody's conversing with each other.

But it's not Bible. It's not Bible. I know these scriptures are not in the hell. I love your imagination of the world. They're all back in the bedroom talking. All right, so let me give you an example of this. I'm thinking about doing a lesson on this. Y'all can critique what you want.

I'm liking it. So in John 6, Jesus does something because he's showing what God is like. And so he's doing miracles and he's feeding 5,000 and everybody's loving it. And then all of a sudden in John 6th, it gets a little crazy because he starts talking about unless you eat my body and drink my blood, you can't have a part in me. Now he was meaning that symbolically because that was going to give you forgiveness through a cross because he hadn't died yet, but he was planting the seed, and you're going to get

the hope of the resurrection. Well, watch what happens when he started talking about that. You can read the whole book of, I mean, the whole chapter six, and you'll see where he said that. In verse 64, he said, yet some of you don't believe, for Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him. And so he went on to say, this is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the father has enabled him. From this time, this is the point I want to get in 66, many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him. They went from metanoia and following Jesus to metaverse.

I'm going to go out in the world. I'm not getting hooked up with this. He's talking about he's the bread of life, I mean, and all this stuff. So Jesus asked, he said, so you do not want to leave to do you? Jesus asks the 12. And this is one of Peter's shining moments. He answered, well, Lord, to whom shall we go? There's nothing out there in the world that's producing what you are,

which was a really good answer. You have the words, and this is how I'm tied it in to the resurrection, you have the words of eternal life. He had made the connection that no matter what relationships you have out there, this is about eternal life. This is about being a family forever. We believe and know that you are the holy one of God. Then Jesus replied, because he then tells them, yes, you know, you're right, but there is a risk

here even in the church, which is what I think is happening in. have i not chosen you the 12 yet one of them one of you one of you is a devil he meant judas who though one of the 12 was later to betray him right so that's why i was bringing this up there's there's risk to relationship but what is the reward of having relationships of having an inner circle in jesus so this is the risk in that some are going to leave and some may betray you you see this firsthand. So you said, what are the rewards? Well, here's my example for that.

So when you're turning there, Judge, the context of John 6 begins with him feeding, remember the thousands of people with the fish and the bread. So then when he gets to that point later, he's like, you come for the food, but it's really about me being the food. You know, that's his point. And then a bunch of them didn't follow him because of that. They were only thinking in the physical realm, and he gave them something more. Yeah, it was great.

great, it's great that you brought that out, clarification on that. So, so in Acts, now here's another example. That was Jesus. Well, this is Saul's conversion. So we're all familiar with that. There's three times in the book of Acts. So it definitely was highlighted. Yep.

And later on, he brought up that metanoia in the third conversion. That's where we get that verse that says, repent and prove your repentance by your deeds. You were once darkness, but now turned from. in the darkness and be light and your eyes were closed but open y'all remember that yeah but what watch this little point about inner circle here so so saul goes from being perhaps the worst non-christian ever in that his main sins were killing people who followed jesus well that's going to be a relationship barrier going forward yeah to say it's risky is is uh And understand, yeah, because somebody's liable to take you out in the name of Jesus at this point and could justify it, really.

Or you show up at a house church and, you know, two years later and in this house church are three people that you were responsible for the death of a family member. Yeah. That's a hard icebreaker. So in that, in that spirit, because this is another obscure verse, in verse 26 of Acts 9, when Paul came to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples. Well, he wants to be a part of the inner circle now because he's been converted. Well, watch what happened. But they were afraid. Justifiably so.

This guy's got a track record of killing people who's following Jesus. And yeah, I know you may say, I mean, how many times have we done that in the faith? It's like a plot, a ploy. Like a secret spy. Two individuals came and stayed at our house. When y'all were just leaving, y'all were young at the time, it's been 15, 20 years ago. They stayed at our house. They just showed up out of nowhere.

We fed them. We talked to them. I talked to them for about a week. They slept on the floor. When they left, within three days, Ms. Kay was looking at the newspaper, and they were caught having murdered an 80-something-year-old woman. Their landlord, yeah.

They left our house after staying at the house. after staying there with biblical instruction, it was a small group. Those two, me, two, a few of the brothers come by, but we tried to point them on the right path. They left our house and murdered a woman, and they were sent to prison for it, still are, I guess. I would think that was...

And they were under our root. That's how close... Well, to my point, Phil, that's the risk of trying to establish relationships. That's right. In Jesus, when you're putting yourself out there and meeting people. There's a lot of evil people in this world. And for the record, that was 35 years ago. But that was a Judas. Look, you know what you run up on? You ran up on a couple of Judas.

But you remember it. I remember well. So, but let me, to give my point. So in verse 27, look, but Barnabas, oh, well, I skipped over apart. They were afraid of him, not believing that he was really a disciple. I thought it was a ploy. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles. And he told them how Saul on his journey had seen the Lord and that the Lord has spoken to him and how in Damascus he had preached fearlessly in the name of Jesus. So Saul saved with him and moved about freely in Jerusalem speaking boldly in the name of the Lord. So my point is yes, even Jesus chose Judas to show you that it is risky. It is messy when you befriend somebody. Even in even in the

Lord and dangerous and dangerous and here you have barnabas doing what culminated in a passage that paul wrote in romans 157 where it says except one another then just as christ is it has accepted you i mean that's our role and that's what happened in corin the reason it all broke down is everybody got mad everybody got offended you know why because same reason everybody's mad at each other in this life we can't get along we focus on Tell me about it. People are evil. Dangerous things happen.

And so what we come up with in our society is, let's just all be by ourselves and create a world that we can get in without taking any risk. No risk. And I just am by myself. But it's the exact opposite of what God wants us to do. They forgot that high technology only comes out of heaven, not over the... That's a good point. Let's take it. Let's take a break.

You know what else I like about that? I didn't thought to you read that was that you said take a risk. Barnabas, whose name means son of encouragement, he took a risk by standing up for Paul. I mean, he knew what he had seen. They could have alienated him as well. They could have said, oh, you know, you're working in with him. But he took a risk and stood up for him. And then all those missionary journeys that they went on together, talk about accountability and inner circles,

was because he stuck up for him. So the first two that launched out from Antioch to start all those churches that we're reading about Corinth, Macedonia, all those places, Barnabas and Paul. That's wild. I'd just like for our listeners to understand because, let's face it, out there,

the ones we're talking to, there are many, many, many people of many, many, many denominations. I mean, the word denomination means division. Yeah. So we've sort of come in here over the last 200 years at least in America, and everyone's running in every direction, and each group has its pet little creeds and all of that. I would just suggest to everyone that they remember 1st Corinthians 15,

the gospel, Jesus is death, burial, and resurrection. Because in many churches, that's not even preached. Yeah, it's very little. It's got to be about Jesus first. Yeah. Above all the time, all the ones out there, you can bet that there are people out there hearing us talk about division and all and, you know, corrupt group, bad character, corrupt, bad company, corrupt, good character.

You put all that together. All these people out there in the homeland, America, they're seeing this out every Sunday morning. They don't get along with it other day, even where we are. You know, one of them was arguing with the other one, you know, and over something, it was not even worth arguing about at all. Right. But they come up and tell them about it, one of them, you know, he got his feet insert. So in all the churches, this stuff is for real.

And from just a few of you all to gather together all the time, not just Sunday morning. You ought to interact with one another. Just make it a smaller group as you want, two, three, four, five, meet together. just so you get to know each other a little better and you're all on the same page. Well, and you can't malign the witness of Christ in how you treat one another inside the body of Christ. That's correct. I mean, we don't want to be a deterrent. We talked about why a lot of times unbelievers and atheists or, you know, evolutionists don't want to follow Christ.

Sometimes it's the blocking of the religious world. I mean, we become our own worst enemy. That's why in your own in our circle, I mean, if the. difficult situation comes up. I mean, look, I'm in quite a few all the time. Like, where something happens in the world, and we're trying to be like Jesus, and, I mean, things come up.

So even with us, you know, having this baby that we talked about that seems to have fallen from heaven, you say, well, how do you approach it? What do you do? I call a lot of people in my inner circle, and I was like, what should I do in this? What, that's the, there's a belonging in Christ that we share, brothers and sisters. One, you can hold each other accountable just in your own life choices and

potential temptations or whatever, but you're also getting advice from these people. Right. So, I mean, I just go down the list. And then I, you know, you talk to, I talk to five guys who I consider successful, lovers of the Lord, out doing what they're supposed to be doing. And it's usually the same advice from the five people. And you're like, well, how come you got to five? Because I didn't agree. But after about five, five of them, okay, I think this is what we should. The weight of the evidence was coming forward.

Then I go in there and tell Missy, I'm like, here's what we need to do. You know, and she's like, well, I don't agree. I was like, no, this is what we need to do. What are you basing it on? Five of the most courageous spirit-led men that I know said, this. is probably what I would do, kind of figuring that's what I need to do. But if you didn't have that, well, you know. Street strands are wrong.

Are you going to find that? Are you going to find the answers to life in some make-believe universe that you're looking through some goggles on while you're getting so big you can't get through the door? Because you're not even doing anything. No, you're just stuck. You're just looking. In a dark room somewhere.

So I wanted to get to my last, if you're keeping up. So you had the kind of the risk of the relationships when it comes to live in a metanoia life, a repentant life, a change of direction, and a humble life, trying to do what God wants you to do. You kind of have the rewards because you have a belonging despite how many scripts you had. And Barnabas proved that. I mean, he wanted Saul slash Paul to feel like he belonged with everybody else. else, even though he had done atrocities. And that was risky.

Right. And it's always going to be risky. So I was going to give you the last example, and this is kind of the results of trusting in Jesus in all your relationships. And I kind of went through this last time. But so he, because he comes to them, you know this is devastating to his inner circle when he said, look, I'm leaving. Now I'm going to prepare a place for you. But what is their response? Well, when Thomas was like, well, Lord, we don't even know where you're going.

So I don't even think it was about that as much as he was upset about saying he's leaving. Right. Because that's what the argument. I mean, you wouldn't like that all of a sudden. This guy's claiming to be the son of God. And you've gone all in and left everything. And you've seen some mighty things. Yeah.

And then all of a sudden he's telling you he's leaving? Well, what happened? That's like your wife coming in there saying, because technically we are married to Jesus. Right. You know, I'm leaving. I've got a different, I'll come back for you. I won't leave you alone. Okay.

I mean, you know, when somebody starts talking about like that, you react emotionally. The same reaction. A lot of truth came out of it. Hang on, let's take our last break. But then he says this in verse 16 of chapter 14. I'm going somewhere with this on the results of being part of Jesus' inner circle with other people. So 16, he says, I will ask the following, he'll give you another counselor to be with you forever.

The spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him because it neither sees him nor knows him, but you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans. I will come to you because he was sad. What is the most sad thing that can happen in life? Is an orphan or a widow. That's why true religion in James was described it as helping widows and orphans,

because they are literally without any of their relationship. So he addresses that. Then he makes this key concept about planting the seed of the Forever family, and that's in verse 23. Watch your book, John 14, 23. He said, Lord, in 22, do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world? If anyone loves me, he will obey me. He'll trust me. My father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.

Well, how long is that home going last when you think about the spirit indwelling you? So he gets to 15 and he makes this illustration that I'm the true vine and you're the branches. Speaking of inner circle and connected and what we have. So then when he gets to verse 5, you see this reward of being in Jesus and with other people who love Jesus. He said, if a man remains in me and I and him, he will bear much. fruit. But apart from me, you can do nothing. There's your metaverse. Yeah. What's going to happen there? Nothing. So that's one result. What branch survives not connected to the vine? Exactly. You die. So another result of remaining in Jesus and having this inner circle in Jesus is as the, in verse 9, it says, as the father's loved me, so I have loved you, now remain in my love. Well, you get all the benefits of God's love, which is 1st Corinthians 13.

peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, uh, no record or wrongs, trusting, protecting, persevering. Uh, what are the other ones in first Christmas 13? I started naming the fruits of the spirit, but I think it's the same concept. Right. Uh, and then verse 18, I think it goes back to the risk. Because now this is all the, from the metanoy or the metaverse, if the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first if you belonged to the world it would love you as it's own as it is you don't belong to the world but i have chosen you out of the world

that is why the world hates you so that's why i said it's two contrasts of worlds what we have in jesus yes it is risky because all relationships are risky and people rejects you and people betray us and people lie to us. But in the end, we have God's love. We have each other. We have a belonging, not, you know, even though we've screwed up. But we also have the possibility of having a forever family. What do you have in the Metaverse? A complete waste of time.

That's true. That alienates you from other people and that promises nothing. It's like a You know something that's promised that's hollow inside There's nothing in there And really the roots of that whole concept You remember the movie The Matrix when it first came out Which is maybe 25 years ago

I don't know when the first one came out But the idea was is that all of the world Was a metaverse because at this point Human beings were just in a sack somewhere of fluid and everybody was virtually living a life that wasn't real. Remember that? And then Neo, you know, the Keanu Reeves, he breaks out of the sack and, you know, finds these other people. But the concept, I think that's been around from so long.

That's probably where all this stuff comes from. Exactly. Is it real or is it fake? Well, he had mentioned in 1427, he had said the benefits of being with me, and I think it's the biggest problem in our world today, is there's no peace. I mean, you think about what do we want to happen in this war in Russia and out? We want peace. Right.

Well, the peace that he's leaving, he said, I'm going back to the Father. But peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. The peace that comes from an experience and a lifestyle in Jesus transcends any kind of peace, even in a worldly sense. This is peace that's everlasting. Therefore, I do not give to you as the world gives. And that's why I came up with this contrast. Because I got it from him. Do not let your hearts be troubled and don't be afraid.

So what do we have in our world? Trouble and fear. And the definition of peace, freedom from war, stopping of war. stopping of war to end war or the threat of war freedom from public disturbance or disorder freedom from quarrels

peace undisturbed state of mind peace absence of conflict peace calm quiet tranquility peace of mind I just added to it after the definition was read, rarest commodity on earth, and it can only be found in Jesus. That's where you find it. Peace.

Is that right? Yeah. I just happen to have that written down to finish up your little dissertation there, Jace. Well, that's why I just, it just, I was thinking along these lines, because he was just talking about what if there's no resurrection? I mean, your faith is futile. this is you're spinning your wheels we're all doomed and we're you know and then he gets into what's going to happen when jesus comes back you know we didn't really read through it but when in verse 21 of 15 of corinthians he said you know death came through a man well the resurrection of the dead comes

through a man for as an adam all dies so in christ all will be made alive but each in his own turn christ the first fruits then when he comes those who belong to him That's what you get. One of the greatest benefits of being in Jesus and having a church is that we're going together. You have a belonging. You're a part of something and it won't end. Very seldom do I hear when people are talking about the cell phone and the Internet. I seldom hear any kind of instruction about peace or definition of peace.

You don't hear much about it. It's not there. People are attacking each other. You would think you could all come together with the little computer in front of you and come together as one. But, Jase, somewhere in the metaverse, I don't know. I mean, it's... I mean, at first I made fun of it.

From your experience with the Internet, when you click it on, is it full of peace or is it full of war? It's just full. It's full of, it's like anything. I mean, I do like that you can get knowledge, even though some of it's wrong, just had a fingertip. But the social interactions, so-called social interactions, is really just, it's not that social. It's just a way to put yourself out there in a better light that's not real. It's a version, it's a better version of yourself.

because most people, they're not using it as an interaction. They're using it. They just have a microphone. They're like, because they're like, hey, I'm fixed to go to Taco Bell. I don't care. Well, what would I care? Those are the kind of post that I thought. Or these.

You stopped before you, you were on your way out of the door and you said, you know what? I'm going to let everybody know that I'm going to go ahead to Taco Bell. Or if you're on this. Good. Good. I didn't realize. If you were going to do that. Instagram, the endless pictures of yourself.

Yeah, but you know what's weird about it? Then 14. If you're the right person, then 1,400 people like it. That you're going to do. They click. They like that you're going to Taco Bell. And if you're like somebody really famous, look, there'll be a million people. And you're asking me, why don't you have one of these devices?

Why is asking you that, then? I get it. So here's what we're going to do. We're out of time. But you've prompted me because we're not going to get to the first thing this, 1535. I told you I had a potential lesson. You did. And it was excellent.

But it prompted in my mind in the overtime. I want to talk about what are the evil ones tactics against metanoia? Because it's really not Zuckerberg. We're fighting against it. It's something. So we'll talk about that in the overtime. And the next podcast, we'll get back to first week of this. Thanks for listening to The Unashamed podcast.

Help us out by rating us on iTunes. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube. And be sure to click that little bell to get notified about new episodes. And for even more content that you won't get anywhere else, subscribe to Blaze TV at blazedtv.com slash unashamed.