Behind The Pulpit
Our weekly pastors podcast where we discuss fun new stories, church events, previous sermons. As well as answering interesting questions from you!
Behind The Pulpit
Go Johnny, Go!
This week on Behind the Pulpit, Pastor Bob is joined by Tim, who steps in as guest host while Pastor Dave recovers at home. Together they dive into a mix of topics — from fall weather trends and winter predictions to reflections on marathon season, baseball’s thrilling World Series finish, and the ongoing issue of Christian persecution around the world. The episode blends humor and insight, complete with the latest Book War results and a surprise Theology Sprint question from Pastor Dave that keeps everyone on their toes.
Listeners will also hear an exclusive interview with Youth Director Johnny Graves, fresh off completing the New York City Marathon. Johnny shares about the challenges, discipline, and endurance it took to go the distance, and how his experience on the course became a picture of faith and perseverance in everyday life.
In the sermon segment, Pastor Bob unpacks Isaiah 40 and the comfort God offers His people in the midst of catastrophe. From a discussion on Deutero-Isaiah to the subtle idols of modern life and the grace God extends even in our self-inflicted storms, this conversation reminds us that true strength comes from trusting in the Lord.
**SUBMIT YOUR QUESTIONS TO THE SHOW HERE**
https://millingtonbaptist.org/sermons/behind-the-pulpit-ask-your-questions/
Church Work Day
https://millingtonbaptist.org/trunk-or-treat-2025/
Fresh Wave
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8G7LHDsI9R2kMdhQ9eLWmErvDUsk_7_t&si=_ZjbsrWTVLq29OIS
Shepherds Freezer
https://millingtonbaptist.org/freezer/
Rejoice!
https://millingtonbaptist.org/women/
Music
"Ventura"
Morgan Taylor
U76EPPNJDYZYU0Y7
Isaiah has in mind here the image of young military fighting men, the people who are in the best shape of their life, people who can run a marathon. By the way, speaking of marathons, I have some friends who run them. Um it's marathon season, if you didn't know. Uh actually, Johnny Graves, our youth director, is running the New York Marathon Marathon right now. And Tim actually managed to pull up where he is. Where's Johnny right here? All right. Oh, going through Harlem. Let's pray for Johnny right now. There we go. What's the pace? He's still doing seven-minute mile. That is impressive, I gotta tell you.
Tim:Welcome to Behind the Pole. But as you can see, Pastor Dave is not here today. He's still home recovering from an illness that he's having. So uh it's just a two-person crew. Noah's on vacation. Uh, Pastor Dave is sick. So it is just Pastor Bob Erbig and myself today. Pastor Bob, how are you doing?
Bob:I'm doing okay. I just got done with our interview with Johnny Graves, which we're gonna insert somewhere along this this way. So it was like I was running a marathon very quickly asking him questions, but I'm doing well. Um the fall is in in in play. I'm enjoying the fall.
Tim:We're we're nearing the end of peak, still some really great colors.
Bob:We're on the end the the downside of peak, and very soon the leaves are gonna be falling off. So I was actually walking home for lunch and I had a couple leaves smack me in the face, which is telling me winter's coming.
Tim:Wow, but winter is coming. Um but yeah, the it's beautiful. The uh it's it's getting it's starting to get a little nippy. Um I kind of wish it was colder. I mean, yesterday was great. I think we got up and it was like I I looked at the temperature. It was 37 degrees when I came into church yesterday.
Bob:We're starting to get in that season after the um like the the the that mixture of fall and summer. So you begin the beginning of the day with the fall and you you end the day with the summer, and so you're always like shedding shedding your your your layers, but now it's uh it's staying consistent.
Tim:Now, prediction wise, what do you think this this year's winter is gonna be like? Because I personally I want it cold, I want to play pond hockey, I want I want the lakes to be frozen. I don't care about the snow, I just need it to be cold. Do you think last year was like on and off? We had like some some warmer winter days, we had some colder winter days, but it never was consistent. What do you think we're gonna get this year?
Bob:I I'm gonna go with more inconsistency. So I don't know. The first year that I moved here when I when I began working at Millington was 2011, and that was a brutal winter. I moved from San Jose, California over here, and it was just snow after snow after well, I was buried in snow for four months. Um, but lately it's been inconsistent.
Tim:So it's New Jersey. I don't know, I don't know what it is. Maybe maybe it's global warming, maybe it's something else. But the winters in New Jersey definitely look different now than they did when I was a kid. So we'll uh Well, we can always hope.
Bob:We can always hope we can hope we can pray, we can pray to that learning about prayer last week with Pastor Davis.
Tim:Yes, let's pray. Let's pray for winter. Amen. Well, as we get kicked off in our show today, we have a couple things that we want to announce. The first is going to be our Millington Baptist Church Work Day. Let's see if I can get this up to here. Awesome. Uh so on November 15th, we are gonna be having a work day, I believe, sponsored by the men's ministry. It's gonna be an indoor, outdoor day uh where you can just come. If you're not with us serving on city relief, we would encourage you to come on out from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Hearing food is provided. Uh, we're gonna do some some planting, we're gonna do some yard work, we're gonna do some work on the inside and outside, uh, just overall campus beautification. Uh so check out our website if you are interested in doing that.
Bob:What's going on with this graphic here, Tim? Did you make this or Noah make this?
Tim:That is a Noah graphic. What do you what are your questions?
Bob:Is brick supposed to be inside and the vine on the the wood supposed to be outside?
Tim:Do we do we have any indoor do we have any indoor brick here?
Bob:Well, I mean, the whole fellowship hall has brick that's painted. We don't have any brick that looks like like a chimney like that. Um I don't know. I don't know what's uh what's going on here.
Tim:My grandmother at her house has some exposed.
Bob:Although that font does look very work work day.
Tim:Yes, it makes me want to grab a shovel and dig. Absolutely.
Bob:It makes me want to pull that vine off of the fence right there.
Tim:Well, that brings us to our first segment of the day where we'll be talking about what's going on in the world around us. It is in the news. Alright, so let's kick off uh with something fun before we we dive into some of the more serious stuff that we have planned for you guys here today. The Tirot No. The Los Angeles Dodgers are your 2025 World Series champions. Uh man, it came down to the wire. Seven games, uh, and the Blue Jays had the lead going in with one out in the ninth inning, um, and then a solo home run, and then another solo home run in the 11th, and that was it. And the Dodgers are now your champions. Pastor Bob, did you consume the World Series?
Bob:So let's talk about the World Series here, Tim. Yes. I I heard literally heard Alex Rodriguez say that this was the best World Series he's ever seen. Wow. And he's been in one. And he's been in several, I think. Uh it it was uh I didn't watch the first six games, but I heard there were some nail biters there. And uh because I like Don Mattingley, I I I said we're gonna sign up for Fox One so we can watch the game. And I did watch all of Game 7 all the way to the end.
Tim:Wow.
Bob:And uh I I thought the Blue Jays were gonna have it. And did you see the that the bot so the bot the ninth inning? Uh the uh Blue Jays uh closer blows it. Uh that Rojas, I think it was Rojas, hit the home run, tied the game, and then in the bottom of the ninth, it was bases loaded, and uh I forget who hit the uh who hit the ground ball.
Tim:Oh no, not the ground ball.
Bob:The ground ball to second base, Rojas, the second baseman, catches it, stumbles backward, throws, and the guy I I I still think it was a close, close call. It's still debatable in my mind.
Tim:Isaiah Connor Falefa, the uh the player who was on third base, was a Yankee at one point, and he was kind of known for his like speed, like he was one of the Yankee speedier players.
Bob:Well, they yeah, they put him in as a pinch runner.
Tim:He put him in as a pinch runner, so I thought the game was over. It's I didn't see any angles, but I feel like he could have got a better jump. I don't know. I feel like he could have beaten that out. Especially, especially with the stumble. I feel like there's definitely a lot of players in in this league that would have beat that out. But you know, it's a high pressure situation, it's the World Series. You know, you're kind of like, ah, what do I do?
Bob:Well, the angles were close. It was questionable. It was close.
Tim:So I thought he was out. Like it and then and then you look again, I'm like, oh, his foot might have come off the base. And it did, but I think it got back down. I think the call was right. I think they got he he got the uh it was close.
Bob:It was close. But anyway, they they blew it a couple times, and um it was it was a it was a great series, though. It was a great series. Um Don Mattingley still does not have a ring, so there's still time. We can still hope.
Tim:He looks younger every year.
Bob:He does look pretty good for I think he's 64 now. He looks like he can get out there and hit the ball again.
Tim:Absolutely. Yeah. So uh yeah, did you watch the World Series? I know for me, like I I am tuned out of baseball. It's hockey season. I'm watching hockey, I'm watching random games that I have no business watching, but I was I was I the World Series is on, it's game seven. I feel like I should be watching this.
Bob:So where does your love for hockey come from? So you just want to consume that all the time.
Tim:Yeah, it's funny. Um, so I was never really introduced to hockey in my household. My family was not a hockey family, it was a baseball first, Yankees first, and then Giants Jets, and that was kind of the sports that we watched. Um, and then I just started, I was like, oh, there's a sports team that plays in New Jersey. Like I should be paying closer attention to them as someone who likes sports, and I really started to get into them. Um, and then I just grew to love the game. Like our my high school, I went to Ridge High School uh here in Basking Ridge, and they always have a pretty good hockey team. So I started going to their games and just kind of fell in love with the sport. Um Did you ever play hockey? No, I uh I just I I've I uh whoa. I I play a little pond hockey here and there. I started last year, last couple years, got some skates. I play with my brother-in-law. Um, he lives up in uh Sussex County in the lake community, so he shovels out a um a rink. But um, yeah, I just I just fell in love with the sport. I think it's awesome. Um it's my favorite sport to watch, and I have a bunch of friends who we watch it together.
Bob:But yeah, have you ever seen that Seinfeld episode where Putty dresses up with the face painting and they go to the devil's game?
Tim:He's just it comes out Yellow BCA. Yeah, it always uh if you go to a devil, if you've ever been to a devils game before, that clip gets played at like 95% of the game. Is it really? Yeah, it's always a devils and that actor, I forget his name, he actually he he's done like the so most uh NHL teams have like a hype video that they'll play before every game. And he voiced it-port the team. Yeah, support the team. Yeah, he he voiced it last year. Uh the devil, you're not ready. It was it was always it's it's always good. Uh moving on to our next story here. Uh, we've talked about it a couple times on the show, more of a more of a serious topic. Uh, we are still seeing some Christian uh persecution in uh the nation of Nigeria. Uh this has been going on for a little bit. And recently, President Trump actually made a comment. Uh he he made a tweet about it. It was uh a classic Trump Trumpian tweet. Uh Pastor Bob, I know, has been paying attention to this and just want to give you the floor.
Bob:Well, this is what's happened if you haven't been haven't been following on X, which I I I go and see people post. There was a lot of people lobbying for the US to take uh to take notice, for President Trump to take notice. There's been a number of videos of um uh Nigerian pastors standing over the graves of people who have been uh killed and um and calling for help for what's going on. So um I saw more chatter about this online and over the weekend uh uh some politicians were commenting on this, Ted Cruz, I think a few others, and and Donald Trump finally did make a make a couple tweets about this. Now the latest one is the one that was the strongest uh comment, which is I'm sure is a little controversial depending on what you you think about the government. But this was this was the tweet from Trump. Uh he said, if the Nigerian government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the USA will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria and may very well go into that now disgraced country, guns ablazing to completely wipe out the Islamic terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities. I'm hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action. If we attack, it will be fa fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attacked our cherished uh Christians, warning the Nigerian government better move fast. Now I'm sure this is a debatable topic here, but I think we can all agree that the killing of Christians, the persecution and genocide that's been happening over there is dra is d dramatically terrible and and uh disgusting. Uh I think it's been a hundred and hundred and thirty thousand Christians who've been systematically killed since around two thousand ten, two thousand nine. And the the biblical uh issue here is that the reason God puts government in place is if you look at Romans 13 and Genesis 9, which are the key texts, uh is the main purpose of the government is to restrain evil. And so it does not appear that the Nigerian government has been doing that. Now the Prime Minister or the President of Nigeria issued a statement, said they're doing that, but there's all this other uh videos and and people uh shouting about this saying they're not. So is it right for the US to go in they they said they want to offer assistance, but is it right for them to cross somebody else's border to stop such atrocities from happening? I I don't know that this is such a bad thing. Um now that's probably a debatable thing, depending on if you think it's okay for them to evade invade a sovereign country. Not not not invade, but come in and help with a specific issue. Um but it's something we definitely need to pray about, it's something we need to give some serious thought to, and uh this needs to end is is sort of the bottom line here. What's your thoughts on this, Tim?
Tim:Yeah, I mean it's it's horrible, and I think I'm I'm always just like as someone who uh is a Gen Z person and and I think overall us as as Gen Z are pretty well connected to what's going on in the world, and you know, we always have our phones and um in our in our left hands or right hands. You know, I really you really have not heard that much about this. Like I feel like in mainstream.
Bob:And there's other countries too. I mean, I've been s I've been seeing people comment on what's going on in Sudan as well.
Tim:Yeah, it's there's you know, I feel like this should be something if this has been happening for so long and it's just like a p you have over like over 130,000 people have been killed. That's a huge news story. Um, and I I feel like that is has not been something that like we hear, you know, I'm not I'm not downplaying at whatsoever, you know, the the the loss of life on that we've been seeing in the Middle East with between Gaza and Israel, and then you know, the Ukraine and and Russia than the two kind of headlining stories over the past couple years. You hear about that every day, all the time. There's people in the streets, it's talked about on the news every day, and yet there's a whole other story developing that's that's been around for a while in in Africa about you know this these killings and this genocide of of a people group, and there's there's not much to be heard about it.
Bob:Specifically kill for being Christians from the Fulani uh terrorists, the Islamic uh folks that are going in and doing this just for the fact that these folks are Christians. Um there was a video I saw the other day about just uh this group coming in and just all of a sudden shooting up a whole village and causing them to leave. Now, I guess the thing I would say is that you know, let's think about other genocides, genocides like with the Jewish folks in in Germany um or with the Armenian genocide and over in Turkey, um, and I'm sure there's others. Is it wrong for a country to come and intervene to help stop that because that the government of that country is not basically doing its job or it's corrupt at some level. Um so I I like to see this end and I'm glad that our our government is is paying attention to it and is putting pressure at least on the Nigerian government. Uh in a previous um uh statement, I think Trump said that they're gonna withdraw aid if the government of Nigeria does not uh do something about this. So we're gonna see how this plays out. Um, but I'm glad the pressure's being put on Nigeria to actually provide some protection for its citizens.
Tim:Yeah, I would agree. And I I think you're a hundred percent right. Like I think you know there's things that happen personally, I think there's things that countries do within the confines of their own country. I think from country to country, it it's really none of our business. But when it comes to like looking at this through a Christian worldview, and and you know, we talk about the sanctity of of human life when it comes to, you know, a lot when it comes to abortion um on that topic, but this is you know, this is the life of of Christians, but also just like other image bears. Um, you know, this should be something that we're we're talking about. This should be should be something we'd be advocating for. So I think I would agree, like, if push comes to shove, I think something should be done um to save lives here. As as for any other situation, if for any other genocide, um that happens as well.
Bob:So pray for the persecuted church and pray for our brothers and sisters in Nigeria.
Tim:Yes. One last did you have something else you want to add?
Bob:Well, I was gonna mention about the voting.
Tim:Yes, I was gonna I was gonna see that.
Bob:Well, you go ahead and do that then.
Tim:Um it is it is election week here in New Jersey and around the nation. Um, and I think a stance that we take here at Millington Baptist Church is that you should go out and vote. Uh, we think it's important that uh you do your civic duty to uh get to the polls and vote for uh a candidate of your choosing. Uh we think that's important, and I know Pastor Bob likes to talk about that. So what would you say to people who in Millington Baptist Church who are thinking about going or not going out to vote this week?
Bob:Well, I would say this this particular election, your vote is gonna matter. Uh in in other elections, uh when you know there's might be a foregone conclusion about how the state is gonna go, you might feel like, you know, what's the point? But this one, it's really it's been a hotly contested governor election. All eyes are on New Jersey uh tomorrow, and uh I would just say don't stay home, go and vote. Uh this is a place that we live, we care about, and uh we should be very much civically engaged. So I I would encourage you to go and go vote and make a plan to vote, and the polls close tomorrow at eight o'clock. So go out and do it.
Tim:Yeah, I I know like you mentioned this just now. I feel like in the past it's always been just I mean, uh for me, re like I I've am I able to vote. I'm able to vote relatively recently in my life, but I feel like when it comes to New Jersey, there's always sometimes there's this stigma of like, what's the point? Like the you know, we know which way it's gonna go. Uh that's not the case this time. I feel like it's becoming becoming over the last couple elections, it's becoming a little bit closer, and the polls look really close.
Bob:The governor election is definitely down to the wire. Aside from the fact that, you know, I was talking with Scott Lavender, who's uh on the township committee for uh Long Hill over here, and he was saying what you what really makes a difference in your life is like the local elections. So for here in Berners Township, our our uh our township committee, there's a couple open seats, uh Board of Education. I got a little more educated on uh the Board of Education uh candidates. So uh I don't normally vote for the Board of Education candidates, but this time I said, you know what, I'm gonna go look up statements, and I I made a decision uh after having done some research on it. So vote, vote uh vote all the people.
Tim:It's a good example of well-informed voting. There you go. Great, that's the news. So uh we hope you enjoyed that. And as we move on to the next portion of our show, wanted to give another little shout out. We talked about this a bit last week, but it's in full swing. Uh whoops, the new iteration of the fresh wave. You got a little bit of a new uh rebrand there, uh, a little bit of a graphic refresh, new color scheme. Uh, but yeah, our new form of the fresh wave is gonna be taking uh it's it's it looks like this. It's gonna be week to week switching off between Johnny and our other host, Maddie. Uh, one to two minute uh quick little teachings and commentaries for teens. So if you're a parent of a teenager, this is something really easy. It's on Instagram, it's on YouTube, they can see it. The last episode was like was one minute and 22 seconds, I believe. And this is a really great tool that we're building to just share with people. It's a it's an evangelism tool. It's on Instagram. You know, our students and your kids and even you can do a really quick just send it to somebody. Uh, it's a quick watch. Um, you know, we're not we're staying away from the longer form podcast uh as our as our youth attention spans get shorter and shorter. I think we need to meet those demands. Uh so yeah, check out the new Fresh Wave. It's it's a pretty cool format. It's a little more produced than it has been in the past. So uh it's a good looking show. So uh check it out.
Bob:Where's Maddie looking in that in that image right there? Uh went off to the side. Looks like she's holding the microphone kind of like this.
Tim:She is uh yes. And also, if you notice, it's uh it's a new microphone style too. We uh we got a little mic stand instead of using these bad boys for these. So um, so check it out. So it is uh it is time to move into our favorite segment. Now I'm always I always love, you know, people. We had Andrew Strain on last week, and the last thing he said before he left, this wasn't in the recording, is I love the book war. I love getting people who come up to me and asking about the book war. When I messed up with the voting thing a couple weeks ago, I had people letting me know about it.
Bob:Uh so people it's the water cooler talk around there.
Tim:People love the great book war. Um, it's it's a it's a heated battle.
Bob:I see you have a book. All 13 of them that vote love the book book war.
Tim:Yes, and listen, there's a there's it's a tight race. Uh it's a lot of the same people voting each week. They want that behind the pulpit merch. They want to be known as the fan of the year. So keep it up. And listen, if you haven't started voting, it's not too late. People might miss a few weeks. Um, we might have some prizes for like the top two.
Bob:I gotta see who won last week or something.
Tim:Oh, yeah, we are getting there. So here we go. Uh, let me just pull that up. I'm not as quick uh as I was. And the winner from last week is Pastor Dave. So I know Pastor Dave will be watching at some point later today, probably. Congratulations on the reliability of the old uh testament by KA Kitchen. And if we go in and look at the breakdown, uh 10 responses, so eight votes for Pastor Dave. Right.
Bob:So I made I made a wrong choice on what I should have recommended. Pastor Bob. I should have gone with the other book.
Tim:Yes. And that is okay. Uh the score now is two to five. There's plenty of time left. It's only a three-point game. Next week, uh, since we're not having a competition this week, we're gonna have Pastor Bob recommend a book, uh, but it will not be voted upon. Uh next week will be a two-point week. So, Pastor Bob, you have a chance to cut it to one. Somehow you'll lose, I feel like.
Bob:But also somehow I'll win.
Tim:You will win. Uh so make sure uh you got a week off from voting. So uh enjoy the week off for those of you who vote.
Bob:Uh, but you're not gonna recommend a book?
Tim:Um I don't have one on me, but I I could recommend a book. Maybe I'll recommend one of the Colson books.
Bob:But uh we'll just we'll just do I think we'll just pray about it while I recommend the book that I brought with me. So here, this book is written by a woman named Elizabeth Urbanowitz. Uh she runs an organization called Foundation Worldview. I've purchased a few of her uh video series that I've used with my kids on teaching them how to develop a Christian worldview and and related topics. So she came out with a book recently called Um Helping Your Kids Know God's Good Design. Helping your kids know God's good design. So if you're a parent, if you uh know somebody who's a parent, they got especially they have younger kids, if you're a grandparent, you want to recommend this. This this this curriculum is really, really good. So the subtitle here is 40 Questions and Answers on Sexuality and Gender. And what she does is she has all these different questions that your kids might ask or might come up, and you're wondering, like, what do I do? What do I say? Here is a resource guide for you from an educational professional who also has a degree in apologetics and has been developing this worldview curriculum for um Christian parents, educators, church leaders, uh all and all the above. So I definitely recommend picking this up, reading it through. Um there's another book by Andrew Walker that has a similar, similar slant to it. I I just feel like there's so much so many good resources out there now on topics like this to equip you as a parent, somebody who's training up the next generation, um, that you should very much take advantage of it. So Elizabeth Urbanowitz, helping your kids know God's good design. And look at the uh look at the artwork right here. It's got like little, you know, Legos on the front, little shapes and everything. And you can help shape and spiritually form your kids. So right here.
Tim:Alright. Well make sure you go pick up that uh book. And I I did pray about it, Pastor Bob, and I am gonna recommend a book.
Bob:All right.
Tim:I don't have it with me, um, but I'm doing I am part of the Colson Fellows program here at Millington. I do have some catch-up work I need to do this month. I'm a little behind, but uh one of the books we read for our last cycle, it's not a Christian book, but I think it it really was a fascinating read. Uh and it's called Man's Search for Meaning by Victor Frankel. We talked about it at our last cohort. Um and Victor Frank, it's a firsthand account of uh a man who was spent um time in a Nazi concentration camp uh and as a as a professional psychologist, and he kind of it's essentially a memo, a large part of the book is a memoir of his experience in the concentration camp and what he noticed about the mental health and just the mental processing of different inmates and how they handle tragedy and suffering. Uh it's a very sad book, um, but as someone who um has studied psychology and just enjoys thinking about the mind, um, I think I thought it was a fascinating read. So um, if you're looking for for something you know a little bit heavier uh in terms of emotion, you know, trying to trying to switch up your reading list a little bit, uh pick that up. It's it's really interesting. Um it's kind of cool how you can kind of see from the beginning to the end as as the suffering continues, um, how he kind of touches on biblical principles without really realizing he's doing it when it comes to suffering. So um that would be my my book recommendation. Maybe we'll put it to a vote this week. We'll see.
Bob:All right. Mansured for meaning or God's big design.
Tim:Go vote.
Bob:See what comes up.
Tim:Uh you decide we we recommend. All right.
Bob:A little inversion of that. We decide you recommend.
Tim:We decide you recommend.
Bob:You decide we recommend.
Tim:Something like that. All right. So we are going to move into the next portion of our show. We did have an audience question. Thank you so much for asking your questions. I'm going to start putting the link down in the show notes as well. Uh, we we encourage you guys if you have any questions, man, especially about the sermons, but anything else, uh, we would really encourage you. Um, you don't have to say your name. It's an this question today is anonymous, so we're gonna go through that, and Pastor Bob will see uh we'll have you tackle it for us. Today's question is this why did Hezekiah show the king of Babylon all his riches in Judah?
Bob:Oh well, what a wonderful question. That's a good question. I think uh and thank you for asking it. We're we're always happy when we get those. Hezekiah is an interesting figure. So we we heard from Pastor Dave last week about his faith and how he came before the Lord and how he laid out um all his papers before him and God delivered uh Hezekiah and the people of Judah from Assyria. Um but then we also see that Hezekiah is human. He's a complicated figure, and when you look at chapter 39, you wonder, is this the same Hezekiah? So the motivations and reasoning, um I think uh there's a couple explanations, a couple um I guess to some extent speculations as to why he's doing this, but I think they line up with the text. So the first reason uh I would call it pride. Right? So Hezekiah has been blessed, and he he's got all these riches from what God has brought into his realm, and he basically wants to show off his success and his wealth. In fact, in 2 Chronicles uh 33, 25, and 26, which is a uh uh passage that speaks about this background, it reads that Hezekiah's heart was proud and he did not respond to the kindness shown him. So we knew that we knew that there's some kind of spiritual uh pride uh going on here, and it did wind up costing Judah dearly, even though it seems like Hezekiah learned his lesson afterwards. Uh secondly, uh politics were definitely involved. There's always politics everywhere, right? So uh historically Babylon was uh or Babylon um uh wanted to build these alliances with surrounding nations uh to help them in their fight against Assyria because Assyria was the dominant power, but Babylon eventually would would take over from them, followed by the the Medo-Persian Empire. Um and Hezekiah, uh having been delivered from the Assyrian siege, or about to be delivered from that, uh, might have seen Babylon as a potential ally. And so uh this is this is this makes a lot of sense to me, this reasoning that he he was showing off his riches and what he could offer uh this political alliance with Babylon. So it was a bit of a diplomatic uh move. Um and then finally, uh just from a spiritual perspective, um it it was a failure of spiritual discernment. So Hezekiah's response to Isaiah's prophecy in in verse thirty n in chapter thirty-nine, verse eight, was he said, The word of the Lord the word of the Lord you have spoken is good. And I always found that to be such a strange response after Isaiah basically says, You're gonna get wiped out, all of your people are gonna get carried off to Babylon, your sons are gonna be eunuchs, which means they're gonna, you know, be be kind of half the man they used to be. Um and and his response is, Well, that's that's good. Uh which just reveals a very short-sighted, self-centered attitude when you hear about what's gonna be going on, because things are gonna be okay for you, there's gonna be peace and security, but your descendants are gonna have to deal with your uh mistake. So I think those are a couple major reasons why why Hezekiah uh opened up his vault. Uh to me, I think the political motivation makes a whole lot of sense, but I think there's a little bit of the other two sprinkled in.
Tim:Great. I think that answered it well. So yeah, keep the keep the and uh questions coming. Um and we have two uh today just one, but two very intelligent pastors who are willing and able to answer your questions. So keep them coming. Alright, so now Pastor Bob alluded to it before, uh, but we if you listened to the sermon yesterday, you will know that uh Pastor Bob talked about marathons, and in that marathon uh illustration, we actually got a chance to uh kind of watch our very own Johnny Graves uh run a bit of his marathon as a small dot on a map. Uh and we actually got to sit down with Johnny and and hear a little bit about his marathon experience. But before we do that, we just want to tell you guys about something else that we have going on in our ministry. And that is, keep doing that, and that is our shepherd's freezer. Uh, this is a really cool ministry that we have here at Millington where we just we have a freezer in our kitchen that we fill with meals uh that we can just give to people who are in need. So if the if you feel that this is on your heart, that you uh are interested in contributing to this, there's a QR code on the screen. Uh you can find more information about that on our website. But essentially what you want to do is you want to just buy a frozen meal or make one yourself, uh and you can bring it here and put it in the freezer, and it'll just add to the database of uh meals that we have that we can give out for free to those people who in our church uh who are in need and might need a meal for any reason, maybe a medical condition, uh maybe you know, just busy time taking care of family members, um, new baby, anything like that. Uh, we we love to bless people with those meals. So uh check out more information on that.
Bob:By the way, I'm feeling led to comment on every single one of these graphics. Put that back up there. So look, we got the shepherd's freezer, which is kind of wonderfully placed in this doily in the middle of the thing. Treats for a cause. I just noticed all the way around there, there's all these treats.
Tim:They're all carb based.
Bob:It is, I see. Pretzels, breads, cupcakes, a fresh cruler, a croissant, uh pretzel, a muff a couple muffins. Right there. I never noticed that before. It is it's quite a beautiful graphic. Yeah. Although usually when you go to the shepherd's freezer, those aren't the things that you get.
Tim:No, you're you're the good hearty lasagna. Yes. Um lasagna is a bit more likely to get than than some donuts, which I think what I would I would argue is better. Yes, as I said before, please enjoy this interview that we did with Johnny Graves uh to tell us a little bit about his marathon experience.
Bob:Alright, so we're here with uh Johnny Graves, who just completed his uh is it second marathon yesterday? Second? Wow. Second. And you told me today you came in and you said I'm feeling pretty good. I'm feeling all right. Yeah, I'm walking stairs, sitting down, standing up. My goodness. Well, I I was making a jab because I'm not a runner. You're a runner. Uh we were talking about it in the sermon yesterday, and uh we were watching you. Tim Tim was able to put up the uh the actual tracker. We saw you beginning in the nine and finish close to finishing the second uh service. There it was, right there. He's up there. That's Johnny. Uh people were loving it, though. They were they were cheering you on, like, yeah, go. Actually, the second service you were in Harlem, I think. So is that where you fin you come in the top of uh Central Park and finish in the middle of Central Park?
Johnny:Yeah, you kind of do like this little little like uh U run kind of around it.
Bob:Okay, okay. Well, very cool. Um, so anyway, so we were talking about marathons. So why don't we why don't we talk a little bit about how did you get in? Why did you want to do this? Why did you want to run for 26 miles for that long?
Johnny:Yeah, I got it and uh thought about it a couple years ago. I did my first one in Philly, uh, and that one was a a hard experience. I didn't really train for it. Uh signed up pretty quickly. Did you train at all? Not really. I mean I ran, but I didn't really do any like marathon training. And it was just horrible. Like I felt horrible halfway through the race. I was like, my goal was just to like not die and fall over. And then after the race, Tim was there. Tim and some other people were there, and I was just like white as a ghost, didn't talk to anybody, was in horrible shape. And then I yeah, like after that actually, after I finished my first marathon.
Bob:Let me just pause and just say the fact that without having done any training, the fact that you could still finish it is pretty impressive.
Johnny:Yeah. But after after I finished that marathon, I was like, this is the stupidest thing in the entire world. I was like, why do people do this? People like fly around the world to do it in Tokyo and London. I was like, this is the stupidest thing ever. I'm never doing it again. And then like a week later, I started to feel better, and I was like, all right, eventually I want to do it again, I want to train, I want to, you know, get a good time. So uh uh yeah, like a year or two goes by. I got into the New York City Marathon on behalf of a charity, Rise Against Hunger, who I ran for, who we've actually worked with as a church, packing meals for them, and I was able to run for them, fundraise for them, and got into this one. So it was an awesome experience, and yeah, just really wanted to do something new, have a cool accomplishment uh to do, and it's obviously good to stay healthy and run. So there you go.
Bob:There were positive benefits. Before we talk about the actual experience of running the marathon, what uh so I was mentioning this in in the sermon yesterday. So tell me the process of getting into the marathon. It wasn't you, my friend Jason is also a marathon runner, and he was telling me about all the hoops you have to jump through to actually get into the race. Right. It's like applying for college.
Johnny:Right, right. So every marathon has different ways you can do it. So the like, for example, the Boston Marathon is considered one of the most like elite ones. And you can really only get into that one if you have ran a marathon before in a certain time. So like for my age and gender, you have to run under three hours, which is pretty fast. And then for female, I think it's like three hours and 30 minutes. And then depending on your age, it's slower, faster. But for other marathons, for example, like New York, I think Chicago might be similarly. There's just a general lottery. So there's just a whole pool. They just pick at random whoever gets in. And apparently, to the statistics, it's harder to get into the New York City marathon than to get into like Harvard and Yale. Like it's like a wow, the percent is like two, I don't know. This is really, but it's like a two, three percent that you might actually get it. Acceptance rate, wow. Acceptance rate. Yeah, it's very, very low. It might not be exactly that. So last year I tried that, didn't get in, obviously. And then for this year, uh, the other way you can do it is uh there's one where you can do you can qualify for this one. So if you do like a New York run earlier this year, there's like a half marathon you can do. If you like New York roadrunners, if you do like a half marathon at a certain time, you would get your uh your your bib or your ticket into it. Uh if you've ran actually I just found out because a guy I went with, if you've ran 15 New York marathons every year after that, you're automatically in. Which is kind of crazy. So if you've ran 15 marathons, you're automatically in no matter what.
Bob:Wow.
Johnny:And then the way I did it was I did a charity, so I applied to run on behalf of a charity. They accepted me. I just had to fundraise for them. So that's how a lot, that's how a lot of people get into this one as well, is they find a charity, they apply, they select you, and then you you run on behalf of their organization.
Bob:Harder to get into than than Yale or Harvard. So you like you really, really have to want to do this. You really got to, yeah. Well, what was your training regimen getting ready getting ready for the marathon? What did she do differently this time than than last time? And did it improve your movie time?
Johnny:Oh, yeah. Well, I did a lot more. Uh yeah, so I I had a uh my sister-in-law's ran a lot of marathons. Uh she's the she's a six-medalist one, so she's done all the majors. She's very good, very fast.
Bob:Boston?
Johnny:She's yep, yep. She qualified, did Boston, did Tokyo, London, Berlin, all those. Uh she sent me a plan that I think she's enjoyed. And yeah, it's a 16-week plan, six days a week. For yeah, for so I started mid-July, finished up the the day before the marathon. And yeah, it made I mean I felt pretty good the whole race. Like I never really was super out of breath, didn't feel like super exhausted. I mean, like the last mile, obviously. You're you're just you're pushing everything you guys. But yeah, majority of the race felt really good, felt strong. Uh, was able to see a lot of fans uh during the race, so that was cool. I got able to be alert and see them and high-five them and stuff like that. So it was uh much more enjoyable, felt good. I didn't crash. A lot of times during marathons, people hit, they call it the wall, where you know, you're feeling good, you're feeling good, and then mile, whatever, 15, mile 20, you just like your body just like shuts down and is like you need to stop.
Bob:Okay.
Johnny:So you see some of those people, you know, they're they're walking or they're you know, they're just they're hunched over or holding, you know, holding a leg or whatever. So yeah, with the training, I felt felt pretty good, felt strong, ran consistent, kind of.
Bob:So how far how far did you run the day before the marathon?
Johnny:So the day before, you just do like a really slow three miles, just like mental shake, body loose, just kind of okay. Yeah, the week or two before a marathon, you really don't run that much. You just kind of they call it like the taper week. Okay. So you run a lot of miles and then like you start to kind of slow down so your body's in like prime, prime condition, it's very rested, it's not injured, you're you're ready to roll. Gotcha.
Bob:So do you ever actually in the training process get up to doing 26 miles before? Okay.
Johnny:Yeah, so usually a max is like 20 or 22 miles, is what you'll do like three, four weeks before. That's kind of your max run.
Bob:Interesting. Yeah, wow. Wow, this is intense. All right, well, take us into the actual running of it. Speaking of the last mile, I did watch your little dot up in the balcony and it was half a mile, and then Johnny's done. Oh my gosh. And then three hours and thirteen minutes, which I thought was pretty, pretty fast, right? Yeah, thank you. Yeah. Um so what where did you start and what did you see? What was the experience? Uh Tim had some pictures he wanted to put up here. All right. Yeah, there we go. Look at you with the metal at the end. You got the metal. Yeah, pure gold. Uh yeah, so yeah, you start. Is that afterwards? Oh, it was after. It was delicious.
Johnny:That was great. So hungry, so tired. Yeah, so you start at the Verizano Bridge, you start in Staten Island, and you really you travel through the five boroughs, which is really cool. So, yeah, you go over the Verrazano Bridge, which is just huge. I think it's uh I think it's like a mile and a half, maybe. Up yeah, you go up and then you go down. So the up parts are, but then when you get down. But the hardest part is actually just how crowded it was. So when you're that first Verizano bridge is just like shoulder run faster, and you're like, come on, move.
Bob:Right, right, right.
Johnny:So you're almost like kind of weaving around. Uh but yeah, you're shoulder to shoulder, it's tight. Yeah, but it's it's just it's cool. It's like the it's like a very famous, well-known race. It's a famous bridge, everybody knows about it. The view's awesome. You're going over the water, you see the city that you're gonna be running into. So that was a great first part. And then yeah, you run through the five boroughs. I don't remember in the exact order, but you know, you go through Queens, you go through Brooklyn, you go through Manhattan, uh, you go through the Bronx, you go through obviously starting Staten Island. Those those might be all five, actually. Uh yeah, so you go through all the bridges to get each time I think each time you go over a bridge is when you entered a new borough, and the bridges are really hard because the bridges obviously go up and they go down. So the Verizon was really hard. The the hardest bridge was the Queensboro Bridge for me. Because that's at like mile 16, so like you're you're already kind of getting kind of tired, and then you have this just straight, steep uphill bridge. Wow. And the Queensboro Bridge isn't that nice compared to the Verizon. You don't have a nice view, you're just kind of like sheltered in. And yeah, I mean, the the it was what was pretty crazy was just the the atmosphere. I mean, it was literally 26.2 miles of fans along the entire race screaming. Are they are they cheering you the whole way? Yeah, cheering you.
Bob:The you know, if you're they're they're they're shouting for five hours.
Johnny:There's music like every month like every often. There's people handing out Smoothie King gave me a water, I was running. Smoothie King had a boxer hand out water, so I grabbed one. Uh everyone else is handing out snacks and waters and drinks. So it was pretty pretty cool experience, lots of lots of fun and alive to tell the tale.
Bob:You are wow, that's impressive. Well, the the application that I used in the sermon about the marathon illustration was we were talking about Isaiah 40, 31 and the idea that um uh what those who wait and trust on the Lord uh will rise up on wings like eagles, they'll run and not be weary, they'll uh walk and not faint. So um I I think the application for the the marathon is the fact that you you need kind of this strength to get you through and not and not fall down. But imagine you go through a whole marathon and yet at the end you you can you can just keep going. Yeah. Like the image of the eagle, um which I said, they they have this natural renewal process over the course of their life. They shed their their feathers and get new ones, that there's just natural renewal, so they never um are are in a season where they can't fly, which I guess is different than other birds. Interesting. Yeah. Um but but sometimes in your life, like you just go through a a season where you're just so tired and weary um you just can't go on. Like you hit the 16 You hit the wall. You hit the wall, and like that's it. Yeah. So so I don't know. Did did you did you learn anything? Um, was the Lord speaking to you in the midst of the marathon? I guess.
Johnny:You know, it was funny is uh obviously like a lot when when people run, a lot of people listen to music. And during my training, I listened to a lot of music, uh, listen to you know podcasts, Colson Fellow stuff, whatever it was, just uh you know, when you're out running for a few hours. Uh but sometimes I would run with nothing, just um wouldn't listen to anything. And for this marathon, I I was probably gonna listen to music. And just before the race, just lots of people. This is an incredible race, the atmosphere, the energy, everyone's there. And a lot of people around me weren't listening to music. So I was like, you know what? There's gonna be a ton of people, crowds are gonna be loud. I also, you know, I had a lot of family and friends that I was gonna hopefully see during the race. I was like, if I have my music on, uh it might be hard to hear them or see them, and I just want to like kind of take in in the crowd. So I didn't listen to any music. And uh Shannon, my wife asked me yesterday, she was like, So what did you think about for like three hours? And I was like, I literally didn't think about anything. You're just like constantly looking at like your watch, seeing how fast you're running. All right, I have one more mile. Like, all you're thinking about is just like literally you running for like three, like your mind if you want like a mind-numbing thing to do, go run for three hours. It'll just there's there's really like no, you you almost can't physically think about anything. Like if you went for a really like slow, easy run, you could like think about life, think about something that happened yesterday or today. But during the marathon race, my mind was just there was no thinking. All you're thinking about is all right, I'm I'm I can hold this pace, I'm gonna get water next break, I gotta take a gel, or this is you know, whatever. Like my it was very interesting. I've never really experienced that where your mind just kind of is like, this is it.
Bob:So you were able to heal with the pace, same pace the whole time.
Johnny:Yeah, yeah, which I was which I wasn't was a goal of mine to like kind of have a consistent run. Uh, because sometimes, you know, in races you'll have have a really slow couple miles, fast couple miles, or whatever. So I wanted a a nice consistent run, which I was excited to get.
Bob:Wow, awesome. Yeah, well, very cool. Uh well, thanks for telling us about the uh the experience. Yeah. How if anybody was looking to run a marathon, what would you what advice would you give them?
Johnny:Uh just yeah, you just take it mile by mile, you know, just get out, start running. And it's uh yeah, I mean, if it's it's a training, you just gotta train for it. You know, if you took 16 weeks to just kind of slowly build yourself up, uh, you know, I do I think most people could most people can do it. I mean, you see the people finishing, some people are in their 80s, you know, like finishing. Wow. Um, so it's not all about what's cool about running is it's not really all about time in a sense of you know, well, is that good or did you beat anyone? It's track is has always been about like PR for a lot of people. So, like what's your personal record? What's your personal best? So just do what you're capable of doing, just you know, just stay consistent. I think that was a big thing, is just staying consistent and during your training process and everything. So yeah, it just starts with mile around, right? Like when you start the race, you can't think, oh, I have 26 to go. It's just get that first mile and get the next one in. So cool experience. Thanks for the shout-out. What was funny was before we end here, what was funny was you texted me and Tim. You're like, oh, congrats, great job. We tracked you during the sermon. And in my mind, I literally was thinking, oh, maybe like Dave was preaching, and Bob was just sitting in the pew looking me up, seeing how I did. And then I get the video and the picture of Bob pointed, yeah, you have the picture back up. There it is. I'm like, oh, you actually quite literally tracked me during the live sermon.
Bob:That was Tim was Tim's idea. It was Tim's idea. But the people loved it. Tim.
Tim:That was very funny. I did not know that's what you meant. We were at the run through, and and Pastor Bob had the marathon bit in his sermon, and after after we're done, Pastor Dave goes, You know, Johnny is going to be running the sir the marathon while you're preaching. You probably should mention him. And I was like, actually, I think we can probably pull up a tracker. Oh my god. I'm sure that exists. Um and so yeah, it was it was very easy. How about how do they track you?
Johnny:Do you have like a So yeah, the bib has um The bib if you're like a bib, yeah. Your number has the has these little pieces on it that uh tracks you during the race. And I think it was actually started because during a race, somebody started the race, they actually left the track, got in a car, and drove to the finish line a little bit later and cheated basically. Wow. And then crossed the finish line. So the tracking point uh tracks you so that it knows you're crossing all of the mile, like each mile. It has a like a I think to know that you went through each push. Why would you do that if you're gonna So this tracker was very cool though. I didn't know so the one I did before, it only showed how fast it only showed like every like five miles basically, like how fast I was going. This one was like like a it was down to the 360.
Bob:This is how much further he has to go, and then done. Yeah, I didn't know that's what they had, so that was pretty cool. I was flipping to it um once in a while on the screens up in the balcony, and yeah, it's like you zoomed in, you can you could see exactly where you're so I guess just some sort of like tag that just shows you where it's funny because when I was doing the thing I said, oh Johnny is walking through running through Harlem, we should pray for him, and everybody left.
Johnny:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Bob:All right. Well, thanks for being here and giving us that recap. Very cool. When you see Johnny, give him a high five for finishing the marathon. Oh, by the way, what's next? Next one.
Johnny:Uh what's funny was my family came out and they loved it. They're like, Oh, this is so cool. Are we gonna do this again next year? I was like, sure, but somebody else is gonna have to run that. So we'll see. I I'll we'll take some time. Don't worry about it. We'll see where the Lord leads.
Tim:Thanks. All right, thank you. Well, that was really awesome. Uh, really great interview with with John. Johnny just ran on out of here. He did, he just left. Uh, that was not prerecorded, that was just a snap of a finger. Um, but yeah, we uh we really appreciate um Johnny and what he does here at NBC, and he's just so so skilled. Uh, so it's really cool to hear about his marathon experience. Uh so as we move into the next portion of our show, I would like to tell you a little bit about rejoice. Women of NBC, it is almost Christmas time, which means it is time for the Kim and Chrisana signature event. It is time to rejoice and have uh celebrate Christmas with the women's ministry. Uh so Saturday, December 6th, um, from 9 15 a.m. to 11 a.m., uh, we'll they will have their Christmas celebration. I'm hearing about a potluck breakfast. Uh, so bring an amazing breakfast dish along with you. It's gonna be a really great time. There's gonna be worship. I think there might be some testimony time. Child care is provided. So if you're not able to get child care for that day, uh bring your kids with you. Uh, we will be able to provide that for you. But yeah, if you've never been to a woman's event, this will be a great time to start uh December 6th. And if you have, we encourage you to bring a friend. Christmas is a really great time to bring people together. Um, and I think Kim and Chrisana do a really good job at facilitating that. So rejoice, women of NBC, the a Christmas celebration. Uh, make sure you check that out on December 6th. Rejoice. Rejoice. There you go. They're a signature event, really. I that probably. Okay.
Bob:I mean, we'll so if you want to get one taste of the women's ministry, you've got to come to rejoice.
Tim:Uh, you know, maybe no. You know what? It's I take it back. It might have to be tea and testimony. Okay.
Bob:That might be the other TNT.
Tim:The other TNT. There you go. Yes. All right. It is that time where we spend the most amount of time here at Behind the Pulpit. We are going to move into our sermon section. Pastor Bob, uh, we got the opportunity of hearing you preach out of Isaiah chapter 40 yesterday, uh, talking about comfort, comfort my people, um in chapter 40, verse 1. Pastor Bob, would you offer us a 60-second flyover of your sermon and we'll get into some of the behind-the-scenes work here, uh, maybe a couple visuals, a couple questions, and then we'll begin to wrap up our show.
Bob:Well, it was uh it was a delicious section of uh scripture that we've been into yesterday. Uh we looked at Isaiah 40, uh, did the lead-in with Isaiah 39, which I've already commented on. Um but I but Isaiah 40 really starts after this this coming catastrophe that that is set up in Isaiah 39. It gets us into the exile and the people of God leaving their homeland, being taken from their homeland, going into Babylon. Um and and I really do, and we we can talk a little bit more about uh the author, but I do think Isaiah is writing this prophetically, uh, looking toward the future when the people will be in exile, and he's giving them a good word. He's offering them comfort. And so um we talked a lot about how we respond to catastrophe, and there were four truths in the book of I in Isaiah chapter 40 that I think we need to really we really need to take heart. The first one was God will comfort his people, that's the first eleven verses. And then in the middle section we learned, secondly, that God is the king of creation, God's gonna call us by name, and then finally, and most famously, the last section talks about God providing certainty in the chaos. He's gonna uh help us when we're weary, he's gonna be the one who holds us in his hand, he's gonna be the one who walks with us even when we're tired, and he'll lift us up on eagle's wings. Um so the main theme was that in order to prepare for a coming catastrophe, we have to wait or trust in the Lord. Are you trusting in the Lord this week? And we can talk more about that. But that's the general outline and the gist of the message.
Tim:Awesome. Thank you so much. Uh so since you mentioned it, why don't we jump right in? Uh, you you kind of teased a little bit and you saw the podcast yesterday. Um, this idea that there's some speculation and some debate amongst scholars uh of who vote who wrote I think everyone pretty much agrees that Isaiah himself wrote Isaiah 1 through 39, but there is a little bit of speculation about who actually was it actually Isaiah that wrote chapter 40 verse uh chap uh chapter 42, 66. Um and you you gave your opinion yesterday, but you said you'd unpack it a little bit more on the podcast, so let's not keep people waiting. What are your what are your thoughts on Deuterrough Isaiah?
Bob:Yeah, and I hadn't really thought about this uh very much for a while since my seminary days, but when Dave and I did this um uh training session with Tim Mackey last fall, some of the uh lead-in materials uh got into this this topic. Um and there there's some interesting thoughts on it. But but it's been a topic that's been long discussed, long debated about whether um there's one one author, the prophet Isaiah, son of Amos, or if there's multiple authors. So the the summary is is basically uh everybody agrees pretty much that Isaiah 1 to 39, it's got historical background, historical backing. Um Isaiah wrote those. But then when you get to chapter 40, there seems to be this shift. You have the scene in Isaiah forty, particularly the verse eleven verses, that seem a lot like Isaiah chapter six, that throne room where you know the seraphim are flying around and they're crying out, holy, holy, holy, and God brings this coal to Isaiah's lips and he commissions him to go and speak for his people. Uh but here uh it looks like he he's calling him to speak a word of comfort, to speak a word of goodness to his people, and then also with similar language. There's a voice crying out, there's a response. Uh so is this a um uh a commission of a new author? Is it is it duplicating what happened in that Isaiah 6 passage, or is it uh uh a commission again for Isaiah the prophet and cause calling him to extend and speak uh to his people? And I I tend to lean on the second uh part. Now, the um main arguments for the multiple authors are the historical references. So when you you read one to thirty-nine, you know, there definitely is that background. Remember Pastor Day when the first week said you gotta go read first Kings 15 to 22 and then the related portions of Chronicles. Um but then forty to sixty-six doesn't have as much historical background. It looks very much like he's writing after the people of God are in exile, um, waiting for the return. That's sort of the tone of forty to sixty-six. They're waiting, they're waiting for this Messiah to come, they're looking forward to this this new Jerusalem that he talks about when you get into the into the sixties of Isaiah. Um also Cyrus of Persia is named in Isaiah 44, even though he lived 150 years um in the future uh from when Isaiah was writing. Um most people traditionally think that Isaiah was killed during the reign of Manasseh, one of the last really, really terrible, awful kings of Israel that he was sawn into. Uh it was a really terrible end for the prophet. Um so obviously he wasn't there during the exile. Um there's also a chain in tone, uh change in tone. So again, Isaiah 1 to 39 is about judgment, it's a warning of judgment, but then Isaiah 40 to 66 focuses on comfort and restoration in the future. Um so you have the pre-exilic and the post-exilic Israel kind of focus here. And there's some differences in style and vocabulary. Um you know, there's some variations in the Hebrew stuff. So that's the main reason people bring up the multiple authors. But um the arguments for Isaiah's authorship and the unity of the book, uh, I think I think are stronger. So um and here here's I'll just go through a couple. Number one, there's an ancient Jewish and Christian tradition that both the Hebrew Bible and the Septuagint, which is the the Greek um translation of the of the Hebrew Bible, the Masoretic text, they treat Isaiah as a single book with no author divisions. So um those are are Bibles that were written much closer to the actual time and events of this happening. And so I tend to think the closer you get back to the time that it was written, uh there's going to be some more accuracies. Uh also Jesus and the New Testament authors quoted from both halves of Isaiah, and they attribute it all to Isaiah the prophet. They don't say, Oh, Isaiah wrote this, and Deutero Isaiah wrote this, and Trito Isaiah wrote this. It's one Isaiah. Um also I I mentioned um that there's some unified literary and theological themes. So one example is the use of the word holy. Uh the holy one of Israel came up again in Isaiah forty. Um that word is used throughout evenly the book of Isaiah. It wasn't something that was used at the beginning and then forgotten. It's a it's a constant theme. Uh-huh. Um there's a theme of judgment and sin and redemption, God's sovereignty over the nations. They appear throughout the book. There's some contrast, but not not super stark ones. Um also if this was indeed a prophetic insight, that's a very core biblical concept. So Isaiah naming Cyrus 150 years in the future is consistent with a claim that he makes in chapter 46. Uh-huh. He uh God says, I make known the end from the beginning. So do we believe that God can see the future, predict the future, and reveal that to his prophet? I very much agree he can. And then the last thing I'll mention is just the manuscript evidence. So the Dead Sea scrolls, which were a major discovery in the uh the Qumran caves back in the day, they are dated before Christ, and they contain the entire book, the entire scroll of Isaiah as one continuous scroll, and there's no break between chapter 39 and chapter 40, which you would expect to see if you have multiple authors. Um those are some of the technical reasons. I definitely lean towards the one author view. Um other people might might disagree, um, but I I think that's I think that's the correct view. So there you go.
Tim:Quick follow-up question to that. Um Does either does that change at all? Um Okay, hold on. Does whether Isaiah was written all by Isaiah or deuter Isaiah and Isaiah change? Would that change at all how we should be reading it or looking at it?
Bob:I mean, I don't think so. Uh maybe in some people's minds it might be weird. Um but the idea would be that there's there's other authors that are writing later on in the voice of Isaiah, like they are Isaiah if you're taking the multiple author uh view, but the church did affirm Isaiah as the word of God at the councils and at councils and um yeah, the early councils. So it it is it has been affirmed as the authoritative word of God. Great. Um we can debate about the author thing, but I don't I don't think it changes how you would read it.
Tim:Great. Yeah. Uh so there's kind of two places that I think would be cool for us to kind of park um the bus a little bit here uh today. The first one, um, you talked a little bit about idolatry, and I I I know there's some people who really like this visual that you put up, so I'll put up on the screen here. For those of you who are listening online, it is the cow uh idolatry cow that uh passes.
Bob:Which is why you should subscribe on YouTube so you can see the visuals.
Tim:Uh yes, but if you are not, if you're if you're listening online, it it is a cow. Uh and it's in normally uh where it's sectioned off as pieces of meat that you would get from the butcher. Uh there's there's multiple sections with different modern day idols. So social media, ego, me, approval, pride, sex, drugs, career, possessions, control, um, overindulgence are some of the things that we are seeing uh on this cow. Um and you you talked in your sermon a lot yesterday about idols that we were seeing um in the time of Isaiah and how these idols were physical. You you showed the um when you went to the Penn Museum, the the um the artifacts that you showed on the podcast last week, um, and you made mention that today, for most people, our idols aren't like physical statues. They're they're actually they're they're more nuanced than that. Um so how how would you um help people to kind of identify what those are if they're not always just like physical uh if the idols are not like physical things that you're worshiping?
Bob:Yeah, well, they they could be physical things you're worshiping. So if you go like over the um was it last the summer before last, we did a mission trip with Amun Sharon, one of our our rural partners, and he took us down to a Hindu temple, and they do have uh like idols. Literally, I remember having a conversation with the guy down there about oh, we believe in this this little statue is containing the spirit of a specific god, and and they're worshiping and making sacrifices to these literally, to these idols. Um but when it we were talking about kind of secular modern western societies, they're not creating these these overt totem poles that they're they're worshiping, like like the Baal images or the the Asherah images, although those were all over ancient Israel. There was all this inner mixture, and that's why God told Israel to go in and take them down, and then you hear about these Israelite kings that are putting the high places back up and then they're taking them down. If you put them back up, you're walking away from God, you take them down. But the good kings usually did that. Um But in in our modern day, uh yes, I think there there is um a lot of those things you saw on the cow are are prevalent. So and and and it's it's um uh it's deceptive because some of the things that become idols are good things. That as Tim Cower says, they become ultimate things. So you don't think that your education could be an idol, but it could, because if it takes an ultimate controlling position in your life, um that can very much become an idol. The thing that you focus your attention and your your the thing you glorify the most, the thing that will will make you weep if you lose it. Um I think that's how Keller describes it in Counterfeit Gods. He says it if it's anything that if you were to lose it, you would think. Your life is not worth living. So even your family. Family is a good thing, but family, you can have an idolatrous relationship with your family, with your job, with uh romance. Uh, some folks that uh go from person to person, they date, or they're constantly waiting to look and see if they they have a marriage partner, and that becomes like the central focus of your life and what you're about and what drives you, that that can become that can become an idol. Um uh money. Uh, but m also money is a is uh is a clue into what it is that you're pursuing. Fame, fortune, all of that. So did that answer your question, or do you want me to go to go on?
Tim:No, yeah, that that absolutely answered my question. Uh, this is something that comes up um in in youth ministry a lot as well. Um, you know, I'm I'm a one of the leaders at our youth group here, um, under Johnny. And this is something that I think we see a lot um with our teens, this idea like these unrecognized idols. And I think a lot of times like it's it's things like like it's school um and it's sports, um, and and you know, it's it's our how what do we look like? How are people how are we being perceived by other people that we see a lot? And it starts to like you see, some of these are good things, like yeah, I think playing a sport is a good thing. I think your education and your grades are good things, but sometimes these things what they'll start to become, like you said, ultimate things, and these things are taking you away um from your time with God and your relationship with God and ultimately weakening it.
Bob:Um and it's they're not put in their proper place, right? They become something that you care about more than God, or do you lose your identity if you don't have it?
Tim:Yeah, yeah. Um and yeah, ultimately, yeah, these things kind of take over, and it's it's really important to um to see those things. I know something that I think we see a lot in today's society, and I can speak for this to this um from myself um from the past, is I think especially um amongst some young men, is I think their sports sports teams um kind of become idols. You know, I see I hear about people, and this used to be me, I hear about people see people that just like are their day, if their sports team loses, like if if you're a Giants fan and the Giants lose and that ruins your entire Sunday, that I think that might be an issue.
Bob:That might be something that or your entire month.
Tim:Or yes, or in your or your entire month. Like if if you're if you're still like if if the fact that the Yankees didn't win the World Series this year is still something that is causing you mental health issues, that might be something that needs to be looked at. Um but that there's other things like that too. That's that's just something that that I have have seen personally.
Bob:Yeah, and and in Isaiah 40, it it's really clever what what he does because when he talks about the idol and um where is it? It's uh yeah, in verse 12, um uh or no no verse uh verse uh verse uh verse 18, he talks to whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare to him? An idol, right? So and then I mentioned that the word the Hebrew word for God is is El, which is also the same name for the the high God in the in the Canaanite pantheon, but when God, the God of the Hebrews, the God of Israel, is mentioned in the in the Old Testament, the word that's always used is Elohim. Um so what he's doing there is he's kind of he's kind of pointing out like God is not like like El, he controls El. El is not he he's not on the same level as the true God. Um I was watching the episode of the last episode of the House of David last night, and um uh there's an interesting scene where uh David's going off to battle to win uh uh to defeat the Philistines and win the hand of Michal to marry her and bring back a bride pipe price for for Saul, and he's talking with his friend Uriah, who of course comes up later on in the story of Bath David and Bathsheba. But uh Uriah is a Hittite, he spent time in Egypt, where all these other gods were, and then David asks him, Well, why did you come to Israel? What what do you like it? Why'd you stay here? And he goes, Well, your God is is real, he's not made of stone, like our gods over here. And that's really the theme that comes up over and over and over again, especially in the Old Testament. Um, and I think it has a lot of application for our lives. We're we're constantly going after these gods that are carved in our images, uh, that are made of stone and wood or metal nowadays, I suppose. Um, but our God is real and our God is true, and he has power over all things. And that's the the point of the middle section of Isaiah 40.
Tim:Amen. Uh, one other thing that I wanted to cover with you, if you don't mind, is uh you kind of talked a little bit about, you know, we used the great illustration of the hurricane and how we have hurricanes in our lives. Um, but there's also the illustration of the self-inflicted storm, right? The things that we kind of do to ourselves and the situations that we put ourselves in that are out that are in our control. Like we could have done something to avoid the situation we're in, or we've done something to ourselves that has put us in that situation. And I think a lot of times when we think about that, it's kind of just like it's kind of weird to think about. It's like like we put I put myself here, like I kind of deserve what I'm getting. And I feel like that like we almost almost causes us to look at God's grace in those situations differently. Um, you know, it kind of feels weird, like even to talk about those things. There's this view like, oh, this person did this to himself, he deserves it, you know, and we view that kind of grace differently. Uh I was just wondering if you'd had any more things that you wanted to speak into that kind of self-inflicted storm idea.
Bob:No, I I think it was a good point that was brought up when we were doing the run through and going through it, um, a point to add, uh, which I did. Um But we we do make choices in life, and sometimes we get ourselves into um predicaments, let's put it that way, because of the choices that we make. And in many ways we could make choices that go against what we know is right. Um so like with my kids. My my kids like to do things, or certain things that they like to rebel against. I'll say, Don't do that, and then they'll say no, and then usually they get they get punished, but they'll still do it later on. Um like my my daughter likes to do she's really into gymnastics, she likes to go and do um cartwheels all over the house, and multiple times we tell her, Don't do the cartwheel. Um and yet she'll bump into one of her siblings, or she'll bump her head, or she'll hit her foot, and then she comes over crying. And that's that's a self-inflicted um y mistake, uh hurricane if you want to call it that, a little hurricane. Um but in those moments she she she recognizes her her mistake and wants to come to her her her parent, her father, and receive grace and a hug. Um and that's I I think to your point, w we can make uh bigger decisions, bigger hurricanes, because we um you know made made made a bad decision with our money or a bad decision in a relationship. Uh those those things can be self-inflicted because we did stuff that we knew we weren't supposed to do, but yet God is still there to offer us grace. And uh in those moments I think the grace is even sweeter when we realize, hey, I know I shouldn't have done that, and yet I still did, and yet God still loves me.
Tim:Yeah. So how should we approach those situations in prayer? I think I would I would say probably more than likely the prayer that we are praying um for a storm that in a a storm in our life that is out of our control, the prayer that we pray to God for a storm that we uh started ourselves, I think that's a different prayer. Um so how should we approach those um those situations?
Bob:Yeah, obviously a hurricane we didn't have any control over, and disaster can strike there. But when we did something that was not honoring to God or not obedient, I think the the first thing that should be prayed is confession, uh repentance, turning back to God. Uh that's in a lot of ways what God is calling Israel to do. Um, you know, he he he uses the name, O Jacob, O Israel, because he's speaking tenderly to them and it's in uh verse uh twenty twenty-seven, right? Yeah, twenty uh forty-twenty-seven, uh God asks, My way is hidden from the Lord My way is hidden from the Lord and my my right uh my right is disregarded by my God. So he's saying, Why do you say those things? Why do you ask that? And what's interesting about about his question there is that the reason Israel is in exile, the reason Israel is in the place that they are in, is because they have chosen to turn their back on God, but yet God doesn't turn his back on them. So in that moment, the response um i is repentance. It's turn back to God, uh admit you're wrong, turn back to him and trust in him. Um and this happens over and over again. If you look at the book of Judges, uh uh so many times Israel uh gets in a predicament, they're getting conquered, they cry out to their God, and God intervenes, and yet after a certain period of time they forget, they turn away from him again, and yet the same they call it the judges cycle, the same thing keeps happening over and over again. Um and that can happen in our lives too. Um but our prayer is to say, Lord, I made a mistake, forgive me, I repent of this, I need to trust in you and not these other things. Um whereas I think if you you have a a hurricane that's outside your control, you're you're pleading with God for mercy and intervention um in a different way.
Tim:Yeah. That's good. So I guess to put a to put a bow on that, if there's anyone listening or watching this show today who is in the midst of a self-inflicted storm, uh, what would you say to that person listening under the sound of your voice today?
Bob:Under the sound of my voice, yes. Uh well I would say that God's God's grace runs deep. It runs deep, and his call is to to turn to him and trust him again. That's what the the idea of waiting for the Lord means. Uh the Hebrew word for wait is to trust. So those who trust in the Lord shall renew their strength. Um don't think that he's forgotten you, he's not. He is right there, and he's calling to you today to put your faith and your trust in him, and uh and he will intervene. Maybe not in the way that you think he should, but but he will. He he will hear your prayer when you do that genuinely and honestly.
Tim:Amen. That's awesome. Uh, is there is there anything else from your sermon that you'd like to touch on before we maybe move on here?
Bob:I don't think so. We covered that marathon pretty good, man, so let's just leave it at that.
Tim:All right.
Bob:Uh Dave, though, I will say, is gonna do uh he's gonna tackle a big chunk next week. He's gonna do 40 to 48 41 to 48, which is called the Trial of the False Gods, which is gonna pick up more and more on this idolatry theme. So if you're longing for more teaching on idolatry, uh show up this coming week, and Pastor Dave is gonna scratch where you itch.
Tim:Can't wait to be scratched. All right. So as we move into Speaking of Dave, speaking of Dave, as we move into the final part of our show today, just want to give you all of our amazing shuttle riders out there. We just want a quick announcement for you. Uh, those pesky teenagers will be taking the buses, uh, the vans to their fall retreat this weekend. I will be driving one of them. Sorry. Uh Larry gave me permission. Uh so we can uh if you ride the shuttle, uh, we would ask that uh we would not ask there won't be a shuttle for you. Uh so are we still are people still able to like park over there and walk? I know that's something that some people do.
Bob:That's that's a great question that I don't know the answer to. I don't see why not. You can park and you can walk.
Tim:So I I would assume we still have the speed to get your stokes in. If you're one of the shuttle, uh if you're one who uses the shuttle lot for your and and walkover, we you can still do that. I know some people do that, but uh, if you typically ride the shuttle, maybe get here a little early to make sure you have a spot because there will be no shuttle this week. It'll be back next week. All right, it is time for the theology sprint, uh, one of our favorite segments here where we try to we give the pastors a tough question um and see if they can answer it within 60 seconds. So normally uh it is Noah Graves uh who performs and and asks this question. That will uh be our theology sprint question. Uh, but he is not here. Uh and so then it would normally be me, but I am hosting the show. So I thought it would be fun if uh our very own Pastor Dave, who's not here on the show today, got a little bit of a spotlight. And so I asked him to ask a theology question for Pastor Bob today.
Bob:Oh, I have to answer it. I thought he was answering. Oh no, he's asking the question. Okay.
Tim:So here is Pastor Dave. See if I can get this to work.
Dave:Hey guys, glad to be with you today for today's theology sprint. I've thought long and hard about this, and I'm gonna try my best to stump you on this one. This question is about public theology. So here it goes. Is the church supposed to be focused on evangelism and sharing the spiritual message of the gospel, or should the church focus on social justice and caring for the poor and the marginalized in our society? There you go.
Bob:A well thought out uh question there from uh Pastor Dave.
Tim:Thank you, Pastor Dave.
Bob:If you're watching woke up at uh 12 o'clock just to answer that, ask that question. Uh normally he's up super early. Well, I I would say, and this is this is actually in our our core values for Millington Baptist Church, that um uh the church should be focused on both gospel proclamation and gospel demonstration. So uh the gospel proclamation is the very clear call of the gospel for you to repent of your sins, uh, to turn from your wicked ways and to give your life to Jesus Christ and to trust in him as your Savior, to be regenerated, to become a new person, uh new creation, as Paul tells us. Um now, the outworking of your salvation is, as James talked about, faith without works is dead. Uh, I do think there's an element where, as you read through Isaiah, we are called to do uh justice. Uh we can debate about the actual uh meaning of what social justice is, but when we talk about biblical justice, there is an element of us uh working in the world to help people and to uh uh make things right. Uh and until God comes back, I think we're called to bring the kingdom of God to earth uh by bringing justice, mercy, the common good to the people that are around us, seek the welfare of the city, uh Jeremiah tells us. And so I think it's a both and um there's both proclamation and there's uh demonstration, and the church should seek to live out both.
Tim:I agree.
Bob:There you go.
Tim:There it is. Thank you for that.
Bob:I'll let you wrap it up.
Tim:Yeah, thank you for that. Uh, and thank you, Pastor Dave, for asking the question. Well, we are at the end of our show for today. I hope you enjoyed it. We had so we had a really great interview, talked about a lot of good stuff. I surely am ready to get back behind the producer chair next week. This is this is definitely uh an area where I would leave for Pastor Dave week to week. But I hope you I hope you enjoyed a little bit of uh a little bit of a changeup. Uh Pastor Dave, get well soon. Switcheroo, right? A little bit of switcheroo.
Bob:Uh curveball right now.
Tim:Yes, that's good it was a good one of the better curveballs in baseball history. Uh enjoy the rest of your week. Make sure you get out to the polls tomorrow, and we will see you next week on Behind the Pulpit.