Tuesday, October 17th | Speak Life

Welcome back, everyone. Today is Tuesday, October the 17th. I'm Ryan Hill. I'm John Galantis. You're listening to Clearview Today with Dr. Abbadon Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearviewTodayShow.com, or if you have any questions for Dr. Shah or suggestions for new topics, send us a text at 252-582-5028, or you can email us at contact at ClearviewTodayShow.com.

That's right. You guys can help us keep the conversation going by supporting the show. You can share it online. Leave us a good review on iTunes or Spotify, anywhere you get your podcasting content from. Absolutely nothing less than five stars.

We're going to leave a link in the description so you can do just that. Today's verse of the day is coming to us from 1 Corinthians 6-12. It says, But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. I love that writing style that Paul has, where he reminds people of their identity. You have to think this would have been something that was especially significant for Paul, because identity was a big part of his journey. He wasn't always Paul. He was Saul.

He was the persecutor of the church, the persecutor of Christians, and then he had his identity shifted by Christ. So he's writing to the Corinthians here, and he's like, You are not who you used to be. You are not your former life. You were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified, not because of what you brought to the table, but in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

Those are all verbs. You were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified. Your identity is in what Jesus did.

It's also in who He is, but also what He did for you. That's where your identity is. And speaking of where your identity is, that is going to be the topic of today's gripe vine. Welcome to the gripe vine.

Today's, I got a juicy gripe today. You're talking about identity, right? Yes. We live in the South. We do. I grew up in the South. I would not consider myself a country boy. I don't like any of the stereotypical Southern things. I mean, I wouldn't say I don't like them, but I would not consider myself a country boy.

Yeah, I'm not into them. I don't hunt. I don't fish. I don't go mud. I don't get my truck stuck in a mud puddle on purpose. You know, silly, silly, foolish things of Southern youth. Do you like that? That caught me way off guard. That was very funny. You think about it.

Stuck in a mud puddle on purpose. Yeah, that's that's what we do for fun here because we don't have TVs or any of your fancy magic electronics. So I grew up in what a lot of people, and I know David, you want to go ahead and cut your mic on because I know you think this. I grew up in a time where people consider that the golden age of like radio pop country music.

Oh yeah. And all the songs that people love are so cringy. They are so cringe.

It sets my teeth on edge. Back then I didn't really hear it, but like now, like, okay, what's, what's the one that you always see all the time? The one about the hillbilly selling turnips on the side of the road and he convinces a woman to leave. I was sitting there selling turnips on a flatbed truck. That's a great song.

It's a great song. There's a hillbilly sitting on the side of the road. A woman comes up, asks for directions. He says, Hey, I'll tell you what, you can go that way to your destination or you can spend the rest of your life here in the backwoods with me. No, what he said is way up yonder past the caution line.

I know what he said. There's a little country store with an old Coke sign. You got to stop and ask Ms. Bell for some of her sweet tea. Which itself, that itself is like Anne of L.A. trying to dupe the girl, because who is Ms. Bell? Yeah, it's his mother. It's his mom.

And she's asking for directions to L.A. Why are you telling me about this? But a right. A left's going to take you to the interstate. That's great. But a right will bring you right back here to me.

She should have squealed tires and went on. What's the other one? All these songs, if you start looking at the country songs of the 90s, they're all so, so cringy. What's the one about the, um, about the, uh, my son cussed in the truck? I've been watching you. That ain't that cool. I want to be like you and eat all my food. Eat all my food. Strong as you are. That's a great song. That's a good one.

Why is it a good one? What's the one? Um, there's another one. Um, you gotta, you gotta, which one?

The, the carrot top that can barely walk. Yeah, Mr. Mom.

No, that's not Mr. Mom. It's, um, that's, uh, my front porch.

What does that mean? My front porch is looking in. The best view is on my front porch looking like he's looking into his house and his family. And Ryan, you said Mr. Mom, which is, I do love Mr.

Mom. Classic. See, I know David, you're having a field day right now. These are songs that you're like, and I can't tell if you're like, these are cringe, but I still like them. You're like, these are legitimately lit songs. You want to know one of my favorite cringe country songs? What? The, um, oh gosh. I can't remember the name, the name of the song, but it's the auction one.

Oh, the Grundy County auction. Yeah, yeah. I said, hey pretty lady, won't you give me a sign? I'll do anything to make you my own mind. Harmonize with me, David.

Teach you back in call two, three. Never seen anyone looking so fine, man. I got to have it. She's a one of a kind. She's going once, going twice.

I'm sold to the lady in the second row. Yeah, that was good. That's a lot of fun. You got to cease and desist. Oh no. They're fun. I hate it.

Okay. Look, yeah, I'll, I'll come back a little bit on my gripe. They're cringy, but they can be kind of fun. I mean, with most, as with most pop songs, they're cringy, but they're fun. I feel like that's pretty much pop music. What's your favorite cringy country song, David, that we didn't mention?

Probably Me and My Gang by Rascal Flatts. What is that? You've never heard that song? No. Oh, that's a good one. How about this?

Yeah. Let's cut to a break. We'll listen to it. Let's go to the ad break.

We'll listen to it and then we'll come back and talk about it with Dr. Shep. Okay. Me and My Gang. Yeah. Rascal Flatts is in a gang? Yes.

We're going to rip off a dude selling turnips on the side of the road. Dude. Oh, man. All right.

Some overlap. Let's, let's talk to Pashaw and see what his, what his favorite country song is. Let's listen to Me and My Gang by Rascal Flatts.

Let us know about your favorite cringy country music. Text in and let us know 252-582-5028 or visit us online at cleareadtodayshow.com. We'll be right back. Hey everyone.

My name's Illie. And I'm David. We want to take a minute and let you know how we can actually serve you as you're listening to Clearview Today. The Bible paints an extraordinary picture of who we are as a church body. The mission of Clearview Church is to lead all people into a life-changing, ever-growing relationship with Jesus Christ. A huge part of leading people is praying for them. A big reason that Christians have unanswered prayers in their life is because they're not praying.

You know, 1 John 5 15 says, and if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of him. If you're listening to the Clearview Today show, we want to know how we can pray for you as well. There's a number of ways that you can get in touch with us at Clearview and share your prayer requests, but the best way is by texting us at 252-582-5028. You can also send us an email at prayer at clearviewbc.org or you can download the Clearview app on iTunes or Google Play.

You know, on that app there's a dedicated prayer wall that helps us to get to know what's going on in your life, how we can pray for you, and how we can take any necessary steps to get you moving in the right direction. Thanks for listening. Now let's get back to the show. Welcome back to Clear View Today with Dr. Abbadan Shah, the daily show that engages mind and heart for the gospel of Jesus Christ. You can visit us online at ClearViewTodayShow.com or if you have any questions or suggestions for new topics, send us a text at 252-582-5028.

That's right. If today's your first time ever tuning into the Clear View Today show, we want to welcome you, let you know exactly who's talking to you today. Dr. Abbadan Shah is a PhD in New Testament textual criticism, professor at Carolina University, author, full-time pastor, and the host of today's show. You can find all of his work on his website. That's AbbadanShah.com.

That's an interesting title. Professor, Carolina University. Yeah, that's right. He is Carolina University. A lot of people don't know this, Dr. Shah, but you have actually, you are a patron of the South, or really I should say a citizen of the South, longer than you have been of India because you came to, you moved to Georgia in 1991.

That's correct. And have been in the South ever since. Have you ever heard country music that just set your teeth on edge?

Oh, well, how do I say this? I always loved the old West. Okay. I love the old West. I love cowboys stuff.

I love Indians. As evidenced by the props behind you. Yes.

Yes. This is all me. People will be shocked to know how much I know about the West, whether they are, you know, the Spaghetti Westerns or Tombstone or whatever. I've watched them all hundreds of times. I love, you know, the old gunfighters.

I love them all. Bat Masterson, Wyatt Earp, you name it. Wild Bill Hickok, all those guys.

But then when it comes to country music. Yeah. Yeah. I like it.

I like it. The old ones, right? I like the old ones. I even like some of the ones that I was listening to when I first got here, but then something happened to it. It changed. Something happened to country music. Like nineties country was one thing, but something happened after that. Yeah. I even still think that was pretty crazy. Like when I hear some of those old, like, what was the ones we were talking about earlier this morning?

It was like Grundy County auction. I just cringe. I cringe so hard. It's just, you know, so cheesy.

So if you ask me what is the one, and I don't hate country music. I like it. You know, it's, especially when I'm having a bad day. Just kidding.

At least I'm not as bad off as. Yeah. No. But the new country music, people don't have bad days.

In fact, they have decided to put rap and country together. Yeah. Now that I don't get. Yeah. Cause it's like country music, but it's talking about how big my truck is, how much money I have, all my designer boots.

I thought this was for the working man. Yeah. So, so not that I hate rap music or whatever, you know, people like it.

I had a roommate who loved listening to rap music. That's a genre. Okay. Leave that there. And country music is a different genre. And I know we're trying to play eighties rock. I get it, but bring them together with 2000s rap with eighties rock. I don't know.

It just didn't do for me. I was just like envisioning these guys who are country bows, but they're trying to just, you know, those cars that do up and down what I call those things with the hydraulics, yeah. Like lowriders or something. Lowriders, downtown Atlanta. They step out and they got the cowboy boots with the spurs. I'm having trouble identifying.

Where do I go? It's like, we're crossing genres here. And it's not, it's not, it's just not meshing well.

Yeah. You know, what's funny is like when they write these songs, they, they forget how critical their words are. Like the words they choose when they write these songs, like you'd like a blue jeans, a cold drink, a red pickup, what was the other, like a cornfield. Like that's all they used to need.

But now they have all this, these unnecessary filler words taking up space. When I first met Nicole, I mean, she was, she would listen to country music. I don't know why I, people had dated. I knew one girl, I didn't date forever, but she had pure country on repeat from the moment she got up. And so I don't know, but, but Nicole loved country music, George Strait, John Michael Montgomery.

And then, then the Christian country, I forgot the name now. It's terrible. Yeah. Yeah. There was, there was, but anyways, a lot of good stuff out there. Yeah.

Yeah. Good stuff. And, you know, John, I appreciate that, that segue that you kind of lobbed there.

The, the word, the word, the power behind the words of country music. You're usually a lot smoother with the segues than me. It was good. It was good. So we were talking today.

We, we began this conversation yesterday talking about the power behind our words and it was really eye opening. I messed it up. Not at all. I was, I was actually hoping you would kind of, you would kind of bridge it a little smoother. Cause I was like really fumbling to get it out. Just really rocky. It's like trying to, you ever ride a bicycle down a gravel path?

Yeah. It's like, yeah, I made it, but it wasn't fun. If you have a dog who doesn't run up to you and try to bark at you and bite you, he's like, that makes it really bad. You're like scat. He like grabs your pant leg.

It like, it doesn't hurt, but it scares you. And you're on gravel. That was me. I was a dog just a moment ago. Anyway, so we're talking about our words today.

And you began this conversation yesterday. It was really eye opening to think about, you know, what your words bring to the table. Are you building people up or are you tearing people down? Are you encouraging people or are you discouraging people?

And Dr. Shah you reminded us yesterday that our words hold within them either the power of life or the power of death. Yeah. This is the way I began the last episode by saying this message is convicting or this episode is convicting.

This one is convicting again, because all of us, all of us fall into that trap where we say things that don't really build people up. Right. And so even if we have to correct people, we have to go about the right way. And that's not always done. I don't always do that.

And so this episode is for me as well. But I would say though, it's important to recognize when the people in your life, especially those who are over you do build you up. Cause even at lunch today, we were talking about this and this is one of the things I love about when we sit down to eat together as a team at Clearview is we talk about these things that matter. And even today you were like, Hey guys, I want you all to take ownership of the thing you're doing because you are impacting the world and you are impacting this community.

And sometimes, I mean, I would say oftentimes your teams need to hear that. And it's good to hear that, especially from your pastor, from your boss that, Hey, it's not that you're not doing well. It's that you have so much more in you and you have so much more that you can be. And I believe you can do it. And I want that for you. What I wanted to say, and I hope I'd communicated that is that God has put you here.

It's not that I have hired you. God has put you here. There have been people who have come through here and shuffled along and God had them here for a season, but this isn't, this was not the place for them, but God has you guys here for a reason, claim it, own it. And now do with God's help, of course, and for his glory, do what will make an impact for God's kingdom for the gospel of Christ for eternity, right? Do whatever it takes. This is yours. And I have caught that vision.

I caught it years ago and it took time to build and refine and, and purify. But now, I mean, this is my life. This is my vision and I see what's coming. And so anyways, thank you for saying that. And I hope I always even in moments when I have to correct you guys or say, Hey, let's try to think this way. I hope I will do it in a way that is hopeful, encouraging, but at the same time, not sugar coated either.

That doesn't help anybody. So I have a lot to learn. You do, you do an incredible job of helping us not just be task oriented, but helping us be vision oriented. So you have, we have these tasks that we have to get done. I mean, in order to make the week function or to make services happen on the weekend, we have to get these things done and we've got to knock them out. But it can be easy to be driven by, I've finished everything on my checklist. I've got everything done.

And then Tuesday rolls around and I'm going to just start that checklist again. But you do an incredible job of keeping us focused on the longterm, on the vision, on here's why all this is mattering. Here's why all this is happening.

It's not just complete X, Y, and Z. It's this is where we're headed and this is how your tasks are helping us get there. I think the past couple of years have shown me that most miscommunications, I don't even know if it's in ministry, but just in work in general is a imbalance of the how versus the why. Because like me, I know I'm bent towards the how. Like, hey, someone else has set this vision. Here's this vision for the church. Cool.

I'm interested in how this is going to happen. But when I focus on the how all the time, I do lose track of the why. And it's not enough just to say, okay, I've already bought in. I've already agreed to the why. Now I never have to hear it again.

I do need to hear it again. Because a lot of times I get so focused on the how that I start to forget, if I realign myself with the why, I realize that a lot of these how questions sort of clear themselves up. You know what I mean? And also life has a way of distracting us. People have a way of distracting us. So I hope answering the whys and hearing words of vision and direction and goals will help us get back on track. Because I need that at times as well. And you guys helped me by things you do with excellence by staying on a task or even this conversation right now is helping me go, okay, it's good.

This is good. If they really believe what they're saying, we are headed in a good direction. So those words that you're giving are also in line with our conversation today, which is words have power, right? You know, that's what we're talking about today is that words have power. God has entrusted us with incredible power. And that power is not located in our minds or our biceps.

Although mind does have power, and our biceps can accomplish a lot. But the power we're discussing today is located in our mouths. We can either use our words to breathe life, or we can use our words to bring death.

Yeah. And I know yesterday, we were reading in Proverbs, and we kind of got into it where we were talking, we basically said that. And it was really cool, because you said it at the top of this episode as well, is when the love of God is in you, when God is truly in this place, if he's the one who brought us here, then those words flow from him, right?

You know what I mean? It's not just that I'm choosing the right words. It's that God is giving us those words. Yeah. And that's an encouraging thought. Absolutely.

The love of God is flowing through our hearts. Right. Right. And so we just talked about the Old West, right? And during the summer, especially in places like Nevada, a pool of water would be sitting under the hot sun, and the surface water would evaporate, leaving behind deadly minerals and high concentration. Oh, yeah. So an unsuspecting thirsty traveler would drink from it, and the arsenic would cause a rapid and painful death. So the signs that you look for are dead vegetations, and animal or human bones by this little oasis. Somebody else that tried to do the same thing.

Same thing. And they crawled around a little bit until they collapsed. And you can just imagine incredible pain. And they died. So the question I want to ask people is, you're listening to somebody in your life, right? We're all listening to somebody. The person you're listening to, are they surrounded by death? Or are they surrounded by life?

Wow. That's a good point. There are people who will speak in your life, speak to you, speak around you. But if you look around them, even if their words sound very interesting, intriguing, inspiring, encouraging, but then there's a stench of death that is there. Lives are destroyed. Hearts have failed. Marriages have fallen apart.

Kids have gone off in craziness. And when you see that, they just know that it looks like good water, but it's actually arsenic. And I like that you bring that up because something that I've learned is that I'm not nearly as wise and strong minded as I think I am.

So like the way that you put it, that's really helped me is, you know, cause I've always thought like, I'm going to listen to this person and be the bigger person and be open-minded. Really, I'm just allowing them to use my ear and my heart as their garbage disposal. It's their trashcan.

There's pouring all that sludge into it. And I'm sitting there thinking I'm righteous and holy and letting them do it. And I think that's what people do.

Yeah. And they do. And just watch lives around them. They may hop from church to church, but sooner or later, and usually sooner than later, right.

They will contaminate and corrupt and even make sick the people around them. And then all of a sudden the joy is gone. Life is gone and there's nothing but a disgruntled, angry, bitter, depressing, evil satanic spirit takes over and you go, what just happened here? Oh, you drank from what you thought was good water.

But you drank some arsenic laden water, laced water. And so verse 13, this is Proverbs 11. That's where we are folks. It says, wisdom is found on the lips of him who has understanding, but a rod is for the back of him who is devoid of understanding. Not the rod. Beat him.

Not the rod, dude. How do you get understanding? Like, I mean, that's, I guess that's really the question. I want understanding. The word is Nabon, which means someone who seeks and finds knowledge. Someone who recognizes the moral order of God, someone who submits himself or herself to the guidance and correction of God. So a person who is ultimately submitted, I know there's another religion that has taken the whole idea of submission, but that is bad submission. That's got nothing to do with truth. You can submit to a lot of things, but submitting to the triune, holy God who has spoken to us through his scriptures, whose son is the only way truth and life, submitting to him is being understanding.

Wow. There's also false submissions. Let's not go there. Yeah, that's true. And that makes the rod make so much more sense because what do you do if someone is, if someone or something is defiant and they're out of line? Well, I mean, there are times when you have to like forcibly get them back in line. If a person is not submitting to God and his moral order, they're prideful, they're boastful, they're bucking authority. Do you think it's also like this thing of you can't even hear wisdom or you can't even receive wisdom, like even if you hear it because you're defiant or you're devoid of understanding? Oh, absolutely.

Absolutely. You see people like that in life. You see people like that in church and even we have at certain seasons or days or hours have gone through that period of defiance and it's a horrible place until you drop everything and just submit to a holy, righteous, loving, gracious, all powerful, all wise, all caring God. When you submit to him, all of a sudden wisdom and understanding comes in and you realize, wow, that's all it was?

Shucks. I will submit every single moment, but then our sinful nature returns. People do people things and we go back to self-preservation, self-pride, arrogance, defiance and sometimes we do that even towards God and well, okay, the lesson starts again. Well, and then what could have been something that built us up for the goodness of God's kingdom just becomes a lifelong lesson on repeat that we have to... Yeah. And sometimes some lessons you have to go through for years.

So just want to talk to people who are listening to us on the radio or maybe on YouTube, watching us. If you are that person or if you know somebody in your life who doesn't seem to get it, just know that sometimes it takes a while for them to be broken again and again and again and again. But in time, if the Holy Spirit is in them, they will come to an understanding of who God is and what he's doing and how to let go and let him take charge.

I think it's a good point because you see a lot of times on the internet or you see on TikTok or you see just in churches or in universities or wherever, people are hearing wisdom, good godly wisdom, but they get angry at it because they think that the professor or a guest speaker, whoever, they think they're being condescending to them or they think they're scolding them or they think maybe even in our own lives, we have leaders and authority figures giving us that godly wisdom, even sometimes from the pulpit, and we buck up at it because we're not there to receive it. Hey, I've done that. I've done that to my own mentors, people who I've asked to be my mentor.

I've asked them, can you guide me? And then when they gave me an advice I didn't like, I had plenty of defenses. Let me explain to you my... You don't understand what I... And I had to bite my tongue and then in time realize, look, I've asked this person to be my mentor. They are speaking to me and I went into the defensive mode.

I didn't need to do that. And so what I've learned through the years is just be quiet, wait. And once the dust settles, if it's not true, if there is somewhere in what they were telling you is a misunderstanding of your situation, okay, then reconcile within yourself. But if not, most of the time you'll find they were right. You just didn't like what they were telling you. Yeah, I think it's actually funny you say that because the next verse actually says exactly that.

That's really crazy. Wise people store up knowledge. This is Proverbs 11.14. But the mouth of the foolish is near destruction.

I can't tell you how many times I've been there. I can't tell you how many times I've been so close to the edge of destruction just because I didn't know when to stop talking. And you don't even clock it. You don't even realize you're that close to the brink. No, because I'm so smart and I'm so savvy that if I just keep talking, I can bulldog my point of view onto someone else. You know what I mean? I'm so convinced that if I just keep talking, they'll understand me.

And it just has never worked once. Maybe there's some people who are listening or who are watching today, Dr. Shaw, and they recognize this in themselves. Like, I have been in this place or I am currently in this place and I need to submit to God.

I need to submit my will to His order and gain understanding. What are some practical steps that people can take to bring that about in their own lives? I would say one place is self-reflection. Just do a genuine examination of your own self. You don't have to believe everything bad that people have said about you. So I'm not saying go ahead and just say yes, they're all right. No. Ask yourself in light of God's word, are there places in your life where you need to change?

That's different. Human beings, friends, family, enemies, neighbors, strangers will accuse you of a lot of garbage. I'm not for a moment telling you that submitting means saying, okay, everybody's right about me.

No, that may be not true. But ask yourself in light of what God is telling us in His word through His Holy Spirit, are there things in your life that you can do differently, words that you can use in a better way? Is there a filthy fountain inside of you that is bringing forth words that are not right?

Okay. Now, how about submitting to God? How about letting Him do His deep work in your life? How about letting the life of Jesus Christ flow through you? And it comes from a place of submission, and almost a sense of letting Him take over and saying, God, you do what you need to do.

Yeah. Man, I pray that I'm always in that posture. And I pray that for our listeners and our viewers as well. If you guys enjoyed today's episode, or if you have questions about what that might look like in your life, send us in text 252-582-5028. We'd love to encourage you to help me take those next steps. Make sure to visit us online at clearveetodayshow.com.

Don't forget, you can partner with us financially on that same website. John, what's coming up on tomorrow's episode? Diving back into Contends Day Wednesday. Contends Day Wednesday.

Our apologetics are on the horizon. Stay tuned. We'll be back same time, same station. Very exciting. Love you guys. We'll see you tomorrow on Clearveet Today.