This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Masculine Journey, and we're back again this week. And no, this is not Sam Main.
If y'all were getting used to him down in Spartanburg in that area, well, we've changed up on you again. And I'm the resort host, Danny Marsh, the last resort usually. I was going to say guest, but you went there. Yeah, I went there. Yeah, yeah, they don't let me out of the cage often, but here we are.
Well, they let me do it a few years back and thought better of me ever doing it again. Well, there's probably been some committee meetings on my say-so here, so you know. Anyway, we have an interesting topic this week for you, and Jim, I believe this is your topic. It is, and it was inspired because I found myself having an old mic card song, and if you don't know who Michael Card is, you missed all the really good contemporary Christian music. But that was contemporary in the 80s and 90s and 60s and 70s. Well, actually, he did start this earlier than that, but he was big in the 80s. That was like the phonograph era, wasn't it? Well, we had cassette tapes back then. You probably had to explain that one to some listeners, I'll tell you that.
If you're that young, look it up, because you're good on your phone, unlike us old. I almost said fogies, but I did say fogies, but that wasn't what I was going for. But anyway, we are looking at the power of God's paradox, paradoxes, and he had a song that I probably shouldn't even mention the name of it, because that offends some people that are easily offended, but it was an excellent song, and it was about the power of the paradox of Jesus as fully man, fully God, and it extends on from many of those. And we are going to look into the things that seem illogical to us, like Christ as the servant king, and you can look at that different ways. But our opening clip... Well, break down just for those of us who thought paradox was a pair of shoes, a little simpler of what a paradox actually is.
Please. Because it is something that is true, but seems illogical. How can you be a king and a servant at the same time?
How can you be first and be last, or last and be first? And we got a million of them. And a lot of them.
How do you wash your disciples' feet? How does that make sense? There are many things that God has presented that are backwards of what culture would say is the truth. The rich are poor.
The poor are rich. And now you can introduce, since I was stepping on your toes. No, you weren't.
No, you weren't. I got steel toes on. Nia is required for this radio show. We're being a part of this group. Being a part of this group, you need steel-toed shoes.
Or you could be in my condition, and you can step on my toes, and I don't notice it, unless you're a little old lady stomping on it. True. We have it. I'm leaving that one alone.
Andy, you have the first clip. So before I start, I'm just thinking of what Jim's talking about. My mind went to Isaiah 55, where God says, My ways are not your ways.
We don't – sometimes we just think the world goes by what our thoughts are, what the world's – what the predominant thought is about a particular topic. We kind of go with that. So anyway, this clip is from The Chosen, and it's Jesus and Matthew, and this is not in the Bible here. This is some of the artistic license. But they're kind of coming up with what the Sermon on Mount is going to be about. And they're bouncing ideas off, and Jesus just comes up with the idea and shares it a little bit with Matthew, and you hear this. But the Sermon on the Mount, and specifically the Beatitudes part of it, there's paradoxes all through there. It just doesn't make sense to, like I said, the prevailing thoughts of the world of how things should operate. And we'll just play the clip and let you hear it from Jesus himself, or at least the guy that's acting as Jesus. Jesus did say it first. Okay. The what?
Directions, where people should look to find me. Have I? Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Yes.
But how is it the map? If someone wants to find me, those are the groups they should look for. Yeah, and that's where Jesus has really taken us into, not just trying to extract something from this life, but actually looking for those groups of people that are in need, and that we actually find him in that, when we're looking at life upside down. I had a pastor one time that said, we live in an upside down kingdom. The ideas, the prevailing thoughts of the world are not what operates here.
The truth of God and those things that counter the prevailing worldly wisdom is how it operates, and that truth. That's a perfect example of that conversation he's having there with Matthew, and telling that story of who really matters in the kingdom. Again, we tend to focus sometimes on our own selves of trying to be the greatest in the kingdom by how we are looked upon by our fellow Christians or the world or even, but instead of really humbling ourself and being a servant like Jesus, like he washed the feet. Ironically, I think, his life modeled exactly what you were saying because all the disciples and all the people who followed him were looking for a leader to take him out from under the role of oppression and everything, and here's this guy, just a regular guy, and he's doing all the stuff that they're doing. There's no way a rabbi would do this or a leader would do that, and he's just turning the world upside down.
He is, and sadly, that's a lot of the leadership we have now are the new rabbis, the pastors that are up on a pedestal instead of down in the trenches with the troops, and looking for the most humble leader we can find, and these days, that's not that easy to find. Well, probably in those days, too, as well. It's not something men want to hear. Men or people in general, it's just our kingdom, it's to extract as much as we can out of this life.
I don't want to jump ahead. I think somebody's going to use the idea of the Scripture that I was going to mention, but it is a counterculture compared to the rest of the world, Christianity done right, done the way Jesus gave his direction. I mean, all through the New Testament, you find the very things that, and the Old Testament, too, but there's so many. Jesus was an epitome of, you think the kingdom of God looks like this, it doesn't.
It looks like this. And all through his Scripture, I mean, all through the New Testament Scripture, when he's challenging the Pharisees, it's usually somewhere along the lines of the beatitudes. Anybody else got anything they want to share? We've got a few minutes before the break. One of the things that strikes me is the people that say, well, I want Jesus, but not the church. Well, guess what?
You can't have that. Jesus loved the church and gave himself for it. So if he loves the church, who do you think you are that you can say you don't need or want or love the church? And the thing is, people may be looking for the perfect church. That exists only in Jesus' realm. If you found one, you couldn't be a part of it, because you're not perfect.
You're going to mess it up. Nor am I. So there's a contradiction in terms there that people are wanting. You talk about people being put on a pedestal and then getting knocked off by having the pedestal kicked out from under them because they get caught doing wrong things. They're not perfect. But those of us looking at them are not perfect either.
And it's a question of what direction are you going in, not have you attained perfection, because you cannot and will not. But you better be headed in the right direction. Yeah, and that's where, when you said something about the church, you start looking around like there's churches everywhere. But most of the churches aren't churches anymore.
You've got somebody in there. They're leading something, but it's not church. It's not what Jesus brought. It's nothing even close. It's not the Word of God.
It's got so many things that are off from it. And we just sit there and watch this. We see it. We know what's going on. But it's hard to fight that with some people because, oh, no, this is true.
It's not the truth. Yeah, well, that's so true, Rodney, that you have to look for the genuine part of the church. Look us up on masculinejourney.org and you can find a lot of information.
See you after a break. What we have at our boot camp is something that makes you stronger and gives you the strength to go on your regular walk with God. It's something that will make you be bigger than you were when you got there. I think sometimes as men, we feel like we're on our own and we've got to do everything ourselves and the weight of the world is on our shoulders and it's our job to fix everything and make everything right and have all the answers. And I think when you come here, you just get really honed back in and reminded that God really is for us, that a good Father helps you and a good Father makes you have all the tools you need and a good Father comes through for you when you need Him and you just feel less alone.
Register today at masculinejourney.org Jim, I believe that was your bump. It was and that really was my inspiration. I just had that song, which I've always loved, rattling around in my head. I wondered what that noise was. Was it lonely? Sam's here. God, we are so happy to have Sam join us.
A little bit late, but it's always on time. That was a very powerful song the first time I heard it and every time since really. The power that God displays in weakness, which is one of the paradoxes, that it really is amazing to me how much we do have backwards that Jesus was trying to put right side up. You brought that up earlier in the show that we're in a world upside down. When you were talking about the churches, I want to say, was that the Catholic Church or the Baptist Church, the Methodist Church, the Ecumenical Church?
All of the above. That was the right answer, so I knew you'd have it, being the oldest and wisest of us all here. Well, Jim, since you're on a roll, we've got your clip up next, I think. My clip is from the shack and Mac is talking to God. If you've seen the movie, this is the Native American God, and it's a very powerful exchange about forgiveness.
I don't know that I need to set it up any more than that, okay? He killed my God. I want to hurt him. I want him to hurt like he hurt me.
I want you to hurt him. I know you do, but he too is my son, and I want to redeem him. Redeem him? He should burn in hell. So we're back to you as the judge. So you just let him get away with it?
Nobody gets away with anything. Everything bears consequences. What he did was horrible. I'm not asking you to excuse what he did. I'm asking you to trust me to do what's right and to know what's best. And then what?
Forgiveness doesn't establish your relationship. It's just about letting go of his throat. Mac, the pain inside is devouring you, robbing you of joy and crippling your capacity to love. I can't. You're not stuck because you can't. You're stuck because you won't. You don't have to do this alone. I'm here with you. I don't know how.
Just say it out loud. I forgive you. Mackenzie, you're such a joy. He barely gets that out, the I forgive. And one of the things I love through this clip is God has finished his sentences.
And when Mac gets stuck, he leads him to where he's trying to take him. And when we have a relationship with God, that's what we get. But it never takes us where we think we're going to go. And that's one of the paradoxes as well. When I say, okay, God, I know this is where we're headed, every time I do that, I'm wrong. Even though it may be a well-thought-out plan. And his is different. And that is a big part of the relationship is if we don't go to him to find out what our next step is, our next step may be off a cliff. But he's still going to catch us. And that's the hard part about when you start talking about everything is you've got God who knows everything.
He knows what you're going to say every second of every day. Where you're going to go, what you're going to do. But there's just so much that I can't make a decision on.
It happens every day. And I'm just like, well, do I go left? Do I go right? Do I go straight? Do I go up? Do I go down?
There's all kinds of things out there that just – there's things that are just pulling at you and pulling at you. And just be able to pick between what God is doing or not doing. Where am I supposed to go? What am I supposed to – it's just hard to always come up with that simpler answer. It's a lot easier just to punt and do nothing or just to do, well, that's what Danny did, so I'm just going to do what Danny did. It's easy to do what – You're in trouble now.
I know, exactly. If I just do the same thing that I see somebody else do, I just go do that, that's trouble. Following God takes something where you have to dive in and read his word, understand his word, know his word, be about him.
Try to deceive the things out of it that are blinding you and being in the way. You have to get all that out of the way just to go do it. And what it does is it grows you. It makes you stronger. And that's one of the beautiful things about being able to go do this and just even doing this radio show. It's wonderful to sit here and talk with the guys and listen to what they say and what they go through and part of their life because it just grows me when I see it growing you because then I can grow from you, and it's great. You mean there's more to this Christian walk than sitting on a pew, listening to a few nice songs and hanging out with my buddies? Just a little bit.
Just a little bit. Now we want to know what Danny's going to do. Well, Jim says my clip's up next, and it's from the series Picard, Star Trek series, and it's the last show. And I've used this clip a couple times, but I like it, and nobody has objected so far, but Sam is here now. But it's where they have gone back in the past and cued the godlike creature in the series. He's going to take them back to their home in the future. And a guy named Chris, who's a starship captain, he's telling them he's not going to go.
And you'll hear the deal between them, but his reasoning for what he's doing is what I was drawn to, Jim, so I'm going to play it and we'll talk about it on the other side. I never had a family in any real way. You changed all that. All of you did. This is where I belong. Jean-Luc, come home.
Make a good future. Maybe it was always supposed to be this way. Time's a funny thing. Yes, it is.
Interesting. You know, in so many ways I identify with Chris, because I thought about the paradox Jesus says, he who tries to gain his life will lose it, and he who loses his life will gain it. And being caught in drug addiction and alcoholism for years and that kind of thing, trying to gain something, trying to be who I thought I was supposed to be, and I think I lost my life. I mean, literally died spiritually and mentally and emotionally, just nothing, Andy. So when I gave up is when I gained life. And Rodney said real well earlier that God begins to help you pick up the pieces, and I love Sam's analogy, that a broken heart is literally shards of glass. We're not talking about like chunks. We're talking about shards of glass. As he begins to put all that back together in a great mosaic fashion, so to speak, you gain life. You gain life more abundantly, and that's been my experience.
There's some bumpy roads, and I don't get it right most days, but the things that I have that are just simply because he loves me and to follow him is just an amazing journey. So that's kind of what I was thinking about after I googled what a paradox really was, Jim, because I was like, uh-oh, Jim come up with the topic. I'm in trouble. Those shards sound a lot like a couple of nails that pierced his hands. Yeah, sure was.
Anybody else got anything? On that losing your life to save it, I mean, I started doing, when I was doing the talk, I think I was mentioning to you guys earlier for the poser at boot camp, you begin to think about what you're trying to get out of all these false selves, all these poses, and you're trying to get life from it, and when you lose those poses, those attempts of gaining life, of getting love for those poses, trying to get love for yourself, you actually do find life. Whenever you can step, you find your life, your true identity, the true you, who you are, and it's cool to be able to take Jim's topic and tie it to the masculine journey a lot about what we talk about. I mean, it's a paradox to live in a counter way to what the world suggests a man should live and how he should live and how he should try to obtain things from the world and to lose our life and how we expect to get those things and how we're trained to get things and that kind of thing. It's a paradox to walk away from that and walk in the way God intended us to be to become a true identity, our true selves. That's true in my life right now in this season walking through with this cancer diagnosis and everything because the world says I should be scared to death. The world says I should be this, but God says trust me, and that's really all I got to do is trust Him. So anybody else, real quick? No, you're all going to leave me hanging for a minute.
One of the things that hit me is that something I heard even before I had a walk with God was that in an insane world, the insane person might be the sane person, which is something of a paradox. And now you can say goodbye. Now I have hope. Look us up on masculinejourney.org. You can go there and register boot camp coming up. November 20th through the 23rd is going to be in Royston, Georgia, and you can register there and you can see all about us. So see you next time. This is the Truth Network.
