BEMA 33: Session 2 Intro

Transcription Status

18 Jul 22 — Initial public release

4 Jul 22 — Transcript approved for release

Session 2 Intro

Brent Billings: This is The BEMA Podcast with Marty Solomon. I’m his co-host, Brent Billings. Today we set the stage for Session 2 of the podcast, we will review our journey through Torah to bring everyone up to speed for what we will study next.

Marty Solomon: Man, new music. Hold on, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to Session 2.

Brent: We’re entering a new phase of biblical history, and so we thought we should have some different music to set the right mood.

Marty: I’m excited. I don’t even know if I can match the intensity of the music.

Brent: Well, it’s a little violent... Well, oh, man… It’s so good.

Marty: All right. Session 2, Welcome to Session 2. We’re doing a presentation, by the way, which might be helpful. There’s not a lot on there. A little short discussion today, more than likely, but we’ll see what God takes us, we’re just going to set some stuff up. Here’s what you need to know. After you have happened to stumble across this podcast, and this is where you’re beginning. It’s probably self-evident by calling this Session 2, it alludes to the fact that there was a Session 1. In fact, there is a session that we really recommend listening to first.

If you were to start here fresh without any experience in Session 1, you may wonder just what in the world we’re talking about half the time. There’s so much stuff, especially if you go back to Session 1, especially the introduction, there’s an introductory lesson that we have talks about East versus West. Man, just such a good starting place for anything that we’re doing here with BEMA. Then Genesis 1–11, there’s like 8 or 9 or so episodes there that are just really critical.

You mentioned it in the Capstone lesson of Session 1, Brent, if we don’t start in the right place, if we don’t have the bedrock, the foundation of what we’re talking about, we’re just missing a really big, important piece. You want to go back and you want to find BEMA Podcasts Session 1, it’s about Torah. You are currently listening to the BEMA Podcast Session 2, which is about the Prophets and Writings, but you want to find the one on Torah, so it should be pretty easy to find.

Brent: Marty, at the end of Session 1, you promised me that you were going to explain what galavanting you’ll be doing during the summer?

Marty: Yes, so a big part of what I do — I’m the president of Impact Campus Ministries — I am a self-supported missionary, as is every other campus minister who works for our organization, and a lot of people are familiar with other campus ministry organizations, whether it’s Cru or InterVarsity, Young Life, Navigators — there’s a lot of other organizations out there. Most people are aware that all their staff, or at least most of their staff, the people in the field, are self-supported missionaries.

That means they have to go raise their funds, and I’m one of those people. I have to get out there and I have to raise my compensation package, which includes my salary benefits, that kind of thing. Health insurance. I have to raise the expenses needed for the ministry that I do to students. I work with college students, it’s a big part of what I do. When I buy them coffee, and when I need stuff to put on this podcast, when I need things to do in our discussion groups, when I want to provide breakfast for my disciples, these are all things that come out of that ministry budget, and I have to go raise that.

For me, in my job as president, I have a $15-18,000 travel budget. I have to raise every single year that allows me to travel once or twice a month, to do the work that I need to do around the country. Part of the reason why I share that here is because if you’re listening to this podcast, you might be one of those people that may be the work of our ministry, or the work that I’ve been able to do here through the podcast has really impacted you in a big way, and you might be in a place where you can help join our team as a financial partner.

We’re always looking for people to join our teams. We’re always looking for financial partners, people that will give monthly, people that will give annually, just whatever it is, however it is that works well. We’re always looking for people that can help us in that way. One of the things I would ask is if this podcast has meant something to you and if you’d like to give back, to consider contacting me asking me more, or you can find the information you need on our website. You actually have a tab there on bemadiscipleship.com about how to support us in different ways that you can support us.

Brent: I’ll put a link in the show notes too. If you’re listening in a podcast app, you need to scroll down in your show notes and tap the link there if you’re interested.

Marty: There you go. Yes, always looking for that. It’s a big deal, and when the people that I get to meet through our ministry, become partners with us in an even deeper way. It’s good. Thanks for letting me drop that little bug in your ear.

Brent: Yes, these microphones ain’t cheap.

Marty: That’s right. Yes, people talk about the quality.

Brent: We sound good because of the microphones. It’s not because there’s anything amazing about what we’re saying.

Marty: Well, we wanted to do this right. We didn’t want to do this poorly. We wanted to do this right from the get-go, and we did so. Big kudos to Brent, who helped me put all this stuff together and the way helps every single week here too. Just a fun thing we get to be a part of, and I hope that we always get to keep this free for the help. I hope that everybody says that, I don’t know if things will change.

My hope is that I can always make my living the way that I do now, and get to provide teaching, and I always feel like that stuff should be free. There’s actually stuff in the Talmud about teaching the teaching of Torah, the teaching of God’s word should always be free. I definitely don’t want to make you feel like you have to pay for that, but if you would like to, and your generosity helps, that would just keep this awesome. It’s like Keep Austin Weird. Keep the story…? [chuckles].

Anyway, well, where we’re headed in Session 2 is we’re going to be entering a section of the biblical narrative that we talk about as history. We’re going to talk about this section as history, and then we’re going to move into prophets and we’re going to talk about wisdom literature. The next stage we’re going to move into is history, and it’s going to begin with the book of Joshua. That’s going to be the next episode. Next episode will be Joshua. We’re thinking that’s going to be posted on June 1st, if you’re listening to these real-time, we’re thinking June 1st is when Joshua is — details subject to change, but that’s our plan. You can expect to see that there.

Before we were to post that podcast, I think it’s always good to go back and summarize where we’ve been. For some of you might have just listened to the capstone lesson not too long ago, for Session 1. I would just really encourage you to try to internalize this review, and the summary because one of the things we talked about at Impact is message, mode, and milieu. The first one we talk about is message. The idea of message is that we should be able to communicate the whole story of God as a seamless narrative arc. A lot of us don’t have that kind of grasp of the scriptures.

We see the scriptures as all these books and different stories, and it’s all crammed into my Bible, I want to be able to talk about like, I would love it if my students and people listen to my podcast and me, hopefully, if we could talk to-- if we could sit down to somebody at lunch and say, I just believe that God has been telling a story. If they were to say, like, really what would that be? How would you--? Tell me about the story of God? I hope I would have enough grasp of the narrative of the scriptures that I could tell from the beginning, to where I sit today, as this concise, seamless narrative.

Well, here’s what God was doing in the beginning, and it shows this partner and then He took this partner, and He put them at the crossroads of the earth, and He asked them to bless all nations, and that was a struggle, and so on, and so on, and so on. I just hope that we could talk about the Bible that way. This isn’t just to waste time or to just be obnoxious as a teacher, I believe having this intimate grasp with the story is an unbelievable blessing to the people around us as we try to talk to them and teach them and be a kingdom of priests in our world.

Brent: If you think about what the Jews do, they’re going through Torah once a year, without partial readings. They’re going through the rest of the Tanakh every three years. We’ve got to keep going through this stuff over and over because if we set it aside, we’ll forget about it.

Marty: Right. Yes, especially as Westerners we have become addicted to entertainment. If it’s not entertaining, if it’s not moving, if it doesn’t have a soundtrack, it’s hard for us to see the value in it. This stuff has value because you’re internalizing it, you’re getting in you so that God can do something with it so that it can come out of you. That takes discipline, and that takes a faithful pursuit of creating this kind of space.

It’s all stuff we’ve talked about, but here’s a quick summary. We started in the book of Genesis, we said that we had a preface, Genesis 1–11, that was God’s setup to the stories, the big ideas, who is God? Who is humanity? What is the world, and how are those three interacting with each other? We learned that creation was good. That God thinks it’s good, that God is for creation. He’s not against it, that He’s put everything that creation needs in creation. He’s not holding out on creation.

Then He invites humanity to trust that. He wants this creation to trust that everything they need is already there and He’s got their back. We, of course, see a bunch of stories, in the preface, of humanity not trusting the story and that leads to tragedy and right about the time you’re about ready to lose hope, we walk into the intro — which is Chapters 12 through 50. We meet the family of God. People like Abraham and people like Isaac and Jacob and Joseph and the patriarchs. We meet a family — incredibly dysfunctional, make all kinds of mistakes, but they do trust the story.

They don’t believe that their mistakes define them. They keep getting back up. They keep leaning back into the story of God and because they’re willing to believe in the inherent goodness of what God’s doing in the world, not the inherent brokenness of the world, God’s able to partner with them because they understand. Now the stage is set. I’ve met some of the characters. I understand some of the big ideas and now the stage is set for God’s narrative. We have this narrative, which is a tale of two kingdoms. We talk about empire versus Shalom. Brent, talk about empire.

Brent: Empire is all about power and control and wealth and more and I don’t care about the other people. It doesn’t matter what happens to them as long as I get what I want.

Marty: Self-preservation. This agenda of making sure that I — and really it’s driven by fear. The underlying current of empire is a narrative of fear that there’s not enough to go around. Scarcity worldview and if I don’t look out for me, something’s going to all fall apart. Then there’s Shalom. Talk to me about Shalom.

Brent: Shalom is about everything in its right place. Trusting God that will give you enough when you need it.

Marty: Instead of self-preservation, this ends up being about self-sacrifice, because I believe that there is enough, because I’m not about coercion, I’m about invitation, because I’m not about fear, I’m about trust. I’m buying into a narrative that frees me to lay down my life on behalf of other people. This is what the whole Bible’s going to be about. The narrative of God is going to be about a tale of two kingdoms that are always in conflict: Empire and Shalom. That narrative’s going to start in Exodus, and the narrative of God, the drama of God, really starts with God rescuing his people out of Egypt in the story of the Passover.

He leads them through the red sea. He takes into Mount Sinai where there’s a big wedding ceremony. There’s a marriage. He basically says, “If you’ll marry me, and if you’ll say I do, I’m going to make you, although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me, a treasured possession. A kingdom of priests, a holy nation.” God says you’ll be a kingdom of priests for me. They say we do, they say, we’re in, we’re a part of this marriage and then God says, “Great, let’s build a tabernacle.” Which the tabernacle, if we were to look at it as marriage imagery, the tabernacle is going to be the what, Brent?

Brent: The honeymoon suite...

Marty: Honeymoon suite.

Brent: …where God gets to know his people in an experiential way.

Marty: Absolutely. If we were to watch it from a literary perspective and look at Exodus as a piece of literature, we might say that it’s what?

Brent: Genesis 1 retelling.

Marty: It’s a retelling of the creation story. Functionally in the narrative, the tabernacle becomes the follow-up to this statement we just looked at. God told those people they would be a kingdom of priests. The problem is they don’t really know what a priest is. They’ve been in Egypt for the last 400 years, so they don’t even necessarily understand what God means when He says a kingdom of priests. That in and of itself is a foreign idea, not a kingdom with priests, but a kingdom of priests.

God says, “Well, I’ve got great news. This tabernacle that you just spend all this time building, we’re going to put it right in the middle of your camp. Every single day, you can watch literal, physical priests do their job. In watching them do their job, you’re going to understand your spiritual job as priests.” Not only that, not only just watching them at the tabernacle, you’re also going to have the book Leviticus. The book of Leviticus is going to be your manual, your handbook for priesthood. It’s going to start out with a section on atonement because if I don’t understand that God and I are good, I’m going to screw up the rest of the story. I’m going to make everything else that I do about trying to atone for something that’s wrong.

God talks about who the priests are, what they wear and who they can marry, and how they go about doing their ministry. Then He also talks about later, what to do when they screw up and they blow it and they don’t follow all the rules correctly. In the middle are a bunch of rules about how you’re supposed to live. Eating kosher and not putting two kinds of seed in your field and not wearing clothing made of two kinds of fibers and all of these laws because you are supposed to be a priest. I understand my call to be a priest within the bookends of the actual Levitical priesthood. Then God has a whole section on how to party because we got to remember that the story is good.

If I don’t go back and remember the preface, the good news of the preface — we could even say the gospel, the euangelion of the preface — if I don’t remember that I’m going to forget and I’m going to turn this whole thing into a story about obedience and earning God’s favor. The party reminds me of the fundamental truths of the story. I celebrate God’s goodness, I celebrate His love, His values, acceptance of us. Then God says the whole reason we’re doing this, the whole reason we’re learning about priesthood, the whole reason we’re on mission together as partners with God is because we’re putting the world back together.

We need to know how to take care of the oppressed, we need to know how to take people on the bottom and lift them up, and we need to know how to make things right and that leads to the honeymoon. You’re just talking about the honeymoon suite, where you have a whole book. The book of Numbers is about God shaping his people in the desert. Learning who they are, they’re learning who He is and they’re growing together in this new intimate relationship. They’re growing together and they’re learning about each other and they’re getting to know what it’s going to be like when they go on mission together.

The last book is the book of Deuteronomy in Torah. That was a call to remember. We need to remember where we came from, we remember the beginning, we need to remember our roots. When we do that, when we remember our roots, we remember that we were slaves in Egypt. We remember that we were aliens, orphans, and widows. That means that we take care of the alien, the orphan, and the widow. We’re looking out for the AOWs. We’re remembering who we used to be and we’re noticing those people all around us and then when we notice those people all around us, we’re reminded of who we used to be and the story keeps finding its center and the story of restoration and redemption.

Brent: Gosh, I look at this now and the people of God didn’t really know God when they came out of Egypt. It really is just like an ancient wedding where the bride and groom did not know each other before the marriage.

Marty: Somehow, you read this story and you read about Moses’ grandparents and their names are Jochebed and Amram. Amram, meaning “exalted people,” Jochebed meaning “Glory to Yah,” shorthand for the Lord’s name. Somehow these stories must have gotten passed on through father Abraham, who had many sons, and many sons had father Abraham.

Brent: Did he have many?

Marty: And I am one of them.

Brent: I guess He does now.

Marty: That was a Rob Bell joke, sorry. We have this — what are we talking about? I totally lost my train of thought.

Brent: In the marriage.

Marty: They have these stories that have been passed on, but they really don’t — we talk about the word yada in Session 1. They don’t yada God, they really don’t know God at all. This has been generations of them down in Egypt, so you’re right. I think we forget that. We lose that. God’s having to take a brand new — talk about green people. They are fresh coming at this story and God’s taking them from square one and we’re so critical. We’re like, “Stupid Israelites, wandering through the desert, always complaining.” Consider where they’ve been, consider what they know. This is a pretty interesting story.

That next slide is just — that is a more concise summary. We looked at the Capstone lesson of Session 1. Really, you could sum up all of Torah and partnership. Genesis would be where God teaches us about the basis of the partnership and we meet the characters of the partnership. The book of Exodus would be where God chooses His partner and the partner chooses God. There’s an agreement, there’s a marriage, there’s a uniting of these two parties. In Leviticus, God defines the partnership. In Numbers, God shapes His partner in the desert.

He takes them out to the desert and He shapes them and molds them into the people He wants them to be and then God asks His partner to remember where they’ve been, remember where they’ve come, remember the beginning, remember the end, just remember all of it as we walk forward. That’s where we’re going to pick up in Session 2. We pick up where God has found this partner, He has redeemed this partner, He’s told the partner what it’s going to look like, He’s shaped the partner, he’s told the partner to remember because we’re about ready to walk into the Promised Land. Now it’s time to take this partnership and we’re going to walk into the Promised Land and we’re going to see about the things that we learn there. That’s going to lead us into Session 2.

Brent: Sounds great. We’ll pick up in a couple of weeks with Joshua.

Marty: Absolutely.

Brent: In the meantime, get connected with us. Check out our Facebook page, check out our Twitter, check out Marty specifically on Twitter at @martysolomon. I’m on Twitter at @eibcb. We want to hear from you guys. We want to have our discussion groups. We hope you guys are still meeting some of your other discussion groups, but either way, if you have questions, get in touch and if we can’t address them right away, then we’ll get to them in the fall at least. You can find more details about the show at bemadiscipleship.com, and thanks for joining us at the start of Session 2. We’ll talk to you again soon.

Marty: Cue the music!

[music]