Curt Harlow [00:00:00]:
Hello, my friends, and welcome to the Bible Study Podcast. I'm extra excited this time. Why? Because I have Cameron and Dena here. Well, no, it's because we're studying the Bible, but also because Cameron and Dena are here. I get it, I get it. Okay, Dena Davis in the front of Thrive College, if you're new to our, uh, podcast. And then we've got Cameron, who— where are you at, Cameron, and what are you doing?
Cameron Wells [00:00:24]:
Uh, Bayside Adventure. And doing a little bit of everything.
Curt Harlow [00:00:28]:
That's exactly— that's why I asked you the question. I wanted to see what you would answer. Yeah, he is one of the finer Bible studiers that we have. When Cameron says something in the sermon prep meeting, it's like E.F. Hutton. Everyone listens. And so very excited to hear. We are— if you don't know anything about the podcast, we cover the passage that we're doing on the weekend at all of our campuses.
Curt Harlow [00:00:49]:
Right now on all the Bayside campuses, we are in a sermon series called Not Without. And this week is not without unity. We're going to talk about this idea of unity. And there's probably no better place to approach this than the direct teaching on unity from Jesus Christ in the Gospel of John.
Cameron Wells [00:01:11]:
Seems fair.
Curt Harlow [00:01:11]:
Kind of an authority. There's kind of 3 places of great or extended discourse in the Gospels where Jesus just— if you got a red-letter Bible, it's just read for pages and pages. And the most famous, of course, would be the Sermon on the Mount in the book of Matthew, right at the beginning. Then we have the Sermon on the Plain, which is in Luke. And then we have this, which, while those kind of are Jesus saying, here's my declarative teaching, here's what my whole ministry is going to be based on. This is a summary statement. Jesus is about to be tortured. And crucified.
Curt Harlow [00:01:50]:
And yet he starts the whole thing off by telling his apostles, do not let your hearts be troubled. And then he teaches them the summation of 3 and a half years of discipleship, 3 and a half years of camping and listening to Jesus at the fireside, 3 and a half years of watching him go to town to town, especially in and around Capernaum, and what he taught and taught over and over again. And then we have John's beautiful summation of it, which concludes in chapter 17. We're going to start in verse 20, go to verse 26. Dena, what other comments would you make about this before you read it to us?
Dena Davidson [00:02:31]:
Yes, this is called the High Priestly Prayer. And I love Jesus starts by talking to his Father and talking about his role on earth. And then he prays for his disciples, those that he's called and gathered and been teaching and instructing. And then he prays for us. And I love thinking about that context going into this because he's going to pray for those that would believe in Jesus, in him, after those gathered in this room would go out and declare the gospel.
Curt Harlow [00:03:00]:
It's kind of like we made the Bible.
Dena Davidson [00:03:01]:
We seriously, it's— and I teach this, actually, I teach this passage to the Thrive College students every year. And I always ask them to think about, okay, it's Jesus's, one of Jesus's last nights on earth. And he's about to pray for you. What do you hope Jesus would pray for you? What do you expect he would be praying for you for? Like, think about all the problems in your life.
Curt Harlow [00:03:24]:
Yeah.
Dena Davidson [00:03:25]:
Think about all the theological lack of clarity that you have. Think about all the doubts that you're struggling with. Think about all the pain that you're in. Think about all of the attacks from the enemy. Like, what do you expect Jesus is about to pray for you for? I have them kind of anticipate that.
Curt Harlow [00:03:41]:
Such a great frame.
Dena Davidson [00:03:42]:
And then we dive in.
Curt Harlow [00:03:43]:
And do they answer gas money?
Dena Davidson [00:03:45]:
Yes, 100%.
Cameron Wells [00:03:47]:
Yeah, as Curt would say, so inductive.
Dena Davidson [00:03:49]:
So inductive.
Curt Harlow [00:03:50]:
But that— what a great angle on that. If I were to guess what Jesus wanted me to have through prayer versus what he actually wants me to have.
Dena Davidson [00:03:59]:
His concerns, his obsessions, are they our concerns, our obsessions?
Curt Harlow [00:04:02]:
All right, well, let's read it and get into it. Go ahead.
Dena Davidson [00:04:04]:
Okay, he says, I do not ask for for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one, even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me, because you loved me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.
Curt Harlow [00:05:04]:
Especially in the version that Dena's reading it, Kim, this is a lot of complex sentences. This is not baby talk. Yeah.
Cameron Wells [00:05:16]:
My prayers don't sound like that.
Curt Harlow [00:05:19]:
Sum it up for us. What in the world is Jesus praying for here, Cameron?
Cameron Wells [00:05:23]:
The beauty, I think, of this prayer, it's kind of a microcosm of the person of Jesus himself. Is that it's giving us access to his relationship with God. So everything that these people at this time would've understood, you have the temple, and then in the temple you have the Holy of Holies, and that's where they believe the presence of God lived. And only the high priest could enter into the Holy of Holies once a year. And so it was very separate. And then Jesus comes and he teaches his disciples how to pray and he says, our Father. He invites them into this relationship. And then he takes it a step further.
Cameron Wells [00:06:03]:
And in this prayer, he's basically saying, God, everything that you have done and are to me, I pray that you are and I am to them. And it's almost like Jesus is handing us the baton as he's about to leave his earthly mission. And he's going, everything that I've prepared you for and everything that you're going to do, you you are now ready to step into because I am in you and the Father is in me. Yeah.
Curt Harlow [00:06:30]:
So talk to me about that, Deanna. So what is the source of unity? Like, I'm struck by Jesus prays for those that would come after, and then the very next thing he says goes to the source of unity and what unity is actually caused by.
Dena Davidson [00:06:48]:
Yes. And so the big reveal, this passage, like he prays for us for unity. And that doesn't ever make the list, by the way, of what the Thrive College students say they anticipate Jesus was praying for them.
Curt Harlow [00:06:59]:
Gas money, boyfriend, girlfriend.
Dena Davidson [00:07:01]:
Right. Save me from the evil one. Yes. Save me from my sinful nature. All these things. No. Unity. That we would be so connected to each other.
Dena Davidson [00:07:11]:
We would have the same type of connectedness that the Father and the Son have. So I think he goes straight to the source. To tag in what Cameron was saying, because immediately when you start thinking about unity, you start thinking about all the problems with unity, like unified with their sin, unified with their crazy, like unified with their ugly, like unified with their weird. Like, I don't wanna be unified with humanity. I don't know if you've ever gone into a different Christian circle and you're like, "I cannot believe I'm related to these people." Like, they are so different than— I don't wanna be part of them. I don't wanna be associated with them. Them, much less unified. And that's why Jesus brings in the oneness between the Father and him, because that's the source.
Dena Davidson [00:07:57]:
We have to be connected to each other, not because we so agree with one another, not because we so like one another even, not because we so— it's literally nothing besides our devotion to God and to his cause that can make us unified.
Curt Harlow [00:08:16]:
I think what Jesus is saying here, or what he's praying here, is that we think unity is idea-based. I have the same, uh, ideas on how to raise my kids, how to spend my money, how to study my Bible, how to vote. I have the same ideas as you. And so if we could all get the same ideas— and, and, uh, pastors are very guilty of this because we and we rightfully so, we press people to, you know, embrace the main and plain truth teachings of the Bible. We want to, you know, accept the doctrinal statement, say the creed, and then once we all can agree on the creed. The problem is we find that creeds actually cause sometimes healthy disunity. They don't, they're not really the source of unity. So unity is not idea-based.
Curt Harlow [00:09:12]:
Unity is value-based. Because I value the Father, because I totally and completely value the Father and completely submit to the Father, I pray that they would completely and totally submit to me just as I completely submit to the Father. So I have a group of friends that were all heads of our training program back in the day when I was a US missionary to secular universities. And these were kind of the most effective, most committed missionaries to the secular college campus in our movement. They were all really wonderful people, all very effective leaders. They'd all done really significant work on campus. And they all were in charge of taking 10 to 15 interns and turning them into full-time professional, fully funded, fully theologically trained missionaries. And they fought like cats and dogs.
Curt Harlow [00:10:07]:
Every time we'd get together, we had once a year kind of week-long meeting where we would talk about how should we train these new missionaries? And no one could agree on anything. And it was like, it was just like, if you got 'em alone, they were wonderful. You put 'em in the room, it was like, is anyone saved?
Dena Davidson [00:10:26]:
Yes.
Curt Harlow [00:10:27]:
And so I got thinking about this problem and thinking about it, and I realized the problem is we only see each other once a year. So we have very little relationship, and all we're doing is fighting over technique. We should read this book. No, we should read this book. We should have the semester end here. We should have it end here. And what we weren't doing is agreeing on values. And I bet you we agreed on 80% of our values.
Curt Harlow [00:10:53]:
And the 20% were willing to negotiate. So I held a week-long meeting. I said, zero ideas, no dates, no times, no books, no theology, no curriculum will ever be mentioned. We're gonna come out of this with 5 values that we all agree every brand new missionary should have. It was, first day was easy, second day was hard, third day was harder. Fourth day was incredible. By the fifth day, we were all crying and hugging and praying. And then it came together.
Curt Harlow [00:11:27]:
And what happened is after we said, "We submit to these values," we said, "All right, now go create a curriculum within those values that you see fit for your context." And so Jesus here is saying, not let's agree on every dot and tittle, which by the way is impossible. Because I don't even agree with me. I am debating in my head some of my beliefs and rethinking them.
Cameron Wells [00:11:55]:
Yeah.
Curt Harlow [00:11:56]:
But so if we could shift from, do we all have the same idea, to we all have the same Father. What a great idea.
Cameron Wells [00:12:06]:
I love the idea that because what's going to happen in a few chapters is Pentecost at the beginning of Acts. And I love the thought that Pentecost is the undoing of Babel. So you have everybody in the book of Genesis working to, it says that to make a name for themselves. And so God has to change languages and create confusion and they all separate. And then at Pentecost, you have all these different people coming from different places and backgrounds and the Holy Spirit comes and it unifies them. And it's like, you see that in this prayer though, is that God is giving us the one thing that can unify us and push us towards the good. Because anything else that we unify around will eventually lead to bad.
Curt Harlow [00:12:49]:
Right. Mark brought up this point in our server prep, Mark Clark. He's like, not all unity is good unity, right? So if we are all unified, let's be a kangaroo court, angry mob and go punish that person without due process. That's unity. It's not unity I want applied to me or anyone I love. Yeah, unity around the right cause. And in this case, really, the cause is an extension of the right person. The person of the Father is what Jesus is saying.
Curt Harlow [00:13:22]:
So why are we so disunified then? It's a pretty easy concept. We all love Jesus. Jesus loves the Father completely. We're all submitted to Jesus. Jesus submitted to the Father. Should be no church splits.
Dena Davidson [00:13:33]:
Well, I think even the relational concept it's founded on is actually a little confusing. We're supposed to base our unity on the Trinitarian unity, right? Who can raise their hand and say they fully understand what it actually means that I am in my Father and my Father is in me, and yet we're one and yet we're separate. So I do think that there is an absolute, beyond human comprehension aspect to this. This unity that we're supposed to have is an act of God. Right? I don't know with perfect clarity the right moments to overlook an offense and to be unified with a brother, and the right moment to say, "No, no, I'm going to separate and say, I can't walk side by side with you. I'm going to have to do that thing where I treat you like a tax collector," that it says, you know, I think in Corinthians or somewhere. I think that it's actually pretty hard, and it's pretty unclear. And I think that's one of the first things to own is, there is no simple path, simple, clear path to unity.
Dena Davidson [00:14:40]:
The first thing that we have to do is we really have to master that this is Jesus's heart for us. I think that the reason we're disunified is because we don't see this as much a priority as it is for God. Like, this is big in his story. This is big on his mind, big in his heart. It's literally before he went to the cross to give his life for us, what he was bleeding emotionally for is that we would be one. So I think before we can ever hope to achieve it, we're going to have to really receive that this is God's heart for his people, is to be one, just like he and the Father are one.
Curt Harlow [00:15:16]:
So you're saying it's not a priority? It's not the same priority in us as it is in Jesus?
Dena Davidson [00:15:23]:
I can count on my hands the number of times I've heard a sermon about unity. And certainly, if it was preached, it was about unity within that particular church, not within the global capital C Church, not about how I should feel about the church down the street, not about how I should feel about the church in a different continent. It's always, if it's preached, and it's not preached often enough, in my opinion, it's preached about the little c church. Let's all be on the same team so we can wage this war against hell.
Curt Harlow [00:15:56]:
Yeah, I preach on it a lot.
Dena Davidson [00:15:58]:
Do you?
Cameron Wells [00:15:59]:
You should start coming to Auburn. Yeah, I was, uh, so I've gotten into, I've gotten into triathlons, and one of the things that they tell you in triathlons—
Dena Davidson [00:16:08]:
that is such a mild way to put your endeavors into triathlons.
Cameron Wells [00:16:12]:
Yeah, if you saw it, you would not think it's impressive. But one of the things that they say is like, to be successful, you have to accept that there's no one way to do it. Everybody out there, to your point earlier, looks different. Uh, me during the swim does not look like the pros swimming. I look like I'm drowning in one direction. I figured out how to do that productively, but it looks different for everybody. Everybody's got a different brand of tri suit. Everybody's got a different brand of bike— Canyon, Giant, Trek, right? But we're all moving to the same 10-foot by 6-foot finish line at the end.
Cameron Wells [00:16:47]:
Everybody's on a different bike. Everybody's got different fuel. Everybody's swimming different. Everybody's form is different, but we're all moving the same direction to the same point. And it's like we get so hung up in the church on what brand of bike that you're riding, what kind of fuel you're using, what form are you using? And we just move into this spiritual elitism.
Curt Harlow [00:17:08]:
Are you riding a verse-by-verse bike or a topical bike?
Dena Davidson [00:17:12]:
Get 'em, Curt.
Cameron Wells [00:17:13]:
The message?
Curt Harlow [00:17:14]:
I think it's ingenious, Cam. So this is, I think, more of the Paulinian approach to this. So Jesus' approach is, I'm in the Father, the Father's in me. Would you come be in us? And to Dena's point, it's very relational and it's very values-based. It's, are you submitted to this relationally? You know, he's not making— certainly Jesus makes creedal statements all the time. You know, teach them to obey everything I commanded. If you love me, you'll do what I commanded. But here he's saying for unity, it's relational.
Curt Harlow [00:17:52]:
Let the Father in you the way that— let me in you the way that I am in the Father is what he's saying. What you're saying is value others that are different than you is the path to unity. And I think that's Paul's approach every time. So Ephesians 4, every joint and ligament supporting one another from the source, the head that is Christ. Then what will happen is if we're every joint ligament supporting one another— so I might be a tendon in, uh, here and you're a ligament there— we will no longer be tossed back and forth by infants on, uh, ships at sea, which is a mixing of metaphors. We're going from body to infants to seas. But we get the picture, powerful pictures. And then the goal of that is that we will grow up in all things, reaching maturity.
Curt Harlow [00:18:50]:
And what's the sign of maturity? Unity.
Dena Davidson [00:18:52]:
Yeah.
Curt Harlow [00:18:53]:
So, so Paul's argument is, if I am a mature person, I will look at Dena's role in the body of Christ and say, I value that. It's different than mine, but I value it. I really appreciate it. It's, it's great to watch. I celebrate it. Look at Cameron's role in the body of Christ. I value that. That's Great.
Curt Harlow [00:19:10]:
That's awesome. That's not me, but I value it. As opposed to the ranking or hierarchical or significance order of, I got to be on stage, so I'm a little bit better than you. I get to give more. I have more means to give, so therefore I'm better than you. Or we can name 1,000 of those comparison-like things.
Cameron Wells [00:19:32]:
I heard somebody say once, the Holy Spirit in me doesn't make me better than you. It makes me better than me.
Curt Harlow [00:19:38]:
Yes, that's good.
Dena Davidson [00:19:40]:
That's good.
Curt Harlow [00:19:40]:
Amy in sermon prep gave this illustration, so shout out to Amy Zilsdorf. Zilsdorf, tagging in with her name. You're practicing that one. Watch the other episodes, you'll get that. Uh, the point is Amy said it's like watching her kids play soccer as 5-year-olds, which if you're a parent of a 5-year-old, it's bunch ball. So there is no goalie, there is no defensive players, there is no wide You know, the wings, there's no forward. Everyone is, I will kick the child next to me in attempt to kick the ball. And it's just, they're bunched up.
Curt Harlow [00:20:15]:
So there's no value in difference there. And of course, you'd think at that level you'd score all sorts of goals because people have a hard time defending. No, the ball just stays in a little bunch right in the center of the field the whole time.
Cameron Wells [00:20:32]:
Something really interesting too is we always focus on, and this to your point, especially church to church, right? Well, we disagree with that church because of X, Y, Z. All of our processing power goes into here's why they're wrong. I have learned a lot from people that I disagree with because it's eventually led me through wise people in my life, not my own wisdom, but not just thinking about why they're wrong, but thinking about why I feel like I'm right. And I feel like we never really go, I disagree with that person and it's okay, but that should lead me to go, well, why do I think that the position that I hold is correct? And not just, this is why you are wrong, because that just leads to more division.
Curt Harlow [00:21:14]:
And here's the dirty little secret. Most of the time I think my position is correct, not by careful reasoning and by deep learning and listening, but because it's the first position that I was told when I was taught that issue.
Cameron Wells [00:21:30]:
What's that line? Opinions are too loosely formed and too firmly held.
Curt Harlow [00:21:36]:
Too loosely formed. And this is really a psychological dynamic that's been proven over and over and over again. There is something that makes the brain feel more secure by holding on to the first idea on a topic that it is given. So if you are told race cars are great and essential for life, you will not be afraid of speed. If you're told race cars kill thousands of people and there should be no racing among the moral, then you will be intimidated and antagonistic towards racing. To free your brain up to think another way is a deep sign of maturity and even And even when you know this fact psychologically, it could be difficult.
Dena Davidson [00:22:21]:
Yeah. So, all right, help me though, because I think devil's advocate, it's hard to be devil's advocate against what Jesus is praying for you for, but let's do it nonetheless. What is the difference? When should Christians divide? So when would we be taking what Jesus has said and taking it out of the context in which he said it. You know, like we're not actually honoring Jesus's prayer for unity here. What's good unity and what's maybe toxic unity?
Curt Harlow [00:22:51]:
Well, I would say to your point about how much Jesus values unity, and clearly it's a huge value of Paul. "Make my joy complete," he says, "by being of like mind," to the Philippians. And the Philippians were the least in disunity with him. But he's in a jail in Rome and he's saying, you know what makes me happy? You guys stay in like-mindedness. So the question I would ask to answer your question would first be, what attitude should I bring when disunity is required?
Dena Davidson [00:23:28]:
Yes. And can I give the first answer from Paul for that?
Curt Harlow [00:23:31]:
Sure.
Dena Davidson [00:23:32]:
Okay, so Paul's the guy who is so upset to the church, in the Galatian church, because these Judaizers have come in and said, "It's Jesus plus, it's Jesus plus circumcision," and he's irate with them. And he's fighting this battle all throughout the New Testament to the point of saying, "I wish they would go just emasculate themselves," right? So he's very upset about it, and he's being very hyphy with them, we can say. And then he also is— this is the same man who says, "I would wish that I were a curse and cut off from Christ." rather than those Judaizers.
Curt Harlow [00:24:05]:
Right?
Dena Davidson [00:24:06]:
So like, hey, bring all of the rhetoric, bring all of the argumentation, if you have the heart of Christ, which is for unity and for the sake of the salvation of those who do not yet know Jesus's name. Now, that's Paul literally arguing with non-Christians and saying, "I love and so want those people to be saved that I wish that I could be cut off from Christ, how much more so should our heart be towards those who know Jesus, but are maybe just stuck in sin or stuck in some really bad theological ideas? So that's the first attitude.
Curt Harlow [00:24:41]:
I totally agree. I think grief is the main attitude. If I get any enjoyment out of correcting, any significance out of correcting, if I find any— Yeah, significance is probably the chief one. Look at me, I know you're wrong.
Dena Davidson [00:24:56]:
I feel better about me because I'm getting to correct you.
Curt Harlow [00:24:58]:
Yeah, even if I'm right, you're not right. In that. So, again, going back to Paul, Galatians 6, if anyone of you catches a brother in sin, restore them gently. And so what is the response to doctrinal errors? What is the response to sin that is being hidden? What is the response to worldly, like, let's, like, I used to always say this to our student team. I'd say, okay, let's brainstorm. How do we get the word out about our student group? And I would say, here's, I'm gonna let you guys do whatever you want. I want you to own this. Here's the parameters.
Curt Harlow [00:25:45]:
On one side, we have to get the word out. We are compelled to go and reach the world. We're gonna go make disciples. How will they not hear if someone doesn't preach? On the other side, not every technique that is available to any advertising agency is available to us. There will never be a bikini-clad beer model on our poster for our campus ministry. So there is a place right in here. So if you are on this side of it and you're using some— even if it's in the area of strategy, your doctrine could be fine and you're using a strategy that is worldly or fleshly. That should be talked about.
Curt Harlow [00:26:25]:
You know, talking about consumerism in the church is fine. Talking about, you know, we pastor at a very large church, talking about the excesses that can happen with all the power that's accumulated in a larger church. That is a— there's nothing wrong with that conversation. But it shouldn't be done gleefully. It shouldn't be done like, you know, I saw someone the other day online. They're like, look at all these big churches. And I was like, I don't want to hear what comes out next. Because if what you say is right, we should all be weeping.
Curt Harlow [00:26:59]:
And if what you say is wrong, we're just, I don't know what in the world we're doing it for. So.
Dena Davidson [00:27:05]:
Our young adults pastor, Morgan, in sermon prep, she shared that there's this trend on TikTok, I think, that just hit this area where influencers go and visit all these churches and they're like, "Hey, come to church with me." And then they post a recap. Of the pros and cons, the good parts, the bad parts of that church. And first, ick, ew, I don't think that honors Jesus's prayer. But what really impressed me is she said that what was beautiful is that the people who go to that church were hopping on, and they were saying, you know, not like, "Ew, you're so wrong, you're so bad." They were hopping on and saying, "Oh, here's what I love about my church." And I think, "Ah, that's it." Like, that's gospel. If anyone, a non-believer, came across that influencer's post, again, ick, that's not what I would want them to come across. But I hope what would capture them is all of these Christians saying, "Oh yeah, imperfect place, but here's what I love about my church. Here's the way it's impacted me." I think that's the right heart that we all need to have.
Cameron Wells [00:28:07]:
For sure. And we've kind of moved out of it a little bit, but culturally over the last 10 years, we've kind of separated people into two groups, oppressor and oppressed. And it's like, if you can just be in the oppressed group, then you have a voice at the table. But if you're labeled as an oppressor or you're in that oppressor group, then we don't want to hear from you. The problem is that you can infinitely— what's that word? Regress down into infinite oppressed groups and infinite oppressor groups. And if you only unify around things that you disagree with, you can infinitely regress from there and you will never stop drawing those lines in the sand. If we unify around the person of Jesus and the unity that he has in the Father, that will never change. And so it's a foundation that you can carry with you through your entire life.
Cameron Wells [00:28:59]:
But if we continue to unify around things that we simply disagree with, you'll forever be shifting in what you disagree with and you'll forever be alienating other people.
Curt Harlow [00:29:10]:
Yeah. So I mean, to answer your question very, very directly, Dena, when should you be deliberately out of unity? And I think the answer is found in the two major heresies of the New Testament. So Paul threw a fit whenever Christianity started to walk away from the free gift of grace and add works to it. And so whenever we see Christianity become performative, then, you know, you have to do this to be in the club, then I think we need to stand up and say this is a different Christianity. This is in the category of the Galatians of even an angel should come to you and preach a different gospel than I am preaching. So again, we should do it with grief. We should do it knowing that we can become a subset definition of ourselves to what Cameron's saying. But whenever Christianity is something I have to earn, I'm adding myself into the equation.
Curt Harlow [00:30:22]:
Yes. The other major heresy, I think, that is throughout the New Testament, it goes into the first, second, third centuries. You can see to this day, is the diminishing of Jesus. So, you know, if we're all— if unity is not all of us agreeing together, but all of us submitting to Jesus, who's submitting to the Father, the second we lower Jesus, so the second we make him Lucifer's brother, or one of many gods, or a really high-up angel, or a pretty good teacher, the second that that happens, you know, the instinct in humans is to devalue Jesus constantly. And the right is to actually magnify him. He's actually bigger and greater and more loving and more righteous than I can know. And so either of those two are the ones where we should, I think, draw the line in the sand with, With humility and great grief and not wanting to do this, great conversation. Am I seeing this correctly? Coming as a learner.
Curt Harlow [00:31:33]:
But those are the two big ones.
Dena Davidson [00:31:36]:
I want to add a third one, because I see this one in scripture too.
Curt Harlow [00:31:38]:
I don't agree. You're going to.
Dena Davidson [00:31:40]:
Sure. Well, we should be unified. I think the scriptures call us to separate from unrepentant sinners. And that's hard, because we're all unrepentant sinners. But I do think that there is, a prayerful place for especially church leadership when we have approached a brother and we've said, "You are in grievous sin." You're like, "You're sinning in a way that is basically not like I'm struggling with this sin, but I'm literally giving the middle finger to God. I'm gonna keep on sinning no matter how many times he tells me to stop." That's what I mean by unrepentant sin. The Bible says to treat that person like a tax collector, And how did Jesus treat tax collectors, by the way? He ate with them, and he invited them into ministry. So this is not cut them out of your life, but it means we don't give them access to positions of power.
Dena Davidson [00:32:32]:
We don't treat them as though they are faithful to Jesus, even though they're not. We keep having the honest conversations with them. So I think that a good line of separation, especially when we're talking about church leadership, is unrepentance.
Curt Harlow [00:32:46]:
My— your claim that you are a follower of Christ does not require me to believe you're a follower of Christ.
Dena Davidson [00:32:53]:
Yes, exactly.
Curt Harlow [00:32:54]:
This is where I would put that in. So I do not believe that the sort of psychological isolation of shunning is what Jesus is calling for or what Paul practiced at all. And I've never seen anyone who's been shunned by a community have it ever result in sincere repentance. And I've seen a huge lot of religious damage, especially in cults where people get shunned or isolated. And that being an act of repentance, I'm doing something I don't want to do and I'm confessing it, and you still get shunned.
Dena Davidson [00:33:29]:
Shunning is crazy, by the way, based on the clear example of Jesus towards tax collectors. It's very much not reading the whole Bible.
Curt Harlow [00:33:37]:
The main accusation against Jesus is you hang around with the wrong people.
Dena Davidson [00:33:41]:
Yes.
Curt Harlow [00:33:42]:
And you eat on the Sabbath wheat that you've picked. But the idea that— I mean, I used to say this to my staff all the time. I say, listen, every student that we engage with Christ on the college campus that prays a prayer with us and starts studying their Bible and starts coming to church, every one of them, Let's keep treating them like a non-Christian for a couple years. Because what will it hurt? Yeah, like, like what's going on in your heart of hearts, whether you've truly submitted or you're— you know, the amount of people I've seen come to Christian activities and Christian fellowships on campus and church, because they found someone cute, right? And they started studying the Bible. And like, I don't teach missionary dating, but a lot of missionary leading on has unintentional has led to people getting out of Christ. So I do think, I think it's a good point. I do think though, Dena, just to push back a little bit, if you dig underneath where people are doing that, where it's happening, that I am, I'm saying I am a Christian, and yet I refuse to repent of this particular thing that we all know is main and plain in the Scripture. It's usually a devaluing of Jesus and/or of adding of works.
Curt Harlow [00:35:04]:
That is kind of a symptom when we get who Jesus is wrong or how salvation, his salvation works wrong. That's what leads us into all sorts of practices and thoughts and ideas that are as deceptive as the legalizers of the New Testament.
Dena Davidson [00:35:27]:
I think I'm thinking specifically of people staying under church leadership that is clearly unbiblical, we're talking sexual abuse, we're talking financial misusing, misuse of funds, like known, addressed, confronted by the elders, will not repent, and yet we stay for the sake of unity. I think that's the wrong kind of unity.
Curt Harlow [00:35:50]:
Agreed.
Dena Davidson [00:35:51]:
We are unifying around the concept of unity instead of unifying around Jesus. And that's what the passage is really calling us to. But I mean, do I as a deena have the perfect ability to judge when I'm in one of those situations? No. I think I would very much need to lean on the voice of the Holy Spirit and many other believers in my life to discern whether I was in that moment. But I think it should go on the list.
Curt Harlow [00:36:18]:
Okay.
Cameron Wells [00:36:18]:
We'll add it.
Dena Davidson [00:36:19]:
We'll add it.
Curt Harlow [00:36:20]:
Maybe. You two will add it.
Dena Davidson [00:36:21]:
I'll listen to it. We'll say to be, to dance.
Curt Harlow [00:36:24]:
Okay, let's apply this. We're feeding them. It's over. Who wants to go first? Who's got a practical application? Jesus is praying for unity here. What should we then do about it?
Cameron Wells [00:36:34]:
I think the fact that he's praying for unity means there's going to be disunity. So I don't think we should be surprised by it. Anything that Jesus asks for or says, please let this be so, means that it's probably not going to come to fruition.
Curt Harlow [00:36:46]:
So don't be disillusioned. Maybe check your heart if you're disillusioned by some disunity.
Cameron Wells [00:36:51]:
Check your heart if you're disillusioned by some unity. And then the other thing, in light of that, I think if any of our doctrine, theology, model of ministry leads us to change how we feel about other people, I think maybe we need to check to make sure that that's still in line with who Jesus is. Because I think we can disagree with people, or they could be evil, terrible people. But I think the minute that we start changing how we feel about people, low-hanging fruit, Democrat, Republican, that has influenced how I feel about people, that's not of God, because at the end of the day, those are the people I'm still called to love. And I think that's especially true church to church.
Curt Harlow [00:37:35]:
Very good.
Dena Davidson [00:37:36]:
My very practical is to speak positively of the Bible-believing churches in your area, even if you don't agree with how they exactly practice it. It's not your favorite style of ministry, if you're not a fan of everything, err on the side of wanting good things for them and speaking positively. So what this looks like is when I meet someone, they're a Christian, I say, "What church do you go to?" And they say, "I go to so-and-so church." And I say, "Tell me what you love about that church." "Oh, that's amazing." And I kind of store that away so that I can be thinking those positive thoughts about that church, because I know I'm going to hear the negatives. I work at a church, right? We're gonna hear the areas that we disagree, but I wanna be filling my mind with what Jesus is doing right and how the body of Christ is getting it right, and not just constantly be filling my mind with what's going wrong. I wanna see the churches in our area win, right? Like, I wanna believe good things about them and believe that God's prayer before he went to the cross was not ineffective, but that it was very effective.
Curt Harlow [00:38:43]:
Very good. Uh, I'm going to base mine on verse 24. Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory. So what does it mean to be with Jesus and to see his glory? It means to go to heaven. So I think a lot of disunity probably is birthed in the fact that we're too much in the now, we're too worried about the now. And so my encouragement is to think more about heaven. And to think more about how every concern you have will be resolved when Jesus tells us who was right and who was wrong. And every technique, every strategy, every creed, every little thing that bothers us, the size of church or small group technique, every little thing that could disunify us, that will someday resolve.
Curt Harlow [00:39:32]:
And we will live in perfect unity. We will be with him. And see his glory. And I think the more we have that longer view, the less we'll take today too seriously, and the more hopeful we'll be. Yeah, so just get a little bit more heaven thinking going in your life.
Dena Davidson [00:39:53]:
Amen.
Curt Harlow [00:39:54]:
Amen. All right. Hey, T. Meister, we still— oh no, it's Will. Well, I feel like we're orphans here. We got Brother Anis last week. We got Will this week. Where is Bree? Bree, come home.
Curt Harlow [00:40:07]:
Come back, Bree. We need you. Will is producing today. Will, what campus do you go to? He goes to the Auburn campus. That's right. Great producing today, by the way. Do you know what— who's going to be our guest next week? Mason.
Dena Davidson [00:40:21]:
I don't think he's been on.
Curt Harlow [00:40:23]:
Has he been on? Yeah. Okay. You're going to love Mason. Great communicator, great thinker, great young leader around here at Bayside. We will be talking about Easter-y stuff, uh, next week, and we got a special episode coming up too in a week or so. So look for that as we transition out of the Not Without You series into an Easter emphasis. And then, very exciting, we're going to be starting a verse-by-verse, chapter-by-chapter go through the book of the Gospel of John. We'll probably be in the Gospel of John.
Cameron Wells [00:40:54]:
So exciting.
Curt Harlow [00:40:55]:
Uh, I think they said 2— 20,032, um, something like that. So a while. So get ready for that. And as always, please spread the word about the Bible Study Podcast, and thank you so much for listening and/or watching.