Why Genesis Changed Everything We Know About God (Genesis Part 3)

welcome everybody Welcome to crowd Church my name is Matt uh it's great to be with you this wonderful evening I'm with the beautiful Anna good evening everyone that is so funny you know because last time I did this with you a couple of weeks ago there was no sound at all and today it was like boom boom it's better to have lots of sound than nor they I don't know there's there is such a thing as too much Matt too much yeah too much of Matt's voice perhaps ask Sharon about that one your lovely wife absolutely uh so if you're joining us live online uh let us know in the comments say hi whether you're on I think we're on YouTube Facebook and Instagram tonight we are doing all three so uh let us know where you're watching from do come join us in the comments and say hi it be great to see you um yeah let's have a look who we got already oh Dan orange is in the comments Miriam's in the comments Cruz in the comments we've got it all going on so yeah warm welcome to everybody I should probably check Facebook I can hear myself turn the volume down [Laughter] see even Matt wants to turn the volume down on himself this is not a good start everyone even Matt thinks it's too much mat sometimes someone was listening to the live stream here in the church building and the problem with it is it's like 20 to 30 seconds behind it's like a there's a time lag uh with the live stream and so hearing yourself 20 seconds ago is a slightly surreal experience yeah quite quite weird how was your weekend it was good you know I um have just got back from Oxford it was there for a weekend conference well all day Saturday conference actually but it was there um from Friday night so yeah it was a rhythm of Hope in Oxford so yeah it was rhyth of Hope and there was Rhythm and there was hope yeah there was lots of hope it is a Christian Conference about um for couples who were dealing with infertility and pregnancy and baby loss so oh wow it was pretty powerful weekend yeah yeah yeah no doubt it was awesome recommend it yeah if anybody is interested in that subject definitely check out their website it is a really cool event I am I was there sharing our um story um as a family which has to do with recurrent pregnancy loss so yeah we shared a bit of our in testimony and yeah was part of the ministry team over the weekend it's just an awesome time to be honest wow sounds like fun yeah it was good um a little bit tired today but a little bit tired as you wazzed back down the m6 to get here for the yeah yeah no Manchester where I dropped a friend on the way back yeah well thank you for joining us yeah I know was cool how was your weekend uh yeah the weekend was good yeah yeah we um we had a cookout yesterday evening uh which was good so you know it was pretty I caught up all my DIY jobs yesterday so Sharon's happy winner winner yeah yeah I scored lots of Branny points yesterday so happy wife happy life right uh absolutely that's what my husband says does he believe that philos um well I got home today and he like took me out for lunch so I guess I okay Andy well done top and hon brownie points for that one yeah awesome he's proberly watching so there you go baby and if he's not he should be yeah right ex right uh so tonight we have the legendary Steve connley first time on crowd Steve is that right which is very exciting uh known Steve for I want to say well over 30 years a long old time we both didn't have gray hair I think when we met yeah funny that did that pick up up with the mics because I feel like everyone needed to hear that comment well that Steve's gry ha developed after meeting me yeah yeah first just in case anyone missed it so we've got Steve carrying on uh our journey through Genesis we are on part I want to say three uh week three of our journey through Genesis and Steve is looking at the nature of God tonight which I'm very excited about so uh he did the talk this morning at the morning service and Zoe my daughter I was just saying this earlier she said it was very funny so you know no pressure then if he's not funny tonight there no one's gonna laugh at his jokes they just gonna dive uh so if you find Steve funny and inspiring just write haha in the comments yeah let us know yeah yeah yeah he'll He he'll appreciate that so uh should we get Steve up yeah let's do it do you want to roll the speaker thing to you right uh good evening uh everyone so uh yeah uh my name is Steve uh I've been part front line for many decades uh married to the lovely kery and uh I work as a GP up in anfield in Liverpool so uh yeah obviously we're still almost at the beginning of the new year and we're in this series called in the beginning and that's because we're looking at the beginning book of the Bible and we're going to begin uh this Sunday uh sort of Journey Through the book looking at V various of the stories and characters uh in the Book of Genesis and what we can learn from them so as we begin this journey uh at the beginning of the year looking at the beginning book of the Bible in this series called in the beginning we're going to begin at the beginning of the book which has its famous opening line in the beginning so let's start and I believe you already know a little bit about the Book of Genesis uh I know they they've they've talked a little bit about it and about the history I did have some PowerPoint slides but apparently uh they can't find them uh but since we're talking about creation today it's not really the end of the world is it uh so there you go we're starting and uh as as you'll know if you've been listening to to the uh the talks in the chat there's many different ways we can read these opening chapters of Genesis uh many people very clever academic people will hold different views on this so it's important we we gracious and humble with one another as we consider these different views uh just so that I'm not dodging around it for the rest of the talk uh I'll tell you my view on this and it's not I'm telling you what what you should believe and that this is the right view or any official view of crowd church or Frontline Church but I would hold what I call a genre sensitive view uh I believe that these are well they are ancient documents we need to consider that context and uh I believe these passages are teaching us things are literally true about God about us and about the world and they're doing it in the form of a story which was a very common way of doing it in the ancient world so I'm reading these passages mainly in terms of theology rather than as history or science and that's my position and what I'm going to do I'm going to take a really broad look at what we can learn from these opening two chapters about who God is who we are and how it all fits into the big picture of the Bible so let's start with who God is Genesis 1 verse one opens with this famous beginning line in the beginning God now as as you've heard before that these stories were were written as a sort of counterargument against other ancient creation stories and this is one of the first points that it makes against them is that pretty much all the other creation stories were polytheistic in other words there was lots of gods and when you read them the really complex and Fantastical stories of gods appearing and and fighting and procreating and dying Often by killing each other you know it's a bit like an episode of cosmic East Enders but in Genesis 1 we just just have this really simple opening line in the beginning God there's no origin story there's no battles no hierarchies just God and just the one God and that's Point number one there is one God the next thing I think we can go on to see from even from these first few words is that God is eternal you see it doesn't say in the beginning God was created or a god appeared he was already there at the beginning and you can look up loads of verses referring to God as the Eternal God very easy to do now we struggle with this idea of Eternal uh or infinite because we've got you know tiny little finite minds and the nearest we can come to is the idea of a very very very very very long time but really what this concept means is without beginning or end and so our God he is the original uncaused cause he's the uncreated one and sometimes people will try and trip us up and say w who created God eh and the answer is no one he's Eternal you're mistaking him for someone who was created and then we go on to look at the whole of the rest of chapter one where it tells us that God created everything everything that exists he talks about the heavens and the Earth the the light the Sun the moon and stars he talks about the plants the fish the birds other animals and eventually Mankind and he says he did this by the power of His word he said let there be light and there was light now some people may feel that same Rush of divine creative power when you say Alexa turn the lights on and low the light cometh on but that's cheating because you've already got the light bulb and you've already got the electricity God just creates everything out of nothing really but the Bible says everything that exists comes from God in John chapter one in this passage that sort of Echoes Genesis chapter 1 where John is talking about the word and he tells us that that's Jesus he says in the beginning was the word and the Word was with God and the Word was God he was with God in the beginning then it says through him all things were made without him nothing was made that has been made wow you know that is divine creative power and that's my next point that our God is all powerful and you know other civilizations they worshiped things like the sun moon and stars or animals or mountains or Seas but in this story says no they're things that were created by God they're not to be worshiped sun's not a god it's just a light in the sky it's the second commandment not to make an image of anything in Heaven above or an earth below or in the waters uh below you shall not bow down to them or worship them then in Romans chapter 1: 20- 25 I'll just pick out a few lines it says for since the creation of of the world God's invisible qualities his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood from what has been made you know and for many of us we can see that we go out into nature and we just see God's handiwork but it goes on to say that people exchang the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles they exchange the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator who is forever praised amen but think even today you know people can make claims about God and about belief in God and say things like science has disproved God and I think these passages help us with that as well because people say we don't need God as an explanation of where we came from because science has explained it we've got the big bang and the higs bowon now I love science I'm a doctor as I said before I use Medical Science all day to help people and uh I would have done physics if it hadn't gotten into doing medicine and science it keeps the lights on it gives us television it's great but sometimes science can make claims or people can make claims for science that science itself doesn't support okay and it's not usually serious scientists that make these claims by the way CU they know the limits of science but the fact is science has not explained where matter and energy comes from it's not explained how it came to be there's lots of theories lots and lots and lots of them they're all speculative and they use fancy equations and big words but when you listen to proper scientists they will tell you we just don't know we're not sure but someone say I's the Big Bang what caused the Big Bang what happened before the Big Bang well we've discovered the higs boson the so-called God Particle but where does that come from is that just come out of nothing for me the idea that an all powerful Eternal God made everything doesn't seem like an unreasonable idea unless I'm just going to close my mind off to all possibility of a supernatural explanation for anything but I'm not prepared to do that but you know science and religion don't need to conflict they can sometimes Clash if science makes claims of a religious nature or if religion makes claims of a scientific nature but even there they don't have to conflict because they're just looking at things differently for example if I go in the kitchen put the cattle on and krie my wife comes in and says I understand exactly what he's going on here and she'll say how electricity is generated in the power station how it's transmitted by conduction down the cables into the kettle where it hits the element and meets some resistance which so turned into heat energy that heat energy is then transferred through conduction and convection into the water and the water molecules their energy increases so they can break free the bonds holding them in the liquid state and they can enter the gaseous state known as Steam by a process we call Boiling and she say see I understand perfectly and I reply well that's very interesting there but my understanding of this situation is I thought you might want a cup of tea so you can see they are not in Conflict they're just different they're both right one's not wrong they're both right but they're looking at them differently and if you know this whole idea of Science and religion is is something either you're interested in or something you've struggled with or something you want to look at more there's lots of resources out there and two that I would signpost you to one is a guy called John Lennox he's uh Emeritus professor of mathematics from Oxford University uh and you can look him up online spell his surname l n o x and he also works for an organization called OCA the Oxford Center for Christian apologetics and that they'd be a good place to start uh to look at those things in more detail next thing I want to say is that when God created everything he declared them to be good and in the Hebrew that word good it's at its root it means a complete and perfect representation of a thing and in Romans 1 we read that we can see God's qualities from what he has made and so when he made everything to be good and perfect that tells us that's who he is too now we know things aren't like that now that's because of the fall and you'll come on to that later but our God is a good god he could not be more perfect and linked to the idea of goodness is kindness and there are many things even in the passage we can see in his provision in nature for us but you know when Adam and Eve fell it says that they ate from the fruit and they saw that they were naked and they were ashamed and so they covered themselves with leaves and they hid and we know the story that God expelled them from the Garden of Eden but even as he was doing that he says he made them clothes of animal skin to cover the nakedness and the shame even in judgment God showed kindness and the next thing is I want to show that our God is a relational God in Genesis 1:26 God says let us make man in our image now for Christians this switch to the plural points to the Trinity so God is relational even within his own being and we can also see that God saw that man being alone was not good it was the only thing he points out that wasn't good in creation and we also see that he came looking for Adam and Eve when they hid from him you see he wants relationship with us because that's who he is and the final thing I want to show about God is that our God is a personal God sometimes we use the word personal to mean a private or an individual thing like my personal opinion or you know I have a personal train at the gym I don't uh I I don't go to a gym uh fortunately you can't really see on this this camera if it's a bit higher up and turned sideways you you know that I don't go to a gym uh but what we mean by this is that our God is a person he's not a thing he's not an impersonal force and we see this because he has a will he speaks and we see because he made us male and female in His image and we are persons to be a person means to have a mind a will and emotions and this again can Clash with some Modern thinking that would have people say prayers or give thanks to the universe or to Nature to impersonal things and we have what I think is a much better story that our God who we pray to who we give thanks to is a person a bit like us but infinitely better now I want to bring out two points about what we can learn about ourselves and who we are and each one of these could be a whole series in themselves so I'm just going to touch on them briefly just like with all the points I make today feel free to follow these up yourselves look into them in more detail ask questions but the first thing I want to say is that we are made in God's image Genesis 1:27 so God created Mankind in his own image in the image of God he created them male and female he created them now there are many many things we can take from being made in His image but the main thing I want to say is that it means we are of infinite value you know in terms of other creation stories it was often just the king or the emperor that was made in God's image of course and Mankind was often just a play thing of the Gods there to do their bidding or else but here we We Are The Pinnacle of God's creation formed by his own hand in His image Made Alive by his breath Psalm 8 verses 3 to 5 says when I consider your Heavens the work of your hands the moon and stars which you have set in place what is mankind that you are mindful of them human beings that you care for them you have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with Glory and Honor you know it's easy to feel in significant compared to the vastness of space but God imbues us with significance and V value glory and honor the one Eternal all powerful God is thinking about you he cares for you you are that important and also we were the only one of the creatures that were made in His image you know I'm not going to get into a discussion about Evolution here but the Bible tells us that we are special we an act of special creation we're not just highly evolved naked Apes we're unique in creation not just another animal and the other part of want to make is that as well as giving us value and significance God gives us meaning and purpose the next verse in Psalm 8 verse 6 says you made them us rulers over the works of your hands you put everything under their feet and it goes on to list all the animals and everything else and this is taken directly from Genesis 1:26 to 28 and in the retelling of creation uh the story in Genesis 2 we read that God gives us the responsibility of taking care of the garden I say Obviously Adam and Eve this is what ruling means in God's ways it means to serve and you notice that this purpose isn't to serve God directly in the sense of bringing him sacrifices and offerings to appease his anger but it's to take care of the good things God has given us and it's us who receive the benefit of those things in terms of food and shelter and provision vision and finally I want to look at how this all fits into the big story of the Bible you see in the first couple of chapters in Genesis 1 and 2 we see God's original plan for mankind and the world he creates a paradise in which everything was as it should be there was no death no pain no suffering God walked with us in the garden Heaven and Earth were in Intimate relationship then there was the fall the push for independence from God the blessings of Eden were lost to the curse of the Fall mankind was expelled from the garden and from God's presence the relationship was broken death reigned but then if we jump directly from these first couple of chapters of the Bible to the last two chapters revelation we see something amazing in Revelation 21 talks about the New Jerusalem coming down from heaven and a loud voice from the throne says look God's dwelling place is now among the people and He will dwell with them they will be his people and God himself will be with them and will be their God he will wipe away every tear from their eyes there will be no more death or Mourning or crying or pain the old Order of Things has passed away it's just amazing and then revelation 22 the last chapter of the Bible reading one verses 1 to 5 then the angel showed me the river of the Water of Life it says it flows down the middle of the city on each side of the river stood the Tree of Life says no longer will there be any curse the Throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city and his servants will serve him they will see his face and his name will be on their foreheads there will be no more night they will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the Sun for the Lord God will give them light and they will rain forever and ever so we can see if you look closely we're back in Eden the tree of life is there there's no curse God and Mankind are in perfect relationship we once again reigning with him God's original plan was this perfect union where we are in perfect relationship with him enjoying his presence and provision forever in a state of blessing now we blew that in Eden and we've been blowing it ever since but God's plan Remains the Same these two bookends of Genesis 1 and two Revelation 21 and 22 show us God's plan and the rest of the Bible is part of this big story of how we have rejected God and his plan but God because of his great love for us is always working to bring us back to the place where things are once again good exactly the way God intended them to be and so said Roman rans 1 the passage we read says that creation shows us what God is like and amongst other things we can see that God is one he's Eternal he's all powerful he is good he is kind he's relational and he is personal we can also see that we are of infinite value and filled with Divine Purpose God's original design in Eden has only been lost temporarily he has made a way for mankind to return to him through Jesus and his death death on the cross we can ReDiscover our value and purpose we can rekindle our lost relationship with him and ultimately we can spend eternity with him in Perpetual goodness and blessing and this is how my story will end whatever comes my way in this short time on Earth the Eternal God has made me part of his eternal story however difficult challenging hard life gets I know it's not the end but I know what the end is and the end is good but this isn't just my story it's the story of many people and the good news is this can be the story for everyone and it can be part of your story too if it's not already and feel free to connect with people to find out more about that so we started this talk in the beginning and this is the end thank you well done for keeping it with the graphics there guys love that good job uh thanks Steve love that yeah that was good there was a lot in there wasn't there there was definitely a lot in there let me just close a lot of this Tech down so many screens way too many screens going on um but yeah no it's great thank you Steve love that was that was that funny zo was as the first one yeah we got a thumbs up great we're still approved uh which is good so right let's get straight into it shall we um lots of comments fun comments going on on YouTube as you would especially from Matt crew Matt crew asked me what was it like watching the original creation seems to think I was there it's not the only comedian in the house tonight absolutely uh so need to be okay with not totally understanding the uncaused cause is mindbending I love that great expression isn't it yeah the uncaused did you make that up yourself is that who's that from oh okay but I love it I've never heard that before no I haven't heard it before it's good uncaused CA like when you're a wordy person I like that yeah yeah that's really good uh the uncaused cause um so but you need to be okay with not totally understanding it do you think that's true absolutely I mean we were talking about this the other week weren we when I was last hosting that kind of I don't think God is something that you can ever fully understand and and it goes back to that thing of who wants a God that you can totally wrap your in human mind around right that's pretty small yeah it is you know it is I don't think we're you know even the most I mean even the most intelligent people like you know we still so small-minded compared with the infiniteness of God right and yeah I I don't want a God I can understand and put in a little box and carry around and fully have you know like kind of all sust and sorted because that would be a pretty average God wouldn't it it probably wouldn't be God in reality what was interesting was we put out on um in the big wild world of social media a clip of you saying I don't want a small God right and there were comments that came back in from that more so than we've had good or bad there it it was it was more questions because people would say like um and I don't know Steve if you got an answer to this but or any thoughts on this but the the comments that came back what well that's a convenient thing to say that all this is happening I'm my brain is too small to understand what God's doing it's a convenient thing to say when and they likened it to suffering so when there's a lot of suffering going on in the world to go back and say well I don't understand it God's bigger than me therefore and they they came out and said it was a convenient excuse I don't know if you've got any retort I mean yeah that's a huge question isn't it which we spend an hour discussing but I mean I would say the Bible does clearly give an answer to suffering it does doesn't fully understand all why me God why me that emotional kind of cry when you kind of yeah experience personal suffering but in terms of that kind of beginning to end story Genesis to Revelations that Steve just touched on the Bible just tell us that there's this narrative Arc where you know life was without suffering and pain and then it entered the world um with Adam and Eve's choices and then in the fullness of time God is making all things right again so so yeah I think Christianity probably gives a better answer for suffering than any other religion to be honest yeah I think you're right I think CS Lewis became a Christian because of suffering yeah um which is interesting I do think I I I understand where some of the comments are coming from in the sense that I think it's easy to say God is Big I'm small and therefore not have any form of critical thinking do you what I mean and not think about these things and not debate them which is neither what you said or what Steve said actually I think it's it's the complete opposite yeah but I also think kind of I I kind of see what people are saying but I also think you could leave the same argument towards atheism or saying well the Big Bang just happened it just came out of nowhere and the world just kind of the universe just came into being of its own Accord without a Creator God behind it like you could you know all those arguments still stand to th to that as well like I don't think there's any better explanation that sort of resolves that yeah no it's true and also just to say on the whole science and Steve got got into it a little bit the whole science thing science and Faith next week we have Josh my son who is speaking on the whole science and Faith thing which I'm excited to hear yeah he's just graduated from St Andrews with a masters in theoretical physics and so has a few things to say about the whole thing and he has quite a strong faith but he's also quite science-minded a bit like Steve um and so I'm really Keen to hear what is going to come up next week so if if the whole science um thing is of an interest to you do stay in touch and also put any questions any thoughts uh in the comments or get in touch with us with your questions yeah and there's quite a lot of scientists because there's I mean there's some quite big questions aren't there around science and I kind of think we have probably haven't got the space or time on this live stream to fully dig into each of those questions but we could probably like send you to some different resources or books that would look into them in much more details so if anyone has any questions we can also sign post you to a bit you know more intelligent people who can give you more thorough answers than we can here yeah something like that Aid in the comments sent me a message last week saying on the whole science thing he said I love it if you got any questions let me know so just send them to him uh the comments did Aid will quite happily answer your questions awesome and also just to reiterate John Lennox another resource that Steve mentioned do go check out John Lennox he is all over YouTube man have you heard any of his stuff no I can't say it h love John Lennox love love love John link such a great guy the brainer size of a planet that fell he's he's like the professor is he the professor of maths at Oxford oh he's he's retired um uh but he's an exceptional uh apologist so he has a lot of um interesting ideas and thoughts about God so definitely worth checking out yeah yeah uh can you comment on God's goodness yes you can go on I'm looking through the questions you have to I mean I think God's goodness is something that is both true in terms of the Bible tells us of examples of God's goodness through history and it's also something that I think we can probably have personal experience of today like I know I've got seasons of life where I've really clearly seen God's goodness I'm sure you have two at um so yeah it's something that's both true and factual but also something you can experience so it's experiential as well yeah there's this really interesting Psalm very famous Psalm uh Psalm 23 that um talks about how you know when you walk through the valley of the shadow of death I fear no evil it's that Psalm and at the start of it the psalmist says uh your goodness and your mercy they follow me all the days of my life and that word follow the modern equivalent as best as I can tell and I'm not into Hebrew I I heard the if it's not true I'll go and blame the speaker that I heard say this um the modern equivalent of is in Hot Pursuit yeah and if you're have a certain age I'm thinking Smokey in the Bandit I'm thinking Top Gun you know in Hot Pursuit kind of lot I love top you go for it don't don't don't hold back as a complete aside I saw an Instagram re earlier on which which was all about getting Top Gun into everything and there was a guy lead who was doing worship Home Alone guy was doing worship that was a different talk yeah yeah the guy doing worship and he was playing Top Gun sort of secretly on the guitar during a worship session I thought it was brilliant and some people actually looked at him and he went I used to have a a friend who's worship leader room years ago where where I grew up in Oxford and um and yeah and he used to play like slow down Guns and Roses like in all the musical interludes it was so funny so Laura challenge set got to get Top Gun yeah yeah it's up going into the worship which would be anyway what we talking about oh goodness um the goodness of God the mercy and goodness of God follow me they are in Pursuit Of Me and this um speaks again back to what Steve was talking about in terms of value yeah as in the value God puts on creation like um he there is this sort of special place uh in creation of for mankind and Dave Conley is actually going to be talking about what it means to be in the image of God in a couple weeks um but this idea that the goodness and mercy of God are inot Pursuit Of Me all the days of my life doesn't mean I feel it all the time doesn't mean I recognize it all the time but there is this eternal truth which says the goodness of God is in Hot Pursuit Of Me all the days of my life and I think that that'll preach right there yeah I think that's really good and I think it's a really good distinction to make that that isn't the same as life always going well or always having good things like in terms of our understanding of oh only good things will happen to me because I'm a Christian like that is just you know obviously not real on not anyone's experience like no one has a just good life do they when nothing bad as we understand bad to be ever happens but it's that overwatching goodness and kindness and love and mercy that kind of underpins like I would kind of call it the kind of Baseline of my life you know it's always there um yeah you talk a lot about this don't you I do yeah yeah have you've written a book yeah it's not just about that but yeah no it's you know it's I think it's something that when things are difficult when you go through seasons of suffering or hard ship it's something that's tested and you really learn to find and you you know it's kind of you test it and know it to be true um and so like I feel like you know I grew up as a Christian so you kind of learn about God is good and you sing songs about how good Jesus is from a very young age and I I feel like it's something that is only tested and becomes true in your the depth of your heart and your soul like you know it CU you know it CU you know it when it's really tested and chips are down and life doesn't feel like it's good that's kind of when you realize that that there's a deep Trea there um yeah yeah no totally uh absolutely uh Miriam's asked a question or one comment uh is we probably shouldn't sing because we'll have to pay royalties Udo I I don't think it was close enough to the original to be quite Fair do not think so um What would life be like without God Miriam as do you think what would your life be like um because there there's had to have been opportunities actually where you I mean we talk about you know one God uh a personal God but there are moments where going back to what you said earlier where actually I think all of us like Adam and Eve have the opportunity to try and turn away from God that may be because of suffering that may be because of something bad that's happened it may just be because we want to live life our own way um so you must have had moments where you were faced with the the fork in the road as it were yeah I think we probably all have um I think there's probably a few moments in the life where it's like I could choose to continue to follow God or not I think when we were going through a really hard period of of recurrent miscarriage it's like God why is this happening to us and how can I believe that you're there and you care and you're you know you're involved when we're praying for healing and nothing's happening yeah so that was definitely a time where I questioned it that you know there's times I'm younger like when I went to UNI and um yeah I kind of stepped away from my kind of Christian family background it's like do I want to continue to follow God or not that's my choice now I think there's a number of seasons of life that I can look back in whether there's like that kind of fork in the road and it's a decision point I guess you've probably had them as well haven't you yeah very much so um very much so and I think I remember asking myself this question once like what would my life have been like had I have not become a Christian I don't know if you go do these interesting thought experiments what would my life have been like or what would my life have been like had I have walked away from God at this particular difficult point I think they're just really interesting thought experiments and I remember the first time thinking about what would my life look and I remember praying about it I'm like God what would my life have looked like had I have not become a Christian when I was like 18 19 years old had that event not had happened and I just felt God really clearly say to me it's not so much about what your life would look not have looked like but what about all these other people whose lives have changed because of what I've done through you if that makes sense and I just started to think about all the people that God had touched through me somehow you know like um whatever that that may have been and I just thought oh wow what a privilege you know to have been used by God the way that I that I have and the way that we have and the way um that we have and will continue to be whether it's through this whether it's through your writing through you know speaking at rhythm of hope I I'm really sorry whenever I say that I want to say Rhythm is a Dancer and I've got the song In My Head we can't sing apparently yeah we can't sing we're not allowed to sing um but you know what I mean about all those different lives that you've touched and that you've connected with over the years I think you just become really Greatful so I find it really hard to imagine what life would be like without God I I know what you mean but I also I think there's certain Seasons where I think well yeah I think if I had decided I wasn't going to follow God when I went to UNI I think how life would have felt different is I probably would have been quite lost in those early kind of 20s where yeah I really needed that sense of purpose and who am I and you're forming a lot of your sense of identity and what you're meant to do in life and I kind of meing was a large part of me realizing a lot of who I am um and I think I would have felt a lot more lost in early life had I not had that sense of this is who God's created you to be and this is what he's calling you to do and then like you say you can look at just the everyday things like I spoke to a conference of 70 or 80 people yesterday and like so that 70 or 8 to people who are dealing with infertility that wouldn't have heard my story yesterday had you know I'm not had God at that point so you yeah you're right you can look at it and there's some really specific things but I think for me when I think about kind of dark times and if I hadn't if IID taken a different route and I hadn't followed God and believed in his goodness I actually think you know when we go back to that sort of season of suffering in our lives I I feel like without God it would have been like just a lot darker like I actually God is the only hope in that situation so as much as I understand when people going through suffering they're like you know why is this happening to me God but actually I felt like giving up on God and the Eternal hope that I have in him just makes an already Bleak situation in my life a whole lot Bleaker because not only is there not any good outcome that I want here and now there's also not an eternal resolution either so for me it felt like throwing my hope away um yeah not just the immediate hope but the Eternal one as well so was a bit of a no-brainer for me really in the end it's like why would I make an already depressing situation in my life even more depressing yeah they say that backland and Christians are some of the most oppressed people you can meet and not always true but I think it often is yeah because you're neither in nor you're out and it's it's kind of it you know what and in again you know the goodness of God but you're not really living in the fullness of that and I think that's quite a hard place to be yeah I think so yeah it's um I I've got Mr Miagi in my head do you remember Mr Miagi yeah Karate Kid yeah Karate Kid I've watched it quite recently with my little boy actually bet he loved it yeah he's really into Lots yeah well he talked about walking on the left side of the road you're safe walking on the right side of the road you're safe walk in the middle of the road squish just like grape and I think that's a t-shirt slogan so you can form a theology from this yeah it's um I I I think it's a really well here's someone written here in the comments that um the more I learn the more I realize I don't know which I think is very true yeah the older I get the more the less I realize I know um we were talking about we were we talking about this this morning um about how a friend of mine who was complaining about how his 18-year-old son wouldn't listen to him and I just thought this was really funny because I'm like well when you were 18 did you listen to your parents and he was like no so why do you think your 18y old is going to listen to you because you knew way more than your parents when you were 18 right so he knows way more than you at least that's in his thinking and then as I get older I realize actually I probably know less and less than what I thought I know yeah and that's part of growing up and WIS gaining wisdom isn't it you realize how little we know and yeah you just I think the more you live the more you realize there's more areas of gray than you pups once thought and everything's very black and white and straightforward when you're young some ways isn't it but I yeah I agree but I also have a nine-year-old he doesn't listen to me so think is a problem at all ages not just when they're 18 yeah that's so true that's so true so just having a look through to see if there's anything that we have missed why do you think we should understand everything well but I think a better question here is why do people try and understand everything do you think people have desire to know don't they yeah why is a big question I think yeah I think it is and I think it's part of our god-given design isn't it like we we're created and we're created in the image of God and we want to understand we want we're created to know God and to understand and and to be in relationship with him like he's a relational God he's a Creator God he's yeah so we're Made In His Image and it's like so of course we want to understand like that why question is always going to be there isn't it it's how he's designed us but I just think that the answer is probably so much bigger than we've probably got a fraction of it haven't we in our human understanding and there's so much more that we will probably understand only in the fullness of time yeah but I think it's part of our designed to ask why I don't think God Minds in fact I think he's made us inquisitive and creative and kind of In His Image well scripture talks about seeking understanding doesn't it and and and and actually pursuing understanding and and investing our time and energy into understanding I just I do wonder if we try and understand the the things in the wrong order sometimes so there's someone that I see um who is quite uh mentally ill quite depressed and the question they must ask 50 times an hour it's just going through their head constantly is why would this happen to me why could this happen to me why could this happen to me I don't deserve it why has this happened and it becomes this sort of circle that you go around uh or it's certainly he does in his head why why why why why never really looking for an answer that's going to help him if that makes sense almost looking for someone to blame or a a thing to blame or a procedure to blame uh as if that's going to help him somehow um so I think sometimes our in our trying to understand stuff and seeking that understanding we can get caught up in these downward spirals which don't really lead anywhere yeah and I think you're right and I think sometimes when you're going through a hard season or struggling with mental health or anything else like that I think a point comes where it's less useful to say why and like for me like cly when we went through a season it was difficult was like I kind of got bored of asking that question because there was no straightforward answer and even if you had one it doesn't really resolve anything and actually a much more interesting question for me now is okay so that's what's happening so what so what now what next what are we going to do with this God like what you know what's the next thing cuz that actually takes you somewhere it takes you into a solution so it's like you you know how are we going to do something about this or so where are we going to go from here like what next such a powerful question isn't it and like it's it's one of those you can you can spend a lot of time trying to understand why something is happening to you but at the same time you can go what was that noise was that you okay somebody's just got a phone on but like like you say you can also I think invest energy it's like well instead of saying why can't I do this saying what can I do do you what I mean or instead of and I I think you're right I think it's such a powerful question because it's a it leads you to different possibilities like I don't understand this God so what should I be doing now right it's like God where are you leading me in this yeah I mean we're both quite practical pragmatic people in a way aren't we and I just I just find it I'm like so what you know so what we going to do like what's the action how do we get out of this or fix this or move on from here like I just otherwise you can become so stuck um and I totally get why people do become stuck in difficult things but it's it's not a nice place to be really no no sorry no have to use the microphone Matthew good microphone Tech listen we have run Bang Out of Time overrun slightly uh but thank you so much for joining us if you'd like to come say how's it in about 10 minutes time we will be on Google meets come and say hello if you're watching online be great to meet you come and say hello um come meet folks if you want to do that we'll only be online for like five minutes just saying hello to to people and that link will be coming up on the screen and going in the comments uh I'm I'm looking at the tech guys and girls the tech girl is sorry Dan um but yeah bringing those up we'll make sure those are in the comments but it I think it's go. crow. Church MeetMe go. crow. Church meet we'll be online for about 5 minutes at 8:00 if you'd like to come say hello go grab yourself a cup of tea in the meantime we're going to start packing down but anything else from you in closing no just like if you want to keep this conversation going if you've got more questions or anything you want to talk about or pray through then either like Matt says join us tonight or hook up with us through the week drop us an email or a text or whatever and yeah we'd love to continue the conversation yes absolutely we would and in person we're going to hand over to Dion That's your you you take your coat off if you want love that's fine uh so we're going to hand over to Dion but thank you so much for joining us uh it's been so so good to be with you like Anna said any questions any thoughts any prayer requests do reach out to us let us know uh come join us online big shout out Steve enjoyed that yeah it was great thanks Steve yeah absolute Legend do join us next week as we talk about science and faith and get into that whole debate so you're not going to want to miss that Genesis part four yes it is are you here next week you're not hosting are you I'm not hosting I don't think I haven't actually checked the rer I don't think I'm hosting but I will probably be here I think it's me and will actually yeah oh yeah Will was also another science so looking forward to that thank you so much ladies and gentlemen God bless you we'll see you next week see you all soon