Perceived Obstacles (Part 1?)

Obstacles trip us up. They often keep us from what we want to get to. They make things harder than they should be. This week we talk about some obstacles we have encountered when trying to learn about God and Jesus. There is tons of erroneous doctrine and manmade additives in religion that it is often a huge obstacles that leaves us running in the opposite direction of Jesus. Tune in to hear how they just aren't true, and in fact they aren't obstacles at all if you follow the simple truth.

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We, we learn from Obstacles. And that's what I want you to talk about because it's just an observation and it happens. And so now if you shed light on it, what the obstacles are, then maybe you can Deal with them. See, that's why I wanna talk about the context of obstacles. There's an obstacle that keeps people from coming to Christ. But then there's also obstacles that we run into in life that teach us things, right? In the context of this writing, I want to talk about things that just are barricades that stop people from even wanting to listen or even want to intellectually, uh, study the Bible we're talking about obstacles. They keep people from coming to Christ, not obstacles that are good for our teaching. I know that there's more than one. So list off obstacles that you think that are impeding people's ability to get to Christ. Okay? If, if I were to ask someone that hasn't come to Christ, what keeps you from coming? Most of them will say The stupidity of religion. And you've done This. Yes, the, uh, these doctrines that are just too difficult for me to even fathom, such as some of the, uh, the church's traditions, such as that Christ is in this way for his DNA is in the way and it's not needed. So, uh, erroneous doctrine okay. Is one. So that's like one, there's lots of, that's one stuff in it. What else? A lot of sub, titles under that. Mm-hmm. Then there's the obstacles that we place there. Our pride, I should be able to figure this out for myself without some blind faith, right? I think it's, it's important that you ask people there, they know their obstacles. And the one I real that really started me writing about this and thinking about this, was the erroneous doctrine of different denominations, religion. And they really don't need to be there. They're obs obstacles to the simple message that God has given us a way to be reconciled, and that is in the person of Christ and his finished work. All right. So let's dig deep into that one. Sounds like that's your, the one that's on your heart and on your mind the most now, right? The Doctrine. The erroneous doctrine. And they don't Need to be. Yep. So before you dive deep into each one of them, you know, I think you touched on a few, but kind of give us, give us the detail behind erroneous doctrine. Cause I hear doctrine, then I hear religion, then I'm thinking religion, I'm thinking church, I'm thinking church. I'm thinking all the things I learned at it. What is erroneous doctrine for people that want to say, I dunno. Is that what's the obstacle for me? Or is it not? If we go back to our, our basic mission, get 'em to Jesus. These erroneous doctrines keep people from coming. Now getting people to Christ is different than getting, getting them to church. Right? And when, when we get to church, each dom denomination has either a book of discipline or a book of, of catechism. And I'm, I'm talking And making a mistake that's different from the Bible. Far and away, Absolutely completely separated a man made doctrine that states you have to do this to either get the salvation or maintain, salvation. And we can, we can hit the big ones. Baptism, uh, the, the transubstantiation. When people come to communion, the Bible says, Jesus said, do this in remembrance of me. But if you go to some of the churches, and I'm not talking about just the Roman church. I'm talking about many denominations feel like they've taken scripture out of context and made their own doctrine, right? So to give you an example, a communion is Jesus said, this is my, this is the bread and this is the blood. He was sitting there with a cup of wine and real bread and he didn't say, bite me in the elbow. And if we, if we take the Bible in context, will see that he's saying that I am the bread of life and I'm gonna shed my blood and do this what I'm showing you in remembrance of me shedding my blood and giving my body. And he didn't say do this in order to, he didn't say do this to be saved. Didn't say do this, to maintain. He was giving a sign of remembrance. And it's a, it's a sign of praise when we go do that. Because we remember what he did for us and what did he do for us. And if you read that last writing about obstacles, we talk about his flesh was broken, he became a human being flesh. And that became broken. And that was a picture of the veil being torn in the temple. So pull it back to the obstacle though. Why is it an, uh, I mean, I think I know the answer, but why is it an obstacle for so many people, these erroneous ocre and the, the additional, you take the truth of the Bible take the, the word of Jesus and we're adding to it. So what is the obstacle that comes with that, that big? Uh, I don't know. It's like a airf flight checklist. I would Say, I would say that, you know, we are made in the image of God. We we're able to think and reason, like I had a good friend who said, I just can't bring myself to think that I'm eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Jesus Christ. Good cuz you're not you're not. And and you know, scripture says, unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood and what we go to the rest of the Bible and it's Christ showing that us, that this becomes my word in John 6 63. He says, it's not the flesh that prophets anything. It's the spirit. It's my words. And what I've done for you is what you need to do that's eating my flesh and drink in my blood. In other words, the faith of his finished work permeates us like food for the physical body. His word is for our soul, our spiritual body. So, but back to your question, um, my friend reason he said that just I know that the dna n a of Jesus Christ is not in that wafer , and I could take it scientifically. And we have found out things now that scientifically show us. Yeah, this is not, it's just not true. So that becomes a, For me, it's not a shocker that Jesus isn't in a cracker, But yeah, it's an, it's an obstacle for him because what happens now is he can't believe a lot of the other doc because wow, this stuff. And we know now through data, through sites, through different data that they basically have egg on their face. They didn't have to do It. So this actually happens a lot in my line of work too. So I I think you're saying that for a lot of people, the reason this can be an obstacle is once it becomes so erroneous or so unbelievable, one data point and Obvious, Right? And obvious, you look and say how many of the other things aren't true. So you throw the baby out with the bath water. So you take the religious doctrine, but you take the Bible, you take the idea of Jesus and you throw the whole thing out and say, yes, I'm gonna discount all of it. Yes. Because we've now mixed the two things together. And that, I say it in my work a lot because you get one metric wrong, one data point wrong, everyone looks at you and says, what else did you get wrong? The other 37 metrics that you built. So I completely understand that approach is as you build layers onto something, if you get one layer wrong, people take it wholesale and say the whole thing's wrong. Go all the way back to the Bible. Jesus. The story include that with the religion and the church and all those things get thrown out. It's funny that you make, you said you used the word mix. Yeah. If we look at truth, we don't have to add, we don't have to take away. In fact, the, I believe the, uh, the definition of perversion is adding to or taken away from a pure substance. Mm-hmm. if we add to a takeaway from that pure simple message, we've perverted the message. Any truth, any truth, right? Does not require interpretation. It is what it is. So with all, all of those concepts in this obstacle of religious doctrine, erroneous religious doctrine, one thing I kind of thought of as you were talking about this, I'm gonna make it clear for anyone listening separate for me, cuz I know how we think about this. But I think it's important for other people to hear it separate religion and what church really is. Because we're not, we're not laying churches out here and saying church is a bad thing. Church has gotten this all wrong per se. Religion is a manmade artifact, so to speak. And that has definitely added to a truth that didn't need to be added to. So When we think of church, yeah, eia, some pronounce it Ecclesia, it means they're calling out. And if we dig in and rightly abide scripture, we see that the church, the body of Christ found in Paul's letters and in in the book of Acts, the church, the body of Christ, for those who are called out by faith, whether you're Jew, gentile, man, woman. So let's, let's make no mistake, the church is the body of Christ, whether you're in Africa, whether you're in America, it's those people who by faith have accepted the finished work. Now we have your local church, which gets into religion because religion now instead of It can not all do. Right? Right, Right. It doesn't have to. There's plenty of grace, grace churches that preach the simple finished work of Christ. But those aren't the obstacle. The obstacle is the religion side that has the CaTECH teaching and the books of discipline that people are so ecstatic when they get saved. And now you're telling me, oh, I gotta do A, B, C, and D, which is, there's A maintenance plan. A maintenance plan. And, and, and Christ said, no, I finished it By faith, you're born again. Now you'll find teachings in his work to show us, um, how not to put obstacles in the way of us praising him and, and the, the simple joy of living in Christ and through Christ and, and allowing him to do that work. Easier said than done. So I'm glad you made that differentiation. This is the part that I come back to in terms of execution. So you laid out one obstacle. We're gonna talk about lots of different ones down the road, but today we've talked about one obstacle, identified why it's an obstacle. If people are sitting there saying, yeah, that's been a total obstacle for me. Religion has messed me up, and now I see maybe it's not church, it's actually religion. Manmade. Right. Maintenance plan, checklist plan. That's, that's me. That's kept me far away from Jesus. That's why I'm basically separated. What Can we do? What do we do with it? As I wrote in the last center's pulpit about obstacles. I would ask each individual ask the question? How can I identify these obstacles? Ask yourself, does the institution that you belong to, does it promote doctrine that are not, that are not in line with scripture? It's like be saying to you, and I know you hate this analogy, but it, I love it. The square root of 16 is four. It's not four plus one, it's not four plus 22, it's not four plus a hundred things. Christ said, my finished work sets you free. Yeah. Just ask yourself that Christ has taken all the obstacles away between humanity and divinity. The only obstacles there now are what we've placed there in these doctrines of tithing, in these doctrines of, of transubstantiation, where we have to, you know, do certain things. And if we don't, it shows us we're not saved. So, And that makes so much sense. Right? The way you just simplify that is like, so he removes all the obstacles. The only ones you can put back are the ones that we put back. Yeah. And the way we just talked about religion, that's exactly what it's doing. It's adding a new rule, a new maintenance plan, a new checklist, a new, now you've done, now you've been saved. But you need to do X. So it it, it's doing exactly that. Religion's adding back. And these doctrines keep people confused. Scripture tells us God is not a God of confusion. If you're confused about salvation, if you're confused about sanctification, glorification, there's all kind of doctrines that will keep you confused. I mean, it's what was the main, what is, what is the one obstacle? Think about this between the divinity and humanity. Sin. Sin, okay, what did Jesus do? Removed It all. He removed it. Yeah. That's the one obstacle between, it's not that you got a D on an English paper. It's not that you, you're, you're unemployed. It was sin. Jesus took it away. Think of a clear road from A to B where you need to go. Jesus cleared it. Now guess who put the obstacles back? Satan. Absolutely. Now Satan will come along the earth, if you will, and place the world the things of the world and causes us to say, Hmm, what about that? Well, but yet keep in your mind that Jesus took 'em all. Jesus took the obstacles away and Satan goes about and gives us thought, you know, And, but they still show up. And that's, that's the part that I sometimes struggle with. I'm on, I'm on your page. But they do still show up. So I imagine that clear path you just talked about. Jesus cleared it. I've got a, I've got a clear shot that sounds good to me. Yeah. And I'm like, but I'm standing on the damn road and I, boom, I hit enough. Okay. I hit something, boom, I hit something. I don't feel like I put them there. I don't feel like it's because of me. So I'm going love your message sinners pulpit. But I'm looking down the road and it's not, it's not You. And you would ask a person on the street, or a friend or a family member, what are those ops obstacles? They jump up. What, what are other you just said, you look down the road and there's an obstacle. Mm-hmm. what is it? I mean, for me, not for me. They're, uh, they're so highest enough. Yeah. No, they're not those for me. But I think for a lot of people Are so, so let me hear yours. Yeah. My practically and that's mine are more practical. But it's more about all the other things I have to do on this, in this world that I need to take care of. So I like the clear path, but on the way there, oh man, work jumps up in the way then family life, then dishes, then I can't get my home gym together in time. So I'm trying to make time for that. And then as soon as I'm like, oh man, I'm gonna have some quiet time to like actually have that one-on-one time because I'm getting to Jesus. I've already gotten to Jesus, by the way, for everyone. Yeah. So how are they obstacles? You see? They're obstacles because they feel, they feel like they're between me and, and where does he live to know Jesus? Yeah, sure. He is with me. Yeah. And I So you just put 'em up. Uh, good point. But so, and that's, that's I think what I want people to hear is that, just practically speaking, that road doesn't always look that clear. But I, I placed those things on the, I let them be on the road. They're not even on the road, But it is. He says, they're not even on the, he says come. He says come the doors open. If we were to take it on a micro level, it's, it's the distance between an open door, right? And what have we placed there? Yeah. All type of obstacles. But you get why people would, would say that, right? Absolut? I mean, they, and you've had it Yourself. I, I've spent, you know, the last 20 years trying to get over obstacles. But every time I go back he says, no. That's frankly clear, didn't you to Oh yeah. But I use drugs Come, that's not an obstacle. Clear. Yeah. It's not an obstacle. They're more on the Side. They're more on the side of the road. That's if you, if you stick at the analogy, it's like they're not actually, he's saying no, they're, they're not on your road. They're, you see them as you're passing by. But I'm, you're still clear, Pat's clear. And man, that is so good because you can still come down the road and these things are, you're human. He knows he became human. He knows. But the path is clear. Yeah. You're gonna have these things because you're human. So what do we do with the obstacles? We trust his finished work, number one. How many people say well have it, its been enough time in the Bible. And I don't wanna talk about the Bible because I'm not well versed in the Bible. Let's start from Jesus says it's Clear. Yeah. Which is, it's both like the hardest thing to do as a human. But it will actually be the easiest to say simply put, you just have to say, those aren't obstacles. They're just not Obstacles. They are annoying and they feel like they're in your way and they take up mental space but they're actually not Obstacles to him. It's not obstacles to him. Think about how many people we, we, we just mentioned what was, what is the main obstacle? Not what was what? Well, yes. What was the main obstacle? Sin. It's been moved, it's taken away. Uh, Romans off to the side of the road, Roman side of eight. We see it, we Live it. He showed forth his love that while we were yet sinners, this barricade between us and God, he says, I died for you. Paid the debt and took it from you. Now come. Okay, but how many people still continue? They're more, they're obsessed with their sin. And like Andrew Farley says, not their savior, our savior is so much bigger than our sin. Why are we still concentrating on this big obstacle I think the answer is the, because the proximity, right? Like sometimes Jesus feels like a far away notion, even though he lives inside of you. If you read your scripture. Right. But it, you see other things as you're on that clear path. I look to the left and the right and they're all over me. They're climbing all over me. Every one of those things. So it, they feel like obstacles and they feel like they're very, very real. Yes. But, but just back to the simple message. Either God became flesh among us and died to the sins of the world at the cross, or as CS Lewis said, or he's as phony as a, as a a man on the level of a poached egg It really does come back to that simple message. Yeah. Okay. So y i I would ask you, because I don't know every how many, in my last writing we talked about 30 some thousand different variants of religion. Sure. So I would ask the individual, and this is how I wrote it, look at your catechism. Mm-hmm. look at your What's a catechism? A catechism is a, a book of rules. Gotcha. Teaching ca I think ca catechetical means to teach. I mean, so, but, but the catechism is like paragraph 9 95 says, unless you eat the unless you, if you miss mass. Right. That's a mortal sin. Okay. And there's moral sins in, there's, there's, um, venal sins. See, these are all obstacles. Yeah. So I would ask the individual to Look which one keeps them up at night Kind of thing. Which one keeps them up? I would ask you it. Look at your own teachings. Mm-hmm. And the popular ones would be tithing and baptism and immaculate conception and transubstantiation, mortal sin, veal sin missing masks, all these, um, uh, these rituals of, of swinging incense in. I mean, I was at a funeral when I told you and, and the wasn't the priest, but a representative of the priest because the priest couldn't be there because the guy didn't practice his religion and he was deceased in the coffin and took a, a little bottle out and and baptized the way his sin. These are, these are a guy sitting in the audience says, that man is dead. Right. And this little water and these words you said are not the simple message. And I knew the man personally, and he, he had accepted Christ as his personal savior. That's what got him in the glory, not the advising bottle for the War. Right. So the, you know, we could, we could go on and on and list our obstacles. I would ask each individual to, to look at their specific obstacles and are they personal or has religion placed them there for you? Keeping you from coming to the true message? Good. That's helpful. But could we list, we could stand here probably. I mean, I haven't sat down and I should bunch and I should, yeah. And how many could we come up with? What I don't know to tell people, and I'm looking for your guidance. When you list this long list, how do you know it's religion or if, because as you said earlier, you can look in in the Bible and if you accept that as some level of truth, we can talk about that forever. But if that is the scriptural truth and, and kind of your true north, if you even accept that, you'll see things in there that would point back to a lot of those things that man has now I think taken and kinda stretched it and changed and tweaked it into that maintenance checklist and into all the things you just named. You can kind of find him in the Bible. So do I know if that's a catechism or was that actually like, no, man, the Bible says that like, I need to, I need to do that. Right. Back to what? And that's a, that's a hard for some people to be like, wait a minute, I I didn't think it was religious or religiosity. I thought that was in the Bible. So I did think I needed to do that. Which brings us right back to always, we have to study to show ourselves a prude, rightly dividing the word of God. At some point we have to get in there and say, did the religious institution add this thing? Because look, let's just take a simple, which is a big obstacle. Yeah. It just came to me, the 10 Commandments. Oh wow. I would challenge you. They're same. Absolutely. And the law is good and perfect, but the law was given us to show us that we couldn't keep it leading us to grace. The old, the, the law is the school master that leads us to grace. I would challenge you to ask those people who, who, who say, you have to keep these or what or what. Right. To even name the 10. I can't, Most can't. Yeah. Most can't. I've, With that being said, many people say, I, well, but I can't keep the third, I can't keep the fifth. The first commandment is to love God with all your mind, heart, body and soul. Mm-hmm. and have no other gods. Okay. Who does that? Well, a religious person will tell you. Oh, I do. I mean, who can in their mind say I love God with every fiber in my being and I really Certain versions, there's no other God shall come before him. Right. So like, there's other things. Tell me if I'm wrong about that, but point being like, I always say there's one God, but you often I put things before him a lot. got A lot. Absolutely. Which shows us how are we gonna keep the other nine? I'm Like, yeah, but I meant for him to be first. First. Do you, you know, do you, the third one is don't take the Lord's name in vain. Everyone takes Yes, I did that. Uh, this podcast 30, 34 minutes ago. I did it 35 minutes ago. Is how many times do we say Jesus Christ? I mean, that's taken the Lord's name in vain. Yeah. How about oh my God, if you say it. Not in a, in a worthy manner. So Jesus told us, You picked the nice ones, by the way. We, he, he told us. What? Well, that's good. You know, adultery, what people think that's cheating on their wife. If you even look Jesus. See, Jesus raised the bar. Right. You know, from, I love Andrew Farley's teaching. He Didn't raise the bar. Right. He met the bar. The bar he raised the bar six us. Okay. And he said, even if you look at a woman, so, so, but just the 10 commandments are obstacles. Yeah. Because we're trying to keep'em. Yeah. The law was there to show us we couldn't keep 'em. But look at the obstacle. What I'm not, I I I can't come to Christ because you know what I do Look at women or you know what? I did honor my parents because they were all Shithead. He said, I know you will. Yeah. So he'll clear it, he'll clear that pathway. Yes. But you are saying, well, you know, I lie, it says Han command, I lie and I lie. So I'm not even gonna try to get to Christ. So it, it's always, it's bringing us back to you are putting those obstacles there that he's cleared. And I think we need to be more specific. And this is what I'm trying to do in each writing. And it's almost a series of op obstacles on the way to Calgary. What keeps you from the simple message mm-hmm. that Christ has cleared the obstacles. And he'll take you however you are in whatever sin you're in, and people say after rep pen sin and stop your sin. If we did, we're all screwed. We're all right back to where we were with our sin. Good. Because that, that makes more sense of it as we talk about other obstacles in, in the next couple casts here. But it's what keeps you from it? What is the obstacle for you? And some people will say, because it sounds like a load of crap. Right? Okay. What sounds like a load Of crap. What is that though? Right? That right there is pride and intellectual Stint interview still, I can't get there no matter how true, true. No matter how these people frame it up. Right. That you can at least they could at least ask that question. What's kept you from being willing to have a one-on-one relationship with Jesus? I like the way you said that. Each individual, because, but with that being said, whatever your obstacle is, Jesus is saying, Nope. Cleared it, died for it. And you can come read about it and look about it and Yeah. You could find it. Yeah. If you took the time. And that's why I think a lot of what we do here right. Is getting people to Jesus. Because we're not gonna, I'm not, we're not gonna convince, and we certainly can't be the judge if you figured out or not get to the word, get to Jesus on your own. You have to. And, but the obstacles aren't in your way. And you know, it's funny because, you know, last night we talked to that lady and, and she was really struggling because she couldn't find that clear road, that clear, perfect path because she trusted her intellect and she didn't feel like her intellect and taken her to that place. And we all know the Holy Spirit is the one who's gonna move to give you wisdom. You know, Paul says that God's used the foolish things, a man what intellectual, what, what, what PhD wants to hear that. Right? Like what you've used the foolish things. Yeah. And that's because God wants you to trust him. The smartest man in the world hawking and look at Einstein, they all, they, they looked at their intellect. They believed there was a bigger thing, but they didn't know how to get to it. You know, Einstein said that he believed there's a greater bead, but I just don't know how to make it personal. And God's told us in Hebrews one, I've talked to you over a thousand years through the profits, and now I've sent your son. If you've seen the son, you've seen me. We've seen the character of God. We've seen the love of God. And, and so I could say all that to say, this Christ says, runway's clear and, and you look down the runway and say, well, what is that sitting on? Nothing. Let's go, come to me. Or the little doorway that says, just come this far. So does Christ live in me? He does. Or he's a liar. He said, if you sneak me, you'll find me. If he was lying, then he's not living in you. So if you have an obstacle, it's yours. It's or it's religion. It's not his.