Episode 59 - From Adam to Christ: The Power in Naming

Join us for an enlightening conversation with the legendary Glen Scrivener at the Speak Life headquarters in Eastbourne, as we unlock the secrets of divine communication through the beauty of language, poetry, and song.

Explore the evolution of human expression from simple sounds to the profound harmonies of sacred music, and discover how heavenly realms perfect communication through these art forms. Hear how Charles Wesley's hymns have deeply influenced theological thought, offering a spiritual resonance that transcends mere words.

Unlock the intersection of ancient philosophy and contemporary music as we juxtapose the ideas of Plato, Descartes, and Immanuel Kant with the lyrical genius of John Belushi. Experience the gripping power of non-Christian music alongside scripture, and understand how their poetic nature can reveal profound truths about existence.

Through the lens of speech act theory and a deep dive into the call-and-response patterns found in both scriptures and poetry, we demonstrate the transformative impact of words in creating and shaping our reality.

Finally, we delve into the biblical concept of dominion and the profound significance of naming. Reflect on Adam and Eve's act of naming as a foundational element of creation, drawing parallels to Christ's commissioning of believers. We explore how words hold the power of life and death, influence identities, and reveal our true selves. Through vivid storytelling, we illustrate how Jesus’ parables shift perspectives and immerse listeners in alternate realities, challenging our understanding of beginnings and existence. Join us for a poetic journey that promises to reshape your worldview.

The theme music is "Wager with Angels" by Nathan Moore

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:32

Well, welcome to the Christ-centered cosmic civilization. And we're on the theme of language still, but I'm here in Eastbourne at the Speak Life headquarters and I'm joined by the legendary Glenn Scrivener. It's a great honor to be with him here.

Speaker 2: 0:54

Hey, thank you so much for joining us. We love having you here.

Speaker 1: 0:57

Oh, thank you. Yeah, whenever I've been here I've loved it Place that takes Jesus seriously and communicating him. But words and language is. I know that it's something that whenever I think about that and Christians taking that seriously I know Glenn is like that and is a crafter of words. Now, words, as we've been exploring that on this podcast with Glenn, I always think of him with poetry and this form of language and words and I think about how with human beings, as we're born and a baby, we might make mere sounds and then single words like mama cup, things like that, and then that's like an achievement to get to the level of single words like mama cup, things like that, and then that's like an achievement to get to the level of single words and then we like it. There's the concept of moving to simple sentences and then building upon a hierarchy of language, we can make slightly more complex sentences with conjunctions and things and sentences that relate to others and form paragraphs and when we get to that it's considered like, oh, we're getting somewhere with language.

Speaker 1: 2:19

But I think that that's not as far as language goes, because there comes a point. I think if you continue to develop language rightly and I think, historically anciently, and I think historically anciently, humans were more concerned to keep developing. You become next to where of the rhythm and the form of words and the concept of rhetoric, and how, not just now, the mere construction of the sentence, but how does it work, how does it feel, what's the rhythm of it, the form of it, and now this is poetry. We're moving now towards something called poetry, where the form becomes ever more important than merely correctly using the words to form like a sentence or something. You say no, no, but we need a rhythm and a form and something more to them. They must be crafted, and this is the concept of poiesis, where it's a creation now. Where it's a creation now it's not merely the production of something according to rules, there's something more, perhaps a creation, poetry. And then I would argue like what poetry can then do is the concept of melody, which is an even more refined form of rhythm. So the poetry then can become where melody and music become ever more relevant to it, and then we end up with song, which I'm going to propose for us to consider is apex, communication, apex. And so we've gone from sounds to sentences to song, as a hierarchy of communication, and so all I'm going to say this like in the heavenly place, which is the source of life for the whole of creation, that have from the heavens and the earth and the earth and the throne room, in the throne room, all heavenly and divine communication, I think, is in poetry and song. I think in the Bible it is.

Speaker 1: 4:51

And the Lord says sing a new song. The Bible surprisingly often has this inspiration to sing a new song. It doesn't say write a new paragraph, it's like no, you could write a new paragraph and if that's what you've got, okay, do that. But that's not what I want you to aim for. I want you to go higher and what I'm summoning you to is true, complete, perfected communication, which is a new song I want you to, is true, complete, perfected communication, which is a new song.

Speaker 1: 5:17

Like I want you to generate that um, and why that's important. Like um, I mean glenn's probably thinking where are we going with all this? I'm just setting up, setting things up for these. It's just um. Now, if we think about the eternal family, the father, son, son and Holy spirit and how they, it's quite important in the Bible, where we have genuinely, that they talk to one another. Um, and and that's why I think it's important that they are like separate conscious persons and that sometimes someone was saying to me recently no, no, there's only a single divine consciousness. You mean distinct, distinct.

Speaker 2: 5:56

Not separate.

Speaker 1: 5:58

Distinct, whereas if they said a single divine consciousness, I was like, oh, I'm not at all comfortable with that because it really starts to undermine language and the idea that language is eternal. And they talk to one another. I was going to say sing to one another. I think that's what the Trinity really does they sing to one another and that when a person repents and we've got church, when a person repents and we've got church, we know the Lord sings about that. That's his kind of, that's his really divine form of communication. So I think, if we're thinking about the heavens and the earth and where it's all going and already we could you know, our ancestors talked about the, the music of the spheres, like as if already the planet, the stars and the planets sing and they're, they're already at that level of communication. They have music and song stars, planets, trees, animals. In the bible they're like it too. Um, something we may get into, but in that way of inanimate things being able to speak, sing, communicate, and maybe something we might touch on later is that we can teach inanimate things to not necessarily to think, but maybe to speak. Now, okay. So poetry, that's where all this is about, poetry and songs, a setup. And by that let me just give this personal testimony Like in the 70s and 80s, and I was a little boy and then a teenager, I would say that my theology primarily no question primarily came from poetry, hymns, like obviously the greatest hymn writer is Charles Wesley, that's just fact, I mean, there's no discussion about that and he himself draws from Ephraim a lot and he's also a contender in his own way.

Speaker 1: 8:05

I'll give him credit for that. But I recognize that was when the theology came from, because not only was it, it kind of would speak to me because I was reading Puritans and early church fathers, but there was something about receiving theology this way where I would memorise it and sing it and it would be touching me at more levels than any other. And then, and and then, just by way of like the end of my intro to this, I just on another level, I remember there was a game I played literally mid 80s probably 84, 85 something, and it was to do with Arthurian legends and the. In a box it came with there was a poem that had been included in it and nothing. The game itself was good, but it was this poem that absolutely, uh, haunted me. It had this kind of incredible and I learned it. And I would at school try to say listen to this poem. And I'd learned it. And I would.

Speaker 1: 9:05

Not everyone was as impressed by it as I was, but um, and then when we did Shakespeare, I learned Shakespeare like a whole play. Um, because there was something about it that was I don't know. I don't know what it was, but I it gripped me and I loved to learn it and repeat it and it was kind of the language which sometimes I didn't know what it meant at first, but having learned it and like taking it in, I was like now I know what that meant. I didn't do, but now I do, because I'd owned it. And it was sort of expansive, sort of like I could get get inside this poem and like like explore, and then I'd begin to discover it. It wasn't that I knew it in advance, it was only by learning it and repeating it.

Speaker 1: 9:53

And that was with the hymns. I remember when I was again little, quite young, that one Immortal, invisible, god, only Wise, enlightened, accessible. I remember singing that when I was very young and not knowing what it meant, but having this feeling that I will do and learning it anyway and singing it anyway. So all that is by way of intro, about poetry. What about all that Like? What's your reaction? I've just dumped, like a whole bunch of mess there, of thoughts and feelings.

Speaker 2: 10:24

I was at a baptism service at a Baptist church and so lots of teenagers were getting baptized and I would say that out of 12 teenagers getting baptized, a majority of them pointed to a song. That was like the real moment, because they're looking for some kind of testimony of faith and this is where it all made sense and probably the majority of them pointed to a song made sense and probably the majority of them pointed to a song. Actually, and that's very interesting for me because I'm a very, very amateur songwriter but I spent my time being a preacher. I'm starting to think maybe I should just switch.

Speaker 2: 10:58

Songs kind of burrow deep into our hearts and songs immerse us in a world. I think poetry. It's very interesting that poetry just means like a made thing, it's what is made, it's a world builder. Poetry is a world builder that sucks you into its universe and slows you right down and disrupts you, because with prose you're kind of expecting a sentence that's got a beginning and middle and an end, but with poetry there are things that are patterned and that you're expecting, but then there are kind of curveballs that are thrown that get you kind of off kilter and it definitely immerses you in a new world and I would say, as a teenager and then on into my late teens, what really brought me to the Lord actually was a couple of non-Christian songs, so the Blues Brothers singing Everybody Needs Somebody to Love.

Speaker 2: 11:56

I was at university studying what the ancient greats would think and I was studying what Plato would think. And I was studying what Descartes would think and I was studying what Immanuel Kant would think, and I was listening to John Belushi on repeat singing yeah, but everybody needs somebody to love. I was like, oh, those guys are idiots. John Belushi is right Love the divine family, father, son and Spirit. And suddenly, when my friend was telling me that let's read the Gospels together, and when I was listening to John Belushi sing that I was like I was in touch with something that was resonant and that song, together with a song by Amy Mann, who wrote the soundtrack for a film called Magnolia, you might've seen it back in 2000.

Speaker 2: 12:38

And it's a song called Momentum and it's all about being stuck in a rut and not being able to kind of, and feeling like you're on a conveyor belt towards destruction and dissolution. And she says, oh, for the sake of momentum, I've allowed my fears to get larger than life and it's brought me to this current agenda where a plan to deny fulfillment has yet to arrive. I know life is getting shorter. I can't bring myself to set the scene, even though it's approaching torture. I've got my routine and I was like like she was singing about what life was, like John Belushi was singing about what life ought to be. And between the two of those non-Christian songs and reading the scriptures and meeting Jesus in there, it gripped my heart in ways that nothing else really could else really could.

Speaker 1: 13:35

So that that's in that that feeling were a poem or a lyric song. Yeah, lyric can like say more than it's like. They say more than almost they apparently are doing, like sometimes, if you just look at the words and then you just like let's say, well, it's just this, but somehow it isn't. It's something that gets you. Why is that? There's something powerful about that, isn't there? I don't understand it. You do Tell me I don't really.

Speaker 2: 13:59

And I've had such a naturalistic, atheistic view of poetry even as a Christian naturalistic, atheistic view of poetry. Even as a Christian, I think I've tended to. Even as I've written poetry and I've always written poetry, from teenage years onwards, I think I've had a quite atheistic view of what poetry does and I've just seen, oh, you know, a bit of rhyme and meter is a trick, it's a trick of the brain that, just you know, helps the idea to embed itself a little bit further. And, of course, a very atheistic, naturalistic view is that we've got a dead cosmos that we have emerged from somehow. Consciousness comes to the party really, really late, and then language comes, and if you write a love song, it's just to get a girlfriend, right, it's just to pass on your genes, and it's so instrumental and you flip it on its head.

Speaker 2: 14:47

When you come to the bible, because you begin with poetry, you know, in in the beginning was the word and the word was with god and the word was god. He was with god in the beginning through the word, all things were made. Without him, nothing was made. That has been made, and, and so poetry comes first in the bible, it comes last in the atheistic picture comes first and it is a. It is the ultimate world builder in a way that I think modern western literary theories are catching up with, like so late. Like you look at something like speech act theory, which was sort of hailed as this, this novel kind of discovery in the 1970s. You know, the words actually create things. Have you ever thought about words creating things? And you're like, well, no, for thousands of years we've been absolutely on this, because God makes through his word and I also. I love the way how, going back to Genesis, yes, it's through his word, but there's something liturgical about heaven and earth In the beginning.

Speaker 2: 15:47

God created the heavens and the earth heavens masculine, earth feminine and there's a kind of a call and response thing going on. And obviously everything happens in this patterned way, in this methodical way, in this beautiful way, in this cathedral-like, symphonic kind of, and there's a crescendo all the way through Genesis 1. But what you've got really is this kind of call and response of heaven and earth. And no wonder, throughout the scriptures what you get is a kind of poetry that is like that. You can't read many psalms without getting that. The heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of his hands. What's going on? It's kind of call and response. You might call it antiphonal, right. There's these different voices that are opposite one another and they're calling across a distance to one another and responding.

Speaker 2: 16:40

And when the heavens declare the glory of God, the next line is a sort of a reflection back of that line, but with some changes, right, and the sky is proclaimed the work of his hands, and it's sort of the same thing. But it's sung back to the original and according to the Bible, that's what there was before. There was a heavens and an earth. You know, there was a father calling to the son in the spirit, a son, calling back in the spirit, such that when you get this kind of pattern and when you get things interacting with one another and this is like that, don't you think?

Speaker 2: 17:13

And you place this idea together with that idea, you know, you might just think of something really simple, like William Blake, you know, tiger, tiger burning bright, and like just the idea of a tiger burning, burning, but he's not actually on fire, right, you wouldn't smell the fur, there wouldn't be a singed fur, but oh, he's orange and he blazes in a different kind of a way. And just putting two ideas together is kind of the basis of poetry, it's the basis of all creativity, really, like putting this is this really, but this is this transformed in some way, and this is this glorified in some way and recapitulated in some way, right Brought to a higher level of glory. And that's what's always going on in poetry. It's kind of a call and response and I think it reflects not only creation, heaven and earth as these partners in conversation, but it goes right back to a primordial, poetic, symphonic conversation Father, son and Spirit words are not merely sort of descriptive of something, but create and change and so on.

Speaker 1: 18:39

And let's just think about that when the Lord, like the God the Son sort of says who is like God, the Son is the one, who is this word, who is like this perfect expression of the Father. And yet the Father can look at his Son this is eternal, everlastingly can look at that Son and then in some way is reflected back and sees himself. And you can even say and theologians sometimes have that the Father understands himself by looking at the son and that's sort of the deep thing. So in other words, it's like a genuinely giving and receiving relationship.

Speaker 2: 19:19

End of 1 Corinthians 2 is all about that, isn't it? I think so the spirit, searching the deep things of God. Yeah, the breath and all that.

Speaker 1: 19:27

I think that. So when you then then so, so, like that, if the way they have communicated to each other is constructive, like kind of, and it's like who has advised the father, like the proverbs and the wisdom, and it's like, oh well, this guy, this one has like, it's like so that there's a kind of like where the father says I'm thinking like this, and then this is like, I like it, but what about this? And then would advise him and reflect back the sense of having a conversation out of which something emerges. But it isn't as if it's just like here I already know that, I knew it, you know, but there's a genuine sense of conversation, that that well, athanasius does make that argument, doesn't he?

Speaker 2: 20:08

yeah, if the son is the wisdom of the father, the father's never been dumb, has he? Yeah, so the son's eternal right?

Speaker 1: 20:13

yeah, you know I think that's powerful that way. So, if that's true and this creative conversation is eternal, and then when adam is created and the first thing happens is he says okay, I want you to come up with some names, I want you to do some language work, describe these things. I'm going to bring you all the animals, all the creatures actually, um, and I want you to, uh, do some language work and then and now under one model people go.

Speaker 1: 20:43

Well, he already knows the proper names for them and I'm like I don't know that he does yeah, yeah, he seems happy to delegate. Yeah, and he's like I don't know that he does, yeah, yeah, he seems happy to delegate, yeah, and he's like I don't know, I haven't really thought of words for them yet, you know like deliberately he's deliberately not done that.

Speaker 1: 20:58

Of course, he could say I already know what you're going to call them, I've already decided what the right names are. But what if he isn't like that, be interesting, give me like, how are you going to describe this thing? And then he goes oh, it's like a tiger, it's like a burning thing. And he's like, oh, wow, okay, yeah, isn't it? And that's, there's something quite powerful, if that is why Because he himself has already named things he said this is light, I'm going to call that light and this is that, I'm going to do this. And then he says now, I want you to do this sort of thing too.

Speaker 2: 21:30

Yeah, so Psalm 115, you know, even the highest heavens belong to the Lord, but the earth he has given to man, so there's incredible delegation going on there. But it's interesting to think that, you know, the Lord gives dominion to Adam and Eve in Genesis, chapter 1. And you know, a lot of people read Genesis 1, they say, ah, therefore God is king. Well, actually, adam and Eve are king, king and queen. Right, they're the ones given dominion. And in what way does Adam express his dominion over the earth? And we might imagine him with sweat on his brow, tilling the earth. But we don't actually get that image. The thing we get in terms of Adam's pre-fall work, the thing he does is name. The thing he does is find just the right description, just the right label, just the right name for all the different animals. And that is his kind of dominion and that is his prime work, his chief work, from which every other work flows. Now scientists will tell you that. You know, you can't get on with science unless you do taxonomy first right, unless you have names for things and categories for where you put things. And there's that sort of application for it. But there's also in the New Testament when Christ, the second Adam stands on the earth and he says all authority has been given to me. Therefore, now you go and be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. I mean he's basically doing a Genesis 1 again to humanity.

Speaker 2: 22:55

The second Adam says okay, with my authorization, really go out. And what do we do? We get to name the world right. Adam got to name the animals. We get to name the nations right. We get to put the name of God onto people all throughout the world. And it's still, it remains, our chief task actually to put the name of the Lord onto people. It's a priestly task, you know. It's what Aaron, you know, does in Numbers, chapter six. You put the name of God onto first Israel. But then Psalm 67 says ah, but Israel's job is to put the name of God onto the nations. And then Christ, the true Israel, says, you know, says to us now like let's do this thing right, let's go and put the name of God. And so it's still. There is still this we make worlds, we still make things by naming reality, by naming the reality of Jesus putting his name onto people. It is still a word-driven world and we're still delegated that authority by Jesus to kind of go out and name reality. So it's yeah, it's still something that we're doing.

Speaker 1: 24:05

So because the thing that I find shocks people who have never really read the Bible before and then they suddenly start reading it a lot and they quite often will say to me why is the Bible so obsessed with speech, words and like Proverbs, there's more than any other sphere of human activity, more than any other sphere of human activity Like we now may be obsessed about how we use like violence or intimacy issues and things like that, and those are all there too, kind of.

Speaker 1: 24:41

But really I think it's probably hard to question the fact that word use is way at the top of just all this instructional stuff. And the jesus says it, james says it, the prophets always going on about it, the wisdom literature, incredibly obsessive about it. That and literally, we create life or death with our words, we bring life or death with our words, as if and you first think, well, no, you know sticks and stones and everything like that. It's like no, no, no, no, like a broken leg is nowhere near as as powerful as how you are named, like by people and yourself and society and things like that. So let's just react to that because the whole way the the bible is true, isn't it Incredibly obsessive about how we talk?

Speaker 2: 25:32

Yeah, from the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks, and by your words you'll be acquitted, by your words you'll be judged. They're incredible. You know, it's a tongue of fire and it's set on fire by hell itself, says James. And so our words are incredibly important. They reveal who we are. They flow from the deepest part of our personhood and out they come to make the world in their image. Why? Because this is what God is like. From the very depths of the being of God comes the Word that makes a world, and he makes the world good.

Speaker 2: 26:03

We are a bit more of a mixed bag in terms of the words that come out of us, but you're absolutely right. Our words are far more consequential than we think they are, and it's something that psychologists have been aware of for well over a century. Now that you just listen to somebody for any length of time and out will come their whole meaning, and in a way that the person themselves wasn't aware of. I love Proverbs, chapter 20, verse 5. It's the purposes of a man's heart are deep waters, but a person of understanding draws them out right.

Speaker 2: 26:41

And it's the idea that you are not transparent to yourself. You don't know what's going on down in there. But again, in conversation, and it's not even that, you just decide to speak out your truth and it'll come out. Actually, it probably needs a friend, it probably needs somebody opposite you in this antiphonal way, right In this conversational way, to draw out from you your words and what had been completely invisible to you and what had been shaping you in the core of your being is in that conversation, articulated as a word, as a sentence, as a thought, as a belief. And you're like oh, paul, you realize you just said should, five times in that sentence.

Speaker 1: 27:22

Why did you say should there?

Speaker 2: 27:24

Oh, I didn't really realize that, and there is something absolutely profound about words.

Speaker 1: 27:38

And there is something absolutely profound about words, which is, yeah, why, again and again, it's in wordful communion that your true self is revealed. Will. And he would say, a person would be maybe a little bit drunk and they would say very bad things, and then he'd have to sometimes intervene and sort of settle things down, but then later they might go. I didn't mean to say that and he said you did mean it. That's the thing you actually you really did. Now you don't mean this, but that you did mean yeah, I always say that in marriage counseling.

Speaker 2: 28:17

So when somebody says I'm sorry, I don't know, I don't know what came over me, like nothing came over you. It all came out of Right. It came out of somewhere very deep and dark and old and pandemic.

Speaker 1: 28:28

So it comes out of us and that what we say reveals about us. But what we say also creates the world around us. Like Jesus says, if you say that person's like a fool or worthless, they are worthless to you. That's not just what you've done is made that person worth. You'll kill them. You're like I want that person dead. They're not. They have no life. They have no value to me. Jesus, you murdered them just because of the way you've described them, the way you've labeled them, and we're like what words are like that? And that you then see the world the way you've described them, the way you've labeled them, and we're like what Words are like that, and that you then see the world the way you describe it. Is that right?

Speaker 2: 29:10

Yeah, I think so. And another thing that words do is they show the frame in which you're viewing the world. So your imagination is kind of like a frame through which you kind of see the rest of the world, and it's put together with thoughts. I always think of 2 Corinthians 10. Let me have a look at this. In the King James translation, the original.

Speaker 1: 29:35

If it was good enough for the apostle Paul, it's good enough for us.

Speaker 2: 29:39

He says, though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strongholds. So we've got a very Jericho-like imagination there.

Speaker 1: 29:51

How do?

Speaker 2: 29:51

you pull down Jericho. Well, the Jericho is made of what? What are the walls made of? He says well, we cast down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. And of course he's talking about the ministry of the word. Right, he's not doing it with carnal weapons, he's doing it with the sword of the spirit, like with the word of God.

Speaker 2: 30:16

But with the word of God you cast down imaginations, because that's what our friends and families are imprisoned in, right, because that's what our friends and families are imprisoned in, right, they see the world according to their imagination, according to various thoughts that they've assembled into a world in which they inhabit, in which they are probably the main character in the story, and everyone gets to play the bit player. And what do we need to do with the word of Christ? Go to battle with the word of Christ. Go to battle with the imagination that people have assembled out of their own self-centered thoughts. And I guess what happens in a person's life is they liken one thing to another thing and assemble in their imagination a kind of a world that makes sense to them according to their own thoughts. So let's just think at a cultural level, the way that we have associated what a person is with a machine for instance A thought that we've had for about 300 years is that we're very much like machines.

Speaker 2: 31:20

And it makes sense to us because machines have become very powerful in the industrialized West. What we're getting a version of nowadays is we're just like a computer, aren't we? And all of a sudden, as soon as you liken people to machines or people to computers, you get trapped into this kind of imagination, this way of seeing, and Paul says we go to war. It's a battle of ideas, battle of words, and what I think poetry can do is insert into your thinking the right kind of likenings.

Speaker 2: 31:50

You know the kingdom of heaven is like this, and Jesus never says it's like a machine. The kingdom of heaven is like this Stop thinking in this way, start thinking in that way. And poetry is probably the most concentrated way of slamming together there's this and there's this. Right it's. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? All right, let's do that, okay. And all of a sudden, all the associations of a new imagination are being built and you're invited to inhabit a different world in which this and this goes together, not that and that, because that and that is what we're always trying to do, and it's a prison cell.

Speaker 1: 32:31

Poetry is one way of bringing the word and and capturing imaginations so, like the say that past 300 years that you describe like like a particular kind of way of imagining the world has dominated, say, the Western world, and this kind of post-Enlightenment idea where truth is a kind of impersonal I'm going to say propositional thing. So people, for example, would go. You were rightly enthusiastic because Genesis begins with poetry, but the real, like Christianity largely in past history, would go it's only poetry, do you see what I mean? And they go. So therefore it doesn't really carry truth.

Speaker 1: 33:20

The same way, it's something which is kind of expressive, or this is what it meant to people, but it's not telling you how the world really is, because it's poetry. Do you know what I'm saying with that? And that it's been an incredibly destructive strategy for Christianity that's led us to the point of extinction, whereas when I've just been, I was interacting with some atheists yesterday and you know they have that kind of. They have a kind of wheel of predicted that it's like they'll spin the wheel and it's going to be. Oh, I had a bad experience of religion one time and that's why it's rubbish or you know whatever.

Speaker 1: 33:57

You know those ones and I was like here we go and that roundabout it goes, but all of them, like, what I used to do was try to answer those things Like oh, no, no, no. Like you think the Bible's saying this, but it's actually let me think of a way to explain it and I kind of increasingly think, no, no. Like they inhabit a world that in which say, they say there cannot be a god because I'm looking for, like a big yeti right that's wandering around the cosmos.

Speaker 1: 34:31

There isn't any evidence for a big yeti wandering around the universe. Therefore, it's irrational to believe in such a thing. You're like well, no, I'm gone. Like you need to imagine something entirely different. Or similarly like suffering, suffering is so unjust, and so on and forth. What sort of a sick God could do that? And you're like well, hang on. What have you imagined? That suffering was entirely different than you thought it was, and so it's no point in a kind of just like going head on propositionally. And is that how Jesus does things where people go listen? We've decided you're like and is that how jesus does things where people go listen? We've decided you're like a prophet, that's good. And he's like doesn't even engage with that whole way of imagining who he is. He just goes oh, like you have to be like born again, as the ancient prophets said. Yeah, to end it. And it's like the negative is like what? Yeah, I don't think of things like that. And he's like I know, but but do you see what I'm saying?

Speaker 2: 35:26

And isn't it a rebuke to us that, like for the last 300 years, we've sort of thought that the Bible is a pretty good approximation of what God ought to have said? But if he had his time over he'd probably write Genesis differently. And if Jesus had his time over again during the parables, he'd probably boil it down to three propositions Right and like no, but what no? What if?

Speaker 1: 35:45

What if he knew what he was doing?

Speaker 2: 35:47

He knew what he was doing and genuinely, this is precisely what we need. So, like, I've just came out with a book at the beginning of this year called how to See Life, and it's all about okay, we'll see all things through the lens of Jesus. So, what is Jesus' vision of God, jesus' vision of the world, jesus' vision of you? And every chapter I absolutely insisted it has to start with a story, and so you're kind of inhabiting this story and people kind of think, oh, glenn, you're telling stories because that's the sort of the spoonful of sugar that helps the doctrinal medicine go down. And I'm like, no, no, actually a story is the most aggressive bit of proclamation you can do, because you're basically saying shut up and listen.

Speaker 2: 36:29

There was this king and there was this dragon, and there was this wizard, and as I tell that story, you have no part to play in this. I've sucked you out of your main character energy. You're now sitting in the audience and you're having to consider life from a totally different perspective. And so stories do that, but poetry does that. I began one of the chapters like this. It's here, she says, only half believing it. The map was right For once, for once, he adds under his breath. As she walks ahead into the forest, clearing Over her shoulders, he believing it, the map was right For once, for once, he adds under his breath. As she walks ahead into the forest, clearing Over her shoulders, he sees it A simple well of grey stones rising above the ground about three feet. The waters glow, blue-green and emit a hum now audible in the still night. Air Beautiful, she thinks. Creepy. He thinks oh, look a plaque Drawing near. He sees it too on the inside of the well, just above the high waterline. She reads the inscription aloud A see-through well to see-through days.

Speaker 2: 37:30

Reflects not here and now. Instead reveals thy longing gaze. Not what is seen, but how. Neither know what to say. They let out a disbelieving laugh which quickly turns into a gasp when they look down. Both see it their reflection, but ten years younger, reveals they longing gaze, she says, impressed.

Speaker 2: 37:50

He reaches out towards the image. The moment he touches the waters, it changes. Now he sees himself as a child. He splashes the waters again. Now it's his father, as a boy, don't? She says. But he's unable to stop. He stirs the pool as if, rubbing out each reflection, but it only gets replaced by an earlier one.

Speaker 2: 38:05

Soon there are scenes from the 19th century, the 16th, the 12th. Back and back. It goes as he moves the waters or other waters moving him. She joins in, surprised by how heavy and warm the waters feel. The hum deepens and loudens as the waters churn.

Speaker 2: 38:19

The images lose colour as they reverse in time. Soon there are no more people, then no more animals, then no more trees, just a barren earth. Then not even that. Finally, like a reverse lightning strike, a brilliant white blaze shoots upward, blinding them momentarily and knocking them both backwards onto the grass. Flat on their backs, they rub their eyes slowly, opening them towards the night sky. The grass is now wet. It wasn't only light that shot up from the well. What was that? She asks breathlessly. Life in reverse, he says, like hitting rewind on everything. They hear the hum. Now back to its regular tone. The blue-green light is still shimmering, reflected on the leaves of the trees.

Speaker 2: 38:57

Clearly the well has more to reveal. One more image, something even more ancient, more fundamental. Not life as it is, not even life in the beginning. It's life before the beginning. As they get to their feet, he notices the water level has gone right down. Underneath the original plaque, another is revealed. He reads it this wishing well, thy wishes, tell that frame what thou wilt see. Behold the first, thy primal thirst. This shall be God for thee. What does that mean? What shall be God for us? He asks. But she can't hear him. She's walking down the slope from the well along what looks to him to be a dry riverbed. What are you doing? He calls Seeing where it leads. She replies as if it was the most obvious answer in the world.

Speaker 2: 39:40

Where what leads the river. Of course the well must have overflowed, overflowed. He yells what are you talking about? He looks down, unable to see any water, unable to see the bottom it's empty. He cries. He hears no reply except those two words echoing back the end right.

Speaker 2: 40:00

So that's the first story that sort of immerses you in this world. Wow, end. So that's the first story that sort of immerses you in this world, and it was interesting. I couldn't write it without resorting to poetry at times. I didn't intend to write poetry, but it's the sort of thing the story tells you what it needs. The story tells you