The Gospel Announcement: Signs & Wonders

In this episode of The Gospel Announcement series, we explore the profound role of signs and wonders throughout the Bible. 🌟 What do these miraculous events reveal about God's power, both in ancient times and today? We'll dive into the biblical worldview, examining how miracles bridge the spiritual and physical realms, and demonstrate the authority of God. 📖 Join us as we uncover the deeper meanings behind these awe-inspiring acts and discuss their enduring significance for modern believers as evidence of God's kingdom advancing in the world. 🌍

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Chapters

• 0:00 Torture Museum and Dante's Inferno
• 8:59 Signs and Wonders in the Gospel
• 15:38 Ancient Worldview on Miracles
• 29:24 Linking Healing and Authority
• 33:34 Exorcisms and Demonic Authority
• 40:35 Miracles of Nature
• 48:25 Understanding the Gospel Announcement
• 51:44 Recapturing the Wonder of Miracles

Transcript

Signs & Wonders

David: [00:00:00] I don't know who sacrificed what before this weekend, but we've had about eight inches of rain this week. 

J.R.: Somebody sacrificed something.

David: So they can knock it off. They can stop it. Yeah. Hey, thanks for listening to the Navigating an Ancient Faith podcast. Unfortunately, J. R., we're not sitting in the same room like we did last episode. We always have good intentions that, hey, let's do the whole series while we're at the same place. 

J.R.: Yeah, we always say we're going to knock out four or five episodes and we get done with one. We got one. And then talk the rest of the time. 

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: But the conversations are good. We're preparing for the following episodes. 

Yeah, it's been a busy last couple weeks ever since I met you in Tallahassee we've had, golly, it seems like a million birthday parties in the summer. <Oh, yeah?> Everybody is born in the summer. Good night. 

David: Well, your birthday just happened. <Oh yeah. Yeah.> Your daughter's birthday. 

J.R.: Yeah, I actually share a birthday with the father in law and daughter in law and my son in law. Yeah, we're like all within a week Yeah, it's just it's just so last couple weeks have been nuts I heard you got away a little bit, [00:01:00] right? 

David: Yeah, I've been taking some side trips The most recent one after Tallahassee was we went away to St. Augustine. Have you ever been there? I know we've been there as probably as kids, but. 

J.R.: Yeah, I mean growing up in Florida, I'm sure I have. There's a lot of saints down on the coast, so I'm not sure which one. I'm sure I've been through it, but I, don't remember what the specifics of St. Augustine were. 

David: Yeah, I had forgotten about it too, and a couple years ago, we took a side trip there, and we both love it. It's just a fun city to go visit. Good restaurants, a lot of history. Last time we were there, we went to the Pirate Museum, which I thought it was going to be cheesy, and it was a little bit, but it was actually a collection of pirate memorabilia because St. Augustine is actually very much tied into that era of pirating and things like that. So that was interesting. 

J.R.: St. Augustine is on the east coast, is that right? 

David: Yes. And they boast that they're America's oldest city. The old town goes back, I don't know, a couple hundred years and a big fort there, so it's all, it's very neat. We've been there several times now [00:02:00] since we rediscovered it.

So this past time, it did something interesting. We went to, and this is going to sound weird at first, but we went to the Torture Museum. In the old town there's a museum that's called the Torture Museum. 

J.R.: That sounds like more of my speed, but yeah, okay. 

David: Well, there's, there's worse ways to spend an hour in the AC in Florida, right?

J.R.: No, no doubt. 

David: To go through the Torture Museum. 

J.R.: No, I would, I'd be fascinated by this. 

David: Yeah, so it was actually interesting and it was actually another private collection. So these were for the most part, authentic devices that a collector had collected. And there was about 50 of them and it was dark and spooky and they had some wax figures and there was an audio recording that told you about each one and there was a little story attached.

So the whole thing took like an hour and it's much more interesting than any of us thought it was going to be, right? 

J.R.: Okay. Yeah, it wasn't cheesy like the Pirate Museum or not as much. 

David: Well, not as much. Yeah, One of the things we were laughing about though my wife and a couple other family [00:03:00] members That I think I've determined why the Middle Ages never advanced technologically and the reason is because all of their creative energy went into how to torture people.

J.R.: Exactly. You know, that's what I've noticed about old torture devices. I'm sitting there. First of all, you look at it and think, man, who comes up with this? What kind of sadistic person just sits down? 

David: No, exactly. Yeah. 

J.R.: Engineers and draws this stuff out and says, man, we can really prolong the death if we do this. So yeah, it's definitely sadistic , but, yeah, you're right. It's like all the creative energy is into the ornamentation of this iron maiden or this thing where they cook you to death or. 

David: Yeah So there was a lot of creativity. It just wasn't channeled right. I I pictured some guy saying hey I think i've invented a combustion engine right and they said well, how does that torture people? He goes well, it doesn't but it it makes traveling a lot easier and they're like i'll pass we're not interested. 

J.R.: Yeah, move on. For those reasons, I'm out. 

David: Okay. Yeah We don't want to hear about it unless it actually inflicts [00:04:00] pain on someone else, so. 

J.R.: Right. 

David: So all this was interesting because it's one of these things where several things converge and I'm also reading Dante's Inferno.

J.R.: Okay, you haven't knocked that out yet? 

David: I'm almost done with Inferno, and then there's two more, but it takes a while to work through. 

J.R.: No, they're no joke. 

David: I have to use a little website that tells me what's going on in each, it's called a canto in my version, you know. Each canto and each chapter, basically.

So what's interesting, though, is Dante, he actually mentions some of these torture devices. Because, you know, in Inferno, I don't know if you've read Inferno, but in Inferno, the sins or the crimes that these people have committed to end up in Dante's version of Hell, the punishment is somehow appropriate to what they did.

Right? And so each chapter, Dante is describing what he's seeing, and he's asking the guide who is Virgil from the first century and he's saying what did these people do. And so Virgil says, you know here's what they [00:05:00] did and then what they're suffering and how they're suffering it kind of is appropriate to what they committed on earth to make them end up in the inferno, right?

J.R.: Okay, so it's, but something deeper than just mere justice. 

David: No, yeah, it actually is. There's a lot of depth to it. And it's, very interesting read. Like I said, it's not an easy read. You've got to work your way through it, but I'm almost done. He just reached, this morning, he just reached the ninth circle of hell. So I'm going to see how it ends. 

J.R.: You're on pins and needles, aren't you? 

David: Yeah, yeah. So, anyway, it's interesting because I'm reading about Dante's Inferno, and then I went through the Torture Museum, and there's a lot of overlap, And so then I was out for a run one day, and this is when I do my best thinking, because I'm thinking, in this series that we've been talking about, we're talking about aligning yourself with God's kingdom, right?

That's part of the gospel announcement. We've said that several times. And from Dante and this museum that I went through, it's almost like this is what it looks like when you don't align yourself with God's [00:06:00] kingdom, when you align yourself with hell, right? And I actually thought there was an interesting definition of hell, or aligning yourself with hell, when all your creative energies go to inflicting pain on other people.

J.R.: Oh, sure. 

David: Right? 

J.R.: Okay, yeah. No, I see that connection. 

David: I was thinking about even modern society. We don't have these torture devices, but look, it's just a little bit more what's subtle. Right? Because our culture is obsessed. If you disagree with me, my creative energies go into making your life miserable.

J.R.: Right. Who hasn't stewed about some kind of conflict and you just replay it over and over in your mind saying, I wish I would have said this. Boy, if I had landed this little verbal barb, this would have done some damage, or here's how I should have responded to that. You know, and you can obsess over that. And you're right, you create your own little hell in your own mind because you're completely fixated and obsessed on inflicting the right [00:07:00] torture against your enemy. 

David: Right. And we see it. 

J.R.: And of course these are all, yeah, symbolically, but yeah, we do, we get obsessed with this.

David: Yeah, and we see it in social media, we see it in cancel culture, and, I just, all of a sudden, it's one of those symbolic moments where I'm learning to think more this way. It's one of those moments where I thought, yeah, I can go through this torture museum and be horrified at all these physical devices that inflicted pain, but how much have we really evolved?

Because our culture today, if you disagree with me, politically, socially, my goal is to somehow inflict pain on you and make you suffer. Well, from the torture museum from Dante's Inferno, like that's just a version of hell. That's aligning myself with hell, right? 

J.R.: Yeah. 

David: And that really jumped out at me.

J.R.: No that does that's very interesting because that is that is something We can all kind of relate to yeah You know and hopefully, you know, you kind of work these things out in your own mind. You don't want to obsess. But yes, there's been plenty of times where I've have a blow up with a guy at work and I, think about it for weeks until my wife just says, [00:08:00] stop, stop, you know, break the cycle.

I don't want to hear about it anymore, you know? And that's, kind of the voice of reason saying, yeah, let's, let's move on. No need to bask in this. 

David: Drop it. I think about. 

J.R.: But the idea of maximizing the punishment. It's easy to see how sadistic it was in the Middle Ages when you see these devices. But we completely don't look in the mirror when we see that we do it all the time in our day to day lives in different ways. 

David: Individuals as a culture, yeah, and it really is a key indicator of a culture that has aligned itself with hell. 

J.R.: No, I think you're right. 

David: And, yeah, so who knew all that came out of the Torture Museum in St. Augustine, Florida? 

J.R.: All right, did you leave all that in your 

David: In my, my Google review, yeah. 

J.R.: Did you, yeah, did you leave all that in your trip advisor review? That's the, 

David: No, I didn't review that, but yeah, that would have been a long, you know, page two, page three and people would be in like, man, what was this guy on when he went through this torture museum? But anyway. 

J.R.: No, man, yeah, you get a bunch of upvotes on that. 

David: Yeah, true, true.

J.R.: [00:09:00] Okay, so how does this tie into signs and wonders? That's where we're going today, right? 

David: Well, it ties in more to the entire gospel announcement series, but yes, today then is we're going to talk about signs and wonders.

We've talked about what the gospel announcement was, we've talked about heaven and hell, what is the kingdom of God? And so we're gonna talk today about the meaning of signs and wonders. And I thought a good place to start would be how we've been starting in the previous episodes, which is just revisiting a little bit of our modern take on how we view signs and wonders, right?

Right. We talk about miracles, supernatural events, I would say how we interpret supernatural events in the Bible today is far different than how they would have been interpreted in the ancient world, and this is a consistent theme we've been doing throughout this series.

What was the gospel announcement? How would it have been received first century AD, right, when Jesus would go around talking about it? So, I don't know what you think, but I think there's kind of two ends of the spectrum if we talk about [00:10:00] miracles, signs, and wonders today. So, on one hand, we tend to minimize them, because we know better, right?

Much more advanced scientifically, we know some of the causes of these things. And I think we even see this in Christian circles. To see a miracle and say, well, yeah, we know better today. We know that that was a disease and not a demon, right? Right, so I think that's one end of the spectrum. 

J.R.: I've noticed here, oh, it's been a few years, but I read a book and I can't recall what it was. But it was kind of adamant about I've just noticed a few authors that I've read recently that seem intent on scientifically explaining away miracles. And the weird thing about it is that they don't seem to be discounting miracles. They accept the fact that they're miracles, but they try to give these rational explanation on how these miracles could have taken place. And so, you know, the parting of the Red Sea could actually be a natural phenomenon if the weather patterns were right, or the quail that fed the Israelites. I read somewhere that it could have been a migrating flock that the [00:11:00] wind patters blew them off course and that they dropped dead of exhaustion. Right? 

David: Right. 

J.R.: You know, and it's, it's interesting. I mean, I look, I'm a sucker for all this stuff. But some of the explanations are certainly interesting ideas, but they're missing something, right?

They're minimizing the link to the spiritual is what they're doing when they do that. And while there may be kind of a interesting place to think through these things as far as Old Testament miracles or biblical miracles. When you do that, you minimize the link to the spiritual. And we do have kind of a tendency to kind of go to one extreme or the other. 

David: Right. And I think you also minimize what the author was trying to convey through some of these as well. <Oh, sure.> I read this I think I mentioned a couple episodes ago. But I read this Jewish Commentary on the book of Judges as a follow up to our judges series because I was interested in some other takes. And it was an interesting commentary. But one thing this Jewish commentator modern Jewish commentator said repeatedly throughout it is that if we can explain things [00:12:00]naturalistically today we have no need to resort to a miracle. And I thought well you're kind of missing the point of all this. <Sure.> But I also think that's kind of a common sentiment even in Christian circles, right?

J.R.: Right. 

David: So that's one extreme on the spectrum. I think the other one we can go to is we almost I don't know how to say this. We almost over spiritualized them They have all this religious meaning but we don't give too much thought beyond that and I don't know I'm not picking on anyone in particular, but you see people who they see a demon behind every rock. Everything is a miracle, right? Which also kind of misses the point of why these stories are there. And look, you know God bless you if you see everything as a miracle. I think that's not a bad perspective. 

J.R.: Well, like I said about the book that tries to kind of minimize, or like the book that tries to explain away through natural phenomenon the miracles, it's minimizing the link to the spiritual, but then there's the other extreme that sort of over emphasizes that everything has this spiritual link.[00:13:00]

David: Everything, yeah. Yeah, that's a good way to say it. 

J.R.: Right, I mean, the reality is we're stuck between two worlds. We live in the normal world, and our souls were made for the spiritual world. And so we'll see this connection, but we do have one foot in each realm, and that requires a balance, like we've always talked about, kind of having an understanding and a balance between those two ideas.

And I've seen that too, and I can't think of any specifics of the over spiritualization of every flat tire or every time you know, , the phone rings some way, you know, you, you kind of hear people talk that way, and ...

David: I had a professor I just remember this. I had a professor who said, , he said, I'm becoming more and more convinced that. And he held a pencil up, and he dropped it, and he said, Every time I drop this pencil and it falls down, that's a miracle from God. And I thought it's also gravity. 

J.R.: Right. 

David: Right, but I mean I understood what he was trying to convey. But I think it actually is kind of a good way to understand this over spiritualizing thing. But [00:14:00] he said, you know, it's a miracle every time I drop this pencil that it doesn't go up, it goes down. And I'm like, I'm kind of tracking with you, but that's also the way God made the world, right?

J.R.: Right In a way, but if every time you drop the pencil, it's a miracle, well then, I'm no longer blown away by the miraculous, right? < Yeah, yeah.> And so we're just redefining the word in some way. 

David: Which, that might be a better way to think of it, too, is that you lose some of the awe of when something amazing actually happens. If everything is amazing to you, right? 

J.R.: Right, yeah. And I guess it depends on how you view the word. I mean,we could start here also. How do you view the word miracle? How, how do you define that? I mean, in general, I've always sort of looked at it as well. Okay, this is when the spiritual forces override the natural world.

David: Yeah, I think that's a ...

J.R.: The water into wine type thing, right? 

David: Yeah, I think that's a common definition. I'd have to give it a little more thought. But [00:15:00] basically, a miracle is something when something suspends the way the natural world works, right? So to use that professor who dropped his pencil, if it actually went up, now that would impress me, right? That was a miracle. But the fact that it fell down to me was just, that's the way the world works. And, and so I guess, yeah, that's, that's a very high level definition of a miracle. It's the unexpected, because that's not how the natural world works. And also we're going to get into this today, but also, you know, more of the spiritual intervention into the natural world as well. 

J.R.: So yeah, those two extremes sort of make sense to probably most people. 

David: Yeah, so we have to go back then to the ancient world and understand how they would interpret them, because I think that's helpful in understanding everything we've talked about so far in this series, right?

So let's talk about the ancient worldview for a minute. Some of this is going to be repeat because all these ideas tie together, and they build on each other throughout the series. So, you've heard us say this [00:16:00] before, the ancient world believed there was a connection between the heavenly realm and the earthly realm. And things that happened on earth were actually telling you what was taking place in the spiritual realm, and an ancient very much would have had that mindset. So fortuitous events reveal the god's favor, right? Bad events showed that you upset a god, and you had to rectify that, right? 

J.R.: Yeah, we might casually use the word luck, but they would always assume that there's a spiritual force behind it.

David: Yeah, maybe not so much luck. They would talk about fate. They would talk about the ...

J.R.: Fate, yeah, that's a better word.

David: You know, the will of the gods. But yeah, we much more chalk things up to luck today than they would have. 

J.R.: Yeah, right. Yeah, where we look at it and say, look, man, there's 300 million people in our country. Somebody's bound to go through this certain oddball, you know, turn of events. Where we sort of look at the numbers of things and say, yeah, well, it's bound to happen somewhere, you know? And no, they certainly didn't look at things that way. 

David: Yeah. [00:17:00] To go back to your example of a flat tire, today we would say, well, you know, what did I do, what did I do wrong that I had a flat tire? And you go, look, probably hundreds of thousands of people have a flat tire every day. You know, it's just your turn, you know, maybe you should have changed your tires 10 years ago or something like that. But yeah.

J.R.: Yeah. Yeah. The fact that you ignore the tire guy for about four different visits, <Yeah.> until it's completely slick like I do. 

David: He repeatedly told you it's time to change your tire. 

J.R.: Yeah, and then you then you want to curse the gods when you're on your way to work. Yeah, it blows. 

David: So there's this connection between the heavenly realm and the earthly realm that would have been a very much ingrained in the ancient world view.

Another one is the timing of natural phenomena was not coincidental. And this is another thing where we would, we read things in the Bible sometimes and we say, well, that's just a natural phenomenon. It's kind of like that book I was reading earlier. If you can explain it naturally, there's no need to resort to a miracle.

But the timing of it was not coincidental in the ancient mindset, right? If a thunderstorm [00:18:00]happened, if a volcano erupted, that was the gods trying to tell you something.

J.R.: Right. Do you remember a few months ago, the Nineveh eclipse? I don't remember that. Oh, you don't remember? Yeah, the Big Eclipse.

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah, the Big Eclipse, it came across the United States. 

David: It wasn't a big deal here. We didn't see much, but I know what you're talking about now. 

J.R.: Yeah, we had a good look at it here in Tennessee. Anyway, it apparently crossed over, I'll get this wrong, but I think seven Ninevehs in the United States. You know, Nineveh, whatever. 

David: Oh, city names, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah, it crossed over seven Ninevehs and so all over Twitter, which is kind of my world of conspiracy. There's all this noise on Twitter about, you know, that this is going to usher in, I don't know what it was going to usher in, but it was clearly a sign from God and it was interesting, you know, okay, I went down that rabbit hole. It was fun. 

But yes, the idea that it's not merely an eclipse that we know exactly what that is today. Oh speaking of the Nineveh eclipse, what's interesting is that when I was going down this rabbit hole of the 2024 eclipse [00:19:00] I looked up when Jonah, you know, was supposedly on the earth and the timeframe. And there was actually a complete total eclipse that went directly over Nineveh, the city in the Middle East right around that time, right around the, the time of Jonah, you know, the Jonah and the whale story. Which is interesting because, well, I am going down this road of trying to explain away a miracle with a natural phenomenon, but when Jonah arrived at the city of Nineveh, that they were so quick to ask for God's forgiveness because they had just seen this total eclipse. 

David: Yeah, well, but I think hitting on one of the things we're just talking about here is that even if you can explain a natural phenomena, to say an eclipse, look, the ancients weren't stupid. They knew what eclipses were, and there's some evidence that they even knew how to calculate them.

 <Right.> And yet, the timing of them still, to them, there was a spiritual message there. People didn't just shrug their shoulders and [00:20:00] go, Well, yeah, we thought that was going to happen, and it did. 

J.R.: No, no, you're exactly right. Same thing with the wise men following the star. 

David: Yeah, you can say it was a comet. 

J.R.: They saw, yeah, whatever it was, but the point is, is they saw something that was out of the normal because they studied the skies, and they were following it. 

David: Right. 

J.R.: They knew the sign it was giving. 

David: And events held meaning. So we just had a tropical storm go through the Gulf yesterday as we speak.

J.R.: Oh, yeah. 

David: And that's another thing that always comes to mind is today we go, yeah, we know why that occurred. But sometimes I think we're a little bit clueless about what God might be trying to tell us. And again, you can take it to extremes because there's always someone who said this is God's judgment on this city. And you go well, what did that city do, you know? But but But still sometimes I think we're maybe not even attuned to that at all of what events mean in the big scheme of things, right? <Right.>

 So I'll share one more story and then we'll move on because we talked about this just before I was hitting record, but I asked you if you had [00:21:00] seen this Netflix show called Midnight Mass. 

J.R.: Yeah, yeah, it's been, a couple years, but yes, we enjoyed that. 

David: Yeah, it's turning out to be a pleasant surprise. It's a great show, but it's a little bit of a horror flick, but it's, without getting into it, it's not like gory horror. It's more psychological, but there's this one great conversation. One of the main characters is an atheist. He left this little island and he doesn't believe in God anymore, and a new priest comes to the island. And without getting into the whole story this priest performs a miracle.

And he meets with this guy, he's been meeting with this guy regularly, and so the Sunday after this miracle occurred, the guy sits down with the priest, and he's kind of angry, right? I don't know if you remember this scene, but he says, look, I can explain what happened. He said, the girl was misdiagnosed. The body heals itself, right? And he went through several of these things about why that miracle wasn't really a miracle, right? Right. Then he pauses and he says, There's one thing I [00:22:00] can't figure out, Father. And he says, How did you know? How did you know to call that out last Sunday? And the father, the priest, looks at him and he says, Ah, there's the mystery right there, isn't it?

And I thought that was a great scene, right? 

J.R.: Yeah. No, that's a great line. Yeah. And the timing of something actually is part of the mystery. 

David: Yeah, exactly.

J.R.: Even though it can all be explained away, there is a timing aspect to it. Well, you said it before. We've all kind of experienced that. 

David: Yeah, and I think a lot of miracles in the Bible fall under that category. You could say, well, clearly, I think we talked about this in Judges, well, clearly a rainstorm came through and the river overflowed and it swamped all the chariots. But the timing, you know, to use the line from the priest, Ah, there's the mystery right there, isn't it? That's right. Why did it happen right at this battle?

J.R.: Yeah, that's exactly right. 

David: So a couple more things I would say about the ancient mindset. We've talked about this before. Signs and wonders revealed whose god was greater, right? And [00:23:00] today, we are in such this mindset of, you know, I'm so sure there's one god.

But in the ancient world, and it was competing gods, and when the God of the Bible did something, that was a show of, I am greater than all these other gods that you're worshiping. 

J.R.: Yeah, I think you take for granted, or we take for granted, the fact that you might have competing religions, and we can have debates about it, and have apologists do their thing on TED Talks and all those avenues .

But you're right, I don't think we really grasp the ancient understanding of multiple gods. See, we're not arguing over who's God is greater between us and Islam, so to speak, right? We're just, we're just, yeah, we're debating over theology and specifics. But back in the day, they would say, oh, well, this is clearly Baal.

This is clearly Dagon. This is clearly the work of this god. And because they were all associated with different aspects of the weather and other natural phenomenon, that yeah, they would give credit to [00:24:00] those gods. And, of course, it, when you have, when you're giving sacrifices in these pagan cities to all these different gods, there's gonna be some kind of confirmation bias by somebody who happened to give the right sacrifice that morning, and then the next thing you know, it rains.

So that's the story that's gonna get around. You know, you want a story to spread, it's like, hey, Dave, Dave sacrificed this morning, you know what? It poured down rain on his crops. Never mind all the times that you might've sacrificed and it didn't work out because we explained that away that maybe I, the sacrifice wasn't right. But yeah, that's that whole phenomenon in the ancient world that we just really don't understand today because we're too busy kind of debating over specifics of theology and, and our spiritual texts. But that's what they debated about in the ancient world. 

David: I don't know who sacrificed what before this weekend, but we've had about eight inches of rain this week. 

J.R.: Somebody sacrificed something.

David: So they can knock it off. They can stop it. Yeah. 

J.R.: Right. Well, we could use some up here. It's been hot and dry. And I'm sure it's headed this direction. 

David: Yeah. So you had [00:25:00] this worldview where gods had different powers and like you said, there was this attempt to figure out which had the better power, the higher power.

Right. And mm-Hmm. . When you even look at the Olympic pantheon of gods, you know Zeus is known as the most high God. Well, that's because Zeus had more power than the other gods. And then you have Yahweh come along. In the Bible, the constant assertion of the Bible is that, look, Yahweh is not just one of the pantheon, right? Yahweh is the Creator God, and all these other gods answer to Him. There is no kind of hierarchy going on here. 

J.R.: Right. so it's a common question of, hey, how come we don't see miracles today? And the common answer is, well, sometimes they do happen. They certainly happened today but they're not going to be on Fox News or something. But the question of why miracles don't happen today can kind of be answered with that reality of we don't view the world that way today. That's not our culture today. Yeah, I would. We don't have competing [00:26:00] gods.

David: That's a big part of it, actually. 

J.R.: Yeah, and a lot of things that happened in the Old Testament and a lot of things that happened in the New Testament was the establishment of a single god, Yahweh, over all the other gods. And we may disagree on what type of god is at the top, you know, whether Allah, Yahweh, whoever, but we all kind of agree on one single god.

And so there isn't, this competition, there isn't this need to prove one God over the others in our culture. I've heard of that as a explanation, or one of the explanations on why we don't see miracles kind of day in and day out today. 

David: Yeah, I think there's some truth to that. So as we talk about the ancient worldview, it's important to keep in mind too that even believers in Yahweh, right, even monotheists, we could say. They still held this ancient worldview, not maybe in every single aspect, but it was still part of their worldview. You know, the connection of the heavenly realm and the earthly realm, that the timing of natural phenomena was not coincidental, signs and wonders revealed who God [00:27:00] was and God's power. So all that plays into how we're going to talk about the rest of this episode, because we're going to start looking at some of these signs and wonders then that Jesus does, and maybe even the Apostle Paul, and try to understand then how they would be understood, right?

Because again, we talked about our modern mindset. We go to these extremes, the ancient worldview. Let's start talking about some of these miracles and what they might mean, right? 

J.R.: All right. Where are we starting? 

David: So. There's some broad categories here that I kind of tried to lump these things together. So, first is miracle of healing, right? A lot of miracles of healing. <Oh, sure.> And one of the first ones that came to mind is, The Healing of the Paralyzed Man in Matthew chapter 9, we won't read that whole account, but I think we actually talked about this maybe even last week, last episode. Right. Because it's this episode where Jesus heals a paralyzed man.

J.R.: He heals the paralytic that was brought down through the roof. 

David: Correct. And there's this moment where the guy is still paralyzed, but he's sitting in front of Jesus, [00:28:00] and so Jesus said, your sins are forgiven. And there's kind of this gasp in the room and people trying to think, like, what does that mean, right? And so that's where we pick the story up in Matthew chapter 9. Jesus says, "which is easier to say, your sins are forgiven, or to say, get up and walk? But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins."

So then he says to the paralyzed man, "get up, take your mat, and go home. And the man got up and he went home. When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe. They praised God who had given such authority to man." Now, I think we talked about this story again, but the question that Jesus poses is which is easier to do, right? < Right.> Forgive sin or heal this man, perform a miracle. 

J.R.: Well, I love this story because he links those two things together. <Yeah.> Because in one way, healing him. Everybody knows. Everybody sees it. You know, if, I say I forgive your sins, well, there's really no way to prove or disprove that that actually happened.

And so sort of to establish that he did have the authority to forgive [00:29:00] sins. He asks the question and then he heals the man to demonstrate his authority. <Yeah.> Now everybody has story of, well, the guy know, he's been lame since birth or whatever, and now he's walking. So that story spreads through the city like wildfire, but it's going to be attached to the idea, but then he also forgave his sins. And that's the more important, rather than the guy's healing, was the forgiveness of sins. 

David: Yeah. And this is a bit of a review from last episode, but I'm understanding one of the key words in this story is authority. Jesus first says, I want you to know the Son of Man has authority.

And then the people were amazed that God had given such authority. And we talked about that word authority last time. I think we can gloss over that word, but it's actually saying, what God do you represent and what power does that God possess? 

J.R.: Right. 

David: And so this idea of healing, then, linked to authority, is very much Jesus saying, look, this is the authority that I have. This is the authority that has been [00:30:00] given to me by Yahweh, the true God. And to demonstrate that, I'm gonna forgive sins. I'm going to heal, right? I'm going to perform miracles. It's a demonstration of authority. 

J.R.: The two were linked together. That was the whole point of that is to, yes, demonstrate his authority in the invisible way, meaning that nobody knew if he could actually forgive sins. But he demonstrated in a visible way of the healing of the paralytic that he can get up and walk.

And when you tie those two things together now, what God gave you that authority? Those are two dramatically different spiritual ideas to most people in the ancient world. <Yeah.> You'd pray to one God for healing. You'd pray for one God for forgiveness. You'd pray to a God for crops. And so he's kind of doing these two wildly separate things, but then tying them together and tying them under the single umbrella of overall authority of, <Right.> the physical world and spiritual world. 

David: And if you had any question whether he had the authority to forgive sins, you might start to [00:31:00] accept that maybe he knows what he's talking about because he just had the authority to heal this guy.

J.R.: Yeah, exactly. 

David: And he has the authority to do other things as we're going to kind of unpack some of these. So the two are more linked than they seem. 

J.R.: Well, yeah, because associated physical infirmities with their spiritual lives. You know, and they may say something like a demon is causing this or something like that. But yes, there was always the Job, Job's friends line of questioning. What did you do wrong to have this infirmity brought on you.

<Yeah.> So there's going to be that tie in. So yeah, you are right. They are more connected than you think. 

David: Yeah, and I think you brought up a point that physical maladies and infirmities were linked to demonic activity or sin.

 <Right.> And those were very linked. And that's another place where we can say, well, we know better now. But again, there's something to it in the ancient world. 

J.R.: Well, there's something to it in, like you said at the beginning, the kind of the mythic structure of the Gospels, that when you fail to align yourself with God, [00:32:00] things don't work out well for you.

It might, it might work out in the short term. But overall it just, things don't seem to work out well. And so I understand the idea of associating your character with your outcomes in life, right? <Yeah.> And we do that today. I mean, my sixth DUI, I think somebody sets me down and says, Hey, maybe it's you. Perhaps you're making some poor decisions that it's, that's constantly putting me in this situation, right? 

David: Yeah. 

J.R.: And so we do kind of see this, but definitely back in the ancient world, they really tied those two ideas together. 

David: Yeah, And in that sense, then, too, then when Jesus is physically healing someone, there would be some connection with a demonic or spiritual world, right? And so, one of the things that Jesus is doing when he's healing is, he's not only showing his authority, but he's actually reclaiming the spiritual realm.

And I think that's another big part of miracles. <Okay, yeah.> Because, I think we talked about this, again, this ties into the last episode, where Jesus says, [00:33:00] "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me." Well, we hear that and we go, well, yeah, sure. But no, that's, part of the gospel announcement. Because Jesus is saying, look, the spiritual world is no longer characterized by these rogue spirits, by all these, by chaos, right? Yeah. I'm bringing them under my authority. 

J.R.: Right. 

David: And so that's,

J.R.: That's interesting. That's an interesting way of putting it, and I think you're right on that. 

David: Yeah, so we also see healings as reclaiming the spiritual realm that has been chaos up to this point. <Okay.> And we're gonna unpack this a little bit more as we go through this. Well, it actually leads to the second thing I would say is there were miracles of exorcism. And these are always interesting. I think these are fascinating. 

So, yeah, there are several places where Jesus cast a demon out, right? And again, Mm hmm. Even today we might dismiss that and go, well, you know, that doesn't really happen. But in the ancient world, you have to go back, and we talked about this in the Old Testament. Demons were a specific group of fallen angels who were allowed to [00:34:00] roam the earth. But they were also told that they would ultimately be destroyed.

Okay, that's a subtle narrative, I would say, in the Old Testament. And you see that more clearly in some extra biblical material as well. 

J.R.: Right. The Book of Enoch kind of clears a lot of that up. 

David: Yeah, yeah. and whether you agree with that or not, you have to understand that the ancient world thought in those terms.

<Right.> Okay? So, you have that backdrop, then, of demon possession. So, there's a couple of episodes where Jesus casts out a demon from a person. So, I wrote down Luke chapter 4, verse 31 through 37. They are in Capernaum, Jesus is confronted with this demon possessed man, and what's always interesting to me is what the demons say to Jesus, right? So in this case, in Luke chapter four, the demon says, "Go away, what do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." Now, there's a lot there to unpack, just in that statement, right? [00:35:00]

J.R.: Yeah, it's another good example of Jesus authority being the primary concern in these stories. Right? Not the crazy fact that we're talking to a demon here, right? That's apparently not the most surprising part of this story because people in this particular exorcism, people were amazed by the fact that Jesus had authority over the demons. I think I would have been blown away by the fact I heard a demon speak out of this guy, you know, however that sounded.

<Yeah.> But that's the story that I'm telling people. But apparently, you know, the idea was that he had authority over the demons, and they knew it, as soon as they came into contact with him. 

David: Yes. And that's one thing you see that's consistent in these exorcisms, is the demons actually recognize who Jesus is. <Right.> And they know exactly who he is. Right? So in this case, he said, they call him Jesus of Nazareth. Now, another part of this story that we can pick apart is they ask the question, "have you come to destroy us?" Now, that's a, that's a interesting question [00:36:00]because you don't see people going around just, unless it's a sci fi movie, just killing demons.

Right. Like, in general, It's this weird in between realm we're gonna operate in here for a second. But in general, like, you don't kill demons. And even in the Bible, you don't see Jesus killing demons. You see him driving them somewhere else. 

J.R.: Right, casting them out. Right. That's right.

David: So, it's an interesting question, then, like, what are they talking about, then? Why does the demon say, have you come to destroy us? 

J.R.: Well, this is one of the things that when you and I read The Unseen Realm by Michael Heiser, it clarified some things that I think he's dead on about. And that is the idea that the demons are holdovers from the Watchers, the Nephilim, that were destroyed in the flood. And that their spirits were, what, allowed to remain on earth, but not in their physical form. Their spirits were allowed to roam the earth. Yes. And what was it? It was essentially that they were [00:37:00] allowed to roam the earth until, I guess, what, the final judgment?

David: Yeah, until the final judgment. Yeah, that's the whole coming of the kingdom of God. And that's where you get into Revelation that says he's going to cast all these spirits into, you know, all this imagery, the lake of fire. <Right.> But your point is the, again, let's go back to the ancient world. Their understanding was that these evil spirits knew that the clock was ticking on their existence.

J.R.: Right, and also that the experience with demons is that you didn't destroy them. You drove them out. 

David: You drove them out. 

J.R.: You really couldn't just, you can't destroy a spirit, right? 

David: Yeah, I mean Buffy the Vampire Slayer and all that. But yeah. 

J.R.: Yeah, that's right. That's right. 

David: That's extra biblical too.

J.R.: Yeah, when the demons say, have you come to destroy us, that ought to perk you up right there thinking, Well, I didn't think demons could be destroyed. There's the other contact with the demons where the demons basically say, Have you come here to destroy us before the appointed time?

David: Yeah, now that one gets a little more specific, yeah. 

J.R.: Right, yeah, that one's a fascinating one. Cause when that was [00:38:00] pointed out, that's when the light bulb went off. It's like, oh wow, yeah, that's exactly what they're saying. It's almost like they're saying, hey, we had an agreement. We're allowed to roam the earth until the final judgment. <Yeah.> Are you coming to break that agreement? Because you do have the authority, you have the power to do that, but there was an agreement. It's almost like implied in that statement. Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time? 

David: Yeah, they say, have you come here to torture us before the appointed time? <Right.> it's almost like they're not necessarily saying, you know, hey, are you breaking the agreement? But it's actually, I think, more of a recognition like, Oh, wow. Are you the one who's going to usher in the appointed time? Is this it for us? 

J.R.: Right, yeah, maybe that's it. 

David: And of course the answer is yes, but not yet, right?

J.R.: Right, yes. Which is why that second story is so ironic, that the pigs, you know, that was the one that he cast the demons into a herd of pigs. <Oh, that's right.> And they ran off into the sea to drown. They're basically retelling the narrative of the flood. <Yes.> That's what killed them the [00:39:00]first time, and the second time appointed time isn't quite yet. But just for ironic purposes, we're going to cast you into the pigs and off into the sea you go again. 

David: Yeah, and the sea, of course, chaos, right? 

J.R.: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. 

David: Casting you back into the chaos . So it's a really interesting, this just occurred to me. It's a really interesting question. Why didn't Jesus just kill them? <Sure.> If he had all this authority. And the answer is, it wasn't the appointed time. And that's exactly what this evil spirit, questioning Jesus about. Yeah. Is this the appointed time? 

J.R.: No, I think that's dead on. That makes perfect sense to me. 

David: So there are other episodes where Jesus casts a demon out, and they all have very similar interactions with them, right? And I think the Apostle Paul even has some of these interactions. But it is interesting that Jesus doesn't kill them, right? Because it's not the appointed time. So what is Jesus doing?

Well, again, in line with the gospel announcement, what Jesus is announcing is the kingdom of heaven is [00:40:00] advancing. And I, I think it, What he's actually doing is he's putting these evil spirits on the clock to say, look, you've had roam of the spiritual realm for too long. I have the authority to do this. It's not going to happen yet. But you're on the clock now. 

J.R.: Yeah, your day is coming. 

David: Yeah, your day is coming. And I think that's a big piece of exorcism. Again, it's that saying, the kingdom of God is arriving, right? Which, to tie in the last episode then, goes much further beyond just a personal invitation to accept Jesus Christ. That's part of it, but it's a much larger announcement. 

J.R.: Right. Exactly.

David: All right, so another category is miracles of nature. We've kind of talked about this as well, but where Jesus you would say maybe interferes with the natural phenomenon natural order of things. 

J.R.: Right.

David: Probably one of the best examples is, and I love this one, too, is the calming of the storm. Jesus is in a boat with his disciples. They're on the Sea of Galilee, I think, Luke chapter 8. And their storm comes, [00:41:00] all the disciples panic, and Jesus steps up and says, I think he says, "Peace be still," right?

J.R.: Yes. He calms the storm. Right, and everything calms down. Yeah. Yeah, the sea becomes glass.

David: And the disciples reaction is what cracks me up, "In fear and amazement, they asked one another, who is this? He commands even the winds and the water and they obey him." So I kind of read that as I always picture them as almost being irritated, you know, like, Hey, this isn't even fair. This guy just tells the storm to stop. 

J.R.: Right. 

David: Like who are we dealing with here? 

J.R.: Yeah. and again, ancient people connected weather patterns to spiritual forces. That was not unheard of. <Yes.> But they probably had never seen such an immediate result. You pray for rain and hopefully the next day that there's rain. But they certainly had never seen somebody say, "peace be still" and the rain immediately stops and the waves are immediately calmed, right? You know, it's just that kind of immediate power that they're seeing. They already connected whether or not phenomenon or natural phenomenon to spiritual forces.

David: Yeah, that's a [00:42:00] good point. 

J.R.: But just the immediacy of it just had to have blown him away. 

David: Right. So it's not just that Jesus had control over this natural phenomenon. He actually had control of the spiritual realm that might have been producing this. <Right. Yes.> Because they very much would have held that there was something behind it, you know. Whether it be, again, I think I said a volcano, a storm, an earthquake, right? Those things just weren't coincidence. There was something behind it, and Jesus just demonstrated that He had control over that as well. 

J.R.: Right. Yeah, just that umbrella authority again that's like, this is definitely not His lane, yet He has authority over it all.

David: Yes. So another one, and this is obvious, but we'll state the obvious, the Resurrection demonstrates His victory over death. Which again, death was not just a natural phenomenon, there was a spiritual force behind death. And so maybe the ultimate display that Jesus has control now, is taking control of the spiritual realm, is the resurrection, [00:43:00] then. Death cannot hold him. 

J.R.: Right. And he already demonstrated his authority over death with Lazarus. That's true. And so that story certainly was getting around. But then to what, to do it yourself, to overturn death in your own self when you yourself are dead. You know, it's like is there anything this guy can't do?

Yeah You know, I mean just chalk that up. Of course, he could do that. You know with all the things that the disciples saw we kind of look back with 2020 vision and say, Yeah, surely they had to think that he can pull this off. He's pulled off everything else up to this point. He raised Lazarus. But apparently, the fact that he can raise himself was just, surely Jesus can't even pull that one off, right?

David: Yeah, and he does. 

So, I think there's about 25 miracles in the Gospels. I think I looked that up, you know, so we just hit on a couple of them. There's also miracles, though, beyond Jesus, of Jesus followers. So, I want to hit on one or two of these. We talked about some of this in Acts chapter 16 on Paul's missionary journeys.

Now, this is an interesting one, because this [00:44:00] happens at Philippi. Paul and Silas get thrown in prison, an earthquake hits overnight, and it loosens their chains. And the unique thing about that story is that Paul and Silas do not leave the prison. They stay there. And of course the jailer then says, hey, give me some of what you're, what you got cause you know, anyone else would have just run. But what's interesting and lost in the story sometimes is the magistrates the next morning the language reads that they're very anxious for Paul to get out of town.

First of all, they let him out of prison because he was a Roman citizen, and they basically beg him to leave town. Now, what I want to point out here is that I think we can miss the point in a story like this, that why were the magistrates so anxious for Paul to get out of town? Well, the earthquake was no coincidence to them.

J.R.: Right, even though earthquakes were certainly heard of in that area of world, but It's the timing of it. 

David: Right. We imprisoned this guy who is talking about the coming kingdom, [00:45:00] right? And all authority is under Jesus. We imprison them, and then an earthquake happens. Like, they don't want any part of this.

Right. Right? Because the implication is, what we have done has upset their God. And their god has authority to free them if he wants. I think that aspect is lost in the story sometimes, but I think it's there. I think ancients would have recognized that. 

J.R.: Yeah, once you realize that there is a power behind this person that you've locked up. Yeah, the last thing you I mean, obviously you want to make it right. Let's let him go, but then I really don't want him to stick around our town at all. No, let's get this on unhinged power.

Let's just move it on to the next town. That way we won't be associated with it in a negative way. Right? Right. If the earthquake comes to free him from prison, who knows what's going to happen next. So let's just move on. 

David: If this guy's God has that much power, he needs to be someone else's problem. Move on the road to Thessalonica, right? 

J.R.: Exactly. 

David: So, this isn't the only instance where, you know, Paul [00:46:00] and some of his followers perform miracles. There's an interesting one a couple chapters earlier in Acts chapter 14, where Paul and Barnabas are actually mistaken for gods. I think this is a fascinating one, too.

Right. So, in Acts 14, It says when the crowd saw what Paul had done, because he just performed a miracle, they shouted in the Lycanian language, "the gods have come down to us in human form." Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul they called Hermes, because he was the chief speaker. Now that's an interesting idea of how they identified those two. But basically what happens here is Paul performs a miracle, and the crowd basically say, Hey, the gods have come down to us.

And I think if you read the whole story, the priest of that town actually bring out a bull and say, We're going to sacrifice to you. And Paul's like, No, no, no, no, no. Guys, this is getting out of hand, right? You've misunderstood this. 

J.R.: Well, what a perfect setup for Paul. Like he couldn't have asked for a better segue than the crowd to think, Hey, the gods have come down in human form. Because all he's going to do is pivot [00:47:00] that and tell the crowd about the real God who came down in human form and tell them about Jesus.

It was like, thanks for the, yeah, this is a perfect setup. And the other cool thing about this story is that, you know, we've been to Greece several times and the culture, especially in Athens, is so, I mean, there's just all these statues to Zeus and Hermes and all these different gods. And it's kind of interesting that these two cultures mixed, but there's not much in the Bible about Zeus and Hermes. But this verse right here, kind of cross over a little bit. 

David: Yeah. So in the Old Testament, sometimes there's a lot of coded references to different gods beyond Baal and Moloch and all that. You don't really see it in the New Testament, but I think it's a fascinating story because they just say, hey, this must be Zeus and Hermes.

J.R.: Right, right. Yeah. it's just a neat overlap of those two cultures. Because you don't really tie them together, even though they were contemporary cultures going on at the same time, you know, you have the Christians spreading the news of Jesus [00:48:00] at the same time that Athens was still worshiping Zeus and Artemis and, you know the multiplicity of gods of the pantheon.

David: So we've talked about several of these miracles I think people, hopefully you're getting the picture then, of I think a lot of these miracles are announcing the advancement of the kingdom of heaven. And actually, I think a lot of them are referring to the spiritual realm, just as much as they are talking about the physical realm.

J.R.: Sure. 

David: So I guess let's step back and then, kind of wrap this episode up. What does this mean for our understanding, then, of the gospel announcement? So if we go back to those two ends of the spectrum, right, if we relegate signs and wonders to superstitious ancient people, I think we're missing the message of what they were trying to convey, that God is advancing, that God has authority in the spiritual realm, right?

And we talked a lot about it, but when we just say, oh, we can explain this now, well, you missed the point of what that is trying to convey. 

J.R.: Yeah, it's just easy when you have been, especially if you've been raised in the [00:49:00]church, this is just not difficult to grasp. That Jesus has all authority because he is God, you know, I mean, and we bring all of our, the way we were raised in the culture we were raised in, and it makes obvious sense.

And it's easy to overlook the way the ancients had to have wrestled with who this Jesus character was, right? <Right.> And the demonstration of the authority that he had. And, what that means for the gospel. It's just easy for us to say, well, of course. You know, I, I knew that in second grade and Sunday school. But the ancients they had a different view of it and they wrestled with these concepts and ideas a lot more than we do today.

And again, yes, you're right that when we look at ancient people as just superstitious people kind of in the dark ages, then you miss the narrative that was trying to be communicated through the life of Jesus and through the life of the disciples that carried that on after Jesus.

David: Yeah, and as a side note, it always cracks me up when someone said, well, they were just [00:50:00] superstitious people. I mean, these are the same cultures that produced Plato and Socrates, right? <Right.> That basically laid the foundation for Western culture. You and I have been a lot of places in the Middle East. Some of what you see there is absolutely amazing, from a construction standpoint. 

J.R.: Oh, sure. We can't explain it today.

David: No, and these people knew, you know, clearly we have technology that they didn't have, but they knew how to build things. Some of the things that they had available to them were lost for a thousand years or so. <Sure.> Right. So, yeah. 

J.R.: And, and the idea that they're just scratching around in the mud trying to feed themselves and that's about it. You go to these ancient sites and you see some of what's been reconstructed. We don't give them enough credit for the technology that they did possess. And in a lot of ways, they harnessed the technology that was available to them at the time better than we do today. 

David: Yeah. So that's the one end of the spectrum. If we go back to the other end where we, I think we also can run the risk of, over spiritualizing them, and we [00:51:00] also miss the point. So we just reduce the gospel to something like a set of moral teachings and miracles to show how much God loves us.

And again, I don't want to belittle of that because there is an aspect of that. But again, I think you miss the point of signs and wonders if that's the only thing you take away from the miracles that are mentioned in the New Testament. 

J.R.: Yeah. if everything is a sign or everything is a wonder, then really it loses the things lose the wonder, right? You know, there's nothing to wonder about anymore. Everything sort of is. 

David: And. 

J.R.: Yeah, we can definitely over spiritualize. 

David: Yeah, and I don't know, just on a personal note, but we've talked about this a little bit. You brought it up. I don't know about you, but, part of me is trying to recapture the original. awe of miracles, instead of trying to go down the road of trying to over explain them. You know, I've read some of the same books you have, I've read other stuff. People go to great lengths to explain, well, here's how this miracle could have happened. And I just think, personally, I'm [00:52:00] actually wanting to recapture some of that original intent and just go, no, that's the announcement of the Kingdom of God coming, right? <Right, right.> And we're in that era right now.

And, I'll finish with this and then get your last thoughts as well, because you said something about, why don't we see more miracles today? And I think one aspect of what you said was correct. I think there's another aspect that Jesus then announced the coming of the kingdom. So we are kind of in this new era where the kingdom of God is advancing and it's here. And part of the idea of miracles was announcing it. Well, it's already been announced now. 

J.R.: Right. It's at hand. 

David: Yeah, so there's a less of a need to demonstrate the authority that Jesus had. We have it recorded. We've studied it for 2,000 years now, and that's what we need to focus on instead of saying, Well, if God would just show me a sign, you know? I guess that's my last thoughts. [00:53:00] What do you think? 

J.R.: Well, I agree with you. And because of the scientific revolution that sort of takes the wonder away from natural phenomenon. You're right. I think what our generation would be wise to do is to recapture that wonder, to recapture that, because that's what's missing.

You know, this over rationalization of everyday events, and including digging into the Bible and just sort of rationalizing that. You know, you can see that that's the motivation for certain authors. And I think what we're missing is the wonder. If you look at life as a narrative arc, you can see the timing of events. You can see the way things kind of move together. And maybe, Oh, not to get too mystic, the rhythms of life and the timing of events, you see those things, you can recapture that wonder.

But it does take kind of breaking free of this, jump in your car, drive across the country, jump on a plane, go across the [00:54:00] ocean. You got to kind of break free of that mindset. And that's why I think people reconnect with the spiritual by isolating themselves for a certain amount of time. You go up to the cabin in the mountains. People go to the lake, people go to the ocean. Sort of that reconnecting with the spiritual that it can be as simple as that. But we're just so ingrained in modern day conveniences and technology. And don't even get me started about our cell phones. You know, I mean, we're just so ingrained in it that we can't ever break free of it to possibly see the wonder that's right in front of us all the time.

David: I think that's right. I'm trying to keep that more in mind even as I walk the dog and just try to pay attention, you know, I leave my cell phone at home, like you said, try and just pay attention to, I don't know, around here there's different seabirds flying around and turtles and just trying to pay attention to that, you know, the sunset. So simple things like that can reconnect us to signs and wonders as well.

J.R.: Yeah, I have never had a [00:55:00] green thumb. But we planted several hundred dollars worth of flowers this season. Okay, really done this. And so I'm invested, right? I've got to make sure you water them every day. You know, well, it's, it's August. Normally they would be long dead, but because we planted these things in the spring. Well, it's August and I'm out there picking the dead leaves off, watching the new buds come up.

And, you know, that idea of just kind of stepping away from your busy life to focus on something as common and as simple as a flower garden. I've greatly enjoyed that this summer and for the first time, I'm thinking this is what people love about gardening.

You know, you pick this thing off, you trim it a little bit. And the next thing you know, here's a new bud coming up. And, the cultivation and maintaining of that. But yeah, it's all around us if we just take the time to take a look. 

David: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Well, that's another aspect of this gospel announcement.

Next time we're gonna finish this series up and we're gonna talk about the final aspect, or I'm sure there's more, but the final one we're gonna talk about, [00:56:00] which, what does it mean to reign with God? Have you ever thought about that? 

J.R.: Up on the clouds, strumming our harp, right?

David: Exactly. Yep. Pick your cloud out. Your instrument of choice. 

J.R.: Yeah, that'll be interesting to dig into. 

David: So thanks for listening . We have our standard ways of connecting with us. If you expand the episode description, you'll see links. You'll see links to our Facebook page. You can text us, you can sign up for our newsletter. We'd love to hear from you and we will talk to you next episode. 

J.R.: We'll see ya.