They Were Gospelling | Disruptive Presence 69

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[00:00:00] David: Well, it's good to see you, John, 

[00:00:06] John: It's good to see you, sir. Yeah,

[00:00:08] David: you're, you're in Wales right now, traveling at the Bible College of Wales, aren't you?

[00:00:12] John: I am, I am. I'm down at beautiful, sunny Swansea, which is absolutely gorgeous. We've had a bit of rain, but it's beautiful down here right on the coast. So yeah, doing it, doing a week's teaching here. So loving it. I love the place. I love the attitude of the students. It's just wonderful. So I'm really enjoying, my teaching here.

[00:00:29] Finish tomorrow and then, and then heading off heading off to Ireland. So yeah, all good. So very good. Great time.

[00:00:35] David: And, and should we confess to our to our listeners that in between the last episode they've listened to and this episode you've actually been to Canada, visited me and now we're back home again, sort of thing,

[00:00:49] John: That's true. We had a wonderful time. Was over with you for about a week. Oh, it was magnificent. Great visiting your church. What an honor to serve. yoU and the context at King's Church Westside, just a blessing had such a wonderful time. Our, our listeners should know that the temperatures dipped to minus 15 at one point. but actually in saying that, it was fabulous. absolutely fabulous and just loved hanging out with you, my friend. It was absolutely wonderful. It was

[00:01:14] David: it was, it was a kind of surreal experience because it was the first time we'd be in person together since well before the podcast started,

[00:01:20] wasn't it? 

[00:01:20] John: it's incredible. So that was lovely to be in your lovely home and have time with your family and your church family as well. Just beautiful. Thank you so much for the privilege.

[00:01:29] David: So speaking then of travel, a, a, a move that probably was not nine hours , in, in, in the comfort of a, of an airline. We have Paul and Barnabas trekking their way across parts of the Mediterranean, and, and today we make it to chapter 14. And they are on their way and arriving at Econ, aren't they?

[00:01:54] John: Yeah, yeah, it's amazing. We've had that gorgeous, paradoxical end in chapter 13. It says, verse 51, they shook the dust from off their feet and protest against them. And in verse 52, as they're on their way to Iconium, it says, and the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit. So you get that lovely contrast, which the Book of Acts does a lot for us.

[00:02:15] It's that sense of sort of, one minute you're getting persecuted, but in the next minute, you're rejoicing. So, so chapter 14 sorry, chapter 13 ends with that, that sort of controversy. And yet we, we enter chapter 14 with a bit of optimism as well, which is great.

[00:02:30] David: Yes. Yeah. So we want to dive into chapter 14 then and see what it has to say. We're going to, we're just going to look at the first section, sort of down to verse seven at the moment, but maybe, maybe rewind a little bit and sort of blend us out of chapter 13 into, into chapter 14. So, you're going to read that for us today, aren't you?

[00:02:52] John: I would love to, I would love to. So, right at the end of chapter 13, it says verse 52, and the disciples. We're filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit. That's the disciples at Iconium. And then we jump into what happens there. Verse 1 of chapter 14. At Iconium, Paul and Barnabas went, as usual, into the Jewish synagogue. There they spoke so effectively that a great number of Jews and Gentiles believed. But the Jews who refused to believe stirred up the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers. So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of his grace by enabling them to do miraculous signs and wonders.

[00:03:38] The people of the city were divided, some sided with the Jews, others with the apostles. There was a plot afoot among the Gentiles and Jews, together with their leaders, to ill treat them and stone them. But they found out about it and fled to the Lycanian cities of Lystra and Derbe and to the surrounding country, where they continued to preach the good news.

[00:04:03] David: It's so good, isn't it? It's

[00:04:07] John: Marvellous.

[00:04:08] David: It's so good. The, the matter of factness of it. is what always strikes me. It, it just, it really, it kind of leaves me a little bit speechless the way Luke reports some of this sort of stuff. And this theme of just, they continued to preach, they, they, they kept spreading, they kept proclaiming the, the good news.

[00:04:32] I mean, it's just, I mean, the, the, the wonderful thing in the Greek is it almost, Is even more understated. Like, I don't know if you I don't know if you spotted, if you spotted that in the Greek text. So when you see, and it's perhaps just a good tip for anyone reading scripture, there's no controversy here whatsoever.

[00:04:54] But like, if you notice the one translation I've got in front of me says continue to spread the good news, another translation that continued proclaiming the good news. And. And then I think yours said they continued to to, to preach the, the, the good news. And but if you notice that the Greek literally just gives us essentially two words and it just basically says, and they were gospeling.

[00:05:23] John: yes.

[00:05:24] David: And I love that. I love that notion of they were gospelling, which is some level. I mean, I have this is probably present to me for a conversation of heaven recently. It's an over quoted quote and often decontextualized, but most people will have encountered it. The St. Francis's famous quote where he says, preach the gospel all times.

[00:05:47] If necessary, use words and people have sort of attempted to weaponize that quote from time to time to say, Oh, don't don't preach. Right. But, but there's, I think what's in Francis is sort of saying is the gospel leaks out of us in much. wider ways than just sermons. So that text comes to mind when I read this and they were gospeling.

[00:06:10] And so there's a part of me wants to not criticize the translations that are saying proclaiming the good news, but I quite liked this one that says spread the good news because there's more about spreading the gospel than just preaching and proclaiming. I think. Preaching and proclaiming is a fundamental part of it, but when Jesus washes the disciple's feet, like this is the work of the gospel, right?

[00:06:34] And it is, it is proclaiming the gospel, isn't it? In a, in a, in a way. So, I mean, there's no huge point there. I just love that notion of that, that Luke's Greek just says they were gospeling,

[00:06:45] John: yeah.

[00:06:46] David: and, 

[00:06:47] John: But I think it emphasizes again that this activity that Paul, Barnabas, the team are involved in, it's not like a forced program. If they can't do it in one place, they just move on to the next place, and they move on to the next place, and they just find a way to do it however we're going to do it.

[00:07:09] And, and, it's, it's that sense that you do start to get the feeling that it's just part of who they are. And I, and I love that about the Book of Acts, that rather than feeling this is programmatic, or that's, that's do a thing. There's a sense in which they're just doing life, and they're moving on from one place to the next.

[00:07:32] If they can find a synagogue, they do it there. If they can't find a synagogue, they do it where they can. If, if it's about ministering to people, they minister. If it's about speaking, they speaking. So you, so you get this lovely idea, like, that our passage is topped and tailed, with essentially, you could say, sort of the, the wider elements.

[00:07:49] You've got effective... communication, effective teaching or preaching within a synagogue setting. And then at the end of it, a sort of a gospeling idea, whatever that looks like in its entirety in terms of words and actions. So you're getting a lovely comprehensive feel about all of that. And remembering, like down the road, they've been literally expelled from where they've been before.

[00:08:16] And it's just like, they just take a breath and they carry on. And it just feels, it does, I think you're right, it feels almost like routine, matter of fact and I think there's something the modern church could certainly attitudinally embrace in the context of that, which I think is so, is so outstanding.

[00:08:38] Let's just get on with it. Let's just do it. There's no sense of, Oh, the Holy Spirit told them to do it, or empowered by the Spirit. We, as far as the Book of Acts is concerned, that's all now just part of the narrative. That's in there somewhere. But they just go to Iconium, okay, reset, start again, and keep going.

[00:08:57] And, and I love that sort of matter of factness about, about even the the tone of this text. 

[00:09:04] David: No, that's, that's, that's kind of what I'm feeling as well when I read it is exactly is the day to day ness, the, yeah, and I really like that you said that, that sense that there's not a program or even so much occasionally feels like there's not a strategy, even they're just going where, Where it's available to them, where it's open to them, where the Holy Spirit is not allowing them to go, they go somewhere else.

[00:09:36] Even like verse three, they remained a long time, because there was work to do. There was, it was, there was, there was quite a few things and I'm, I'm struck by how often that happens. And again, I'm thinking of conversations that you and I've had offline in this, but how often this question of.

[00:09:53] the gospel working, about God working through us in ordinary spaces. You were talking recently about Moses and he, he has this encounter with God just out watching sheep Jacob sees a vision of angels ascending and descending because he was sleeping. And the text tells us he was, he laid down and went to sleep.

[00:10:14] Because it got dark, it's a, there's a very matter of fact, just sort of ordinariness to these things. And these ordinary moments and ordinary life aspects become places for, and I think maybe that's what's stirring me in verse seven and they were gospeling. Just, it was just ordinary for them, that's just what they did.

[00:10:33] Of course, of course they were gospelling. It's, it's Paul and Barnabas and you would expect to see them do that. Does that make sense?

[00:10:41] John: Oh, totally, totally. And again, I love that, and we've leaned, we've leaned into this before, where, where you've got that Jewish synagogue, they went as usual, uh, to the Jewish synagogue. So again, were that open to them? Now, without, without jumping too far ahead of maybe our, our next podcast, of course, but, but in Lystra, they, there is no synagogue, so they, they start somewhere else. So again, we'll discover that when we get to verses eight and nine and ten, that there isn't the Jewish synagogue option for them in Lystra. So, okay, well, let's go somewhere or let's do something that doesn't require the Jewish synagogue. But I, I love the fact they use what's available to them, or they use what is there, or they're not, they're not sort of stuck on one plan. Because there's a great debate, of course, in which you read the Book of Acts, does Paul and Barnabas, do they have a policy practice plan? Or are they sort of making this up as they go along? And I think it's a bit of both. I think that there's a sense in which they're doing stuff and learning as they go.

[00:11:52] And then they're leaning into some stuff. And I think when eventually we look at the second. It's a journey of Paul and Silas after this one. I think there are some patterns emerging where Paul has clearly learned some stuff from the first trip and he's leaning into that. But also it's this, they're also willing to be spontaneous.

[00:12:11] They're also willing to just respond. To the situation that they're in, and I do like that. I, I'm, I'm personally a very programmed person, so I like program. I like process. I'm very comfortable with all of that, but I also know I need to be much more open to the spontaneous, to the moments where what I want to do, I can't do.

[00:12:31] So in a moment like that, what should I do? And I think with Paul and Barnabas and the team, you see an ability to adjust ability to move with challenges. They get closed down in one place, so they go to the next place. If that place is a synagogue, they go there. If it doesn't have a synagogue, they go somewhere else.

[00:12:49] So there's just this idea of, okay, let's just find a way to get the gospel out to people, whatever that looks like, and not be trapped by one way of doing it. And I think that's a pretty impressive mentality to have. And it's one we're seeing developing throughout the book of Acts.

[00:13:05] David: It feels consistent with the sort of military stuff we see in... Joshua and Judges as well, that, that there's a, there's not and I'm thinking not about, I'm not trying to draw a parallel of what they're doing in Acts with wartime by any stretch of the imagination, but something I've often thought is interesting when you read Joshua and Judges is how they, they're not looking for a way to do things.

[00:13:32] There's a. There's an ear towards how the Lord is leading them. So they go into Jericho and, and they take a city that relatively rudimentary method of just walking around it becomes, but you don't see the people of Israel arriving at the next city and deciding, okay, well, let's just walk around this one as well.

[00:13:52] Right? And, and in fact, the only time. And correct me if I'm wrong here, because I'm thinking from memory here. It's actually when the behavior of, Oh, I know how to do this. And therefore I can just do is happens in Joshua and Judges, it's Samson, isn't it? Where, where he says, Oh, I, I, I'll just do what I've always done.

[00:14:15] And then there's that terrifying text, which says but he did not know the Lord had left him. Right. So, so I'm, I'm, I'm just sort of thinking out loud here, John, but there's almost, we almost see this principle in scripture, like resist boxing God into a strategy or a program or a, a marketable concept.

[00:14:35] This is, how to do this in, in one sense, we've seen it in the early days of the people of Israel. An ear towards the Lord, that in the current situation, in the place that you're in, God will guide you, sometimes very naturally and very ordinarily, to, to what needs to be done in that space.

[00:14:56] I mean, does that track? I mean, do you think that, do 

[00:14:59] John: Oh, for sure. No, I love that. I love, it's one of the glorious things about the Good News of the Kingdom of God is that, actually, without changing the core message, it can find itself contextualized in a way that makes it Attractive and accessible to people within their own context, and I think where sometimes we make the greatest mistakes, or maybe have made the greatest mistakes, and I wouldn't want to judge those who've gone before us or any other situation for that matter, but I think sometimes when we try to impose an idea or a regime that works in one context and we try to impose that onto another context hoping for the same results.

[00:15:49] I think that sometimes we can find that, that there is a pushback and it's not because of the gospel. It's maybe because of the way we are gospelling the gospel. So it's, it's that sense of, of adapting. So, so we've seen this in Jesus, Jesus in John chapter 3 sits with Nicodemus. And they go straight at it.

[00:16:12] I mean, they literally go into overdrive from the very opening conversation. We know you're a man sent from God, Nicodemus says, and then Jesus launches straight in. Nicodemus, you need to be born from above. If you're going to get the kingdom, you have to be... And it's, and it's like we're straight into a high powered theological conversation, which clearly gets under the skin of Nicodemus and maybe later on it tracks through the conversion and followership of Jesus.

[00:16:37] In the very next chapter we've got Jesus sitting in a well waiting for a woman and he opens a conversation about water. And it's a completely different approach. It's an absolutely profoundly different way to approach essentially the same conversation that, that, that by the end of the conversation, John, for this woman is born from above.

[00:16:57] She believes Jesus is the Messiah. And she becomes the first evangelist in Samaria in that context but the approach is absolutely profoundly different. So I think we're seeing these ideas all the time. And I think, I think what we've got to be careful of is because something works somewhere, it has to work everywhere in that way.

[00:17:19] Now, the gospel works everywhere. I believe the gospel works everywhere. So, so it can work anywhere it's given a chance. But of course, the, the, the genius of both working with the Holy Spirit, and we've been talking about the disrupting presence of the Spirit. Is that we're willing to listen to him. We're willing to adapt, not the message.

[00:17:39] The message is the message. Jesus is the Messiah. That's never going to change, but it's adapting the way we make the approach to the message and how we contextualize that message into the world in which we, we serve. And we're giving them the gospel a chance to be heard. So, so I, I, I think it's crucially important.

[00:17:58] I think if people, if people listen to the message of Jesus and reject it, that is one thing and I think that's that. But if people are rejecting the message of Jesus because we're not presenting it well,

[00:18:11] because we're not contextualizing it in a way that's accessible to them, I think that's another conversation.

[00:18:15] I think that's on us. The gospel's on Jesus. but the approach of the gospel is on us. And I think, I think that's what we're seeing constantly. There's this ability to adapt and change and mold and move according to the context. And sometimes the church does that really well, and sometimes they struggle.

[00:18:33] But I think that's an ongoing challenge for us all. Yes,

[00:18:38] David: an important conversation in this passage, because there is sometimes a sort of how do we call it, connection fallacy, where things go badly for the person intending to proclaim the gospel. And it's easy to then read a text like Acts 14, 1 7, and say, oh look, it was pretty difficult for Paul too.

[00:19:05] I'm doing the same as them, but there are ways to be bad at the gospel, and there are ways to do the gospel with selfish intent, and we've seen this in acts already. So we know these are ways. So there's often, it seems like there's almost a reflective question, which is, do I feel like I'm being persecuted?

[00:19:28] And there's a question that, Is perhaps a little tense, even for Christians in in the West at this particular moment, do I feel like I'm being persecuted and is the persecution because I'm announcing the gospel or is the persecution because I'm trying to make the gospel work well for me, and people don't like that.

[00:19:54] Like, it's stunning for me in this passage, what is the problem? And I would be tempted to say that the problem Paul and Barnabas are encountering Is, is one of inclusion. It's the loss of identity. Willie Jennings talks about, you've mentioned his, this phrase that we love, his disruptive presence.

[00:20:15] And he says one of the ways that you end up with a disruptive presence in, in acts is that Paul and Barnabas are announcing a cosmopolitanism. And he says this brings the bodies of Jews next to the bodies of Gentiles. Into intimate holy space where God is to be known and worshiped. And, but the problem is you've got a section of, of people who see the Gentiles, not as bodies in the image of God drawn here to worship, but see them as insurgents, see them as invaders, see them as not welcome.

[00:20:49] So, and I think this is, this is really apt for our moment. In the church that so often when the persecution that we seem like we're encountering is because we feel like we're losing our rights, you have to ask, where are you seeing yourself in the X 14 story? Right? Because because the reason Paul and Barnett's are.

[00:21:13] Encountering difficulty is their gospelling says Gentiles are welcome with us, and there's other Christians who are saying, and other people outside of the Christian community are saying, no, no, no, that can't work. So the why of the persecution is so important, isn't it? Persecution because you're.

[00:21:32] Trying to keep people away from Jesus. Persecution because you're putting yourself first and others second. There's a part of me, I mean John, is it uncaring for me to say, that's on you? And whereas what Paul and Barnabas are encountering, the radical nature of the gospel, which is saying we have got to find new ways to live because of Jesus.

[00:21:52] I think that persecution is probably To be expected, because the moment you try and draw people to Jesus and don't apply your demands to them, only let them encounter the demands of Jesus, that, that's a different whole thing, isn't it?

[00:22:11] John: is. And I think we see it in the passage. I think like the language is very

[00:22:17] David: Mm,

[00:22:18] John: It says, but the few, the Jews who refused to believe. So there, so clearly, if you look at verse one there at the synagogue, they spoke so effectively that a great number of both Jewish and Gentile people believed.

[00:22:34] So, so they've communicated, however Paul and Barnabas have communicated, if we're looking at previous patterns, Paul's used the scriptures. Paul has shown honor to Moses. He's shown honor to the prophets. He has ministered out of Tanakh. So he hasn't disrespected the Jewish heritage of this new way at all.

[00:22:56] In fact, he's used it. And as a result of that, then a huge number of beliefs. So then the persecution it's rising up here is. Is not about any method that Paul is using. This seems to be, at least in Iconium, it seems to be a definite issue around belief and truth on this group. And it's interesting.

[00:23:16] And I don't know if you noticed this, David, I thought this was fascinating because it's a sort of unique. type of phrase within the book of Acts. It says that the Jews who refused to believe stirred up the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers. That's fascinating. So it's one thing for you as a person to go, no, I don't believe that.

[00:23:37] It's another thing for you to then try and stop other people believing that who are not even part of your group. So it's fascinating that it's not even like. These people are stirring up opposition amongst Jews. They're stirring up opposition amongst Gentiles. So it's, it's almost that they're so passionately against the way that Paul is preaching and what Paul is saying that they don't even want the Gentiles to hear anything remotely connected to that.

[00:24:08] And there's a, there's a powerful stirring up against The truth here. So, and, and, and I think, I think that's really interesting in the way that's phrased in this passage.

[00:24:20] David: It, I mean, the phrase is, I mean the,

[00:24:26] John: Mm-Hmm.

[00:24:27] David: It's quite literally to, to turn against and they've, they've translated poisoned in a lot of texts, but the souls, the suka, the soul seems much deeper than just the mind. So it's not, it's not simply they've presented some good arguments and their, their minds have been adjusted. Luke seems to want us to see, like, this is deep. Deep, like the Sukkah. It's the self. It's them, right? They very identities have somehow been, this is like deep rooted sin when you start turning somebody's self changing who they are.

[00:25:06] But there's also irony in this that if you think about it. They have found unity with the Gentiles. Paul's come along and he's talking about unity and diversity, but here they found unity by saying, we will we will unite with these these Gentiles to turn against Paul and Barnabas. So I think there's some irony in that, but what I thought was interesting, John, building on what you're saying I was, I had this moment where I was trying to remember, what do you get stoned for?

[00:25:45] Right? So because stoning is stoning is one of these things because we see it in the text. Don't they? They put together a plot, you're going to stone them. And I think we have a tendency of thinking. As moderns reading texts like this. Oh, well, stoning is just a mob. Just get a mob. You grab some rocks. You start throwing at people.

[00:26:03] But if you're, if you're in a Torah observant, a Jewish law observant context, stoning is the, is the punishment for particular things, isn't it? It's not just any old thing. And so I was looking in the list is things like. Touching Mount Sinai an ox that gores someone to death, violating Sabbath, sacrificing your offspring to Molech being involved with necromancy or wizardry.

[00:26:29] But then here's where it gets really interesting. And there's rebelling against parents certain forms of, of sexual immorality or sexual violence. But then there's three that I thought are interesting. One is... Attempting to convert people to other faiths, cursing God, and engaging in idolatry. And those are the only three that I think you can see.

[00:26:53] Cause you see the question I was trying to ask is what do they think the crime is that Paul... And Barnabas are committing and quite clearly they don't think they're oxys. There's not sabbath violation. There's no malik offering. It's not sexual. So you're left with these three categories of converting people to other faiths, cursing God and engaging in idolatry, right?

[00:27:13] I, I think it's. It's evident that they're not cursing God, although you could argue that their language of Jesus sounds like they're pushing against God is one, right? With the early Christian forms of Trinity, the idolatry is potentially an interesting one, but this notion of converting people and I wonder if maybe they're all muddled up in there, but I'd be curious your thoughts as to whether You see that same resonance, these issues of converting people, cursing God, and idolatry seem to be behind why it's getting the strength of Of response and then the irony that they partner up with these Gentiles to stop them from listening to the gospel.

[00:27:59] I don't know if you see, I mean, that's what was in my sort of mind as you were saying the part that you were saying, I said, Oh, you can see how these things kind of joined together.

[00:28:07] John: That was great. I mean, I've never quite made that connection. So I thought that's fantastic. And in fact, again, without stealing our thunder in a future podcast, but when they eventually get to Lystra and Darby this group do catch up with Paul and actually do stone him. So, so there is a, there is a real passion to defend the law.

[00:28:30] Of course, we've had the echo of this with Stephen Stoned. Was that the sort of drive behind some of that as well? So, so again, you're seeing something of. And this is the challenge, something of a zealous religious defense of what is true in their eyes, or a defense of what they believe is the good news, defending that against this way, this cult.

[00:28:59] And of course, even, even stirring up other groups outside of the Jewish community to sort of back them up with that. So I love that link. Hadn't quite seen that before. And I think that's definitely worth leaning into in terms of why we see a common pattern of stoning when it comes to opposing the gospel in this way.

[00:29:19] And I think it's a great observation, David. Love that. Love that.

[00:29:23] David: And this, I mean, the whole. The irony of this, this passage is quite interesting where, where there's the, the, the language of division. It's the, it's the alternate image of what the gospel is aiming to do. The gospel is aiming to bring unity and diversity. And here you have. I mean, it feels to me when I read texts like this, it's like modern commentary.

[00:29:51] The residents of the city were divided, some sided with the Jews, some sided with the apostles. And then it becomes violent. I mean, we this we've seen this play out time and time and time again through history, right up to this week, this year. The last three years we saw, we saw it, we see it in violent conflicts.

[00:30:13] We saw it during COVID people so quickly, there's something in the human spirit that causes division. And the irony of it is once you've chosen your division, strange unity start to get formed, right? So, so here you have this strange unity of, of Jewish people who don't believe.

[00:30:37] Aligning with gentile people who don't believe against some Jewish people in some gentiles who do believe so the frame of what binds us together has all of a sudden shifted and you and I have talked about our, our upbringings. I grew up in aspects of a civil war. You. Grew up in, in, in, in Belfast.

[00:30:58] We've, I now live in Canada where there's challenges of, of, how people live together who are indigenous to Canada and settlers in Canada, we see it in race in the USA. We see it on, we saw it from, from that right through to Israel, Gaza, Ukraine, Russia, but then even right down to things like, do you wear a mask during COVID?

[00:31:18] Do you not wear a mask? And all of a sudden, people that wouldn't normally unite together are united together in these things. But then the gorgeousness of the gospel, which is actually coming into that place and saying, well, actually, God's vision is to unite all of us, not in monochrome ways. So it's no longer we're this club and you're in.

[00:31:39] But the unity and diversity of the gospel, isn't it? Where it's actually, no, the gospel is the thing that unites us together. Now, not our particular take on a thing or our ethnic identity or our view on some socio politically boundary lines, our take on a global pandemic, all these things get, get. given second protocol because the gospel is what unites us together.

[00:32:04] And in these, it's like a little visual image of this happening in these seven verses of Acts 14, isn't it?

[00:32:10] John: Yeah, so powerful. So powerful. And in fact, I was, I was, I was reading this just this morning in the context of my, my daily devotions in the book of Ephesians, and I, I love this sort of idea of the power of the gospel being chosen in him, having redemption in him. He's made the mystery of the gospel known to us.

[00:32:37] And then he says this, to bring all things in heaven and on earth under one head. even Christ. And I love that sort of beautiful picture towards the idea that actually the gospel in Christ is about unifying people under, under Christ. So, so the, the sort of diversity of humanity within that can, can can be fully experienced and expressed.

[00:33:05] And yet and yet come into this beautiful sense of, of unity. And, and I, I think, it's one of the things we've got to keep leaning into in the gospel is the courage to always point to the fact that Jesus is the unifying factor, that Jesus ultimately is a reason we are together. That's why the church can be a phenomenal example to a divided and broken world because we can illustrate a community that lives with the tension of diversity, but we are managing that diversity because we are unified in Christ.

[00:33:48] And if that becomes a real reality to us, then it is a genuinely unifying idea. It's not, it means that I can be really different from you. I, I can be, hold different views on lots of things and I can actually be, be coming to the journey of Jesus from a different perspective, but yet genuinely find some commonality with you simply because of Jesus.

[00:34:13] And I think, I think we don't, we don't celebrate that enough. We don't work hard enough at that. I think, I think often in local communities, we're really, if we're honest, we're trying to make everybody a bit samey. We're trying to make everybody look the same and be the same and respond the same and I understand that but, but actually what unifies us is not the color of our skin.

[00:34:35] It's not our socio economic standing. It's not our background. It's not our politics. What really, really unites us is we are in Christ and we've been brought under one head. And again, I think we're seeing sort of the passion of that in Paul, not only in his practice in Acts, but later on in the things that he writes.

[00:34:59] David: And I think I want to hold it there, John, with that thought that our tendency is to try to look samey. And I mean, I think that's so true that at some level, this is not pushback, by the way, just in case anyone thinks that's what I'm about to say, at some level, that's Paul's plan too. But the samey that he wants us all to look like is Jesus.

[00:35:25] And, 

[00:35:25] John: Absolutely. Yeah, 

[00:35:26] David: and. And our, what we tend to do is we try to look samey based on a particular attribute that we have generated and created and so, so there is no all groups end up looking samey and Paul, Paul just seems to think that what the gospel has revealed to us is the only safe way to look samey is if we're all trying to look like Jesus by looking samey.

[00:35:52] At Jesus, and that perhaps is maybe what it means by, and they, they were gospeling.