1:00

My guest today is Michael McPatten . He

1:02

is the author of Genesis to Revelation

1:05

Abraham's Promise Finding

1:07

Christ and Seeing God . Growing

1:09

up in Virginia , michael dreamt of one

1:11

day becoming a naval aviator . That

1:13

dream came true in 1981

1:16

. That dream led to another dream that saw him become an

1:18

airline pilot for both Northwest Airlines

1:20

and Delta , retiring

1:22

as international airline captain in 2017

1:24

. And retirement Michael gave you time to something he

1:27

loved only second to flying , which

1:29

is reading the Bible and studying mythology . Michael

1:32

published his first book in September Genesis

1:34

to Revelation . We're not reading

1:36

and writing . We enjoy spending time with his wife

1:38

, their children and their eight grandchildren . Welcome

1:41

Michael to the podcast . Welcome

1:45

Michael , how are you doing today ?

1:48

Keith , I'm doing great . How are you ?

1:49

I'm good Glad to have you on .

1:51

Great .

1:52

I'd love to get to know my guest a little bit better before we dig into some

1:54

very deep topics today . What's

1:56

the best piece of advice you've ever received

1:58

?

2:01

I thought about that question and I

2:04

think there's been a lot of good

2:06

advice , but each advice that we get is usually

2:08

for the stage of life we're in . I think the best piece

2:10

of advice I got was writing this

2:12

book from Revelation and it says

2:14

if you are destined to

2:16

go into captivity , into captivity

2:19

you will go If you are destined to die by

2:21

the sword . By the sword you will be killed

2:23

. This is the belief and

2:26

the endurance of the saints predestination

2:29

.

2:30

Okay .

2:31

Once I got my head around predestination and

2:34

accepted it , my life changed

2:36

dramatically for the better

2:38

.

2:39

Well , you picked an easy topic to get your mind wrapped

2:41

around predestination .

2:44

We didn't talk about that earlier .

2:46

No , we didn't talk about that . I'm

2:50

curious , michael . Everybody has people in their

2:52

life who have served to inspire

2:54

them or , in their journey , kind of be

2:56

an important part . Who are some people

2:58

, if you want to kind of give a shout out to , who have

3:00

been influential in your life ?

3:03

You know , it's kind of like the question about advice

3:05

that I've received Every

3:08

stage of my life . There's been somebody , somebody

3:11

who kind of took me from where I was and passed

3:13

me on to the next person . You know and

3:15

you don't even recognize that they're doing

3:17

it . It's not always mentors

3:20

. You know it can be your boss

3:22

, it can be coworkers . I've got great

3:24

advice from children before . So

3:26

all along , all throughout my life , I've

3:28

gotten all of these mentors

3:30

. You know , if I learn anything today

3:33

from you and I expect I will then

3:36

you're one of those people . You're the latest

3:38

in a long line of people Keith Does

3:40

that make sense to you ?

3:41

It does make sense . Yeah , I can think of a lot of people who

3:43

, at different points , just happen to show up

3:45

. They just the right time

3:47

with just the right influence

3:50

or impact on my life . I

3:52

remember when I was a young pastor and trying

3:54

to figure out how to lead , I ran across

3:56

John Maxwell and it's like , oh

3:58

, that's what leadership looks like . So you

4:01

know , it's always

4:03

cool .

4:04

You know , it's funny as we model ourselves

4:06

after our inspirations . And when I

4:08

was younger , I went into the military , I was in the Navy

4:11

, and so the people I looked up

4:13

to , the leaders that I looked up to

4:15

, the guys in my squadron , were who I wanted

4:17

to be like . They were all the

4:19

same , so I became

4:21

like them . I talked a certain way , my

4:23

mannerisms were a certain way . Now

4:26

, fast forward 30 years . I'm out of the

4:28

military , I'm doing my own thing and

4:30

I go to an air show and I meet a

4:32

couple of young officers flying

4:34

an airplane and I go up and I start talking to

4:36

them . Man , it was like being transported 30

4:38

years in the past . I swear I was like I

4:41

know these guys . They

4:43

haven't changed in 30 years .

4:46

That's so neat . So

4:49

you kind of gave us a little glimpse about you begin

4:51

your life in the military , so kind of give

4:53

us your personal journey and

4:56

tell us the lessons you learned along the way

4:58

.

4:59

Okay , I think the most unique thing

5:01

maybe about my personal

5:03

journey is I never went through the phase

5:06

where I was really angry

5:08

at God or didn't believe in God . I was raised

5:10

Roman Catholic , so right from the back we start

5:12

off there's a God and they're Satan and

5:14

you believe . But then when

5:16

I became a teenager , I remember meeting

5:18

a guy who was an atheist and he says I just don't believe

5:21

that there is a God . And I go that's interesting , oh God

5:23

, huh . And he goes what happens ?

5:24

then when you die .

5:25

And he goes well , nothing , you just go back to

5:27

nothing . So I played

5:30

with that . I wanted to kind of believe this new idea

5:32

. I thought , oh , this is kind of an interesting idea , I'll think about

5:34

it . I couldn't shake it . I mean , I always

5:36

knew there was a God . I

5:40

never it wasn't like

5:42

oh , god's with me and I'm having a wonderful

5:44

time . I still had a hard life like everybody

5:46

else , but I just I never felt

5:48

like there is no God or anything like that . I

5:50

think that's unique Because I think it's almost

5:53

part of the Christian journey to have this , you

5:55

know , this dark night of the Christian

5:57

soul they talk about , where you do feel abandoned

6:00

, you do feel alone . I have

6:02

felt like that in my life , but not

6:04

like the God had left me . It's

6:06

just just these feelings of aloneness

6:09

or solitude or whatever . But

6:11

I think that you know , as far as

6:13

my journey goes . It was pretty boring , to be perfectly

6:16

honest , until I started to write the book

6:18

. You know , I

6:20

just had issues with what was being taught

6:22

in the Christian church that I didn't feel was right

6:24

, that I could not find scriptural backing

6:27

for , and I started doing my own research

6:29

, which is , I know , terrifying to most pastors

6:31

. But hey

6:35

, the point is . The point is is I started

6:37

to do this research and I did discover things that

6:39

were anomalous in

6:42

the text , things that don't add up , things

6:44

that are contradictory , you know , and you'll

6:46

see those channels on YouTube . Oh , they love to point

6:48

out all the contradictions in the Bible , and most

6:50

of them are fake , but they always like to point out the contradictions

6:53

. Sure , there's contradictions , so what ? That doesn't

6:55

mean a thing . There's a million things that line

6:57

up in the Bible and you find a few that

6:59

were all okay , you know what ? That's not

7:01

evidence whatsoever , anyway . So I

7:04

started to write the book and I

7:06

started to understand that these myths

7:08

in the Old Testament were symbolic

7:11

myths written with two storylines the front

7:13

story of Joseph or Moses

7:15

and then the back story , which

7:17

tells the story of the human soul

7:19

. If we know what the story

7:21

is ahead of time , we can monitor

7:24

our progress . We can see where we are

7:26

on the path

7:28

towards our day of the Lord . Now , this

7:30

is something that isn't taught either . Hey , you're

7:32

going to have a day of the Lord , keith . You can't

7:34

get out of it . It's not optional , it's going to

7:36

happen to you . It might happen soon

7:38

, it might happen tomorrow , which

7:41

would be amazing . I would be very happy if I heard

7:43

about that , but without a doubt it

7:45

will happen . If not

7:47

while you're alive , it will happen as you die

7:49

. So that's part of our dying process . This

7:51

day of the Lord that Paul talks about . I'm

7:55

kind of going off track here , that's okay

7:57

. That's the question .

7:59

I think we need to probably help define

8:02

some things , because you use a term myth , and

8:05

for the Christian , especially

8:07

the Lutheran Christian which I

8:09

am , the antennas go off when

8:11

I hear the word myth . So

8:14

define

8:16

for us what you mean by the term myth

8:18

.

8:19

Okay . So it's interesting

8:21

because , yeah , when I say myth , the first thing

8:23

you think about is an untrue story . But

8:26

I tell you that Genesis one

8:28

, for example , is a myth . You

8:30

go , wait a minute . That's a story about

8:32

the creation of the universe . Yeah Well

8:36

, so the universe was created and as Christians we

8:39

believe God created the universe . That's

8:42

what Genesis one tells us , but it does

8:44

it in a mythical format . So

8:46

a myth is

9:43

any story real or

9:45

not real , fiction or

9:47

nonfiction that is told in

9:50

a mythical format . Mythical format

9:52

is writing a front story of

9:54

the myth with words like the story

9:56

of Adam and Eve , and then there's a backstory

9:59

to every myth . That's written in

10:01

symbolic language , and

10:03

typically the symbolic language has

10:05

something to do with our spiritual

10:08

journey . Whether the myth is a pagan myth

10:10

or whether it's a Jewish

10:12

myth or whether it's a Christian myth , all

10:15

these myths are written to teach us spiritual

10:17

lessons , and the spiritual lessons

10:19

are all taught in the symbolic language

10:22

buried within the myth . Okay

10:25

, so I was talking

10:27

to you earlier about the story of Abraham . Abraham

10:30

was a real character , but his story

10:32

is written as a mythical format

10:35

. So it's a

10:37

myth but it's true at the same time

10:39

.

10:41

And see we actually in our church . Buddy stopped

10:43

using the word story .

10:46

What are you ? You can't say myth , you can't

10:48

say story .

10:50

We use the term account because

10:52

we believe that we

10:54

believe that the words and the

10:57

parts of Genesis and the story of Abraham

10:59

are an account , a written

11:01

, accurate record of what

11:03

happened , and we don't use because that

11:05

storm , a storm idea to story

11:08

in our minds gives people the wrong

11:10

impression of confusion between

11:12

true and untrue . So we

11:14

stand on the fact that we believe the word

11:16

of God is true and an error and

11:19

everything is accurate as written

11:21

. Now we also believe that some

11:23

of the accounts have symbolism attached

11:25

to . So we kind of agree with you that there is symbolism . So

11:29

, like we talk about there are types and

11:32

different anti types of Christ

11:34

. Well , there are types in the Bible of Christ

11:36

. We see that Moses is a type

11:39

of Christ . He kind of mirrors who

11:41

Christ is going to be , even as talked about in the New Testament

11:43

, that when at the Transfiguration

11:45

, who's at the Transfiguration ? You have Moses

11:48

and Elijah , so you have we

11:50

see that as being the law

11:52

and the gospel coming together

11:54

at the Transfiguration

11:56

. So we kind of use that term account

11:59

versus story , because story is

12:01

what you tell your kids before they go to bed .

12:03

So you're right . You're

12:05

100% right , and that's not

12:07

the only word that I'm going to say wrong today . But

12:09

you're right the account is the best

12:12

way to describe

12:14

a story or an

12:17

account from the Bible because they are somebody's

12:20

written record of what happened

12:22

, and so I believe

12:24

all of it . Like I said , abraham

12:26

has to be a real character , he has to

12:28

have carried Genesis out of Sumer , or

12:30

none of my suppositions

12:32

at the beginning of the book really make any

12:35

sense .

12:35

Right .

12:37

Well , here's why . Let me let me explain something

12:39

real easy here . So

12:41

so I'm in the middle of Genesis one

12:44

, reading about the creation of the universe . I'm

12:46

going and I see there's poetry

12:48

. So each day is divided into two

12:50

parts . There's the part where God wills creation

12:53

, and then there's the part where God creates

12:55

creation , actually builds it . And

12:58

so I was going there's , what

13:00

is the name of God ? I'm looking at this

13:02

, thinking to myself .

13:03

What ?

13:03

did ? What did God tell Moses his name

13:05

was ? So I go back to Genesis or to Exodus

13:07

three to read that I go through

13:09

my chapter three in my book is

13:11

a long legal brief about

13:14

proving that the name of God is

13:16

an .

13:16

I am that I am .

13:17

That's ridiculous . The name of God is

13:19

I am and I become . That

13:22

is the name of our God . He is

13:24

a singular God and a plural

13:26

God mushed into one thing

13:28

I am and I become . So that's

13:30

what I deduce from chapter three

13:32

. When you go to Genesis , chapter one

13:34

, I am and I become is

13:36

is listed over 50 times

13:38

in that chapter in one way or another

13:41

. Here's one way when they

13:43

talk about God creating , they use the word

13:45

Elohim . That's the only term for

13:47

God that they use in chapter one . Elohim

13:50

is plural for God . Eloah

13:52

or L is singular , so

13:54

they use Elohim . So

13:57

if you read it in the English , it's actually in

13:59

the beginning the gods created

14:01

the universe , the heavens and earth . But

14:04

they also use a form

14:06

of the verb to create or raw

14:09

singularly . So

14:11

you have a singular God creating

14:13

a plural universe . So

14:17

it's plural Elohim creating

14:21

, singularly creating . So

14:23

that's that bad grammar .

14:25

No one ever answers it .

14:26

But I'm telling you that that's how they tell

14:29

you God's name with a plural

14:31

singular name . In Genesis

14:33

2 , his name changes to Yahweh

14:36

Elohim , singular

14:38

Yahweh , plural Elohim

14:41

. I am and I become Okay

14:43

. So this is what we

14:45

see in Genesis 1 . So

14:47

this is just a symbolism that they're using

14:49

to tell us what God's name

14:51

is . In the beginning they

14:53

tell us that it's supposed to say let there be

14:55

light . That's not right . When you

14:57

read that Hebrew text , what

14:59

it says is I am light , god

15:02

becomes the light and the

15:04

darkness . The darkness is

15:06

the physical world and the light is

15:09

God . That's all it is . This is God , but

15:12

the darkness is the physical world

15:14

. So in Genesis , chapter

15:16

1 , you have to read my book because

15:18

it really gets into it . We don't have time to go into

15:20

it now , but trust me , the

15:23

authors of Genesis describe the creation

15:25

of reality the same way quantum

15:28

physicists describe the creation of reality

15:30

today . 4,000

15:33

years ago they knew about quantum and

15:35

they knew how reality was created . They

15:37

called it God Particle

15:39

physicists . They're not quite sure what's going on

15:41

. They know what's going on through experimentation

15:44

, but they don't know that it's God that's doing this . The

15:46

Sumerians , abraham's

15:49

ancestors . They knew who was doing all this . They

15:52

said it was God .

15:53

Well , I'm glad you pointed out you know , some of the

15:55

things that always gave me pet peeves about

15:58

God's name and the Old Testament , because I

16:01

thought the Elohim part , of course , was

16:03

beautiful , because it does try to describe

16:05

the Trinitarian aspect of God , that

16:08

there's Father , son and Holy Spirit . But

16:10

we also in our church body and I'm sure you guys

16:12

talk about in the Catholic Church as well that God

16:14

, the Father , created the universe

16:17

. What's also interesting about

16:19

Genesis is there is also

16:21

the appearance of the spirit Ruach

16:24

, which hovers

16:26

over the earth . So the Holy Spirit is also there

16:29

at creation . So I think it's kind of neat

16:31

that at least those two presences are there

16:33

at creation . Now the Son is there

16:35

too , but you don't see his name show

16:38

it anywhere in Genesis . But you know there

16:40

are all three of the presences

16:42

, all three of the aspects

16:46

of God . God's divine

16:48

presence is all there . So I love that the

16:51

Ruach hovers over the

16:53

earth as it starts out in Genesis

16:55

.

16:57

Yeah , the actually

16:59

, when I was writing my

17:02

book , I was compelled to read Genesis

17:04

and I kept thinking . I remember reading

17:06

one time , a long time ago , that the two most important

17:08

books in the Bible were Genesis and Revelation

17:10

. I'm going well , I can't read either of them , so that's

17:13

not going to help me at all . I have

17:15

no idea . Genesis is what ? Are you

17:17

kidding me ? A guy and a woman , and they're hiding

17:19

in a tree and a talking snake and how do you

17:21

hide from God ? This doesn't make any sense at all

17:23

. Right , and I'm

17:26

looking at this stuff , and

17:28

when the first symbol

17:30

popped into my head , when I saw that this was

17:32

symbolic for something else , I

17:34

started going oh wait , wait , there is

17:36

something here , isn't there . You can't know

17:38

your Christian journey unless you know

17:40

where you came from . Genesis

17:42

tells us where we came from . It

17:44

tells us why we need a Messiah

17:47

. There's no reason . And so

17:49

you go to Genesis . You learn

17:51

about how the human machine works . Okay

17:53

, that's what Genesis 2 and 3 tells us . It tells

17:55

us how the machine actually works

17:57

, how we got messed up , and it kind of

18:00

tells us how to un-mess ourselves up . But

18:02

that's not its purpose , so it doesn't do a

18:04

good job of that . It just says here's why you're

18:06

messed up . Then you can't

18:08

really go through the Old Testament because it's

18:10

not going to help you . You have to go

18:13

then to the New Testament to

18:15

find out what the Messiah is saying

18:17

. Then , once you have Christ

18:19

in your life because Christ is the teacher

18:21

you can read all the spiritual texts in the world

18:24

you want . You don't have Christ in your heart to

18:26

teach you what they mean , right ? Then

18:28

what's the point ? So we get Christ

18:30

. Now we can go back to the Old Testament

18:33

and we read those stories and they're all telling

18:35

us the same story as the story of

18:37

the human soul . The story

18:40

of the human soul is best allegorized

18:44

that's what Paul likes to use . Allegorized

18:46

. It's great Anyway . So it means that you know the

18:48

symbolic story , the best symbolism , metaphor

18:51

for the journey of the human soul is in

18:53

the days of creation . In the

18:55

days of creation , god

18:57

creates the evening

18:59

, it says , you know , and he becomes

19:02

the evening and he becomes the morning

19:04

, but there's no darkness . So what

19:06

you're led to believe is that God is not part of

19:08

the darkness . God

19:11

isn't the darkness , but he creates

19:13

the darkness . He manifests the darkness

19:15

, but God is not the darkness , and that's

19:17

something that people have got to figure

19:20

out on the run . This world , you

19:22

know this material world God

19:24

creates , he manifests all God

19:26

, but God is not the material

19:28

world . The material world is an illusion in

19:31

our mind . It's an illusion , you

19:33

know . The physicists will tell you that , the

19:36

Bible tells you that . But you have to know it's an

19:38

illusion that God creates so that

19:40

we can have this experience of life . You

19:42

know that's what all this is

19:47

about , anyway . So the Genesis

19:50

account tells us where we

19:52

start , why we're here , what

19:54

went wrong . The Messiah then

19:57

tells us how to pray

19:59

and believe . So praying , if you

20:01

want to look at it this way , opens the light

20:03

up onto the path we're traveling and

20:06

believing which Jesus was adamant

20:09

that we needed to learn how to do pray

20:11

and believe , believing moves

20:13

us along the path closer

20:16

to our day of the Lord . That's

20:18

the purpose . That's what Jesus came here to teach

20:20

us was how to get to this

20:22

day of the Lord before

20:24

we die . You

20:27

look like you want to say something .

20:29

No , I have a lot in my mind here , I know

20:31

.

20:33

That's the problem in my book . It's so dense

20:35

. We could go anywhere with this thing

20:37

. We could .

20:39

Anyway , when you talk about the day of the Lord , I'm

20:41

going to jump back a little bit because that's always

20:43

fascinated me . Because there

20:46

is a day of the Lord mentioned in

20:49

the Old Testament and

20:51

it's misunderstood by

20:54

the Jewish people . They

20:57

saw the day of the Lord as

20:59

God's retribution on

21:01

Gentiles for all the things He'd done to them . And

21:06

I remember preaching recently on Amos and

21:10

in Amos the people going yeah , lord , bring

21:12

that day of the Lord to get those nasty Gentiles

21:14

. And he's like , no , really , the day of

21:16

the Lord is kind of your

21:18

reckoning for drifting

21:20

away from me , and

21:23

it was misunderstood by . It's

21:25

not the punishment

21:27

on the Jewish , on the Gentile people , but

21:30

it was this God kind

21:32

of bringing people back to Him again and

21:34

it was God's way of reminding

21:36

us , when we have drifted away , that

21:40

it's there reuniting with the

21:43

human and God again . And

21:46

so that was the essence . Do you

21:48

want to hear ?

21:49

my take on it . It's

21:52

a little different , but it's close . So

21:55

it's all symbolic to me . I

21:57

see everything as symbolism , so I'm not saying

21:59

I'm right , I'm just saying this is how I see it . And

22:03

so the day of the Lord is always portrayed

22:05

as the destruction of the physical world

22:07

. In the Old Testament , I think Tupeter

22:10

and Acts also talks

22:12

about a physical destruction of the earth

22:14

. Paul talks about the day of the Lord

22:16

as our receiving

22:18

Christ fully into our lives , becoming

22:21

full blown saints and fully

22:23

righteous before we die . That's

22:26

how Paul interpreted the day of the Lord . Now , what

22:28

was interesting is that what Paul

22:30

was preaching was that this day

22:32

of the Lord can . It's

22:35

not a fixed event in

22:37

time . The day of your death

22:39

is whatever day God has

22:41

selected that you will die . You're going to die

22:43

on that day , on the hour and the minute

22:45

. That's fixed . What is not fixed is

22:47

when you receive the Lord on your

22:49

day of the Lord , intrigued

22:51

.

22:52

I am intrigued , okay

22:55

.

22:56

So what we're doing is we're praying

22:58

to have Christ , to

23:00

have that day of the Lord event come

23:02

early . So the Greek word for this

23:04

is pro-el-piso . El-piso

23:08

is translated usually as believe

23:10

, it's not . These

23:12

are to hope . It's not hope

23:15

, it's expectation . So

23:17

when you put pro in front of El-piso

23:19

, you get early expectation

23:22

of Christ . That's

23:24

what all these people that Paul's writing to were expecting

23:26

.

23:26

This is the good news .

23:28

You didn't have to wait till you died . You

23:30

could have this happen in your lifetime

23:32

. So the way this works is have

23:35

you ever heard of the hero's journey ? No , I

23:37

haven't . It's

23:40

a secular

23:43

version of the Christian journey , because

23:45

the hero's journey is the journey of the human soul

23:47

from the point we're born until the time of

23:49

the day of the Lord . It's

23:52

all a myth . The ancient myths are about the human

23:54

soul , so all of them are

23:56

hero's journeys . Joseph is a hero's journey

23:58

, moses , ruth is a hero's

24:01

journey . They're all hero's journeys . Hero's journeys

24:03

basically start off with a call

24:05

to adventure and you cross the line

24:07

, the Red Sea , and you enter the wilderness

24:10

. And you travel through the wilderness defeating

24:12

the three major sins , which is lust of the

24:14

eye , lust of the flesh and pride of life . At

24:17

the end of it , you reject the

24:19

world and your ego and

24:21

self-awareness , human self-awareness . You reject

24:24

that for Christ . You take the leap

24:26

across the threshold and you become one

24:28

with Christ . That's your day of the Lord

24:30

. That happens at the end of the road of

24:32

trials and now you have to go home . So that's the

24:35

hero's journey . The point is , we're

24:37

all on a hero's journey . We're all

24:39

on it , and what the Christian message

24:41

is , as I understand it , is that

24:43

you're going to pass through anywhere

24:46

between five and 17

24:48

gates . These are trials

24:50

and tests in your life that you have to pass

24:53

through to become the man

24:55

of Christ that you want to be . We all want

24:57

to be right , but these trials that

24:59

we go through , all the hardships in

25:01

life , they're the ones that are creating

25:04

the man that will become that man

25:06

, because we have to burn these

25:08

things out through trials and

25:11

tribulations while we're going through

25:13

life . The little fights with your

25:15

wife , the different

25:17

frustrations and stuff . They're all

25:20

building us into better people , all these

25:22

little trials . So when

25:24

you pray and believe yourself

25:26

into Christ , this

25:29

is what you're supposed to be doing . You're

25:32

supposed to be a better man in Christ . You're squishing together

25:35

all of your gates , all the trials you're

25:37

supposed to go through to

25:39

get to the cross , to Christ . Right , when

25:42

you're squishing together what happens ? The cross

25:44

grows heavier . You

25:46

have to pass through every gate . Only now you're saying

25:48

well , I want to end a compressed format , god , so I can get

25:51

to this

25:53

day of the Lord earlier . Does this

25:55

sound familiar ? Like a Christian's life is difficult

25:57

when they choose the path of the cross

25:59

. That doesn't make any sense

26:01

. I just explained how it makes

26:04

sense . You're still going to go through all

26:06

the gates . You're not hopping

26:08

over anything . You go through all the gates

26:10

. You're just squishing them together through

26:12

prayer and believing to

26:14

get through the gates to the other side

26:16

, which is where you want to be , which is your day of

26:18

the Lord .

26:20

So a couple things . The wait

26:23

, no , You're great Keith .

26:28

I already liked you a lot , because you're just sitting there listening

26:30

to this going . Okay , I

26:33

can deal with this . You're great man , Go ahead .

26:36

No , I wanted to explain a little bit better . So the

26:38

way we interpret the day of the Lord in

26:40

my tribe is

26:43

that is the day of the Lord's judgment

26:45

on the final

26:47

judgment , and so when Israel

26:50

was , I think I probably didn't explain it as well as I could . The first

26:52

time , when

26:54

Israel is what wishing for that day

26:56

of the Lord for everybody else , they're ignoring

26:58

the fact that their day of the Lord comes

27:00

as well . It's for everybody

27:03

when Christ comes that second time . I

27:06

want to get into something else you said , because I

27:08

think the role of faith is important

27:10

in this discussion , because what you just

27:13

described , the gate thing defined

27:17

for us , when you talk about faith and

27:19

versus faithfulness , how

27:21

do you define that ?

27:24

Okay , so I have a whole chapter

27:26

on belief , believing and

27:28

faith . Faith is an English

27:30

word that didn't even enter the

27:32

language until about the 13th or 11th

27:35

or 13th century somewhere in there , right ? So

27:37

those words that we read in

27:40

the Greek , they only mean well

27:43

, they mean believing , belief

27:47

or to believe . So

27:50

these people who are being described

27:52

as the early Christians were called

27:54

believers because they believed

27:57

. And you've got to remember

27:59

now the Christianity was competing with

28:01

hundreds of religions at the time . You

28:03

know all the cults of Jupiter

28:06

and the cults of Artemis and Isis . You

28:08

know all these people worshipping these various gods

28:10

. So what made the Christians

28:12

one ? What made Christianity

28:14

so popular ? And

28:17

two , why did Christianity grow

28:20

so fast ? Why were they so excited ? What

28:22

was all this good news about ? That was making this

28:24

faith grow crazy , right ? So

28:26

when I see the word faith

28:28

, you can use the word faith if you want

28:30

, but what I say in the book is that you

28:32

have to understand faith only means belief

28:35

, it only means to believe

28:37

. That doesn't mean that I have trust

28:40

in this person or anything else

28:42

that they put to it , for

28:44

example , when Jesus is telling the story

28:46

about the talents , right ? So the master

28:48

goes away and the servants

28:51

are left behind and one of them doubles

28:53

five , and one of them doubles two , and one of them

28:55

buries his talent , right . And

28:57

so the master comes back and takes that one talent

28:59

away from the servant who didn't

29:02

do anything with the money , supposedly

29:04

. But the end of it is what's

29:06

interesting , what the master says

29:08

to each of the servants . He says

29:10

he says , you know , come my

29:13

good and believing servant

29:16

, not faithful , right

29:18

? So the point is

29:20

, is when we think of faithful , we oh , this is

29:22

my trustworthy , my man from Friday

29:24

, right , he's trustworthy and he's my

29:26

right hand man , as opposed to the

29:28

servant who believes .

29:36

So , looking

29:38

at the Greek word pistols for just faith

29:40

, as we just we're talking about , it has

29:43

multiple meanings and you're right , it could

29:45

mean believing . It

29:47

could also mean reliable , so

29:49

we could be saying here is my reliable

29:52

servant .

29:54

Well , so here's . Here's the problem

29:56

with that is that these terms were

29:59

added later , when , when

30:01

Paul was writing , when the gospel

30:03

authors are writing , when , when , when

30:06

John of Revelation was

30:08

writing , pistols only

30:10

meant believing . It was

30:12

. If the God

30:14

of the goddess

30:16

of persuasion was

30:18

, I think it was pistols

30:21

, but anyway it was named after her

30:23

. So the idea is to persuade someone

30:25

to believe something other than what

30:27

they might believe now . So

30:29

when they add all the terms

30:31

to it later , they change the meaning . So

30:34

what words ? With what ? Did they think

30:36

pistols . So when you look back at the ancient Greek

30:38

writing , pistols only meant to believe or

30:41

believe . So this

30:43

is a big thing in my book , like if you read the introduction

30:45

of my book , I say , look , they've changed a lot of these

30:47

words . We got to go back to the beginning . What

30:50

did they mean back then before

30:53

? It's been

30:55

2000 years . So they have changed

30:57

the meanings of a lot of these words . Right , when

30:59

Paul talks about faith , he's talking about your

31:02

personal ability to believe

31:04

, because Jesus said you

31:06

know God , it's your faith that

31:08

has healed you , your ability to believe

31:11

this reality . Because Jesus was telling

31:13

her he didn't heal the girl . Remember the girl with the bleeding

31:15

condition . He's saying

31:17

I didn't heal you . God

31:20

healed you through your own belief

31:23

. You did this lady ? You did this , and

31:25

so because of her ability to

31:28

believe in the new reality , right

31:30

? All it is is . That's

31:32

perfectly normal , by the way , that's just

31:35

a placebo effect . 30%

31:38

of the population has the ability

31:40

to believe something

31:44

that's different from reality . Through

31:46

the placebo effect , like when they do drug

31:48

trials , 30% of the

31:50

people will always be cured by the new drug , even

31:53

if it doesn't work right , because they'll

31:55

get cured by the sugar pill too , because

31:57

they just believe that's what

31:59

belief is . It's spiritual healing done

32:02

correctly . That's what I say

32:04

.

32:05

And we will disagree on that .

32:07

But really well , tell me , I'm interested in what

32:10

you think .

32:11

Because to me , if we say that she healed

32:14

herself , that minimizes

32:16

the God

32:19

portion of who Jesus was .

32:20

Oh no , what I said was

32:22

God healed her , but it was her

32:25

belief . Through her belief , god

32:27

does . All the healing Acts tells us that Jesus

32:29

didn't heal anyone . God healed people

32:31

through Jesus , right , uh-oh

32:34

that's

32:36

what Acts says that God ? Does all the healing

32:39

. That's OK , we don't have to agree

32:41

?

32:41

No , we don't . We were probably just

32:43

differing on that apart . That's OK .

32:46

I don't mind a bit .

32:47

No , it's fine , you know . And when I looked

32:49

up because I also wonder , I

32:51

looked up the word faith in the Hebrew and

32:54

it's a very different meaning in the Hebrew

32:56

than it is in the Greek , with

32:59

Greek the word for faith

33:02

amet . Amet actually means

33:05

trustworthiness , or to

33:07

prove something , to be firm . And

33:10

so I wonder how

33:12

much of sometimes , as

33:15

Jesus is speaking , sometimes in Aramaic

33:17

or in Hebrew , and the Greek

33:19

are translating it and

33:22

they use the word faith to translate

33:24

the word amet from the Hebrew . They

33:27

mean similar things . So if you go and

33:29

put those two together , it means to

33:31

have a firmness

33:33

, a trustworthiness , and you'll see that . Talk

33:35

about how God is trustworthy , god

33:37

is faithful , god

33:40

is steadfast .

33:43

And so that's another thing that they

33:45

what they'll do is they'll put

33:47

in like . So the term that they use

33:49

is pistos theos , which

33:51

is a believing God

33:53

, but they turn .

33:55

Oh , god is faithful wait a minute .

33:57

I get that . But you know

33:59

, the same God is trustworthy

34:02

, kind of says what we you know he

34:04

might not have been . You know

34:06

, that's the way I guess how I hear it , you know , says

34:08

like it

34:11

could be that way , or we would say it's

34:13

, it's not .

34:15

It's not something that God is trying to achieve

34:17

. Is this ? It's a status thing ? This is who God

34:20

is , is not God's . God's

34:22

at one time was and was not . This is

34:24

just a state of who God is . God

34:26

is trustworthy , not God

34:28

is Morphing

34:30

into trustworthiness . No

34:35

, that makes total sense . No , I , we're on the

34:38

same track , you and I just there's some things

34:40

that I've you like I said . I

34:42

like I said earlier .

34:43

I can't not believe what I believe . You

34:46

know , I went in there . I've got scripture

34:48

that backs everything up that I'm saying . So

34:50

it's like this is I would

34:52

. If someone has something better . I'm like I said

34:54

, I don't have a horse in this race I it doesn't

34:56

matter whether hell exists or not to

34:58

me because one . I Can't

35:01

be a better person that I'm trying to be right

35:03

now and I'm not that good . Be perfectly honest

35:05

, number one , I try , you

35:07

do too . We're all like this , right , we're trying , and

35:10

but but let's say there is no

35:12

hell , no one asked me no one . No

35:14

one asked for my vote on this , so

35:16

there is there is . If there's not , there's

35:18

not . I just telling you what I read at

35:20

sea and then and I'm asking

35:22

people , go read it yourself

35:25

. I don't believe me . Go read what I'm reading

35:27

and see . If you don't see the same thing , it's

35:29

uh , you know you're not gonna believe

35:31

anything that Christ doesn't allow you to believe

35:34

until the time is right .

35:35

Right that's why I see it , you know and

35:37

you know , I guess I would add this we , the

35:40

, the idea of we're all trying

35:42

to achieve the , the

35:44

person that God wants us to be . We

35:48

realize , as Lutherans

35:50

, that we're never going to achieve that , that

35:52

perfection , and that's why

35:54

we live under God's grace and

35:57

the , the part

35:59

about heaven and hell . We believe

36:01

, because that is that that comes down to again

36:03

today . Of the Lord , that is when , that

36:05

, when Christ comes back and God

36:08

says those who believed , those

36:10

who had faith , you ascend

36:12

to heaven . Those who reject it

36:14

Refuse to believe . You

36:17

have punishment , and so yeah . But

36:20

but going back to something that she said , I was wondering

36:22

I want to get back into . When you talk about

36:24

your atheist friend who did not believe in hell

36:26

, I find it interesting . Even

36:29

the people like the Egyptians believed

36:32

in afterlife and

36:34

and they spent their entire existence

36:36

with those who had money Preparing

36:38

for the world to come , because

36:40

they knew they would spend more time there than

36:43

they spent here . So , even atheist

36:45

, to me it takes more faith to be an atheist

36:47

. It doesn't be a Christian , because you have to . You

36:50

have to force yourself to believe that there is

36:52

no , there's , there's no divine .

36:54

You know 50,000 years

36:56

ago . Neanderthals , if you believe

36:58

, you know beyond six thousand , but but they

37:01

have evidence . The Neanderthals were

37:03

burying their dead in

37:05

preparation for an afterlife

37:07

.

37:08

These aren't even full humans . These are .

37:09

Neanderthals doing this Okay so

37:11

this is . This is widespread . We

37:14

all have this sense of something

37:16

beyond . So , basically

37:18

, um , if , if

37:20

I had , if I wanted

37:22

someone to take away something

37:25

from my book that Well

37:27

, I believe would really help them . One

37:30

is is the section on prayer

37:32

and believing that Jesus taught us to

37:35

the section that

37:37

Paul . What Paul tells us , he shows

37:39

us the various gates of the awakening

37:41

, like what this happens , you're here when you

37:43

, this happens , you're here , and then Finally

37:46

, right before the day of the Lord , there's this thing that Paul

37:48

calls the apostasy out and the apostasy

37:51

as the breaking away , where we start to see

37:53

ourselves as

37:55

being separate from the man of sin

37:57

, the , the sin and not my members

38:00

, as Paul called it right . We start to realize

38:02

that this ego , this

38:04

personality that exists within this man

38:06

is not me . It's program

38:09

code that lives in the head , but it's not me

38:11

, and you get this internal separation

38:13

. Then you get to a point where you

38:16

you the things that I want

38:18

to do , I do not do , and the things that I hate

38:21

. That is what I Do right so you're going

38:23

. No , I don't want to be like that anymore , I want

38:25

to be like this . But you're still doing it right , you're

38:28

still track and then , but slowly

38:30

, that becomes de-emphasized

38:32

. You become less and less of an

38:34

ego . Once that separation , you start

38:36

to see the difference , you know . You know I

38:38

delight in I , I am the man

38:41

internally that delights in God's law

38:43

, not the man of sin . That's

38:45

the sin of my members . It's not much I could do about

38:47

it . It's what Paul said . So

38:49

once we get to that point , then

38:51

things accelerate really quick . And

38:54

then they say Jesus said be alert . Be

38:56

alert , for even the Sun does not know

38:58

. Only God knows . The day Right

39:01

, and the day of the Lord is an

39:03

awakening process that you will go through

39:06

. Keith . You need to start praying and

39:08

believe in this . Okay , nothing else

39:10

matters pray and believe that the day

39:12

of the Lord , your day of the Lord , can become

39:15

sooner for you . I

39:19

.

39:22

Guess I'll just add this one thing that reminds

39:24

me kind of what you were talking about with Paul , and they're good that

39:26

I would do . Luther

39:28

, one of our great theologians , would say we

39:31

die daily to sin . You know

39:33

, it's like he says . It talks about the new man

39:35

and how the new man has

39:38

had to learn to swim . Well , because every day we sin

39:40

, and so you know , we're drowned

39:42

every day to sin , but he's learned to swim .

39:44

Yes , yeah , we see Paul . Paul talks

39:46

about the new man , and that's what every day

39:49

, every day , we wake up and

39:51

we believe ourselves to be slightly

39:54

better than we were the day before , slightly

39:56

closer to Christ . Yes , we're dying

39:58

to that physical sin of ours . This , the

40:00

sin is the ego , the sin is

40:02

the physicality that we take

40:05

on when we enter the man as human self-awareness

40:07

and become this guy . Right

40:09

? So , as we pull ourselves

40:11

out of human self-awareness to enter

40:13

into the awareness and consciousness of God

40:15

, that man

40:17

so goes about his business . But it ain't

40:19

you anymore , right ? You don't identify

40:22

as that man anymore , right you ? Just you

40:24

observe God's creation from a backseat . You

40:26

go us a lot better . My thought

40:28

it be .

40:31

I don't know , that's true , I'm just making that that's

40:34

good . So

40:36

I love to ask my guest this question Michael , um

40:38

, what do you want your legacy to be ?

40:40

Oh , that's

40:43

easy . My book , you know I I

40:45

started this book and I it was a hobby

40:48

. I'm not a writer , I don't see myself as an author

40:50

, but I Put

40:52

everything into this book . Everything that I

40:54

that I found in the , the Bible that

40:56

I felt was true , I put in this book . And

40:59

this is the book that I want my grandchildren to start

41:02

their lives with to go out into the world . So you

41:04

learn this book . Life's gonna be a breeze

41:06

. You'll understand Everything

41:09

that's going on in your life . That's

41:11

my legacy , I hope oh cool , so

41:14

working .

41:14

Let's just find your book and we're gonna find you on social

41:16

media .

41:17

Okay , I have a website it's wwwmichael-mickpaddencom

41:23

, and

41:25

then that has links to the book and some of the

41:27

reviews and whatnot . I have a Twitter account

41:29

that's Genesis to Rev Um

41:32

, and then the book is on Amazon

41:35

. If you look up Genesis to Revelation

41:37

by author Michael Mcpadden , it should

41:39

come right up and it's got a

41:41

Kindle version , paperback and up and

41:43

hardback .

41:45

Cool . Well to Irish goose

41:47

got goose . Talking about the Bible

41:49

is always kind of cool , the

41:53

old Hanes . Thank you for joining the podcast

41:55

, michael , and and blessings on

41:57

your continued journey . May

42:00

God continue to bless you and

42:02

the journey of faith

42:04

that you're walking on .

42:06

Thank you so much , keith , and the same with you . God

42:08

bless you and your endeavors , and we're

42:11

all learning right . Let's hope that we continue to

42:13

learn and open our minds to God's .

42:15

Yes , we're all learning . Thank you for being

42:17

on , michael .

42:19

All right , thank you , keith you .