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Podcast 25 - Oh man, again?
42 Plays9 days ago
Come join ua as we discuss some recent events in the news.
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Transcript
Introduction: Chaos in the Middle East
00:00:09
Speaker
Hey, welcome back to Field Podcast. Excited to have the opportunity to be back with you again today. You know, every week we we kind of get our heads together about 10 minutes before we come on the air and try to figure out how we want to go about whatever conversation we're having today. you the most real realistic...
00:00:26
Speaker
reaction out of our heads the response it needs to be real so no preparation you know when we put this together we decided we wanted to be kind of like you were sitting in the living room with us just having a chat and so we're about to shift subjects on you right here we go uh unless you've had your head buried in the sand dare i say the middle eastern sand uh you uh you know that there is war again in the middle east um this time initiated by the united states and israel depending on your perspective some say but i might say initiated by Iran and choices they have made not just recently but over the years um and it has turned into as as it always is just major chaos over there and continues to grow every single day so I thought we'd start with what happens naturally anytime a war breaks out back when Ukraine and Russia started four years ago you believe it's been four years since that war started um
00:01:21
Speaker
People immediately turn their hearts to Matthew 24.
Prophetic Questions: Are We in the End Times?
00:01:24
Speaker
So one of you, I think, Scott, that's going read that for us a little bit. Yeah, Matthew 24, verse 6 through 8. It says, "...you will hear wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come.
00:01:38
Speaker
Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of the birth pains." So naturally, people's hearts turn to that, especially it seems like the Middle East, because it is, of course, the place of the Holy Land. People begin to start talking about, is this the one? Is this the time? So let's let's just get right to that question right off the bat.
00:02:03
Speaker
No, this is not the end of the world. How do we know that?
00:02:09
Speaker
What are we waiting on? What is the significant... figure for us that we wait on. Other prophecies to take place Other prophecies that have to be fulfilled. Primarily that the whole gospel will be shared throughout the world before all that happens. um So if you're worried about that, then don't tell your friends about Jesus. I mean, that's, you know, I don't know. yeah ah But if you're one of those who's like, man, we really we really long for the day that Jesus comes, then the primary determining factor is that we are sharing the gospel end of earth to the end of the earth. Right.
US-Iran Historical Tensions
00:02:39
Speaker
ah What's happened in recent days is not new. The United States and Iran have always had problems with each other going back to the 70s when the Ayatollah came into power, I think, then. Jimmy Carter dealt with it. Every president since then has dealt with it. Most recently, what happened is Trump has has been sending people over there to do negotiations with the current Ayatollah regarding nuclear development. But more importantly, I think, it just my estimation, not so much the threat of nuclear war as much as all of the sponsorship of terrorism that they are involved in. Mm-hmm.
00:03:14
Speaker
um it's a it's a man It's a tricky thing over there. It's it's almost like trying to, you know how when you used to build dominoes and try to make the dominoes fall and you accidentally would bump your finger one way and the whole thing would collapse before you're ready? That's what the Middle East feels like to me on a constant basis because As the United States was developing and building up its forces over there, kind of as a show of force against Iran, I don't think anybody predicted, maybe somebody did, made people smarter than me, nobody predicted we'd be seeing missiles dropped on allies of Iran right as they're going after it. um
00:03:50
Speaker
So you both have families. I don't know if your kids are engaged in this kind of stuff, if they know about these kinds of things. Do those things bring questions for your kids? Do they? do they Does it make them nervous, make them scared? Yeah, for sure. There's always the unknown of things. And I think you would say, i could think you could put most adults in that same area as as a child. um What I like about this verse is you're not to be alarmed. And so these things are happening, but as followers of Christ, this is just another area to put our trust in Him and what's going on. ah But yeah, there's always a conversation around the house and ah maybe I don't know everything, right? And I can't speak to everything, but I do give them the gist of of what's happening. Yeah. um How about you? Circles you run in and do what what are people talking about? What are they saying?
Public Reactions to Middle East Conflicts
00:04:38
Speaker
I think it varies. I have some people that literally know nothing about it. I'll be honest, I was one of them. yeah As I walked through the weekend and you know things started happening on Friday and Saturday, ah I talked to my dad Saturday night late and He said, hey, you know, you're talking about this, and I have no idea what's going on other than the fact that I know that there's bombing going on. right To me, it you go back, it's almost as if it happens every quarter century, you know even every decade, that there's some bit of angst between one nation to another. and In my circles that I'm going in, even in the young adults where I help lead consistently,
00:05:19
Speaker
I think they understand that that's a normal way of life. They, some of them grew up and, you know, we were still in the Middle East. We were still in Afghanistan. We were still in Iraq. Uh, but a whole lot of concern, maybe not so much. Uh, and from my point of view, i look at it as same old, same old for the Middle East, the hotbed for yeah craziness, uh, radical lives there and it breathes there. Yeah.
00:05:44
Speaker
what's ah What's crazy is air everybody always likes to put their spin on it, right? Depending on where you get your information. And so yeah this could be pro-Trump thing. This could be a negative Trump thing, just like Obama and Biden, right? yeah um As soon as they make a step, it could either be pushed as good or bad for either party. um And then depending on what it is, right now we're talking about nuclear, discussion of nuclear weapons, or in the past it's been land, who has the land. But it all
Spiritual and Media Perspectives
00:06:11
Speaker
comes back to this, it being a, a really a spiritual battle. um It's the nation of Israel, a God's chosen people, and just the ah and the uproar that ah that has always caused.
00:06:22
Speaker
Yeah. ah Let's be honest. Jesus nailed it with his prophecy. Two thousand years. I don't know very many years in human history since Jesus said that, that there haven't been wars going Correct. yeah Sometimes more local or regional tribal kind of things. Obviously, we've had World War I, World War II. We've had Korean and Vietnam Wars that were bigger things.
00:06:42
Speaker
Those really tight tend to to catch people's attention. I think any time the United States, the big boys on the block are involved in something like that, it gets people's attention. Maybe gets them a little more alarmed, but what what a lot of people don't know is that while this has been going on between Israel, the U.S., and Iran...
00:06:58
Speaker
Pakistan and Afghanistan have been fighting for a couple of weeks now. yeah And to me, that's a more alarming war that nobody's paying attention to but because baak Pakistan, that's a, Pakistan, Pakistan actually has nuclear weapons. And also is not that big of a friend with their...
00:07:16
Speaker
Indian neighbors over there. So you know things like the spillover, cross borders, and stuff like that. So to me, one of the reassuring things is you know Jesus knew 2,000 years ago it would be like this. He predicted it He called it. Which is just further assurance. He's got this whole thing under his command. yeah right he's He's got it all under... his control.
War Narratives and Economic Concerns
00:07:36
Speaker
The sad thing in all of this is the one that most people are not talking about is the innocent civilians that are caught up in government, right vying for attention, vying for resources, vying for power and those kinds of things. um
00:07:50
Speaker
already coming out of the out of Iran are reports of the U.S. s bombing a school and killing civilians and those kinds of things and then people from the other side saying it wasn't an American missile it was an Iranian missile that did it you just you don't really don't know how to believe you're grasping at straws trying to figure out okay where's the real information the true information one thing we know to be true Inflation's getting worse. Mm-hmm. You know? Mm-hmm. I don't know about... If y'all paid attention, gas prices went up 20... Like 20 cents in about three hours yesterday. Mm-hmm.
00:08:23
Speaker
Iran because of its control of the Gulf of Hormuz, no, Strait of Hormuz over there, limiting a lot of the oil and that kind of stuff. um Air travel has been impacted. um Places not in Iran, places like Jordan and Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, all those places kind of on a tight lockdown because of things that are going on there. So wars are wars. They are what wars do. um How do you give hope and peace to people in times like this?
00:08:55
Speaker
ah Sunday school answer? or Yeah, give us give us the Jesus answer. Jesus. There you go. um Like I said, it comes down to a lot of unknowns. And like you were saying, it's hard to know where to get your information from because everybody has an agenda with the information they have. And so we have to go back to what we know to be true. And that's this saying that there's going to be hard times, there's going to be wars, there's going to be rumors of wars, and that our hope is in Jesus Christ. And so regardless of what's going on, and ah you kind of hit it real um briefly, ah there's innocent casualties on on both sides of this. I don't care if you're
00:09:33
Speaker
which side you're rooting for, people are dying, right? And so with that, ah we have to provide the hope that people need, and that's the
Christian Duty in Modern Warfare
00:09:42
Speaker
name of Jesus Christ. Yeah. War really does reveal the depths of our broken humanity, doesn't it? true um that just the The idea that a person can look at another human being and pull a trigger. yeah Self-defense is one thing, but but literally going after somebody because of the color of their skin or the their choice of religion, those kinds of things... I think what's happened is it's become too easy nowadays, though, because it's become depersonalized. Yeah, but I think you're so right, Ridley. To your point of ah behind the news story, behind the trigger, behind even the the ship that sits in the middle of the ocean and is, you know, hundreds, if not, you know, thousand miles away.
00:10:27
Speaker
to me, we have to look. And that's where the hope is. Whenever we can look past the trigger, whenever we can look past those things and start to see there's humanity there. um And even though we have some of those that are righteous actions that are done, we have to look at the humanity in every decision. And and I pray for our you know leaders that are making decisions in the Pentagon as they go and I think righteously make some of those hard decisions. But also as they intersect with normal civilian life in the Middle East and they're saying, okay, is this a target or is this, you know, we have to look first and ask the question, is this a righteous action? You know, is there, what what are we doing? What are we pursuing? And I wouldn't want the decision, you know, but yeah, I think there is hope whenever people see humanity. And so I think some of us do, and I think we do a really good job of that. And I pray for the ones that
00:11:23
Speaker
have the task of going to war and strapping up and guarding up and having to make that determination sometimes on a second basis. I thought you were getting ready to say something. Was I?
00:11:36
Speaker
don't know. could say something. um So it's ah it's a constant reminder to us as Christians that we are called by Scripture to be God's people who seek peace, who try to seek...
Prayer, Evangelism, and Leadership Wisdom
00:11:49
Speaker
um helpful resolutions when conflict occurs. We are to be a people who are consistently, and and this is an area where I fall down, and an area of my prayer life that is weak, is praying consistently for the nations.
00:12:06
Speaker
Yesterday, somebody from the Defense Department, I guess it's called the War Department now in the United States, made a comment that we had sunk 11 naval vessels already for the Iranian Navy Which, you know the Patriot side of you goes, out of boy, guys. we you know wait did We take them down. But I'm thinking they weren't naval vessels. They were boats full of people. yeah and A lot of people die without Jesus in a matter of a couple of days. And every time a bomb is dropped, somebody else dies without Jesus because this is a nation full of people who don't believe in Jesus. Yeah.
00:12:37
Speaker
so you're flipping at something over here you yeah i was just looking for ah psalm 20 122 verse 6 says pray for the peace of jerusalem may those you who love you be secure um just back to your point of just constantly praying for the nations our nations and then us as individuals too because we like to look at the big thing and say look at these two countries fighting but we can drive down the road and get road rage and you know I think there's two varying sides of war too, as we look at the side that you just mentioned. And sometimes I kind of find myself in that camp. We also, i mentioned righteous action in war. Sometimes the trigger's okay. Like yeah sure we have to realize that too, and and as much as we care about life and sanctity of life,
00:13:21
Speaker
that when people are continuing to be a part of a regime or an oversight of a country where I'll have you know, in Iran, i think it was 81% mark that yeah was not on the side of the government. and It was very much so against. yeah So that man, God providing a way for them to be taken out. As as sad as that is. Well, and to give you clarity on that, if you have a murderer, it's not loving to set that guy free.
00:13:49
Speaker
Right. Because then there's risk to other people. Right. And so the same thing. You have a regime, you have a terrorist organization, whatever it may be, that's on a rampage. It's not loving to let them continue to take innocent lives. Right. and So ah war is necessary at some points. Yeah.
00:14:03
Speaker
So if you're like me, i sit and I watch the news or read something on ah an email or whatever, a news app, and you kind of get this helpless feeling.
00:14:13
Speaker
Because as a follower of Jesus Christ, you're never desiring that someone right die without Him. At the same time, as an American, maybe you have mixed feelings about this. There are some who are very much behind Trump who go, Man, attaboy, way to put an end to, or at least damage to the terrorist movements over there. Way to protect our our interests there, even our allies in that part of the world. That all seems really, really good. If you're on the other side of the fence, you're going, you pulled us into another war when you promised that was not going to be part of our agenda. And it just seems like there's really no solid good answers so to any of this. So you kind of, it's almost like you become numb. How do I respond? What do I do as a believer? So I want to throw four practical ways out there for us as Christians to encourage, and let's just chat
Practical Christian Engagement in Conflicts
00:15:02
Speaker
with them a little bit. Maybe it'll encourage somebody's heart out there who kind of feels that same feeling as me. Number one, always the first answer, prayer.
00:15:09
Speaker
Does prayer really matter? Absolutely. I mean, it just yeah instructed us to do so. I heard a good quote, and I mentioned it last night in a conversation from John Piper. um Prayer should not be our butler service.
00:15:23
Speaker
It should be the walkie-talkie where we're in there when we're in the middle of war. It's constant communication. Yeah, yeah. And there's lots to pray for. I mean, obviously we're praying for peace, that there would be some kind of resolution that that delegates from the countries can get together and bring an end to this. Protection of innocent people. um I mean, you you see images from over there, the beautiful, beautiful children they that are in the midst of this and obviously have nothing nothing to gain, or everything to lose from this.
00:15:52
Speaker
ah Wisdom of leaders, which in Iran's case is really, really, I mean, not to be silly about this, but it's going really, really hard because many of their leaders have been wiped out by this. Right. And so there's this huge void that's been created there. But somebody, hopefully God can raise up somebody in the leadership that has the wisdom on how to balance their beliefs with living and peaceably in a world that desperately needs that. And of course, one of the things that maybe we don't think about as much is the power of the gospel witness in the midst of all this.
00:16:23
Speaker
One of the things that people don't know is that Iran has one of the fastest growing churches in the world, Christian churches, primarily because of the persecution. We all know that the church thrives into that. um So prayer, I mean, obviously prayer works. It's effective. Sometimes we can become a little numb to its power and its effectiveness, but it's there. Awareness and education, staying informed on the facts. yes um How do you do that in a world where, depending on what channel you're listening to, the news is good or bad or whatever? ah It's incredibly hard. yeah yeah It's incredibly hard because ah even the news outlets, you think, oh, they must be neutral. There's still an agenda from someone. There's a financial agenda. yeah And so it's really ah tough. I tend to look to you, honestly.
00:17:11
Speaker
Yep. A lot of pressure. Howdy, baby. Way to go. This is Ridley Barron reporting. And then just to know that if one side is saying this and the other side is saying this, there's probably some factual stuff somewhere in the middle rather than the the the extreme sides. And so just kind of taking taking everything in and ah keeping your nose in Scripture to know what truth actually is and navigating it that way. I think sometimes, too, whenever you look at the...
00:17:38
Speaker
major players in the the network scheme that we see in America, you can see where their bent is and their desire to publicize news. So sometimes you can kind of do process of elimination based on where their ties are, where their ideology is. But another thing that I go to is I know some people aren't on it I'm not encouraging you to get on it, but, uh, I have been on here, Twitter X for a while. And sometimes you see more from the independent journalist or the independent crowd, but,
00:18:14
Speaker
I definitely would avoid the mainstream media nowadays. What I do is that sometimes I'll take those pieces from all these little portions and I'll create a little bit of ah um an end result in my own mind. And I don't hold too tightly to it either. Right. There's a lot of wisdom in that. I think you have talked about this before. There's about four or five news sources that I follow and one of them is purposely left of center. um i don't I don't ever follow the mainstream media. They're trying to sell and make money. But left of center gives me the perspective of somebody who's not solely aligned with where I am and who I am. I don't go far right either. i
00:18:55
Speaker
I know what they're up to. I know what their agendas are. And taking bits and pieces of all of it and trying to find where that truth actually lies, as as Kyle said a minute ago most of the time it's somewhere in the middle between those extremes that are being thrown out there. This is a complex situation. I mean, yeah universities have whole departments based on studying this stuff and trying to bring resolution to this stuff. History has been written about it. Wars have been fought. Millions of men have died determining the future of this area. And the Bible says it won't be determined until the very end when Jesus puts an end to it all. So don't get buried by it. Don't get overwhelmed by it. Just just stay informed. Find somebody you trust who can help you with that. ah Compassion and giving is an important thing here.
Supporting War-Affected Communities
00:19:40
Speaker
How do you lovingly do your part to support when you're 2,000, 3,000, 4,000 miles away from, don't know how far that is. My geography is not that great.
00:19:49
Speaker
but why it I think it's longer than that. I think it is much further than that. so um what do What do you do? how can you What are some play ways that you can actively, lovingly support the people of Iran or you know families in Saudi Arabia right now? I think we live in a ah very, ah I would say close to an urban center in Nashville. Yeah.
00:20:10
Speaker
There are people that are probably sitting in Nashville now that have family back in Iran, back in the Middle East. now And I think ah I've just gotten done having conversations over the last couple of months with how do we engage those that are of a different faith, an Islamic faith, obviously a faith that is errant. There's error to it. How do we as Christian, as believers, ah come alongside them? And I think it's, first of all, understanding
00:20:40
Speaker
who they are and how we can love them and how we can walk alongside them as, first of all, they're just missing family. They're without family. So I think it's looking at that compassion with who are they first. And then secondly, how can I practically love them? You know, Christ, as we look to the New Testament, he practically loved on people. He fed them. He yeah cured them of their ailments. And not saying that we're going out throwing miracles, but you can always extend a hand. You can give food. You can do those things yeah to understand and get a little bit better perspective of where they're at.
00:21:16
Speaker
Yeah. I haven't heard anything come through emails or anything, but typically the Tennessee Baptist has a resource where you can donate or give financially, or sometimes they even do supplies and make shipments over to war areas. ah So that's like a practical, physical way that you can do it. But also see, number one, pray for them. and There's no greater way to share your compassion with someone than to actually pray for those people on the ground by receiving the brunt of this. most ah To your point, most of your denominational agencies here in the United States have some kind of connection to relief agencies that are over there. Do not do not just grab something out of thin air. There's a lot of scam artists out there that will abuse it. There's also a lot of quote-unquote legitimate organizations that will take your dollar and about 10 cents of it will make it there. The yeah rest of goes to administrative costs. Don't do that. Yeah.
00:22:05
Speaker
Go to your local church, get your staff to help you look for answers. Go to Franklin Graham, organizations like that that are already involved nationwide, worldwide, and and are and going there. Those are the places, the best way you can help those families that have been affected in the region. Lastly, and this one may be most eternally important, and that is um the evangelism and hope that comes from supporting through prayer the work of Christians who are already on the ground in those areas.
Hope, Evangelism, and Spiritual Narratives
00:22:35
Speaker
In times of fear and stability instability, our message has got to stay the same. that Our hope isn't in who's going to bring the biggest missiles, not whose army is going to be the biggest. Our hope is found in Jesus Christ, who is the reigning King of kings, who is undefeated in every battle he's ever fought. who will once again come to restore order to the world. And at the end of the day, let's be reminded, as as bad as the secular side of it is from our country, this is involves one of the largest, fastest growing religions in the world, which is total heresy. it It's false.
00:23:09
Speaker
ah So maybe, in keeping with Romans 8, 28, that God works all things together for His good, maybe this is a door that's been cracked open by somebody's evil intent that might give an opening for Christians to be outspoken and have some freedoms there that they haven't had in decades. Yeah. It also provides opportunities here. um Obviously, there's questions going on. And so if you have someone who's asking you questions about these types of things, you now have the ball in your court to share the hope of Jesus that we're talking about.
00:23:37
Speaker
um So in your workplace, your family, cousin, whoever it may be, and this is a conversation starter for bringing in Jesus. I think when crisis hits, too, to your point, they're looking for a leader. yeah And what they had as a physical leader, they may see as a need man.
00:23:56
Speaker
God, you know, the true one, true God of the Bible, ah that he would get a hold of their hearts yeah and that we would also pray for another way. This evangelizing that you're talking about, ah there are missionaries that are serving the underground church i was made aware of that afghanistan 2001 9 11 hit ah i heard a story of ah a good friend that's friends of a missionary that was over there and what a an opportunity he had whenever tragedy and their culture hit you know obviously it was over here but over there
00:24:32
Speaker
they knew that the U.S. was coming. So whenever all this turmoil hit their homeland, they had to turn somewhere. And so ah maybe this is an opportunity, to your point, that missionaries can be presenting the gospel in such a tangible way that god God's going to do something. And that's a great point. We've talked already about praying for the the innocent people over there who are being harmed by this, the ones who have, they really don't have a dog in the fight. They're being caught in the crossfire. But add to that the lives of missionaries all over in the Middle East who now may or may not be placed in danger, may or may not be given a bigger platform as they minister to the needs of people. Pray for our military as they are serving over there. We have lots of people in our church who are former military, corsairs,
00:25:18
Speaker
hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of families. In fact, some of our guys are are on standby for call-up, those kinds of things. So be praying for those families. Be praying for humanity. The Word just reminds us constantly how bad and broken we are. but At the same time, and it reminds us of how desperately we need the hope of Jesus Christ.
Conclusion: Staying Hopeful and Engaged
00:25:37
Speaker
And God cares about the Iranian people just like He cares for us. that's right So it's a call for us as Christians to be very active in our prayer lives. I hope this has kind of been helpful for you. um We're not students of the Middle East, but we are students of God's Word. right So I hope that it's helped to encourage your heart, maybe give you a little bit of light in the middle of all this confusion. We'll be back next week.
00:25:59
Speaker
Wish I could tell you what we're going to talk about. but We don't even know. But we would love to have you come back and join us. to Have a lot of fun doing this. Click, like, and share, and we will see you back here next week. Bye.