Chris goes to Disney while Laura and Davis spend money on things they already have, and they discuss destruction in the prophets, David’s double-sided cave prayer, the power of love, and how theology works within history

Red Tree Readings: Micah 5:10-13; Psalm 142; Ephesians 3:14-21

This week’s “BUT WHAT ABOUT” Passage: Genesis 21:8-21 (Hagar Sent Away)

You can learn more about Red Tree at redtreegrace.com

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

The post Episode 28 – Hewey Lewis & the (Good) News appeared first on Red Tree.

This predisposition to believe that we bring artistry, knowledge, or any unique addition to the works of God in our lives is something that we see time and time again throughout the biblical story. It’s been a problem since the garden, and one that will remain with humanity until we and our earth (and along with it, our creativity and imagination) are fully redeemed when Christ returns. Regardless of how majestic and beautiful our works can be on this side of heaven (and man, do we knock it out of the park sometimes, you guys), they will never compare to a mere thought or word that passes from the mind or mouth of God. 

Now, does God work through us to create these inspired and astounding pieces of art or literature or engineering or whatever it is we create in our lives? Absolutely. We see it in the Bible. Consider Noah’s ark, for starters. God ordained what the ark would look like, how it would be built, what it would be built of, and how many doors and decks it would have. And when the last nail was put in, God filled it with his own walking, flying, and buzzing creations, both to witness and to showcase. And from this God-inspired ark, we saw life step out, the enclosure having protected God’s people through Noah’s family.

The newly freed Israelites were also on the receiving end of specific instructions that would help them co-create with their Creator, for another ark, this time for the Ark of the Covenant, the box that contained the Ten Commandments and served as the very throne of God in Old Testament times. Again, we see specific materials, measurements, and flourishments. Not only that, but we see in Exodus 31 that God filled the men working on it with his Spirit, ensuring that the vehicle of his grace and protection would be truly worthy of his presence. Again, just like the ark of Noah, this ark would produce and provide a way for God’s people to live in this world alongside their holy and just Creator.

Then came Solomon, who completed a dream that his father David had and built what was without a doubt one of the most breathtaking pieces of architecture that ever graced the face of this earth: the temple. But this one, though the most ornate and dripping with the most wealth, carries one major difference from the arks. While the construction of both arks was led by God’s instructions, the temple’s was led by Solomon’s. In this section of Scripture, the language is no longer God speaking and providing, but Solomon proclaiming what he is doing to make this building majestic. He sends his skilled men (2 Chronicles 2:13) instead of God’s Spirit being the lead architect. He chooses the wood, he chooses the measurements (3:3). The language is subtle but important. “And he made” appears over and over again, which is not something we see in the other accounts. It is clear that this is Solomon’s temple, and though he dedicates it to the Lord, and God even sends his glory to fill it, its creation was birthed in the minds of David and Solomon. The lack of divine instruction is a glaring omission, but intentional as it’s set within the fabric of the story itself — what comes before and what comes after.

Also important is how these structures fared over time. We are not told about the fate of Noah’s ark after it parked itself on a mountain. We can assume that it eventually disintegrated, but it isn’t a small thing that the Bible doesn’t tell us, because narratively speaking it makes the ark eternal. The same can be said about the Ark of the Covenant. The last we see it is in 2 Chronicles when King Josiah instructs the Levites to return it to the temple. The temple was subsequently destroyed and plundered, but the text remains silent about the fate of the ark. Again, it gets absorbed in the theological timeline of God’s redemption of His people. As mentioned above, however, the Bible is very clear about what happened to Solomon’s temple. It was dismantled and destroyed, brick by brick, as the people of God were led away in chains. There were attempts to rebuild it, but they would pale in comparison to the original. It was a tragic reminder that the best that man could offer was unable to provide them the sanctuary that was freely provided by both arks that came beforehand. 

To punctuate this difference, God spends a good deal of time in Ezekiel talking about not only the purpose that Solomon’s temple ended up serving before it was destroyed (“Behold, I will profane my sanctuary, the pride of your power, the delight of your eyes, and the yearnings of your soul,” which sounds very reminiscent of the tower of Babel, another man-made wonder), but also brings Ezekiel to the doorstep of a greater temple. In a vision that comes just after a promise from God that he would restore His people after their impending destruction and imprisonment, Ezekiel is shown a temple that dwarfs Solomon’s in both size and glory. In it, we find water flowing through the midst of it, which clues us into how this is the new temple that will make its earthly appearance at the end of days when the doors are thrown open and the River of Life will flow from the side of Christ and in our midst for eternity. 

And at this point, in case it wasn’t clear already, the New Testament goes full tilt. Think of Stephen’s sermon, moments before he is stoned to death when he speaks of Solomon’s temple he follows it quickly with a Davidic psalm that proclaims “the Most High does not dwell in houses made by hands” (Acts 7:47). Paul, too, declares to the Athenians that the “Lord of heaven and earth does not live in temples made by man,” but that “in him we live and move and have our being.” Despite the grandness of the temple, God urges us to move on from it, and to see that it’s in his work, his building, that we live and rest, not he in ours. Indeed, the only rest we can have is found in the hands and feet of Christ, nailed to the cross, having finished the work, the building of the temple where God would dwell for eternity.

So, was Solomon’s temple magnificent? Absolutely. Was it a sin to create? I don’t think so. But, just as with anything we do, the trap lies in forgetting that our creativity sprouts from Creativity itself, as well as forgetting that the Bible constantly moves us away from the works of our hands and towards the works of Jesus on our behalf. When we do things for our pride, our delight, and our yearning, we harness ourselves to the side of Solomon, whose pride blossomed from this creation and ended up tearing the nation apart. But this is so much more than just a simple lesson in pride. It’s a reminder that when God’s hands are in our lives, we have the opportunity to delight in being swept up in the very source of Imagination itself. It’s a reminder that our eternal protection, provision, and sanctuary all come from the outpouring of God’s creative flow and not our own. It’s a promise that when it comes to what matters most in life, we can stop trying to make something beautiful enough for God to notice us. Instead, he distances himself from our religious charades and invites us to live with him through what his Son has done for us alone. 

The post The Master Architect Works Alone appeared first on Red Tree.

Laura goes to Chicago, Chris gets dressed, Davis laughs with his toddler, and they discuss self-reliant sailors, sleepy prophets, the direction of love, mysteeries(?), and stingy bridesmaids

Red Tree Readings: Jonah 1; Psalm 121; Ephesians 3:1-13
This week’s “BUT WHAT ABOUT” Parable: Wise & Foolish Virgins (Matthew 25:1–13)

You can learn more about Red Tree at redtreegrace.com

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

The post Episode 27 – Put Down Your Oars appeared first on Red Tree.

Why include such a petty detail here at the apex of the story? Some argue it adds a layer of forthrightness to the scriptures that make it more believable. In other words, while religious texts often seek to paint their followers in a positive light, this one doesn’t hide from seeing people as people. 

Undoubtedly this type of honesty strengthens the trustworthiness of the text, but it still doesn’t answer the question of why it’s here – at such a pivotal moment in the story. There is an abundance of sight and sounds from the first Easter Sunday to choose from so why land on this offhanded, gloaty comparison?  

One possible answer can be stated in the form of a question: instead of reading these words as John bragging, what if we consider him to be confessing?  

John has a front row seat to the most exciting moment in history and yet he’s still stuck thinking about himself. Imagine sitting courtside to watch Caitlin Clark break the NCAA all-time scoring record, but you don’t clap because you’re trapped in your own head considering the ways you’ve made better life choices than your sister…or how that dumb friend from high school’s salary is double your own…or how the emotional intelligence of your supervisor could possibly be that low… or on and on we go. The scores we keep may be petty, but their grip on our thought life is undeniable. 

And maybe that’s the point. John’s confession is one of many invitations from God heading into Good Friday and Easter. Our intuitions during Holy Week often include doing spiritual things to feel closer to God. John’s approach here is to show how the doorway to things above, that is, holy (literally set apart) activity is never what we expect because it’s upside down. God is not saying to step up, or speed up, to moral high ground, but instead to step down from the ladder of our ideal versions of ourselves and back into reality – to look at who we actually are in the dark recesses of our own hearts. Holy Week is all about acknowledging the things we actually think about because here is where we find our great need for rescue.    

Jesus died on Good Friday to deliver us from our daily scorekeeping and petty comparisons. He passed us up in our race to self-deification and showed us the end of those things is only death, but he rose again to bring us into a new reality, never again to be marked by your place in relations to others. Freedom looks a lot like self-forgetfulness, and the surest way to forget about yourself is counterintuitive: confess the scores you keep and watch them lessen their grip because the last will be first. Jesus wasn’t in the tomb awarding John with a first place ribbon. Our races don’t flatter him, he’s never at the finish lines we expect, because he’s already out there working to find us apart from our best efforts. 

The post That Weird Easter Footrace appeared first on Red Tree.

Laura, Chris, and Davis consider their favorite vacations and discuss the best version of Daniel & the lion’s den, the most quoted Psalm in the NT, crumbling walls of hostility, and why Jesus spoke so much about money 

Red Tree Readings: Daniel 6; Psalm 110; Ephesians 2:11-22
This week’s “BUT WHAT ABOUT” passage: Eye of a Needle (Matthew 19:23-26)

You can learn more about Red Tree at redtreegrace.com

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

The post Episode 26 – You Are Not Your W-2 appeared first on Red Tree.

Good storytelling usually leaves us in a state of surprise — not just with a well-placed plot twist, but with which part of the plot gives us the most “feels” and which part we walk away ruminating about. Dune is an excellent example of this. 

The lore and world of Dune would take too long to summarize here, not to mention the intricacies of the story itself — maybe you’ve seen or read it? — from the traditions of Bene Gesserit witchcraft to the geopolitics of the spice trade to the biology of the sandworms. But I will say, visually, Denis Villeneuve’s film adaptation of Herbert’s sci-fi classic hit on all cylinders. At least for this fan.

One of the more endearing parts to me amid the relative darkness of the story is how undeservedly and almost stubbornly the main character, 15-year-old Paul Atreides, is loved by the big three father figures in his life. I say father figures because they even seem to surpass the love of his actual father, Leto, who often seems more concerned about pruning his heir than spending quality time with him. 

Their names are Thufir Hawat, Gurney Halleck, and Duncan Idaho, all of whom play significant roles in helping to protect and secure the Atreides’ house. They’re elite warriors, master assassins in their own right, yet they share such a surprisingly soft spot for the boy Paul. Thufir (who is a much more developed character in the book) calls himself “an old man who’s fond of [him],” and is constantly watching his back. The younger Halleck wants to play-wrestle with him and oscillates between that and the actual sparring meant to prepare him for battle. Duncan, portrayed by Jason Momoa, isn’t afraid to embrace him or playfully tease him, calls him “my boy,” and ultimately lays down his life for him. The moment when he touches Paul’s thin arm and says, “You’ve put on some weight!” to which Paul says “Really?” to which Duncan replies “No” was the only point that I audibly laughed while watching the movie.

They’re light, humorous, and admittedly passing moments in the story. You might be thinking, “What about the sandworms!” Yes, the sandworms are epic. But as is the case in a grand but otherwise loveless story (sandworms don’t love), these things stick out. They’re meant to. And what accentuates the love even more is the solemnity of their situation and the significant threats that await the family on Arrakis. Paul’s personal struggles and sins stand out as well: his inner messiah complexes and nightmares that plague him through life, which he sadly gives in to at the end of the book. This disillusionment with the savior figure leads us all the more to ask who we’re rooting for and who or what is going to bring resolution. But this is a welcome twist, not unlike the “heroes” of the Old Testament who have more flaws than strengths, and who give us glimpses of hope, but ultimately not from themselves.

Maybe in Dune’s case, the answer is staring at us right in the face, through the B-level characters who love from the shadows. In the midst of one of the crueler depictions of humanity that you’ll see anywhere in literature or film (the Harkonnens), and the drama of war and betrayal, I find that my hope is less for a universe that Paul can conquer, or even for Arrakis to transform into a tropical paradise, but instead for a world filled with a love like Hawat’s, Halleck’s, and Idaho’s.

There are a thousand other things going on in Dune. I’m not trying to “solve” this story by any stretch. Its complexity and how it breaks the mold is what makes it so intriguing. That said, it’s this love from outside of us, and from outside our bloodline, that I can’t shake. 

It reminds me of the Book of Ruth when Ruth decides to return with her mother-in-law Naomi to her homeland after both of their husbands die. Her promise of “Your people will be my people, and my God, your God” is one of the more well-known in this section of Scripture. It’s a bright spot in an otherwise dark time of biblical history “when the judges ruled” (Ruth 1:1) and all Harkonnen-hell was breaking loose pretty much all the time. But Ruth is a glimpse of love that was all too rare those days. 

At the end of the book, Naomi is told by her friends, “Your daughter-in-law, who loves you, is better to you than seven sons.” Now, there’s a plot twist. No offense to my or anyone else’s in-laws, but aren’t our kids even more valuable? Yet here the Bible operates on its own terms. The surprise left hook of a love coming from outside our bloodline, apart from us altogether, pushes the story forward to the one we could call the ultimate in-law, the friend who sticks closer than a brother (Prov 18:24), Jesus Christ, who would come to love us apart from what we have to give him, by dying for us. God’s grace is given, not sourced or earned. It’s a complete surprise, so we can’t take any credit or consider it a “family trait.”

And yet it’s what we need to quell the tide of the messiah complexes in our hearts, our tireless attempts at self-deifying and self-aggrandizing. We need a love that precedes it and stays faithful to us when we slip back into it. A love that doesn’t keep score and that simply loves us for who we are, even when we’re up to our eyeballs in the sands of sin, drunk on the spice of power, and seduced by the allure of thinking that we’re enough on our own.

The post Fatherly Love and Messiah Complexes appeared first on Red Tree.

It’s not surprising to see the in-between show up all over the Bible. Maybe our lives consist of these spaces in between precisely because they show up in God’s story first. Take the lives of Isaac and Ishmael or Jacob and Esau, where blessings and inheritances live for a short time in between the oldest sibling: the rightful heir, and the youngest sibling: the unexpected inheritor. Or how about David’s anointing as the God-chosen king happening well before the end of Saul’s people-chosen reign? God moves in and through it, but there is a moment in time when both kingships are propelled forward simultaneously. Then there is the time when the prophets Elijah and Elisha overlap, one fading out while the other rises up. We even see it in the engagement period in the Song of Solomon — a space between the bride being chosen and being wed – the in-between is where most of the book’s drama unfolds. 

But the ultimate transitory space in God’s story can be seen in the lowly backwater town of Bethlehem. Jesus of Nazareth is born as poor and weak as any infant who had come before him, and yet his birth begins the transition from the old covenant born at Sinai to the soon-to-be-born, new covenant when his blood will pour down an old-rugged cross. It’s easy to forget how his life is one big transition, an “already, not yet” moment in time. It is the fleshing out of the book of Hebrews’ insistence that “what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away” (8:13). Before he dies, the Law hangs over the heads of God’s people, but Jesus methodically begins to dismantle its curse, urging his disciples to pick food for themselves on the Sabbath, touching and healing lepers and insisting that their cleanliness came from his mere word and not from the priest’s levitical rituals, and even stepping in between an adulteress and her law-demanded stoning.

These three years where he moved in and among not only the people of God but also the Gentiles is the space between the inhale and the exhale. The Israelites had spent thousands of years inhaling, hoping to take in enough air on their own in order to be able to live in the presence of a perfect and holy God. While the incarnated feet of God walked upon our earth, our breath was held, until it was irreversibly intertwined with the last breath of Lamb of God that trickled through his tortured lungs on the cross. And that’s when we could finally exhale too, but in a different way. It’s when we could release our white-knuckle grip on the idea that our salvation, our reconciliation to our Creator, was up to us.

The old gave way to the new that day, which led to a short but important transitional period where Christ lay dormant in his grave for three days. The power of sin and death had been broken, yet followers of Christ were left in the in-between space between death and life. Their encounters with the risen Lord would firmly place them in the “after”, forever closing down the possibility of going back to the “before”. 

And so we live our lives now, post-death and resurrection, but pre-full and complete redemption. Our sin continues to boil over, harming ourselves and those around us. We often find ourselves caught in the chaos of the “middle,” like Paul’s existential confession in Romans 7. Our desperate need for Christ remains, and always will. And yet, we can take comfort in this space because of how faithful our God has been in leading his people from one era to the next. Christ stepped willingly into the tomb, into this groundbreaking space in between. His willingness to breathe his last allows us to take our first breath on the other side, inhaling his grace instead of working our lungs to death in a fruitless attempt at making things right with our works. It is with our death in Christ, in our figurative burying of our old selves that we see in our baptism, where our final transition begins, which will end in the full light and embrace of the eternally scarred hands of who was, at one point in history, just a squalling child birthed by an unknown woman in an uncared for town. And so, all along we’re reminded that it’s not up to us to resolve the tension of the “in-betweens,” but to believe in the one who steps into it himself, who bears our “old” and who becomes our “new,” so that we can walk these last few miles on a road paved with the grace-filled blood of Christ, unburdened and unchained.

The post The Space In-Between appeared first on Red Tree.

Laura, Chris, and Davis consider their own mediocrity and discuss the purpose of and behind time, why Jesus died in the air, and God helping those who can’t help themselves

Red Tree Readings: Ecclesiastes 3:1-10; Psalm 80; Ephesians 2:1-10
This week’s “BUT WHAT ABOUT” passage: Hard Hearts (Romans 11:7-8)

You can learn more about Red Tree at redtreegrace.com

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

The post Episode 25 – Frozen Hearts appeared first on Red Tree.

Laura, Chris, and Davis are back from an unexpected paternity leave and they discuss royal eulogies, weepy kings, Kirk Cousins, torn heavens, hungry vultures, and why Paul never ever stops giving thanks.
 
Red Tree Readings: 2 Samuel 1:17-27; Psalm 144; Ephesians 1:15-23
This week’s “BUT WHAT ABOUT” passage: The Coming Kingdom (Luke 17:20-37)

You can learn more about Red Tree at redtreegrace.com

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

The post Episode 24 – Humans Not Heroes appeared first on Red Tree.

The miracle of seeing two brothers continue to work together professionally without breaking up or killing each other is almost as remarkable as watching a love song be created ex nihlio right in front of your eyes, like when they riff “I Wish I Was” from chicken scratch ideas on napkins to chords and production and onto the big stage. 

Hands down, however, my favorite part of the film is everything that surrounds and is behind the harrowing song: “No Hard Feelings.” The lyrics bring us listeners face to face with our mortality – inquiring about the possibility of being ready to die when our time comes: 

When my feet won’t walk another mile?

And my lips give their last kiss goodbye?

Will my hands be steady when I lay down my fears, my hopes, and my doubts?

The rings on my fingers, and the keys to my house

With no hard feelings?

But more than this, the face of death brings a sharp, visceral confrontation with all the jealousy, lust, and nasty inner-angst we experience most days that end in the letter “y”. We’re invited to see how little these feelings do for us besides keeping us afraid and cold, ignoring all we’ve been given to have and enjoy. From there, we’re taken to a place of wonder at the freeing possibility of laying all these down and encountering supernatural laughter, light, and love: 

When my body won’t hold me anymore

And it finally lets me free

Where will I go?

…

Will I join with the ocean blue?

Or run into a savior true?

And shake hands laughing

And walk through the night, straight to the light

Holding the love I’ve known in my life

And no hard feelings

The song is poetic and palpably moving. But what happens next in the film is profound. The room of producers and support staff congratulate and praise the song: “Home run, boys – beautiful song” they’re profusely told. But rather than smiling and receiving the high marks, the brothers have taken a visible toll with this song, as if power had somehow gone out from them. They almost look like they’re crawling over the finish line of a long week at work after playing this one song.

And it’s here that we’re given a front-row seat to what truly draws people together. “It’s weird to be congratulated on mining the soul,” the younger Avett says before his older brother describes the elephant in the room as the fact that this is the hit song of the album – the one that’s going to make the money: “It’s the best song because it’s taken the most sacrifice to make. It’s taken the most living to make. You’ve sacrificed deeply, and the evidence of that struggle came out in something beautiful.”

The brothers have taken a resolute look at the lives they’ve been given and brought out things that we’re all afraid to confront. The song cuts through all the haze of life’s perpetual shallowness and “hey how’s it goin?…fines”. It takes the presence of death to see how often we’re overwhelmed by hard feelings that divide and leave us empty and cold. 

And yet we’re drawn in. We play the record over and over. Why is this? Because whereas other people’s strengths often keep us at bay and pretending, weakness invites us in and allows us to open up to our own inadequacies and experiences of being trapped. When someone metaphorically bleeds in front of you, a doorway opens. We’re brought into something more than the daily lists and measurements that wear us out with hard feelings of jealousy and insecurity. 

In 2 Corinthians 4:10, we’re told we always carry around in our body the death of Jesus. It’s a strange thing to say and perhaps an even more strange way to live. But these two brothers singing folk songs are showing the beauty in this strange way of being. The death of Jesus, like this song, gets to the point and silences all that traps us because our trappings are draped on his shoulders as he is strung up on the tree. It’s in his death we see with clear eyes that there really is a Love that rests at the heart of the universe. A doorway opens in the wound in Christ’s side, his poured-out blood making a way for our insecurities and shame to be absorbed and destroyed in the shame that Jesus bore on the cross. It’s an Active Love that finds us and replaces our coldness and the very existence of enemies with friends. Because in the story of Jesus, we were the enemies, and he died to make space at his table for us. In him, we have no enemies…and no hard feelings. 

.

The post Encountering God with the Avett Brothers appeared first on Red Tree.