350: Luke Nicholls - Exhortation: Savoring the Things of God

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

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   Welcome to good Chris Adelphian talks. I’m Levi. I’m Chris. I’m Jason. And I’m Brian, thank you for joining us this week. On this podcast, we select one talk a week to help us get the Bible in our Daily News feed. Each week we post a talk that we previewed from suggestions sent in by listeners from around the world.

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   Then we record a short intro beforehand as a personalized recommendation to you on why we are sharing the talk. And now let’s talk more about this week’s talk.

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   Hello, it’s Levi. This week’s talk is an excitation that was given by brother Luke Nichols at the Brighton Ecclesia, which is outside of Adelaide in Australia. He gave it on April 27th of this year and the title was Savoring the Things of God. I very much enjoyed this excitation. He touches on a lot of really important concepts.

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   He pulls his thoughts from the verse in Matthew 1623, where in the King James it says for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men. And he kind of digs deep into that word savouring, looking at mindfulness and the kind of different related concepts. So I would definitely think this is a this also kind of specifically a word study, but I really, really appreciate it.

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   It was very easy to listen to. I listen to it just on a walk as, as I know many of you, you know, consume the podcast this way. I think it fits perfectly kind of for that setting and kind of exploring the idea of being really thoughtful and mindful of the things that we think about and the things that we pursue. He has a discussion in the in the invitation about kind of dopamine and how easy it is for our brains to reach for things that give us kind of short dopamine hits. This is definitely something I’ve been thinking about in my personal life and in my walk in the truth. Just how easy it is, you know, to reach for your phone or to look at sports or different things that kind of distract us from the things of God instead of really choosing to mindfully consider the the ways of the Lord, the things that be of God. So I really found this again to be very powerful and a really great excerpt.

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   So I thank brother Luke for that and the the, the, the, the brother that sent in this recommendation. We thank you for that. I’m going to have a fun time titling it because savouring is spelled different in American English versus Australian English, but we’re going to write it out the American way, so I will.

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   Here it is savouring the things of God, the resolute Nichols. Imagine you’re sitting on a beach in a comfortable deck chair. It’s dusk and the air is balmy with a light breeze coming off the ocean. You take a deep breath in and your lungs filled with warm, fresh air. You smell the salty seawater which is lapping at the sand with gentle waves spread out in the sky. In front of you is a magnificent sunset, a massive orange and pink hues so well blended that you cannot see where one colour ends and the next starts.

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   God’s canvas of colours, a witness to the creativity of our Maker. The heavens declaring the glory of God, the Sky’s proclaiming the work of his hands.

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   Wispy white and pale pink clouds are scattered in the sky with a perfect round orb at its centre. The bright light of the sun softens as it prepares to dip below the horizon.

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    The ocean reflects the orange and pinks with a backdrop of blue, which is darkening as the light fades. We savour this moment, what we can see, what we can hear, what we can smell and what we can feel. It’s something that comes quite naturally to us. Savouring. It’s instinctive. It’s also unique to each person. We can savour very different things. Some people love coffee, others can’t stand it. Some people are captivated listening to an orchestra, others would prefer be somewhere else. Our favorite foods can vary significantly. Some people love lying on a beach on a hot summer’s day. Others love sipping a hot drink by a crackling fire in their slippers.

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    We savor in a variety of ways, too. We savor through sounds like rain on a tin roof. We savor achieving or accomplishing something, maybe that’s running a personal best or completing a uni degree. We save a taste, like eating a delicious meal. And we save a smells as well. Think of that earthy smell after a rain that we’ve experienced recently.

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    So we really want to consider this idea of savouring this morning. And this idea comes up in our reading in Matthew 16, verse 23, and particularly the second-half of the verse. If you don’t have a King James, you might be looking at that the end of that verse going, I’m not quite sure what Luke’s getting out here, so I’ll read it for you from the King James Version, Matthew 16, verse 23, the second-half of the verse, Jesus says for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.

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    Other translations have something like you are not mindful of the things of God or you are not setting your mind on the things of God. So the Greek word for savouring or mindful is froneo PHRONEO, and it occurs 29 times in the New Testament, and it’s only translated as savour here in Matthew 16 and also in Mark 8, which are both renditions of this same story. It’s also translated elsewhere in a number of ways throughout the New Testament.

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    It’s translated in Colossians 3 verse 2 as affection. Set your affection on things above. It’s translated in some places as care in Romans 8 verse 5. It’s translated as mind. They that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh. It’s also in some in some places it means being of the same mind or like minded.

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    For example Philippians 2 verse 2. Paul says, Fulfill ye my joy, that ye be like minded. In Romans 14 verse 6, Paul uses it when he’s talking about regarding one day or another. He that regards the day regards it unto the Lord. He uses it a number of times in that chapter. And then finally, it’s also used in other places in the New Testament as thinking or understanding something. So this word franeo has a number of different applications and ways it can be used.

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    The Strong’s definition is quite long, so I won’t read it out, but there are four key ideas from that definition if you care to look it up. So the first key idea from the Strong’s definition is exercising the mind. It’s also got this. This word also has the idea of something that entertains us. It’s also got the idea of being mentally disposed in a particular direction.

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    And then finally, it’s also about being intensely interested in something. So these four key ideas, that they’re quite varied, as we’ve already mentioned, we savor in different ways, don’t we? So let’s just go back through those four ideas in a bit more detail to consolidate them and explore them a little bit more. So the first idea was exercising the mind. And there’s two key elements of exercise. There’s effort and there’s consistency. And I think what this shows us is that savouring takes spiritual, savouring takes concerted effort. It’s something we build over time, not overnight. The second idea was what are we entertained by when we have a free moment?

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    What do we choose to do? Do we love doing our daily readings, or do we do them just to tick them off? Or do we struggle to even do them at all?

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    The third idea was being mentally disposed in a particular direction. What course have we set ourselves on? Where do we want to end up? Where do we expend our mental resources, our thinking? And then our 4th and final idea from that definition was something that we’re intensely interested in. What is it that we really want to learn more about?

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    There’s lots of things we can be keenly interested in. Are we keen to learn from God’s word each day, or are there other things we’re more intensely interested in? It’s also interesting to note that this word, franeo, comes from a Greek word which combines the ideas of feeling and understanding. Franeo goes beyond what we know.

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    It’s about how we feel too. And we’ll see from the passages we look at today that these feelings inevitably cause us to act as well. So hopefully you’ve already got Matthew 16 open in front of you and we’ll dive into that chapter now. And we’ll start with our key verse in verse 23. So it says, but he turned and said to Peter, get behind me, Satan, you’re an offence to me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men. This is a strong rebuke from Christ. How would we feel if we were called Satan if a close friend who we respected and looked up to told us we were an adversary to them?

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    It would stop us instantly in our tracks. Maybe anger would well up inside us. Maybe we’d be so shocked we wouldn’t know what to think. Maybe we’d realize how wrong we were in what we just said.

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    We aren’t actually told how Peter reacted, but he definitely would have been feeling one of those things. And Christ doesn’t leave it at Satan either. He goes on. You are an offence to me. Would you feel comfortable talking to one of your friends like this? This is pretty severe language.

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    So why is Christ so harsh in his rebuke of Peter? In my centre margin there’s a note that offence can also be translated stumbling block. I think Elliott’s translation the ESV had hindrance as well. Both of those words are good. So offence can be stumbling block or hindrance. The things Peter has said to Christ a deceptive They might seem to make sense on the surface, but Christ cuts deeper than that. In an instant.

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    He sees where Peter’s thinking will lead. So let’s go back a few verses to remind ourselves what has occurred in the lead up to verse 23. So back to verse 15. And there we see that Jesus asks his disciples who they think he is and Peter confidently answers, you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.

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    He hits the nail on the head and Christ commends him for this. He’s not an adversary or an offence to Christ at all. In this moment in verse 17, Peter is blessed by Christ. We he, he says there blessed are you, Simon by Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. So we see the blessing there.

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    But Christ also establishes a contrast in this verse between the things that flesh and blood can reveal and what his Father in heaven can reveal. And this is similar to the contrast in verse 23 between savouring the things of men and savouring the things of God. So we’ll just skip down a few verses through the story to verse 21 and 22, which reads from that time. Jesus began to show to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and be raised the third day.

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    Then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, far be it from you, Lord, this shall not happen to you. So Peter is telling Jesus that he won’t have to suffer and be killed. This is why Jesus calls him an adversary and a stumbling block. Let’s dig a bit deeper into those verses we just read. Did you notice the beginning of verse 21? From that time, Jesus began to show this is the first time that Jesus has taught his disciples about how he would have to suffer and be killed.

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    It’s something we’re quite familiar with, isn’t it? But this is the first time it would have been introduced to the disciples, and it’s quite a contrast to the excitement that would have been in the air after Peter’s declaration that Jesus is the Christ. Can you imagine the person who is the most assured and confident in your life telling you that they’ll have to go through immense suffering at the hands of the revered religious leaders and then be killed?

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    That’s the last thing you would expect. They’re the person who’s got it most together. They wouldn’t have to go through something like that. It would turn your life upside down. You wouldn’t know what to think or say. We instinctively want to live and thrive, not suffer and die. And on this instinct, Peter responds and rebukes his master.

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    But I think the phrase began to show also indicates that Jesus was teaching his disciples these things from Old Testament scriptures. Christ wasn’t just saying that he would have to suffer and die. He was showing the disciples passages in the Old Testament that said this. Mark’s record supports this. In Mark 8 verse 31, he says and he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things. Peter wasn’t just disagreeing with what Christ was saying. That would have been bad enough.

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    He was speaking against prophecies in God’s Word. That’s not something a disciple of Christ should be doing. So what made Peter do this? How did he get to the point of directly disagreeing with the things God had prophesied? Well, this brings us back to verse 23, the verse we started in. Let’s read it again.

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    But he turned and said to Peter, get behind me, Satan, you’re an offence to me, for you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men. Peter had lost his focus. He wasn’t looking at the bigger picture. All he heard was that his beloved Lord was going to suffer and be killed, and his human nature kicked in.

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    I wonder if he even heard Christ say that he would rise again the third day. Surely that would have helped him think a little more calmly and clearly. But it seems he was already preoccupied with the suffering Jesus would have to go through. I think the new English translation renders Peter’s words even more clearly.

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    It reads God forbid, Lord, this must not happen to you. Peter clearly wasn’t thinking straight. God can’t forbid something that He has prophesied in His word. I think this shows how quickly we can move from savouring the things of God to savouring the things of men. A human nature will kick in and take over if we aren’t regularly and intentionally savouring the things of God and our natural response, our human instincts, we’ll inevitably disagree with God. We aren’t naturally good.

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    There’s a battle in our minds between our natural fleshly thinking and the thinking of our Father. And Paul talks about this battle in Romans 7 and eight. He uses our word for NAO in Romans 8, verse 5, which we’ll just read together now if you’d like to turn there. Romans 8, verse 5. So for now in this verse is set their minds that phrase. So Paul says in verse 5, for those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.

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    So in this section here in Romans 8, Paul is contrasting caring about the things of the flesh. And the things of the spirit. But it’s more than just a contrast. He portrays it as a battle. A battle between savouring the things of the spirit and savouring the things of the flesh. To see this, we have to go back to the second-half of Chapter 7.

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    Many of us would be familiar with the words of Romans 7, verse 19 in the King James. It reads for the good that I would I do not, but the evil, which I would not that I do. There’s this battle in Paul’s mind. He wants to do good, but his default path is to do evil even though he doesn’t want to do it. He describes this battle in verse 22 and 23 of Chapter 7. For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man, but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

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    So Paul wants to do the right thing, to savour the things of God. But this way of thinking conflicts with his nature, the law in his members, the law of his mind. There are two armies fighting and the battlefield is our mind. It’s a lifelong battle. We can’t assume the victory halfway through.

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    In a battle, one army may have the upper hand, but the opponent can mount a resurgence. We have to remain disciplined and focused to maintain the advantage. Just because we savour the things of God doesn’t mean our human nature won’t try and take over at times. Really, it’s about our thoughts, what we’re feeding in, and as a result, what our brain feeds back out.

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    It reminds me of that quote from Brother John Carter. The mind is insensibly affected by the stream of thought passing through it. It is desirable, therefore, to have that stream as pure as possible. We have to involve the things of God in our thoughts and our lives, savor them deeply every day to provide our brains that pure stream that will lead to a life that pleases our Father.

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    The other thing that Paul makes very clear in chapter 8 is the outcome of both ways of thinking. In verse 8 he states that those who are in the flesh cannot please God, and in verse 6 to be carnally or fleshly minded is death. In contrast, he talks about the positive outcomes of being spiritually minded in verse 6 and verse 13. Verse 6, to be spiritually minded is life and peace. And verse 13, if by the Spirit you put it put sorry, I’ll start again.

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    If by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you’ll live. So what are we savouring in our lives? What are we intentionally setting our minds on? If we leave it to our default, we’ll seek temporary pleasure and entertainment. We’ll lose sight of the bigger picture, just like Peter did.

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    Our careers will take over our lives. We’ll find ourselves endlessly scrolling, seeking constant entertainment. Society is designed to satisfy our human nature, whatever it is. Music, sport, movies, work, exercise, learning, cars, our appearance, food, travelling. Naturally our brains will savour these things more than the things of God. This takes us back to the idea of exercising from the strong’s definition. We learn to love the things of God, but it takes consistent effort over an extended period of time. We need to go searching for the things in God’s Word that really spark our interest.

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    Maybe it’s staying across the news and seeing history being poured into the mould of Bible prophecy. We might be drawn to themes or repeated words which we circle or color in and reflect on. Perhaps you were consistently touched by Jesus gentle interactions with so many people and the wisdom with which he spoke.

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    Maybe you’re fascinated by the imagery in Revelation and complex links to the past and future they hold. The key to. Whatever it is that causes us to stop and savour God’s Word is worth pursuing. We need to be intentional, setting a clear goal of where we want to head in our lives. Peter had to learn this too, to not default to fleshly thinking. In Matthew 16 verse 24 and 25, Christ says if anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

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    For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. Christ doesn’t promise that following Him will be easy. We’ll have to deny ourselves and take up our cross. But if we choose to savour the things of God and pass up experiencing everything we can in this life, we will receive eternal life and there will be so much more to savour.

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    Then to conclude, I want to briefly consider 3 verses where our word for anaio occurs, which will help bring our minds to why we’re here today. The first two talk about the the things that we mined collectively as a group. Listen to these words from Paul in 2nd Corinthians 13 verse 11. Finally, brethren, farewell. Become complete, be of good comfort, be of one mind for a NAO, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you.

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    These are some of the last words Paul wrote to the Corinthian ecclesia. He wanted them to be of one mind, to come together and savour the things of God together. It’s not something we just do individually. It’s something we do together too. Paul expresses a similar idea in Philippians 2 verse 2. If you want to turn there.

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    Here in this verse, he uses Fornaio twice. In fact, he uses it 11 times in Philippians in just four chapters. He’s really encouraging the ecclesia to be on the same page and set their minds on the things of the Spirit. So let’s read Philippians 2 verse one and two together. Therefore, if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy fulfil my joy, being like minded, having the same love, being of 1 accord of one mind. So we see there that we come together today to strengthen and encourage each other to be like minded, to be of one mind. And Paul goes on in verse 5 to explain what that one mind we’re striving for is.

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    He says, let this mind for a NAO be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. We’re striving together to have the same mind that Jesus had, to savour the things he savoured. We’re following the example of a man who spent days in the temple talking about God’s Word, who committed Scripture to memory, who spent whole nights in prayer, and who ultimately offered up his life to do God’s will.

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    What an amazing mind to have. So let’s take a moment now to savor the things that God and Christ have done for us. Thank you for listening to the good Christadelphian Talks podcast. We hope this talk helped you in your walk and brightened your day. If you would like to hear more, please subscribe for new episodes. We are on all major podcast platforms and also on YouTube. If you enjoyed this particular talk, please share it with someone else who you think might enjoy it too. For show notes on the talk you just listened to, visit [email protected] or check out the Show Notes section of your podcast player.

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