Isaiah 40-55: Modern Preaching

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast, making Theology Central Well. That theme music that intro tells you, well, wait a minute, something's not normal, and you're right. Today is not a normal Sunday. We are not at Victory Baptist Church. There's no one sitting in the pew in front of me. It's no in person service. I am broadcasting live well from the Theology Central studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. But whether I'm steadying in front of people or whether I'm sitting in front of this microphone, we can still do the same thing. Right. We can dig into scripture, dig into theology. We can have some interesting discussions and hopefully, when it's all said and done, everyone will benefit from it.

0:49 So I guess I need to give you the official podcast welcome. I wouldn't say this from the pulpit. I guess I could start saying it from the pulpit. Good morning, everyone, Welcome everyone. It is Sunday. That would sound weird, but I can say it here. Good morning everyone, Welcome everyone. It is Sunday, February sixteenth, twenty twenty five. It is currently nine point fifty one am Central time. And as I have already said, I am coming to you live from the Theology Central Studio. Yeah, I can't even speak correctly. I'm coming to you live from the Theology Central Studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. And as I have already said, just to be abundantly clear, yes I'm not coming to you live from Victory Baptist Church. But we can still accomplish a lot. Maybe can we accomplish anything?

1:39 I don't know. I don't know if we can accomplish anything anymore, because I'm starting to lose all hope. I'm starting to become more and more just discouraged, depressed, frustrated, and feel like what's the point, Because it's becoming at this point, it's almost reaching a level that if someone would have told me that I would be at this point, even going just back to say October of twenty twenty four. In October of twenty twenty four, if you would have walked up to me and said, hey, you're going to start listening to sermons that are based off scripture found between Isaiah chapter forty and Isaiah chapter fifty five. You're going to start listening to scripture to sermons based on that section of scripture, and after I don't know a few months, you're going to have listened to almost one hundred sermons on this section of scripture, and you're going to find out that not one sermon even bothers to a tempt to handle the scripture in anything that could even be seen as a correct way. Sermon after sermon is just going to take the scripture. It's going to move out the original recipients, move us and make it all us about us, us us, and it's going to become maddening. It's going to become just what's going to demonstrate something for you. I think I would have looked at you and said, I think that's a little negative. Okay, I don't think it would be that bad. I mean it's going to be bad. I would have agreed with

3:09 you there, but I wouldn't have agreed how bad it has become. Because we started our discussion, and we started our discussion in Isaiah chapter forty three, and we started listening and reading and considering different things that were being said about Isaiah forty three, and I begin to realize, wait a minute, nobody is handling Isaiah forty three, and it's proper historical context. Okay, well, let's just expand it. Isaiah forty three is in a section called the Book of Comfort that starts in Isaiah chapter forty. It ends in Isaiah chapter fifty five. So let's just now expand this and listen to any sermon we can find based on any scripture between Isaiah chapter forty, verse one and the end of Isaiah chapter fifty five. Right, that expands it.

3:53 That gives us a greater chance of finding even you know, more sermons that cover this entire sea. So we're abound to stumble upon. You know, there'll be it'll be like a divide, right, He'll be this side will be filled with all of these sermons that handle it correctly contextually. You know, they're going to apply it correctly. It's it's they're going to be good. I may distill disagree with some conclusions, but they're going to be overall, we're somewhat at least in the same you know, country, hermoneutically speaking, that's I would I would have said, Okay, that's that's what will happen. And then on the other side will be these sermons that are train wrecks. They're horrible, they're just they're just they're they're the worst of the worst. Okay, we I kind of expected that would be the divide.

4:41 I had no idea that the divide would be there's there's none over here, there are none, there are zero. And just to demonstrate that, I continue to listen to sermons based off Isaiah chapter forty through Isaiah chapter fifty five. And just this week I reviewed a sermon on Isaiah chapter forty three, and once again, I mean, right from the very start, it was Isaiah forty three, and well, it's about us. It's about us. It's about us. It's about us, It's about us. And at some point, I'm just like, what do I say anymore? What do I do anymore? So I because since October of twenty twenty four, I've been looking at this, researching, this studying, this studying the section of scripture one of the things I have done continually since October twenty twenty four, as I've been an ongoing conversation discussion with artificial intelligence about this entire problem, about this entire phenomenon, about this entire discovery of exactly how bad it has become, and what's kind of funny is by this point, because almost every sermon I've listened to, I have taken the transcript of said sermon and given it to AI. So AI has analyzed and reviewed every

6:12 sermon I have listened to, and at this point artificial intelligence is basically like, you're just going to have to give up. You're just going to have to accept it. But yesterday, I think it was yesterday or last night, AI said this, this experience, everything that has happened since October of twenty twenty four, this experience highlights a major issue in modern preaching. And I'm like, oh, that's wonderful. Yeah, I know there's an issue in modern preaching, and I know this. This doesn't just highlight it. This is like walking up punching you in the face, going, hey, there's a problem in modern preaching. But you can't really tell anyone there's a problem in modern preaching because people will just roll their eyes. They think it's no big deal.

7:03 You're just making a big deal out of it. It's really not that significant. Who really cares, just but that's the problem. To me. The problem isn't in modern preaching. The problem is nobody who goes to church cares there's a problem in modern preaching, because if they cared, the problems in modern preaching would be changed quickly because there would be nobody going to church because they'd be like, what's the point since nobody can handle the text correctly? But nobody really cares that the text is handled correctly. All anybody cares is that the text is handled in a way that doesn't go against whichever theological side they have chosen. I know that sounds cynical, but nobody really cares about the text, because if they did, all things would be radically different. Ai goes on to say, this experience highlights a major issue in modern preaching, and that issue and modern preaching. AI describes it this way. In modern preaching, there is a tendency to immediately personalize and apply biblical text without first addressing their historical and literary context. Now, what I will say is, you have two kinds of churches, right, you have one kind of church? Yeah? They don't really, they don't care. They just immediately personalize it, immediately apply it to us, and they don't care about the original audience.

8:34 They don't care about the literary context. They don't care about the historical context. They just ignore it. They just immediately make it about us. Okay, got you. That clearly is one one type of church, one one form of Christianity. The other, I say, is the more deceptive one, because the other group of churches will at least tell you, oh, we have to care about context, we have to care about history, we have to care about the literary context. They will say all of the right words. They will even at the beginning of their sermon, talk about the historical context, the literary context. They'll talk about it, they'll talk about the textual context. They'll talk about context, context, and it sounds so good, but almost inevitably, after they kind of give you that false sense of security, then they just grab the steering wheel yank it. You go flying off the road, through the fence, hit a cow and guess what they make it about us, us us us us us. And it's like, okay, So which is worse?

9:38 The ones who just ignore it are the ones who pretend that it matters to only demonstrate that it actually doesn't. I don't know which is worse. I don't know. I think the ones that pretend that it matters drive me the craziest because they will come across so like we care about this stuff, but then when you really get down to it, they actually don't. Ai went on to say, this is especially problematic, this tendency, this issue in modern preaching. This is especially problematic and prophetic literature like Isaiah forty through fifty five, where the original message to Israel and exile is absolutely critical to understanding its meaning. That's one of the things that's driven me. It just drives me crazy and just I mean literally, ten minutes before going live, ten minutes before going live, right, oh, I saw a new sermon that had been uploaded to the sermon's two point oh app I looked at it, and guess what immediately I saw. Immediately I saw that they that was a sermon based on Isaiah fifty four seventeen. Isaiah fifty four to seventeen that falls right there between Isaiah forty and Isaiah fifty five. No weapon that is formed against THEE shall prosper, and every tongue that shall rise against THEE in judgment, thou shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is

11:11 of me. Saith the Lord. Now, of course, and the sermon, it was no weapon that is formed against not THEE, not them, not they. It became a sermon about no weapon formed against us. So immediately the original recipients are moved out, we are moved in that literally, I saw that literally fifteen minutes before going live. It just will not stop, over and over and over again. So this problem in modern preaching, where pastors it basically immediately personalize and apply the Biblical texts to us without first addressing their historical and literary context, is especially problematic and prophetic literature like Isaiah forty through fifty five, where the original message to Israel and exile is crucial to understanding its meaning.

12:04 And again, fifteen minutes before going live, here's another sermon, once again taking Isaiah and literally changing the words or it says, no weapon formed against the All of a sudden that becomes you and me. How do you do that? I don't understand. So AI said this, all of this, this entire thing that we have watched. If you've been paying attention to the podcast at all, you have heard hour after hour of this discussion. I said, if you take everything that we have listened to, everything that we have discussed, this is what it tells us about modern day preaching. Number one, it's anthro percentric. It's man centered.

12:51 It's anthro percent percentric. It is it is based off man. It is man centered preaching, anthro percentric. It's man centered. That's that's what preaching is today. It's about us. It's about us. It's about us. Hey I goes on to say, interpretation dominates. It's a man centered interpretation that dominates preaching today is an anthropocentric type of approach. It's a man centered interpretation. It's about us. So you go to Isaiah fifty four seventeen, No weapon formed against what It's me. It's us, it's about us, it's all about us. Every passage is about us. Every passage is about us. Every passage is about us. Hey I said, it's this man centered.

13:43 A man centered interpretation dominates modern preaching. Instead of letting the text speak for itself, preachers center the message around the audience. So pastors go to the text and make the text of the people whom they're going to preach to, and so they make the text speak. Instead of letting the text just speak, They've got to find a way to make the text speak to the people and whom they're going to be preaching to. So it's anthropocentric. But I think you could also say it's audience centric, which is still man centered, but it's based off the audience. See, the pastor knows I've got to have a sermon, and I've got to preach it to people, So I've got to make it about us. I gotta make it about us, because if I don't make it about us, who wants to listen? I mean, who wants to go to church and hear a message that's not about us? Preacher center the messages around the audience. AI goes on to say, the primary concern and modern preaching seems to be how this passage makes us feel or what it does for us, rather than what it originally meant. Nobody seems to care what it originally man. Nobody seems to care how the original audience would have understood it. It doesn't matter. They don't matter because we've moved them out and we've moved ourselves in. Ai goes on to say, this self focused, man centered, anthropocentric type of interpretation ignores the rich, philological

15:19 and historical dimensions of the scriptures. So what does this all tell us about modern day preaching. What's man centered? Number two? It demonstrates and it shows us that modern preaching has well it neglects historical and textual context. Most sermons skip over the Babylonian exile, Israel's covenant relationship, and the prophetic role of Isaiah. Instead of asking what did this mean to Israel? They jump to what does this mean for me? This violates basic hermeneutical principles. Contexts must come first before application. Now, pastors will say that, they will tell you context matters. What's the number one hermeneutical principle, contexts, context, context context. Knowing the principle doesn't mean anything if you don't follow the principle in your preaching. Context matters. And it's not just context before application. It's context determines how you can or cannot apply it because in some cases there's no real application as far as a specific one, because it's it's well, you're trying to interpret a passage that's descriptive, it's not prescripted. On and on and on and on. There's a lot of issues. Well, what a lot of people say, Well, I mentioned the context, I mentioned Israel, I mentioned Babylon. Okay, now we can apply

16:51 it to us. Who whoa wo slow down? Slow down? Slow down? Is there anything here that's even applicable to us? We see a promise to them, we see a warning them. Okay, can I take that promise and make it about us? See that's where the issues become, and well, it becomes a major problem. A number So, a first major problem in modern preaching is that it's man centered and it's anthropocentric. Number two. It neglects historical on textual context. Number three. It's typically a more devotional approach rather than an exegetical approach. People want their sermons to be more devotion They say they don't want a devotional sermon. They say they don't want that, but in reality, they do want it very devotional.

17:38 They want it to feel church. They want it to feel kind of spiritual. They want a little Jesus thrown in. They want a couple of points thrown in right, and then they they like that it feels it makes them feel like, oh, okay, I went to church. It gave the sense of being spiritual. Now they say they don't want that. They say they want an in depth study. But in depth study would sound very different. So they want an in depth They say they want an in depth study, but they want that in depth study to be presented and as much more in a devotional what they call a sermon type way. They don't really want to dig into the text. They say they do, but they don't really want to. They want to pretend that they're digging into the text. Well, in reality, they're getting basically a devotional type message delivered to them. All summarize with an opening illustration three points, and a closing story that touches the heartstrings, and a closing prayer, and then get out on time. And then they say, oh, that was so touching, pastor, that was such a great sermon. Yeah, do you understand the text? Well, who cares? It felt like church? So AI goes on and says modern the problem.

18:52 One of the problems of modern preaching is it takes a devotional rather than an exegetical approach. Many preachers treat Isaiah as a collection of inspirational, inspirational sayings rather than a prophetic book with deep theological themes. They may pull comforting phrases out of context. Fear not for I have redeemed you Isaiah forty three to one and apply them directly to Christians today, ignoring their original Covenental message. This flattens the text, missing its depth and complexity. So there's this people want, this kind of a devotional approach, and pastors, I'm more than happy to provide what the people want.

19:32 Because if you don't provide what the people want, the people leave. If you don't provide what the people want, then there's no one there to preach too. So the pastor is then bound by having to give the people what they want, even though they're trying to say, you know, I'll have to step on some toes and sometimes I have to offend you. We can talk a big game, but when push comes to shove, you have to make a decision. Do I go here, Do I challenge this? Do I question this? Because if I do, I take off this, I take off that person, I take off that person. They leave, then the church doesn't have any more money. And if enough people leave, then the church closes down. So what do you do? Well, human logic dictates you give the people what they want. Now they will act like, oh, it's not about me, it's about Jesus.

20:21 I just want everyone talks a big game until they are confronted with the reality, and then well, we see what happens. So even Ai acknowledges the problem with modern preaching is it's a man centered interpretation. It neglects historical and textual context, and basically it approaches things from a devotional perspective rather than an exegetical one number four. This is all Ai just destroying modern preaching, completely criticizing it. Ai goes on to say, what you see in modern preaching is a complete disregard for the philological structure of Isaiah.

21:01 Modern preaching disregards the theological structure of Isaiah, especially forty through fifty five. This section of Isaiah is deeply structured with themes of God's sovereignty over nations Isaiah forty Isaiah forty four through forty five, the futility of idolatry Isaiah forty one and Isaiah forty four, the servant of the Lord as the true Hope Isaiah forty two, forty nine through fifty three, the ultimate restoration of Israel Isaiah fifty four through fifty five. Instead of following the flow of Isaiah's arguments, preacher's cherry pick encouraging phrases. So the modern day preaching disregards the theological structure of the section. Now some now what again, there are two kinds of churches.

21:49 Some will completely ignore the philological structure. Others will mention the theological structure, talk about it. May even give you the theological structure at the beginning of the sermon. But then it's this very deceptive thing. It's like slide of hand, Oh where did the card go? Because they give that to you, and then immediately it turns into about us, about us, about us, about us, about us, about us. So when the sermon is over, do people remember the philological structure of Isaiah forty through fifty five. Of course not. They remember it's about us, and almost inevitably, it turns into Oh, I need to do this, and I need to not do this, and I need to do this, and I need to do this, and I need to read my Bible more, and I need to go to church more, and I need to pray more, and I need to do this, and I need to do this.

22:37 Because almost everything becomes nothing more than a theistic moralism. Ay I gives a fifth problem, the misuse of prophecy to make everything about the church. It's amazing how Ai knows all the problems with modern day preaching, but the church itself doesn't seem to know the problem modern day preaching. Ai says. Another problem with modern preaching is they misuse prophecy to make everything about the church. Many preachers assume everything in Isaiah forty through fifty five directly applies to Christians, without recognizing the original audience was exiled Israel. The promises are rooted in Israel's restoration, and some of the elements are fulfilled in Christ, but not all are yet realized.

23:26 Oh wait, are you telling me there's promises in Isaiah forty through fifty five that are not yet realized even inside the church. Oh what a radical idea. Oh it's amazing that Ai can figure that out. But oh, talk to some people. Oh no, everything in Isaiah forty through fifty five, I mean it's the church. It's the church. It's the church, because you know, Israel doesn't matter. Ai goes on this modern preaching leads to oversimplifications, like assuming every promise of deliverance and blessing is for the church today. Just not the case when you're dealing with Israel. You're dealing with promises. You're dealing with the covenant promises that are only for them, they don't apply to us. To make them applicable to us, well, you're gonna leave people either with false promises basically telling them that God's going to take care of every problem, which he never promised us.

24:26 He gave specific promises to Israel, and so you're gonna ultimately set people up for major disappointment, major discouragement, major just feeling like this stuff doesn't work, or you have to take the promises then somehow flip them on their head, spiritualize them, so then then you can then try to make them work for us. But that's what the text is about. Ai goes on to say, this is shocking what modern preaching has become, but sadly is very common. So AI goes, we have now reviewed over one hundred sermons, and none zero have done justice to the historical and textual context. That is a i's conclusion after reviewing one hundred sermons over one hundred sermons. It's AI's assessment is none zero none mine. AI's assessment is that none have done justice to the historical and textual context. This shows that most preachers are trained to approach scripture devotionally rather than exegetically. It also suggests that many are preaching from tradition rather than engaging deeply with the text. I've said it before. We've got to get rid, especially those of us are not Catholic. We're like, no, we do not

25:59 follow tradition. We do not follow tradition. We don't we're not Catholics. We're all about the Bible. We're all about the Bible. And then how do we approach the Bible based off our own theological tradition? So how do you If you are from a lordship tradition, every text has to be lordship. If you're from a calvinistic approach every section. We approach everything from our own philological tradition. I don't care what your theological tradition is. When you open the Bible, your theological tradition needs to cease to exist because you approach the text by allowing the text to say whatever the text says, whether it makes your theological tradition comfortable, or whether it offends it, whether it ticks it off, whether it goes completely against it, your theological tradition should not matter. If we truly believe and scripture being the final authority because scripture rules over your theological tradition, not your theological tradition ruling over the text. But if if your approach to the text is always in light of your theological tradition, well then it becomes simple. Every passage is just interpreted in light of your theological tradition, just becomes the hermoneutical guide. Well, if you want to do that, then that's no different than basically your theological tradition becomes the magisterial magisterium and then it tells you what you can and can't do with the text. That's that's just a Protestant form of Catholicism. So AI says, well, what

27:33 can be done? This is what AI tells me that I can do. AI says, continue exposing these issues through your podcast. Well, thank you, Ai, I greatly appreciate that you want me to continue to expose these issues. Well, all I do is tick off people and irritate people, and nobody wants it, and nobody likes it because they just want me to give them a little devotional message with three little points. Next, AI said, is your careful study of Isaiah forty through fifty five is highlighting a massive gap in biblical preaching so wide. What difference does that make? Number three, it says, keep challenging listeners to evaluate sermons critically and demand a better handling of scripture. Okay, everyone, I'm gonna do it. I demand a better handling of scripture.

28:22 I demand it, and guess what, nobody cares. It's an exercise in futility. I would have a greater chance of getting dropped in the middle of Africa somewhere and trying to preach to you know, some wild animals. They may listen to me better than people will. Because none of this matters anymore to the modern church. AI tells me I should create teaching resources on Isaiah forty through fifty five. Since so few sermons handle these chapters correctly, there's a clear need for our resource that does. Oh, so you want me to create a teaching resource through Isaiah forty through fifty five. Nobody would follow my teaching resource if I gave it away for free, because nobody wants to teach that way. Because everybody wants Isaiah. They want little sermons.

29:15 People go to church for sermons. They don't go to church for the text. If they went to church for the sermon for the text, then they would get mad at sermons. But they want sermons. You don't give them sermons. People start complaining and whining, Oh, I want church to feel like church. I don't want it to feel like this. Okay, well then never mind. Well just let's get up a You just as well go on those websites, order a prepackaged sermon and make everyone happy. Now, all you gotta do is you got to say it a certain way, because you got to fool the people and thinking we're really digging into the text, we're really studying. If you manipulate the people to believe that they'll buy anything, they'll buy into the concept. It's like, well you think you really study the text. Great. All you gotta in most sermons that they think are so amazing is asking five questions about the text. They can't even answer the question, but they'll be convinced that they really studied the Bible.

30:13 Ai goes on to say, consider developing a series, a study guide, or even a book that walks through Isaiah forty through fifty through fifty five exegetically. Oh no, no, I think that's a waste of time, and then this one cracked me up. Engage in conversations with other preachers and teachers. Some may not realize they're mishandling Isaiah forty through fifty five. Oh how cute. I almost want to pat Ai on the head and say, oh, how cute, how naive? You're so ridiculous. You don't understand human beings, right. Ai goes on to say, you could challenge preachers to re examine their approach and encourage deeper study. That's that's yea, yeah, AI is clueless and what to do. AI is great at identifying the problem. It doesn't know what to do either, but it just I just want you to understand AI itself.

31:13 After reviewing one hundred sermons, it's like, I don't know what to tell you. There's a mess. Ai goes on to say, everyone should be shocked. This mishandling of Isaiah forty through fifty five is not a minor issue. It's systemic. When an entire section of scripture is consistently misapplied, it distorts the message, it distorts theology, and it impacts how we understand the Word of God. So AI is like, Hey, everyone should be shocked by this this is a systemic problem.

31:58 This is an issue. It's amazing. AI understands the problem more than people will be like, Oh, you're just getting upset about nothing. Who really cares? All you want to do is just pick on everything else, blah blah, all the little whining that you'll get a. I was like, No, this is a major problem. This is a systemic problem. This really impacts theology under our entire understanding of God's word. AI then tells me this. AI says, keep pressing forward, because if even a handful of people start seeing Isaiah forty through fifty five as it was meant to be read, that's a major victory. Even if just a handful of people do right, Yeah, Okay, that's easy for you to say, Ai.

32:55 AI thinks that that's that's the way it should be approached. And well, I I like the I guess positivity. It tries to put a spin on all of this, but I'm telling you, like, it's just crazy. And just in the last what twenty four hours, we've heard Isaiah forty three and the sermon review we did utterly just totally annihilated, destroyed, just a mess. Fifteen minutes ten minutes before going live. I see another sermon on Isaiah fifty four, verse seventeen, no weapons formed against thee. The THEE becomes me and you and I, once again ripping it out of context.

33:39 It has nothing. It becomes nothing about Israel, nothing about their situation. It becomes about me again. It has nothing to do with me. So and just in twenty four basically twenty four hours, already two more sermons can be added to the list of that over one hundred. So it's easy to say, keep pressing forward, even if only a handful of people get it. I don't. I almost what I want to do is I almost want to just finish Isaiah forty, since we're right in the middle, and just say that's it. I'm done. There's no point. It's waste of time, it's useless, it's meaningless, there is no point in trying to fix this problem. It's and it's just you reach a point where the dam has broken and there's no there's no there's no you're not going to get the water back in, there's no repairing.

34:32 The day it's gone. The water is gone and there and and everything has been flooded over and there is no going back. There is no going back, and you can say, how did we get here? Well, I think we got here A lot a lot of it has to do with devotional material I mean, the church constantly told people you need to do your daily devotions, you need to do your daily devotions, and then the church would try to provide devotional materials for those who actually did daily devotions. Using devotional materials, well, they got this devotional approach to scripture where if you take any devotional every scripture becomes about you, your daily struggles, your daily problems, your daily encouragement, giving you a sense of daily hope, daily piece. It's all about you. You you, you, you, you you, So then every scripture becomes about you. You get trained to do that. Sermons are all about you, are all about you. So since everything is all about you, then you approach every scripture about how it's about us.

35:28 Even though people say context matters, context only matters for someone to say, well the contructs to a residual, Nobody's like, okay, good, now what is it? What's in it for me? And I think I think it comes down to we we created this mentality that the church is there for something other than the actual study of the text. It's about everything else. It's about community, friends holding hands, singing kumba, y'all having as having this, and we we've annihilated the text. So because we're not doing things in the traditional way.

36:12 This morning, I wanted to take the thirty about thirty minutes and just just I've started putting that as an introduction to something I can now make it just separate. And it's just like, what has Isaiah forty through fifty five? What have sermons taught us about modern preaching? What has I'm gonna I'm probably just gonna take this, make it its own podcast episode. What has one hundred sermons taught us about modern preaching? And it has taught us all of those things? What is it taught us? It taught us that most modern preaching is anthropocentric, man centered. It's a man centered interpretation. It dominates the church. Number two, It shows us that the church and modern day preaching neglects historical and textual context. Number two, the church approaches reaching in a devotional way rather than an exegetical approach.

37:03 Number four, it disregards the theological structure of Isaiah forty through fifty five. Number five, it misuses the prophecy of scripture or prophecy in general to make everything about the church. And what has this shown us well, it says that it shows us that most preachers are trained to approach scripture devotionally rather than exegetically, and it also suggests that many are preaching from tradition rather than engaging deeply with the text. That's what it demonstrates. So what I'm going to do is I'll stop there, I'll upload this, and then we'll come back in and then we'll start our work on Isaiah forty twelve through seventeen. That's what we'll do.

37:54 Then we'll do our work on Isaiah twelve through seventeen and see if we can at least finish that. I don't know if we can after we get done with Isaiah forty twelve through seventeen, I don't know if we can get to Can we get to eighteen to twenty four? I don't know. I don't know if we can get that far. But we'll come back in and do that. So I wanted to at least get this out of the way because if I just make it an introduction, well then you see, then you know, then the next part would we would be taking our time. This way I can break it up. If I was doing that introduction at church, well then it would just be a part of it. But this way I can break it separately. So I'll upload this and then we'll come back and then we'll start our work on Isaiah forty twelve to seventeen and we'll see what we can get accomplished. So I'll stop now, upload, and then we'll be back. Be ready, Isaiah forty twelve through seventeen. This is where we are.

38:48 I've got pages of notes here, and we'll see what we can do and what we can do to understand the text exogetically in context. But at the same time, we've got to realize what modern preaching is doing. We've got to see it. You've got to be able to hear it. You've got to be able to recognize it. You've got to be able to go what is happening here, because if you don't see it, there's got to be some group of people out there who can be. And it's not about I just want to make sure this is very close. It's not about well we do it better than them. It's not about who's doing it better. It's about even artificial intelligence, who has no emotional, you know, connection to it. It has no in a sense team in the argument. It can just say no, exegetically, hermoneutically in context. There's not been a sermon yet out of the one hundred I've reviewed that's done justice to the text.

39:45 That's AI's own words, with no team that it's it's trying to protect. AI is not trying to say I do it better than you, you do it better. It's just saying, no of the sermon of the hundred has come close to handling the text has done justice. The text not based on someone's theology, not based on someone's opinion, based off just basic hermeneutical principles. So you can try to reshape this and recast this as oh, just you're making a big deal out of nothing. At least artificial intelligence is willing to agree this is a problem. In fact, AI classifies it as shocking. AI classifies it as a major issue. AI classifies it as a systemic problem throughout the church. Now, if you don't want the text, and guess what, then it doesn't matter. And the reality is nobody everyone says they want the text, but they don't we see that in the handling of the Sermon on the Mount Matthew five through seven. I mean we see that and how a Hebrews is constantly handled. It's not handled in light of it becomes. It becomes, and we see it over and over and over and over and over again. It's a systemic problem. We just had no idea when we stumbled onto Isaiah forty three that we were going to find out that Isaiah forty through fifty

41:15 five it is the pinnacle, it's the it's the best case, it's the best object lesson on how this occurs. So we'll be right back. We'll look at Isaiah forty twelve through seventeen, and we'll do that in about ten minutes. Thanks for listening to this episode and hopefully the next one, we can advance our discussion and benefit everyone. Thanks for listening. God bless