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Transcript

Good afternoon, brethren. Second Samuel here. I’m not opposed to raising jokes especially if they get laughs.

But I’m going to start with a scenario, and I want to see if it’s familiar to you. So, after church services and maybe sitting down in the potluck, and there’s a conversation that you’re a part of and it starts to get a little heated. So it could be about news, could be about health, could be about any sorts of thing. But there’s two sides, you’re one of them and neither one of you seems to be backing down. Things are getting a little more, well, a little bit of friction and it gets awkward, doesn’t it? It’s awkward and uncomfortable.

I was almost going to ask for a show of hands but scratch that. Let me give you a different scenario. You are witnessing two people have a conversation, and it gets heated. Neither one wants to back down and it gets a little awkward and uncomfortable. Who’s seen that before? Everyone’s raising their hand. So that’s happens. We’re human beings and there’s that friction sometimes and things do... those sorts of situations do happen.

They do happen and the Bible actually addresses them and says what we should be doing instead. Because those are uncomfortable, we don’t like them, do we? So let’s turn to Romans fourteen. I’ll reenter my glass for my left hand in this here. Romans fourteen. It shows us about those sorts of conversations, it starts to kind of put a light on them. So in Romans fourteen and verse one, “Him that’s weak in the faith receive you.” We’ll get into that in a moment what that means, but the second part of this verse is especially important.

“Him that’s weak in the faith receive you, but not to doubtful disputations.” Thank you, King James, for saying doubtful disputations. Like, what does that mean? But just break it down. Break it down. Think of those conversations where’s that friction neither side’s backing down. Usually, it’s about something that’s doubtful, isn’t it? Sure, there’s some doubt to it, whatever that conversation is about or disputation. Dispute. So it’s something of dispute. Those two words kind of help us to frame that.

And the reason why it makes us uncomfortable is that we’re people of truth and as Christians, we’re one, we’re unified. We know that. We’re together. So when that happens and there’s those conversations and occurrences, it makes us feel uncomfortable because is wrong and we should feel like we’re one. The revised standard version puts it this way. So instead of doubtful disputations, it says this, when you come together, don’t have disputes over opinions. Disputes over opinions.

Don’t argue over opinions and your thoughts, what one person thinks the other one may think the opposite. Don’t argue over those things. And as we go, you’ll see that doubtful disputations are more than just opinions, but it helps us in our mind to get past that kind of King James language and see opinions. Okay, I can wrap my mind around that. We don’t want that. We don’t want those frictions, those sneaky divisions that can happen where we often hear of division, and we think of doctrinal, and you can have all of those things on board.

So doctrinal divisions definitely wrong. We know that and we avoid it, but you can, and we can have all things doctrinally correct and what we believe, but still have these little divisions over opinions and doubtful disputations. So brethren, let’s look at how we can avoid these doubtful disputations that can needlessly drive us apart. So we’re here in Romans fourteen, and Paul is talking to the Romans and he’s bringing up a number of different disputations that are happening.

So in fourteen, it says, “Him that’s weak,” fourteen one, we’ll read it again, “... in the faith, receive you, but not to doubtful disputations, not to argue over opinions. For one believes that he may eat all things and another, who is weak, eats herbs.” Likely what this is talking about in the first century is meat sacrificed to idols. And there was a debate happening, a discussion happening where some thought, I can’t eat something that’s sacrificed to an idol and elsewhere, the Bible addresses that and said that that would be fine.

But it was a question and people were unsure, and what was that call on that? So it said, don’t push that person that’s weak and is still unlearning certain things. That’s fine. Don’t have those doubtful disputations. Verse three, “Let him, that eats not and let him, that which eats not judge him, that eats for God has received him.” So don’t judge the one that doesn’t eat and don’t judge the one that does, for God has received them all.

“Who are you that judges another man’s servant; to his own master he stands or falls.? Yes, he shall be holding up for God has made me a bold stand.” Here’s another of those doubtful disputations, “One man esteems one day above another and another esteems every day alike, for let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.” So here’s another of those things that we’re unsure that people were talking about. So some were likely, this is talking about fasting and different days to fast.

So some thought there was a certain day that you needed to fast and it came from practices and Judaism from Christ’s time. And they would think Thursday’s the day to fast or Wednesday or whichever one it was, but there was a specific day and others thought, no, you can fast any day. It’s whenever you need to. And there was friction over that but Paul is saying, don’t do that. Of course today we know that you can fast any day and generally, not on the Sabbath, but could in special circumstances because that’s a feast day.

But those sorts of things are not as in question today, are they? You can think of that’s because of the internet. We’re able to know some of these doubtful disputations, things that we may be unsure of regarding spiritual things are already showed up. If you ask your minister about something and he doesn’t have an answer, he can contact Headquarters and get an answer very quickly of what is the right thing here. Where we don’t have these doubtful disputations, these questioning over opinions in the same way on spiritual things.

They can come up from time to time, but it’s different today. So how can we apply this now? How can we apply this now? Where do these doubtful dissertations come for us? I was mentioning the first century. You can see a lot of how those different questions came up in X and it goes over them. One example is circumcision. Where they were unsure early on. Some of the people who were converted were unsure. Do I need to get circumcised? And for men, that’s a big question.

It’s like, if you’re not and you’re a grown man, do I need to get circumcised? And in Acts fifteen, you can read that if you wish to later. But it goes through the whole process and they bring different ideas and the apostles work together and they came to the conclusion that, no, you don’t need to be circumcised if you’re a Gentile and you came into the truth when you were older that’s not something necessary. Still need to keep God’s law and keep the Sabbath day.

Don’t eat unclean meats, it has all those stipulations, but those questions were answered back then. Those were the questions that were answered and we have access to them through our literature answers to those questions, they’re all there. And if they’re not, your minister can answer them. So our doubtful disputations, our personal beliefs come from being personal beliefs, the things that, ideas that we have on our own. They could be opinions.

Here’s what I think about this situation and you can have a strong opinion or a less so strong opinion, but that causes those frictions. They can be sneaky things that we think are facts and they’re really not facts, and we’ll get into them as we go through some of those. But what are some of those situations and subjects that cause these? Cause these disagreements with brethren. Cause us to be separate and apart and feel like we’re not one. I mentioned some of them a little bit earlier, but politics is a big one. In this message, I’ll talk a lot about US politics. I’m sure all around the world, there’s political things where you can have discussions and it can get a little tense sometimes, but it’s easier in the US because there’s two sides. There’s Republicans and Democrats, so I’ll use them as an example as we go through.

But politics is a big one and especially in an election year, like this year, where some of those discussions where voices may get a little louder over potluck, politics is a cause. It can be about medical things and it can be health remedies, something that you think works really well for you and you want everyone else to know about it, or what you think about the medical system today. And someone may make a decision in their life and you disagree with that decision and that can cause it.

And others are just plain old personal opinions. So, you may just think that’s not the way to do it. That’s not what to do, you should do it this way, and that can cause it as well. So those are all different ways that these doubtful disputations can come out. You could be on the receiving end of them, so someone just won’t stop talking about a political figure, whoever it may be, but just constantly talking. It could be positive, or they never say anything bad about them and just constantly gush over this political figure, or it could be the opposite.

They constantly say bad things about a political figure all the time, and we’ll bring it up on every occasion that they can. And that’s uncomfortable. It could be someone who’s trying to help you see something with health that like, you may have an issue with this or that, and they think they’ve got the solution for you and are bringing it to you, and you’ve already got a plan and you know what you want to do, but they’re bringing that.

And it could just simply be a clash of opinions on something like, how to set up the hall for services, or if there’s something thrown into the mix, you have to figure out how to solve it quickly regarding that. Or the kitchen is another place that can happen where there could just be... it could be over small little things, but they can get big, can’t they? Of those just opinions and they can cause those little arguments.

Hopefully, you’re not getting to the point where there’s [chuckles] fisticuffs happening, but it’s usually taste smaller, but it’s still, it’s uncomfortable, isn’t it? And it causes us to feel a little bit separated from our brethren. Turn to Second Timothy. This shows what we should be doing instead. Second Timothy two.

And we will start in verse twenty-two. “Flee also youthful lusts, but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call upon the Lord with pure hearts.” So we’re supposed to flee youthful lust. Things that we used to do, flee those old ways and these disagreements and these doubtful disputations are one of those things. But instead to follow righteousness, faith, charity, love toward one another. Peace, it’s the opposite of what we’re talking about now. Peace with them that call upon the Lord.

Another translation says to enjoy companionship with those that call upon the Lord. Enjoy that companionship. That’s what we want. That’s what we long for, that we have that with all of the brethren all of the time. But notice the flip side of that in verse twenty-three. “But foolish and unlearned questions avoid...” Those questions can mean debates, can mean questioning, can also mean a matter of controversy. So things that are a little more controversial, avoid.

Especially when they come with foolish and kind of you don’t know a lot and you’re coming at a situation that’s where these contentions can happen. Steer clear of those sorts of things. Verse twenty-three ends “...knowing that they do gender strifes.” Those debates, and questionings, and discussions, they gender strifes, don’t they? And strifes can mean battle. A person is at variance, disputes, like we said before, contention, and quarrels.

Strifes seems like strifes. I don’t want that, but then when you start to break it out, it’s like, I definitely don’t want battles, especially when spending time with brethren, don’t want variance, don’t want disputes, don’t want contention, don’t want quarrels. Those are the things that we want to avoid. Titus three. Keep framing this and seeing what we want to avoid. We already know we want to avoid it by just seeing it in every angle, what are these doubtful disputations? What does that mean? What does it mean to argue over opinions?

What causes it? Titus three, eight starts to show us. “This is a faithful saying, and these things I will, that you affirm constantly, that they, which believed in God, might be careful to maintain good works.” So maintain good works. Of course, those are good things. These things are good and profitable unto men. But here’s what to avoid again. Avoid foolish questioning, genealogies, arguing about pedigree. Doesn’t happen quite as much in the United States.

But we should avoid also contentions and strivings about the law for they are unprofitable and vain. Contentions, here, is strife, wrangling, and debate. Same thing like we saw before, but notice what they are. They’re unprofitable. They’re vain. These things are useless and empty. It helps us explain why they make us feel uncomfortable. Helps to explain that. One more verse here is just to see what kind of company though do these doubtful disputations keep?

So we’ll turn to First Timothy six, and I’ll explain what I mean. What kind of company, though, do these contentions and profitable discussions keep? First Timothy six, three. So this verse we’ll be taking it a little more to the extreme, but we’ll just cement in our minds that definitely... okay, I don’t want these in my life. I want to avoid them, and I want to avoid them, especially with brethren.

First Timothy six, three. “If any man teach otherwise…” other than what the Church believes, what the Bible says, “…and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine, which is according to Godliness, he’s proud...” Pride, definitely, is at the center of a lot of these. “...Knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words whereof comes envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings.” So this is someone who’s a heretic, and they’re doing... and they don’t want to right their ways.

Strifes of words are something that they’re known for. That term in the Greek helps to frame this one more time. It means disputation about trifles, trifling matters, little itty-bitty things that when you really step back, and you look at them, it’s a trifle. It doesn’t really matter that much. Like why are we... Why is this occurring? But those small things, those small little disagreements can lead to bigger things, can’t they?

So, brethren, do not underestimate that those little things can add up. If we have those disagreements and arguing little arguments over opinions, over time, they can mean that one church member doesn’t really want to spend time with another one. And it can go both ways, but it causes even more and more separation between us, where it’s not just one time, it can cause kind of more of a rift that’s more difficult to remedy. And you can look at that and say, why does this happen? Why is this occurring and can occur to us? It happened all the way back in the first century over certain things, and it’s happening today. Human nature is part of it, but also so is society. So let’s look at why doubtful disputations are such a big thing today. Why do they happen so often? So up until recently, society had a lot of shared experiences. I’m going to use television as an example because it brings us to the fore in a good way.

But before cable, television was a big deal. Obviously, that’s old now. Before streaming and before cable television, there were three channels in the United States, and probably less than other ones. But there were basically just three channels. You would watch the same programming, and most everyone, there was a high chance that they saw something that you did. And so there was that shared experience. So, at the same time, because you couldn’t record it, you would sit down and you’d watch it, watch a television show.

And then the next day, because you all watched it together, you could talk to your friends or co-workers or whomever about what you saw. A good way to look at this is the series finales of television shows, so popular ones, they were a big deal. And millions and millions of people all tuned in on their television set in their house and watched this at the exact same time. So M*A*S*H is an example. A hundred and five million people watched that at the same time.

TV show about the Korean War. Cheers, eighty-point-four million people watched it at the same time. And then The Fugitive, the TV show, seventy-eight million people watched that all at the same time. That’s a lot of people. Regarding The Fugitive, I prefer the Harrison Ford movie, personally. But as you look at this, those are cultural touchstones where they drew people together and they made you unified. You have shared experiences that you can talk through.

And we’ll see soon that that’s not the case as much anymore. But of the top twenty series finales of TV shows of all time, the most recent one was two thousand and five. So there’s been a lot of TV shows since then, but the same amount of eyeballs and doesn’t command the same amount of people watching it. So we’re not all seeing the same things and kind of experiencing the same things together. And you don’t have those shared experiences to be able to discuss.

And like, “Oh, I remember that.” So how does that translate to news? In the past, it was similar, where there was basically three channels and there’s three different places you could get news. And they all had to stay pretty in the center. They didn’t go too far left or too far right because they needed to appeal to a wide audience because they were one of the only three in the game. And boy, how things have changed, haven’t they? With news. There’s so many different news organizations and we’re not all seeing those same things.

You can think of newspapers. In the past, there were quite a few of them, but it wasn’t hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of news websites where you can find the one or I can find the one that kind of fits for what I think about and how I feel. And I’m going to go there. This is mine. They’re speaking my language. It doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t do any of those things. YouTube doesn’t help the matter for news consumption because you can watch. It will keep feeding you what you like.

So if you only like a certain news organization or a certain type of news, whether it’s left- or right-leaning, or far right or far left. Whatever it would be, it’s going to keep feeding that to you. And pretty soon, you’ll be in an echo chamber where you only hear what you want to hear and any dissenting opinions or viewpoints you just will never hear. Things have changed a lot. And that can creep for us as well where the Internet will cause us to kind of be in that bubble, where this is what I believe and I don’t want to hear anyone else say anything. I’m absolutely certain this is correct. Another issue with news today is there’s a lot of news guessers. And that’s what I call them, news guessers. And what does that mean? They’re just looking at certain things and then guessing what’s going on. They won’t bring any facts, it’s just, they’ll see a video. It’s like, here’s what I think’s happening here with no proof. Then often later, there’ll be more evidence and more framing the situation, which will color what you see in that video, but they had guessed what it’s like. They’re news guessers.

They also are often just talking about what could happen in the future rather than what is happening now. And that is coloring how we think we consume that and it’s out there, and it’s a challenge for us as brethren. We know we’re supposed to be watching news, don’t we? We know we’re supposed to be watching world events. And then the news organizations are not helping us by being news guessers or just guessing what’s going to happen in the future. Anything like that. It’s all based a lot around feeling.

There’s a recent example, there’s a big cable news outlet, I won’t reveal the name to protect the guilty. But a big cable news outlet is there was a release of statistics from the FBI, and the FBI said this is what’s occurring in the United States right now. And there were certain numbers and that organization didn’t like it. And this is what they said. They said to the audience, “Do you feel like that’s the case?” So they’re all of these numbers there and it’s like, do you feel like that’s the case?

They didn’t bring up any reason why, hey, here’s why the FBI numbers you shouldn’t trust them because statistics are statistics and you can twist them, but they’re able to... they didn’t bring that. They didn’t bring any of that proof to show hey, this is wrong. It was just asking the audience, “Does that feel like that’s correct?” I guess we’re all about like feeling. I feel like that’s right. I feel like what’s going on. And that’s dangerous. That’s where these opinions creep into our lives and you can feel like it is and then start to believe that it is and to be careful with it.

Also, the news landscape today can build a distrust of anything that you don’t agree with. That’s news. I’ll get off my soapbox now because I work for the real truth and I work at news and look into news all the time and it frustrates me to see that, what’s out there, and it takes work. So I feel for you, brethren. It’s part of my job to look into news and be able to navigate that a little more. I feel for you having to try to figure out, is what they’re telling me correct or not. What about health matters? This is a challenging one.

There’s so much out there. As far as with Google, you’re able to just search and see so many different aspects of what’s going on with health. How to solve this issue or that issue? I know that a lot of people, instead of going to a medical doctor, they’ll go to Dr. Google and try to figure out what’s going on in their life, which is good, but being careful like you’re not an expert. The human body is incredibly complex.

But it’s easy to find, hey, this seems like it’s right to me, or this works for me or seems to be working for me, and then try to sell other people on it as well but remember, the human body is complex. This can feed into wrong thinking, going to echo chambers can happen where you refuse to listen to other opinions or see the full scope of what’s going on. So be careful with those. COVID-nineteen definitely made this worse where during that time, there was a lot of questioning of institutions and things and the medical community and pushed toward more extreme areas.

So just be careful. Be balanced with those. But know that is one of the places that these doubtful disputations can crop up. It’s about health things because it can feel like you’ve got a solution. You want to help brethren, but they need to be willing to listen or sometimes you just need to back off.

And finally, opinions. With the society today, opinions are everywhere, and they tend to be binary where it’s either the best thing of all time or it’s the worst thing of all time and there’s nothing in the middle.

There’s no nuance, there’s no gray areas, and when you bring a central view, people think you’re crazy. For example, my wife thinks I’m crazy but there’s an app we’ve been enjoying and it helps plan meals and in it, it asks you to rate the meal after you make it. So plan the meal, helps you with grocery shopping and things and then you’re supposed to rate the meal. And I haven’t... I don’t think I’ve given anything it’s five out of five stars.

I usually give it about three stars. And my wife said, “Do you not like it?” I said, “It was good. It’s three stars out of five.” To me, that’s a big deal, but she wants it to be five stars or one star. No, she doesn’t go that way, but you see it with ratings for products and things where it either needs to be five stars or it’s the worst experience of all time. And there’s never that middle ground where three stars is good. I recommend it to other people, but I’m not raving about it.

Maybe I’m just a stingy person with opinions or with compliments but you see that everywhere, don’t you? Where there’s that extreme. It’s either the best thing or it’s the worst thing. And you try to bring nuance in a middle ground and it’s hard to find others who do that. So if you’re looking for information and things, but it’s also, just difficult to do that in your life because human nature tends towards extremes too. There’s one more reason why this is happening is that I’m taking on the temperature of the world.

So we’re looking at how the world is doing that. How does that impact us as Christians? Go to Revelation three and verse fourteen. So we can take on the temperature of the world seeing what’s going on there. Verse fourteen, “And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans,” those the people that rule, judge, and decide. We know that’s the age we live in today. It’s happening out in the world. You see it in the media landscape, but it can impact Christians too. People that rule, judge, and decide.

“These things say the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.” We’ll skip to verse seventeen. Because you say I am rich, increased with goods, and have need of nothing, know you not that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.” But focus there on I’m rich, increased of goods, I’m need of nothing, that’s the attitude that breads these doubtful disputations. Where you feel like, I’ve got this figured out, I know what I’m talking about and you kind of walk into conversations.

And if that’s your attitude, that’s our attitude, then it will cause those frictions. It’ll cause us less to drift apart and we can’t quite be one. We want to be one, but it gets much more difficult when that’s happening. So what’s the solution for all of this? How should we avoid it? How should we avoid some of these pitfalls we’re seeing, and ultimately, how do we approach one another? You can think of... a solution would be to simply avoid these topics altogether.

When you come together as brethren, all right, we’re in fellowship, we’re going to talk about very safe things. And that’s a solution, but you lose a lot of important opportunities to growth when you do that for growth. And it would mean that, okay, we’re supposed to be watching world events and watching trends and conditions. And then I come to service and everyone else is doing the same, but we never talk about it.

That’s not right either, is it? So how do you navigate that? The first is to make sure your side of the street is taken care of. And that’s kind of breaking through that echo chamber like I talked about before. I keep using that term, what does it mean? Echo chamber. It’s your blind spots, places where you don’t know that you don’t know. I think the best way I’ve heard of an echo chamber described is that, well, first that you’re in your chamber, there’s no dissenting opinions or viewpoints.

And you’re just in there and you only hear and are confirmed of what you think and believe. But someone recently, I heard them say that echo chambers cause intellectual inbreeding. Intellectual inbreeding. So you think of what happens when humans inbreed over generations. You may get those really big ears that stick way out, like funny teeth, their faces askew, and there’s that constant drool that comes down. We don’t want that with our ideas, or opinions, or viewpoints, do we? I don’t want intellectual inbreeding, so you have to break yourself out of that bubble. Break yourself out of that bubble, and know what’s happening in the world, see it for what it is, and make sure you are seeing other viewpoints with these different matters. Proverbs one, verse five. The biblical principle. Proverbs one and verse five. How you can break out of these echo chambers, or you’re just kind of just hearing the same thing all the time help to question and make sure that you’re staying in the middle of the road. It’s important to do this.

Proverbs one, five, “A wise man will hear and will increase learning, and a man of understanding shall attain to wise counsels.” We need to be able to hear. We need to be able to be looking to increase what we know, and you do that by going out and making sure that you’re not just getting information from one source and those sorts of things, but that’s the same. That’s why we should be talking about some of these things with brethren. And neither do you doing it in the right way, but that’ll help you to see where those blind spots are.

Brethren will because when we come together, each of us is doing something a little different. Remember, we all have our own thing that the algorithm for YouTube is serving up to us, or our favorite newspapers, or news outlets, or YouTube channels that we watch. We all have different ones, and we can come together and share the different sides to those things as we’re going through them. Proverbs four, five. Go over there. One more place that shows, “Hey, you shouldn’t just stick to what you know, go get help from other people too.”

Proverbs four, five. This is how we can break out of those issues, and the first step in making sure that we’re removing doubtful disputations from our lives. Verse five, “Get wisdom, get understanding; forget it not, neither decline from the words of my mouth.” And verse seven, “Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore, get wisdom, and with all your getting, get understanding.”

Get out there and do it. Make sure you’re looking at those things. We talked about health. Health is a good example where you need to go back and question kind of some of your assumptions or some of your beliefs or opinions about certain things because things change. I mentioned earlier that the human body is complex, but think of the different studies over the years about butter. It was the devil incarnate for many, many years. Butter is awful, but it’s softened. And don’t eat a ton of butter, but it’s not seen as awful as it used to be.

Eggs are another one. Well, eggs were awful and now they’re seen to be better now. And it kind of goes back and forth over the next couple of years. Probably what that means is they’re okay for you. They’re not the greatest thing ever and they’re not the worst thing ever. But coffee, one year we hear coffee is going to cause cancer, the next year it’s curing cancer. And then it’s like, this year you don’t feel guilty for drinking coffee and then this year you do. No. But everything in moderation.

But that’s an example where getting out of there, get that understanding. Question, re-examine what you believe and what you hold, especially personal beliefs. And then that will ultimately help you when you go to talk to brethren. If that’s your position, where you’ve got a wider view, you’ve seen both sides to arguments, you’re able to see that gray area. When we go to talk to brethren and spend time with them on the Sabbath, it’s much easier to approach them and approach these topics.

Let’s turn to First Thessalonians. As you’re going out and getting different viewpoints and things, there’s a Bible principle that can help you. First Thessalonians five, twenty-one is where we’ll start. “Prove all things...” First Thessalonians five, twenty-one, “...Hold fast that which is good.” Now this is definitely something to do for Bible doctrine as we’re coming into the church. Prove all things, and then hold fast that which is good. We prove it, and then we hold fast to it, the truth. But you can take this out into the world too. Go out and prove things.

Prove them. Make sure that this is what you think it is. You may have an assumption. Question that assumption, prove it. And then hold fast to it once you find those things. However, there’s many, many, many, many things we can’t prove. And we have to be careful of those. When you can’t prove them, let them go. The verse doesn’t say this, but you can’t prove it, let it go. One quick example of that is, we’ll talk about COVID-nineteen again because it’s a good example.

Did COVID-nineteen come from a wildlife market where they sell all sorts of animals, pangolins, and bats and they’re all together? And is that where it came from or did it come from a laboratory where they do research on COVID-nineteen? Your head would say it’s definitely that. But as of right now, I don’t know. And there’s a lot of different information on it. You can’t know for sure right now. I know I’m meddling a little bit here because we may have strong opinions on this, and strong thoughts on it, but as of now, from all the research that I’ve done, we can’t know for sure.

That happens with a lot of things. We just can’t quite know and that’s one to just let go for now. Two things will happen. Either we’ll never know because China is going to cover up what really happened, or more information will come out over the years if we’re still here, hopefully, we’re not, and then we’ll know more about it. And they’ll go, okay, that’s where COVID-nineteen came from. But for now, just let it go. Because those discussions come up in a conversation, that’s the type of one that can get kind of back and forth.

And you can realize that you’re getting into a doubtful disputation, one of those strifes, debating over trifles. Because who cares, ultimately, whether that’s happening? In all of these, the prove all things, hold fast that which is good, be especially careful of conspiracies, brethren. Conspiracies are something that can bite us and it gets more and more extreme. And those are the types of ideas and thoughts that can push us to want to tell others. I’ve got this secret now. I’ve got this, and I’ve got to tell others. And it can be...

That’s a prime example of something that can bring up those tense situations, those strifes, things that we don’t want among our brethren. So be especially careful. If you tend toward conspiracies, you find them interesting, just be careful. As much as possible, prove all things. You can’t prove it. ninety-nine-point nine percent of conspiracies, you can’t prove them. Just let them go. Get them out of your mind. Move on to other things that you can know and are more sure of.

So as we approach one another, attitude is all-important, brethren. Attitude is everything. Let’s turn to Ephesians four. Here’s the attitude we should have. Ephesians four, and we’ll start in verse one. “I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you, that you walk worthy of vocation which you are called,” so this is our job description, it’s like the vocation that we’ve been called. So what does that look like? What does that job that we have look like? Verse two, “...with all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering forbearing one another in love.”

So we should come at each other, and when we talk to one another, come with lowliness. The outline of biblical usage, that’s a Bible help, they say lowliness means having a humble opinion of yourself. A deep sense of one’s littleness. So as we approach conversations with brethren, especially when talking about news or health or whatever it would be. Have a humble opinion of yourself. We’ve been talking about opinions and opinions can cause trouble. This is a good opinion, have a low opinion of yourself.

Verse three, “Endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit, the bond of peace, and avoiding those conflicts. We want to avoid them as much as we possibly can to keep that unity of the spirit. Ah, feels good. A bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, even as you’re called in one hope of your calling. Keep saying one, one, one for a reason. That’s what we should be. But it comes with that having the right opinion of ourselves, low, meek, depressed.

So what happens if a conversation does get a little more heated and starts to see that temperature gauge just starting to go up a little higher, a little higher, what happens when that does? Let’s be honest, we’re all human beings and there will be those moments where things will get a little spicier. The first step is to be the first one to step back and step down. Be the first one to back down. Proverbs thirteen.

Proverbs thirteen and verse ten, “Only by pride comes contention, but the well-advised is wisdom.” So here in Proverbs thirteen, it’s showing you that contention comes from pride. Only when there’s pride there. And almost always when it’s happening, they come from both parties. Be the first one to admit it. You should be kind of if there are two people who... this is happening with our multiple, and clamoring over yourselves to be the first one to back down.

Just back away from it. Back away from it. Instead, we should be doing what it says in Proverbs fifteen. Let’s turn over there. Proverbs fifteen, one. Memory scripture. “A soft answer turns away wrath, but grievous words stir up anger.” So have those soft answers. As you’re having discussions with one another, you can say things like, “Oh, interesting.” There may be a strong opinion that comes at you. “Interesting. That’s not what I read. Here’s what I heard.”

Or, “This is my understanding of the situation.” And as you can, you can add some facts. So helping bring and see that whole situation. As much as we can, brethren, when there’s these discussion happening, it could be about anything. We can talk about news, we’re talking about health, we’re talking about whatever it may be, facts. Rise above the situation. See God’s mind. Don’t just get dragged down into how the world disagrees about things.

Instead, rise above it. See both sides of the issue. See those gray areas. Be able to talk about them and be willing to talk about them. Because then you can build past, and you can grow and you can learn with one another. And when these things, sorts of things happen, brethren, just be ready to forgive. If things go farther than you want them to, forgive. First, if you were at fault, say you’re sorry and work that out with the individual.

Where, once again, if you’re avoiding all of these conversations, you won’t have that opportunity to grow closer to your brethren and work through those situations. And you’ll be better for it in the end. You’ll be better for in your end. Let’s turn to First Peter. First Peter three as we wrap up. And we’ll start in verse eight. First Peter three, eight, “Finally, be you all of one mind,” Work with one another. Talk to one another. Help see situations, rise above them. Bring God’s mind to them.” When we’re fellowshipping with one, brethren, those are the things that we can be doing. “...Having compassion on one for another. Love the brethren.” Have compassion if someone tends to be a little more pushy. Overlook that where you need when you can. “Love as brethren, be pitiful and courteous. Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing, but contrariwise, blessing. Knowing that you are there unto you were called, that you should inherit a blessing.

“For he that would love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile. Let them eschew evil and let them seek peace and ensue it.” Seek peace and ensue it. With everything that we can do, seek peace with brethren. So let’s fellowship with one another. Spend time with one another. Help one another be balanced to break out of those echo chambers. Forgive each other when we step out of bounds. Be the first one to back down if there is a little bit of contention, if those doubtful disputations happen. Brethren, as much as we can, let’s avoid doubtful disputations.