Pastor Plek's Podcast
Pastor Plek's Podcast
Faith, Leadership, and Second Chances
338: Dive into this episode with Pastor Plek, Pastor Holland, and Jordan Smith as they explore the powerful themes of repentance and divine compassion in the book of Jonah. They discuss the striking parallels between Jonah's reluctant journey to Nineveh and Martin Luther King Jr.'s courageous leadership during the Montgomery bus boycott and reflect on how Nineveh's transformation underscores the impact of genuine faith and obedience, offering insights into the nuances of prophetic disobedience and the significance of the term "Elohim."
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and welcome back to pastor plex podcast. I'm your host, pastor plexo. God, all of you are joining us, and with me in the studio is none other than east side pastor holland greg howdy. You may know him from his twitter handle or x handle, where he battles Pokemon on the regular. All right, jordan Smith, welcome back to the show. Forensics expert and local hero. Yeah, excited to be here. Welcome back.
Speaker 1:All right, so we're talking about Jonah, and specifically Jonah, chapter three. And so there's a lot of things and, holland, I'd love to hear your insight on this because I was hurtling, I was trying to overcome three things on this because I was hurtling, hurtling. I was trying to overcome three things One, preaching through Jonah. Two, doing blessed, which is our begin with prayer listen to people's stories, eat with them, serve them, share the gospel with them Easy, and it was Martin Luther King Day, and to incorporate Martin Luther King into that message, all of that in one, wow, luther King Day, and to incorporate Martin Luther King into that message, all of that in one, wow. That was like that was the challenge on a Martin Luther King weekend. So that's kind of what I was going for Very challenging, very challenging. So what it is.
Speaker 1:I talked about how Martin Luther King was actually always sort of like in his early, early twenties, always sort of passionate about racial injustice. Growing up in the South, went to school in the North and as he was graduating he had to decide will I go be a part of racial injustice living in Montgomery Alabama or will I lead the charge from his 24-year-old mind to bring racial equality to the United States from Detroit? And so he and Coretta talked it over after getting married and then chose eventually to go to Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama. And it wasn't even a month later that he was sort of nominated to take lead for the Montgomery bus boycott down there. So anyway, I went from that talking about how Jonah down there.
Speaker 1:So, anyway, I went from that talking about how Jonah, after he repented, after he was thrown up from the whale, was sent to a nation that didn't want to hear from him and he didn't really give them the gospel he called. It was interesting. He called God Elohim all throughout the book of Jonah. And yet, maybe because they knew Jonah, maybe because the word of God doesn't return void, they took the message of 40 days and it will be overturned and repented, so much so that Jesus said that those people would stand up with the current generation he was at and judge those who didn't repent and believe in Jesus, because their faith and their repentance was so powerful and so strong.
Speaker 2:What is the significance of Elohim?
Speaker 1:in that Elohim is just a general name from God. You wouldn't know that was Yahweh. It's not the covenantal name, it's just the. In fact, Elohim means gods plural. It could also mean judges, but it's usually referred to. It's like the gods, but in our context we know it's God, right, but it's also. Elohim is also, even though it's a plural, Im is like with an S. Im is always a singular noun, even though it has an S at the end, so to speak. I know that's super complicated, probably more than anyone ever wanted to go on the Elohim. But it could also be about the ruling council, right, you know, you can kind of call the ruling council where Yahweh sits atop of that, and it's still. It's kind of like saying the elder board when you really met the pastor. That's kind of what it means. Did that help you?
Speaker 2:Jordan, Probably not, I mean you didn't say that on Sunday, just wanted to make sure. Yeah, I mean you didn't say that on Sunday, I just want to make sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's so complicated. Sometimes I skip on that kind of stuff because that's like am I going to get into the angels and how? They were immortal beings but not God, and they sometimes activated God's will for the Lord, and so the Elohim responded to something. It may not have been God, but it was God ultimately that gave him the authority to do that. So that's where it gets complicated.
Speaker 2:I think just saying yeah, it doesn't refer to specifically God in Jonah's context.
Speaker 1:Move on. I mean, that's a good point. I didn't know that. I do appreciate that. So Jonah heads to Nineveh. He gives the simplest message ever 40 days and Nineveh will be overturned.
Speaker 1:And the overturn could be like Genesis 19-2, where Sodom and Gomorrah was overturned by fire, or it could be like the Psalms, where God overturns your heart and causes you to repent. So sometimes when people say, did God change his mind? In this case he actually didn't change his mind. He fulfilled it and Nineveh was indeed overturned from the heart. You like that. But he also has compassion to God, who wants no one to be destroyed but wants all to come to everlasting life, and he gives them grace, which he's known for doing. Okay, other than that, we just sort of landed on that. Jonah went and obeyed God and God gave him a second chance, and second chances are something that God's all about, and the thing that I brought up that I appreciate is that Jonah got a second chance, but he didn't get. Like a. A week off he's laying on the beach covered in vomit and God says, hey, now go to Nineveh, arise and go. And so then it says he arose and he went. Thoughts on that.
Speaker 3:The best thing you can do is obey God, and so taking a week off from obeying God sounds like a break, but it's not what you think. Obeying God's always the best thing. Even if you're tired, even if you're covered in vomit, even if you just had a rough couple of nights at the bottom of the sea, obeying God's always the best thing to do.
Speaker 1:Have you ever experienced being in the belly of the fish Jordan and then going? I know what God's calling me to do, but I need an emotional break to ease into it. It feels like for me. It kind of reminds me of immediately, because she'd asked for too much and so I'd go work out a little bit that was not quite as hard and then eventually work myself up to one of her workouts. Is that kind of how it works? Anybody you know of like that's how it works for them with God. Oh, I mean, I'm all about comfort.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I think that's how we are and I think there's a part of us that say like listen, god, and we kind of work out deals. I part of us that say like listen, god, and we kind of work out deals. I need this emotional um crutch for a while and I know, god, you're supposed to be my, I take all my worry and concern to you, but you don't understand. I'm emotionally needy right now and I need this um porn. I need this woman. I need this not God-ordained relationship to sort of get me through until I can get on my feet. So we use people, use stuff to kind of get ourselves emotionally. It's like an escape until we become functional again, and I think that's problematic for a lot of people.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean for me. If I'm wondering if God's calling me to do something, I'll be like, hey, can you show me? And I normally don't get a sign. So I'm wondering if God's calling me to do something, I'll be like, hey, can you show me? And I normally don't get a sign. So I'm like, all right, move on, which is probably not a good thing, but that's my justification for that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I appreciate that. That's why I think one of the things like there's God's word, there's God's spirit, which means you can believe the truth, you can be convinced about the truth, but there's always God's people. You need accountability to follow through what God has called you to do. What do you think prevents us from following what God calls us to do when it comes to people? Why is the accountability aspect so important? Holland? What do you think?
Speaker 3:Accountability is important because we can, I think, convince ourselves out of doing something, even if we know it's the right thing to do. Because we can, I think, convince ourselves out of doing something, even if we know it's the right thing to do, because we have stronger affections for some, whether it's comfort, like Jordan mentioned, or we can kind of reason our way through and lie to ourselves or fool ourselves. But when you bring other people in community and they you know those things like they sound good in your head, but when you say them out loud to other people, you know he realized, okay, I can't actually follow through with it. I realize how bad it sounds. Or other people call you out or correct you or help you or pray for you.
Speaker 1:So, um, yeah, I feel like when I say stuff out loud, I can hear how childish I sound and when I, when I just say it in my head, it makes total sense. So when Jonah says out loud, yes, I do well to be angry, you know like, oh, you are, you have a problem. And I appreciate that about this book because it just sort of reveals the dark heart that we all have. And I do feel like Jonah is a mirror to the soul not only of us contemporary times, but to the people of Israel and probably to the people of Judah, who incorporated it into their canon for a reason, because it was so powerful about what happens when you don't have grace, like God has grace on you. One of the questions we got it wasn't really a question, it was more of a comment of a comet Very interesting using MLK during the sermon considering his list of heresy and here's the list of heresy that I got he was denied the reality of the Trinity and the resurrection.
Speaker 1:He was a serial adulterer. He was on tape laughing as a woman was raped by several men. He wrote about his desire to redistribute wealth in the United States. He was on tape laughing as a woman was raped by several men. He wrote about his desire to redistribute wealth in the United States. He used the civil rights movement as a tool to advance a communist agenda. He's not a hero. He should not be celebrated. That's pretty extreme statements, and you know I don't know if I was I can say I definitely know that his adulterous ways not good. I didn't know fully, probably before I said he was, you know, a full on like Trinity denier, but he definitely did deny Jesus divinity at one point, so I guess that then that denies the Trinity. I didn't know about the resurrection though, but that's sort of a wild list, especially the part about laughing as a woman was raped by several men. That you're just like. What a wicked deal to which I don't know what do you have? What do you think about that, jordan? What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2:I mean it's pretty messed up if that's true Like I have no idea if that's true or not, but also it's just like yeah, you can talk about Chris and say every single bad point about him. Everyone's going to hate him, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I do think it is problematic. If you were to like you should just believe whatever Martin Luther King believes. And that really wasn't the point of the sermon. It was more of like a hey, here's a guy who went and did something crazy. Now, granted, was it for God or his own communist agenda? He, at least you know, cloaked it in a good God thing packaging. You know, I am a pastor, I am a, I love God and and the what I quoted, the quote I read from, is like we believe in the teachings of Jesus, which, if you believe in the teachings of Jesus, you believe that he is God. So it's, it's, you know, one of those things where it's, it's good to know that.
Speaker 2:So people just say Jesus is a good teacher though.
Speaker 1:Sure, but part of his teaching was that he's? God.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Mormons say they believe in the teaching of Jesus. Jehovah's Witnesses say they believe in the teaching of Jesus. Fair enough, fair enough, fair enough.
Speaker 1:Pretty much there's a lot of cults. It's like, what do you mean by that? We could ask him and one day I guess we'll find out. Yeah, I don't know. I think the primary purpose of that is saying like, hey, facing your fear, doing the hard thing is kind of what I want people to get out of that. I'm not advocating a martin luther king like civil rights agenda of, uh, like the oppressed versus the oppressor, or a marxist agenda, uh, where it's redistribute, redistribution of wealth, or something along those lines. But I thought he brought up some great points and, uh, what he did you can't deny it with the nonviolent protest that did seal into the hearts of America the reality of like the that brought repentance. So I think that is good. So you know, he might be off on a lot of things, but he was on at least on one thing, and I'll give him credit for that. So, yeah, I can appreciate that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I recently talked to someone about this too. He said the evidence for the virgin birth is too shallow to convince any objective thinker, brought up the divinity of Jesus, virgin birth and bodily resurrection and said we could argue with all degrees of logic that these doctrines are historically and philosophically untenable. And so he Do you know when he said that, give like a you can. Let me see here.
Speaker 2:I mean you're removing the whole faith aspect at that point.
Speaker 1:right, Right, yeah, that sounds very Marxist, so that I mean I'm not saying that, he didn't say that. What I'm saying is like I wonder if that was very beginning when he was a rookie, or was that when he was older, when he was, like you know, hardened by all of his life, I don't know. Um, but I mean he had a hard go of it. I mean he did get stabbed in the chest by a woman, uh, and he kept going and it was a. It was a black lady, was a, she had a mental what's it called Breakdown. Yeah, like an episode. Yeah, just was like started stabbing King at a book signing in New York City, which is sort of in Harlem. So isn't that wild, yeah, anyway. So, whatever he believed, he believed it fully and it might have been her heresy. He believed it fully and it might have been her heresy.
Speaker 1:But I guess the point I'll use things. If he is a complete and out-and-out heretic, then I use Martin Luther King as the good Samaritan On the one thing he did the right thing when it came to standing up for racial justice, and he probably did a lot of wrong things, and I'm glad that we can point that out and just like probably every other historic figure had a lot of wrong things and and I'm glad that we can point that out, and you know, just like probably every other historic figure, had a lot of great and bad, although, right to be fair, martin luther king being a heretic is kind of more of a bigger deal. Uh, so don't believe anything that martin luther king taught. Believe what martin luther king did, or is that too far?
Speaker 3:well, how about? You can't even say that because of the orgies and adultery and stuff, but some of the things that he said and some of the things that he did were very good. You know there's—and that's true of a lot of people that in American history, as well as in redemptive history of the Bible, you know you have someone—you have Lot. You know who's, who's called righteous Lot in the new Testament, um, who you know was ready to hand over his daughters to um, an angry gang raping mob. Um and uh.
Speaker 3:You know you have very, very questionable decisions made um by people that are referred to as heroes of the faith in Hebrews, chapter 11, right. So I think you can say like, yeah, jesus is perfect. Every other person, even the greatest heroes of the faith, fall short of that. Even like there's all truth, is God's truth? Right, and you can have it come from the mouth of a heretic or an atheist or a donkey or a donkey, and still acknowledge the truthfulness of what someone is saying if they've said it. Well, and while not affirming everything that they've said and done, I guess yeah.
Speaker 1:And I'm looking at I think one of the places that people are quoting him from is one of his papers that he wrote in 1949. And I'm like, yeah, all right, he probably. And when you're starting out and you're listening to the liberal professor and and doing all the things, I'm like I don't know Cause, when, when there's some of the last speeches, like the last speech he gave in April of 1968, he's like I've been to the mountain, I mean, he's talking about heavenly things, and so I don't. Again, I know that I wrote a whole bunch of ridiculous things in my twenties. Um, that I'm like, uh, I'd like to have that back. Um, so again, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Uh, he became more hardened over time, but what he was right about was the racial justice thing. What he was wrong about might've been like Marxism and a lot of things, but what was kind of wild is that he took the, the nonviolent thing, which was really wild at the time, especially for somebody. It was probably more Gandhi in him than Jesus perhaps, but Gandhi got the nonviolence thing from Jesus so long way around, and Gandhi was also from Jesus so long way around, and Gandhi was also really racist. So there you go. You know, like that's kind of a wild thing to think about too. Everybody's flawed Like. So don't quote Gandhi, because we all know that he hated black people more than anything, and he probably would have been turning over in his grave and very angry at Martha King for using his teaching. There you go, there you go, anyway. So it's just kind of a wild reality that you have there.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, like we can summarize this by saying it's not a perfect analogy.
Speaker 1:No, it's not. It is not perfect. Every analogy breaks down, I'm sure, if we went too far with the good Samaritan. Uh, that doesn't mean convert to be a Samaritan, that means just do what he did in that one particular instance. Anyway, well, hey, uh, remember any questions you guys have, um, regarding Jonah, regarding anything, please text me.
Speaker 1:I actually had one person come up to me on uh yesterday and said hey, I really appreciate it about Jonah because that was my one hang up with the Bible and that kind of made me giggle just a little bit because I was like your one hang up with the Bible was a dude being eaten by a fish, or what about the talking donkey?
Speaker 1:Yeah, like that, like that, if maybe you hadn't gotten that far in the Bible yet. You know, people usually don't know, they know about the fish and Jonah, they sometimes don't know about talking donkeys, but you have a talking snake, you have lots of talking animals. It's like you know Aesop, fables and the Bible. People are like, like the same. And. But he said like when you, when I talked about how there was a dude swallowed by a fish and you can kind of look up a story from 2021, uh, I spent like 40 seconds or so in the belly of or in the mouth of a whale. Uh, now, granted, he did get spit out and vomited out and it wasn't three days, but it doesn't make it seem completely impossible that somebody could survive in there and make it so kind of wild yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know the digestive time frame around whales.
Speaker 1:Sure, or the miraculous time frame of how God can stop time, can make people have superpowers, like Samson ripping off the city gate or, you know, splitting the red sea so people could walk through it. You know, if we can believe any of that, then a dude in a stomach of a whale can't be that super hard. There you go, all right. Thanks so much for watching. We are looking forward to getting to hear more of your questions. Please text them in. We'd love to hear from you at 737-231-0605. Oh, one other question from that same questioner came in and I'm not sure if we've covered it before, but it is relevant. What is your opinion of Jonah being a prophet still not listening to God throughout the whole book Meaning?
Speaker 3:I think we covered that a couple days ago or last week maybe? Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:All right, good, maybe we did cover that. Check last week's episode. Yeah, yeah, okay, all right, good, maybe we did cover that. Check last week's episode.
Speaker 2:Yeah, check last week's episode. Doesn't every prophet do that, or no?
Speaker 1:Well, he's saying that he never actually repents, okay, and I'm kind of more of the yeah, we did talk about it. I'm more of the yeah, yeah, yeah, he did.