00:00number 32 question asking and
00:03implicational thinking we're going to be
00:05reading from Genesis 18
00:0823-33 I'm going to read selections from
00:13this is the encounter between Abraham
00:15and God and Abraham's intercession for
00:19Sodom and Gomorrah it is the longest
00:21conversation that God has with anyone in
00:26Abraham approached God and said will you
00:29sweep away both of righteous and the
00:34he's he's doing a case-old study okay
00:37suppose you find 50 righteous people
00:40living there in the city will you still
00:42sweep it away and not spirit for their
00:44sakes surely you wouldn't do such a
00:46thing destroying the righteous along
00:49with the wicked why you would be
00:51treating the righteous and the wicked
00:53exactly the same surely you wouldn't do
00:55that should not the judge of all the
00:57Earth do what is right then God answers
01:01and says no I wouldn't do that and then
01:03he goes on and says suppose they're only
01:0545 righteous people rather than 50.
01:07suppose they're only 40. let me speak
01:10again suppose only 30 righteous people
01:12since I've dared to speak to the Lord
01:14let me continue suppose they're only 20.
01:17suppose only 10 are found there and the
01:19Lord replied then I will not destroy it
01:27are in a place of learning
01:30in discipleship and education
01:33isn't so much more than just learning
01:36facts it's how to connect the facts how
01:39to analyze and think
01:42true education is not about learning
01:44data and acquiring data and information
01:47true learning is about learning how to
01:52how to really ask questions how to
01:55compare it's not just knowing the
01:58capital cities of each Nation
02:05how do we grow in our thinking
02:09suppose suppose suppose suppose Abraham
02:13was asking God he's trying to understand
02:16and what he's doing in this analysis is
02:18you compare similar things
02:21and dissimilar things two things that
02:23are like each other is called a
02:25comparison two things that are not like
02:27each other it's called a contrast he
02:29says you can't treat two people who are
02:31different in the same way it doesn't it
02:34doesn't work it's not just it's not
02:36right so learning to follow a thread of
02:39thought until its final conclusion when
02:41you grab a hold of something Abraham had
02:45an understanding of what was Justice
02:46they start with 50 and then went through
02:4840 and then 30 and 20 and 10.
02:52what if he'd continued a little bit more
02:57God said I will not destroy I will not
02:59destroy I will not destroy he was not
03:02like the gods of the Pagan Canaanites
03:05who had to be appeased who were always
03:07trying to find an excuse to destroy
03:13our God is a life-giver
03:15so good education learning about
03:17learning how to think following up a
03:19good question is where the doorway of
03:22great discovery let me tell you a
03:29almost three decades ago I was teaching
03:32at the school of biblical studies and
03:34why I'm in Cape Town South Africa
03:37and they'd invited me to speak on the
03:39book of Romans and at that time I was
03:41doing my Master's thesis on the role of
03:44women in leadership and I've been
03:46looking at the difficult passages that
03:48sometimes are cited in by Paul in First
03:51Corinthians 11 First Corinthians 14 and
03:55and so he's been spending hours and
03:57hours on those passages but now I was
04:00tasked with teaching through the book of
04:03Romans and as I'm reading through that
04:06book and preparing to teach I come to
04:09chapters 9 10 11. it talks about
04:14God's encounter with Rebecca and how he
04:18promises that she will have two children
04:21that he's chosen the younger to rule
04:26that thought is the foundational thought
04:30for all of those three chapters and
04:34Paul builds his understanding of the
04:37history of Revelation on the word of God
04:40that came through a woman
04:42I went to bed that night with that going
04:44through my head and thinking
04:48how crazy is it people have said that
04:50Paul refused to have women teach but he
04:54builds his whole teaching of church
04:56history on the principle that came to us
05:00by God through the agency of a woman
05:04wow I fell asleep thinking about that
05:08and in the middle of the night I was
05:11awakened with a thought
05:13I believe it was God who is speaking to
05:16me and sometimes I love it when God when
05:18we have questions and God answers our
05:21questions but I think find it even more
05:23exciting at times when God pauses and
05:25asks us questions and challenges us to
05:29come up with the answers and that night
05:32woke up with a thought I'd never been
05:35through my mind before and was like
05:38if that word came through a woman what
05:42other parts of the Bible came only
05:46and would you be willing to take those
05:48parts of the Bible out because if you're
05:50not supposed to have receive teaching
05:52from a woman any part of the Bible that
05:54came through a woman should be cut out
05:55from the Bible if that is indeed what
05:57the scriptures are saying wow that was a
06:00interesting thought but in order to
06:02answer that question I had to like
06:06Abraham had to pull through the threads
06:09I got myself a new Bible and I read
06:12through it and every time there was a
06:14passage where there was only a woman
06:17um I would highlight it and I found that
06:26that the only explanation is that they
06:29came to a woman you know versus like
06:31when Elizabeth and Mary are together and
06:35and they worship God for the miraculous
06:39birth that both of them are going to
06:41experiencing in Luke Chapter 2 or when
06:44Rebecca and Leah are arguing about who's
06:48going to sleep with the husband Jacob
06:50that night in in Genesis and there are
06:53passages where only a
06:55there's no man within shouting distance
06:57and they come to the description so very
06:59conservative so I made a list but then I
07:01thought maybe I missed it so I just said
07:03I'll read the Bible again so I did it a
07:06second time and then I thought well I
07:07still might have missed it so I got a
07:09another time and did it a third time and
07:14each time with a new Bible because I did
07:16not want to be influenced but by what I
07:18had seen before and that last time I
07:20asked four friends to join me and I gave
07:23them each a Bible I said would you mark
07:25these passages now I had seven Bibles
07:27that have been read through and marked
07:29with passages that only could only have
07:32come to us through women and that's how
07:34I you know that takes about a hunt if
07:37you're just reading the Bible from cover
07:38to cover it's only 72 hours in English
07:40but if you're pausing and highlighting
07:42maybe 100 hours so it's somewhere
07:46500 and 700 hours between myself and my
07:50trying to find the scriptural evidence
07:53to answer the question that God gave us
07:56that gave me that night
07:59866 verses that's more than the Gospel
08:03of John that's more than Romans and
08:05First Corinthians but together there's
08:07no way we'd cut those passages out of
08:09the Bible God speaks to women but how
08:13hearing a question pursuing an answer
08:16and hanging on analyzing and thinking
08:19and reflecting and continuing on until
08:22you go like oh this is God's ways
08:25friends if we're going to change society
08:27if we're going to be a blessing to the
08:29communities in which we are giving an
08:31alternate to the corrupt ways that we
08:34live in today's age we're going to have
08:37to think deeply we're going to have to
08:39search the scriptures profoundly we're
08:41going to have to love intensely and
08:43we're going to have to persevere and not
08:44give up until we get the answers from
