The Christ Centred Cosmic Civilisation
Rod Dreher wrote “to order the world rightly as Christians requires regarding all things as pointing to Christ”
Christ is the One in Whom in all things consist and humanity is not the measure of all things. If a defining characteristic of the modern world is disorder then the most fundamental act of resistance is to discover and life according to the deep, divine order of the heavens and the earth.
In this series we want to look at the big model of the universe that the Bible and Christian history provides.
It is a mind and heart expanding vision of reality.
It is not confined to the limits of our bodily senses - but tries to embrace levels fo reality that are not normally accessible or tangible to our exiled life on earth.
We live on this side of the cosmic curtain - and therefore the highest and greatest dimensions of reality are hidden to us… yet these dimensions exist and are the most fundamental framework for the whole of the heavens and the earth.
Throughout this series we want to pick away at all the threads of reality to see how they all join together - how they all find common meaning and reason in the great divine logic - the One who is the Logos, the LORD Jesus Christ - the greatest that both heaven and earth has to offer.
Colossians 1:15-23
The Christ Centred Cosmic Civilisation
Episode 58 - Myth and Gospel: The Celestial Connection
Joined again by the Reformed Mythologist, Nate Morgan Locke, we ask - what if the cosmic patterns of the universe were fundamentally rooted in the life of Jesus Christ?
Join us as we take a celestial journey through the stars, contrasting the insights of Lessing and Isaac Newton, and unravel how celestial phenomena and zodiac symbols form part of a divine narrative.
Our episode examines the intricate links between cosmic archetypes and biblical stories, illuminating Jesus Christ's role as the fulfillment of ancient prophecies and the central figure of history.
We then challenge traditional doctrines by proposing that the universe's patterns of life, death, and resurrection are all reflections of Jesus' story.
This perspective shifts the focus from seeking an abstract divine essence beneath the Father, Son, and Spirit to recognizing Jesus' story as the core reality shaping the cosmos. Our discussion touches on the power of mythos, exploring how the gospel serves as the foundational narrative that holds the universe together, offering a fresh lens on divine reality through biblical stories.
Lastly, we dive into the complexities of defining divinity and the significance of mythological language in conveying profound truths.
By drawing parallels between the Apostles' Creed and the hero's journey archetype, we underscore the timeless nature of Christ's story. Drawing inspiration from C.S. Lewis, we highlight the unique historical grounding of Jesus' narrative, making divine revelation immediate and relatable.
Join us as we unlock the mythological power of Christ, enriching our understanding and connection to the Christian faith through vivid biblical visions and tangible symbols.
The theme music is "Wager with Angels" by Nathan Moore
just be quiet yeah and let's just see what happens yeah because it's not gonna. Unless you're able to take in the story that's being played out in front of you, you won't be able to answer any of your own questions yeah if you just wait and just let it happen.
Speaker 2:Watch it really pay attention and and that.
Speaker 1:So I've always taken that watching and listening to the thing at present as just being like that is part of the role that we have, as, whether we're just Christians or trying to communicate Christian theology, a lot of it is just about our attention being given over to the gospel, and it's like what would separate Lessing from Isaac Newton in the way Like Lessing is saying I'm looking out at the stars and he's doing the Timon balls of gas thing and he's like oh man, everything's gas with you now, whereas Isaac Newton said oh no, I'm going to describe the stage, the theatre, and realistically he might be like I'm probably one of the best there's ever been at that, like you know, but he's like.
Speaker 2:But I'm only doing that because I know they are talking about jesus and in that sense that the earth is the viewing point to view all this and then, viewed correctly, as the bible says, oh, if you look at this correctly, I mean we could even get into the whole um zodiac idea that there's this way, that there's like justice and and all these like thing, a story is being told literally and you might say that's insane because, like these, some of the formations are stars that are not even in the same galaxies kind of thing, but represent patterns in the sky and it's like, oh yeah, but it's a story where there's like a virgin and, uh, a virgo's virgin and she's going to give birth to this redeemer and it's all
Speaker 2:being played out, the stars above us, or even just the the sun's rising, you say, even just the sun's rising. You say, look, watch the sun is rising. It defeats the darkness like a champion. It's like a bridegroom on the way to get married. Because that's the story of the universe, and there's this heaven and earth, a male and female, to be joined together, and the whole universe seems to be trying to say look, do you get the story that's going on? And right in the center of history, this god actually becomes a human being. And and you say, well, what would god look like if he did show up on earth? Because some people why doesn't?
Speaker 1:he just sit up and you go.
Speaker 2:But imagine if he did, wouldn't he like? Here's this guy who wanders around and he, like you know, controls the weather, feeds the hungry, answers everybody's questions, raises the dead. The demons are scared of him. Then he says I'm gonna die and then I'll bring myself back to life. And he does go.
Speaker 2:Well, that kind of yeah, that is kind of what yeah I think god would look like that yeah but that's the and you say, instead of trying to say, oh, I'm gonna like focus on, like abstract truth one what is the story that the heavens and the earth are saying? And then, where has that story in fact happened?
Speaker 1:So yeah, and has it happened? So one of the things that you were talking to me about before we set up this conversation was was it an interview with Jordan Peterson, and someone asked him about whether things in the Old Testament had happened or whether he thought they were historical.
Speaker 2:Alex O'Connor is asking him.
Speaker 1:So he says, like did those things happen? And Jordan Peterson sort of fluffs, he sort of wants to jump around a little bit. But for him, because he wants to stay in the abstract, and maybe this is a bit of a kind of a Zodiac type thing, because he's a Jungian- so, he's using these archetypal categories of you know, the great hero, myths and the stories, so he wants to keep those as like.
Speaker 1:They're true. That's true out there, and every now and again you might see an actual example of it played out in human history. Yeah, and probably the best example of that is when jesus was in yeah, so jesus is is an example of a cosmic archetype, so he's not the fulfillment of.
Speaker 2:Or even the origin of it, or the origin. Yeah, go on.
Speaker 1:What do you mean by the origin and fulfillment?
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I think what Jordan's doing is saying yeah, like there are certain he might be saying, let me say he might be saying something. As big as the universe functions in a particular way and you see certain patterns occurring over and over again, and what humans have tended to do the wise humans is encapsulate these ways that they observe life, works kind of thing, and encapsulate those in stories and archetypes and things, and so what?
Speaker 2:what's good about the bible, he says, is if you mine it you will find wisdom about these patterns that like, so like where famously he goes, like the exodus is. It did it happen and he'd go. Well, that's not so important, as it it always happens yeah, yeah, yeah, and you're like oh, I see, so you're for you.
Speaker 2:It's an instance of a general pattern of humanity like sort of thing and then you'll say, oh, and jesus is a great example, you know, an embodiment of these archetypes, and he illustrates things that are generally true. Now, lessing would be like exactly that is what jesus is. He's on my side of the ditch. There are certain, certain things that are just true right and jesus is illustrative of them okay it's an instance of them. But what the whole claim of what? What the bible is about?
Speaker 2:jesus said no, no, no, he's the origin of them. So if the unit say the universe has patterns of death and rising, yeah and seeds die and spring up, resurrected, and the the sun rises to life in this resurrection every morning and defeats the darkness of death. Yeah, it does that because at the the art, the origin of it is the is jesus of nazareth yeah and the like.
Speaker 2:The bible makes this outrageous claim. He is this lamb slain before the foundation of the world, Like this story of Jesus of Nazareth being born, living this life, dying being resurrected, ascending.
Speaker 2:That is prior, not like chronologically, but prior in the sense that that is the origin. That story is the origin of the universe itself. So when he makes the universe, he writes that story into the universe and makes sure that the whole universe bears witness to his life and he's like one day I'm going to do these things, but I'm going to set the whole universe up so that it's about that, it's about that, so that it's not that he's merely an, so that it's not that it's me. He's merely an, an instance of something that's cosmically generally true. It's that the universe. So it's not that he's a projection of it, it is a projection of him. Yeah, does that? Yeah, yeah, no that's so.
Speaker 1:It's so helpful because I think a lot of the time when people are recognizing and would you say it's a grace of God that people can recognize that there is this story- out there, oh yeah. And so. But of course, in our sinfulness we twist it and we turn it into something else, and that's why people are so nervous when we talk about myth and mythos, because they're like like oh, I know what you mean by myth. Basically, what you mean is there were these stories of you know demeter and persephone it's like it's just.
Speaker 1:You know, it's an etiological myth, it's just because in the old days people weren't very clever.
Speaker 2:So they didn't understand. Yeah, they don't understand stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah so they have the stories and they're supposed to help us, whereas when you're using the word mythos, I think, and when I'm using the word mythos I'm meaning that the, the story is primary, and, and maybe some of the people in the kind of churches that we've been part of would feel more comfortable if we just said the gospel is primary. Yeah, but so do we want to?
Speaker 2:I think we have. Why do we want to? Differentiate between the gospel and the mythos, and because the mythos is, the is like a framing story in which everything is. It's not just because sometimes like it's okay, gosh, but like if you mean like gospel, if you go back anglo-saxon, god's spell yeah like a spell that he has cast over all creation and what is? That spell. It's the story of Jesus.
Speaker 2:And like the whole creation holds together. As, glenn, we touched on this idea in Hebrews, you know, when it says Jesus is the expressed image of the Father's person and holds everything together by his powerful word, as if, like he is telling the story of the universe and that's how the universe holds together. Going back to the aslan cs lewis, where he sings it into being, yeah and that's, and then it's as if, as he see, as he describes in song the universe, it comes to be because, he's telling the story.
Speaker 2:It's as if he's saying this is the story of the universe. And as he tells it it becomes yeah, and it's as if like and that's a really different thing, because it's like there is a storyteller at the very center of the universe what is the story that he's telling. That so um so.
Speaker 2:Mythos means that yeah and it means like what we tend to do, like kind of like try this on the doctrine of God, like see how you I find nearly every doctrine of God is utterly rubbish. Like utterly rubbish. Okay, that's going to get us in trouble. But the reason I think it's utterly rubbish nearly everyone I ever read is because and that's not fair, but a lot of them is that they are doing that mistake of trying to go let's dig down to get to the rock okay and so they'll say right, here's god, father, son and spirit.
Speaker 2:That's not our starting point. What we need to do is dig down to get to say the essence, the fundament, the fact there's something under them okay and if we dig under them, we'll get to this thing. That is the foundation bedrock of what a god is okay, like a divine essence yeah and then having.
Speaker 2:Then we'll try and define what that is yeah and then we can build on that, the three persons, and try and fit them, and so it's like a what they do, it like the bible never does, that the never never goes. Uh, you know, when you know jesus doesn't. Okay, this is how you should pray. Try to imagine an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient essence that nobody talks like that at least to old Jesus.
Speaker 2:You know why that's a problem? Because it's like that problem of saying, if we're going to understand the stars's, like, try to abstract down to what, what are they made of and how do they move, and things like that, like we can get to, and it's like no, no, don't do that you might.
Speaker 2:You might get to a correct description of it provisionally, but you don't know the truth. With the living god like, we're not going to be able to do that. What is the composition of the divine persons like? Well, this is what they're made of. I mean the absurdity of that. Or this is the regular patterns of divine persons, or something Of course. That's absolutely absurd.
Speaker 1:And because the abstract categories you're trying to make those primary You're trying to make those a reality.
Speaker 2:Yeah, try to say that's the reality, the real real, the real, real, real is that and then there's a kind of second then, secondarily, let's talk about these three who were made of that stuff okay, no, I'm saying that's absurd.
Speaker 2:We have no way of being able to work out what they're made of, or, like, what is the essence of them or what makes them divine. I'm like, well, what are you talking about? You fool like how does jesus define his divinity? He just goes oh well, I'm sent from the father, I'm the father's son yeah and then for him. That's, that's what makes me divine yeah like he doesn't go. Oh well, I'm made of a divine stuff yeah like what an absurd thing.
Speaker 2:So I'm saying it's impossible. It's an impossible task to work out, like to try dig down to the divine essence. Yeah, like and, and our east eastern christians, like the, the oriental authors and author, they're always like what an absurd thing to do of don't even, don't need to even ask the question is blasphemous, let alone to try and answer it.
Speaker 1:Kind of thing yeah so, um.
Speaker 2:So I think it's impossible and also undesirable, you know, is it even desirable to try and answer it kind of thing? Yeah, so, um. So I think it's impossible and also undesirable, you know, is it even desirable to try and work that out? But is it not more truthful to just say well, here are these three, and it's like father, son spirit, and that's automatically what I would call mythological language right, because there's a it's family and it's that sort of thing, and that's why Proverbs 30 verse 4, I've written Proverbs.
Speaker 2:why have I written Proverbs 30 verse 4? That's probably relevant. I better look it up quickly because I underlined it.
Speaker 1:Are we in Sister Woman of Noble Character, the Wife of Noble Character no?
Speaker 2:No, it's this one. It's that Agor guy and he says and I've got King James here because it's the original, let's you know.
Speaker 1:Go on.
Speaker 2:Who hath ascended up into heaven or descended? Who hath gathered the wind in his fists? Who hath bound the waters in a garment? Who hath established all the ends of the earth? What is his name and what is his son's name, can you tell?
Speaker 1:well, of course, that's just poetic language too.
Speaker 2:We've got to get behind that, and we you cannot say just poetic, anyway the word, but it's like that's the. Thing that's what people do. They go. Well, that's not serious I'm saying no, that's, that's utterly. That's the thing. That's what people do. They go.
Speaker 1:Well, that's not serious, I'm saying no, that's utterly serious, that's the most true, that's the real real. That's the real real when he's like saying let's stop mucking about, right?
Speaker 2:Who is the one who does all these things and use mythological language to describe, like the sun, the moon, the stars, the weather, and what is his son's name? As I feel like now we're?
Speaker 1:now we're not mucking about, we're getting right to the heart.
Speaker 1:Go to the garment bit, so it starts with the the ascended, descended yes so one of the challenges people are going to have and I think maybe you know to to to put this back is that the ascending descending thing feels like oh, there's now this kind of there's this place yeah, totally and then you know, there's this character who's going up and down so you've got this, this protagonist who's going to be going on a little journey up and down, back and forward all this sort of stuff right and I and, and he's good, there's, and he's wrapped stuff up in a garment, so he's got things like there's objects and there's and, as you say, it's really mythological.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a story with a hero.
Speaker 1:So the thing I'm most excited about sort of studying more in the next couple of years is how the Apostles' Creed, particularly the middle bit about the son, is the origin, as you were saying earlier, of the hero's journey, which is the joseph campbell idea that he talks about him.
Speaker 1:So he's not a christian but he, he wrote the hero of the thousand faces and really trying to show people how what the jungian you know, like what those guys recognize as being, there's a story out, there is a story and there's some archetypal things and there's like some tropes that keep coming up and you're like, oh, that seems to work and we've got these, these steps and the journey, and they cross a threshold and all that sort of stuff, and to say that when we talk about Christ, who is conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, and so on as he goes on his journey, that that is both origin and fulfillment of this monomyth, this true one mythos.
Speaker 1:But and again to go back to Lewis, he's got an essay, Myth Became Fact, where he says the myths usually take place in this nowhere land and nowhere time, but the fact that it happens on the Pontius Pilate, Pontius Pilate's included in the Apostles'.
Speaker 1:Creed which is weird, because he wasn't like a and he was the guy we started with, with his what is truth and stuff. It's like he's here, Like the real. Real is right in front of you and that's why lessing's freaked out, because he's like I could cope with a jordan peterson archetype thing.
Speaker 2:This isn't.
Speaker 1:This is something that seems to be generally true, yeah, no, no, no, no, it's not a general truth.
Speaker 2:It's a historical truth that is projected onto the universe by him yeah and that's the freaky thing.
Speaker 2:It's like this guy lives this life and it turns out that life somehow is written into the entire universe prior to him, living it like from the very foundation of the universe itself. This guy's story is already present in all things, yeah, and that if we, if it is a general truth. It's general because it was first particular. It was first particular, yeah, and then projected from him to all things. So that's why you know god, the father from whom all fatherhood comes.
Speaker 2:That's the bible yeah, yeah and that's that weird thing where people like jordan peterson, another I mean, he's a great guy and everything. I'm not wanting to troll him too much, but I'm just saying he'd do a lot better if he just got wised up to jesus a bit. But it's the um. That thing is like oh, he's always going on about.
Speaker 2:Oh, there's this thing about people's relationship to a father child. Stuff is primal. And I'm like, yeah, like even before the universe begins, it's kind of primal. Yeah, what? And that this issue of related father-son relationship is unbelievably primal, much more than you think. And he thinks, oh, it's so primal because all humans deal with it. And I'm like, no, it's more primal than that. It's like everything in the universe orbits around a father-son relationship by the power of the spirit. You know what I mean. And I always think he needs to go further. So when people like that mythological why I know the word mythology, yeah, you're right, people struggle with it because they're like myth busters, like falsehood busters yeah, he's like no mythos is like maybe, like it's this way of taught, it's, it's describing.
Speaker 2:I think really it's kind of describing reality as it really is, yeah, rather than mucking about with abstractions yeah and it's like in the bible, revelation four and five, or daniel seven. So this is what heaven's like. It's a door. This is what heaven's like. There's a door opens. This is what heaven looks like, and there's a throne, and instead of it going, oh, there's this like supreme being who has all power and things.
Speaker 1:The.
Speaker 2:Bible's like well, yeah, but that's an incredibly weird way of describing it's like just don't bother trying to know, Don't try and dig down under what you see it's as if Daniel dig down under what you see. It's as if daniel just say what you see, say what you see.
Speaker 2:So he says oh well, there was like this throne and this ancient days and there were like tons of angels and holy ones and books are opened and then there's this son of man guy comes forward and gets all this authority about. That's what I saw, that's the story of what I saw. And it's like, yeah, now just tell that story, because that will actually tell you the truth about everything. Revelation, you know four and five. It's like john's like what well, I was in the spirit and then I saw this.
Speaker 2:This is what I saw yeah and he just tells us what he saw. And there's this throne room and there's like an emerald rainbow and there's a throne and there's some dude on it who's like carnelian and you know and things like that, and he says I'll just tell you what I saw and we what the temptation is to go. Yeah, but what is that really?
Speaker 1:yeah and he's no. That is what it really was.
Speaker 2:That's what I saw, and so that is the reality at the center. It is, but we know. But like we want to translate, it into some weird abstraction.
Speaker 2:But is it not interesting? And when Jesus says, when you pray, just go our father in heaven. So he's literally saying I hope you've got exactly that image that John or Daniel has given you or that Moses gave you in the tabernacle, Just literally, have that as a little kid would. And if you said to a kid, could you draw the father in heaven, He'd pretty much draw some sort of like well, he has a throne and let's have an old man on here or something like that.
Speaker 1:Do you see what I mean? Because people often will talk about oh, you know, people get stuck on the signs, you know.
Speaker 2:So they'll be like oh, it's the road sign that says london is like um right right and they go.
Speaker 1:Imagine how stupid it would be if you got to the road sign and you went oh, this is where it's like this is this isn't london, this is just the road signs but what we're talking about is that if you were in the middle of london, yes, and you're literally right there.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, this is a sign it's pointing me to. I can see big ben right there.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, this is a sign it's pointing me to. I can see big Ben right there. And there's the Thames, the London Eye, and then a bit further down there St Paul's Cathedral, but what? Is London, but when will we get to London? That's right, true London, that's right, london, london. You're like, no, you're in London it, that's it that's it.
Speaker 2:That's so. That's exactly nate. That's you nailed it, that's it it is john's like no, this is god there's the father, yeah here's the son yeah, there's the spirit.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's god, that's god and jesus, like now. Think of that every time you pray and don't try to go. Yeah, but what is it really? No, no yeah that's it really, and it's like, and it turns out real. Real truth is kind of described in the bible personal, relational, family, even geographical language, even the geography of a universe that has structure and upness and downness, as you would say, and it's like that and I don't know you make this like.
Speaker 2:One of the things we know is like if you go God is omnipotent or he has all power infinitely, you go oh yeah, okay, that sounds quite powerful. But if instead you describe what is in Revelation? And you go, there's this guy on the throne and there's emeralds and lights and angels and there's this choir singing these songs, and worthy is the lamb and all things by his will and all that, you come away. Oh that's powerful, much, much more than that silly language of abstraction and that's because it's show, not tell.
Speaker 1:And if someone was to say oh.
Speaker 1:Lionel Messi is, statistically, the best football player that there's ever been, and he actually he's won all of this number of trophies, which is a really significant number. He's very, very, very good, like he is. Many people would say he's the greatest of all time, and it's like why don't you actually show me some of his goals? Let me go watch him play, and then I might come away going, oh, now I'd actually like to learn some of the facts about him, you know, and to be like to learn some of the facts about him, you know, and and to be able to recall some of the goals because it's been displayed in front of me yeah it's actually been kind of a reality that I've been able to see and I've been able to engage with, rather than it's just a set of propositions about you know and.
Speaker 1:I, because I often think about it as I'm when it comes to philosophy. I'm not very good at philosophy, partly because I can't think about the. I have to think of the images. I have to think of the specific things, and so when I'm confronted with a thing or an object or a person, a thing that I, you know, then I can engage with it.
Speaker 1:I feel, as though I can kind of cope with that, whereas if I'm just being asked to consider some abstract nouns like time, you could tell me about time, but if I'm late for a train, like that, I'm aware of time, like I know what time is. And again, lewis goes into this and myth became fact where he's like. The human mind is like, can be abstract, but our, the concrete realities, is what we confront. We can confront, you know, pleasure and pain, and and and and this dog and that sort of. We can deal with that because it is a thing that presents itself to us, is shown to us, and that's how we engage with it. Rather than no, you should really just try and wrap your rational brain about these real concepts which aren't you know.
Speaker 1:I mean, all the images of them are just kind of.
Speaker 2:No, I'm 100% with you and that's why the Bible says no this. If you were to see into heaven now, this is what it really looks like.
Speaker 1:And there's the Father.
Speaker 2:And you will be able to see the Father completely, you know, to the pure in heart. You will see him Like eventually. You're just going to see all this, but for now here's just a few little images to keep you going, kind of thing.
Speaker 1:But think of that, don't try to go beyond them, or beneath them?
Speaker 2:you don't. One, you don't know what you're talking about. Two, there is nothing. But this is it. There is nothing beneath the father, son and spirit. This is actual reality and if you could go to that highest level of reality, that's what you'll see. And I think us trying to be clever we've actually become thick, like really thick, and don't have as good of like.
Speaker 2:It's much more awe-inspiring to take the mythological picture of God like that story geography happenings, comings and goings, characters that is much more awe-inspiring than mucking about trying to dig under that.
Speaker 1:And there's nothing there. There is nothing under this, the further you dig the further away. You're going to be forever, yeah the only distance is away Away, not deeper.
Speaker 2:And that's why, if you really want to be overwhelmed by Jesus, just read the stories about him. There's nothing so moving and overpowering as that and almost in a way that I think, when God shows just how much of a God he is, it's actually really at the cross and it's something very concrete, and he says, like all these other gods wouldn't go into death, but I'm gonna, and when you watch me die, then you'll know I'm the real deal yeah and it's like nothing makes me think of the power and wonder and wisdom of god is watching him die in weakness and shame and god forsakenness.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know I can't get my head around that.
Speaker 1:Nah, no one can and and the, even the very things of you know.
Speaker 1:So we only really have a focus on them, on on like good friday yeah but do you think like the crown of thorns exactly like a crown, and again with, with, with, with, in story, you have objects and you have wardrobe and you have costume and you have like, there are things that are there, and so just the simple, like fact that there is a crown made of thorns that is placed on jesus head is itself way more useful to me as a christian, than half the books on, you know, systematic theology that I've ever read, because I'm like, no, it's a crown that goes on your head and that's usually something you are like, you're, you're coronated, you are crowned, and that that's a thing that only really happens to the person by someone else is like crowning them, and now that person is wearing the crown, whereas previously they weren't wearing it.
Speaker 1:So a thing happened where the crown was put on, and it's such a basic, a basic action and it's such a basic change that you know you've got a hat on or you haven't got a hat on, you put it on and a thing happens there and even just like simplicity of, I think, something like the crown of thorns, for me, you know, it's just so vital to to know that the mythos, the myth that is fact, that is history that's found, it's, it's point, it's in that moment of Christ being crowned with the crown of thorns and then put on the cross. That is so essential and I don't want to try and get behind that.
Speaker 2:There is nothing behind it. That is it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, actually you know know well, the thorns it's illustrative of something.
Speaker 2:So no, no, no. Before it ever tells us anything else, it is itself the fundamental truth.
Speaker 1:Yeah and it is, and it's, and there's thorns because it's pointed back to exactly there's thorns everywhere and there's a whole thing, but it's a crown, because it's, yeah so, the real crown of thorns. You know, and and sometimes I don't know if you find this helpful, but pausing and focusing on particular details like that, oh yeah, Like we just did with the crown of thorns A hundred percent Rather than just a kind of oh.
Speaker 1:the whole thing is just Jesus dies and rises again and saying let's look at the crown of thorns, let's look at the stone of thorns.
Speaker 2:Let's look at the stone, because we're taking the story seriously, because that matters. Yeah, the details of the story are full of in court.
Speaker 1:Yeah and I can cope with that as a as a, because I'm not, again, not very as good with just thinking in the abstract categories I was. This might not be relevant, but I was chatting to a friend the other day who was talking about how he uses coins with his children, even though you know, obviously, a lot of the stuff we do is cashless society.
Speaker 1:I hate it. But the coins thing is really helpful because his kids can. They can deal with a coin like oh, this one's a pound, it's a whole pound, and then we're going to go shopping and we're going to go and spend probably like a whole pound and then sometimes we have to go and and spend a hundred of them and that's like and they're like oh my goodness, that's so many pounds, it's like it's got.
Speaker 1:It's got a value and significance which, if I'm just told this on something costs 100 pounds, I'm like… Cashlessly, it means nothing. It doesn't, but if you're carrying it it means a lot. It's huge.
Speaker 2:That's very powerful and the Bible… I think we're designed to think in concrete things and visuals. Actually, you say you're not good at abstract thinking. Actually, I don't think anybody is actually, but some people think they are and it actually damages them. Actually, I don't think anybody is actually but some people think they are and it actually damages them.
Speaker 2:So honestly, nate, thanks so much for this. We've actually used up our time and it's been amazing Reform mythologist for those listeners of the Christ-centered cosmic civilization, and maybe one day we can have Nate again, because he's an infinite resource of wonders, isn't he? Hope you'll listen in next time.