0:00:00 - 0:00:31 OK. So I am super busy. I'm just gonna try to sneak a video here as I'm uh I'm trying to get a quick workout in before I start work. Um hm So lately I've been thinking a lot about how um truth is hierarchical. If you've read The Glory of God's Intelligence, I hope you do um that there's a whole lot in 0:00:31 - 0:00:56 that book about the nature of truth and how it's shared and how it's understood. I still consider that to be very much introductory, but it's a, it's a meaty book and there's a lot that you can get out of that. But so one of these ideas um not necessarily in the book, it's in the book, but what's been 0:00:56 - 0:01:29 on my mind is how difficult it is to convey uh concise truth that is helpful and significant. And um uh the the issue is that uh truth exists in layers. And um when you're trying to convey something at a lower level, you're calling upon information from higher levels and it has to be queried, collated 0:01:28 - 0:01:55 and translated. So, um you have to think about what it is you want to convey, go into your understanding of things, maybe even go into even higher understanding and ask more questions to get answers to them and then turn around and um echo that through the lower layers, which um not just symbolically 0:01:55 - 0:02:15 but quite literally, you see in 30 35 11 when the father speaks from heaven, but it has to be echoed through three layers before it hits earth. And uh what you may or may not have realized is that once people understood it, it was because it wasn't the father saying it, it was echoed through three levels 0:02:15 - 0:02:55 of messengers. So um that's a deep thought. Um I wanted to um briefly just mention um this idea of the value of mortal messengers. So um recently I had a discussion with someone I know very well uh that a family member and she was talking about the meekness of Moses and uh making Presumptions about how 0:02:55 - 0:03:21 he must have been face to face as a person. And I say Presumptions not judgmentally, but just factually because for someone to say that there are only two possible sources of information. One is what's in the scriptures and two is personal revelation. And um there doesn't, there isn't very much in scripture 0:03:20 - 0:03:44 uh at all about Moses or even Jesus daily interactions with people. I think I've mentioned this before um in a three year ministry teaching and doing things every single day, we just have this tiny little slice of largely overlapping things from the different gospels. So it's, it's effectively, it's 0:03:44 - 0:04:07 one gospel worth of one book worth of, I mean, gospel, uh, as in the gospel of Matthew, the gospel mark one of those worth of stories. And that's all we've got. And for Moses, there's even less, way less. There's no, here's what Moses did on Tuesday the fifth of whatever. Um, here's his day, his whole 0:04:07 - 0:04:26 day. Um, here's a conversation he had with Joshua about this or that or here's what he said when this person came to him and complained that their one sheep was sick or whatever. You don't have any of that. And so not only do you not have all that but the, the few stuff, the few things we have are written 0:04:26 - 0:04:47 by certain people with a certain perspective and say history is written by the Victors. Well, the scriptures are written by the Victors too. They're written by righteous people. And if you're not a righteous person, then um you're not gonna get very much out of that compared to what someone who is would 0:04:46 - 0:05:07 if that makes sense. So it's a call, it's a distant call and you're just trying to hit you with something. So you're better off than nothing. And uh anyway, so the comment was, well, Moses was a very meek person and I said that's true. He was very meek, but you don't know what meekness means. Um Because 0:05:07 - 0:05:30 you're, you're imputing onto Moses your definition of it when he stands much higher than you. So he knows what meekness is. You don't. So when you're using the same word, you're, you're meaning two very different things. And a simple proof of this in a specific case of meekness is you can't be meek towards 0:05:29 - 0:00:00 God and man at the same time. So Jesus was the lamb of God. He wasn't the lamb of man. There's a big difference. So a lamb of man is a coward. A lamb of God is humble to God, but a lamb of God abhors sin. And you should look up that word. A bhor it's in the scriptures. Uh It describes, for instance, 0:00:00 - 0:06:14 people who are sanctified by the Holy Spirit and they abhor sin. And if you want an example of what that looks like uh go read alma five or some other uh passage where you see a servant of God totally laying into people. So if you abhor sin, you have to preach against it and you have to do the best you 0:06:14 - 0:06:35 can to convince people of how detrimental it is. And you can't do that in a nice way. You can't, not when they love it. It's about love and hate and you have to hate sin in order to help other people hate sin and you can't love other people without hating sin. You can't if you understand the true consequences 0:06:35 - 0:06:59 of it. But anyway, back to Moses. So um what about the So, so my point is if Moses walked among us today, you would not notice him. If you did notice him, it wouldn't be for high holiness. You'd probably think he was a, he was a total weirdo. You'd probably think he was a total jerk. Actually. Um You 0:06:59 - 0:07:24 wouldn't say this is the, um this is the epitome of uh kindness, right? So, um notwithstanding the fact that Moses would do incredibly kind things and sacrificing himself for other people. But you probably wouldn't notice that the reason is that someone ascends the hierarchy of holiness, their values 0:07:24 - 0:07:48 change. And I don't mean values in the necessarily in the sense that the world uses the word, I mean what they value and by how much, so what they love and by how much and what they hate and by how much and that's not just gonna differ in terms of assignment, it will differ in terms of quantity a holy 0:07:47 - 0:08:19 person loves and hates much stronger than a person who is not holy. So you have to go to the extremes to encounter the extremes. Um There are reasons for this, but I don't wanna digress. Um So how would you notice someone like Moses today? Um Well, let's go back to Israel and, and, and try to characterize 0:08:19 - 0:08:47 how they felt about the guy. So it's interesting that um Moses was this Conduit through which the Lord um freed Israel in a miraculous way. Um And yet through all those plagues and their deliverance from Pharaoh. Even after all of that, they were shocked when um he came down from the mountain and he 0:08:47 - 0:09:07 had to put a veil on his face. And it's just interesting to go through and look at the contradictions of their behavior and attitudes. And it reveals how they really felt and just how much they could experience without yielding the attitudes that, that we just presume humans would have as a result of 0:09:07 - 0:09:25 the experiences that they went through. And uh the takeaway from that is not to say, oh Israel is so wicked. It's to say human nature is a really terrible thing. And guess what? We've all got it by default, it's what we have to overcome here. And so if you're going to presume that you would react in 0:09:25 - 0:09:42 a way that's dramatically different than the Israelites, did you better have a damn good reason? And it, it shouldn't be the theoretical thing. You should be able to point to experiences in your life where you have done differently than they would have done in your place. This is like uh how silly it 0:09:42 - 0:10:03 is to date people who, you know, you don't want to be with long term. And this is the norm today for a lot of reasons, including how expensive it is to have your own place. And people just stay in relationships because they can't afford rent otherwise or they're afraid of being alone or maybe they've 0:10:02 - 0:10:24 gotten a clue that they're getting older and they have less to offer in worldly terms and, um, people just aren't, aren't as interested in them. And so they stay with someone they, uh, aren't interested in. Um, because it's the best thing they, they have faith in, um, anyway, but that, that is, um, not 0:10:24 - 0:10:46 a good place to be. So, um, a lot of times when people don't want to get out of relationships, it's because they, they fool themselves into thinking the person is gonna change. Um, and they don't have any evidence for that. And so the question is, if you expect a massive change from someone, um, can 0:10:45 - 0:11:05 you point to situations in their life where they have changed massively? And if not, then what you're expecting is an insane miracle of totally unpredictable behavior. And you're, you're leaning on that and that's a ridiculous thing to do. So, back to the application of this with Moses and the Israelites 0:11:04 - 0:11:29 . Uh, if you presume that you would react in a dramatically different way than they did to a guy like Moses, you better have reasons in terms of things you've already done, not hypotheticals that you hope you would do one day. And, uh, that, that's hard to find. So, um, another thing to touch on is the 0:11:29 - 0:11:51 value of mortal messengers. Uh This is something widely misunderstood. So, um, back to Moses when he was walking around among the people, even with these dramatic miracles. They were shocked when he came down from the mountain, his face was glowing. He had to put a veil on. So why, I mean, if you really 0:11:50 - 0:12:09 believe that God's working with someone and come down and they have all these miracles and whatever that they do, why would it shock you when their face glows? The reason is they didn't really believe not that much anyway. I mean, they were happy to take the fruits of the miracles, but get out of slavery 0:12:08 - 0:12:27 , receive a promised land release, a promise of a promised land and so forth. But um did they really believe that Moses was the guy that he was? No, did they did not? They didn't believe in the beginning when Moses tried it the first time. And the, the, the guy says, who the heck do you think you are 0:12:26 - 0:12:52 who made you ruler over us? Which is hilarious because the answer was God. God did. And what like what better answer is there for that question? Um But people don't want to hear that they have their own ideas about how that works. Um And they, they apply their attitude, uh they apply they, their attitude 0:12:51 - 0:13:15 of unwillingness to subject themselves to God and his truth that automatically transfer that onto anyone who is his servant. And, and um this is something that Jesus teaches very plainly in the New Testament. He says that to his disciples, um people will treat you like they treated me and anyone who 0:13:15 - 0:13:39 accepts me will accept you. So um so the, the Israelites didn't see Moses for what he really was. And even when they accepted him like this, they didn't accept him like this. Jesus says uh to Peter, he says, who do you, who do you think I am? And Peter says, oh well, some say you're this and some say 0:13:39 - 0:14:04 you're that and he goes, yeah, but who do you think I am? And Peter says the Christ and the thing is that um you can only receive from someone up to the level you think they have. And this is uh truer in terms of messengers from God than, than any other context. But it's true in all other contexts too 0:14:03 - 0:14:27 . So um because receipt isn't limited to some abstract thing, it has to include value. If you don't value a gift, it won't give you joy. And so if you think of uh Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, they were in paradise. But did they see it as paradise? Adam saw more of the value of that place than 0:14:26 - 0:14:49 Eve did. But um neither of them saw it for what it was. And uh in a very interesting pattern which you say, see played out in your own life over and over again. Um but also on a more global scale and ultimately, uh on the scale of the entire human family, there's a pattern of returning to where you started 0:14:48 - 0:15:16 . Um, and the environment doesn't necessarily change, um, from what it started as there's a transition, but it comes back to how it was. So what is different? It's the understanding of the people. It's the value they find in the thing right now, in the tragedy of, of uh tragedy of mortality is you usually 0:15:15 - 0:15:32 don't find these things out until it's too late for you to have them. So there's two ways to encounter value in something. One is to know what it's like to not have it yet, which requires massive faith, both in terms of the need to reveal it to you because it has to be revealed to you through revelation 0:15:32 - 0:15:51 since it's not coming through experience. Um, but also faith because it's massively painful and it's, uh it's a lot more painful than having something and losing it because even then, um, you, you at least have the memory of what that was like. The other way of learning, the value is having something 0:15:51 - 0:16:10 and then losing it and looking retrospectively at what you had. And unfortunately, that's the most common situation because that doesn't require faith at all. It just requires a little bit of honesty. Um, but it's too late. So many decisions have to be made at a certain time in life and they tend to 0:16:10 - 0:16:31 be made very early in life. Um Precisely the time that the person is less likely, le least likely to make the best decision. So that's a tragedy. Um But it is very relevant to what we're talking about because it all the more makes it so much, uh, so important to have people floating around that know 0:16:31 - 0:16:54 something and are willing to share what they know and to pay attention to that. So, uh, back to Old Moses. Um, so, um, one thing that we tend to do, I've had an, uh, a little, uh, expanding fan thing on order from Amazon for the longest time, I've been wanting to buy one for a long time. I said I'm sick 0:16:54 - 0:17:09 of referring to this analogy. I want to show it and it's not here yet. I don't, it probably got sucked up in the Christmas presents and is wrapped sitting in our hiding place. But anyway, some kid's gonna get it and be like, what the heck is this? And, uh, everyone will be confused except for me and 0:17:09 - 0:17:30 then I'll take it from them and they'll cry. Um, just kidding. So, uh, most so what we tend to do is we tend to vastly underestimate the differences between people and this is a topic that I've written a lot about. I just haven't published a lot about it yet. Um, and it has to be written extensively 0:17:29 - 0:17:53 about because that's how strongly these incorrect ideas are baked into our heads in our hearts. Oh, I would love to just take eight hours and talk to you about this. But I can't. Um, so what can I give you now? Well, I want you to think about Moses. There's this movie Noah, uh, with Russell Crowe and 0:17:53 - 0:18:13 a lot of religious people hate it and I don't care, but there's a scene in this movie, uh, they depict the Watchers, these fallen angels as these, uh, spirits encased in rocks like the rock people, the giant rock people, which I thought was pretty creative. And uh long story short, basically, they do 0:18:12 - 0:18:33 this kind of penance for whatever they did and they're freed. There's a scene where they're freed by God to go back to heaven because of their sacrifice. And um I, I will just say briefly, we're, I think three side notes deep, I'll go back. Um I promise my mind's cooperating this morning. So I don't 0:18:33 - 0:00:00 think I'll get lost. Um I, in the, under the law of Moses, it was illegal to touch a leper. In fact, you had to stay a certain distance away and Jesus did not obey that rule. Um But he did it without sinning because when he approached the leper, he healed them. And, and so once the leper was healed, 0:00:00 - 0:19:18 he wasn't breaking any law by being around him, right? The Lord has a way of redeeming things. And as with almost every truth, if not every truth, there's an angle of this that can be used to encourage sin. So please don't be foolish. Um But if you're listening to my stuff, I would hope that, uh I would 0:19:18 - 0:19:38 hope that you've come to a point in your life where you're not as susceptible to that tactic of the adversary to twist things and use them to justify evil. But anyway, with this movie, um, well, any time you're in the Lord's service and in as much as you learn about him and do everything that, you know 0:19:38 - 0:20:08 , you will find that you have these redeeming situations in your life where you touch lepers and I'm not saying touch in, I'm saying um what God has sanctified, obtains the power to sanctify other things. Um Anyway, we could talk about that a lot and, and start talking about things like Elisha's Bones 0:20:08 - 0:20:35 and Peter's Shadow. But um instead of that, let's get back to the, the movie Noah, which most people hated. Um So in movies and, and things like this, I find that there are many opportunities where the spirit uses. Uh these, these, these, this medium to aggregate things into it and provide a channel 0:20:34 - 0:20:56 to teach me things. And so it's a vibrant channel because um language is extremely limited and visual media is also a language, but it's closer to the spirit in the sense that it's richer and less bounded by definitions. It's, there's just, there's more information in the channel than there is in words 0:20:56 - 0:21:21 um which makes sense. It just from an information science perspective in, in scientific terms. If you have some, some moving picture plus sound plus language. It can convey way can, doesn't necessarily, but it can convey way more information than just words anyway. So when these spirits bust out of the 0:21:21 - 0:21:49 rock shells, um what it one thing, it, it helps me uh formulate in my mind is this idea that Moses was in a rock shell, right? He's in fallen flesh as we all are. So now getting back to this idea, the diversity of people on this planet right now. OK. Uh You realize that on this planet right now, no matter 0:21:49 - 0:22:13 how similar we all are, there is one person who categorically is more like Jesus than everyone else. And you could rank everybody, you could make a list and then if you had God's ruler, you could say how different all these people are from one another and put them on the line. The question is, what would 0:22:13 - 0:22:37 that distribution look like? It's a really, really important question. Why not? So that the head person can say I'm the head now bow before me, right? Um Sorry, there's another movie reference that just popped into my head, but I don't think it would help. Um Anyway, um not for that reason, but so that 0:22:37 - 0:22:56 we're looking for that sort of thing because if Moses came today, one of the big problems is no one would recognize that it was someone like Moses, they'd say it was just some weirdo who uh had some bizarre ideas about things and it was really a jerk. And I, I said, I made a blog post at one point. Uh 0:22:56 - 0:23:16 , what would people say about Jesus if he were to come today? And I, I spent five minutes on it. I just busted out a bunch of scriptures and, uh, then wrote in plain English in one sentence or so, what would that look like today? And it's really, really important because we think that somehow we can 0:23:16 - 0:23:38 stand on the earth and judge heaven. Do you understand what I mean by that holiness is hidden? It's holiness for a reason. It's not that we have everything before us and we just pick that and that's it. You ascend in your understanding and as you do that, what you see as valuable changes and, and how 0:23:37 - 0:24:05 valuable it is, it changes. So Moses was in um a Tabernacle of fallen flesh um as a great blessing to Israel. Why do you realize that when angels come to the earth from heaven, there's three ways they can come. Um And these ways are not equal at all in how they look and how much you can benefit from 0:24:05 - 0:24:31 it. One way is for a resurrected being to come to you. So, what are the pros and cons of this? And this is quick and fast. I'm not trying to give a doctrinal essay here, but you couldn't, you couldn't overstate the importance of what I'm telling you right now, if a resurrected being came to you, they 0:24:30 - 0:24:59 have the power to hide their glory and that's important because if, if, if you were exposed to it, it would kill you. It's too much for you to bear. Um, so if that's the case, why is it that anyone else is sent? I mean, can you beat that? Well, let me flip that question around. If that's the case, why 0:24:58 - 0:25:19 does God send anyone but himself? Why isn't it just Jesus who comes down all the time and teaches everyone? He'd say like, well, he just doesn't have the time. I don't think that's the reason. Um Why hasn't he come to you if he hasn't some of you, he has, why hasn't he come to you yet? Well, there answers 0:25:19 - 0:25:44 these questions. One of the answers though is you probably don't know this when a messenger comes from heaven, they have to uh show this isn't phrased very well. So I'm gonna butcher it and then I'm gonna try to explain it better. They have to come in the glory matching the value of the message that 0:25:44 - 0:26:12 they share. So um when they come, there's only certain things they can say based on the glory that they're appearing to you with. And there's a limit to their glory, which is their glory, the max glory that, that they actually have. Um we could talk more about that, but we'll leave it at that. So that 0:26:11 - 0:26:37 is really constraining because what it means is they really can't do much here. Um, not directly with people because if they were to do all they could, there's no one they'd be able to appear to for, for the most part, I'm broad brushing here. Right. So, it's a very limited channel. Ok. What about disembodied 0:26:36 - 0:26:59 spirits? So, people have not been resurrected yet. That's even worse. It turns out because the difference between the two is a disembodied spirit cannot reduce their glory. They have to appear as they are all the time because the spirit isn't uh Tabernacle. There's no, there's no dimmer switch on that 0:26:59 - 0:27:25 , right? So um this is why in, in Hebrews, I believe, but Paul says that uh God makes his ministers a flame of fire um cause their glory is fire, right? So they can be sent to you. But you have to be of the stature to endure whatever their glory is. And the more similar you are to them, the less value 0:27:25 - 0:27:45 it has for them to appear to you. What are they giving you that you don't already have or giving you access to? You don't already have access to. All right. What's the third way? The third way that that God can send you a messenger is by having someone be born on the earth and then they come to you as 0:27:45 - 0:28:15 a flesh and bone person, flesh and blood. Um So I'm, I'm gonna skip over details of how that person comes to obtain anything worth sharing. That's its own story for another day. But suppose, um, suppose you're of the, the, I suppose you meet someone like Moses, you're not going to see the glory. Why 0:28:14 - 0:28:35 ? Because the light shines in the darkness and the darkness perceives it not. So you don't perceive glory. All you can perceive is just above wherever you are. That's the margin of where God works. That's one reason why it doesn't do any good to talk endlessly about all these mysteries without putting 0:28:35 - 0:29:08 them into the context of what is this matter for you right now today. So, um with uh with Moses, um we see that these experiences in his life gave opportunities for people to see more of what was hidden from them. So the plagues, the Exodus, um the travails in the wilderness, they're going on the mount 0:29:07 - 0:29:27 , the coming down with the commandments, all these things manifested the glory of God to the people. Um And they came to know more of what they probably had good reasons to know before. I mean, even his brother and his sister were like, hey, you're not, you're nothing special. I don't understand. We're 0:29:26 - 0:29:52 , you know, just as good as you are and God came down, he said, I don't think so. Let me help you see. And then Miriam was stricken with leprosy. So, uh and Aaron died in the wilderness too. So, um I'll tie it up there. We're just shy of 30 minutes. Um, and maybe that helps you with something but, um 0:29:52 - 0:29:55 , we cover a lot of thought so, lots to think about.