Why I Studied (and Unlearned) So Much

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Hello everyone.

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Tim Winders here.

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Welcome to episode two of the season that I'm calling, why The

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Bible Doesn't Make Sense yet.

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And just so you know, I've kind of titled these internally.

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I don't know if it's the full title this is going to be, but this is called

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Choosing the Red Pill, stepping Outside the Matrix to really understand.

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The Bible.

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So yeah, we'll be using some matrix references here and just wanna remind

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you, if you haven't, circle back to episode one, circle back there,

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and you'll kind of understand kind of how things are flowing here.

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The theme of this episode is, we're gonna use this word deconstructing.

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But don't let that bother you.

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It's really just asking questions.

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It's figuring things out.

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It's learning more, it's going deeper.

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It's seeking, which is all about, what we do here at Seek GoCreate, we'll use the

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word deconstructing decades of doctrine to kind of use some alliteration there.

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Letting go of what I was taught so I could really discover.

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What was true?

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And yes, that involves some deconstruction, some thinking

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differently, thinking outside the box, stepping outside the matrix so that

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you can really see what's going on.

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And so that's why we're going to use that analogy here as we talk about the

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journey that I've been on, that I've been trying to figure out how to share.

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And, just trying to do it in this five episodes that

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we're gonna be talking about.

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you know, when we think we understand the Bible, but we really don't and

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when it doesn't make sense, but you won't admit it, and things like that.

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So anyway, if you listen to episode one, you know, we're

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starting with a big vision.

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I really wanted to start with.

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The end in mind with episode one with the vision, peace instead of pressure.

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But there was a process that I had to go through to kind of get to that

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understanding I had to, had to go through a lot of getting rid of what

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I thought I knew to get to a place where I could understand what was true.

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And let me just tell you, there's a real cloudiness that goes

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on with that, with a lot of.

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Our religion and what we're taught and our paradigms and stuff like that.

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And I'm not pretending that I've arrived there yet, but I feel confident that

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I'm in a better place than I was a year ago, two years ago, five years ago.

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Definitely 10 years ago.

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So.

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the big question is what if, what you know about the Bible is what's keeping

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you from truly understanding it?

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You know, many of us have been through years and years of preaching, teaching,

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and listening to people and things like that, and that's not a bad thing.

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But it starts getting into our heads here and it starts creating some

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thoughts that may or may not be true.

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And then we add that with the way we were raised or the PA part

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of the world that we live in.

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I'm in America and very westernized and we've had ways of.

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Thinking about things that aren't always bad, but they can be.

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They can keep us from understanding what's outside of that matrix

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that we might have been living in.

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so one of the things that we often have to do is to recognize what it is.

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That we think air quotes here, we know and maybe step back from that so that we

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could really understand the, the truth.

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Now, I've given my background before, but I want to just quickly walk

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through a few things to kind of get an understanding of where, where I was.

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I really didn't grow up in church.

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I didn't go to church every week or anything like that.

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We kind of popped in on holidays.

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But I grew up in the deep south, in the Atlanta area, the Bible Belt.

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And so bible thinking religion was all around it.

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You could not get away from it if you, grew up in that part of the country.

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and then I believed that I had a salvation experience.

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I know I had a salvation experience back in the early nineties, 90, late 90, 91.

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And so for that period of time now going on, is that 35 years losing count?

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I've been asking questions.

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I mean, I've been trying to study, I've been wrestling with scripture,

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I've been reading through this book.

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That is the Bible.

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That is the word of God.

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For some time went to, some churches, some would've been considered word of faith.

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You know, where you speak it, you name it, claim it.

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Some would've been considered prosperity Gospel, where they

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believe that this Bible is a ticket to getting what it is you want.

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all the good stuff in life.

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I'm not very accurate.

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You could probably tell by the way I'm saying that also, just spent a

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lot of time reading it, but I don't know that I read it in proper context.

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We'll get to that shortly I would listen to preaching teaching and things

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like that, but I don't know that I.

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Totally put it in the perspective that I needed to.

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Maybe I was just trying to take it and add it to my layer of what I thought success

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was so that I could continue building upon what I, and how I define success.

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I'm not sure I'm the only one that's ever done that, but,

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that's kind of the way I did.

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But it ended up in Bible school in 2015 and my wife and I were thinking, this is

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going to be so incredible 'cause we're gonna be hanging out with Christians

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and people that are studying the Bible and they're gonna be powerhouse

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people and it is gonna be incredible.

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I actually earned what's called a master's in biblical studies from there,

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and let me just tell you what I found out that most of the teaching there

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were just what I would call canned.

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Answers, just quick snippets, pulling scripture out of context to just

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fit what we're doing in our modern life, or in some situations it's

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actually just to fit into the system or structure that they believed in.

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This was a non-denominational school, but there was a man, a person that had started

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it, and so everything sort of had to.

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Fit into that man's belief system and his doctrine and they, there

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was some good things about it.

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I enjoyed being around the people and all of that, but, I can tell you that they

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had some baked in thoughts and ideas that, that were not necessarily healthy either.

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So all of that.

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All of that to say that during my time in Bible school, this would've been like

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2016 or 17, going on seven years later, from the time that I'm recording this,

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I started doing a deep study on the.

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Kingdom of God in Matthew 6 33.

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Jesus says, seek ye first the kingdom of God.

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I was wanting to do some studying on my own outside of what was going

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on and what was being fed to us in that Bible school environment.

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And so I started studying that thing that Jesus said to seek first, and it really

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opened my eyes to the bigger picture.

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I went through every scripture that mentioned the kingdom of God.

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I went through and dug into and hand wrote them out and, you know, studied

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the Greek words and meditated on them.

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Just really allowing, I believe the Holy Spirit to lead and

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guide me through revealing.

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What the kingdom of God was.

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This thing that Jesus said he brought, he brought the

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kingdom of God into this earth.

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And so, that was a big stepping point for me, a big I. I guess a big

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part of the journey was me learning more about the Kingdom of God.

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I don't fully grasp it totally.

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If anyone says they do, I can guarantee you they don't know

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what they're talking about.

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But, I understood it more than I did before.

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Later I went through and my wife Gloria, was doing this, but I

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actually went through reading the Bible over the course of a year.

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In chronological order.

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Now, I had read the Bible through, but I had never read it in order.

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I will tell you that reading the Bible in chronological order of the timeframe

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that the events happened or that they were believed to have happened will

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impact your perspective definitely in the Old Testament in a tremendous way.

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Because, I mean, I just had a lot of stuff jumbled up and did not understand

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timelines and how things fit together.

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I had been reading the Bible okay.

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It wasn't as if I was just a casual Christian.

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I had been reading it and I had gone through Bible school, but I did

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not understand how those pieces fit together of how the prophets and how

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the kings and the nation of Israel and.

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All of that fit.

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I did not understand that until I read it chronologically.

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To fast forward over the last few years, what I've done is I've immersed

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myself in first century history and culture to really understand

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who wrote the New Testament.

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What they were going through and who they wrote it to.

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You know, we throw these words around like, oh, you need to read it in context.

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And I've done that myself, and I've seen other people do that.

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But then when I listen to what I used to say and also what other people say.

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I still don't think we fully get the context of what was going on.

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We really, I believe, have to dig in more to what was going on in that

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New Testament timeframe, which I'll talk about more in the next episode.

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But it's really this timeframe between a 30, about the time that Jesus.

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Finished his earthly ministry and went to the cross and was resurrected

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up to 80 70, which a significant event occurred there, which was the

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destruction of Jerusalem and the temple.

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We'll talk more about that later, but that timeframe, we really, as Christians

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need to understand it so that we could maybe step out of the matrix that we live

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in, in currently recording this in 2025.

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To kind of understand a bigger picture that, went on historically.

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Okay, so here's a few problems with some of the theologies or the

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programming or the dogmas that we have.

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We've got these doctrines, we've got these dogmas, we've got these paradigms.

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That cause us to read scripture and try to make the scripture work with

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what we think instead of allowing the scripture to lead and guide.

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We've got these filters, we've got these ways that we look at it.

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I'll tell you one way we really see it in our current world again, this 2025.

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And that is where people will take scripture and try to make their

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political beliefs, their political system work with scripture.

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And I'm just gonna go ahead and bust up something right here.

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And I've got definite political, I lean certain ways politically, but we've got to

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disconnect that from the way we look at.

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Things in the Bible because I can guarantee you, especially for those

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in the United States where we've got two political basically sides.

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We've got a Republican and a Democratic party, we've got what we call a left.

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We call it a right.

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I don't think that's really a good example, but, I can guarantee you

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that I could take this Bible, this holy scripture, and I could find,

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I could pluck out scriptures.

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That could justify political.

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Hot buttons, political ideas, political ideologies that

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would back up both systems.

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The left, right Republican or Democrat.

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And some of you're saying, no, no, no, the Bible is this way or is that way.

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No, I could guarantee you that.

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I could find examples like that.

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So we have to be really careful about.

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Making the Bible fit our political beliefs.

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That's a whole nother topic I don't wanna get into, but it could

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be part of something that was bothering me along this journey.

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What we were seeing going on politically, I. We are taught what to believe

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before learning how to read in context.

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In other words, we go to churches, we listen to people, we go online and we hear

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things, and then we will go to the Bible to try to find things that back up what we

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believe instead of the other way around.

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The other way around is take the time.

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To really be still and quiet and get into this scripture, get into this Bible so

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that the Bible, the word of God, really spills over into who we are instead of

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who we are trying to justify what it is.

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plucking out some scriptures and so what we do, it ends up.

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we accept certain things.

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We skip over certain things.

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We twist things.

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I mean, I've got an example right now on a Facebook post that I did where

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someone I went to bible school took a scripture and put it in the comment

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as if it fit that post that I did, but it was not in context at all.

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They're taking something that was written to an audience 2000 years ago

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and trying to say it applies today.

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Now it may.

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Apply.

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It may have an impact, but we also have to understand who it

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was written to 2000 years ago.

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And if you do that and really think about that and understand the history

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and what was going on then, then you probably wouldn't add it as a comment for

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something that was made that, in 2025.

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So anyway, here's a few examples of some of these that might.

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Be where we've invented things, we've come up with things we've

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tried to do, things to explain things we don't understand, and what it

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will often do is lead to confusion.

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There's some of them, these are some highly controversial, but the.

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Theory of rapture is one.

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The way we cite the sinner's prayer is another altar call.

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Some of the systems that we see out there, dispensationalism, millennialism,

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pre Millennialism, these were not really scriptural or in the Bible.

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A lot of teachings that we see in most.

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Of our, denominations, the Catholic church has been really good at just

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coming up with layers and layers and layers of things that they've added in.

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but that's happened in a lot of 'em, not just picking on the Catholic church.

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That's happened in a lot of denominations in churches and things like that.

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We just add to, and some of that's not bad.

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I'm just saying that when we add to it is.

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We need to understand where it came from and understand that it

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may not be a foundational truth.

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It may be something that we have just come up with to address something

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or maybe deal with something.

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Or it could be something that we've been deceived and we've just made up

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because we think it's what we understand.

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But, it's why it's important for us to.

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Almost unlearn.

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And, that's why that word deconstruction has become so controversial because you

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almost have to undo some things to get to a place where you could take a fresh look

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at it So one of the things that I did and.

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This is an important step for me.

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I think it's important for most people in the world we're in today.

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We are a very distracted society.

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We've just got a lot of stuff going on.

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My phone right now is my camera up, so I can't hold it up, but I would

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hold my phone up as a prime example.

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Of what distracts us.

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We can scroll, we can look through things, we can get access to news, we

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can get all of this information, and we think we are getting wisdom or knowledge.

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And what we're really doing is getting distracted.

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And so the thing that I had to do was slow down.

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Pause, rest and just be able to think and just stop long enough.

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And what I found is that started clearing my head up.

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And allowing me to just see things in a different light so that when I

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would go to scripture and read things, I saw them in a different way, and

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I believe the Lord was doing that.

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I believe the Holy Spirit was prompting that the Holy Spirit was moving me because

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I wasn't coming in with my clouded view.

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I was stepping outside of that matrix so that I could really step.

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Into the biblical narrative, the biblical story, and be clearer.

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I'm not gonna say I've totally got it figured out, but I can

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be clearer than I was before.

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I could remove some of that growing up in the Deep South dogma that I had with.

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You know, the Baptist and the denominations, and I could remove some

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of that that I had heard in Bible school and just kind of have a fresh eye.

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I could remove some of the teaching from the word of faith and the prosperity

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gospels so that I could see the scripture and the way it was originally intended.

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Not in the way.

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I wanted it to fit my life and my world to make things work out better for me.

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It really is a process.

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We talked about this a little bit in episode one of this

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season, a process of surrender.

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This word that some of us have struggled with humility, just I.

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Admitting that we don't know everything.

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there's a lot of us in Christian circles and followers of Jesus.

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I noticed it a lot in Bible school that people that have, they may have

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spent some time with the Bible and they really do believe, They know it all.

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And I can tell you from just reading this scripture over and over again,

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spending time with the Lord, the more I think I know, really the less I know.

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So when you're around people, and I hope I don't even come across this

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way around, people that say this is the way it is, thus sayeth the Lord.

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I'm not saying you need to run, but maybe just ask yourself, you know?

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Can we boldly say that we understand topics like the resurrection?

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Can we boldly say that we understand eternity?

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Can we boldly say that we understand eternal life?

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Can we boldly say we understand what it means to be a son

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of God or a daughter of God?

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And I, I would say the answer is we might grasp it somewhat, but

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we don't really understand it.

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This side of actually being part of that.

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So this just allows a. Fresh reading if you read things over and over again.

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And one of the things I've read often in the last, say, 12

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months, is the Book of Revelation.

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And one of the things I'll talk about in the final episode of this

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season is just a fresh understanding of what I've seen in relation to

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those things that were in that book.

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So it just helps us see it fresher.

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And one of the things that really helps when you see things in a

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fresh way is to read them in order.

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You know, if you were to take any novel or any story and read it out of order, it's

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probably gonna be hard to understand it.

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Well.

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The tough thing about the way the Bible has been written, or we'll call it

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compiled, that really is the correct term.

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It's been compiled out of order and you know, I've already mentioned that in

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the Old Testament in the next episode.

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We'll talk about that in the New Testament, but it really does help.

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It does me, I'm kind of an order guy.

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Systems and process and flow.

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It really helps to read it.

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In the historical flow or the real flow or the chronological flow

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that it was actually written in.

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And it does change a tremendous amount of just the way you understand it.

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It did for me, I saw connections and timeline clarity that I had.

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Missed in the story and I believe you will too, and I'm gonna talk more

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about it, so we'll get into that.

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But just understand how important it is to read things in order and in the historical

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context that it was actually written in.

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And again, I've brought this analogy up.

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It really is like the matrix, I believe when we're in some of these doctrines.

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Bible schools when we're sitting and taking what people tell us

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and we're not questioning it, we're not asking questions.

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And I'm not saying to be a jerk about it.

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Maybe some people maybe would say that my personality was that way.

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I know I had some run-ins in Bible school and truthfully,

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they ask me not to come back.

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But that's a whole nother story.

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We won't get into it here.

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But, it, it is like stepping out of the matrix.

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the matrix movies are a really good analogy here because once you step

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out, you see things in a different way.

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That doesn't mean that the matrix doesn't still exist, but you see that the matrix

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is just a portion of the bigger picture.

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You could see the framework, you could see things, you could, you know,

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it's it's like Morpheus saying, you know, you've got two choices here.

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You've got the blue pill and everything just stays the same and you're just

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nice and comfortable and relaxed.

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Or there's the red pill and you can never.

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Go back.

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Well, what I did was I took that red pill and, and things have not been the same.

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I've enjoyed the ride.

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I will tell you that it has been uncomfortable and my wife and I, a

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little over a year ago, there was a time that she says, boy, when you

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really start seeing some of this.

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She says it is really shaking some things that I thought they were

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my core, but they really weren't.

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And again, she was raised in the deep south like me and had some baked in

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beliefs that she had to overcome.

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And so that is what we're talking about here.

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We're talking about getting to a place.

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Where you choose, and if you've listened this far, you're probably

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not looking at the blue pill, you're probably looking at that red pill, and

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you want to continue uncovering what might help you see that bigger picture.

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And what's cool is once you start doing that, things that never made sense

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start making sense to you I love that because I don't want to be deceived.

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I mean, part of my makeup is I just don't wanna be fooled.

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I mean, one of my foundational statements has always been

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thou shall not fool thyself.

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I don't know that those exact words are in the Bible.

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I believe that if they're not, they should be.

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It sounds like a proverb, doesn't it?

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but once you see it, you can't.

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Unsee it and you can't go back.

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That's where I'm at, that's where I've been for the last few years, and

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that's what I'm attempting to share just a little bit of in this season,

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in this episode and specifically the other episodes that, we're looking at.

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I've said before, I don't like plucking out scriptures, but there

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are a few scriptures that will back up this, This concept of

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not allowing yourself to be full.

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Proverbs three, five, lean, not own your own understanding.

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And again, what many of us will try to do is take our understanding, our

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smarts, our knowledge and wisdom, and pull from the Bible to make it fit.

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That instead of the other way around.

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You know, a great example that we see in Acts 1711 is that of the Bereans, and this

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was a group of people that it said that they, during this timeframe that we're

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gonna talk more about later of around the 80 fifties is when this they, they

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were, we saw that in acts they examined.

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The scriptures daily.

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They were studying, they were seeking the truth in the scriptures.

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And that's the way we want to be.

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We don't want things to cloud our heads and we don't wanna

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take what people tell us.

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I don't want you to take what I'm saying or just, uh, maybe even

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preacher, teacher, and some people might disagree with that, but.

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I believe that you need to take personal responsibility and dig into

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the scriptures and the word and make sure that you are clear on what the

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context is so that it means something for you and how your life is being trans.

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Formed and, Matthew 15, nine sort of addresses that, where Jesus

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said they worship me in vain.

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Their teachings are merely human rules.

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Of course, in this situation, he's talking about the Pharisees We

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could probably use that example for a lot of preacher teachers today.

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there's just human rules that are being put up.

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He goes, they do not worship me.

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And that was Matthew 15, nine.

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I've already referenced one of my favorite scriptures because it

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launched me into my study of the kingdom of God, which is Matthew 6 33.

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Seek.

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First the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

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Then all these things will be added unto you.

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what I realized, my life up to that point, I had been seeking those things first.

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I. Not God's kingdom.

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And I just had that switched around and many people do in our first world culture.

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John 5 39 through 40 says You study the scriptures, there's more to it than

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that, yet you refuse to come to me.

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What we are attempting to do here.

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This is what I'm attempting to do, and this goes back to episode

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one, is I want to be that new man.

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That new man that CS Lewis brought up, that new man that I referenced, bono,

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that I said, you know, it seems like.

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He is just at peace and rest and not anxious for anything.

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Well, often we have studied scriptures, yet we have refused to become transformed

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and come to him, come to Jesus as Jesus was talking about here in John five,

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and my desire is to be that new man that is at peace, that is transformed.

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And in Christ as Jesus taught.

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So hope that's helpful for you.

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Listen, unlearning this stuff and maybe having to pluck out some junk that

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we've been living with, it is scary.

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I, I know.

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I remember sitting on the sofa in our RV and Glory was just almost shaking with.

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I don't know what's true anymore.

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This is really shaking me at my core and I'm my personality.

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I sort of love being in that position.

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I have to be careful not to just put myself in an unlearning and change

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situation just because I enjoy change.

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But, but, one of the things you'll find it is extremely freeing.

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When you realize that you're stepping more into truth, that you're understanding it,

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that you're unplugging from the matrix so that you can see things in a clearer way.

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You can read this Bible in a different way when you truly understand who wrote it.

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When they wrote it and who it was written to, the context.

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Sometimes the greatest act of faith is to let go of our answers, man's

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answers so that we can hear God and sometimes we're clouded and can't hear

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because we've got our answers and what we want in our head instead of what God

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wants us to hear in the next episode.

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We are going to go into something that has really been transformational

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for me, and that is why the when and how you read the Bible, especially in

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the New Testament, can unlock a story that you have never truly seen before.

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I don't know why most of us.

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Have never learned the history of what was going on in the first century.

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It was such an important time, but as I have studied it, it has just exploded

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the Bible in my mind and my soul truthfully, and it has really been that.

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Big burst that has gotten me outta the matrix to really see truth.

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So we're gonna talk about what happens when you stop flipping through

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random verses and start reading like the original audience read it and

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heard it as a story that leads up to the biggest shift that you'll.

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Ever experience in your faith journey?

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Thanks for listening in.

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I'm excited you're going along this journey with me as I share it.

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Uh, step back, step back here with me next week.

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We're gonna keep going, so let's keep going along this path.

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See you next week here at Seek.

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Go create.