Explore inVerse Bible study guides at www.inversebible.org. What do we do when we fall into sin and feel overwhelmed by shame and guilt? Join us in studying how the altar opens up a way back to God. This week, we are studying the first altar of sacrifice that appears in Scripture. Altars are places of love, worship, sacrifice, commitment, and devotion—all of which God demonstrated in copious measure in Eden.

Explore inVerse Bible study guides at www.inversebible.org. What do we do when we fall into sin and feel overwhelmed by shame and guilt? Join us in studying how the altar opens up a way back to God. This week, we are studying the first altar of sacrifice that appears in Scripture. Altars are places of love, worship, sacrifice, commitment, and devotion—all of which God demonstrated in copious measure in Eden.

Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.

Hope Channel

InVerse 2nd Quarter 2025: Back to the Altar

Sebastien Braxton

Justin Kim

Israel Ramos

Jonathan Walter

01 A Relationship Breaks

Coming to you from Silver Spring, Maryland, welcome to Inverse, a Bible-based conversation on life principles, contemporary issues, and thought-provoking perspectives.

Now here's your host, Justin Kim, with Inverse.

Hey everyone, my name's Justin and welcome to Inverse.

This is a show where we talk about the Bible with friends and around this wooden table I do have my friends.

And We do spend some time talking about random things once in a while, but we do try to talk about, we try, and we do talk about scripture.

And not just scripture for scripture's sake, not the Bible for Bible's sake, but trying to make connections with the Bible and real life.

And sometimes there is dissonance between the 2, and we talk about some of those things and how to resolve those things as well.

So we're glad you're here with us, and we are studying this topic, and I'll go to Jonathan.

Jonathan, what are we talking about this quarter?

This quarter, next 13 episodes, what are we talking about?

It's kind of an interesting title, because what is an altar?

People are not really used to thinking about altars anymore.

It's a very biblical thing, an altar of sacrifice, or you have in some churches today, there are altars, but the concept of the altar has to do with worship, it has to do with a much more meaningful, I wouldn't say meaningful, but there's so much more to it than just like, oh, you know, a pile of stones or something like that.

I think of like these like, you know, old ancient empires and like these stone things where you're sacrificing, you know, lives and like, you know, and that's the altar where the blood is spilt to appease the gods.

We'll get into all that because the Bible does talk about some of what I just exaggerated on.

But we will spend some time, and I think more than the altar itself is getting back to worship.

So we're so glad that you're part of our conversation.

We want to encourage you to go to, what's the website that we go to when we do this?

There's a little tab there, you click on Bible study, and there's a lot of quarters on different books of the Bible, different topics, but this 1 is called Back to the Altar.

You can also get the app, so whether you're on Android or whether you're on Apple, go to the store and look up Sabbath School.

There's gonna be a little blue icon there and you can download the Sabbath School app and in verse of all of its quarters are there.

We're gonna read how this gets started, but before we do so, I'm gonna ask Sebastian, can you pray for us?

Heavenly Father, we are so grateful, Lord, for life.

We're grateful, Lord, for the ability to study your word, and we're grateful for the Holy Spirit whom Jesus promised would guide us into all truth.

And that he would speak to us regarding your son.

So Lord, we pray that as we study worship and going back to the altar that you may restore the altars in our homes, our lives, our listeners, our viewers, Lord, and ultimately may we all be blessed on this biblical journey as we study not only today but throughout this quarter is our prayer in Jesus name amen amen amen Genesis chapter 3 verses 1 through 4 is can you start us off with the text it says now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made.

And he said to the woman, has God indeed said you shall not eat of every tree of the garden?

And the woman said to the serpent, we may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, you shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.

Then the serpent said to the woman, you will not surely die.

And I'd like to, for our discussion, let's talk about a little bit in Genesis 1 and 2, the setup, what's happening in Genesis 3, and then we'll talk about Genesis 3, and then we'll talk about what happens afterwards in the line of worship.

I mean, there's so many angles we can go in, right?

So describe what God had intended for Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

Those parameters, the ideals, let's start off with there, and how that really points to worship.

Well, I think 1 of the first things you see in the previous chapter, in chapter 2, is that God sets up a constant exchange back and forth with Adam and Eve.

And that God is a relational God, even though Genesis 1 kind of paints him as kind of transcendent and otherness, but Genesis 2 shows him as a God that is near, we see in...

I think, just if you go continue, I think that relational point is, it's kind of overdone, but I think so fundamental and foundational because a lot of people, their understanding of God is not relational.

I wouldn't even say even theological, like philosophical.

It's some kind of non-relational thing outside of yourself, but God is relational.

And there's a lot of people who have a hard time with that.

Which is surprising, because when you look at life, when you look at what is truly satisfying and meaningful to us, it always comes back to relationships.

You know, Nobody wants to get to the top and be alone.

There's no 1 there to applaud you, there's no 1 there to celebrate with, there's no 1 there to come back.

And at the same token, relationships also ease the pain of failure and struggle.

That if you didn't succeed, there's people there who still believe in you, who still love you, who are still there and present for you.

And I think in what we're looking at with Adam and Eve is that God set things up in a way to communicate his desire for that relationship and for that relationship to not just be functional, but also enjoyable.

Because when you think of creation, God didn't have to make things beautiful.

He didn't have to make color, He didn't have to make blue skies and beautiful sunsets and sunrises, right?

So you can see that there's a love relationship component.

This is not just a relationship by function.

I'm the creator, you're my creation, and the same way you deal with your blocks or your kids with their dolls, right?

It's very, very much like, I want you to be able to enjoy this.

And there's a, I think, a depth of care and attention to detail that's being put there to kind of make this relationship thrive.

Yeah, you definitely see that in chapters 1 and 2.

Beauty, detail, it's just, I mean, it doesn't even have to say it.

You just know that's what emerges from the text.

Yeah, and it's just, everything is perfect.

So, like, if you look at chapter 2, and verse, you know, verse, really from starting verse 1, does the heaven and the earth, all the hosts of them were finished.

On the seventh day God ended his work which he had done.

He rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done.

Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it because in it he rested from all his work which God had created and made.

So the Sabbath, the final day of creation is where God gives the gift of himself and he has perfected this world.

Even in the previous chapter, he talks about, you know, in chapter 1, everything was good, good, good.

And God now, in the first 24 hours of the human's lives, Adam and Eve, he steps into the space and fills the space of the Sabbath, the seventh day with his own presence.

He gifts himself to humanity, the relational component, and he starts their life, humanity, with his presence, with his grace, with his love, in a very, very meaningful, direct way.

I mean, it's hard to imagine what it must have been like to wake up, create it as an adult.

They didn't go through childhood, but yet very childlike.

Without a belly button or with a belly button?

They woke up and the first thing they see is Jesus, God giving them life.

And while they are adults, they are childlike in their faith, in their trust, in their understanding of the world.

Joe Reeves

02 An Altar Appears

My name's Justin and we are on a trip to talk about the altar, bringing back the altar into daily worship lives.

And we're so glad you guys are here with us.

We've been looking at 1 episode already in Genesis chapter 3, so we're gonna look at the rest of chapter 3.

It's kind of a continuation of the first episode.

So first I should welcome my guests here, Jonathan, Joe, and Sebastian.

They're my friends, and you guys are friends out there too.

And we're gonna continue our study on Genesis chapter 3.

So we wanna encourage you to go to hopetv.org slash inverse and look at the previous episode.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, that will give you proper context.

And for those of you who watched last week and you're wondering, man, I wanna see the continuation.

We should pray and then we should read and then study.

Heavenly Father, as we open your word, we pray for special insight that we can learn more about you and also some more about ourselves and this special story.

And then we're gonna go to Genesis chapter 3.

And just for time's sake, we're not gonna read the entire second half, we'll start from verse, where should we start?

We'll start from verse 15, yeah, 15's always good.

Children, your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.

Then to Adam he said, Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, You shall not eat of it.

In toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life.

Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth to you and you shall eat the herb of the field.

In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground for out of it you were taken, for dust you are and to dust you shall return.

And Adam called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living.

Also for Adam and his wife, the Lord God made tunics of skin and clothed them.

Then the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become like 1 of us, to know good and evil.

And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat and live forever.

Therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken.

So he drove out the man and he placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden and a flaming sword which turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life." All right, so as I said at the top of the show we've been studying Genesis chapter 3 the first time, really Genesis 1-2 to set up for chapter 3 and everything was just perfect.

God created man, God created woman, 2 are hanging out together And then because of a snake and then a fruit, we don't know what fruit he stole.

Some people say an apple, some say a pomegranate, not a durian, but whatever the fruit was, they ate it and then it caused disaster for the rest of us for the next human history.

We did end on verse 7 where Adam and Eve created tunics or aprons or some kind of fig leaf clothing accoutrement, and they're covering themselves up.

And we kind of ended, Sebastian, and we didn't really get to you, but, and this describes kind of the universal human experience, right?

We do something bad, we violate conscience, we violate God's law, we violate something, morality of some sort, depending on your world system.

We experience guilt, shame, fear, ostracization, some kind of spiritual dissonance in some way, and it's the human reaction to recover or to react in some way.

We all have different fig reactions, and mine was just Get up again and try harder next time and Jonathan's going on He's avoiding and he watches a movie or he binge eats whatever he does and so I wanted to kind of open that question to Joe and into Sebastian like You know not anything specific specific situation but just in general what are your tend to do you have the same tendencies or what?

I think, when I think of fig leaves, for me, the fig leaf is interesting because it shows leaves before fruit, right?

I mean, it bears fruit before the leaves.

And so the concept there is that to have leaves is to affirm the fact that you already are producing this particular fruit.

But for Adam and Eve, which I think is relevant to myself, is I like to still put forth a front as if I have not suffered this thing.

To hide and to dismiss my own shame, to dismiss my own guilt.

But you still wanna put up a face like I'm okay, I'm strong, but you're dismissing your feelings, you're dismissing what you need, whether it's reconciliation or I need to go to God.

So psych buffs would call that rationalization.

You're rationalizing like I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay.

And then I also think sometimes the temptation is to pour myself into something that is spiritual or that is worshipful or that is service-oriented.

Right, because you feel like this guilt, and so then you're like, well, let me cover this up.

And it seems like, oh, you're good, but in reality, the...

And there's nothing wrong with that, right?

There's nothing wrong with taking time to pray or to do ministry or whatever, but a lot of times our motive is different.

And while you're doing a good thing, you need to come back to the altar, right?

To make it right first with God, rather than trying to make up for it.

Yeah, and Jonathan responded 3 times, so he really resonates with what you're saying here.

Well, we all do it, but what I'm saying, like, when you use spiritual things, it can be self-deceptive.

You know, because you're doing spiritual things, you think, okay, it's good, I'm good.

And it becomes, that's the sad thing, you can use spiritual things, whatever activities, reading a Bible, praying, preaching, to- As compensation.

It's self-righteous activity, whether you realize it or not.

It's establishing your own righteousness, right?

You're essentially Trying to say that I'm good because I'm doing these activities Because what was their chore to tend and keep the trees of the garden?

Yeah, so now you're gonna use the thing that God gave you as a calling as a responsibility to cover up Yeah, the fact that because I'm doing what he called me to do and I'm utilizing it in this way.

Like just even our exercise now, we're studying the Bible, we're praying, we're recording this for audio and video, but this is not our spiritual life.

Like we're talking about spirituality, this is a spiritual exercise and hopefully you've been blessed by this in some way or other.

Sikhu Daco

03 Remember Not to Forget

I remember once when my mom was little, she would say, hey, don't forget this and don't forget that.

And I know we used to get annoyed because like, what if I forget that you told me that?

Then the whole thing just doesn't, just goes out the window.

Well, God gives us something to ensure that we do not forget.

And that's what we're gonna be studying today.

Hey guys, my name's Justin Kim, and you guys are on Inverse.

We have Israel, Siku, and Joe, and all of you guys, and then me.

And we're gonna be praying for the Holy Spirit to bless our conversation.

We are a group of friends that talk about scripture, about Bible, about theology, about spiritual things.

And in this quarter, this 13-arc section, 13-episode section, we're talking about back to the altar of restoring worship and what is worship and our rightful place in communing with God.

And we'll go to Genesis chapter 12 today.

Our Father in heaven, We are so thankful for your word and for the way in which you speak to us today.

And as we study about the altars and their significance in our lives, we pray that you would give us insights that would make the Bible meaningful to us.

Okay, this is the beginning of the story of Abraham, his name hasn't been changed yet so it's Abram beginning in Genesis 12 verse 1.

Now the Lord had said to Abram get out of your country from your family and from your father's house, to a land that I will show you.

I will bless you and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you, I will curse him who curses you, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken to him, and Lot went with him.

And Abram was 75 years old when he departed from Haran.

Then Abram took Sarai, his wife, and Lot, his brother's son, and all their possessions that they had gathered, and the people whom they had acquired in Haran.

And they departed to go to the land of Canaan.

Abram passed through the land to the place of Shechem as far as the Terabith tree of Morah, and the Canaanites were then in the land.

Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, To your descendants I will give this land.

And there he built an altar to the Lord who had appeared to him.

And he moved from there to the mountain east of Bethel.

And he pitched his tent with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east.

And there he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.

So Abram journeyed going on still toward the south.

And we place a premium on really reading scripture and whether it's Abram or Abraham, it's important to deal with these details.

Some of these details here seem a little bit intense, but these show that these were real places.

This was based in real geography, real history.

And for those who are familiar with it, I mean in verse 5, as far as the terebinth tree in Morah, like if you were alive and were like, wow, as far as the terebinth tree in Morah, man, that is far, man.

The terebinth tree, that's a long, I mean these are real places.

And we still do this today and if we're removed from that context, we may not know.

And so the point is not to get into these details but to show that this is a real history, these real factors.

You haven't been around for a couple episodes.

We've been talking, we had very robust discussions about Genesis chapter 3 in the previous episodes.

And if you guys haven't caught, you're gonna wanna go to hopetv.org slash inverse and go on to binge watch the first 2 episodes on Back to the Altar.

We also want to encourage you to actually study with us with the study guides, and you can go to inversebible.org and go to the Bible study guides, also called Back to the Altar.

And we looked at the human reaction that when we encounter sin, or we do bad stuff with guilt and fear and shame and all the negatives, you know, the junk that we face, we use figs to like cover ourselves up.

And we use figs to like, you know, either we make stuff to pretend as if it didn't happen, or we make figs to like bring our attention away from, to distract us, or we put up a good front, And we kind of went around, and Joe and Israel, and then our other 2 guys who are, Jono and Sebastian, they all shared.

I don't know, what is, not anything specific, but in just general, when you, what's your, what's your kind of tendency or inclination to deal with this thing, rather than coming to Jesus and coming back to the altar and having a one-on-one, you know, repentance and forgiveness and restoration and all that.

A lot of times, you know, when I should be talking to Jesus, I think my tendency is avoidance, because I'm conflict avoided.

Yeah, you know, because I know it's kind of we've got to talk, and I'd rather not talk.

But something that I'd like to say to God's credit, he needs credit for me.

And I see it, you know, in the story with Adam and Eve, and in my personal experience, God has always pursued me.

While I'm trying to avoid the conversation, He seeks me out.

And testimony-wise, 1 of the ways that has been a consistent, and I think it kind of goes to our conversation about building altars, Sabbath observance, having a day that you go to church, it's a day that, the day is centered around worshiping God.

And so a lot of times in my experience, I'll be avoiding Him all week, you know, not having devotions or not serious ones, not praying in my devotions, just doing like the, oh, I read my verse for the day, like to make me feel like righteous.

But once Sabbath comes, it's a day that's just focused on God and somehow by the end of the day, you've kind of had an encounter with Jesus and it's like, why was I avoiding you all along?

Like, you're so awesome, I should have talked to you long ago, I avoided a horrible week.

It's like I almost said, you have to go through the pain to get to the point of resolution and healing.

But we want the healing but we don't want the pain so we just deal with the pain and then pretend the pain's not there.

I know for me, and I guess at the top of the show I mentioned about like, we have a tendency to forget, right?

And we also have a tendency to wander away from God.

And for me, you know, I always pray in the morning or pray in the evening, right?

Before I go to bed, after bed, and there's whole days where I'm just like, God, I'm busy doing God's stuff, but I've kind of avoided him.

We talked about that a little in the show.

And at the end of the day, it's like, ugh, I can't avoid you any longer.

Like, ugh, I can either have a very dumb superficial prayer experience or just kind of unload and come to it.

And somebody said, I guess my point is this, habits, spiritual habits help you not to forget.

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Series

InVerse 2nd Quarter 2025: Back to the Altar

02 An Altar Appears

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

Parts

01 A Relationship Breaks

29m

02 An Altar Appears

28m

03 Remember Not to Forget

29m

04 A Place for Me

29m

05 Morning and Evening

29m

06 A Broken Altar Restored

28m

07 True Worshipers

29m

08 The Altar Life of Jesus, Part 1

29m

09 The Altar Life of Jesus, Part 2

29m

10 The Altar and the Word

29m

11 The Altar and the Heart

29m

12 The Altar and the Three Angels’ Messages

29m

13 Altar Call

28m

Sound Doctrine