Episode 86
Recreational Outrage: The Opening Ceremony of the 2024 France Olympics
Navigating Offense: Christians' Response to the Olympics Controversy
Welcome back to another episode of "Feeding My Faith." I'm your host, Dave Jackson, from theschoolofpodcasting.com. Today, we're diving into a hot-button issue that has set social media ablaze—the controversial opening ceremonies of the 2024 Olympics in France.
Many Christians were outraged, claiming the performance mocked the Lord's Supper. But before we jump to conclusions and join the frenzy of recreational outrage, let's take a moment to dig deeper.
Is this really an attack on our faith, or are we missing a crucial perspective? Join me as we unpack the ceremonies, explore biblical guidance on dealing with offense, and challenge ourselves to respond with love, understanding, and above all, Christ-like compassion. Grab your headphones and let's get started!
Mentioned in This Episode
7 Habits of Highly Effective People
James 1:19
Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.
In Exodus 14:14
The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still
Romans 12:19
Vengence is Mine
Proverbs 19:11
Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense.
Leviticus 19:18
“You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”
Colossians 3:13
Bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.
Romans 3:23
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Romans 12:2
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
Luke 11:4
Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
Luke 23:34
Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.
Recreational Outrage
The new national past time of yelling at every who and letting them know how wrong they are.
Jesus Sat at a Table
Thomas, the doubter
Peter, who would deny him multiple times
Judas, who would betray him.
Was Jesus offended by these people?
No, he washed their feet and shared a meal.
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Transcript
Today on feeding my faith, should I be outraged over the
Speaker:Olympics opening ceremonies? Kick the doors open. Let the party
Speaker:begin.
Speaker:Hey. Welcome to Feeding My Faith. I'm Dave
Speaker:Jackson from the school of podcasting.com. This is
Speaker:where we try to make God simple. I love Jesus,
Speaker:hate religion. And, I don't know, did you see
Speaker:the opening ceremonies of the Olympics here in France
Speaker:2024. These people dancing around
Speaker:in robes and all this stuff. And
Speaker:the next day, look, I don't really watch the news because most of it is
Speaker:just commercials for, you know, drugs, and
Speaker:I I could not escape this story. People were
Speaker:losing their minds because the opening ceremonies
Speaker:mocked the Lord's supper.
Speaker:And I looked at it was like, holy cow. There's that person in the
Speaker:middle with like a little halo over their head and a bunch of people around
Speaker:the table, and I was like, sure. It looks like they're holy cow. And then
Speaker:I saw a picture of the da Vinci painting, and then I saw a
Speaker:screenshot of the opening ceremony. I was like, holy cow. They're mocking the
Speaker:Lord's Supper. I don't believe this. I can't this is blasphemy. This is
Speaker:outrage. This is disrespect. I I hate
Speaker:it when non believers act like,
Speaker:non believers. Yeah.
Speaker:I couldn't believe it. I mean, exactly how did they mock
Speaker:it? Oh, they dressed up in costumes and they
Speaker:went around the table and there was some big guy looked like Papa
Speaker:Smurf, but he was naked. Wait. What? I
Speaker:mean, at my church, we dressed up in old costumes and sat
Speaker:around a table. Is that wait. Hold on. And
Speaker:then I did a little research. Remember, there's that great book. No, not the
Speaker:Bible. That's a great book. There's another book called
Speaker:The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, and one of those
Speaker:habits is understand before being understood. So I
Speaker:went to see, well, wait, did was that on purpose? Like, what's
Speaker:going on here? And the director of the opening
Speaker:ceremonies, he said that basically it was about,
Speaker:the feast of Dionysus, not the Lord's Supper, where
Speaker:Dionysus arrives at the table because he's the Greek god of
Speaker:celebration and that sequence is called festivity
Speaker:and the god of wine which is also a French jewel
Speaker:and father of sequana the goddess linked to the river
Speaker:sign. The idea was to create a big pagan party
Speaker:in link with the God of Mount Olympus and I'm like is that really the
Speaker:first impression you want of the opening ceremonies of the Olympics?
Speaker:Okay. And he says and you will never find me or my work
Speaker:or anyone really mocking anyone.
Speaker:You know, my great first impression, viva la France. Okay. If that's what
Speaker:you say. And I get it. I saw a lot of
Speaker:people losing their minds. Christians.
Speaker:Like, look, Dave. I'm I'm offended. I'm I'm just offended.
Speaker:And when you're offended, what happens? You are
Speaker:quick to anger and we head for the nearest
Speaker:platform, your phone, your computer, whatever it is, and you take part
Speaker:in America's number one activity, no not pickleball,
Speaker:recreational outrage, and you just tell everyone,
Speaker:you're wrong. You're wrong. This is wrong. You're all out of
Speaker:order. Right? But wait. What
Speaker:does the Bible say again? James 119.
Speaker:Know this, my beloved brothers, let every person
Speaker:be quick to hear slow to speak
Speaker:and slow to anger.
Speaker:So am I mad at these people? Let's let's go with they
Speaker:were mocking the lord's supper. You make up your own mind on that, but
Speaker:let's just for giggles. Let's say they were
Speaker:doing that on purpose. Am I mad at these people?
Speaker:I mean, I'm I'm not going to get mad at sinners for
Speaker:sinning, right? I mean,
Speaker:do we get mad if we get a puppy and it
Speaker:pees on the floor? I mean, isn't that what
Speaker:they do? Right? And
Speaker:I know you might be saying, no,
Speaker:Dave. You don't get it, though. I am seriously offended.
Speaker:Like, how am I supposed to react? Well,
Speaker:as Christians, I mean, Jesus said it's gonna get
Speaker:worse before it gets better. So we really shouldn't be offended by
Speaker:anything the world does. I mean,
Speaker:if you think about it, we know better.
Speaker:They don't.
Speaker:And the truth is, as I researched this, look,
Speaker:I could have gone either way on this particular topic because
Speaker:I saw like God shall not be mocked and I was like,
Speaker:But then I saw a lot of other scriptures
Speaker:about not being offended.
Speaker:And there's a guy on Facebook. I think his name is
Speaker:Kenny k. I'll put a link to him. He had to make
Speaker:great point. He said, offense is the bait
Speaker:of Satan. Right? So just picture of Satan on a boat
Speaker:throws out his reel. Ring. Right?
Speaker:We take the bait on that. We get all outraged. And then
Speaker:he says when you think about it, when you are outraged, you're what? You're
Speaker:filled with hate, disgust, outrage. Are you really in the
Speaker:best place to communicate with God?
Speaker:Because you've got a whole different lens you're looking through
Speaker:and Satan's pretty happy about that. The other thing I thought
Speaker:was interesting as I did some research on this, there was
Speaker:I saw many, many screenshots of here's the da Vinci
Speaker:painting. Here's the opening ceremonies, and you'd see that. But then
Speaker:I saw one. It was da Vinci opening ceremonies and
Speaker:then this other picture where someone had altered
Speaker:the da Vinci photo. So it wasn't like, hey, is that
Speaker:the Lord's Supper? It's like, no, it's the Lord's Supper, and they had taken Jesus
Speaker:out of the picture. And I was like, wait, hold
Speaker:on. They're doing what to who the And
Speaker:what did they put in place of Jesus? Yeah. Donald Trump
Speaker:and not a peep. So if it's so wrong
Speaker:to, you know, alter this picture and you're mocking God and
Speaker:but your Jesus and disrespect, yeah, unless you put Donald Trump
Speaker:in there? Wait. Hold on. Which then you go, wait. What's the difference
Speaker:between this and that? Oh, those were trans people.
Speaker:So Satan is like, yep. Gotcha again.
Speaker:Because now you look like homophobes and transphobes and every other kind of
Speaker:phobes there are. Probably got a pretty good laugh
Speaker:out of that. Because I didn't hear anybody saying I'm
Speaker:outraged that they altered this this picture
Speaker:and so what we need to do and
Speaker:sometimes for some people this is easier said than done.
Speaker:We need to separate the sin from the people
Speaker:because I realize you're like, Dave, that's evil. Okay. That's
Speaker:what you believe, but I'm not
Speaker:saying being tolerant of evil and going, ah, no big
Speaker:deal. No. No. No. We gotta gotta keep our eye on that.
Speaker:But we should hate the evil in the world,
Speaker:but we should love the people.
Speaker:Again, sometimes a little harder for some people to
Speaker:do and then people are like wait a minute Dave
Speaker:this outrage thing it's okay to be outraged
Speaker:you're like really they're like yeah of course because, you know, Jesus
Speaker:overturned the tables. And you're like, okay.
Speaker:Yeah. Okay. Got it. Totally see that
Speaker:but where was he again when he did that oh that's right he
Speaker:was in the church And,
Speaker:who was doing all this bad stuff? Oh, that's right. The the church.
Speaker:And so it wasn't a bunch of non believers.
Speaker:It was believers. It was the people in the church and there's a
Speaker:that makes that a completely different situation.
Speaker:1 is basically going
Speaker:to believers and going, hey, knock it off. And the other
Speaker:one is attempting to be the
Speaker:light in what appears to be a very dark
Speaker:world. Apples, oranges.
Speaker:So I'm sorry if you're like, oh, I can't wait to play that card.
Speaker:And have you ever, when you
Speaker:were growing up played your parents, right? You
Speaker:knew what pushed their buttons. I put on
Speaker:Oscar award winning winning performances.
Speaker:As a kid, I could throw a tantrum and within 5
Speaker:to 10 minutes, I had my mom in the palm of my hand
Speaker:and, you know,
Speaker:what if they did this on purpose
Speaker:to offend us, and what if they went out and they
Speaker:said, hey, look. Look. We're mocking your God.
Speaker:See? We're mocking God. Hey. It's your
Speaker:God. Isn't this your number one guy, your Lord savior? Look. We're mocking him.
Speaker:What if we instead of going, how dare you?
Speaker:What if we replied, you know, aren't you? Look look
Speaker:aren't you offended aren't you offended? No no I'm I'm not offended
Speaker:actually because, I love you
Speaker:and you could be doing so much more with your life right
Speaker:now. God has a plan for you
Speaker:and I don't think this is it. What if
Speaker:we said that? That would be different,
Speaker:right? And I always
Speaker:go back to the one of the best
Speaker:marketing strategies for Christians is when they were thrown to
Speaker:the lions. Right? Have a bunch of people in a stadium,
Speaker:throw the Christians out there. They're sitting in the middle of the ring.
Speaker:Lions come out. What do they do? Do they run and scream? Do they
Speaker:cry? No, they prayed. They prayed and people
Speaker:went wait, this isn't any good. This isn't any fun.
Speaker:These people were weird. Big big, must have
Speaker:been a sale on the word weird this week. It's been
Speaker:used a lot. But nonetheless,
Speaker:it looked weird because everybody else was screaming and running fighting for
Speaker:their lives. Nah. And so
Speaker:when we react in a way that's different from the world, we are gonna look
Speaker:a little strange. Like well that's different. And
Speaker:that difference is what draws people. They're like I got
Speaker:to check into what's going on. This seems weird
Speaker:and I get it. They're like Dave, but I'm I'm really upset.
Speaker:Come on. I want a onward Christian soldiers. I want to stand up stand up
Speaker:for Jesus. Okay. I get that. I really do.
Speaker:But does God really need us to fight his battles?
Speaker:In Exodus 14 it said the Lord will
Speaker:fight for you. You need only to be
Speaker:still. And I get it. You want to
Speaker:stand up for Jesus. Well, okay, stand in love
Speaker:because God has been defending his name
Speaker:for quite some time. He's pretty good at it, and
Speaker:our job is to trust in his promises
Speaker:and be that light that he's called us to be.
Speaker:After all. What's that verse? You've probably heard this one.
Speaker:Vengeance is what Right? Romans
Speaker:12/19. Vengeance is mine, not
Speaker:yours. Not, hey, can you take care of this for me? No. God
Speaker:said no vengeance is mine. I got it. I got it.
Speaker:Don't worry about it. And the other thing
Speaker:you have to keep in mind sometimes when we want to do protests, we grab
Speaker:our torches and our pitchforks and our signs.
Speaker:We're all set. They don't always work.
Speaker:Sometimes all we're doing is putting a flashlight
Speaker:on behavior that shouldn't be rewarded.
Speaker:In 1985, 19 record labels started
Speaker:using the parental guidance explicit lyrics
Speaker:sticker. That's when it was invented. It took 5 years
Speaker:for an album to come out that had the song f the
Speaker:police on it. But in 1990, 0% of the
Speaker:songs of like the top 20 or the top charts or whatever,
Speaker:0% were marked explicit. Fast forward to
Speaker:2021, 40% were marked
Speaker:explicit. So a little over 10 years.
Speaker:Now why were 40% marked explicit?
Speaker:Oh, it's simple. They sold more. You put a
Speaker:sticker on an album and tell a kid you can't listen to it. That's all
Speaker:they want to do and it worked. Have you ever
Speaker:told a teenage girl not to date a specific boy?
Speaker:You're like, yeah, Dave. I did. He's my son-in-law.
Speaker:He's still a loser. Turned into Hank Hill all of a sudden.
Speaker:Bobby, propane and propane accessories.
Speaker:Alright. Anyway, here's another one. Joe Rogan
Speaker:in 2020, got a
Speaker:deal, 200 $1,000,000 to
Speaker:do his podcast and to do it only on
Speaker:Spotify. Now, Joe brought
Speaker:up the drug. Again, remember the times here,
Speaker:2020. So the pandemic's going on,
Speaker:and Joe brings up the Nobel committee
Speaker:back in 2015. They nominated
Speaker:ivermectin for an
Speaker:award and if you don't remember ivermectin
Speaker:it's a multifaceted drug and in 2021, it
Speaker:was found notable, it helped to reduce
Speaker:COVID fatalities. And what was interesting
Speaker:about that is, you know, big
Speaker:pharma owns the media and ivermectin is
Speaker:really cheap. Well, you can't have that. So they
Speaker:got the media together and they're like, hey, this guy, that's it we're all gonna
Speaker:get on Joe Rogan he's a horrible human being he's he's putting
Speaker:out misinformation and you know,
Speaker:it's horse dewormer. He's telling people to eat horse dewormer.
Speaker:Right. Regardless of the awards, I believe it was
Speaker:ivermectin. It might have been the other one that actually helped World
Speaker:War 1 veterans, but you know this guy is crazy
Speaker:and the musicians Neil Young and then the next day
Speaker:Joni Mitchell and then the next day Crosby Stills and Nash they
Speaker:all pulled their music from Spotify
Speaker:which would have been a brilliant idea if it
Speaker:was 1970. But alas it was
Speaker:not and it didn't really have much effect.
Speaker:Fast forward to 2024. First of
Speaker:all, all those musicians have since brought their music
Speaker:back because, you know, they need to eat. But in 2024,
Speaker:Joe got a new contract
Speaker:for $250,000,000 and, oh, that whole
Speaker:exclusive thing, you can only get me on Spotify? Yeah. He can be
Speaker:anywhere. So
Speaker:that's one example. I got another one here real quick. Colin
Speaker:Kaepernick was a quarterback for the
Speaker:San Francisco 49ers and he really hated
Speaker:injustice. He kept noticing there were a lot of,
Speaker:innocent black males getting killed, and that
Speaker:seemed to kind of upset him a bit, upset me a bit.
Speaker:And the media got a hold of that, and we were
Speaker:told that somehow he didn't like the troops.
Speaker:He didn't like the troops. America. Okay.
Speaker:And it went on and on. Did anybody try to understand before being
Speaker:understood and go, hey, Colin. What's your deal? Why you kneeling during the, during
Speaker:the national anthem? Because he would have said, I need people to look at
Speaker:the injustice that's going on. Nobody's talking about the fact that all these
Speaker:innocent black males are getting killed, and nobody seems to care.
Speaker:No. They just America. He hates the troops. And it
Speaker:was this whole big thing. Are you gonna kneel or not? And or
Speaker:the team. It was a whole big deal. And so what happened?
Speaker:Well, Nike gave him an advertisement deal.
Speaker:And people were like, oh, how can you he's got a pair of shoes. You
Speaker:can't do that, America. Troops. Nobody's talking
Speaker:about hey. Does this guy have a point about the people getting killed? Nope. Nope.
Speaker:Just America. True. Shoes. Burn the shoes. Everybody burn your
Speaker:shoes. Right. Well, it turns out all that
Speaker:that extra America, burn your shoes kind of thing. Yeah. The shoes took
Speaker:right off. I think people bought them to burn them, but, nonetheless,
Speaker:that campaign didn't really work. In the end,
Speaker:Colin got paid, and Nike sold some shoes. America.
Speaker:Good job. So when I
Speaker:say there are plenty of
Speaker:passages in the Bible,
Speaker:Proverbs 19, good sense
Speaker:makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory. So when
Speaker:you think about his glory, think about God's maturity to
Speaker:overlook an offense. In
Speaker:Leviticus 1918, you shall not take vengeance or bear a
Speaker:grudge, yet the sons of your own people, but you
Speaker:shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.
:13, bearing with one another and,
:if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each
:other. As the Lord has forgiven you,
:so you also must
:forgive. Romans 3 23,
:for all have sinned and
:fall short of the glory of God.
:And I get it. Sometimes somebody says something
:and it just goes right through your heart, and it
:hurts. Been there, done that, got the t
:shirt, but being offended, that's a
:choice made by us. Now, often, it's a
:knee jerk reaction to being hurt. Hurt is
:very much an emotion and offense
:is very much a logical thing, but it doesn't seem that way
:because it was triggered by hurt. But
:hurt requires healing and offense requires an
:objective opinion and it requires a dose
:of just letting it go. It's a choice. You can
:choose to hold on to it, and I think that's what the media wants us
:to do. The media wants us all mad at each other.
:How can you even think that? Right? Because we're too
:busy getting mad at each other to notice what they're doing behind the
:scenes. And so what do we do? Well, we end up
:screaming at each other and we end up screaming what we're against
:And as Christians, we shouldn't be responding
:the way the world does. I feel bad for any
:middle aged white woman named Karen. But if you go to
:YouTube and type in Karen losing her cool,
:there are plenty of videos of recreational
:outrage, and I realize that that's given Karen's a bad
:name. I have a cousin Karen who's absolutely amazing.
:So but there are some people out there
:and they're just losing it and so we shouldn't be
:responding the way the world does because we have something the
:world doesn't have. You see, if we truly
:wanna make a change in this world for Jesus, we
:need to stop talking so much about what we're against and
:start telling people what we're for and what we're
:for is Jesus changing lives. What
:we're for is the love of Jesus being all that we need
:and forgiveness forgiveness
:forgiveness. Romans 12:2,
:do not be overcome by evil, but overcome
:evil with good.
:And I get it. You're like, Dave, I understand. I still feel
:hurt, and they're getting away with it. We
:can't let them get away with it. Well, that sounds like a
:competition, but are we
:really letting them get away with it? Do you do you not
:think God is taking notes? Right?
:It's better instead of holding on to them,
:fighting God's fight that we don't need to fight. He's got it handled.
:God is always in control. We could be giving them
:to the Lord. Just offer them up in prayer.
:Plant that seed
:because you know who wasn't offended?
:Jesus. I mean, think about it.
:If you go to the Lord's prayer, what does it say? Forgive us
:our sins as we forgive those
:who sin against us.
:And what about as they're putting
:nails in his hands and his feet?
:Forgive them for, you know, father forgive them for
:they know not what they do. Didn't seem
:too offended. And
:I'm gonna get a little loosey goosey here with the scripture, so bear with
:me. But I just wanna I just wanna put a scene out
:there in your head, right? A little theater of the mind.
:We know the picture of the last supper. We've seen da
:Vinci's picture. But
:what if Jesus just bear with me. Stay with me here. What
:if Jesus was fashionably late? Alright. All the boys
:are already lined up. They got a seat for him in the middle.
:He walks in, looks at Thomas.
:In his head, he's probably thinking, yep. That guy's gonna doubt me in about a
:couple hours. He looks at Peter.
:Yep. That guy's gonna deny me pretty soon.
:So he walks in, sees Thomas.
:Yeah. That guy's gonna doubt me. What's
:up, Tommy? Little fist bump. Pete.
:What's up, Pete? Good to see you, buddy. Jesus
:knows. Yeah. That's the guy that's gonna deny me. Not once, not twice, but three
:times. Matthew,
:you know, back in the day, dirty, dirty tax collector. There's
:nobody worse than a tax collector, and there he is at Jesus
:table and, of course, Judas.
:Jesus knew all these guys.
:Well, Matthew didn't, but, you know, they they were all
:going to betray him in one way or another here,
:and, he wasn't offended. In
:fact, what did he do?
:He washed their feet. He
:washed their feet knowing that that guy was
:gonna doubt me. That was guy was gonna deny me, and that guy is gonna
:betray me. He washed
:their feet. I mean even later
:when they went out in the garden and Jesus got arrested
:in Luke 22:49 when Jesus followers saw
:what was gonna happen, uh-uh Not gonna
:take my Jesus. Can't arrest him. They said,
:Lord, should we strike with our swords? And one of them, that
:was Peter, struck the servant of the high priest
:cutting off his right ear. But Jesus
:answered, no more of this. And he
:touched the man's ear and healed him.
:It doesn't sound too offended. Recreational
:outrage. It doesn't seem to be working as
:a strategy. Do you think? Is anybody are we
:changing anybody's mind screaming at them?
:We're falling into Satan's trap. We are
:known more for our hate.
:Jesus overturned the tables. How many times?
:And then how many times did he show love and compassion?
:Well, maybe we should try love,
:compassion, and forgiveness.
:I hope you found this episode helpful.
:I hope you think twice maybe the next time you see some
:bait out there put out there by Satan.
:If you know somebody who likes to play in the American
:pastime that is recreational outrage and they're a believer,
:remember Jesus turned over the tables because it was the
:believers that were acting like, well,
:nonbelievers in a way. Could you do me a
:favor and and share it with them? That would be awesome.
:The website feeding my faith dot com, if you feel
:so moved, and we got a donate button out there somewhere. I'm Dave
:Jackson from the school of podcasting.com. I
:help podcasters. It's what I do, and I'm
:hoping I'm helping you realize
:that, there's a big difference between religion
:and God. Take care.
