Welcome to the Boundless Bible. My name is David Shapiro. Hey, I'm Javi Marquez. And I'm Jason Holloway. Welcome back to the Boundless Bible. Today we're trying something new, and I'm actually really excited about it. I'm going to be kind of starting off a series. So I'm going to be giving a little bit of an introduction, and we're going to start off a series that Javi and Jason will jump on next week. Uh, and we'll start talking about something as a series for a couple of weeks going forward. And uh, so I have the privilege of starting off the first episode today. And what we're talking about is hidden heroes. And this is something that is actually really interesting because typically, when you talk about the Bible, you think about the really big characters. You think about the Moses and the David and the Peters and Jesus, obviously. You think about these massive characters, and even if you look at a second level of characters, such as Joseph or Goliath, these are names that you've recognized quite a bit, you know a lot about. But there are some characters here. There are some people that existed that we don't really think about very often, but they are hidden heroes. And today I'm going to go over one that doesn't seem very much like a hero at all. But if you stick with me, I'll show you why he is. And uh the person that I'm gonna introduce today is called Barabbas. And Barabbas, what happened was at the time that Jesus was going to be crucified, Pilate during festivals would typically allow a prisoner to go. Now, if he went free, this was really for crowd control more than anything. Pilate was very good at controlling the Jewish crowds. There would have been a lot of people who came to Jerusalem for the Passover. So there would have been a lot of you know need for controlling the crowd. And this is what Pilate did he typically let a prisoner going during these festivals. So he now presented two prisoners. We have Barabbas and we have Jesus. And we know this story a little bit, we've read it quickly, but I want to go a little bit deeper uh into what the name actually is. And if you look at ancient manuscripts, believe it or not, Barabbas' first name is written as Jesus. This was his name. It was later taken out because they felt like the name Jesus was too reverent, that Barabbas, a criminal, should not have had the same name. But let me tell you why it's really interesting that he does and why I believe it should be in there. Um, Barabbas, if you don't know, in Hebrew, it's Bar Abba. Barabbas means the the son of. So you literally have, I mean, son of the father. Abba means father. So son of father. So you literally have his name being Jesus, son of father. So right now, if I if if you haven't painted the picture for yourself yet, you have Barabbas, son of small F Father, with Jesus, the son of big F father. These are the two that are standing right in front of the crowd now. So I I've set the stage. This is really incredible. You now have two Jesus' son of the fathers who are there. If we go back to Leviticus Leviticus 16, this is where they talk about what happens at the Day of Atonement on Yom Kippur. And typically what happened was there'd be two goats. One would be killed, the blood would bring in be brought into the Holy of Holies for atonement for all of Israel. And then the other one would be let go, would be the scapegoat. And this one goes free. So now when you fast forward to Jesus, you have one that's going to be the scapegoat. This is Barabbas, who's going to be let free, and then you have Jesus, the one that's going to be slaughtered, the one whose blood is going to cover now not just all of Israel, but all of humanity. This is what's happening right now, and it's it's really a cool moment in history. And let me tell you why I say history. Symbolically, we know the blood covers. Theologically, we know the blood covers. But right now, what's happening is historically and physically, Barabbas is having his life covered from the blood of Jesus, literally. It's not a figure of speech. This is happening in history. He's standing right next to him. And let me tell you something else. Right now, you're going, how is this guy a hero? He is a criminal. He is. He's known in the Bible if you read it. He is a murderer. He's a thief. He is somebody who was roughing up the crowds, trying to get them wild. He's somebody who probably was somebody who is a dangerous political opposition leader, somebody who was trying to overthrow Rome with violence and thiever and things like that. So you have somebody here who is not a great person. To my recollection, he does not thank Jesus when Jesus takes on the punishment that he should have gotten. He didn't go off and preach. He didn't become a studied, learned professional. And then, hey, I'm going to go out and give sermons about what happened. No, he just left. And what's beautiful about this, why this makes him a hero, is he is representing every one of us. This is exactly what each of us are. We are people who we accept the blood of Christ. We are the scapegoats. Christ already died for our sins. We sometimes don't thank him. Sometimes we do. But we don't have to go out there, we don't have to preach a sermon. We don't have to do anything. All we have to do is accept that gift that he gave us, and that's it. And that's exactly what Barabbas did. So when I think about him being a hidden hero, no, he's not a moral hero. He's not a hero that went out and did something to push the movement. He's a hero hidden because what he did was represent every single one of us who has accepted the grace of Jesus, who has accepted the role of scapegoat while Jesus paid the penalty. And that's something that makes him truly a hidden hero in my mind. As I start to think about the Bible, as I start to think about all the different parts of it, I know that Jason Javi and I have talked about whether or not this is a symbolic action, this is a literal action, uh, what this means. And we're going to talk about some really great characters going forward, about the ones that you don't really think about and what they've done and their contributions. And what I hope happens is when somebody tells you something, when you hear about Barabbas being son of father, his name being Jesus, and all this happening, you go, wow, I never knew that. I hope that more than just information you're getting, what you're actually absorbing is just this beautiful, this beautiful tapestry that was weaved by God that could only be written by him. This is not something that man could have ever made up. When you look at all the facets, all the little details, everything that comes in the Bible, I hope you're seeing that this is not only real, not only God breathed, but something that can honestly touch you and change you and change your heart. So I hope if you're struggling with something, you're hearing these stories and going, man, this can only be written by God. There's nothing else that would ever, I mean, there's just nothing that could have touched the amount of depth and love there is here in the Bible. And when you look at these people, when you look at the hidden heroes, when you look at the names that you know of, they're all flawed. There's not, it's not like somebody wrote it and said, Hey, let me write in that our people, the the Israel, you know, Israelite people are the greatest, and look at all the things we've done. And no, it's over and over again humanity messing up, doing things wrong, and God stepping in and taking on all of that sin, all of our going against covenants and all of our sins and all of our fighting God tooth and nail from what he wants. And and it's such a beautiful story that God knows that at the end of our humanity, he will always be there. I I think of of when Moses is being told what God's name is, God says, I am who I am. I I need you to understand something. It's not just him going, I am. This is God telling Moses who he is, the the I am that I am, really means that he will be, he will be here, however he shall be here, which means he will always be there for us. I am, meaning past, present, future. I will always be there for you. I think about things like, hey, if I was to die and go to heaven, if you listening were like, Man, I lived a great life. At the end of it, I died, I went to heaven. I'm at the pearly gates, and they say, Hey, why are you coming in here? Why are you allowed in here? You say, Listen, I I went to church, I believed in Jesus, I gave money to the poor, I did things, I tithed. I mean, you just went on and on. Listen, I I I tried to live a good life. I tried to live more like Jesus every day. You'd be right for saying all that because it's what you're doing. But that's not what's getting you into heaven. So all the I did this, I did that, it's not. It's all about him and what he did and how he paid the way. So when I think about the I am, I look at that and go, he is. So when I go to heaven to those pearly gates and go, why are you supposed to be in here? I could just point and go, because of him. Because of him, I'm washed clean. So these hidden heroes help this story not only come together in this beautiful way, but it also shows the beauty and the truth of actually what happened that there's somebody literally standing next to Jesus as he is taking on their sins, literally, historically. It's such a beautiful story. And I hope you're looking forward to this series as much as I am. I'm looking forward to getting back with Javi and Jason next week and really just diving into some of these beautiful characters of the Bible that we don't necessarily think about, but has so much depth and love shown by Jesus. So I'm looking forward to that with you. If you're interested in a certain character, write into us. Let us know. Go on to the www.theboundless bible.com, uh, go onto one of our platforms, write it into the chat. We would love for you to subscribe, to like them. That helps us put out more content for you guys. Um, but go on there and let us know. Hey, I'm really interested in learning about this character. I want to know about this. What do you think about that? We'd love to hear from you. Looking forward to seeing you next week.