Gen Z Takeover Part 2

[00:00:18] Speaker A: So throughout the Bible, we see prophets receiving messages from God. We see people having very distinct visions and God seemingly speaking directly into people's lives. I think a lot of Gen Z wants to know, why has that changed? Why does it seem so different now? Why aren't we hearing directly from God? [00:00:38] Speaker B: Well, two things. One, it is different now. It doesn't happen like it did then because the Scriptures are complete a little bit. [00:00:47] Speaker A: But I would love to dive into our next section of what happens after we die as a believer or not. Yeah. So the Bible has certain things that [00:00:56] Speaker B: it says about sexuality, ethics about sexuality, [00:00:59] Speaker A: and then when it comes to relationships, like don't get married before you do other things. And then gender. And I don't really think the Bible says. Gets too into it. [00:01:10] Speaker B: It does more than you would. [00:01:27] Speaker A: Foreign. Terry, welcome back to Code Red. [00:01:36] Speaker B: Hey, you've got some really good responses from the first one. Everybody likes you being a host, so maybe there's a burgeoning new. Well, maybe a new. A new show. You know, who knows? [00:01:45] Speaker A: We'll see. That could be a fun idea to do. [00:01:48] Speaker B: You've got the knack, for sure. [00:01:49] Speaker A: Thank you. So if you missed part one, we talked a little bit about the difference between Gen X, Gen Z, and all the questions that Gen Z has for Christianity, Jesus, the Bible. And we have plenty more to get back into. But I thought it would be fun to start off with a little game. [00:02:08] Speaker B: Okay, let's do it. [00:02:10] Speaker A: So the game is I'm going to ask you to define some Gen Z slang. So I'm going to give you a slang word and I want you to tell me what it means. Okay? Okay. The first one, Unk or Auntie. [00:02:23] Speaker B: Unk is. Is just an older person who's kind of like an uncle figure in your life, right? No, somebody kind of somebody. Somebody who's kind of dated in their style and all that. Yeah. [00:02:35] Speaker A: Little out of touch. [00:02:36] Speaker B: Yeah, I remember that one. Somebody's used that one on me before. [00:02:39] Speaker A: Wonder who did that. [00:02:40] Speaker B: No, it wasn't you. It was one of the kids, I [00:02:42] Speaker A: think, but I think I did once. Okay, but you can also use it if the person's actually not old, so. [00:02:48] Speaker B: Okay. [00:02:49] Speaker A: Sometimes Landon's little brother will call me and him Unc and call me an auntie. Okay. The next one, and this one can be used in a positive or a negative way. Cooked? [00:03:01] Speaker B: Sunburned? [00:03:02] Speaker A: No. [00:03:03] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:03:03] Speaker A: Okay, so for the negative way, it's like you're done for, like, oh, I bombed that quiz. I'm cooked. [00:03:09] Speaker B: Okay. [00:03:09] Speaker A: And then the positive way is you did really well. Like, oh, he's cooking right now. Like, he's doing really good. [00:03:16] Speaker B: Okay. [00:03:16] Speaker A: Okay. The next one. This one's pretty easy. Bet. [00:03:20] Speaker B: Bet. [00:03:20] Speaker A: Yeah, bet. Yes, [00:03:24] Speaker B: presume is likely. [00:03:28] Speaker A: Maybe it's kind of like when you're agreeing with somebody. So if you were asking somebody if they wanted to make some plans to go out and you were cool with those plans, you'd be like, okay, bet. [00:03:38] Speaker B: Yeah, I've never heard that. Is fire still a thing? [00:03:41] Speaker A: Not really. [00:03:42] Speaker B: That. That had a short shelf life. [00:03:44] Speaker A: It did have a short shelf life. Okay, this one's also easy. Cap. [00:03:48] Speaker B: Cap. No clue. [00:03:50] Speaker A: You're lying. Like, that's cap. [00:03:52] Speaker B: If you say, what does that mean? I mean, how do they know logically get there? [00:03:56] Speaker A: I have no idea. Don't ask me the logic behind these. Okay. Do you know what aura is or ora farming? [00:04:02] Speaker B: Yeah, I've heard that. I've heard the kids use that. And so if somebody's doing well, they're kind of in the zone. They have aura. And if some. If you're leaning into somebody else's performance, then you're. You're farming. [00:04:15] Speaker A: And it could also be a bad thing. Like, you have no aura right now. You're like, okay, not doing good at something. Okay. Do you know what fries means? Or put the fries in the bag. [00:04:25] Speaker B: No clue. [00:04:27] Speaker A: It's a way of just telling somebody, like, to stop talking and do your job. Like if you were in a drive through and the drive thru workers just not like talking your ear off and they won't just give you your bag of fries. You're like, just, come on. [00:04:38] Speaker B: I got one friend who I love to hang out with him because when he, when he goes to a drive through or if he gets on a phone call, you know how, like people who take calls are trained to make small talk with you? [00:04:49] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:04:49] Speaker B: He'll just say, look, I don't need a relationship. [00:04:52] Speaker A: Right. [00:04:52] Speaker B: I don't need a new friend. I need you to do this, you know, this job. [00:04:56] Speaker A: Yeah. So now you have a word for put the fries in the back. [00:04:59] Speaker B: Fries, plural? [00:05:00] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:00] Speaker B: Okay. [00:05:01] Speaker A: Sometimes we'll just get the fries emoji from our siblings and we're like, all right. That means we're talking too much. [00:05:07] Speaker B: I don't like long text. [00:05:08] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. Do you know what busin means? [00:05:12] Speaker B: I've heard it, but I don't know what it means. [00:05:13] Speaker A: Means something's really good. Like if you went out to eat and you really liked the food, you'd be like, this is bussin'. Okay, okay. Chat. Spell it like chat. C H A T. I just presume [00:05:26] Speaker B: it means you're talking. [00:05:27] Speaker A: No. So it started from when live streamers would talk to their chat online. It's usually something when you're addressing a group of people and you want them to give an opinion, you'll be like, hey, hey, chat. What do you think? [00:05:40] Speaker B: So you want. You want. It's not a rhetorical question. No, I can use that. Nobody would know what it means, but they wouldn't. I like a response from the crowd sometimes. [00:05:50] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. If you're preaching a sermon, you want somebody to answer, you're like, all right, chat. Okay, give me a response. Now, this one has a hand symbol. I'll be really impressed if you know it. Do you know what clocked means? [00:06:05] Speaker B: Like in boxing? Like, if somebody was clocked, they're knocked out or hit really hard. [00:06:10] Speaker A: That's probably true for boxing, but it's when you're calling something out and you're accurate about it. So, like, if you were watching a reality show and they're getting into a cat fight and you think one girl's right, you'd be like, oh, she clocked her. [00:06:22] Speaker B: Yeah, but at least context is close. [00:06:24] Speaker A: And then here's the. That's this. Or is it this one, Brady? Maybe this one. This one. Okay. Cloth. [00:06:30] Speaker B: That's how you do it. [00:06:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:06:31] Speaker B: So you know what that used to mean? You're smashing somebody's head. Like in. When I was a kid, that was what we would do if we, like. Yeah, if somebody's getting on your nerves. You do that, you're dead. [00:06:43] Speaker A: Okay, so the next two. I really feel like you should know because you have two daughters and a wife. Okay. Do you know what girl dinner is? [00:06:51] Speaker B: Presume it's girl dinner. [00:06:53] Speaker A: Girl dinner versus boy dinner. Do you know the difference? [00:06:56] Speaker B: I mean, is it like salads or something? [00:06:58] Speaker A: So girl dinner is kind of like when you make a hodgepodge of different snacks. Like, it'd be cheese and grapes and maybe some fries, maybe some chips. You just kind of. You have all these things you're craving, so you get a little bit of all of them, put them on a plate. [00:07:11] Speaker B: That's what I do all the time. [00:07:12] Speaker A: And then boy dinner, we call it also kibble. And it's just meat and rice. And that's kibble. [00:07:19] Speaker B: Yeah. I haven't heard it used that way. I was doing the little couple premiers counseling yesterday, and. And she was talking about getting together with all of her girlfriends and going to publix and spending $500 on dinner and then coming back and cooking it together. And I'm like, what are you buying for one meal? Yeah. [00:07:37] Speaker A: Just little different arrangements. Okay. You should also know this one. Do you know what girl math is? No. Okay, so girl math, is it like [00:07:45] Speaker B: when there's a sale. [00:07:46] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:07:46] Speaker B: And you work out the logic so that it makes sense to buy. [00:07:49] Speaker A: Yes. [00:07:49] Speaker B: Stuff you don't need. [00:07:50] Speaker A: That is girl math. But you can do it not just with buying things. So it's like if I returned a $50 dress that I bought and I bought a $40 shirt, then I made $10. [00:07:59] Speaker B: I earned money so that I think that way. [00:08:02] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:08:03] Speaker B: I'm the accelerator financially in our. So I. We're a single income household, so I tend to not really keep. Julie's the accountant and she knows what we have. She knows what's coming in, what's going out. I don't. I'm just like, I think we can afford this. I'll go out and make it work, you know? But what about you guys? Are y' all. One of you spend more than the other? [00:08:28] Speaker A: I would say Landon is more. He's also our accountant, but he also makes bigger purchases than I do. [00:08:34] Speaker B: Okay. [00:08:35] Speaker A: So maybe I'll like, go to Starbucks a couple times a week, and those are my, like, little purchases I make. But he's more often to make like [00:08:41] Speaker B: one big purchase and you guys will build it yourself. That's pretty cool. [00:08:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:08:47] Speaker B: So, like, rather I would tend to hire it out. You guys get out there and I [00:08:52] Speaker A: wish we could hire it out. Landon won't let me. [00:08:54] Speaker B: Well, it a really good job and I. I wish we did more of that. [00:08:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Thank you. My parents also won't let me hire it out. Every time I show them something I want to do, they're like, we can do this. [00:09:03] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:09:03] Speaker A: And then Landon's like, yeah, we could do that. So they kind of give us this confidence to. To try things. [00:09:08] Speaker B: Well, that's cool. They help out with it. [00:09:09] Speaker A: They do help out with it. They're really good at it. Okay, three more maxing. [00:09:14] Speaker B: I've heard it. [00:09:15] Speaker A: So right now we're podcast maxing. [00:09:17] Speaker B: What does that mean? [00:09:18] Speaker A: So it means when you're trying to maximize something or improve something, you're doing something a lot. So if I go to Starbucks often, I'm Starbucks maxing. [00:09:26] Speaker B: Okay. [00:09:27] Speaker A: It's just you add it to the end of things on Sundays, you sermon Max. [00:09:30] Speaker B: Okay. Is that good? [00:09:33] Speaker A: Yeah. It's not a bad thing. It just means you do Something a lot. [00:09:35] Speaker B: You do it a lot. [00:09:36] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay, next one. Minty B. [00:09:40] Speaker B: Never heard it. [00:09:41] Speaker A: You never heard it? It's short for mental breakdown. Okay, so if you're like not doing good one day, you'd say, oh, I'm having a minty bee right now. [00:09:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I wouldn't say that, but I understand the context. [00:09:52] Speaker A: And then the last one to tweak [00:09:54] Speaker B: or tweaking, that's like somebody that's high, that's like they're a tweaker, that, that [00:10:04] Speaker A: could be used for that. But it's just when you're freaking out, it's also kind of like having a minty bee. [00:10:08] Speaker B: Have you seen the National Geographic spoof on tweakers in society? It's hilarious. So they'll find like, you know, somebody who's, it's really sad, but they're, they're high. They've, they've, they're hooked on something. They're living in a cardboard box and they, but they, they cover it like it's a National Geographic episode. So it's like, you know, following the tweaker and all this, the, the, the habitat of the tweaker, the, you know, food of the tweaker, all this. But, but yeah, so I've heard that on TikTok. [00:10:39] Speaker A: On TikTok. So you're already a step ahead of the game. [00:10:42] Speaker B: I try to be, I try to, I try to stay connected. And I've always been an early adopter. And you know, we talked about in the last episode, in part one, my dad couldn't set the clock on the vcr, so I never wanted to be that dad. I wanted to say, you know, teach my kids stuff. Yeah, but, but yeah, this, the, the lingo I can't keep up with. Yeah, it changes so much. [00:11:03] Speaker A: It just changed so much. I had my little cousin, she came up and said something to me one Sunday and I misheard her. So that was part of the problem because usually I can infer what the meaning of the newest slang words are, but I misheard her and she was like, you don't know what that means? [00:11:17] Speaker B: Do you think, do you think that Gen Z tones that down when they're talking to older people? [00:11:24] Speaker A: Probably so. [00:11:25] Speaker B: Because if I hear my daughter, my youngest daughter, talking to a friend, like, not only does her lingo change, her voice changes. So we're like, you know, she's real sweet with us and kind of a high pitched voice. And then when she's talking to her friends, she'll get a little deeper, a little bit of a vocal fry, you know, all that. She's kind of past that now, but it's like, we can so tell when she. She's talking to a friend. [00:11:52] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:52] Speaker B: And she totally does not want us to contribute, you know, so she'll get into that. But. But yeah, it's like, why do you not talk to us the way you talk to them? [00:12:00] Speaker A: Yeah, we're not cool. My biggest issue with the Gen Z language is sometimes it's so ridiculous that I'll start using it as a joke. Like my bit will be to use the slang. And then it becomes, like, indoctrinated into my speech patterns. I'm like, I got to. I got to cut this out. At my last job, I said slay unironically way too often, just as it started as a joke. And then I was like, I'm saying slay and important. [00:12:27] Speaker B: Okay. [00:12:27] Speaker A: Right now. [00:12:28] Speaker B: So this is. This happened in a sermon. I tried in this. You know, at some point in life, you have to kind of say, okay, I'm. I'm 50. [00:12:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:12:38] Speaker B: I don't need to be using this terminology because I don't know what it means. Netflix and chill. Oh, you know what it means? [00:12:45] Speaker A: I do know what it means. [00:12:46] Speaker B: I didn't. So I literally meant we were going to go home after church and Netflix and chill. [00:12:51] Speaker A: Yeah. We're going to sit on the couch and watch a movie. [00:12:53] Speaker B: And if you don't know what it means, if you're watching, Google it. You can Google it or not, but it doesn't mean actually Netflix and chill. And so I did it. And then you had like, you know, the 13 people who understood it kind [00:13:05] Speaker A: of laughed, scratching their head. Yeah. [00:13:07] Speaker B: Or they're just giggling like he doesn't know what he's talking about. And it's like, certainly didn't. [00:13:11] Speaker A: I remember when you tried to work 67 into a sermon. [00:13:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:15] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't remember that. [00:13:16] Speaker B: I'm still not sure what that means. [00:13:17] Speaker A: I. I don't think I'm sure what that means. There's a few that, like some of the kids say skibidy, skibidy. I've heard that. I don't even know what it means. [00:13:26] Speaker B: Yeah, me either. [00:13:27] Speaker A: They. They'll say some crazy things. So when it comes to Tik Tok, I think that is the biggest cultural phenomenon for Gen Z right now. Is there anything that was remotely like that or kind of like taking over the world when you were growing up? Maybe not like tick tock. Obviously you didn't have a app like that, but anything that was like. Yeah, everybody's talking about it. [00:13:50] Speaker B: Well, probably not to that degree because the access was slower. So I remember when tanning beds came out. [00:13:57] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. So you had one, didn't you? [00:14:00] Speaker B: We don't talk. [00:14:01] Speaker A: Okay. We don't talk about that cut. [00:14:03] Speaker B: But. So at the time, all we knew is there was these casket type things. That's what it looked like to us, that people would lay in and you would hear stories of people, like, getting fried in them, you know, and their contacts melting to their eyeball. I heard that. And so all of these stories and somebody we knew wanted to go to one, and we were like, you know, I'm just not sure that's a good idea. That doesn't sound safe. And next thing you know, everybody in Moulton, Alabama, had a great tan. [00:14:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:14:35] Speaker B: And dad knew somebody, and so he got one for mom. We inherited it and kind of outgrew it at some point. And we kind of said, okay, those are not really great for you. [00:14:44] Speaker A: But. [00:14:45] Speaker B: But yeah, we, we. I was the cool guy in high school that had a dunk basketball goal, four wheelers, and a tanning bed. So I was like, redneck heaven. [00:14:55] Speaker A: Yeah. That's so funny. So I might show my age a little bit here, my ignorance on some things. But what about, like, magazines and comic books? Were those really popular around your age? Nothing. [00:15:07] Speaker B: No. I mean, I remember books a million going to books a million. And that was a big coffee shops. That was probably the big thing that happened when I was in college, because coffee. Old people would have coffee with breakfast. Most people I knew just weren't into coffee. I mean, it was Folgers. That's all you had, you know, And. But I remember when Books a Million kind of took off and Joe Muggs was their coffee shop. And I would go and get, like in college, a financial book or magazine stopped by Joe Muggs. I just felt. It was almost like just by having it, you felt smarter. [00:15:44] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:15:44] Speaker B: You know, and whether I read it or not, it made me kind of hold my head up a little bit, you know? But yeah, there was a. There was a coffee shop next to the campus of University of North Alabama. We would go down there and there would be these big, huge mugs with as much whipped cream as there was coffee in it. And we didn't know what to order, you know, but that took off. I thought when that happened, this will be a fad that'll go away. But that took off, and they were everywhere, you know, in five years. Yeah, but. And that's sustained I still can't really [00:16:21] Speaker A: understand it, but was it Starbucks back then or just. [00:16:25] Speaker B: Starbucks is kind of, you know, they started on the west coast, moved east, but yeah. And then local neighborhood kind of coffee shops would open up and you would have a, you know, a little town like ours. How many do we have here in Fernandina? Half a dozen? [00:16:39] Speaker A: Yeah, we have a ton of coffee shops. [00:16:41] Speaker B: And. And then, Then there was the. The craft beers kind of took off. And I'm still not sure that's going to be around in 10 or 15 years, but they. It's kind of done the same thing, and it's apparently a great profit model. But. But yeah, that was probably the big thing that took off kind of culturally, [00:17:00] Speaker A: and I don't really feel like the coffee shops have left. And I don't know if maybe it was really big and then maybe took like a little bit of a dive and then Gen Z. Gen Z are big coffee drinkers. [00:17:10] Speaker B: Right. [00:17:10] Speaker A: So now they're back up. I feel like every time you talk to somebody, it's, let's go grab coffee. [00:17:14] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And it, it's. If you dig into it, especially for a Starbucks, like, one cappuccino for them is just like pennies. [00:17:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:25] Speaker B: You know, and they're selling it for eight bucks. It's just. It makes total sense. And it's kind of addictive, you know, so it's a great business model. [00:17:33] Speaker A: Yeah. And I was thinking. I was actually thinking about this Sunday because I saw a lot of people during worship holding their coffee cups. And I do. Like you said, I think it's a bit of a confidence thing. I think holding something in your hand and having something to do with your hand gives people a little bit of confidence to feel like, I know what I'm doing in this place. [00:17:50] Speaker B: Yeah. And did you hear the Stanley mug fall over Sunday? [00:17:53] Speaker A: No, I didn't. [00:17:54] Speaker B: So, yeah, somebod back on the left had a huge Stanley thing, you know, that everybody seems to have now. And it hit that concrete and you could hear second service, second service. [00:18:07] Speaker A: It's probably me. [00:18:08] Speaker B: But it was. It was. I have to just. You know, your brain, when you're preaching, does two things. [00:18:14] Speaker A: Clicks on everything. [00:18:15] Speaker B: Well, it's like. It's like you're. You're focused on what you're saying. You're trying to deliver it well. But you're also. There's another part of your brain that's aware of everything around you and you're thinking, who just kicked their. That has to be embarrassing. I feel bad for them. Do I stop and make a joke out of it? Do I keep going? I'm going to give them passes. [00:18:35] Speaker A: And you almost have to be like a comedian on the spot, right? To be able to make a joke like that. But what I do find interesting, and I didn't even prepare for this conversation at all, is the way you prepare for a Sunday. So you kind of make fun of me. You're like, you're so quiet on the weekends. I'm like, I'm not quiet. You just get locked in and you kind of like tune everything out around you. Not in a bad way, just like you're really focused on what you have to say and you don't really have too many conversations outside of what you have to talk about that day. [00:19:02] Speaker B: That's true. I don't like looking down. So when we watch the videos of the sermons and I look like I'm just looking at my notes, reading them, I don't like that, that look because it looks like I'm not engaging with the people. So I want to internalize it. I've always had an auditory memory and a very good short term memory. So if you said like, you brought up Sunday, I have to think about what I preach Sunday, but what's coming up, I'm obsessed with. But it's gone, you know, the next day I can kind of move on. But it does kind of the closer I get to Sunday, it's weird when I take a Sunday off. [00:19:41] Speaker A: Yeah, you have. Coming up. [00:19:43] Speaker B: I do. I've got a season of that. But I don't take as many off as most pastors do because it really messes. I'm a creature of habit and messes with my flow and I don't know what to do. And Julie's like, you could trim the hedges, you could mow the yard. And I'm like, I'm just. I like to do the same thing every day and it throws me off. So she doesn't really like when I take off because I get out of whack, you know, whack. [00:20:07] Speaker A: I'm a schedule person. So when something's out of my schedule, even last week when we had our staff retreat and we were out of the office, I'm like, this is throwing me off. [00:20:15] Speaker B: I really don't. Yeah, I don't like changes like that. [00:20:17] Speaker A: I don't either. So you say that that's how you process your sermons. Were you that way growing up? Like with tests, did you cram it in and have to remember it? And then afterwards it was Gone. [00:20:26] Speaker B: No, I. I don't know how I graduated anything that was just. I did school for social. I like to learn. I've always enjoyed learning. But if I didn't feel that the professor, the teacher liked me, I'm not tuning in. [00:20:45] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:20:45] Speaker B: But if I felt like I was like, I had, you know, three or four where I was kind of teacher's pet. I was top grades, you know, in. In sciences. I always had teachers that took up with me so I could skip grades. I was. I skipped a grade to take a zoology that nobody else in my grade could take. [00:21:07] Speaker A: But. [00:21:07] Speaker B: But the professor was like, you have a knack for this. You understand it so well. I like animals, but I really think he. He was. He just saw something in me. So I kind of excelled there. And fourth grade, I had a teacher that came up, said, hey, you should be in the speech contest. [00:21:22] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:21:23] Speaker B: And I'm like, I was introverted. I'm not. I don't know why he would say that. Really don't know what you're like, you're [00:21:30] Speaker A: trying to do something right now. [00:21:32] Speaker B: I really don't know what put that on his radar at all. But he saw something in me. I won the speech contest. I went to state, did all those things. But. Yeah. So there was something about their belief in me that would cause me to kind of zone in with it. And it could be something with preaching. I don't know. That causes that too. That makes you really want to do a good job, which. [00:21:58] Speaker A: You've also told me before that you growing up, like you said, you weren't really into school. You weren't much of a studyer. That is completely 180 now. [00:22:07] Speaker B: Well, I was a studier, but I wasn't studying what I was supposed to be studying. [00:22:10] Speaker A: Right. You wanted to study what you wanted to learn. [00:22:12] Speaker B: I love going to the library. I would. I was a nerd in that sense, but it would be whatever I was into at that moment. You know, I didn't want to go out and, you know, I spent a lot of times outdoors, but I loved. It just felt like magic to go into a library and you had access to all this information, you know? You know, but. But, yeah, but if you're telling me read this book, Shakespeare for English Lit. I'm not. Give me the Cliff Notes. Yeah, I'll. I'll learn enough to pass the test. [00:22:42] Speaker A: I'm the same way as I could be interested in something, and as soon as somebody tells me to that I have to go watch or do or read. I'm like, well, maybe I actually don't want to. [00:22:51] Speaker B: Right, right. Yeah. And you know, the Montessori method for kids, I get that because you're working with what they're wanting to learn at the moment. So I like that for adults, if there's something. Men typically never read a book. The majority of men never read a book after they graduate, and I didn't want to be that guy. So I read a lot now, but it's things that I'm interested in, you know, and thankfully, after so long in ministry, you kind of work out your doctrine. So you're not trying to figure out what do I believe about this? And you can read more broadly. And what that does is it spices up the sermon. You have illustrations nobody else is using. [00:23:30] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:23:31] Speaker B: Because it's things that you're into and you're reading, you know. [00:23:33] Speaker A: So if anybody has ever seen your office, you have two rooms, a massive library. If you could pick any book and it can't be the Bible, which one would you recommend? [00:23:43] Speaker B: Which is your favorite to recommend? See, that's hard because I know people wouldn't get into it the way I would, but if, if I were like on an island and could only pick one, it would probably be probably just for fun because I enjoy it. Shelby Foote's three volume series on the Civil War, that's been probably one of the most influential books in my life. And it's three or four, but anyway, I think it's three volume, but they're that thick. So I love that series, but it also gave me a Southern gentleman that I could respect, not only in Shelby Foote as an author, but Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, you know, people that I could look up to and say, oh, that's a guy who came from a culture like I did, that lived an honorable faith filled life and did manly things. So I, I really enjoyed that. [00:24:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Where does your love of history come from? [00:24:46] Speaker B: I think that wasn't stress. Like, like we, we only knew my dad was the baby of 12 kids. He didn't really know his granddad. I was raised by my great great grandmother, a great grandmother and a grandmother most of the time. And so I enjoyed older people. We talked about, you know, in this senior adult podcast. I did, but I think it was the fact that I didn't know my roots. All of our family knowledge was in Lawrence County, Alabama, and I wanted to know, how did they get there? [00:25:25] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:25:26] Speaker B: And so somewhere along the way, I began kind of digging into it and, you know, it's like, oh, okay, well, we came from, you know, England and then northern Europe, and, well, what happened there? So I just, you know, and I had. I had grand great grandfathers, great, great grandfathers who fought in the Civil War. And so I wanted to know, what was that like? You know, it helps me feel like since I didn't know them, I can have some sense of who they were, what they went through. Yeah, and you look for, too, you know, your parents. You kind of look at the success level of your parents, and you kind of think, okay, well, I probably could do that. [00:26:07] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:26:08] Speaker B: I had an uncle who was a accomplished fiddle player in Nashville. He knew Elvis John, best friends with Johnny Cash and Merle Hackard. So it at least let me know someone with my genetics can get there. [00:26:25] Speaker A: Right. [00:26:26] Speaker B: So you wonder, well, what else has people in my lineage done? So we dug around until found the brother of Davy Crockett is one of my ancestors. So, okay, well, I've got some Davy Crockett. Yeah, that's kind of cool. I want to learn about him. And then Bess Hardwick, she was in the court of the Queen of England. She was one of the most successful ladies, probably the richest lady in England at the time. And. Okay, well, I kind of want to dig into that. Another one was there's a big theory, you know, who Shakespeare is. So there's a big theory. It's called the Oxford School. That where Shakespeare grew up, he wasn't educated. It's highly unlikely he could have written what supposedly he wrote. So there was another man who was highly educated that was one of the Oxford dons that they say it's possible that he wrote the material and used Shakespeare as a pen name or gave it to Shakespeare. It was not. Theater was one of those things that. That well studied, wealthy people didn't do. It was kind of frowned upon. So he had this knack for writing. He knew the history of it. He produced the material, but he would not want his name on it. So that's an ancestor. And so those kind of things were, you know, when you find those people, the more you know about them, the more you feel like you could potentially do that. [00:27:59] Speaker A: Yeah, you know, that's really cool. You talk a lot about. You use a lot of your logic side of your brain and your creative side. So right now, right where you're at currently, what do you think your logic side, kind of, what are you studying the most right now? And then creatively, what's your current creative outlook? [00:28:17] Speaker B: It Logic stuff, I mean, whether it's just staying up on the news and what's going on. For whatever reason, you know, we've got people in the state government, national government, that we have a voice with that we don't really even understand that. But I want to be able to have competent conversations when those doors open up. So I have to stay up to date on that. But the other side of the brain, so that's. That's left side logic, Is that right? [00:28:47] Speaker A: I don't know. [00:28:48] Speaker B: I think whatever side is logic. The other side of the brain, which I think is right, is poetry. I've never understood poetry. It seemed like a complicated way to say a simple thing. Yeah, I like a butterfly. Right. But they take 20 lines to say it. But I picked up Malcolm Guy's book, which I would recommend. Anybody watching? If you haven't got Galahad and the Grail. Life changing book. [00:29:18] Speaker A: I recommend that one a lot. [00:29:19] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I would. I would. They're expensive. I would buy copies and give them away. I believe in that material one. It's just a great story. It's a story of redemption. People who've really messed up in life, that kind of come full circle. Hero narrative. But it's also beautifully written. And for the first time I went, I get it. It makes sense. So from that, when I. When I got into that poetry, I consumed as much as I could. I'm reading the White Horse and these epic poems. I got into Odyssey. I read the Odyssey. And in those type studies, your brain begins to think that way, mine does, to where it thinks in rhyme. So I've always been a songwriter, but I started writing poetry. And I sit down and it's like solving a math problem. Last night I wrote one and I got to thinking. Somebody asked, are there animals in heaven? [00:30:23] Speaker A: Don't give me the answer if it's no. [00:30:25] Speaker B: No, no, there's definitely animals in heaven. Jesus comes back on a white horse. [00:30:29] Speaker A: Okay, so my dog will be there. [00:30:30] Speaker B: I don't know that your dog will be there, but I don't know that animals are resurrected. Yeah, maybe they are. I prayed when I was a kid, anytime a dog would die, I would say, well, Lord, let him have a spot in my mansion. You know, but. So I hope they are. Yeah, you know, they didn't fall. They did not commit the original sin. So they don't have a sin nature. So that would make sense. [00:30:54] Speaker A: My dog has us in nature. She is a murderer. She kills lizards, frogs, bugs all the time. [00:31:02] Speaker B: So. But, you know, we know that. We know that there are animals in heaven. We know that there that Jesus returns on a white horse. I believe that's literal. And so I got to thinking about the horses of heaven. And so I went through and was talking about the greatest horse in heaven is the one Jesus rides. And so I wrote a poem and I thought, well, what would its name be? What would Jesus name his horse? Which I have no clue. We don't have any. You know, there's nothing about that in Scripture. But I thought, I am a Civil War guy, and Lee's horse was Traveler. And so I thought, what is the Latin name for traveler? And I gave that name to, in my poem, to the horse of Christ. [00:31:49] Speaker A: That's a flattened word. [00:31:51] Speaker B: I think it was. And I thought, well, that's. It's. That's a pretty name. It's hard to rhyme. Yeah, but you just made me think [00:31:58] Speaker A: of a funny story. [00:31:59] Speaker B: Okay. [00:31:59] Speaker A: We went to Columbia for Landon's dad's wedding, and we were horseback riding up a mountain. But when they put you on the horse, there's a little saddle and it has a name on it. And they put me on the horse and they said, pregante. I thought they were telling me the horse was pregnant. So the whole time I was like, this poor horse has to carry me up this mountain. [00:32:18] Speaker B: That was the name of the horse. So, yeah, you know my story about California. I love horseback riding. I grew up. [00:32:26] Speaker A: I would have guessed that I had [00:32:28] Speaker B: a horse growing up, a paint, which means spotted. And it was beautiful. Great horse, fast. I would race. It gets other horses. But I've grown up. And I got out to California, was going to take Caitlin to ride horses in one of the canyons. And they said, now you're way too much. And I was. I was right around 250. Still right around 250. And they said, yeah, 250, sir. Max, we can't do that. So I got fat shamed, and had to leave it. [00:32:59] Speaker A: I think you were like, tall shamed. [00:33:02] Speaker B: I don't know. But the horse didn't want me on its back. [00:33:04] Speaker A: At least it wasn't pregante. [00:33:06] Speaker B: Yeah, it wasn't. It wasn't bearing. [00:33:08] Speaker A: Or maybe that's what you could say. It was bearing at the time. It just didn't work out. [00:33:12] Speaker B: Yeah, that works. [00:33:13] Speaker A: That's so funny. Okay, enough about you. I guess we should get back into where we left off. Our last episode, which if you didn't watch part one, you definitely have to go back and watch part one. We talked about Genesis, Creation, a lot [00:33:25] Speaker B: of theological questions that Gen Z has. [00:33:28] Speaker A: Yes. And I think we Talked a little bit in the beginning before we got into the questions that if you look at the age range of Gen Z, it is. I believe I said 14 to 29. So that is about in the age range. People are coming to Christ. [00:33:41] Speaker B: They are. It's the most. You know, if somebody doesn't make a decision for Christ by 18, the stats are really low. They will after. So we target that a lot. That's one of the reasons we're doing this episode. They have fair questions. We want to answer those. But. But also remember, this is 20, 26 and people are going to watch this. Have you thought about this? Your kids may watch this one day. [00:34:04] Speaker A: That's crazy. [00:34:04] Speaker B: My grandkids may watch it one day. [00:34:06] Speaker A: Yeah, I didn't think about that. So now I'm going to think about it too much. [00:34:09] Speaker B: When they, when they're watching this, some of the things we're talking about may not be the questions they're asking. That's okay because it'll show them what we were thinking through at the time. Yeah. [00:34:18] Speaker A: You know, it'll be interesting to see what the difference is because when I was writing these questions, I was kind of thinking like these questions are kind of the fundamentals, kind of the basics, which makes sense because when you look at Gen Z, it's that age range that is figuring out their path. And. [00:34:33] Speaker B: Yeah, and some of it doesn't change. Some of those. What happened? Why do bad things happen to good people? Every generation has asked that. What happens to a person who never hears about Jesus? Every generation wondered that. So some of these are. Are timeless. [00:34:48] Speaker A: And I think the. The ones that won't be as timeless will be. We put a lot of emphasis on Israel right now. [00:34:54] Speaker B: Yeah, that's big. [00:34:55] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. [00:34:56] Speaker B: Is central Israel. The place of Israel in redemptive history is in. Literally, I can't preach. I thought about. You and I both know there's some people who are Jewish who are visiting our church, and I think sometimes they're probably thinking, when's he going to get off Israel? My next book, I'm in Romans now. The next book is Ruth and. And it's all about how God preserved the people, the nation of Israel. And so you can't really dodge it in the text, you know? [00:35:31] Speaker A: Yeah. Which I find to be really. It's just so funny how God works sometimes. Like, like you said, you and I both know the circumstances, but they weren't coming to the church. And the Sunday that you decide to preach on it is the Sunday that they walk through but that, that has to happen to you really often where you'll preach in something. [00:35:50] Speaker B: Well, you hear about those. [00:35:51] Speaker A: You hear about it. [00:35:52] Speaker B: So if I'm, you know, I rarely talk about giving. We have a very generous church. We don't pass the hat, they just give. And I just, I don't have to harp on it. I never have. But the one Sunday I do because sometimes the text is just there and you have to address it. Sometimes we just want to disciple the people and we do a little short series on it. But it seems like the one Sunday you do this unbeliever who's never gone to church because he doesn't want to be, you know, harped on about money. You know, that's the day he comes. Well, they're probably, you know, that same person may be there in other days. You just don't hear about it. [00:36:28] Speaker A: You know, it's just, it's funny how that works out. So like we said, we talked about Genesis, creation, we talked about Jesus and the people of Israel, how that stand back in the day and how it stands now. And then we ended off in the middle of the section that I titled the Bible and why we should believe in the Bible, the validity of the Bible. [00:36:47] Speaker B: And we'll link to this, that episode in this one in the show notes. [00:36:50] Speaker A: So throughout the Bible, we see prophets receiving messages from God. We see people having very distinct visions and God seemingly speaking directly into people's lives. I think a lot of Gen Z wants to know, why has that changed? Why does it seem so different now? Why aren't we hearing directly from God? [00:37:10] Speaker B: Well, two things. One, it is different now. It doesn't happen like it did then because the Scriptures are complete. So as God was giving the canon of scripture in the Old Testament and the New, you had prophets who would speak not just a word from God, but a word for everyone. You know, this was authoritative. And so as we gathered the text, once that was the faith was once and for all delivered to the saints. You don't see those kind of prophets today, but we're told two more are coming. In the last days, God will raise up two more prophets like Elijah and Moses. And it could even be those two that are brought back for that time. But they're calling fire down from heaven, they're calling down plagues. All of those things happen again. They're killed and they rise up. So some of those spectacular things are yet to come, but it's not as normative. And this is another thing that most people don't realize if you look at the 66 books of the Bible, that's covering at least 6,000 years of human history. So it's not everything God ever did, but it's the moments that were significant for redemptive history, for God saving people. So if you take the time of Moses, seas are parted, right? Plagues are brought down on God's enemies. God is speaking the law directly through Moses. Significant. And then you have the time from there onward. You don't see miracles and that sort of thing normatively until the time of the prophets and specifically Elijah and Elisha. So we don't see great miracles with Isaiah. We see revelations of God's word, but we don't see those kind of miracles. We see them with Elijah and Elisha. Interestingly, when Elijah was taken into heaven, he never died. Elisha prayed that a double portion of the spirit would fall upon him. And if you count the miracles under Elijah, Elisha performed exactly double minus one. So he was buried and a soldier fell dead into the grave of Elisha, and he was resurrected. So that made it exactly double the miracles again. From that point, you don't see like David wasn't performing those kind of miracles. You see God's hand of providence, you see revelation, like through the Psalms, and then in Proverbs with Solomon, but you don't see a lot of miraculous things until the time of Christ. You see it again with Jesus. You see it with the early church. And it seems historically, after the founding of the early church, by 200 AD, we don't see a lot of those things. You see them, but they're irregular, right? So it seemed that Peter could heal on command. He could. He could see a lame man say, rise up and walk in Jesus name and it would happen. That's not normative now. But here's the thing that people need to recognize. It never was normative, right? That's what makes it spectacular and an affirmation that God is doing a new thing. So we see it with Moses, you see it with the prophets, you see it with Jesus, you see it with the early church. We'll see it again at the end of the age. But people shouldn't get up and, you know, if you're coming onto Amelia island, you probably should take the bridge. Don't stand at the Nassau river and command it to part. That's probably not going to happen. God wouldn't break a sweat for it to happen. But he does that to confirm that this is a new time. Something unique and redemptive history is taking place. [00:41:18] Speaker A: Right but what you do see, kind of today, you'll see a news article of teen, deaf teen went to youth camp and their hearing was restored. You'll hear people talking about the dreams that they'll have that are very distinct and that you'll hear also a lot of people coming up and saying, God told me. So what do you. What do you think about that and the validity of some of those claims that we see a lot. [00:41:43] Speaker B: So the way that I would say it, you know, there's a Pentecostal Charismatic tribe within the Big Sea Church that they want to act as though those things are normative. [00:41:58] Speaker A: Right. [00:41:59] Speaker B: Somebody even say, you must speak in tongues or whatever. I'm not in that camp. But I'm also, there's a cessation aside that says God never says anything. Now. Yeah. I'm not in that camp. I do believe God still speaks. I believe that miracles happen. You can, you know, we're told to pray for healing. We're told to pray for miraculous breakthroughs. And God answers those prayers sometimes. Sometimes he answers them with a no, but. So they do. They can happen. God does speak. I don't think if someone comes up and tells me God told them anything, I take it with a lot of salt. [00:42:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:42:39] Speaker B: Because unless I know the person, there are some people that have earned credibility with that. And I'll go, okay, well, if they said God spoke to them, I'm going to take that a little more seriously because they've earned that. But I rarely use that. So here's what I would say in my lifetime, the call to ministry, I know that was a persistent direct. God called me to do this. I know when I married Julie, that was persistent. Clear. He told me years before it happened, I was going to marry that girl, you know, so those are two instances that were proven out. But here's the thing. God showed that to me. But that has no authority over you. [00:43:24] Speaker A: Right. [00:43:24] Speaker B: I can't go to you and say, God called me to preach, therefore you have to listen. [00:43:29] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:43:29] Speaker B: No, I may not be your preacher. You know that it. It's not authoritative. But if I get it out of the text of scripture, I can have the same authority that the apostle or the prophet had. [00:43:41] Speaker A: Right. [00:43:41] Speaker B: But I have to back it up. So the authoritative revelation is not something that's. That's happening today, that. That's over until those two prophets are raised up. But, but yeah, God. God speaks. And there's been many times where he's taken the written word. I would say most of the time, well, maybe all the time he. It's a. It's taking the written word and making application of it. So, for example, when I married Julie, when I feel like God told me, you're going to marry her, it was interesting because I really liked her. You know, I told the story last time, but Mother was sort of feeling like she needed to kind of nudge me to move on. And she would. We would. Literally one night, we were having a phone call, and she said, what about this girl or that girl? She likes you. You know, I don't think Julie's that into you right now, you know? And I'm like, the keyboard was right now. Yeah, yeah. And so I remember where I was at on a bridge, and God told me, whoever believes in me will never be ashamed. So. And he applied that to Julie, who was a Christian, and to Mary in the faith, all those things. So he took the written word and made application to the circumstance. I think more often than not, that's how it happens. A lot of things we stress about, you know, it's kind of like when my children were young, they would say, well, dad, do I get the red sucker or the blue sucker? And I'm like, just get what you pick. I don't care. I think more often than not, that's. That's what God's saying. Occasionally it'll be very clear. He'll say. And you won't understand it. He will say, don't get into that. Don't take that deal. Don't start that relationship, whatever. And it's specific. You can't explain it, but you better listen to it for you. Let's say if God, for whatever reason, said, um, you need to go home and cook lunch on Sunday afternoon, don't go to Chili's, or whatever. [00:45:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:45:57] Speaker B: And you don't understand that. But. But you better listen to it. [00:46:01] Speaker A: Right? [00:46:02] Speaker B: Because God's protecting you from something there. Now, if you came back to me and said, hey, God told me not to go to Chili's, you can't go to Chili's either. Yeah, well, that's not cool. You don't have the right. You don't have that authority. If God wants me to do that, he'll speak to me about it. So legalism happens when we take personal words and make them universal. [00:46:23] Speaker A: Right. Okay, two things on that. So you talk about the authoritative power in what we're hearing. What about the times that you see stories about, I was driving down the road, God told me to walk into this gas station and buy this man a Coke. Or to Tell him to go to church. Tell him Jesus loves him. Would you consider that to be authoritative, like, not, not. [00:46:48] Speaker B: Not beyond the person? Okay, so if it's genuine that scripture calls that a rhema word, that's, that's a word for the moment. And so that happens. It may be more normative for some than others. I don't think it's as normative as some people would like it to be. But, but when it clearly happens and, and I. I judge it this way. If you don't, if you, if you look at it and go, I think maybe God's saying this. I'm not certain, right? I don't give that a ton of credibility. I look at it and go, I'm not going to act on it until he convicts me that if I don't act on it, I'm sinning, right? And. And if it gets to that point, that I can do it with confidence. I had a time. I had a cousin who was going through a real struggle with his faith, and he had been prone to that. I shepherded him through a few instances where he was just not sure and he was having a lot of doubts. His child had a severe medical issue, life or death. They thought the kid was going to die. The doctor came in and said, it's within hours, right? I'm in Kentucky, he's in Birmingham, Alabama. I get in the. The truck and I start south. I'm praying for him. And I, as clear as crystal, God said, the child's going to live. Get down and lay hands on the child. Pray for the child. Child live. I was confident God said that to the point that when I walked in the hospital, they're broken down, they've got this baby that, that they are preparing for burial. They're thinking, the kid's going to die. And I told the mother, I said, I don't know whether I even should say this, but I really believe the kid's going to make it. And we went in, prayed over the child. I could pray in faith based upon that word, and the child made it. It's in college today, you know, so there's times where that happens. But. But that's not something that has authority over everybody else. That's a rhema word for me so that I can believe and pray accordingly. [00:48:58] Speaker A: Define rhema for me. [00:48:59] Speaker B: Okay, so there's. There's a Logos is the written word. So that's what's in the Bible. Rhema is when he takes that written word and illuminates it and makes it for the Moment. [00:49:10] Speaker A: Okay. [00:49:11] Speaker B: So it's what God is saying to you through the text. It may not have any application for me. [00:49:15] Speaker A: Okay. And then the second thing that I had about what you had said before, that explanation was you mentioned that God won't look at a child who's a matrimony red popsicle and a blue one and say, he's like, it doesn't matter to me. Pick whichever one you want. And I think a big misconception that a lot of people have is that it's like our lives are almost a movie that are. He knows how it's going to play out in a certain way and that those decisions should be something. That there's a right or wrong to it. Yeah. Can you break down that misconception for me? [00:49:47] Speaker B: Well, it, it. The big. The big thing to remember is it's a movie. You're just not the star. [00:49:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:49:52] Speaker B: You know, so we kind of have this idea. We're sitting here, we have four cameras around us, so we kind of feel like life is that way. [00:50:00] Speaker A: Right. [00:50:00] Speaker B: That everything is. Is really important. The decisions I make, the most important things in our life are those things that relate to him. He's the star of the show. Jesus Christ is the. This movie is about him. [00:50:15] Speaker A: Right. [00:50:16] Speaker B: It's not about me. And so if you look at the. At the trailer or at the. The deal, the scroll at the end of a movie where it shows everybody who was in the movie, you're in there, I'm in there. We're probably way down the thing. Extra number five, you know, But. But the first name there, lead actor, producer, is Jesus Christ. So when it comes down to me making a decision, do I get the red truck or the black truck? That's not that pertinent. It's not that big a deal that we. We don't stress out over those things. If it comes down to do I buy a truck or do I give more to missions, That's a big deal. And that's where we really need to tune in. Because it's about the star of the show. [00:51:04] Speaker A: Right. So how do you decipher those thoughts? Between the thoughts I'm having and thinking that God is speaking to me? How do you know the difference? [00:51:12] Speaker B: It takes time, you know, it takes some trial and error. You're going to get it wrong. You need to be honest. When you make decisions based on that, it doesn't seem to pan out for God's glory. And sometimes you don't know that. Sometimes. You know, Job never read Job. He never knew how this was going to work out, but, you know, it takes a lifetime, but, but really it's trial and error. A lot of times it's, it's getting into the, the written word. I knew somebody one time that used the illustration of a bank teller. And they're counting money all day. And when they're counting money all day, if they come across a counterfeit, they can tell by the way it feels. Ooh, there's something different there. Yeah, right. And so when you're in the word and you're in the written word and you're studying and you're learning God's voice that way, primarily that way, then when you have these other impressions or thoughts come into your mind, you begin to recognize that sounds like you know what I'm getting from God. When somebody comes up and says, like, I had a guy not long ago say, you know, really, we should be practicing Shabbat, we should be having Sabbath on Saturdays. And I've done that with my family and it's been radically inspiring and life changing. Well, good for him. Good for him. But God hasn't shown me that in the text. In fact, in the text, it shows me that the gentiles were not to keep the ceremonial laws of Judaism. So if somebody makes too big a deal out of something, and if they say, wow, you know, every church needs to be painting low income housing in their community because that's what God would want us to do, my first thought is, did Paul make as big a deal out of that as they're making? Or Peter the apostles, because they had the direct revelation. So whatever we're supposed to be focused on, passionate about, they told us. And so if somebody comes along that has this big idea that we need to really leverage our resources toward that, my first thought is, is that a counterfeit or is that the real thing? If it feels like that's not what I'm used to in the text, then I really, really slow down and don't. The older I get, the more it's easy to discern that. [00:53:52] Speaker A: Yeah, I really like that illustration you use. Because my grandpa, he's passed away now, but he was blind. And we would call him the banker because he always kept wads of cash in his house. And he could feel the difference between the dollar bills. So he would always put a $1 in one hand and a 100 in the other. He could feel the difference between the bills. [00:54:12] Speaker B: Wow. [00:54:12] Speaker A: And he would put them out and say, pick which hand. And if you pointed at the one, he'd be like, you don't want that one. And then you'd hit the 100. And he's like, all right, here you go. [00:54:19] Speaker B: How cool. [00:54:20] Speaker A: So that was. I really love that illustration. [00:54:22] Speaker B: Your spiritual sense develops that way, right? You know, when you. When you begin to lean into it. And again, the best thing a person can do if they want to grow as a disciple is just be in the Word, Be in the written word, Study it, understand it, comprehend it, and you'll recognize God's voice because it sounds like that. [00:54:42] Speaker A: Right? And so another thing that I kind of latched on to, what you just said was you believe that people can have different personal convictions. [00:54:51] Speaker B: So I would say if it's clear in Scripture, that's the. That's the trump card. You got to trust Scripture. But if it's the kind of thing that's not explicitly clear, and there's a number of those things, in fact, I would say most of the decisions you make in life, there's not a clear right or wrong in Scripture about it. So which car you buy, you know, where you go for dinner, all those things you need wisdom for, right? So I spend. Spend a lot of time in Proverbs just feasting on wisdom and training my mind with wisdom. For that reason, more often than not, it's a wisdom decision, not a revelation. You know, and so there's that. But also there are things based upon my temperament, my disposition, my weaknesses that may be okay for you that aren't okay for me. [00:55:44] Speaker A: Right. [00:55:45] Speaker B: And especially early in my walk, there was a season. You know how much I love music, but there was a season when I needed to really just listen to Christian music. Now it got to a point where I could listen to secular music without it influencing me and getting me away from God. But my discernment had grown, so I filtered it differently. So if somebody came in and said to me at that time, is it right or wrong to listen to secular music? There's probably a season where I would say, yeah, you shouldn't do that, because that's what I understood to be true. But it's legalism when you take those personal convictions which are very real for you, I don't doubt that my friend was blessed by practicing Sabbath. God most likely led him to do that. But to take that and force it on other people, that's when you're becoming a law unto yourself. It's just as dangerous as disregarding truth. [00:56:48] Speaker A: So that's another interesting point you bring up, that convictions can change over time and that you can have a personal conviction. One Day and then learn from it and then grow and then not have to be confined to those parameters anymore. [00:57:04] Speaker B: It's just like, you know, growing up, you know, there's. There's a time when it's not legal for you to drive a car. [00:57:10] Speaker A: Right. [00:57:10] Speaker B: You know, it's not safe for you to drive a car, but as you grow and you develop those faculties, you can do things you couldn't do before. [00:57:17] Speaker A: Right. [00:57:18] Speaker B: You know. [00:57:18] Speaker A: Okay, so my next question is something that I see a lot. You'll see it in arguments on. If you go to any video and it's a Christian video, the argument in from non believers is, if God is so powerful, why doesn't he just reveal himself? So why not? [00:57:36] Speaker B: Well, it wouldn't do any good, right? So I had a grandfather who was not a Christian for a number of years. And I wanted to know, as I'm praying for my granddad, this is in the 90s, and I'm praying for him. And I would say God for Paul, when it was solitaris says, you showed up personally and he fell off his horse. There was a dramatic vision. You spoke directly to him, why will you not do that for Jimmy Coffey? And that really bothered me. And what God showed me was, that's not why Saul converted. God still has to do a regenerative work in the. In the heart and soul of the person. You know the story of the rich man and Lazarus, you remember that one? So Lazarus, there was. There was a rich man who fared sumptuously every day. He had all the things he needed. And then there was a poor man that laid at his doors covered in sores, dogs licking his wounds. It's a real vivid picture. And they died. And the rich man was carried by angels to Abraham's side, which is the. The Old Testament form of heaven. It's. It's the presence of God. The rich man died and was in Hades, which is the first stage of hell. And so he's in flames and agony. And he's there in the flames and he's crying across a great chasm to Abraham and begging for just a drop of cold water to be placed on his tongue because he's in agony in the flames. And the answer was no. And he says, well, would you please send Lazarus, who's with you, send him back to earth. I have five brothers. And warn them not to come here. So what would that be? That would be a dramatic miracle, resurrection. And it would seem like that would do it. You know, Abraham's answer was, they have Moses and the prophets let them hear them. If they will not believe them, neither would they be convinced, though one raised from the dead. So the argument was, the miracle's not what saves anybody. He could easily rot it in the sky today, but unbelief is unbelief, and it requires a miracle of regeneration of the Holy Spirit. Blind eyes, your grandfather, whatever was performed in front of him, would not see it. Right. So spiritually, our eyes are blind before God gives sight. And so it's not through works of miracles that people logically go, well, I've seen it, you know. And we're warned at the last days that the evil one Antichrist will come with all manner of signs and wonders, and I take those as legitimate, that he'll be able to do miraculous things. But you don't believe it because of that. You believe it because it's what the Word says and because God gives you the faith to believe. [01:00:52] Speaker A: Right. And so you touched on it a little bit. But I would love to dive into our next section of what happens after we die as a believer and non believers. [01:01:02] Speaker B: Paul tells us that for the believer absent from the body, present with the Lord, so that the moment when you know your body actually dies and can't contain your spirit anymore, that that's taken into the presence of God, you're not in a body, you're a spirit. So my father, his body's buried in the city cemetery in Moulton, Alabama. His spirit's with Jesus for an unbeliever, according to the parable of the rich man of Lazarus. Immediately they're in Hades. Hades has all of the factors of hell. Heat, agony, all those things. But it's a temporary holding place. And at the final judgment, the righteous or the believer is raised, given a glorified body, and they're escorted physically into heaven forever and forever and forever the person in Hades is brought up. It seems that somehow or another they're able to feel the pain of hell. So whether they're given some sort of body, I don't know, but they're judged. They're sent to hell, the bottomless pit, a place of intense darkness and heat, which scientists tell us that the hottest flame known to man is invisible. [01:02:26] Speaker A: Right. [01:02:26] Speaker B: So that it's a re. A physical reality that scripture tells us will happen. [01:02:33] Speaker A: Right. So do you think we will recognize our loved ones? And do you think that we will remember those who aren't there anymore? [01:02:42] Speaker B: So recognize people we've never met? Is that what you're saying? [01:02:44] Speaker A: No. Recognize the people we did know. But didn't end up in heaven. [01:02:48] Speaker B: Okay. So we're not going to be more ignorant in heaven. And everything that I can tell, like when Jesus was raised, that's the best example of what the glorified state is going to be like. The risen body, they recognized Jesus. You know, he even had scars from his earthly experience. It was his body raised. So it's not like he got a brand new different body. It's the person's body raised. So I think not only will you recognize people, you'll recognize people you didn't know here. And I would base that on the transfiguration. Peter's there, James, John, Jesus is transfigured. That means he's glorified before their eyes. And Moses and Elijah show up. How did they know? Were they wearing name tags? We don't know. But it seems that whatever that glory was, it was educational, illuminative. They saw them, they knew people that they had never seen on earth. [01:03:53] Speaker A: Right. [01:03:53] Speaker B: So I presume that. And most likely we will know who's not there, because, you know, it tells us that there's weeping in heaven, that he will wipe away every tear. Well, the only way he can wipe away is there's weeping. And so there will probably be some sadness at that, but. But he will wipe it away. And we will be able to see what we can't see now, and that's why it happened. And you know, there will come a time when we see the judgment of God and we will. All of creation will say, that was the right thing. [01:04:31] Speaker A: Right? [01:04:31] Speaker B: It was absolutely just. [01:04:32] Speaker A: Okay. I am going to try to word this question to my best ability, but I see a lot of people who, Christians who are trying to disciple to non believers online specifically, who will use the argument. It's like, how could you not believe in Jesus even if you didn't fully believe? But it's the alternative. Like if you, if you don't believe. If you don't believe, you're believing that there's a void. [01:04:58] Speaker B: If there's not. If there's not a God and you die, you're gone. [01:05:02] Speaker A: Right? [01:05:02] Speaker B: If there is a God and you die, you have serious problems. [01:05:05] Speaker A: Right? [01:05:05] Speaker B: Is that the argument you're talking about? [01:05:06] Speaker A: Yes. And I want to know what that. Do you think that's a good argument to present to people, or would you go maybe about that a different way? Does it depend on who you're talking to? [01:05:14] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't think it's a lot of apologetics is what that's called. It's trying to give people reasons to believe. And sometimes you followed what we're doing on social media. That's getting some real traction and engagement. And a lot of unbelievers are commenting. I'm not trying to convince that unbeliever so much as I'm trying to keep them in the conversation long enough for the Spirit to do the work. So with a lot of apologetics, that's what you're doing. Nobody's going to go, wow, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, if I die and there's a God, so I'm going to hedge my bets and become a Christian. That's not the way people are converted. The Holy Spirit convicts of sin, righteousness and judgment and draws them to faith. So through the Word. But some of those things can keep them engaged in the Word long enough for that to take root. [01:06:15] Speaker A: Right. So I think when we see people talking about the end times in the media, you see a lot of theories surrounding it. I know right now I'm seeing a lot on new technology and, like, kind of reading that through the lens of Revelations. I wrote down AI, digital currency, microchips, facial recognition. Is there any legitimate biblical reason that you would connect those to the prophecy of the end times? [01:06:43] Speaker B: Well, every generation sees things in their generation that they say, well, that must be the end times. You know, the first generation that saw helicopters would read Revelation and see these great grasshoppers that were swarming over the land. And they said, well, that must be a helicopter. And, you know, at the time of the Inquisition, the time of the Reformation, everybody said, well, the Pope was the Antichrist in the Protestant church. So that's common. It does align. I mean, when you look at there's a prophecy that an image would come to life. And for generations, they would look at paintings and go, how is that going to move? But apparently a painting is going to start talking. Well, we can see screens now, and it makes perfect sense. There are things that we're told that the whole world would see these two prophets die. Well, at the time when John wrote that, you only saw what was in front of you. Today, the whole world can see two prophets die. So, I mean, think about Charlie Kirk. When we saw Charlie Kirk assassinated, the whole world saw that. And that can happen today. So things like the mark of the beast. That makes sense that there would be some sort of implant in the right hand and the forehead that would control the economy. And, you know, if you don't have enough currency with the government, that they could say, well, you can't buy food Anymore. That makes sense. It's doable now. And in my childhood, it wasn't. So, you know, there was a time when they said, well, that must be a credit card. Right? And. But now it's like, that must be AI and digital currency. It could be. Or there could be something else coming that we don't know about yet. What's going to happen is 2026, in 2036, the current reality will not hardly be recognizable. The speed of advancement up to this point is going to rapidly increase, which is another thing that we're told will happen at the end. That knowledge would increase rapidly on the Earth. And that's happening. [01:09:00] Speaker A: Right. So would you say you currently think we are in or entering the end times? [01:09:06] Speaker B: That will be one of the first questions. If we're not, that I'm going to ask is like, well, tell me what I miss, because it really, really looks like it in a lot of ways. [01:09:15] Speaker A: Okay, interesting. So based on that, how do you think that should change the way that Christians are living right now? [01:09:25] Speaker B: So George Whitefield, he was. Which he did a lot for the Lord, preached, you know, to more people in person than probably anybody in history. But Whitefield was plowing in his garden one day, and somebody came up to him and said, whitefield, what would you be doing right now if you knew Jesus was coming back today? And he said, plow my garden. And what he meant by that, as he went on to explain is it's not that we drop everything, quit our jobs, and just go preach to everybody. You know, you glorify God through whatever your calling is. So if a person is a banker, they bank to the glory of God and they glorify God in what they're doing. They can leverage that for the mission. But, you know, in the early church, that was a big problem. They would quit their jobs and go and just stand on a mountain because they expected Jesus to come back immediately. And Paul rebuked them for that. He said, listen, if a man will not work, a man shall not eat. So they need to get back to work. Jesus is coming back. We don't know when that's going to be. So you be faithful. There's a twofold understanding that we've got to keep a balance of manage the tension. One, the urgency of getting the word out. But two, living in the kingdom. Think about this. Work in the garden before the fall. They work. They were to work the garden in eternity. You'll have a job. You're not just going to lay around on a cloud strumming A harp. Right. You'll have work to do, and that's a good thing. And that's glorifying to God. So you do it unto his glory. Don't. Don't do it as a man pleaser to. You know, God's always watching. Even somebody's not. So you do your work to the best of your ability and glorify God in that. So you do both. You know, you share. You represent Christ in that work, but you also. You don't drop your work to go out and change the world necessarily. Some people are called to do that, but not everybody. [01:11:43] Speaker A: Right. You say, we'll have a job. And in my head, I immediately went, I hope I'm a dog walker, and I hope the dogs are there. [01:11:49] Speaker B: Yeah, it could be. I really think something people underestimate is their need for a challenge. And we tend to think of heaven as all challenges are erased. I don't think that would be a lot of fun. Yeah, I think we would get bored with that. And it may be Delaney. You never. You know, Landon's a cook, right, Most of your meals. [01:12:12] Speaker A: He's going to make me a chef, isn't he? [01:12:14] Speaker B: So it might be Delaney. Not only are you going to be a chef, you've got to grow the food and you've got to do it on Jupiter. [01:12:20] Speaker A: Oh, no. [01:12:21] Speaker B: You know, so it could be something just totally beyond anything you can conceptualize here. But up there in the. In the new Earth, in your glorified state, you'll have the capacity to do it. There'll be a challenge. [01:12:34] Speaker A: But what would yours be? Your challenge? [01:12:35] Speaker B: Oh, I don't have. I have. You know, that's the one thing. We're not going to need preachers up there. [01:12:38] Speaker A: Yeah, he's. Your challenge is going to be sitting still. [01:12:42] Speaker B: Maybe. Maybe that's the thing. [01:12:43] Speaker A: You are. You're all over the place, always working. You're a hard worker. [01:12:47] Speaker B: I have a hard time slowing down. [01:12:49] Speaker A: Yeah, so that'll be your job. Yours will be plowing the fields. [01:12:52] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:12:53] Speaker A: Okay. So let's get into a little bit about Gen Z, where they're at right now, and the current things that they're dealing with in today's climate. So I think a lot of controversial that a young person is facing. Controversy that a young person is facing right now when it comes to the Bible, is what it says about relationship, sexuality, gender, and how culture is kind of going against that and telling them the complete opposite. And the Bible is outdated in its ways. What would you say to a young person dealing with that conflict right now. [01:13:26] Speaker B: Unpack that a little bit more for me. So I'm not answering a question you're not asking. [01:13:29] Speaker A: Yeah. So the Bible has certain things that it says about sexuality. [01:13:33] Speaker B: Ethics about. Yes, sexuality. [01:13:35] Speaker A: And then when it comes to relationships, like don't get married before you do. [01:13:40] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:13:40] Speaker A: Other things. And then gender. And I don't really think the Bible says. Gets too into. [01:13:45] Speaker B: No, it does more than you would think. Yeah. So there, there are categories about gender. This would be a, probably a really good one to unpack as a follow up. But there are categories that they had that were outside the norm. So like a eunuch and Jesus addressed, you know, some are by choice, some are made eunuchs by men, some are eunuchs for the glory of God. And he addresses this third category that's not the norm. And so he does talk about some of those things. But, but yeah, the, the, the biblical norm to, to kind of keep in mind is paradise Eden. One man, one woman. They procreate and they're together for life. And then through the giving of the law and through the gospel in the New Testament that's reaffirmed is that one man, one woman for life. So you see accommodations where people like David would take multiple wives. Abraham, that was never sanctioned. And it always led to problems. You know, there was always. The drama was doubled. And I think if any of those men were here today, they would say, yeah, don't, don't go down that road. One man, one woman, till death do we part. That's the plan. And that's what's healthiest for humanity and always has been. [01:15:09] Speaker A: Right. So you would say that it's not necessarily the experiencing the same sex attraction as it would be on acting upon it. [01:15:19] Speaker B: Yeah. So the, the fall affects everybody. It just affects them in different ways. And so if someone has that struggle with same sex attraction or whatever other weird, you know, perversion that can, can happen for a person, don't think that because that's there that you have to act on it. I'm cisgender heterosexual male and I'm married to Julie. That didn't mean that my temptation toward other people disappeared. Right. So what do you do with that? Do you say, well, God made me this way, you know? No, you go, I've got to control that and live a circumspect, faithful life. And, and, and she is my source of fulfillment there. So that's the discipline. You discipline yourself toward the person that you married, you know, and for the person who struggles with same sex attraction, that I've thankfully never wrestled with that, but I don't look down on the person who has. So the person that wrestles with that, I would give them follow the same ethics that all of us have to follow. You rein that in, you discipline yourself. I would say that there might be some time that you need to work through that before you take a wife or husband. But I think it's possible for there to be health and healing there. [01:16:58] Speaker A: Right. So I know we talk about we're all sinners, but why do you think it is that homosexuality receives the most criticism as a sin? Like, it almost feels like, well, there's all these sins, but homosexuality is like, yeah, this huge one. [01:17:17] Speaker B: And that's a fair question. And it actually, even in the text, it's that way. So the. There's two categories of sin that we need to differentiate. One is redemptive salvifically. Now, salvifically, all sins are equal. As a lost person, if you only committed one sin in your entire life, whatever that sin was, if it was cheating on your income tax one time, you sinned against God, and you must have a savior. Now, nobody's lived that kind of life. But supposing it was possible, salvifically, all sins are totally equal. Everybody needs a savior. But in practicality, not all sins are equal. So Jesus says, if you hate somebody, it's like murder. So you stand accountable to God as a murderer for hatred. But he's not saying. He's not making the point that hate and murder are equal. In practical effect, frankly, if you're going to either hate me or murder me, I would prefer you just hate me. Right. Because a lot more people are going to suffer if that goes to murder. So practically, that has a much more damaging effect to society and the human heart. Well, when it comes to sexual sin, Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, said that all other sins. No, Paul says this. All other sins a man commits are outside of his body. But he who sins sexually sins against his own body, the temple of God. And so he uses the illustration of prostitution. He says the person who enters a prostitute is one with her. There's an act there that's eternal, that's lasting, and that leaves wounds. Solomon said it's a mark that will not be wiped away. So the point is not that there can't be redemption or forgiveness. The point is the repercussions of that are unique, and that's in heterosexual sin. So when you go to the biblical view of categorically, Scripture looks At it as, yeah, there are heterosexual sins, that's bad, and we need to get forgiveness of that and rein that in. But it puts same sex sins or trans or whatever category they come up with next into a different category. And it does look at those differently because it sees it as contrary to nature. Strom Thurmond, years ago, he stood on Congress and he said, it's unnatural. And he took a lot of heat for that. But that was one of the most biblical statements ever uttered. It is unnatural in the animal kingdom. That's not the norm. You don't see that. You don't see it. Humans are not built for that. So when they begin to behave that way, it is unnatural. And it's going to have some severe repercussions. [01:20:39] Speaker A: I saw somebody, it was one of those arguments in the street where they hold up the sign and they'll go with people just walking in the street. And one really good argument I saw was if somebody was on a desert or in an island like we talked about the last episode, would they have these thoughts? Would they have these same, like, I'm not the gender I'm supposed to be [01:21:01] Speaker B: thought, that's a good point. And here's the way this has been. I don't know that I can defend this, but this has been my observation. No two sinners are created equal in the sense that if you take someone who's in that particular lifestyle, you can't presume that they all got there the same way. And so I would take that earlier illustration of the eunuch. Jesus says some were born this way, some were made this way by others, and some are being a eunuch, meaning they have a gift of singleness for the glory of God. So a eunuch is a person who never marries, they don't have kids, they live a single life. So in the king's court, if they took a young man that they thought had potential, but didn't want him sleeping with the queen or the princesses, they would castrate him and make it to where he could serve the king but not procreate. So that was the only category that the Jews in Israel really had because it was a life or death thing. Not that people didn't struggle with same sex attraction. It just was not at all normative in that culture. So that was the illustration Jesus used. So I take those categories and let's talk about someone who's same sex, attracted or wrestling with some weird perversion or whatever. Some people, because of the effect of the fall, I don't doubt if somebody Says they've been that their whole life. I don't doubt that that's true. I don't think God made them that way. I think the fall made them that way. And so that's something that needs to be healed and corrected. But yeah, we've all known people that were different from first grade and you look at them and you have empathy for that and pity for that. But that's something that can be trained and healed. There are also people who were kind of pushed that way. There are people who have the Romans one category of they sinned to such a degree. I've known people who in their teens had a perfectly normal attraction and they got into just hypersexuality and eventually it's just like a drug, it doesn't fulfill and they need a bigger high. And so it became more and more perverse. And there are those categories. But if you're looking at three people who are all in that lifestyle, you don't presume that they're all Romans 1. You know, they didn't all send themselves into it. Some people have struggled with it their whole life and they need a lot of help with that discipleship. And they may never get free from that completely. Doesn't mean they're going to live in that lifestyle. But they may wrestle with that particular temptation, you know, so you approach them different and you, you disciple them different. And you know, there's things that, that I would struggle with that you wouldn't struggle with. And, and I would want that same grace for me, you know, so that [01:24:15] Speaker A: kind of leads me to a follow up question which is kind of a two parter for young Christians today who are in this culture and having to deal with this on a daily basis. Would you say that Christians are, should go to a same sex marriage and wedding and attend. And then also if a young Christian has a friend that comes out to them and says, I'm actually this gender and I want you to use this pronoun and this name. Now how would you tell those Christians to respond? [01:24:45] Speaker B: So on the first one, on the, on the wedding, I would not advise that. You know, I don't think it's a real thing. You know, I don't think two men can actually be married, even though there's a legal category for it. Doug Wilson uses the phrase mirage is same sex mirage. They're pretending. And I think if you go to it and you endorse it, you can lovingly speak the truth and say, you know, hey, I'm here for you, I'll Be your friend, I'll serve you any way I can. But I take marriage very seriously and I see it as a covenant between two people and God. And I don't think he makes covenants like that. And you may lose the relationship. I think, I think that's a stand worth taking when it comes down to pronouns. I've not, I've never been able to do it, I'm not good at it. And so I think, I think more often than not when I've had to interact with people, they give me a lot of grace, frankly, because I think they probably anybody who knows me knows that that's going to be very difficult for me to look at you and call you a guy. [01:25:55] Speaker A: Right. [01:25:55] Speaker B: You know, or refer to you as he or whatever. So that community thankfully can be very gracious in their demand. Some is the people who are not in that lifestyle who are the real problems. And liberal white women are the biggest problem. I'm telling you, and I'll lose followers, whatever. That's the truth. It's not the homosexual, it's not the lesbian. I can sit down, you know, I've brought them in and counseled, they've come to me for counseling. We can talk, we can get along, we can disagree. No issue. It's the liberal white woman who takes up that cause that thinks I mean a lot of things. I don't mean that just causes trouble for everybody, frankly. And they're, they're a very small minority. But I have, I've never had an issue, never had a cross word with someone who was actually gay, trans, any of those things. They give me a little bit of grace, I give them a little bit of grace. We do life fine. [01:27:06] Speaker A: Right. [01:27:07] Speaker B: But it's the, it's the co. Belligerent that takes up their cause that, that really stirs the pot. [01:27:14] Speaker A: Right. So you think a young or not even young, any Christian could be friends with somebody that's gay trans? It's just the actions could be affirming. Like if a Christian were to go to a same sex wedding, that would, [01:27:26] Speaker B: well, that's a religious thing, right. You know, so if you're going to, if you're going to make a covenant, that's a religious thing. And I'm not going to, I'm not going to be okay with that. But I do want to have the kind of relationship where they don't, they don't really expect me to, they know me well enough. I've not, I've not changed positions and they're like, okay, that's we're not even. We're not even, you know, we love you, Pastor, but we're. We know you're not going to come to this kind of thing. [01:27:50] Speaker A: Yeah. So I think for a lot of Gen Z, it's the biggest obstacle they face with Christianity isn't the Bible, isn't Jesus, it's the Christians. We are hearing church hurt, thrown around really often lately. So how can somebody trust Christianity and move forward if they have seen hypocrisy from the church or the body of the church? [01:28:15] Speaker B: It's real. It's a real thing. And I think, you know, there's a certain level that we're responsible for. If we idolize someone and they fall, then we tend to demonize that person. We don't look at it like, well, they're human, they messed up. We all mess up. You tend to demonize the person you idolize. So that's on us as believers to get that right. But, but there's also. There should be a higher expectation for people who are in authority in a church. And when that happens and compromises take place, those. And when it's personal, I think it's one thing to see somebody sin across town and you can kind of analyze that. It's when they sin against you, when someone is a jerk to you personally, that's a minister or a leader, deacon and, or they, they cheat on their business dealings with you, those things are personal. And it really does. It's a. It's a violation of office. So remember in Scripture, David and Bathsheba. So when David sinned with Bathsheba, she was married, they had an affair, and God judged David for it. The argument when Nathan came to him, it wasn't even that he wanted to have more sex. God said, if you wanted more wives, ask me, literally, as bizarre as that sounds, he says, you could have come to me and I could have raised up whatever you need. But you took Uriah's wife. And that's the problem. And it's not just that you took Uriah's wife. You, as the king did this. And so that responsibility for the person in power was weightier. He didn't go after Bathsheba that way, even though she was a sinner too. He went after David because he was the king and he was God's representative. So it's a reality that, you know, pray for people who are in leadership. They do. They have different temptations, they have different attacks, but they carry a weight that it should hurt when we see them sin, it should be something we've got to deal with personally. [01:30:44] Speaker A: So what would you say to somebody who would come in for counseling and say that I've gone through this church hurt and I'm struggling to move forward, [01:30:53] Speaker B: first of all, if it's valid. And I can't say if it's valid or not, but I don't. I do think we have to keep a category in our mind that we're in a therapeutic society that does process things differently. You know, I grew up around pastors who were in Vietnam. The pastor at First Baptist Daytona was literally piled on a stack of dead bodies left for dead and happened to resuscitate, come back, build a great church. And Bobby Welch, in this generation, a pastor will quit the ministry because a little old lady griped at him. And that's just a different way of processing. That's not very healthy. So we're all a little bit spoiled in that and tender. So some church hurt may mean we need to toughen up and have more valid expectations. And sometimes, you know, the Bible says it's the glory of a king to overlook a matter of true leaders have to overlook a lot. They get potential hurts every day. And what you can take and move on is a sign of your maturity. So it's hilarious to me, some of the people who would probably say they've got church hurt. And one in particular I'm thinking of, she joined our church and then she left it weeping with like a six page list. And I looked through it, I analyzed it, I thought everything that she's listing was there before she joined. We didn't like come in and do this to hurt her, but that's the way she's interpreting it. So sometimes it's just invalid. Sometimes we just need to toughen up. But, but if it really does happen, then, you know, scripture has real clear protocols on how to deal with it. You go to the person, one on one, and you confront them, you sinned against me. And show them in scripture this is what you did. If you have a complaint that has no verse attached to it, it's probably not valid. But if it's a clear black and white, you sinned against me, and I call you out on it. You can either admit it, confess it, I forgive you, we move on. Hurt goes away over time. It's not immediate, but it gets better. If you will not repent, I get a brother come to you, Delaney. Here's what happened, here's what scripture says, and I'm asking you, please repent. Let's restore this. There's a witness there that says confirms. Kind of an impartial third party confirms or denies what we're talking about. Maybe I need correcting. But we get clarity. Restore the fellowship. If. If you still don't repent, we can bring it before the church and the church can make a decision whether you're representing Christ or not. And sometimes that happens. It's called church discipline. But that is extremely rare. I've never seen it in this church. We had it in the previous church. But here, when people sin, normally they own it. And they're like, my bad, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that and move on, you know. But it. When church hurt, doesn't go through that process. Yeah, it's not going to get better. [01:34:25] Speaker A: Right. So people who have experienced church hurt, valid or not, they leave the church. Can you walk me through the importance of the church, the physical church, and if you experience that, to get back to a. Maybe not that one in particular, but the church body in general? [01:34:42] Speaker B: Yeah, it's incredibly almost essential. A person can be a Christian and not be a member of a church, certainly. But I think it's the most rare thing in the world that a person is actually converted and not a part of the body, the body of Christ. You know, when Jesus said, go into all the world, make disciples, the early leaders obeyed that and interpreted that as church planting. So what does Paul do? Paul and Barnabas. They go city to city, they start churches, they appoint elders, they establish leadership, then they move on. Leave them with a word and move on. And so that is discipleship. Jesus said make disciples, they plant churches. They're synonymous. There's not real discipleship apart from the congregation. So when we come into a congregation, they're all at different levels of maturity. There's different gifts in that body. But we have to remember God gave you spiritual gifts, but he didn't give you all of them. You need what I have, I need what you have and the rest of the body. So if it's done well, any one member can flourish the most around all the other members. And it's just the way Jesus organized it. He's the head, we're the body. You can't love the head and hate the body, you know, so we need each other in that way. And I would strongly recommend sometimes it's the style of church. It's a type of leadership. Most of the time it's personality, and it's just a bad chemistry between the pastor and the people, and they just don't jive right. And you know, in the early church, you didn't have another church to go visit. Yeah, you just had to learn to live together. And it may be we're just going to, we're going to make it work. But, but today we're in a time where there's, you know, 20 churches you could go to. And, and yeah, if that's. That may be a solution. [01:36:55] Speaker A: Right. So I think another major difference between generations today is the way that my generation talks about mental health. And you will see my generation open up so much about their anxieties, depressions, traumas, even their boundaries. That's not something I really feel like we've seen in past generations. So would you say that anxiety and depression and all the things that Gen Z deals with today, would you consider that a lack of faith? Faith? [01:37:28] Speaker B: Well, sometimes it's. The biblical categories are just different categories, different words. So anytime you have a clinical word that's given to a behavior or struggle, it's okay to have that. But ask what is the biblical equivalent to it? So anxiety, it's the same. You know, there's anxiety referenced in scripture, but things like depression, that would be a good example. You don't see it called that in Scripture. So find the biblical equivalent to it and see, sometimes you have prescriptive solutions. Like if it's anxiety, cast all your care upon him, for he cares for you. So his prayer is prescriptive. Sometimes it's growing your faith. Faith goes by hearing, hearing by the word of God, you build your faith. But sometimes it's demonstrative. It's not, go ye therefore, and do this, but depression. Elijah went through what we would call depression. How did he handle it? You know what God, an angel from heaven showed up to Elijah, who's wanting to die. He is depressed. And the angel says, take a nap. I'm going to cook you some food. That doesn't even sound biblical, but it's. He literally said, deal with your physical need and then the spiritual will catch up to it. So, you know, those are just illustrations that we can, we can glean truth from. [01:39:05] Speaker A: Right. [01:39:06] Speaker B: But, but we're highly therapeutic and any good thing taken to an extreme becomes a bad thing. And I think this generation is in danger of that with the therapy. [01:39:16] Speaker A: Right. Okay, my final question for you is, do you think there is a line between needing spiritual help and then something that crosses over into needing maybe more professional medical attention? [01:39:30] Speaker B: Certainly. Well, and we're, we're a three part person, so body, soul and spirit. Body, obviously physical things. I can't help you very much. I can pray for you, you know, but I can't heal you with medicine. But sometimes it's physical problems, sometimes it's soulish problems. And that would be the mental health, mind, will and emotion would be your soul. Sometimes it's spiritual problems. And this could be anything from demonic attacks to temptation that a person's given into. That's where we can be most helpful. When it's soulless and the person has. If it's biochemical, it's physical and so there needs to be medical treatment for that. I can give you every verse in the Bible, but that's not going to change your biochemistry necessarily. But remember, the three impact each other. So Elijah is depressed. God says there's a physical answer to it. Sleep, eat some food, and then there's a spiritual answer. I'm going to speak the truth to you and reveal something to you. So you can't divide the person as perfectly as we would like. So that's just something to remember. But yeah, I do think there are times when a person is dealing with something that it's not beyond scripture, but it's probably beyond the average pastor's understanding to tackle bipolar disorders, some. Some serious schizophrenic. Schizophrenic tendencies. Those things need to be more in a clinical setting. [01:41:14] Speaker A: Right. Well, thank you for answering all my questions today. I know that was a lot that I threw at you between the two episodes, but if I could give you the final word, anything you would like to say to Gen Z believers and non believers alike, what would it be? [01:41:29] Speaker B: Get in a good church, get in the Word, learn to discern truth and press forward in Christ likeness. And you know, there's a lot of resiliency. Whatever they've been through, they will. There's a potential for a better path forward, but it's found in scripture. The Holy Spirit working through the scriptures. [01:41:53] Speaker A: Love that. Thank you for watching. [01:41:56] Speaker B: Awesome.