The 501c3 System w⧸ Zack Killey of Salty Saints Podcast
Episode Stats
Length
2 hours and 46 minutes
Words per Minute
202.20479
Summary
In this episode of the "Nephew's Death Squad" podcast, we have a special guest on the show this week, Zach Hefner, host of the show "Straight Bible" and co-host of the podcast Straight Bible, where he talks about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and much, much more.
Transcript
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Welcome back to another episode of Nephilim Death Squad.
00:01:59.060
And this is Matthew Hefner, the merchant of brown water and host of Straight Bible.
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Where we interview people and have a good time.
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Oh, jeez. Can you focus, Matt? Look at the shot. Look what you're doing.
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Anyway, guys, before we get into today's show, if you're wondering where you can support us, consider going on over to patreon.com forward slash Nephilim Death Squad.
00:02:21.260
Getting early access to episodes, ad-free, listening experiences, first dibs on tickets to Brohemian Grove, which is tentatively the 6th and 7th of March.
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And we'll be doing that VIP day straight from the standard coffee shop slash NDS studio slash casino slash fab shop, where we are Guam-ing at you live from right now.
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Plus a discount code off of merchandise from TopLobster.com.
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I'll get you a stoned ape theory Bigfoot shirt.
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There you go. Have one of those. Why don't you?
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As a little throwback to earlier episode of The Raven.
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Anyway, joining us today is Zach, and we're going to talk all about the 501c3 system.
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Before we talk about any of that stuff, let's tell everybody where they can find you and what it is that you do, Zach.
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Yeah. So, honestly, it's kind of weird to even be here because I'm literally nobody in this sphere at all.
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Uh, I've just been listening to the show for a while, but I'm a pastor.
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Um, I'm a barber and I had a podcast for, uh, like three ish years and we kind of called that quits recently.
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Not totally. We're going to be putting a little bit out, but if you want to reach us, uh, it's salty saints podcast.com.
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Be careful. If you look up salty saints on YouTube, you're going to run into a Mormon apologetics channel. That's not us. Don't do that. So, uh, oh dude, our name's been stolen like twice. Uh, we're yeah. Which is kind of part of why I was like, let's maybe hang this up. Maybe. I don't know.
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So, so I want to say that, um, apparently we, we ridiculed you and made fun of you on a episode of Chronicles, which is, which is awesome. Actually, uh, you had submitted. And I remember when you said salty saints, I said, why does that sound familiar?
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I looked at my podcast and I had subscribed. I remember listening to a couple of episodes. It was a good show. It's a shame that you stopped it or, or hopefully you started up again. Um, but it was a really good podcast. And I remember a little bit about the story while we were talking about it before we started. And it was like, what did you say? Uh, uh, baby stealing Babylonian, uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I wish I, I wish I could, uh, remember that episode. Um, because whatever I read in there was enough to make me
00:04:35.760
subscribe to the show on Apple podcast. So, I mean, I don't know what you're doing. Uh, hopefully you started up again, but I urge everybody who's listening to go find salty saints, not the Mormons. Um, but your show, I know it's at least on Apple podcasts and go subscribe. Maybe, uh, maybe we can inspire you to fire it back up again.
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Yeah. There, there are a couple of, uh, salty saints, um, uh, channels out there. So look for the one with a little anchor. That's us, but yeah, right on, man. Well, I appreciate it.
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Gotcha. Gotcha. So, um, what are we setting out to talk about today? I know you're currently
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and the, the, by the way, I can tell that you got a set of hair on you. So the barber.
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Thanks brother. Yeah, I try, I try. It's like one of my only finer traits, so I'll take it, but yeah.
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So, so what exactly, um, are we gearing up to talk about here in regards to the 501 C3 system?
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Um, well, okay. So when I saw you guys labeled the episode that I was like, oh crap. Cause that's
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like only a piece of this thing. Um, I, I do want to talk about the 501 C3. I think it's kind of, uh,
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I think it has played a heavy hand on where we're at today as the church. I do believe that, um, more
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though, what I would like to cover today is the, uh, great commission. And I believe that that is
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kind of crucial to this whole church thing. Like that's, that's sort of the heartbeat of who we've
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been called to be. It's one of the last things Jesus said to us before he left. And, you know,
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if you think famous last words are generally what we remember people by, right? I mean,
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those are some of Jesus's last words to his people is I need you to do this. Right. Um, and so
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I would like to talk about that. Uh, I want to talk about the 501 C3, but definitely the heartbeat of
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this thing is the great commission. So then can I recommend, let's, let's go through the 501 C3
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system because I'd much rather end on a, can we start at the beginning? Uh, what is the beginning?
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I don't know. Like, yeah. So you're a pastor of a church. Yeah. Yeah. Tell us a, tell us a little
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bit about that. Tell us what's going on with that. What are we, what are we missing? What are we
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getting right about the church and what we're seeing in like what denomination there's a lot to go
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into? So I understand where, yeah. Um, why does a pastor listen to the show? I want to know
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of a pastor that listens to this show. Um, okay. So let's start with the, why I listened to this
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show. Um, I love conspiracy theories, which actually, if we've got a few minutes at some
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point in this, I would like to talk about Indiana with you guys, cause you bring it up all the time.
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And I, I don't know, I might have a few things to throw in the arena there, but I want to hear
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your thoughts too. Um, I love conspiracy talk. I, I think you guys nail it as far as like,
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you guys are pretty in line with like the high zoology, uh, going kind of the Gary Wayne route.
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Like that's, I feel like those are kind of backbone pieces of this whole structure. Um, and then,
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you know, you've got like Jerry Marzinski tacked onto there. You've got like all these other pieces
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that play into that. And I think it's a pretty cohesive picture of where we may be behind the
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scenes in the world. Right. Um, and I enjoy that you guys explore those things. Um, you know what,
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we can't have all the answers on those things, but I like that you guys are trying to do it through a
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biblical lens and, you know, from the get go, like, uh, I mean, you guys are wild and you say some wild
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things and I can't always side off on all of them, but I still love you guys. And, uh, I, I have
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enjoyed watching you guys, like just growing in Christ and latching onto the word and letting that
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kind of guide things. Um, it's just been cool to watch, um, because it's real. It's not fake.
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It's not showy. You guys are just being yourselves and you're actually trying to follow Jesus.
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And I would take that any day versus a polished sermon. So I like you guys. Um, I, not that
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polished sermons are bad, but if it's coming from a fake place, then it sucks. And a lot of them I
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feel like are. So, um, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Matt comes on the show and, uh, I reached out to him
00:08:48.400
how long ago, man, a couple of months ago we talked for a little while. I think you might've been
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the first person I talked to. I think you might've been the first NDS man. Okay. So that's
00:08:57.380
real quick, Zach about Matt. Matt does the laundry list. We're about to get into, huh?
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Well, yeah. Big problems to a lot of, he'll, he'll do a thing. He'll go, this person is talking to me
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or, or right, right. Hold on. Yeah. He'll go like my wife, my wife said this and this and this. And
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then they go, no, that's, that simply didn't happen. Or he'll go, you know, somebody reached out to me
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about that previous episode. And they had a lot to say. Meanwhile, somebody is nobody at
00:09:22.960
all. Nobody. It's Matt. It's Matt playing psychological games. So when he says,
00:09:28.280
I'm muted. I muted his mic. Cause I now have the power. Okay. Okay. It's I would say safely 70%
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of the time Matt says that you can assume that he's making it up. This is like a lot, but a 30%
00:09:42.400
is strong. Yeah. That's a strong Chuck from Guam. I thought he was, I didn't think he was real.
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A complete figment. Turns out he's real. Yeah. We, we don't know anymore. So Zach from Indiana.
00:09:53.800
I do remember. I am real. I am real. And he said, um, you know, it was just interesting because
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is this real life? This is well, now it is real life. But, but, uh, Matt said that, you know,
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his conversations about the 501 C3 system had, you know, made it all the way to a pastor and that,
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uh, whatever, say it like that. I'm paraphrasing. I don't listen to half the things you say,
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so I can't really recall them in any meaningful way, but it's an accurate statement. Um, you know,
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that it had stirred something up and a conversation became of it. And, you know,
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I thought that that was interesting, especially to watch, uh, Matt, who was new to podcasting
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already have said something that he was engaging with the fruits of, of, of that, you know, episode.
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And I thought that that was fascinating. Hey, thanks, man. I didn't,
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there wasn't a compliment in there. No, that was a, that was like the nicest thing you've ever said.
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I don't think there was a compliment, but the fact that there wasn't a, uh, you know,
00:10:46.480
derogatory statement towards me is basically a compliment. I don't do that. I don't do a
00:10:50.260
derogatory. All right. Okay. So if I remember right, that conversation was just like, Hey bro,
00:10:56.080
I hear you like bashing the 501 C3, but I don't know, you seem biblical. And so, well, okay. So,
00:11:03.100
so let me, I gotta be careful. So like when, when I say 501 C3, like I'm, I'm, I'm a pastor. I'm not
00:11:09.300
well-versed on the ins and outs of like, um, how, how the money side of things works. I like, dude,
00:11:17.120
I I'm so not helpful when we have like money talks at the church and things I'm looking at numbers.
00:11:22.740
My brain turns off. That's not the world I live in. And so like, I'm not going to be,
00:11:28.340
I'm not going to be much help to you here talking about like how I think things should be structured
00:11:34.760
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What I do see though is the, not only the 501 C three, but the church growth movement,
00:12:31.160
both come about through the like evangelical movement. And I think both of those things in
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tandem have shaped the church from a community based focus and this like spiritual family, if you will,
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to more of a business model. And that's where a lot of my concerns come from.
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And it's strong armed, a lot of pastors into living in this place where, um, I mean, we're going to be
00:12:59.360
jumping all over the place. So I apologize. Literally. I mean, that's what the show is about.
00:13:03.620
If it was about anything, it's about, uh, being incohesive in our conversation. So please continue.
00:13:09.040
Yeah. Yeah. Um, it, it, it's kind of strong armed. A lot of pastors, I think it's being in this place
00:13:16.040
where like, we, we have kind of changed the scorecard of what church is all about. Like Jesus's
00:13:21.480
scorecard is like bringing people from spiritual death to spiritual life where they are now living
00:13:27.820
obedient lives to Christ and transforming the rest of the world with their brothers and sisters that
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they are also planting seeds to bring to Christ. Right. Today, the scorecard in the church is
00:13:40.560
butts, bucks, bricks, and baptisms. Like who's sitting in, how many people do we have sitting
00:13:48.060
in seats? How much money do we have coming in? Do we have a building big enough? Let's build bigger.
00:13:53.400
And how many people did we dunk underwater this month? And that is a far cry from what Jesus set
00:14:02.380
up. And we've kind of shifted the narrative on who's in charge of doing what Jesus set up. And so
00:14:09.700
that's where all my concerns come from. And the way I think that this kind of bridges with what you
00:14:15.300
guys are all about is, I mean, this show is literally about like the powers and principalities,
00:14:20.660
the forces of this dark world, the things operating behind the scenes. And my argument is the way we
00:14:27.560
combat those things isn't like the way the world wages war. Right. I mean, what, what Bible verse
00:14:33.860
is that? Second Corinthians. Yeah. Second Corinthians 10, three through five. For though we live in the
00:14:41.180
world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the
00:14:45.880
world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and
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every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. And we take captive every thought
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to make it obedient to Christ. Right. Like that's how we combat the darkness of the world.
00:15:03.400
We kind of have this knee jerk reaction though, I think, to get mad at the idea that there are like
00:15:08.880
big bad guy, big bad guys pulling strings behind the scenes. And it's like, I would argue the way
00:15:14.420
Jesus says that we overturn that system is one heart at a time by planting a seed of the gospel
00:15:20.320
in that person's life and then training them up to follow Christ. Is that fair?
00:15:25.380
That's interesting because if you think about what we're, I often look at like, you know,
00:15:29.620
the sort of the propaganda machine, this big programming that's imparted on us by Hollywood.
00:15:34.440
Hollywood loves to show you a definitive bad guy and loves to show you how to war against that.
00:15:39.900
And I just think like, you know, not only is it the antithesis of how we're meant to combat,
00:15:45.960
you know, the world or, or these powers and principalities, these things in the spirit realm.
00:15:50.360
Um, but it's also, we're so subjective to, uh, what would you call it? Like storytelling in
00:15:57.580
particular, there's something unique experience where a lot of our ideas are hijacked by compelling
00:16:03.440
storytelling. I've been subjected to generations of compelling storytelling that tell us the exact
00:16:08.860
opposite of how to deal with some great enemy. There is a great enemy, right? But the way that
00:16:15.020
you go about fighting it, isn't the way that we're, I mean, we just got finished doing a show
00:16:18.980
on stranger things and stranger things is, you know, it's, you have even still this sort of demonic
00:16:25.280
spiritual, and there's no shortage of big demonic baddies in Hollywood films, but how are you dealing
00:16:30.740
with them? You know, your own psychic powers, your, your sword and shield. Um, and, and I just think
00:16:37.260
that it's something that we are subjectable. Is that the word that I was looking for before when
00:16:42.000
I said subjective, I might've made up some word. I think you just made up another one. That's fine.
00:16:45.260
Again, that's fine. Um, but, uh, we are really easily swayed by that, that good storytelling.
00:16:52.960
And right now the storytelling is telling us you fight them with your swords and your shields and you
00:16:58.360
physically destroy systems and you fight big greasy baddies. Um, but that's a pretty important
00:17:04.960
distinction to draw from our, our fight isn't with flesh and bone, but, uh, with powers and
00:17:10.540
principalities in the spiritual realm. Well, so even based off of what you just said, right. That
00:17:15.120
like Hollywood is trying to like always characterize it, that we're supposed to go fight this war with a
00:17:20.500
sword and a shield and everything. Scripture recognizes that it's just scripture twisted around
00:17:25.680
and says like, yeah, but like, it's the sword of truth and it's the shield of righteousness. And you
00:17:30.980
know what I'm saying? Like, it's like we it's biblical principles that that is how we do this
00:17:36.500
thing. So like, I like the scripture doesn't deny our desire for storytelling. It just gives us a
00:17:43.620
truer insight into what those things really look like. I had a bit of a crisis. Um, not a crisis.
00:17:50.560
I wouldn't call it a crisis, but like, you know, everybody who listens knows I'm, I'm new to all
00:17:54.900
this hot dog crisis. No, that was that I had a hot dog solution and be in the break there. And it was
00:17:59.480
just fine. It was a cup full of hot dogs. But, um, I had 15 hot dogs in the garbage can. I made
00:18:07.240
everybody throw all the garbage cans away before we left for a week. And it was loaded with hot
00:18:11.620
dogs. I don't want to air out his personal business. Can you stop? Sorry. This isn't
00:18:15.920
about my hot dog consumption. My bad. It is your bad. Um, but I had just started going to church in
00:18:22.460
the grand scheme of things. How long has it been? Uh, six months. Yeah, just about maybe even,
00:18:26.780
maybe even less than that. And I had this moment where I became a little disenchanted,
00:18:30.360
uh, with this system and this isn't the bash it. I'm just expressing this, this moment that I had,
00:18:35.360
I was listening to Ed Mabry. He's talking about the little season. One of the things that he
00:18:38.280
highlights in this episode and the confessionals is that he went to school for, uh, he majored in
00:18:43.360
psychology and they had a course at some point on hypnosis. And one of the things that he learned
00:18:49.280
was this idea of like anchoring a thought or, uh, um, whatever the goal is to impart upon the,
00:18:57.440
the hypnotism victim, you would anchor it in a specific word and you would enforce that with
00:19:03.280
touch with physical touch. And then he starts talking about how that relates to being in the
00:19:08.620
pews and getting that, that notion of turn to your neighbor, you know, touch them and say,
00:19:13.640
God has a plan for your life, something like that. Right. And what you do is you get this mass
00:19:18.380
repetition going on, which of course, that's a big, you know, part of hypnosis as well.
00:19:22.520
And then you, you have this now, after I saw that I, I, I became unable, unable to unsee it.
00:19:30.520
Wait, wait, wait. So Ed was saying that that whole thing where they say, touch your neighbor and say
00:19:34.620
the physical touch is like an anchoring. And it's like a psychology. It's a, it's a method of hypnosis.
00:19:40.380
Yeah. Method of suggestibility. Yeah. So they do it in mass hypnosis. Like,
00:19:43.600
you ever see when some hypnotist gets on stage and they managed to do it to an entire crowd.
00:19:47.360
The question is where and when did they get taught that as a pastor?
00:19:50.380
And I'm not saying that that is inherently wrong. Well, Zach, hold on. Zach seems like he knows.
00:19:57.020
I definitely, I, well, I don't want to, I don't want to cut you off. Go ahead and finish your
00:20:00.700
thought. This guy's been talking all day. Go ahead. He's crotching right now. I just want to
00:20:04.360
finish this. I just want to, I have, I always have energy. So, um, through that lens, I then begin to
00:20:10.380
see all these other elements where they'll say a thing like, uh, you know, it's been a hard week,
00:20:17.020
right? And then you go, can everybody say hard week? And everybody just goes hard week. And it's
00:20:22.020
like, anybody say hot dogs. Can I even say, how many hot dogs have you, can I hear, can everybody
00:20:27.160
say hot dogs, everybody say nine hot dogs, you know, and you, you repeat, and then everybody else
00:20:33.220
repeats these things. And so I have an aversion to that. I don't like the idea of hypnotism and
00:20:41.920
don't, don't fall for it. Well, it explains why. And literally my wife will tell you who
00:20:47.680
my wife, there has been times where my wife has been standing next to me and they'll go, um,
00:20:54.900
turn to somebody and tell them you love them. And like a psychopath, I will, I'll stare directly
00:21:00.160
ahead and I'll go, no, audibly, audibly. I'll say no. And my wife will even at that moment be
00:21:06.620
filled with shame a little bit. I don't do well with that sort of thing. God made me a specific way.
00:21:13.880
And I'm not saying that it's wrong to do that. Maybe there's something to be said about priming
00:21:18.100
an audience, getting them in this, in this headspace. We look at it as negative. We look at it as you're
00:21:23.400
trying to manipulate me to get me to do something or to get me to believe something. But if what you're
00:21:28.220
trying to get people to accept is scripture, maybe there's a different mindset that is helpful to be
00:21:33.860
in before scripture is read. I don't know. I'm just saying I'm built in a way that makes me reject
00:21:40.640
that. So like to your point, like, uh, man, that's a lot to cover. Uh, so like if, okay,
00:21:48.900
starting at the, like, maybe there's a different mindset to go into, to receive scripture. Like,
00:21:53.440
I think that is very real. Um, we will often start our church services or even our sermons,
00:22:01.800
like with a prayer. And I'll even say like, Hey, let's pray for a second to like, get our hearts
00:22:07.520
focused, like our minds, like primed to receive God's word. Right. There is something to that.
00:22:13.900
Um, Matt talked about that in the study on Jude, uh, like the whole singular focus,
00:22:21.380
that being what like a, uh, a good eye is right. That it's a single eye that it is a wholehearted
00:22:28.040
focus on. Like we have to consciously tap into that. That's real. Um, so there is something about
00:22:33.660
that that I think is like biblical and good. Then again, there's the weird, like everybody repeat
00:22:40.100
after me. So I know I've got you on the same page. And like, sometimes that's cool. Cause I just want to
00:22:45.280
know you're listening sometimes. Yeah. I'm, I'm not big on the, can I get an amen thing? I don't play
00:22:50.120
that game. Like I, I'm not going to lie. I was in a Pentecostal church once and they were doing it.
00:22:54.460
And so I kind of like hammed it up for a second because it felt kind of nice. It was like,
00:22:57.700
they're listening. This is really awesome. If I want to give you an amen, I'll give you an amen.
00:23:02.060
Don't ask. Yeah. No, yeah. That's cool. That's cool. But like, um, a lot of this stuff, man,
00:23:07.820
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00:23:15.220
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We see other people do it and we go, that's what that's supposed to look like. So I don't think on
00:24:02.340
a lot of people's parts, this is like a conscious effort to go like, I'm going to hypnotize this crowd.
00:24:06.580
I think it's like maybe somewhere along the line, could somebody have had a malicious desire to do
00:24:11.600
that? Maybe. But I think it's more likely, like for instance, like the Enneagram, I'll hate on the
00:24:17.900
Enneagram all day. The Enneagram, it's like, do you know what Myers-Briggs is?
00:24:29.020
Super, super popular in the church sphere. Comes from Father Richard Rohr. Richard Rohr is a Catholic
00:24:37.060
priest, gives it to the masses, writes a book on it. It gets super, super popular in even like
00:24:42.360
evangelical Christianity. But when you tap into like one, who Richard Rohr is, the dude's a
00:24:47.860
universalist. Like he teaches some crazy, like it doesn't matter, like it's all about the Christ
00:24:54.040
consciousness. It doesn't matter if you get it from Jesus or from Gandhi or Buddha, as long as you see
00:24:59.280
that. And it's like, why, why are we teaching this dude's teachings in evangelical churches? Just
00:25:06.680
because you read a book and it made you feel good.
00:25:09.520
I don't mean to cut you off, but I just want to make the point that they both come back to the
00:25:12.740
same thing. The whole like, uh, hypnotizing, put your hand on somebody and you know, uh, it's repeat
00:25:19.660
after me or the Enneagram. Both of those things just come from humans, church humans.
00:25:25.360
So what is the, what is the mini gram or it's like, you're a number, like a tiny, you would be
00:25:30.580
like a number seven and he's a number four. We're like the Bible in no way ever labels people by
00:25:35.340
number. Here's the description of who you are based on if you're a number one or two. No, no,
00:25:41.000
no. We get our identity from the word of God. We get our identity from God. We don't get it from
00:25:44.640
the world, but that's what I'm saying. Both of these things is like people bring things that like
00:25:48.660
there's this book about the love languages. People just bring this crap and it doesn't come from the
00:25:54.380
word of God. And it doesn't come from the mindset of the word of God plus is what you're talking
00:25:58.380
about. Right. But it's worse than that. It's just like, it's corny. It's like, well, you Bible,
00:26:03.200
there's a ton of content there. You don't have to go into like human thinking to bring stuff to the
00:26:09.180
table. Like just use the word of God and keep that biblical view of everything you do.
00:26:13.700
Well, and I would take it a step further, even with like some things like not to, like,
00:26:18.660
I do not want to derail this into the Enneagram. Cause that's like a whole episode. And I'm honestly
00:26:23.040
not totally flushed out enough on it in 60 seconds. But, but I will say like, if you trace
00:26:29.340
that all the way back to where it came from, it comes back to spirit writing, a guy or automatic
00:26:33.520
writing, a guy puts his hand to paper and asks spirits to write through his hand. Like it goes
00:26:38.560
all the way back to the occult. And so it's like, that has found its way into the mainstream church
00:26:43.780
because it got popular and a pastor told me it's good. And it's like, yeah, but it's not.
00:26:48.820
And so like, there's a lot of that, but I don't think it's malicious. I think it's from ignorance
00:26:54.660
a lot of the time. Yeah. You know, I recognize that, um, even on, even on a fundamental level,
00:27:01.500
repetition is a useful tool for learning. Right. So with, especially with children, which,
00:27:07.940
you know, I'm going to go out and say it, that we have a pastor that's taking over soon.
00:27:12.200
Don't like the way that he don't know. No, it's okay. Oh, he's a youth pastor. He's a youth
00:27:16.000
pastor and, and he has, um, a way of delivering scripture that is already tailored towards
00:27:24.760
children. So there's a layer of it. That's kind of patronizing, but it's also like, oh,
00:27:29.940
I get it. Like my son, for example, he was just like, I really don't like the part of church
00:27:35.500
where they make us scream the same scripture, like six or seven times. And I go, oh, that's,
00:27:41.320
that's, that's, what's happening with the adults is you're, you're, you're trying to enforce these
00:27:46.180
values, this scripture, this information on us. And you're using methodology that is kind of proven,
00:27:53.600
right. Repetition is proven. Or if you wanted someone to, uh, really remember a thing, a sense
00:28:00.340
of touch might do that. So I, you know, I don't want to get off and say, oh, it's all definitively
00:28:06.320
bad just because it is, there are techniques, there are techniques better through what we've
00:28:12.760
been doing with what I've been doing with my life, not necessarily just this show, my life is like,
00:28:19.720
I'm doing sales, right. I'm selling t-shirts where promoting a product in a way, money,
00:28:25.220
give us your money. But I don't like to use the standard, um, coffee shop, the standard coffee shop.
00:28:31.880
I don't like to use the standard format of selling these things because it seems disingenuous. But
00:28:37.080
like, as we were talking with Wes just before this, in a sense, it is sales, it is suggestibility,
00:28:42.700
but like, how do I, how do I do that in a way that is not just cookie cutter cringey the same way?
00:28:50.500
And why is it so conflicting? Why is it conflicting when I do that? Why does it feel bad? Like if I've
00:28:56.000
tricked somebody, I've used the technique to trick them, but to tell them the right thing.
00:29:03.320
Don't you just put out a rad thing and let the chips fall where they may.
00:29:09.080
With the, uh, the repeating, they're asking, uh, Jack to like repeat stuff, repeat, is it's akin to,
00:29:15.440
uh, memorization and like memorization is how you end up with Pharisees who can memorize and repeat
00:29:22.240
the entire law, but it's never registered to them and they, it's never affected them and they're not
00:29:27.160
actually living it. That's how you end up with that. With Jesus telling people who could like,
00:29:31.500
probably recite the whole law, like by heart. And he says, you don't know the scriptures. You
00:29:36.940
err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. That's how you end up with that. Like,
00:29:41.140
imagine if I memorize the names of everybody in your family, you know, the guys, they come in and
00:29:46.800
they say, they've memorized the names of all my family members and say, ask how each one's doing.
00:29:51.220
But it's like this weird sales thing, almost the way people talk. That's totally different than
00:29:54.900
people who know my family and ask, how's Bella doing? How's Aiden doing? How's Jess doing?
00:29:59.780
It's the same thing in the word of God, man. It's like, you can just memorize stuff or you can
00:30:04.600
actually like take it to heart in a real way. And I don't know all those fake ass ways of doing stuff
00:30:09.600
just makes it very fake for people. It makes it where it doesn't stick. Some people though,
00:30:14.200
there's a lot of people that like this. Like what? The whole methodology we just laid out.
00:30:20.900
And I don't want to call it fake. Like we came away from church this week where David was like,
00:30:27.440
he said, very funny. I don't want pastor Mark. Yeah. I don't, I don't want this. Like he takes
00:30:34.940
this and slides it away. I don't want this thing. And I'm like, I get it. But there's, there are other
00:30:39.680
people there that like this thing. Yeah. What, what does that thing create? You rush, you rush to
00:30:46.160
stop him. You're like, don't let Matt win. I didn't say that. Look at the church thing. Like it's me
00:30:50.520
against you with that church. It is. It's always me. And you're like, don't, don't let Matt win.
00:30:54.060
No. Say you still like it. Yeah. Well, he's on most things, but you get very nasty. Delete the
00:30:58.720
chat about 501c3 systems. You get very nasty. I haven't lately. I feel like I'm kind of just
00:31:04.180
like, whatever. Yeah. It's look, the 501c3 system itself is not terrible. It's, it's the way it's
00:31:11.600
sort of strong armed the church into its current position that sucks. Like it's not, it's not the
00:31:18.260
thing. It's the way we've let the thing change what we should be doing. That's the problem. You
00:31:24.540
know what I mean? Um, and to be like back to the whole, like, you know, some people, some people
00:31:30.820
like this current thing, I would argue less and less people like this current thing. Um, if you look
00:31:38.020
at like, you guys ever heard of Cary Newhoff? No, not familiar with it. He's a, it's, it's
00:31:43.920
carynewhoff.com. He, every year he puts out something. It's like a, it's like N-I-E-U-H-O-F,
00:31:50.800
I think. But every year he puts out a blog called like seven disruptive trends for the church in 2022,
00:31:59.400
2023, 2024, whatever. Um, and so if you look through those, a lot of the times he's showing like
00:32:07.880
different, uh, different stats that are coming out, Barnapoles and whatnot. And dude, if you look
00:32:13.640
at like, I think it's in 2022, the disruptive stats for 2022, if it goes all the way back to 2000
00:32:19.960
and you can find some stats that go back further than that.
00:32:24.660
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00:33:08.520
But like the median worship attendance among U.S. congregations has been in decline since
00:33:15.160
2000. In 2000, the average median attendance was 137. In 2005, it's 129. In 2008, it's 115. In 2010,
00:33:25.760
it's 105. In 2015, it's 80. In 2020, it's 65. It's dipping at a 45 degree angle and has been.
00:33:37.460
Lately, within the past six months maybe or less than that, I mean, given what happened with Charlie
00:33:42.320
Kirk and everything, it does seem to be some sentiment that we're experiencing a resurgence
00:33:48.960
Man, this is like, I am so conflicted about it because Matt's always talking about worship or like
00:33:56.180
the 501c3 music system. And a great example, yesterday I came across a video of Charlie Kirk's
00:34:02.280
Memorial. Brandon Lake is singing this song called Gratitude on, and he's on it. But this is a
00:34:07.760
stadium. There's like, I don't know, 50,000 people there. And I'm looking at Brandon Lake, who is a
00:34:13.600
well-trained, polished performer, great singer, great music, all this stuff. But like, I know what
00:34:19.680
kind of goes into this. This is a performance. And I don't know how much of it is actually like
00:34:23.760
heartfelt worship from the guy. Very hard to tell. But what I can tell is when they zoom out and he
00:34:30.520
goes, hey, let's just let's just sing this chorus together. Let's just sing it together. But there's
00:34:35.340
50,000 people singing the chorus. And I'm like, those people aren't part of the act. They're they're
00:34:40.780
part of the show. They're at the show, but part of this act. And again, I don't want to like trash
00:34:45.920
that guy either, because maybe he's, you know, he's trying to do something. But there is a formula to
00:34:50.440
when you're doing this is a difficult task that he has to do. And there is a formula that works.
00:34:55.160
But when I'm looking at the reaction of the people, 50,000 people singing this chorus. Yeah.
00:34:59.420
In the stadium, like this is powerful. No, I don't know what to make of it.
00:35:03.900
Well, you could imagine that some percentage of those people just like the song, but there is a
00:35:07.420
percentage of those people that are focused on God in their hearts and minds in that moment.
00:35:11.880
And these words that are coming out of their mouth are aimed spiritually at the worship.
00:35:17.240
This is why we need to do this thing on. Well, I need to do this thing on
00:35:20.180
worship because this worship, when I'm watching it in the stadium, I'm like, if you can see the
00:35:24.600
worship, it's flying everywhere. If you saw it, like a lot of it's going to God. Some of it could
00:35:30.360
be going somewhere else. I don't want to be going to Brandon. What's his name? Some of it is just
00:35:33.800
learned religious culture. That's all it is, bro. But there's that too.
00:35:37.900
That that crowd has a certain percent of church goers that they know what to do when he says,
00:35:42.600
sing along with me, hear my heart church. And they're all just going to go along with it,
00:35:46.140
man. And it just ends up being a giant show. So 50,000 people singing, singing words.
00:35:51.480
Did he write the song? Yeah, he wrote that song. Well, what if 10% of them, meaning only five,
00:35:55.720
only 10%, 5,000 people are worshiping God, actually worshiping the Lord. It's powerful.
00:36:00.680
There's something powerful about it. Do you throw it all out? Because, because some part is
00:36:05.400
orchestrated because you just look to the word of God and say like, Hmm, do we see any examples of this in
00:36:10.180
scripture? Like a multitude of 50,000 people. Can I, can I read you guys some scripture really
00:36:18.580
quick? Not to like, just crap all over everything top just said, because I hear you. No, like I hear
00:36:25.000
you. And on some level, dude, I see that. And I like, I'm over here praying like, God, let that be
00:36:30.100
real. Right. Yeah. Yeah. But then at the same time, you have to deal with like passages like Amos
00:36:35.680
5, 21 through 23. It says, it's God, it's God talking to, well, speaking through Amos to the
00:36:45.360
Jewish people at the time, because they're not living lives holy to God, yet they're still showing
00:36:51.880
up in the, in the sanctuaries and doing all the religious stuff. And God says, I hate, I despise
00:36:59.020
your religious festivals. Your assemblies are a stench to me. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and
00:37:04.320
grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have
00:37:08.920
no regard for them away with the noise of your songs. I will not listen to the music of your
00:37:14.220
harps. He goes on and basically just says like, I would rather you like be, be just like, let justice
00:37:21.740
flow from you. Like, like stop cheating people in the markets. Like start, start living the way I've
00:37:27.900
told you to live. Right. But it's like all the religious stuff's there, but the heart's not there.
00:37:33.560
And so that can be there. That can be a thing too. And so we have to like, we have to ask,
00:37:38.700
like, are these people, are there hearts for God? And we can't know that, that that's why we have to,
00:37:45.060
that's why we have to have community where we are around these people and do know them at the deepest
00:37:51.060
level where I can look into your life and go, dude, I don't know that this lines up for you.
00:37:55.160
Like, I don't know that you're actually with this thing or encourage you in the ways you are.
00:38:00.320
Yeah. The crazy thing is that it's like, cause I've been part of, uh, these, uh, I don't know,
00:38:06.040
like a, a worship session, like a worship team. And I've been part of it in a point where I had my
00:38:11.340
both feet out, out of the door and didn't want anything to do with it. Um, and, and participating,
00:38:17.260
helping to create the condition in which we are inviting the Holy spirit. And guess what?
00:38:22.380
It was still there. Even though I was kind of like, like, I was like, I was, I was looking at
00:38:27.900
the exit and I was like, still, this thing is still here. Do you understand what, why I'm
00:38:33.140
conflicted? Cause I agree with what you said. A lot of it's garbage, but like, okay, then how do I
00:38:37.980
make, what do I make of the fact that the Holy spirit is still there even because maybe one person
00:38:44.240
called upon it and it's in that room. And I'm there saying like, screw this shirt. Like the way I was
00:38:52.040
way worse than Matt for years and years, which is why I'm actually soft on the softer on the church
00:38:56.800
now. So. Right. Um, and that, and that's why this is sort of like a twofold issue. And like,
00:39:03.300
it's like, we, we've got like the people that are making a mockery of this thing need held
00:39:08.600
accountable for it. And, and a lot of it is they've been taught poorly. Like, I mean, that's sad.
00:39:14.240
Sadly, that's what a lot of problems for a lot of people boil down to is you just don't know any
00:39:17.920
better. A lot of people do know better and they're in it for the wrong reasons. I run
00:39:22.020
into that. And then on the flip side, you've got honest people who love Jesus in the middle of it
00:39:29.420
that really do love this thing and are being fed by it and really are pursuing Jesus. And so that's
00:39:34.760
why, like, I, I hate talking about a lot of this stuff because I always feel like I'm crushing
00:39:38.420
somebody that doesn't need crushed because it is feeding them and they are growing. But in the same
00:39:45.460
time, it's like, but there may be a better way yet, you know, like, yeah, that's where it gets hard.
00:39:51.140
I think now is the moment for the better way. Like we were just talking about, so you're talking
00:39:55.580
about church statistics going down, but within the last three months or so, I feel like there
00:40:00.820
is a resurgence and you see, if you see what's going on politically and how that's being tied
00:40:05.500
up and mixed up with like, you know, Christian nationality with the passage of web and now
00:40:09.940
meeting with Nick Fuentes, I feel like that's a good signature, indicator of where it's headed,
00:40:15.140
but it's not there yet. And it's like, okay, we just watched, we watched something like it all
00:40:20.800
mixed up. We watched a guy die on stage and now we're watching people be confused about which way
00:40:27.500
to go. And they're, they look like they're choosing the church, but that's like a broad option. That's
00:40:31.180
not a narrow road. They're choosing church in general and they're headed towards this, but they're not
00:40:37.300
walking. In my opinion, they're not walking towards what we're doing, but at least they're not
00:40:42.300
walking towards twerking and Nicki Minaj. Now they're faced in. Well, they are now walking
00:40:46.580
towards Nicki Minaj because she's like, well, yeah, but this is a part of the confusion. Am I
00:40:50.780
making sense to you guys? Yeah, you are. You are. People are trying to better themselves. And I'll
00:40:55.840
say that. So you have, well, you have the church and as it, as it exists and there's the structures
00:41:00.440
and the foundations there. And I would think it, I think it would be stupid to tear this stuff down
00:41:05.140
to the ground. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's not it. You don't. It is at some point going to be
00:41:10.640
torn down. Jeremiah one, he sends Jeremiah. We could pull it up. I don't know. Do we have
00:41:14.560
blue letter Bible or anything or no, we don't talk to them. I'm sending you to tear this thing
00:41:19.080
down so that you can build back up and Jeremiah one, what probably like verse 10, somewhere right
00:41:24.980
in there, maybe eight, nine, 10, somewhere right in that section. I mean, I, I, I think what's coming
00:41:31.780
dude is like that system needs to be torn down. Like that system's been irrelevant. Not to say good
00:41:37.960
doesn't happen in it. Good happens in your car, driving down the road too. Jeremiah one
00:41:41.740
10. See, I have set, uh, I have set this day. I have this day set the over the nations, shut
00:41:47.300
up, man. And over the kingdoms to root out and pull down and to destroy and to throw down
00:41:52.160
and to build and to plant. See what it's for to build and to plant. You got to start new,
00:41:56.080
man. Yeah. I don't know. I see a similar thing happening. Maybe not. Yeah. But does that,
00:42:01.040
does this mean like, like the actual buildings that were there? Like, or, or no, no, no.
00:42:06.400
I'm not talking about like, uh, pitchforks and flames and burning built. No, no, no. I'm
00:42:11.100
not saying that. I'm just saying that system at some point has to go away and real preachers
00:42:15.140
have to be raised up who know the Lord, who preached the word of God, that system. I don't
00:42:20.000
know if we've talked about it yet. It just, it breeds hypocrisy. This concept that you're
00:42:23.880
going to go to this thing one day a week and you're going to act different than you act the
00:42:27.460
other day. Right. Say whatever you want, dude. I would say, no, that's not a neutral system.
00:42:31.880
That's a bad system. And it's not built on the word of God. Like the scripture is very
00:42:36.000
plain that the church is built on apostles, prophets, pastors, evangelists, and teachers,
00:42:40.860
Jesus Christ being the head cornerstone. Like that, like that's what all of this is built
00:42:44.800
on. We've built a completely, I don't know if I want to say antichrist system, but I'm
00:42:50.020
not against saying an antichrist system. Cause it's another Christ, like antichrist, you
00:42:54.420
know, doesn't necessarily mean horns and pitchfork, but it means another Christ. Like
00:42:58.120
we built this other Christ system. And so, um, I don't know. I just think slowly, but
00:43:03.780
surely real ones are going to keep coming out of that system. And, um, some people I
00:43:09.500
would, I like to bash on you and say mean things, but I'm being serious. Like I respect
00:43:12.620
that you do want to stay in that and help it. I get it. I don't, I'm not knocking you
00:43:16.720
for that. I'm not going to help you. Yes, you are. What are you there for? That's what
00:43:22.100
you're always saying you're there for is to help that system, not that system to help
00:43:25.880
what we're doing there. Okay. That's, that's all I'm saying. Yeah. You're there
00:43:28.980
to help. Can we, can we shift it a little bit and come back to this? No. Cause I
00:43:34.060
think, yeah, yeah. We're a great commission. I'll go, I'll go. Um, the, um, so like, I
00:43:42.020
think talking about how we got here can kind of help see like what has been added
00:43:47.220
onto it, which I think makes it easier to talk about what's wrong with it. Is that
00:43:53.140
fair? Yeah. Yeah. Like, like, like, okay. If you go back to like what Jesus was doing,
00:43:58.020
like when you guys look at just like the words of Jesus, the system Jesus set up, like, I'm
00:44:03.880
curious to like, what, what do you guys see? Like, what, what do you think Jesus set up
00:44:07.840
like as his original church? What, like, if you just had to summarize it briefly, I mean,
00:44:12.920
it looks like he was telling people let's meet up one day a week and we'll do announcements,
00:44:17.600
five songs, and then I'll give a speech. So what do you actually think that Jesus was saying?
00:44:24.480
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00:44:35.320
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00:44:40.840
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00:44:46.600
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00:44:57.940
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00:45:04.100
16th, $49 annual fee applies. See club for details. I mean, for me, it looks like he was ministering,
00:45:12.420
like with his life. Like he was going around living in this way. And the people that he came
00:45:19.380
into direct contact with were directly affected by his life, the way he lived, the things he said to
00:45:25.900
them, the things that he did with them. Like this was just a dude that lived constantly in this way.
00:45:31.260
It wasn't like, let's go to this special place and live this way. Or like, you know, it was,
00:45:37.440
it was his life. That's, that's what it was. And like, is it fair to say though, that like the
00:45:42.280
disciples were intrinsically connected to all that, like, like that they were being like brought along
00:45:47.020
for all that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So like, um, can we, can we pull up the great commission? Um,
00:45:53.840
Matthew 28, 16 through 22. It's actually interesting that we're talking about this today,
00:45:59.180
because this is something that keeps coming up over and over again, not only in episodes,
00:46:03.920
but just like in my, it's funny. Cause every once in a while, you know, I'm new in this walk,
00:46:08.960
I'll learn something new. And then it just, I don't know if it's me just repeating the shit on
00:46:14.240
every episode or if it also happens to be, you do a lot of that. I do a lot of that. I do a fair bit.
00:46:18.840
I was going to say that I think the church should look like, and not to, I just really want to say
00:46:23.660
it around Max. He's disgusting. Go ahead. Say it, say it loud. Look at him in the eyes.
00:46:27.080
It should be like Bible studies done on your big white pretentious couch.
00:46:31.240
Oh yeah. It should be. I think your couch is pretentious. Yeah. A little bit pretentious,
00:46:38.920
but honestly, you guys have built for Bible study. You guys have the same couch. Why we have a big
00:46:42.640
couch. You guys literally own the same sofa. Sorry. Hold on. That's a strange shock to hear that.
00:46:47.680
Okay. There you go. Matthew 28, 16. Can you read that? Yeah. What are, what are we in right now?
00:46:53.360
Is it in KJV? Do you guys mind if I go like in Ivy or something just like, cause it's more modern English.
00:46:59.840
I'm sorry, Matt. I know you love your KJV. He loves it so much. Um, I'm all about any
00:47:06.600
translation that works, man. Okay. So the great commission, right? It's, um, then the 11 disciples.
00:47:15.060
What's that? No, Matt's just interrupting. Please. Oh, no, you're good. You're good. Uh,
00:47:19.980
says then the 11 disciples left for Galilee, going to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go.
00:47:24.720
Then they saw him, they worshiped him, but some of them doubted. If you break that down to the
00:47:30.260
truest Greek, it's actually closer to, and they doubted it. There there's, you don't see the whole
00:47:35.660
sum of them. Actually, you can pull that up right now. If you need to, um, if you can break that down.
00:47:42.160
If you pull up worship, it actually says, um, a three piece band came out and started playing.
00:47:48.680
Stop it. Don't worry about that. Because worship is music. A three piece band, man. You have a
00:47:52.540
lame church. We got a 17 piece band at our church. So, so if you see it's these and these doubted.
00:47:58.780
Right. So they doubted, right? Like, so, I mean, like doubt is broader than we, we actually soften
00:48:03.480
that in the English. Right. So it's, and they doubted, uh, Jesus came and told his disciples,
00:48:09.260
I've been given all authority in heaven and on earth. So this is like him speaking from like a
00:48:14.380
kingly decree. Right. And he says, therefore go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing
00:48:19.700
them in the name of the father, the son, and the Holy spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all
00:48:24.280
the commands I've given you and be sure of this. I'm with you always, even to the end of the age.
00:48:29.460
The thing I don't hear talked about enough on this, um, actually maybe before I say this, I'll ask
00:48:36.300
like who, who is this commission to in your opinion? Well, I mean, in that moment, it seems to be
00:48:44.260
to the disciples, but in general, it's those who are disciples, those who are following
00:48:49.400
Christ. How did you land on that? I'm curious. I agree. I have to go back and look at the
00:48:54.140
context. Um, I immediately forgot everything. Well, I'm, I'm just like, that's awesome that
00:48:58.820
you came to that because you're exactly right. But well, to the end of the age, what are you
00:49:04.020
like? So it's then the 11 disciples went to Galilee with him and he's talking to them,
00:49:08.720
but at the very end, at the end, he says to the very end of the age that I am with you
00:49:13.680
always, even to the end of the age. Yeah. He's not just talking about his death or their
00:49:19.620
martyrdom. He's talking about an age. So what age, uh, I think it's like until his return
00:49:25.340
kind of deal, because then he will be with us in person, right? Like it's like, this is
00:49:31.040
a little bit of an, not it's, it's on topic, but not quite the point you're getting at, but
00:49:35.520
it's something I've been curious about. Does it, is he saying go forth, make disciples of
00:49:41.520
men until my return? Uh, I see what you're doing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because which
00:49:48.520
return? Well, you know, just cause the little season thing keeps coming up constantly and
00:49:52.500
it's like, I've been wondering, it's like, um, if, if you believe that we're in the little
00:49:59.180
season, which like, I'm not even pushing back against you. Fine. Whatever. My question then
00:50:03.540
immediately becomes like, well, what is our job as servants of the Lord? What are we called
00:50:07.700
to do during the little season? We're meant to make disciples of men seemingly until the
00:50:12.760
return of Christ. But if Christ has returned and the millennial reign has happened and we're
00:50:16.480
now in some short season where Satan is loosed, what are we called to do? Cause it's like my,
00:50:22.980
my concern really only ever is like, what's my job? Well, let me ask this. Are, are, are people
00:50:27.920
still coming to Christ in this world today? Yeah. How do people come to Christ? Uh, through
00:50:33.960
hearing the gospel. So I would say our job is exactly the same today because we are the, we are
00:50:39.440
the hands and feet of Christ. We are the method through which he has chosen. Like he could do it
00:50:43.980
all himself if he wants to, but that's not the way God has chosen to work in the physical creation.
00:50:49.000
He's chosen to do it through his ambassadors, his people, right? Like we are the method. Um,
00:50:54.000
and so I would say like, look, whether you're a little season or not, I'm not, um, it's still,
00:51:00.420
it's the same deal. Like your job. I do the same thing with Arminian Calvinist arguments of the,
00:51:06.940
like, is it all predestined or is it free will? And it's like, Hey, what's your job? Same job,
00:51:12.620
dude. What's it changed? Like your job is to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in
00:51:18.820
the name of the father, the son, and the Holy spirit. And here's the kicker, teaching them to
00:51:22.480
obey all that Jesus has commanded you, which means everything gets re like, uh, recycled into the next
00:51:30.340
person. So this command to the disciples is a command to every single disciple that they then
00:51:36.340
raise up. The unbroken chain is what you're referring to. And this was supposed to be an
00:51:40.240
unbroken chain that just went from that day to now. Yeah. In some ways it is. And in some ways
00:51:46.880
we have to get back to it. The chain did get broken in a lot of ways. Something else that's
00:51:51.420
interesting too, is baptizing people. Are we called to, are we, should we be baptizing people?
00:51:56.420
I would argue that if, if you are then to teach every disciple that you make to obey all Christ
00:52:04.860
has commanded, like, if you trace this all the way back, all of these things he's saying to the
00:52:09.500
first people he said it to, because they are then supposed to teach the next person to obey all
00:52:15.240
those same things, all these land on you and me. And so my point here is like, baptism, it's not just
00:52:22.160
for pastors. Discipleship is not just for pastors. Like every single one of us as a believer is a
00:52:29.560
royal priest in Christ's kingdom. And we are to be carrying this out. But that's another flaw in
00:52:36.100
that system. That system creates this mindset that it's just for the pastors to do. Doug,
00:52:41.060
so that's what I'm saying. That system is neutral, man. The system is... No, I don't disagree. I don't
00:52:46.020
disagree at all. Which is why it's super hard for me to be in it right now. Because I feel like I'm
00:52:49.780
trying to turn a really big ship. But you're probably the man of God that, like, came up,
00:52:54.220
knew you loved the Lord, knew you were called to the work of the kingdom of God, and there wasn't,
00:52:57.640
like, that was your option. Like, that's what you do, right? Well, it wasn't even that, dude. I was
00:53:01.840
in the system before I even learned all this. Like, I... This became revelatory to me, like,
00:53:08.720
after all that. I got in the system, dude. Like, I... I came out of high school. I went to college.
00:53:14.960
I slept around. I drank. I did the usual, like, I fell away and I came back thing, right? But,
00:53:20.700
like, I didn't get out. I go start a band. I tour around. I try and do that thing. That all blows
00:53:27.080
up. I have this come to Jesus moment, and then my thing... Rock band. My whole thing is, like,
00:53:35.880
I tried to get back to, like... I... It was actually what my NDS Chronicles was about,
00:53:42.820
but it's okay. You guys don't remember. But, like... But... I'm sorry. No, it's not. I'm just
00:53:49.100
messing with you. I do kind of remember this. But... But basically, God gives me this dream. It
00:53:54.720
freaks me out. That sends me basically back to just reading scripture, and then, like, a year later,
00:54:02.320
through scripture, it explains my dream, and I realized all I was being called to the entire time
00:54:07.580
was to come out of my sin and to go tell people about Jesus. And that was it. It wasn't anything
00:54:12.840
weird. It was just, like, really weird circumstances to get me to a very basic biblical thing. So I go,
00:54:20.200
and the best I could understand is, well, I'm supposed to tell people about Jesus. The best way
00:54:23.900
to do that is to be a pastor. So I go become a pastor. But then it's like, wait, everybody's
00:54:29.820
supposed to be doing this. Like, everybody is supposed... So now... Do the thing. That's my
00:54:38.640
whole goal, you know? So... Oh, you guys look very concerned. What just happened in the chat?
00:54:44.880
Number one. Top touched your volume on your mic, and as soon as that happened,
00:54:50.280
your mic cut out for a second, and then Matt had a visual, visceral reaction to that. He had
00:54:55.460
to actually turn his body away from the television and from the cameras. I saw that. That was bizarre,
00:55:00.720
Matt. These guys are not professionals. You're good. You're good. What I wanted to say is,
00:55:05.020
I guess that means we're going to be doing baptisms at Bohemian Grove. Yeah, we're installing a pool
00:55:09.900
right there in the back. No, I think we just get a container, fill it with coffee. Coffee is mostly water.
00:55:14.780
Yeah. So I think we can actually do that. But I've been thinking about this Great Commission thing
00:55:20.280
quite a bit lately. I was having a conversation with my wife, and what ended up coming up was this idea
00:55:28.940
of, like, just because I do this thing on camera doesn't mean that I'm...
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$49 annual fee applies. See club for details. In that I was called because we're all called,
00:56:23.740
right? We're all called to come out of our sin, like you said, and then accept Jesus Christ as
00:56:31.480
your Lord and Savior, and then engage in this Great Commission, which answers a lot of questions for a
00:56:37.120
lot of people who say things like, what am I meant to do here? God, you know, what's my purpose? It's
00:56:41.560
like, your purpose is the Great Commission. To live the life Christ lived. I mean, that's it,
00:56:46.920
right? And then go forth and make disciples, go forth, sin no more, make disciples of men.
00:56:50.780
So it's like, this isn't special to me. This is special to all of us. We all have this thing,
00:56:57.100
and you don't need to be some expert in scripture, or you don't need to be some podcaster with lights
00:57:05.500
and cameras, or you don't need to be a pastor with a stage and all these things. You've been given
00:57:10.960
something. You just got to own a coffee shop. You got to own a coffee shop. You have to be a wizard
00:57:14.280
with the brown water, but you have a testimony. You've been given a testimony. You've been given
00:57:20.120
a story to share with other people. And the thing is, it's like, you know, sometimes you go off and you
00:57:25.280
start reading scripture and to some people that's loaded. And maybe you don't know exactly what you're
00:57:30.120
talking about because you're new. I'm talking a lot about myself. It's like, I don't know a lot of
00:57:33.280
this. I'm still new in my walk. What I know is what I went through and what I experienced,
00:57:38.580
who I was before and who I am now. And that's super relatable because we're all sinners and we're
00:57:43.700
all lost until we answer this call. So you have this thing that's actually really potent. It's
00:57:49.520
really simple, right? You get baptized. You accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior. And then just start
00:57:58.640
by sharing your story and having a genuine, not just curiosity, but like a genuine desire
00:58:05.040
to draw closer to God. So if you're doing that thing, if you're sharing your story,
00:58:10.320
this is what happened to me. I was this shitty person before, which who wasn't, right? And this
00:58:16.440
is a thing that happened. This is what I realized. This is what I was doing. This is why it's wrong.
00:58:20.840
And this is how my life has changed. And this is where I'm at now. That, even if it resonates with
00:58:26.480
one person, what you've now done is you've shown somebody that there's salvation for them,
00:58:34.360
that there's eternity with God for them. Where it's like before, like, I don't give a, what are
00:58:39.960
you, what are you going to do? Even if you, your biggest accomplishment in helping somebody was like,
00:58:43.660
I gave somebody $20,000 once I had enough money in my pocket. And I said, you know what? This guy's
00:58:48.100
hurting. Let me give him $20,000. That's great, dude. That's awesome. Somebody found eternal salvation
00:58:54.180
because you shared some words in a sequence that resonated with them. That's it. It's the, it's,
00:59:00.780
it's really simple. And it's kind of, um, I don't know, profound in its simplicity. You know what I
00:59:08.920
mean? It's like, what are you called to do? Make disciples of men. How? Talk about what you went
00:59:14.960
through. That's it for now. So, um, I teach, I teach a course. Uh, I don't, I don't want to call
00:59:23.580
it. It was really good, man. It was very legit. So like, I teach a training on, on disciple making,
00:59:30.220
uh, and, and we're really careful. Like we, I, I, I like to say disciple maker. Um, that's kind of a
00:59:36.760
term in a circle of people I run with that we try and land on because the whole, like making disciples
00:59:42.940
part has kind of been removed from discipleship. And so we say disciple maker, because then you
00:59:47.380
can't get it twisted. Like that is part of what it means to be a disciple is making other disciples.
00:59:51.800
So we teach people how to make disciples and it's just the Bible. We just talk through the Bible and
00:59:56.680
just talk about like, who are you in Christ? Like, what is salvation? Like, you know, to try and give
01:00:01.980
you the basics so you can now keep replicating that. But one of the things we always try to hammer home
01:00:08.000
is look, one thing nobody can take from you is your story. It's anecdotal evidence. That means
01:00:14.780
they can't disprove it. They can't tell you it didn't happen because it happened to you.
01:00:19.720
And that's enough for a lot of people. And it's a perfect place to start is with your story. So you
01:00:26.140
don't have to be an expert. Anybody can share the gospel. Anybody can plant seeds of the gospel.
01:00:31.780
And that's like the language I love to use. That's biblical language of like, it's a seed being
01:00:36.420
planted. It's a seed being watered. And the beauty of that is like, um, in Mark, it talks about like
01:00:43.060
a man plants a seed and then he goes to bed and whether he wakes up and does anything with it or
01:00:47.880
whatever, like God is the one that causes that seed to grow. Paul says, you know, like I planted a
01:00:52.640
seed, so-and-so watered it. God brought it to life, right? He made it actually grow. And so it's like,
01:00:59.260
we are part of the process. We do what we can, but God's going to do the rest. And it doesn't matter
01:01:05.460
how bad you mess it up. If you're honestly trying to do what's right and you're stepping out in faith
01:01:10.940
and trying to use the word of God to the best of your ability through the use of like, like tapping
01:01:16.080
into the Holy Spirit, like letting the Holy Spirit speak through you, like God's going to use that.
01:01:22.020
God is going to use that for his glory. And so it's like, you don't have to worry and you don't
01:01:26.420
have to be a pastor. We're in this model right now where the whole deal is come and see, let me bring
01:01:32.160
you here so my pastor can teach you about Jesus. It's like, no, no, no, no. It should be a sending
01:01:36.840
model. It should be, you are being trained at church to then go out and be in the world and
01:01:42.300
tell people about Jesus and live a life honoring to God. That's the idea. Let me tell you something
01:01:47.360
though, real quick, man. There's a lot of people that shouldn't. I'm just being, I'm just going to
01:01:52.440
be real with you and kick against what you're saying. There's a lot of people that shouldn't.
01:01:56.560
There's a lot of people that tried name them for years. He's getting nasty. It's getting
01:02:01.140
nasty. Here it comes. It's your family member. It's, it's the person that should not, but
01:02:06.420
they're, they're pushing it on you and you push it away and you want nothing to do with
01:02:10.600
it. Oh, I see what you're saying. They're not living a Christ-like life, but they're pushing
01:02:14.280
like the Bible on you. Maybe, maybe then that comes from the fruits of where they're, where
01:02:18.240
they're being watered. You know what I'm saying? And that's part of the discipleship issue
01:02:23.540
is those people were probably never discipled and probably aren't currently discipled or
01:02:27.600
they'd be getting better at it. You know what I'm saying? Like, you know what I mean? Like
01:02:31.360
that's, that's why this issue is so important. Like most pastors don't have anybody discipling
01:02:37.260
them right now. I'm in a shared leadership model. There's not one pastor that's in charge
01:02:41.780
of my church. Like there's four of us. We're really more of like elders, right? And like we,
01:02:47.120
we shepherd each other. We lean on each other. We let each other know what we're going
01:02:51.100
through. Most pastors don't have that, dude. Most people don't have that. And it's like,
01:02:56.320
it's crucial to growth. I don't disagree with you that there are people that their confession
01:03:01.640
is damaging, but it's not usually because the gospel is being like, that the gospel isn't
01:03:08.960
doing what the gospel does. It's because their life doesn't line up with it and they aren't
01:03:14.060
landing with you. It's not the gospel. It's them. You know what I'm saying?
01:03:17.940
Yeah. It's, um, I mean, you know, that's why we're called to live a life that models,
01:03:24.000
you know what I mean? It's like, go forth and sin no more. The, the fruits of your life
01:03:27.760
should be the thing that people can look at. And I mean, that's, I guess that's a tough
01:03:32.240
walk for everybody though. I mean, I was, but we're now we're talking about something
01:03:35.900
at scale. I think this is, yeah, go ahead, Matt.
01:03:39.360
No, I was just going to say that's exactly what the issue is though. I think maybe this is
01:03:43.600
what you're getting at is that this is a thing we're doing at scale. Whereas discipleship
01:03:47.560
doesn't happen like that, bro. Like I have people sometimes tell me they're going to do
01:03:51.580
a discipleship group in the back and they're looking to get like, you know, 50 people or
01:03:57.320
whatever. And I'm just like, bro, you're not going to like, people ask me if I've ever
01:04:01.400
discipled anybody. I can think of one guy specifically. I met with him every Tuesday for like a year
01:04:07.260
and a half. And he read the scripture for that entire week. And then we'd meet up on Tuesday
01:04:11.760
and talk about what he read. And we do that every week. It went on for a year and a half.
01:04:15.700
We almost went through the entire Bible just doing that, but it's painstaking and it's one
01:04:20.440
on one. And there's no glory for that. There's no, like, you can't do that and get paid at
01:04:25.140
a 501c3 system for one person for a year and a half. But at the core of that word, disciple
01:04:31.500
is discipline. And people don't want that. People don't want to live a disciplined lifestyle.
01:04:36.880
And there's like a huge difference between teaching and discipleship, right? Like they are
01:04:40.540
not one in the same. Like when I'm still like, I'm in a church of 150, 200 people. I maybe have
01:04:47.400
two people I'm discipling, maybe three. Yeah. That other 150, 200 people are not being discipled
01:04:53.780
by me. They're being taught by me. Jesus had 12. Like we think we're just going to disciple.
01:04:58.600
And he's, he's God, right? He's, he's God. And he's got 12. I am fallen man. I can maybe
01:05:05.360
handle three to five. You know what I'm saying? Like we, we, we're discipleship intrinsically
01:05:12.920
needs the ability to bounce questions back. Like it's, it's conversational. It's like, look
01:05:19.840
and see it's, it's kind of that whole, like, you know, I do, then I, uh, what is it? You
01:05:25.140
do, I watch, uh, have you ever looked through that kind of deal of like how to teach somebody
01:05:29.840
something like first you watch me and you get to ask questions, then like you do it and
01:05:34.900
I help. Then eventually it's like, then just you do it. You know, it's sort of this, like
01:05:40.320
come along with me and let, let us do this thing together. That's how you're going to grow.
01:05:45.180
So, um, that's discipleship. It's not sitting in church for an hour on Sunday morning, which
01:05:50.980
is why I also don't know that this is like strictly a 501c3 thing so much as like small,
01:05:58.840
what happens in small group versus what happens on a Sunday morning. Like Sunday morning is
01:06:03.840
not meant to encapsulate the whole thing. It's supposed to be, yeah, we gather together
01:06:08.540
in big groups to love Jesus together. And we gather in really small community based, like
01:06:14.080
relational groups to honor God together. And I would say that part is like 90% of the
01:06:20.080
equation. Yeah. Yeah. Yet it's the part missing for most churches.
01:06:23.780
I find it like supplementary, right? It's like, I don't think you need a church to draw closer
01:06:30.500
to God, but if you're serious about drawing closer to God, it can be supplementary. It'd
01:06:34.940
be massively helpful. I mean, there's been times where I've been there and the sermon is
01:06:38.000
like, damn dude, Holy spirit is a hundred percent communicating with, I'm sure plenty of people
01:06:43.100
in this congregation specifically on this topic, but me directly, like I can feel this thing
01:06:48.420
is something I've been, you know, it was on my spirit for the last 48 hours. And all of
01:06:52.640
a sudden we're, we're addressing it specifically here. You know, it's happened a multitude of
01:06:56.900
times. Top was saying something about scaling up and that's an interesting thing to say,
01:07:02.860
because when I was talking about the whole mass hypnosis kind of techniques, um, I had a bit of a
01:07:10.440
nihilistic thought that crept in where more of an observation. I said, if this was a hypnosis,
01:07:18.540
what then would it be for? And I've settled on this idea that it could be beneficial for the
01:07:24.780
psychology of a person to be in a certain headspace when getting ready to receive the word of God.
01:07:29.180
I also did take note that the very next thing that happened after the music and hypnotism
01:07:35.020
segment segment was tithing. And I said, that is a little shock, uncomfortable of a thought.
01:07:43.860
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Oh yeah. With the, with the tithing, I do recognize though, that if we're called to preach the gospel
01:08:34.600
to all the corners of the earth until finally everybody has heard, you know, the good news
01:08:41.160
of Jesus Christ. Well, it would be a lofty thing to go to X, Y, and Z. And I, and I think that the
01:08:49.200
people that are going and raising churches in Mexico or they're raising churches in Norway or
01:08:56.000
they're doing whatever it is that they're doing, this requires some sort of funds. And so, um,
01:09:02.800
which, which is biblical. Like, I mean, it's not wrong to be paid for the work you do. Right. But
01:09:07.880
at the same time, it's like, where's that line get drawn? Yes. Yeah. So, so I mean, I'm caught up in
01:09:13.520
this place where I'm like, I happen to notice a thing and it's that we've primed everybody
01:09:17.660
psychologically to then, um, be in the most vulnerable place you could be, you know, if
01:09:24.100
you are truly being subjected to hypnotism and then we're immediately asking them to tithe
01:09:28.240
afterwards. Um, and that's, you know, an uncomfortable topic, but then I look over and
01:09:34.860
I go, well, it does cost money. Logistically speaking, to send anybody anywhere to spread the
01:09:40.360
gospel, erect a church, you know, how are these people going to live and eat and all this stuff?
01:09:45.200
People are going to wild places with their family. They're taking their family unit, they're uprooting
01:09:50.540
them and they're going to a place where people don't even speak the same language and they're
01:09:54.120
trying to build a church and they're spreading the word of God. And I didn't think, you know, within
01:09:58.900
that, within missions, there are definitely people that are on fire for the Lord that are trying to do
01:10:05.520
this great commission, but we do recoil at this concept of, of tithing. And I, I have to admit
01:10:13.540
within that context of the hypnosis aspect, it's very uncomfortable. Well, to be totally real with
01:10:18.720
you, like the tithe is not in the new Testament. The tithe is an old Testament temple thing. It's,
01:10:24.120
there's no mention of a tithe in the new Testament or the way the church operates going out of the new
01:10:29.500
Testament. What we are commanded to do is, is to be generous, right? Like we're, we're like, and so
01:10:35.160
my argument is always like, Hey, if you're going to this thing that we call church week after week,
01:10:39.920
and you want to come here and you want to sing the fancy songs and you want there to be like,
01:10:44.420
you know, we can dim the lights or whatever, and we can have blue softer lights that come up maybe
01:10:48.460
every once in a while. Okay. You want to be, you want some projector screens that have light bulbs
01:10:52.460
that cost a lot. And this is a big building because there's a lot of you and we need electricity.
01:10:56.180
If you choose that, that is the way you want to do church and you want it to be in this particular
01:11:00.780
way, it would be kind of crappy. If you didn't help us keep it going. I kind of, that's kind of
01:11:06.420
my argument for it. It's not, you need to give 10% of your income. It's not that that's nowhere
01:11:12.260
biblical. It's just more like, if you want this, help us continue doing this. If not, I'm more than
01:11:17.740
happy to meet in a park next week. You know what I'm saying? Like is why I'm like, I'm skeptical about
01:11:22.900
giving tide. I don't really give tide, but I help if I have a specific set of talents,
01:11:29.500
if I can help you with sound room or AV production, this is what I do. Then I, then I said, yeah,
01:11:34.300
I can help you do that. Cause I see what you're doing here. And in some form or fashion,
01:11:37.940
this is not reaching, I mean, it's not reaching the people in the way that, you know, Matt would
01:11:43.880
like to see it done or, but it is doing something. You know, I look at my father, you can make the
01:11:48.880
all the faces you want. I look at my father who is a product of this sort of system. And he's one
01:11:54.600
of the best people that I know. And because he was in it and because he took the lessons of it.
01:11:59.120
So I'm like, okay, I could call these people assholes. I can call them thieves, liars, losers,
01:12:04.480
which a lot of them are. And I've, I've, I've been kicked out of church for doing it from,
01:12:08.700
from the pulpit, from on the stage, calling the pastor, a liar, a thief, a faggot. Okay.
01:12:14.620
Yes. Oh yeah. We could, we can go down that route, but the reality is that all that could
01:12:20.120
be true, but there is also another set of truths that people are reached by this thing. And I don't
01:12:24.960
know what to make of it. Like it exists now. And if it doesn't get the things, the lights go off.
01:12:30.000
Yeah. I just don't, I don't know, but it does exist. And this is a, we, we have a tool here that
01:12:35.020
we use to do something similar. If we weren't getting paid from this show, this wouldn't be a
01:12:39.540
thing. We wouldn't have all these lights in this fog machine and these laser shows that that's true too.
01:12:43.800
So like, I, like I'm a Protestant, right? Like I'm not Catholic. Um, if you go back to like the
01:12:50.120
teachings of like Luther coming out of the, the Roman Catholic church, like Martin Luther looks
01:12:55.840
at the church and he recognizes that even though he disagrees with the system, that the spirit of
01:13:01.260
God is still at work in it and that there are those who are real in it. And it's like, that's sort
01:13:06.960
of like that remnant concept. Like even when Jerusalem is totally against God in the old Testament
01:13:11.960
points, like there's still always this remnant of true Christ followers, even in the mess. Right.
01:13:18.320
And so like, I, I don't think anybody's got a perfect theology. There was one guy with a perfect
01:13:24.640
theology and that's Jesus, right? Like the rest of us are just trying to make this thing the best we can.
01:13:31.760
Um, so I don't want to totally just hate on it. I'm, I'm with you top. Like, but at the same time,
01:13:36.120
like there are parts of it where it's like, why are we doing that? And it's like, you're not allowed
01:13:41.440
to ask some of those questions and that's not real cool either. You know, I've seen people recently,
01:13:46.400
I am allowed to ask those questions. No, he's saying like, right. As a standard, like as a,
01:13:51.820
as a regular church goer, as somebody that goes to a church and is, you want to have, uh, the status
01:13:57.780
of the person that you want to be a coveted member. I don't really give a shit about all that. Like we,
01:14:02.060
I was, I was there running the sound room and I went to talk to the guitar player and he's like,
01:14:06.020
yeah, I got gas, you know, gear requirement syndrome. I said, good thing you don't have
01:14:09.220
diarrhea, nigga. And he looked at me and he goes, we can't say that. And I go, well, I just did.
01:14:14.280
I don't care what you think about it. I just, I understand what this thing is. And I'm like,
01:14:18.500
can we move the ball on this thing just a little bit more? You can kick me out, whatever. This
01:14:22.920
doesn't matter to me. I'm not going to do what you tell me here. If it's not biblical, I mean,
01:14:27.720
you know, obviously like we have to think about it. I'm not just going to follow your rules.
01:14:30.800
But that's, but that's how you should be like, like you should be ready to question what isn't
01:14:36.560
biblical. You should be ready to ask those questions. It's just, there is this culture
01:14:42.440
we've developed where it's like, but that's a no, no. And a lot of people never make it beyond
01:14:48.240
that culture of like, I just do what my parents did and I don't ask why. And it's like, we have to
01:14:55.120
ask why given you're actually seeking truth. If you're just looking to like, hear what your
01:15:01.620
own itching ears want to hear, then you're going to end up a heretic. But point being like,
01:15:06.440
if you're actually pursuing truth, you're going to end up at truth. Keep pursuing truth. Right.
01:15:12.080
Yeah. I mean, it's a, I don't know. It's, it's a strange thing to be in from, from my perspective,
01:15:19.480
having not been raised in it, because I don't have any of that go along because this is what
01:15:24.140
I was raised in. This is what my parents did. I didn't have, I chose to go as a, as a 35 year
01:15:28.540
old man, you notice the pressure of it, the whole turn to your part, turn to the person next to you
01:15:33.060
and say this, that's kind of what that is, dude. I was getting kind of upset. Uh, there's a guy at
01:15:38.360
the back of the church. Who's just screaming like randomly, just Jesus Christ, just screaming as loud
01:15:45.100
as he can. And I'm like, Whoa, what is going on? And then it's like the, the tongues thing comes
01:15:49.040
around and he's just screaming in English. He's just screaming in English. Like he's not, and I'm
01:15:54.180
not, I'm not saying it makes it better if you do, uh, you know, some shit I ain't never heard before,
01:15:59.180
but he's just screaming words in English. Like I stand at the door and all you need is open it.
01:16:05.860
And I'm like, why, what? Like, are you, you're not Jesus, sir. Why are you doing this? And it,
01:16:11.060
the whole thing is just really weird. And then my son comes over and he's like, yo,
01:16:14.160
worship is, worship is weird. That's what I'm saying. It's like, once there's something
01:16:18.020
I feel like, and I might be wrong, but I feel like when you invite, when you invite something
01:16:25.040
into the room and it's there, I feel like people can take, you can take that. There's an energy
01:16:30.680
there. I don't know, but people can take it and twist it. Well, there was weird stuff, man. I don't
01:16:35.820
know. There was a little, uh, Consuela, a little, you know, Hispanic woman who's doing tongues this
01:16:41.780
time. I had never seen it before. And this time it rubbed my wife the wrong way. And I think the
01:16:47.100
reason is because like, you know, she's Peruvian. So she has like, that's not the same lady that's
01:16:51.080
making stuff up. Well, she's a different lady. No, no, she's, she's like, um, yeah, it wasn't
01:16:54.500
the fedora lady. She goes, um, I think it's because she has like all these Spanish elder female
01:16:59.840
relatives. And she was able to, now there's a cultural connect. She came away being like faking the
01:17:06.400
funk. And I didn't like the way that felt. It felt weird. It felt like you were faking the
01:17:09.860
funk. And so she really didn't like that lady. And like, we just all came away from this time.
01:17:14.440
Even my son, like I said, was like, I don't like when they make me go. And it's like, what are the
01:17:19.620
fruits of this? Am I going and feeling a connection with God or am I going and being, well, that's the
01:17:26.760
question. Exhausted by strange things. What is the fruits of this? If this system created mature
01:17:33.200
disciples, I'd shut my mouth. I promise. So my mouth, but it doesn't produce mature disciples. It
01:17:38.680
produces people who want to go and be entertained. If we can just cut the BS.
01:17:42.500
And dude, it feels like it's entertainment. When I was there, I did look around and I was
01:17:45.780
like, oh, this is a free concert. I don't disagree. Can I ask, can I ask what you mean
01:17:52.320
when you say this system specifically? Like, like, cause like in the midst of it, like we're
01:17:58.100
kind of recognizing, like there are real ones in the midst of like this whole mess. So like
01:18:02.360
what, what particularly Matt, are you referring to? Like as the system?
01:18:06.680
The 501c3 system would be that. So like the church, the church bought into like the whole,
01:18:11.180
like, this is a business now thing. Well, no, no. I just call it that. Cause I used to call
01:18:14.840
it the denominational church. And then I had people say, oh, well, our church is non-denominational.
01:18:18.640
So I was like, okay, what do I call it then? They, what do they all have in common? 501c3.
01:18:22.580
They all have that in common. But what's the elements of it? Five songs. And then,
01:18:26.720
well, that's the service. But I think Zach alluded to this earlier. And this is what it comes
01:18:30.440
back to with the tongues is that like, you have to fit all of your theology into a one hour show
01:18:34.980
on Sunday. So like, do I believe in tongues? Yeah. But do I believe that the Holy Spirit's
01:18:38.840
just showing up, talking to that person at 1024 on every Sunday? Like, no, like we're trying to fit
01:18:44.720
all this stuff into one show. And it's this system that isn't built on apostles, prophets, pastors,
01:18:50.640
evangelists, and teachers. It's built on a talking pastor, a singing pastor, a kid's pastor,
01:18:55.100
a youth pastor, depending on what denomination, maybe a deliverance pastor,
01:18:58.940
a food drive pastor. And we've just kind of made this whole thing different than what we've been
01:19:03.880
given in the word of God, which is nothing new, because the entirety of the Bible is the covenant
01:19:07.600
people going astray from what God has clearly told them. So we've made up this system, we buy land,
01:19:13.280
we build buildings, where if you look at the scripture, the church was actually selling land,
01:19:18.800
they were selling their land and bringing that money to the apostles to distribute to the poor.
01:19:24.220
Now we're taking from the poor to buy land. It's they're completely it's a it's a very ironic
01:19:30.680
reality. But again, it's just this entire system and superstructure. Yeah, that requires so much
01:19:38.420
things that are unnecessary when really, we can be doing like what happens in the word of God,
01:19:44.240
where people are meeting together for meals, and they're meeting in homes, and they're living this
01:19:48.780
real life with one another. Like you see Jesus preaching, it's in real life, man, all everything
01:19:53.100
he's preaching. It's in real life scenarios. It's not in these made up situations, where people have
01:19:58.840
come there to be comfortable and hear the thing the way they want to hear it. Paul's preaching at Mars
01:20:04.000
Hill to people who don't want to hear what he's preaching, right? We built this system where it's
01:20:07.640
like, right, all these people that want to hear it, but they want to hear it a certain way. And you've
01:20:11.980
just built this fake ass thing. And it's creepy to me, bro, because the word of God is the most real
01:20:16.980
thing in the universe, man. There was a dude one time they asked him, they said, I think I've told this
01:20:22.160
story before he was in England, and the church was becoming empty, and the theater was becoming
01:20:27.460
busier and busier. And an interviewer asked this actor in the theater said, why do you suppose the
01:20:32.960
theater is packed, and the church is empty? And he said, I don't know, maybe it's because we take a
01:20:38.280
fake thing and make it look real, and they take a real thing and make it look fake.
01:20:43.900
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01:20:54.820
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01:21:00.340
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01:21:06.100
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01:21:12.620
Hmm. Okay. Yeah, I mean, so, like, to your point, like, for the first 300 years of Christianity,
01:21:20.540
there was not a church building. That doesn't happen until Constantine. Like, we went 300 years
01:21:26.540
just meeting in homes. Like, that's a big deal. And to, like, act like we need all that extra stuff
01:21:34.160
is kind of crazy. But at the same time, even before that, like, when they were meeting in homes,
01:21:40.420
Justin Martyr, you familiar? He's, yeah. So he's an apostolic father of the church,
01:21:48.000
if you want to call him that. But, you know, early Christian. And in his writings, like,
01:21:52.400
he lays out, like, what the church service looked like. And, like, format-wise, you got a guy that
01:21:58.120
teaches. You got some songs. You got, like, it's actually pretty similar to what a lot of churches do
01:22:03.960
today. The question, though, becomes, like, is that really all the church is? Did he get it from
01:22:10.660
the Bible? Because I kind of am getting over this whole thing where they're like, oh, that didn't
01:22:14.840
start until 700 A.D. or this didn't start until 1200. It's like, no, no. What does the Bible say,
01:22:20.040
though? Because we can go straight to the Bible. Yeah. So in 1 Corinthians 14, 26, Paul says,
01:22:28.900
what then shall we say, brothers and sisters? When you come together, each of you has a hymn or
01:22:33.520
a word of instruction, a revelation. Sorry, it's going off the rails. A tongue or an interpretation.
01:22:39.200
Everything must be done so that the church may be built up. But, like, all those things are part of
01:22:45.440
worship. But is getting together to worship God all Christianity is? And is worship really just an
01:22:51.980
hour we set aside where we go, hey, we're doing this thing this specific way where it's all forwarded to
01:22:56.820
God? And at this point, it's not even always forwarded to God. Half the time, it's a TED Talk,
01:23:01.380
so you leave feeling good. But, like, is that all Christianity is? No. Is it part of what it is?
01:23:09.900
Yes. The vaster part is the life we live together. The modern version, dude, I think really stemmed from,
01:23:18.060
and you could probably correct me if I'm wrong, John and Charles Wesley, which was legit, dude. Like,
01:23:22.560
John Wesley's preaching fire, and his brother Charles is, like, writing hymns, basically,
01:23:26.260
of the theology of John Wesley and their rad hymns. And people are getting together in groups
01:23:31.020
of 30,000, 40,000 outdoors where John Wesley's preaching, and they don't have a slide in the
01:23:35.760
lobby and gumball machines and pizza parties. People just came to hear the preaching of the
01:23:39.920
word of God, and his brother set music to that, and they sang hymns, man. And that probably was rad.
01:23:47.140
That probably was an incredible thing. And then that was those guys. That doesn't mean every single
01:23:53.000
church now, like, exactly does that. Like, like, how is it that all of a sudden, everybody's just a
01:23:59.580
cookie cutter, robot model of the same thing? And there's no creativity, and there's nothing new,
01:24:05.120
and nothing's happening. It's just, we're just going to copy that model. So nobody's against the
01:24:09.840
freedom in Christ to develop some kind of like service, however you want. But why is everybody
01:24:14.280
just copying that? Is there an argument to be made that like, we're so sort of weighed down by
01:24:20.880
the, let's just say, like the nine to five grind, right? Like, it's something that we talk about in
01:24:25.900
the show often is how the economy is in such a shithole that it's, you require a two income
01:24:32.300
household in order to make ends meet. So that means your kids being raised by this, you know, sort of
01:24:37.200
public school system that is a government indoctrination system. And you're out of the house all day long
01:24:43.660
working surrounded by people that you don't know and don't love. They're not your family. And your
01:24:48.560
wife needs to also be out doing the exact same thing, spending the vast majority of her day around
01:24:54.220
people that aren't her family. And because of that, nobody's raising the kid. It's like you have this
01:24:59.140
thing where it's a rat race, and you're you're being crushed under the weight of, you know, the economy
01:25:04.160
and responsibility and all these different things. And then when you just want to relax, you have an
01:25:10.060
endless outlet of highly addictive things on your phone on your television, you know, at your grasp
01:25:16.740
at any given moment, you could be distracted. And the next thing you know, time has gone down the
01:25:21.320
hole, and it's time to go to sleep and start this thing over and do it again the next day. And so
01:25:26.000
nobody really has this time or they do have the time, but what little time they do have, they're using
01:25:30.800
it on these addicting, you know, media devices or what have you. And so who then is going to come out
01:25:37.280
and do something new and inspired, that's after the heart of God, they really are just struggling to make
01:25:44.880
any time within their week to go and pursue the heart of God. And so here it is this establishment
01:25:49.460
that's already here, and it's already got momentum. And let's go and do this thing. I mean, I did MMA for a long
01:25:55.060
time. And I've been to enough MMA gyms where it's like the same, you know, you want to talk about five songs at a
01:26:00.040
dance, you show up, you jump rope for three minutes, and then there's a 30 second rest, and there's another
01:26:03.940
three minutes, and there's a 30 second rest, and there's another three minutes. And now you can
01:26:06.720
shadow box and the same thing for a couple of more three minute rounds, then you pair up with a
01:26:10.960
partner, you do a little bit of technique work, you do that about three times, and that takes up the
01:26:15.180
majority of the class. Now it's time for the sermon, which is the sparring. And it's like, no matter where
01:26:20.420
I go, it's the same formula, because we're all just running out of schedule, dude, we don't have a lot
01:26:25.400
of time, we're trying to get in here, pursue this thing that's meaningful to us, and then get out and go back to
01:26:29.760
the grind. I think a lot of it is because there isn't this freedom of expression, we're not
01:26:33.920
here exploring this world and, you know, checking out all the wonders that God has left for us,
01:26:38.680
we're here grinding so that we don't end up homeless, so that we can raise a family so that
01:26:43.720
we can hopefully, you know, get our kid to go to a school that's good and, and carve their own life
01:26:48.900
out. Then by the time you're done, you sigh. And it's like, shit, that was 30 years. You know, I think
01:26:53.740
that has a lot to do with why we're not seeing this new inspired, beautiful thing that's after the heart
01:26:58.980
of God. We're just like redlining it through life. Hanging on for dear life with duct tape and
01:27:04.340
prayer. And then, and then as a church goer, your mindset, because of living like that, it's like,
01:27:09.360
yeah, I'll hand it off to the professional. Like he'll, he'll take care of it. Yeah.
01:27:13.220
Can we talk about like the, so like there, there's a lady named Jesse Crookshank. She's super
01:27:19.620
intelligent. Very, very cool. I got a podcast called Ordinary Discipleship. She's got a book
01:27:26.180
called Ordinary, Ordinary Discipleship. That's what the book is as well. But she's like a,
01:27:32.100
she's got like a doctorate in neuroscience or something like that. Like she's well versed in
01:27:38.260
like the psychology behind what's happening, how your brain works. And then she's kind of tying that
01:27:43.580
with like us as these communal beings in scripture. And she's very much a church is a community thing.
01:27:48.620
Um, but she talks about these five mission drifts, uh, drifts in disciple making that have veered from
01:27:55.360
like the path Jesus originally laid that got us to where we're currently at. Could we, could we talk
01:28:00.520
about those five like real quick? Sure. That's interesting. Is that, is that what's pulled up
01:28:04.460
here? Um, this is, this is her website. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Um, let's talk about that. So like
01:28:11.940
Jesus lays out this simple system that anyone can follow. Anybody can be a part of it. And the whole
01:28:18.160
idea is like you bring somebody along with you and then you send them out. And it's sort of like,
01:28:23.160
uh, the way my buddy Mike talks about it. I really liked the way he sums it up. He says, you know,
01:28:27.820
Jesus, uh, trained quickly. He sent quickly and he coached long-term like he was there for them all the
01:28:35.600
way along, but he was sent these like, you know, spiritual babies out, you know, to do his will.
01:28:41.280
And he trusted them with that, that the information he gave them was enough. They come back,
01:28:46.340
they get a little more, they go out better equipped the next time, you know, and it's just
01:28:50.040
that over and over and over again. And that's sort of what we all were to be doing. But over time,
01:28:55.480
you get, you see drift. Um, and there are a few pillars in the midst of that drift that kind of
01:29:02.260
show these major shift moments. The first one will be Constantine. Constantine comes about,
01:29:08.220
um, and the way she puts it, she says, Constantine professionalized Christianity,
01:29:13.800
that you have this priest class that raises up that are, they're these political actors,
01:29:20.280
they're government approved. And the whole deal is it's all for the sake of the ceremony.
01:29:24.720
And there's sort of this, like, um, they're a celebrity figure in a lot of ways. And the whole
01:29:31.200
idea is like, that's how you follow God is the priest. You follow what the priest says,
01:29:36.180
you listen to the priest. The next major shift would be like the enlightenment.
01:29:41.480
And she says that they, that the enlightenment rationalized Christianity, where Christianity was
01:29:47.460
no longer this thing where the main pursuit is, you know, unity with one another growing in a
01:29:54.060
transformative way in Christ and living lives honoring to him, but that it becomes about rational
01:30:00.640
minds, that it becomes about thinking, it becomes about the pursuit of knowledge, that that is the
01:30:05.260
thing. It's about learning. Now it's not about doing that was her, um, take on the great awakening,
01:30:11.460
like in new England, like, uh, Jonathan Edwards. This would be the enlightenment period. Okay. Okay.
01:30:17.540
I'm sorry. No, you're good, man. When was the enlightenment? What is that? Uh, era or let me
01:30:23.680
look at it. Uh, I do see that though. I see that now where like, um, this, the, this sort of spirit
01:30:30.040
has been removed from much of the discussion. And instead it's like arguing points and information
01:30:36.600
driven and, you know, um, I think it, it really just leads to like this almost debate culture where
01:30:43.240
it's like, instead of being after the heart of God, the feather in your cap is theological debate.
01:30:48.680
Yeah. Yeah. That's a big problem in the church today. I mean, there's a lot of different problems
01:30:53.720
within the American church culture, but one of them is, yeah, this like just an intellectual
01:30:59.000
gospel. I could be biased because I'm an idiot and I don't have the information to back half of my
01:31:03.320
thoughts. So, uh, you know, does seem pretty, uh, convenient for me to pick that, that argument,
01:31:09.580
but, uh, it just seems like that from where I'm standing. It's like, this has become more of an
01:31:14.580
intellectual pursuit and a way to gather information, to formulate arguments than it is
01:31:20.580
a spiritual thing. Cause ultimately that's what it is. Right. Um, and we, we, that doesn't come up
01:31:27.140
a lot, at least not in, in the, from, from this person who's new to all of this. I look up at all
01:31:32.480
the apparatus that's been built around this thing that I'm coming to and falling in love
01:31:36.980
with. And I go, that looks very much like an institution, um, businesses, uh, uh, governing
01:31:44.620
bodies, et cetera, and very legalistic, very text driven. And that's not what I'm discovering.
01:31:52.120
What I'm discovering is, is something that's spiritual. Yeah. Yeah. And to your point, like
01:31:58.460
the, uh, and we'll kind of, we'll get more into the institutionalization of things.
01:32:03.800
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See club for details. But like a point I meant to make on Constantine is with Constantine also comes
01:32:36.820
the idea of the dedicated building of the church. Um, and a lot of that stems from he had come out
01:32:43.120
of paganism and he's looking at around at all these other pagan religions and he's going, well,
01:32:47.940
they all have big fancy buildings. The Christians need big fancy buildings. And so now you got big fancy
01:32:52.960
buildings and they're modeled after the Greek theater, which is, you know, you can hear better,
01:32:58.800
but now you got one guy that gets elevated and he's the one, and you're a docile audience member
01:33:04.240
that is non-participatory and you're to sit quietly. But it keeps coming back to getting these models
01:33:10.420
and the things that, sorry, that we're going to do not from the scripture.
01:33:15.620
A hundred percent. A hundred percent. Sorry. I didn't mean to cut you off. Go ahead.
01:33:20.380
No, go ahead. Well, I was just going to say like Constantine, I mean, he's this
01:33:24.360
brand new Christian. Some would argue not a Christian. I'm not going to make a decision on
01:33:29.660
that. It's just, you got this guy brand new to the faith that just came out of paganism.
01:33:34.080
And all of a sudden it seems like he's superimposing a whole lot of paganism on it because he doesn't
01:33:38.940
know any better. And I would guess he wasn't discipled. You know what I'm saying? Like,
01:33:42.820
this is a guy who just goes, now I'm a Christian and I'm in charge of everything. Here's how it's
01:33:47.220
going to be. That's a problem, right? Great book on that by Frank Viola and George Barna called
01:33:55.040
Pagan Christianity. There's some stuff in there I don't agree with. There's a lot of stuff I do
01:34:00.020
agree with. It's worth checking out if you ever get the chance. Something that I noticed on the
01:34:05.320
topic of, because you said like, we're not participating in this. We're just these bystanders
01:34:10.380
that are being subjected to whatever's happening on the stage. And I really don't like that
01:34:14.380
element. And I was thinking about another aspect of like the sort of ritual, for lack of a better
01:34:21.220
term, just in the sense of repetition. And you do it every time when you show up. And it is this,
01:34:26.060
you know, please stand, right? And then you're allowed to sit for a little bit, but then it's
01:34:30.720
please stand again. And then you're allowed to sit for a little bit, then it's please stand again.
01:34:34.540
And I noticed that the standing starts to wear on you because a lot of the times you're in a
01:34:38.860
vaulted room where we're in a vaulted room where the, you know, there's a, there's a decline.
01:34:43.660
Dude, so it is. It's like my, but then I start, no, but that's exactly, that's exactly,
01:34:55.800
Well, check this out though. Tell me if, tell me if I'm wrong or if there's a real point to this,
01:35:00.920
but the way I see it is it's mildly uncomfortable.
01:35:04.040
Don't laugh, dude. It's mildly uncomfortable because you're wearing like Frankenstein Doc
01:35:11.760
Martens. Yeah. All right. But hear me out. So it's a little uncomfortable. And because of that,
01:35:16.860
you start to focus much more on what's happening to, to, you know, not to use a term too much that
01:35:23.280
we beat to death on this show, but you disassociate a little bit from that. Like,
01:35:26.200
don't focus on that. I mean, why, why, why do you kneel when you pray?
01:35:29.280
We don't kneel at all in church. No, I'm saying like, well, I don't know. I think there's a
01:35:34.340
reason why you, well, it's not a comfortable position. I think, look, I think some of these
01:35:37.700
things are done out of reverence too. Like, I think you kneel in submission. Well, the kneeling
01:35:42.360
thing for me is, is humbling myself. Like it's putting myself lesser than kind of the least you
01:35:47.260
can do. Well, but the standing thing just doesn't make any other sense except for, cause I'm looking
01:35:53.800
at the context of these 90 year olds. And I'm like, these 90 year olds are standing for so long
01:35:59.200
to the point where you see them give up one by one by one. They start sitting down. They can't
01:36:03.620
hang anymore. And I'm like, so up until that point, they're engaged in pain management. What do you do
01:36:09.880
when you're engaged in pain management? You focus on something else, right? So if there are-
01:36:15.220
You're trying to get them to disassociate. Is that where you're going?
01:36:17.640
You get them to disassociate and focus on the hypnosis techniques that are happening on stage.
01:36:22.880
During state, uh, straight Bible, he keeps making me stand up. Is that?
01:36:26.520
Yeah. He's trying to get you. Well, that's really a dominant thing.
01:36:32.180
We have recently, well, not recently, a couple of years ago, we switched at our church. We,
01:36:37.300
we say, if you're able, please stand, you know, cause there's a lot of older folks that that does
01:36:42.040
No, I ain't no bitch. Of course I'm able. And then I look at these 90 year olds and I'm like,
01:36:45.380
I really want to sit down. But if these nine year olds, 90 year olds are still standing,
01:36:48.520
I can't sit down. I can't, I have to keep standing. But I just think that
01:36:52.360
all it is, maybe there's a reverence thing, but I think, uh, uh, kneeling, which I'm not
01:36:57.640
recommending for these old people, but I'm just saying kneeling, humbling yourself. I understand
01:37:01.820
that. Like bowing your face. I understand that. But you know, this standing thing, I'm like,
01:37:07.280
you're just trying to get these people to focus on anything other than this slow, steady.
01:37:11.620
It's taken an hour and a half, but we figured out why David it's not past. It's definitely past
01:37:16.400
Mark. It's not a lot of standing this week. Can somebody say a lot of standing?
01:37:22.740
A lot of standing. I don't want that. I don't want pastor Mark. And I find it very strange
01:37:31.320
that his entire family is on stage and I'm like, what's happening here? That's common too.
01:37:35.940
What's going on, dude? Yeah. But, but pastor Rick's family is in the pews.
01:37:41.060
They can't sing. They can't sing. And they ain't standing either. They're like, I'm not doing this
01:37:45.020
to, to the reverence thing though. Like if you look at, like at a wedding ceremony,
01:37:49.460
like you stand in reverence for the bride when she walks in, you know, like when she walks past
01:37:54.940
you, you got to be standing for five songs. That's three minutes, each song that's 15 minutes.
01:38:00.700
But then again, like who says it's gotta be five songs. That's where, you know, we're talking about
01:38:06.940
that drift, like somewhere along the line that became the norm and it got taught in, as you like
01:38:12.060
to say, cemetery school or whatever, you know? And it's like, that's how we do it now. Um, and I
01:38:17.260
think we just, you just start doing it. I don't think people think about this stuff. I don't think
01:38:21.500
a lot of this is intentional. I think it's back to that question of you don't ask why it's like,
01:38:27.220
eventually when you don't ask why long enough, you're 2000 years removed and you're going, how did
01:38:32.100
we get here? And it's like, nobody's thinking about the knees of these 90 year old people.
01:38:36.960
I will say this, like, so a problem that I had, uh, from this last week. Yeah. Pastor Rick goes,
01:38:42.640
he's, he's talking and he goes, and don't worry, we're going to wrap it up. Like he's like, I see
01:38:47.840
it. Like I see the time. And that's the part for this sermon. Are you done? Are you, when are you
01:38:52.220
done? Matt does the same thing. Do we have time? Do we get time? Because you get nasty about me going
01:38:57.240
too long. I've never, never, not once right now. It's done when you're done, but I have been to a
01:39:04.040
church with a female pastor. Like when I was very young, not by choice. No, no. Is it, is I'll
01:39:10.560
explain it another time. She would preach sometimes for 30 minutes. Sometimes she'd preach for three
01:39:15.580
hours and people would just leave and never come back. And I'm like, yeah, like you've got to,
01:39:20.640
there's a middle ground, there's a healthy middle ground, timing, like being like, well,
01:39:24.040
it's 1045. So now we've got to get to the prayers out and the older, maybe just say what you got to
01:39:30.700
say. Yeah. Also within reason. And also, I don't think we need the guy who goes, and our God is such
01:39:36.380
a awesome God. And we are. I turned his mic off this week. That's why I'm back there, baby.
01:39:43.220
I got the power. Unbelievable, dude. I'm going to take that button thing. But I'm like, I don't know
01:39:47.820
why we need this guy who speaks with the treble in his voice to, to, to do the thing. I don't know
01:39:53.200
why he's just up there for like five minutes. And then pastor Rick gets the baton. There's a lot
01:39:57.940
of baton passing. It's all very confusing. If you're there, go ahead. Well, you, you keep making
01:40:03.960
all these church references that I have never been to a church that looks like half of what you guys
01:40:08.280
are mentioning. So it's like, you're in a very Pentecostal church. Or what are, are you in a
01:40:15.420
Pentecostal church right now? Pentecostal. They keep, they bring snakes every once in a while. It's
01:40:19.040
weird. Oh yeah. That's fun. Yeah. That's good. A little strict nine.
01:40:24.780
I do think some of it's cultural, like, you know, how long should you preach for and stuff?
01:40:30.320
It's like, no, you're, no, your room. And like, how long do you have, have them captive? Because
01:40:34.740
if you're speaking beyond that, why, why, why just for you? Or is it like, because you're actually
01:40:40.760
reaching them, you know? So yeah, you're right. Like you can go way too long. You got to know.
01:40:44.840
Paul preached so long that a dude fell out the window. I mean, that's true. That's true.
01:40:50.020
That was a real environment. Like he showed up into town. They were waiting on him. He got there.
01:40:54.460
He preached and preached and preached and preached. It's just, it was a real thing. It was a real
01:40:59.720
situation with real people in a real place. And so if it's real and happening, keep it going. Right.
01:41:05.940
Right. I mean, yeah. Yeah. But you got to be present. You have to understand when you're
01:41:11.560
expecting this to be like on a schedule. Yeah. It just makes it weird. Yeah. No, I agree. I agree.
01:41:19.980
That's it. So the question is, yeah, if you want to do church, like, I guess maybe the mistake
01:41:24.440
is like, you want to talk to a couple hundred people, like you want to help a hundred, a couple
01:41:31.040
hundred people. That's probably misguided, but here you are with this. And now this is
01:41:37.520
like a weird thing because now there's this platform that you can talk to, not just a couple
01:41:42.120
hundred people, but maybe a couple, you have a couple of clips that went into a hundred
01:41:46.540
thousand. No. Yeah, you do. You already know that. Don't say that. I don't think so. Stop
01:41:50.920
it. He's, he just wants us to say it again. A hundred thousand is you talk to a lot of people
01:41:57.740
and this is completely unnatural. You got no way to disciple these people, but should
01:42:02.900
you stop doing this? Because this is not, this is weird. Well, I say it all the time.
01:42:07.360
This is what we're doing here is weird. Yeah. But we're still doing it. What do we do? He
01:42:12.620
goes, Oh, the, do they need all the lights that like, does the church need the 501 C3?
01:42:16.940
Do they need all this money to fund it? And I was like, we're sitting in a room. Like
01:42:20.340
with, I don't even know how much money of stuff. We didn't take donations to pay for it.
01:42:25.560
Like, like, it's totally different. You're saying two totally different things. Like
01:42:28.880
you guys paid for all this stuff. You didn't ask people to send you donations to pay for
01:42:33.580
it. People pay. And I think that's part of it, man. It's just being straight up. Just
01:42:37.620
being real. Like what, what am I trying to actually do with the money I'm asking for?
01:42:41.500
Like, what is the point? Like that, that's huge. Yes. Yeah. But so the question is, then
01:42:46.260
what are they trying to do? Like, what is the church trying to do when it's, when it's
01:42:49.960
buying all this stuff and it's trying to make this production, like, why is it trying to
01:42:55.420
produce in such a way? Is it trying to spread the gospel? I don't know. It's very confusing.
01:42:58.760
I almost got to give like credit where credit's due. There's a lot of things that are severely
01:43:03.040
wrong with JWs. But when you see them go out into the world with their carts and like, they're
01:43:08.040
trying to approach you. They were in Germany, bro. Yeah. They're everywhere. And they're like
01:43:11.320
approaching you. And they're like, have you heard about Jesus? And I'm like, not in the way.
01:43:15.140
They approach you. Most of the JWs I see don't approach because they, they just have to be out
01:43:20.380
there. So they don't actually engage. There is a lot of that, but it's still like they've created
01:43:25.520
and I'm not saying you should do this, but I'm just saying they've created this program where like
01:43:29.300
you at least have to go out. And if you want to not approach people, that's one thing. But
01:43:33.080
generally speaking, they come and knock on your doors. Right. I mean, I used to have JWs ring my
01:43:37.480
doorbell and I'd be like, Oh no, get in the closet. You know, like I'd be mortified that they were
01:43:42.280
that much. Just, I don't know how, why that's why I dealt with things when I was a kid.
01:43:45.140
Um, but you know, that aspect of going out into the world, whether or not you are going to do
01:43:51.740
anything is up to you, but they're pushing the bar further to create a situation where you're much
01:43:56.640
likely, much more likely to, you know, make disciples of men by going out and preaching the
01:44:02.280
gospel. And so obviously there's a lot of issues with Mormons. Yeah. Mormons do the same thing. Yeah.
01:44:07.400
Yeah. And they're effective at it. Even though it's heresy, but they're effective at it.
01:44:12.800
But that's what, you know, it's like, they have a lot of things wrong and something perhaps,
01:44:17.360
perhaps that's a lesson to be learned there. It's like, they're, they're spreading and,
01:44:21.680
you know, shout out to our Mormon fans, but they're spreading something that is on its face.
01:44:25.920
Ridiculous. Like it's, it's, it was made into like the laughingstock of Broadway and,
01:44:31.700
and for good reason, but they are spreading it. It is growing. And you look at it. I mean,
01:44:36.240
even Islam is growing, I guess they're spreading it in jail or whatever they're doing. Well, when
01:44:39.860
you keep showing up and stabbing people and stuff like that's the way of. So to be clear,
01:44:43.820
Christianity is growing, just not here. Yeah. Like it's growing in China where you can't
01:44:50.360
practice it. It's growing in middle Eastern nations where you can't practice it. It's an
01:44:55.520
underground movement where it is thriving. So, I mean. It only thrives when it's real though.
01:45:01.000
That's the whole point when it's part of the American culture. That's right. They did the big
01:45:05.420
show with the Charlie Kirk thing and everybody's singing along. That's where you just see a church
01:45:10.460
just dying, dude. Like a, like a lazy, uh, like over, overfed, over moneyed giant system. That was
01:45:19.020
those churches that never grows, man. Like only the real church that like lives in hardship and in
01:45:24.100
places where you don't get personal gain for being a Christian. Cause that's what you're describing in
01:45:28.620
China is like there, you're not doing it for personal gain. Like you're only doing it because
01:45:32.340
it's real. Yeah. Because you'll probably die for doing it. Right. Like it's your life on the line
01:45:37.580
here. You have nothing to get for me. Yeah. I guess again, we're, we're back and I don't,
01:45:44.280
I don't, I want to respect your time. Zach. Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey, I texted my wife. I have as much
01:45:48.740
time. I did it. That's crazy. I did the thing, dude. Okay. That's funny. You feel stupid. I feel
01:45:57.960
pretty, I feel pretty good right now. You have a few more minutes. Um, yeah. You were saying
01:46:04.600
something before. Can we hit those three other pillars and then I think, okay, so we're not up
01:46:09.960
against a hard finish. We're going to keep going. Yeah. If that's cool with you, you guys are good.
01:46:14.780
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01:46:38.260
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01:46:45.080
So, I mean, so like after the enlightenment, which was in the 1700s, by the way, you then
01:46:50.300
get, uh, well, so these aren't in, these aren't necessarily in order. The reformation technically
01:46:55.360
takes place before that, right? That's like 1660. But through the reformation, then you
01:47:00.000
get the, it sermonized it. It made it all about the sermon. So it is about listening to the
01:47:05.440
pastor now, because now it's not a priest, right? Now it's a pastor with the reformation.
01:47:09.780
And so it's about the, uh, sermon and the pastor becomes the head that is the discipler.
01:47:15.300
Then you get the industrial revolution. And maybe this one's big for you guys, because this
01:47:20.200
systematized it. This is where the system kind of gets built because like out of the industrial
01:47:24.940
revolution, that's where you get like the modern system for like what school looks like, where
01:47:29.260
everybody is taught exactly the same. Everybody's treated like a sheep that is to learn,
01:47:34.240
not even to learn, to memorize. That's where you get the work line to like the standardized
01:47:38.660
factory work. Exactly. What the school was meant to emulate. I I'll just push back again
01:47:43.220
really quickly though, with this show, something that we we've learned the hard way. If you don't
01:47:49.020
systematize something, it just either nothing gets done or shit goes haywire. And it's like,
01:47:54.800
that has been a big, like for when people see the episodes that air, Matt still doesn't even
01:47:59.200
know there's like, I don't know, 32 steps, maybe something like that. I remember counting it up.
01:48:03.960
It was insane. Yeah. It's insane. You're a business. A business should have systems.
01:48:08.840
There's something to be said about doing it to the degree where you micromanage every aspect of it.
01:48:13.660
And I think when you do that, you inherently remove the spirit from a thing.
01:48:17.060
Yeah. And so let me, let me be clear. It's not the system that's bad. It's that the system becomes
01:48:22.040
that everyone is to be treated exactly the same and everyone learns exactly the same and everybody
01:48:26.520
brings things to the table in the exact same way. And we just know that's not true. We're all
01:48:32.000
gifted differently. We're all built differently. And Jesus's system is the Holy Spirit working
01:48:37.020
through a bunch of differently gifted people. It's like when he talks about the body, the body has
01:48:41.300
many parts, a body can't be made up all out of ears. That body does nothing.
01:48:47.280
Yeah. It's awful, right? Like it needs, the ear needs the eye, the eye needs the foot,
01:48:52.480
He mentions an ear in the passage, but like, but the point, the point is like every single
01:49:00.140
body part comes together for the whole church. We in the industrial revolution are like, ah,
01:49:07.120
it's all just a, it's all eyes. It's all noses. It's like, you know what I'm saying? And it's like,
01:49:11.700
no, you have people are individuals and they, God speaks through different individuals differently.
01:49:17.720
His Holy Spirit, like he uses us as conduits for his Holy Spirit. And so when we gather together,
01:49:23.800
I'm going to learn something different from you to you, to you, like each of you are going to bring
01:49:28.600
something different to the table. And I'm going to bring something different to the table because
01:49:37.840
about the body of Christ. Cause like me and my family talk about it sometimes that like, uh,
01:49:49.000
you know, if you were to take like a lungs and a heart and a kneecap and some fingernails and some
01:49:54.640
eyeballs and, you know, hair follicles and put it all on the table, it wouldn't look like it was part
01:50:00.220
of the same body at all. It wouldn't even look like it was from the same planet if you took all
01:50:03.980
the stuff. And so it's very weird that like modern American church culture, that everybody can start
01:50:10.080
to look the same. I don't know that everybody should be looking the same. Like the thing that
01:50:13.960
we have, uh, in common is love. Like Jesus said, that's how they'll know that you're my disciples
01:50:19.180
is by love. So we could have that in common. But as far as like all being exactly the same,
01:50:24.640
it's not, it's not supposed to look like that. We are supposed to be a vast, vastly different body,
01:50:28.580
which is what makes denominations crazy because they attract all like people. Like if you look
01:50:36.520
at an apostolic Pentecostal church, you're going to see a lot of people that are wired very similarly.
01:50:41.600
If you go look at a Calvinist church, you're going to see a lot of people that are wired exactly the
01:50:46.460
same or very similarly. And it's like, not that I'm, yeah, I got my own qualms with the apostolic
01:50:53.220
Pentecostal church. I think there's some heresy stuff going on there as it's modalism. But my point
01:50:58.440
is like Pentecostals need Calvinists and they both need Wesleyans and that like, we each bring
01:51:06.100
something different to the, and I'm not saying like that we need all the doctrines, but I'm saying
01:51:10.080
like, we need all of our natural wirings that God gave us working together. And furthermore,
01:51:16.260
and sorry, in the, um, in leadership, I'd say it's the same way, dude. Like if you look back at,
01:51:25.420
um, great preachers of time past, take a guy like William Grimshaw, um, a great Methodist preacher,
01:51:31.880
you read his story and he went to everybody's home that was in his, uh, parish, if you will.
01:51:39.280
Cause he's a shepherd. Yeah. He went to everybody's home. He ate with them. He read scripture with them.
01:51:45.080
He prayed with them. He knew where each of the members, if you will, of his church were at.
01:51:49.600
Uh, let's not do that. Um, I'm sorry about the name. He, he knew, he knew how everybody in his
01:51:58.240
home lived. Um, they say Tozer was nothing like that. They said A.W. Tozer was just in a crow's
01:52:04.940
nest office and just came out and preached fire. Every time he preached dude, however many days a
01:52:09.380
week he was doing it, he was just preaching fire. So I don't know, to me, that's more of maybe even
01:52:14.120
like a prophetic role. Like he operated in the prophetic, not in the shepherd role, like,
01:52:19.000
like not in the pastor role, like not even remotely close, but for all of us, we just call both of
01:52:24.020
those pastor because like, bingo, bingo. They shoved them all into one role. They put it all
01:52:29.620
into one thing and that just, that weighs heavy. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. And then you see these
01:52:35.280
pastors are just worn down today because they have to function as all fives. Like they have,
01:52:39.880
like they have to function as all of the roles that's supposed to be in leadership where it's,
01:52:44.820
it's just not supposed to be like that. It's supposed to be multiple elders. Paul told Titus
01:52:48.460
Gordon, elders, plural. It's like in any kind of like congregation or whatever you even want to call
01:52:52.820
it, there should be multiple elders, not one singular. There should be prophets. There should
01:52:57.260
be apostles. There should be evangelists. There should be teachers. And some of those kind of operate
01:53:01.840
across different lines too. They can kind of do more than one. You might be, you might be a couple,
01:53:06.300
right? You know, you want to know something funny, man? David's favorite pastor. I actually,
01:53:12.160
I was able to, it's like, when I talk to people, I don't like to just like, I don't like to talk to
01:53:16.760
them and get like the bullshit. Like you get that from people. Hello, how are you doing? And there's
01:53:20.660
like this thing. I keep like poking and to see who's underneath. And I did one time and I was like,
01:53:28.320
how are things going? There's a transition happening here. This is going to be crazy for you.
01:53:33.000
And he told me straight up, he was like, he's like, I'll be honest with you. Like,
01:53:36.100
I feel like, like he's, he said, he's something like he's being squashed a little bit. He's like,
01:53:40.260
I'm not able to even like get into the word the way I want to, because there's so much,
01:53:45.520
there's so many duties with this and like, especially the transition just as the, as the
01:53:51.100
pastor. And I told him, I was like, that seems like it's a big problem. Like you should, should you be
01:53:56.640
doing this, this way? I don't, I don't know any answers. And he was like, I don't know,
01:54:02.120
but it's like, this is not what I'm saying is this is not something that is like, we're,
01:54:06.100
we're bringing up and like, wow, that's profound. The people that are going through it are being
01:54:09.720
squashed by this. Yes. But we do have the answer for that. It's in a, is it act six or seven where
01:54:16.500
the, um, the Greek widows are complaining that they're not being taken care of, but the Hebrew
01:54:21.340
widows are in the apostle say, Hey man, let's look out dudes full of wisdom and full of the Holy
01:54:26.740
ghost and put them over that stuff, over that business stuff so that we can stay in prayer in
01:54:32.420
the word. So we do have biblical context for, no, if the guy's bringing forth the word, like he's not
01:54:38.860
supposed to be messing around with all the other shenanigans, dude. He's supposed to be like in the
01:54:43.020
word of God in prayer. And then if it is a one day a week thing, like whatever, but let's just say it
01:54:49.080
is, it should be fire, bro. Like people should be shocked at like what's coming forth. They should be
01:54:53.500
like, dang, dude, this guy hits. But if you're so engaged with all the worldliness of the church
01:54:58.640
system all week long, and then somehow you're going to preach some heavenly message. I don't know.
01:55:03.920
That's why it's not happening. I feel like that's really, um, pastor Rick's, uh, spot is when he starts
01:55:11.500
talking about scripture. Um, he has such a great way of unpacking it and then, you know, imparting this
01:55:18.740
on you and you can see in the way he delivers it. Like he loves the Lord. That's like the real
01:55:27.020
genuine thing that comes across. And then in the other stuff, it's like, you know, he's just going
01:55:31.540
through these daily operations, but yeah, man, it's like, if you have a guy that can do that,
01:55:35.380
that's like that in touch with it, that you can tell genuinely loves the Lord and believes this is
01:55:41.180
the word of God and is trying desperately to help you understand this thing. Like that's almost all
01:55:48.480
that guy should be doing. In my opinion, it's like, stop crushing this 80 year old dude. Well,
01:55:52.880
then let him just do that. But then this gets to a question. Somebody had brought this up in the chat
01:55:57.500
and I thought it was interesting. So they said all churches and denominations can do it. Unfortunately,
01:56:02.140
JW and Mormons alike are quick to ostracize and push out anything bad. Yeah. Um, this idea of
01:56:09.400
pushing out of having this small tent, because I don't know how many people are you really
01:56:16.220
realistically going to have in leadership? And then how does this go? Like how many different
01:56:20.960
directions is this eventually going to pull in, like, you know, pull the church in or pull the
01:56:25.860
body of Christ in there has to be something to be said for that. Like about if we are, we're supposed
01:56:31.720
to be one body with that, that are, uh, you know, unique, but all put together. Yeah. And walk in
01:56:39.360
the same direction. How the hell do you do that? There has to be a system. You have to systemize
01:56:44.540
it. It's called God. I mean, like, that's the crazy thing is we, well, like a lot of people,
01:56:48.380
well, how can I support, how can the church exist if we don't take people's tithe?
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I don't know. Maybe trust God. I don't, I mean, how did we open a coffee shop? I didn't have $200,000
01:57:28.820
when I said I was going to open a Christian library. Now you're rich. Now you're rich. Do
01:57:33.420
you see what I'm saying? You just trust God. And I know that's like not a cool thing anymore. We're
01:57:37.160
like, no, we need to make a man-made system to make this work. But I'm just saying that's biblical.
01:57:42.000
But okay. So, so to, to all your points here, like, uh, can I just like power through a few
01:57:48.620
different Bible verses real quick and just make a point about all of them. So like James 5, 16 says,
01:57:53.640
therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.
01:57:57.640
The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. So confess your sins to one another
01:58:03.480
for the, for the purpose of laying down those sins, right? We jump over to Galatians 6, 1 through 2.
01:58:10.780
Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the spirit should restore that
01:58:15.260
person gently, but watch yourselves or you also may be tempted. Carry each other's burdens. And in this
01:58:20.680
way, you will fulfill the law of Christ. Uh, the third one's Hebrews 3, 12 through 13. It says,
01:58:26.760
see to it brothers and sisters that none of you has a sinful unbelieving heart that turns away from
01:58:30.860
the living God, but encourage one another daily as long as it is called today so that none of you
01:58:36.160
may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness. First Thessalonians 5, 14 through 15 says, and we urge
01:58:41.980
you brothers and sisters, warn those who are idle and disruptive, encourage the disheartened, help the
01:58:47.080
weak, be patient with everyone, make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always strive to do
01:58:52.380
what is good for each other and for everyone else. And then finally Romans 15, 14, I myself am convinced
01:58:58.900
my brothers and sisters that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with knowledge and competent to
01:59:04.560
instruct one another. I read all those things right there because it's like, those can't happen on a
01:59:10.840
Sunday morning. Those are instructions given to the body to do for one another. And we look to Sunday
01:59:18.440
and we go, my pastor's supposed to do those things. And like, to your point, Top, like keeping those
01:59:23.540
things in line would be impossible for a pastor to do. Keeping all that functional when we're all
01:59:29.920
together for the good of the team to move towards Christ and we're all keeping each other in check and
01:59:35.500
all moving towards Jesus with the Bible guiding us overhead. Like the Holy Spirit's our teacher,
01:59:41.340
like let the Holy Spirit teach, right? Like that's how we keep things like that in check. It can't,
01:59:46.900
like there are overseers. There are elders that, that see over that and try to keep things in line
01:59:52.580
when they veer, but all in all, like it's up to all of us working together to make it happen.
01:59:58.740
Not a priest class of professionals. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Well, that goes back to that
02:00:05.440
thing where it's not supposed to be this thing that just happens once a week. That's right.
02:00:09.080
You're not supposed to just go and have this experience and closeness to God for an hour and a half.
02:00:13.860
If, uh, if you're an hour and a half, hour, 20, whatever, once a week, this is a life, not a day.
02:00:19.660
What's the, what is the exact context of the Romans 14? Because if Paul's going to look at them
02:00:25.560
and say, I'm convinced that you're going to do the right thing. Like, what is that? What does that
02:00:30.900
even mean? What kind of relationship do you have to have? He says, he says capable, like, right?
02:00:36.100
Like I'm convinced that you're full of goodness, filled with knowledge and competent to instruct one
02:00:40.440
another. He's saying, you're able to do this. He's not necessarily saying like, it's going to
02:00:44.880
happen. Right. But he's saying like, you could be doing this. Like you should be doing this. You
02:00:49.720
know what I'm saying? Hmm. Yeah. I guess this is the idea of the micromanagement, right? The
02:00:55.200
helicopter parent, uh, sort of thing that is very popular in, in recent history, maybe just our
02:01:01.740
generation. Uh, yeah. I mean, definitely the people that raised us didn't do that. And then I guess we
02:01:08.540
raised a bunch of kids and did that shit to them, but yeah. Yeah. They're doing it in the
02:01:13.000
church too. And it feels like, you know, you're, you are controlling a thing and you're making it,
02:01:17.380
um, predictable and you're making it safe. But in the end, what, what are you producing? I,
02:01:23.820
that remains, it doesn't really remain to be seen. I guess Matt has already decided what it's
02:01:27.340
produced. Well, it's, it's almost, um, and I don't think you're wrong. It's almost a bit of a moot
02:01:31.920
point, right? Because it's like, you're not going to change this system. And this system
02:01:37.740
isn't the end all be all we've already established. It's not supposed to happen one day a week. So
02:01:42.720
the only thing to say or do about it is to live your life this way. But the system, the system is
02:01:49.700
prime for change. If this makes any sense, like you're still changing a thing that's only happening
02:01:55.280
on Sundays. Well, no, the church exists all like seven days a week. It's there the whole time. It's
02:02:03.040
just, this is just a building, you know, this is just a place with things in it. It needs to have
02:02:07.560
people there doing and doing the right thing. But like, yeah, I don't, I don't know, man.
02:02:13.720
Well, yeah. And if there is going to be people paying for these land in these buildings,
02:02:17.140
the least you could do is let them access it seven days a week. Like if your congregation paid for all
02:02:22.360
that, bro, you should have something going on there. Again, if you have fully operational apostles,
02:02:27.380
apostles, prophets, pastors, evangelists, and teachers doesn't mean it's the same guy teaching
02:02:32.080
every night. It doesn't mean it's the same people teaching every day, but like, and especially
02:02:36.300
depending on like, uh, how many people belong to this church or whatever, like why are young people
02:02:41.820
paying for daycare? Like why are, if there's old people who are like retired and not even sure if
02:02:47.340
they're like life means anything anymore, you know, they want to have meaning in their life.
02:02:51.400
And then they have young families like in their church paying the world for the world to train
02:02:58.100
their little kids. Like that's just a crazy thing. I mean, there's, there is good.
02:03:01.860
Because we live in a world where if you give my kid a peanut and he asphyxiates, I'm going to sue you.
02:03:05.360
Also the last time I let an old person watch my kid, he pulled his tooth out.
02:03:09.160
Oh, that's right. Yeah, I did. But they just, they just want to know why your kid is not wearing socks.
02:03:13.540
That's the question. Why isn't this kid wearing socks? My grandma, every single time.
02:03:47.740
I'm just saying there's really cool things that could be happening with these buildings that people are paying for.
02:03:56.080
Let's go and talk to pastor Rick and be like, let us gain access to this place seven days a week.
02:04:03.440
That's kind of what it is. It's like this community where people come in and out of,
02:04:06.580
how does it sustain itself? And then are you doing a show on,
02:04:10.620
does it even matter if you're doing a show on Sunday?
02:04:13.460
I have a thought on this, but really quick, just because I think before we get an answer to this,
02:04:29.240
And that means it takes the focus off the community and it puts it on the individual.
02:04:47.540
Top, you were getting at, like, how do you fix this?
02:04:52.180
If I bring this back to a conversation, Top, you and Matt got into it over an issue a couple episodes ago.
02:05:05.100
Tell me if you remember, but like, you guys were talking about how every girl today has got an OnlyFans.
02:05:09.640
And how you don't want your son growing up in an age where that's the world.
02:05:16.720
It's been colored by, like, everybody's got an OnlyFans.
02:05:20.740
No, stop it. Zach's about to slam dunk on you, right?
02:05:23.020
No, I think you might dunk on me, but it can go either way.
02:05:27.360
Because, like, I think you were both right in the way you came about it.
02:05:31.300
Well, I think there's a third way, though, that makes the whole thing work together.
02:05:38.340
Like, Top is right in that, like, it sucks and we should be mad.
02:05:52.020
Just hold on to it, because there's going to be a Matt is right, too.
02:05:55.680
But Top is right in that, like, we should be mad that we live in a world filled with, like,
02:06:02.920
every girl walking down the street's got a porn station out there, right?
02:06:12.820
That should be fixed, because that sucks for the world.
02:06:16.820
Matt said, I'm just going to live my life for Jesus, and it's going to work out.
02:06:23.140
And he's also right, like, God's will will be done.
02:06:30.500
But then I think there's a third way, which is, like, we are called to go plant the seed of the gospel
02:06:37.700
in the hearts of even those OnlyFans models, the people that are doing these things.
02:06:43.280
Because the point is, you and me can try and change the world all day.
02:06:49.120
Or as a lot of people like to think today, if I elect the right guy, the world will change for the better.
02:06:57.160
They happen at the grassroots, and they ripple out into the greater reaches of the world.
02:07:03.120
Nobody changes without Jesus Christ giving them a new heart.
02:07:11.540
And so the way you fix everybody having an OnlyFans is you teach an OnlyFans model that
02:07:17.520
Jesus, the Lord of the universe, took you out of your sin and your death, and he saved you.
02:07:22.220
And maybe that seed doesn't plant, but maybe it does.
02:07:25.700
And maybe for her, then she can start changing, and then she starts preaching that gospel into
02:07:33.400
And eventually, OnlyFans is on its way out because there aren't enough people that like it.
02:07:40.660
No, I think you're right about that, though, because it's like, it doesn't matter if the
02:07:45.640
This is a thing that I've been becoming more comfortable with.
02:07:50.640
Don't be concerned with the what if this doesn't work or what.
02:07:59.640
You're worried that this person's not going to be receptive.
02:08:03.640
I had to learn that the hard way with the whole going and talking to Clint thing.
02:08:07.160
And then I had this whole, you know, debacle that took place because of I'm pretty convicted
02:08:12.140
in the idea that it was because of disobedience.
02:08:18.120
I leaned on a bunch of excuses as to why I shouldn't do it.
02:08:20.860
And then I ended up getting the shit under the stick for disobedience because of it.
02:08:24.620
And it's like, I understand a little bit more now.
02:08:29.840
You're the guy who plants the seeds after the seed is planted.
02:08:38.880
Maybe like you come back and you check on him again, maybe.
02:08:41.240
But like if you're getting red lights all day and they don't want anything to do with
02:08:44.540
you, Jesus says, wipe the dust from your feet and move on.
02:08:48.520
Like sometimes that you got to do that too, right?
02:08:51.260
You got to be in constant prayer over that sort of thing.
02:09:03.400
We live in the villages and this is an elderly community.
02:09:08.100
And so there are, you know, and Matt's one of them, people that are a little bit seasoned,
02:09:14.420
long in the tooth, towards the end of their, you know, experiences here.
02:09:18.920
And as far as stamina goes, ability to focus, he's actually showing early signs of dementia.
02:09:27.800
And it's something that we haven't, it's a touchy subject.
02:09:30.260
And I'm looking for a way to bring it up to him.
02:09:34.820
I don't think that he would remember if we did bring it up to him anyway.
02:09:49.020
He's talking about the thing with Clinton and the talking or whatever.
02:09:55.420
But yeah, I do think that that's what we're supposed to do is we, we plant those seeds and
02:10:00.920
And if, if like, you know, you were just talking about, if there's all these attempts and somebody's
02:10:06.700
But which is interesting because it's not saying it's going to work every time either.
02:10:13.480
If somebody's not receptive to multiple attempts, you know, go somewhere else.
02:10:18.920
Well, that is the issue when you do try to make it work every time is you end up changing
02:10:23.980
the message to make it palatable because the Christian message is not very palatable to
02:10:33.560
You've got to die to self and give your life to God.
02:10:37.240
Like people, you know, you have to change it to make it palatable.
02:10:40.040
And then people go, Oh, I think I like this whole Christian thing.
02:10:43.200
And to that point, man, is like, when we look at the current church and we go, here's
02:10:48.400
Well, everything wrong with it's going to be sin because that's how everything works.
02:10:54.340
And so it's like the way we fix the brokenness of the current church system.
02:11:01.320
One, everything we've said thus far, I mean, maybe everything we've said thus far is like,
02:11:07.780
why can't you just start a church out of your home?
02:11:11.560
Why can't you just start meeting with people out of your house?
02:11:17.320
You need the Holy spirit and you need people called by God.
02:11:22.500
Beyond that, if you are in the middle of the 501c3 system, start getting rid of all the
02:11:28.720
My church is currently trying to go, how can, how can we distance ourself from all the
02:11:39.140
Like maybe, maybe the building is, is run by its own little committee and they worry
02:11:47.400
And then we can just go and we're just the church and we're just going to be the church
02:11:51.960
and we're going to do church and we're going to get rid of all the crap that isn't church.
02:12:01.760
Well, until somebody breaks the mold and then makes that the new standard, right?
02:12:05.640
It's all about, you just need money to do that.
02:12:10.520
I mean, if you want to have people in a, in a place that's not being rained on, he sent
02:12:18.980
It's not the only reason you said no, but the same thing he goes, oh, why don't we go
02:12:22.100
and donate, you know, the, the charity funds to people directly in the hood?
02:12:27.460
You know, somebody else is a better man than me.
02:12:34.340
So what, what do you guys bring to the table though?
02:12:37.400
Cause yeah, maybe you're not the guy that decides how we, how we just stop it.
02:12:49.880
Let somebody else that knows how to distribute money to the people that need it.
02:12:55.500
You don't have to do it all, but get a good group of people around you that are going to
02:13:00.300
Top is actually on a reconnaissance mission, if you will, at the 501c3 that he's currently
02:13:07.700
at, because he's got plans to, as Hicks has requested to open his own church.
02:13:14.440
And he's going to somehow do some kind of music that actually is worship where it's not
02:13:18.640
just a cover band and he's going to like, you want to know my plans.
02:13:30.880
Number one, because my, my parents go there and they've been bringing my children.
02:13:38.620
And I said, okay, I should stick around and check this place out because my children are
02:13:43.160
developing here and they're doing like whatever you can say about the 501c3 system and the
02:13:48.140
youth pastors, a pastor for this, but my kids are benefiting from being in this.
02:13:54.980
So I'm, I'm there and I'm like, I can volunteer.
02:14:03.680
So while I'm in that system, I say, Hey, what's up with this AV?
02:14:08.700
And then I learned that program and then I run it for Matt show on straight Bible.
02:14:13.520
And then they have a professional recording program.
02:14:17.440
And they have, and they have a professional, and they have a professional sound.
02:14:25.600
Everywhere I go, I started off working construction and I was cleaning shit from a basement after
02:14:32.460
And then I said, I, you know, I was hanging out with one of the carpenters and he's building
02:14:38.680
And then the same thing, I go to the MTA and I'm just swinging a hammer and there's a
02:14:45.560
And then he shows me, and then I do, and then I drive it.
02:14:48.260
And then, and then it's just an escalating scale of doing that.
02:14:54.220
And it's like, I don't really see the only downside is that I'm helping to sustain a
02:15:02.520
But if I don't help, what is it, is it going to fail?
02:15:04.860
Because I already left the church and I said, I'll leave here.
02:15:08.220
I used to organize the music for the church and they won't, they still exist today.
02:15:13.640
The kids is the, uh, was the most difficult thing for us was like, yo, if we leave this
02:15:21.480
And, uh, but we, we made a decision, like we weighed the pros and cons and thought it
02:15:28.420
But I would 100% respect anybody who says, no, we weighed the pros and cons and it was
02:15:41.080
I mean, the system would be like, like, uh, being completely indoctrinated by they go once
02:15:46.240
And then the rest of the pretty much seven days a week, they're being dealt with by me.
02:15:49.600
So you could imagine what being raised by me is like, they just come here.
02:15:57.460
They do like activities with, and I'm like, this is great, man.
02:16:00.340
And I think, I think that that's great for my kids.
02:16:06.240
And like another piece of this that is crucial is like the, the, the leaders that currently
02:16:12.660
Like, I know there are people like me that are wrestling with these things and the change
02:16:19.260
you have to bring is like, you got to be up front.
02:16:23.540
You can't, you can't let your livelihood get in the way of that.
02:16:27.220
Somewhere a long time ago, I said, the worst they can do is fire me.
02:16:31.340
And I just started preaching what's right from the front.
02:16:34.000
And it's like, the moment you do that all the way, it's off.
02:16:37.140
It's like, okay, I've already recognized, like, I've got another job.
02:16:43.540
If I, you know, if, if need be completely, I'm trying to get there.
02:16:47.740
I'm trying to get to the point where I can only take a paycheck from the barbershop and
02:16:54.240
But my point is like, the worst you can do is get rid of me.
02:16:59.700
We need more pastors that don't let their livelihood and money strong arm them into getting away
02:17:07.300
from what we're really supposed to be doing as the church and give them what their itching
02:17:12.460
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02:17:42.860
It's tough because everybody's in expectation of living the American dream.
02:17:47.180
And it does beg the question, should all the pastors in America be living the American dream?
02:17:53.980
If our message is that, hey, man, eternity's at stake and that's the most important thing
02:17:57.820
in the temporary realm is not important, but then the world especially, but even the confessing
02:18:02.740
church looks at the pastor and goes, well, it sure seems like he loves the stuff of the
02:18:07.420
He's living the American dream just like everybody else.
02:18:10.280
Then we end up in this situation where the world is saying, why would I believe the church?
02:18:14.540
The church doesn't even believe what it's saying.
02:18:16.600
That's true, but I don't think there's not much merit in being poor.
02:18:26.560
Not just a curse, but it's like people who embrace that are stupid.
02:18:34.320
But to Zach's point, you can end up in a really sketched situation.
02:18:40.940
But in today's day and age, Matt, there's a way.
02:18:48.180
Zach has a podcast that he stopped six months ago, but he has a talent of talking to people.
02:18:55.120
Yeah, and this right here is an avenue to get yourself out of that system.
02:19:01.560
And if idiots like me and David could figure out a way to build this to what it is.
02:19:10.520
But I think the point is that we have people within the system.
02:19:14.920
And Pastor Jose, before he left the church, he's like, oh, I think I want to open up a podcast.
02:19:20.600
He wanted to use like church infrastructure to do it.
02:19:23.800
And I was like, that's an interesting idea because what's going to happen there is, well, I mean, it's going to be weird kind of co-owned stuff.
02:19:31.340
But if you monetize this correctly and you build this correctly, you have a microphone to talk to whoever you want.
02:19:37.620
And you have freedom because you have money coming in from what you're saying.
02:19:41.560
And there's something about that, about the time that we live in now with like specifically what we're doing here that you can do that.
02:19:50.080
I mean, if you can't figure out how to do it, then there's a lot of tricks.
02:19:57.740
And that might be like a very strong solution for these people that are in it.
02:20:02.680
But then also with that, I think you're going to get a lot of weirdness.
02:20:07.540
You're going to get strange stuff coming out of it.
02:20:11.120
But that's one part of it is the preaching through the podcast model.
02:20:15.520
Like that's like, sorry, that's like one part of it.
02:20:20.040
But then there does need to be the real community part too, where you are meeting with real humans in real life.
02:20:26.380
And so people can listen to podcasts and get fed and learn the word of God that way.
02:20:32.180
But then they still need to be a part of a group that they're meeting with, that they know and love.
02:20:36.660
Like as long as I was ever not in the 501c3 system, I was still always in a Bible study.
02:20:44.980
But there was always some group that I was intimate with that entire time.
02:20:50.020
Like the preaching and the Bible learning can really happen much more effectively through the podcast model than it can.
02:20:57.800
And not to be like, I don't know, like egotistical or braggadocious or whatever.
02:21:03.580
We were just kind of talking about like you're in this system and then the people go, behave this way or, right?
02:21:10.300
And before it's like, well, I'm a civilian and I'm a civilian.
02:21:13.200
But like, yeah, behave this way or I'm excommunicated from your community.
02:21:19.960
Maybe if it's a good day on the show, I don't even know how many people we can talk to.
02:21:26.700
And I also I have no ties, no obligatory ties to you monetarily.
02:21:35.440
But like somebody like Matt, that is going to go and give a message on a platform like this and reach all these people.
02:21:41.080
If you go to a church, you're an asset to that church, not just an asset, but you're also somebody that they should be looking at and going, oh, I better not excommunicate this guy.
02:21:53.440
I better I kind of maybe I should look at what he's doing because he's garnered quite an audience here and he must be doing something correct.
02:21:59.940
If they're smart, if they're not smart, they might want to push you out because you're actually giving good criticisms of the church.
02:22:09.200
And I'm not saying anything that's not that's just what it is.
02:22:12.480
That's the existing dynamic of what is happening here.
02:22:15.720
And I think that that does change that that changes the church.
02:22:20.800
Yeah. Yeah. Going out and doing it like I didn't get a committee together to help me open a Christian library.
02:22:26.840
We just did it. We didn't we didn't get we didn't ask for donations.
02:22:30.380
We didn't like try to get a bunch of people behind us to help us do it.
02:22:38.140
And my wife and I came up with the idea to do that, which doesn't which doesn't mean that other people should be doing that.
02:22:43.340
But you didn't change you don't change the church from your own location.
02:22:47.280
Now, when you're doing straight Bible and then you're getting messages and emails or whatever about like, yo, you just you just kind of like tore this down scripturally.
02:22:56.940
Not tore it down. But like what you said scripturally is like, damn.
02:23:00.280
Well, that's the goal with straight Bible, right?
02:23:02.620
Is you just go Bible verse by Bible verse by Bible verse to where when people are arguing and disagreeing with you in the comments, you're like, yo, you're disagreeing with the Bible because I didn't go on some tangent about something.
02:23:13.140
I'm just saying maybe this maybe this is the tool like the tools presented to us now.
02:23:16.900
Like, it's a little bit different, like Leonard Ravenhill and all these other guys, like they didn't necessarily have this tool.
02:23:21.920
This is a tool that's very and this is a this is still low level stuff.
02:23:37.260
But I'm saying like you you double you triple you 10 X.
02:23:45.160
And then especially in the community, you go to a church, they're going to know that you do this.
02:23:49.060
They're going to know that you said this because it's going to be wide reaching and they're going to either have to push you away, which looks really bad for them, or they're going to have to consider what you're saying because what you're saying is right.
02:23:58.600
And maybe that's where the change to the church system comes in from like that guy that's in it.
02:24:04.140
But like now there's this weird thing like you're in it, but you kind of like you're like subverting the the the power dynamic on our head because there's a there's a progression.
02:24:14.180
You know, you're supposed to go here to here to here.
02:24:16.080
You become the youth bastard to the whatever, whatever.
02:24:18.780
This is like, no, I'm just a dude that's helping with maybe the audio.
02:24:21.880
And then I just happen to have more reach than anybody here.
02:24:25.180
That's the first thing Zach and I talked about, I think, was he was like, yo, so what do you do then?
02:24:30.040
Like, I want to reach people and I want to do my part in the kingdom and do, you know, fulfill my destiny that God made me for.
02:24:35.920
Or in you were like, how do I even do that outside the 501 C3?
02:24:41.840
And then I think you said something to the extent of like, oh, you're just like doing it.
02:24:44.880
And then God just like provided you a platform.
02:24:48.880
Well, see, so I mean, a lot of my conversation with you, like it didn't stem from like not knowing what I should do.
02:24:53.980
But my thing is whenever I see somebody who is like, dude, instantly I was like, he gets it.
02:25:00.520
And anytime I meet somebody like that, I want to know what they're doing and how I can also take that and add it to what I'm doing to better myself.
02:25:09.580
And so like, I'm out here trying to do the thing too, in a different way.
02:25:13.580
But my big thing is like where I'm really struggling right now is like turning this big ship.
02:25:19.840
It's easy to turn a little ship, but it takes a whole lot longer to turn a big ship.
02:25:23.460
And this thing's been going since the 80s and it was a country club for a long time.
02:25:31.300
Like the climate in my church is shifting from like country club all those years ago to like a bunch of people earnestly seeking God.
02:25:39.120
And so, but, but I'm looking at this and I'm like, but is there a better way still?
02:25:42.960
So now I'm preaching, trying to say like, Hey, look, I'm glad you're here on Sunday morning.
02:25:46.620
And I don't want you to not be because like, you want this thing and I'm here and we're all here and we're doing it.
02:25:52.120
But at the same time, it's vastly more important that you, through the rest of the week, have a community of believers that you can lean on and grow together with.
02:26:00.080
Cause you're not going to get that from me on an hour on Sunday.
02:26:02.920
And that's like, that's the realization of like the full it's holistic.
02:26:09.040
It's like, like I was thinking about like, nobody wants to put in the reps.
02:26:13.520
Everybody wants to just like be in good shape tomorrow, but they don't want to go to the gym.
02:26:18.860
And it's like small group, that community, that's reps.
02:26:27.840
We all want that on Sunday morning, but you're not going to get fed like that.
02:26:36.720
And it's like, that's the community and it takes both.
02:26:40.400
And I think people are realizing that, but it's not shifting hard.
02:26:46.360
And that's the part where it really bogs me down, you know?
02:26:49.240
Well, because I know offense, Zach, but like, you got to be in the gym every day.
02:26:54.040
If you're cutting hair, you're not preaching the gospel to people.
02:26:56.520
And that you got, again, on the contrary, my friend, I do more preaching from behind the
02:27:04.660
I probably do more for the kingdom at, at my secular job than I did in the two years
02:27:19.620
Like, how do you, how do you talk to even more people though?
02:27:23.140
How do you, how do you make a living for yourself doing that?
02:27:26.620
That's, this is the tricky part because you do need money to survive.
02:27:29.480
And then if this is your job, if you're moving, I'm fine.
02:27:39.720
Like there are guys that don't have that and they do have to ask that question.
02:27:46.560
Like, what are you going to do when you've banked your whole life?
02:27:49.320
Like, we've got all these guys coming up through, as Matt says, cemetery school, which
02:27:53.440
And they're being told like, this is going to be your career.
02:27:56.340
And it's like, yeah, but like, if the church keeps declining at the rate that it is given
02:28:01.700
the blip up from like a Trump presidency and the death of Charlie Kirk, which has affected
02:28:09.240
the church, but still the question remains, who's going to disciple those people?
02:28:13.100
Or is this just going to be a quick fad that's over?
02:28:16.560
Um, but like, we got all these guys, it's like, your life is going to be based on you
02:28:23.900
And it's like, maybe we should stop telling people that maybe we should start like pushing
02:28:31.600
Maybe we should start saying like, Hey, like, or at least asking the question, would you still
02:28:36.240
pastor people if you weren't getting paid to do it?
02:28:38.500
Because I bet there's a whole lot of guys today that would say no.
02:28:41.720
And I think, I mean, historically there's been such things as like a parsonage, right?
02:28:46.780
He had a home maybe on the church property and it wasn't a mansion, right?
02:28:51.920
It wasn't, he didn't have a runway for his airplanes and stuff, but he had a humble little
02:28:58.000
And he had enough money to kind of like do his thing, but he wasn't a wealthy man.
02:29:04.800
But I think, yeah, the weird thing about, uh, to go through the cemetery school system
02:29:08.800
and become like a pastor today is just like, you're in high school.
02:29:12.640
Everybody starts asking you, Hey, what are you going to do when you grow up?
02:29:14.920
And some kids are like, man, I'm going to college.
02:29:17.080
Some kids are like, I'm going to go into a trade.
02:29:19.960
Other kids are like, I'm going in the military.
02:29:22.200
And then this, under that kind of pattern, under that kind of model, under that kind of
02:29:27.600
mindset, some kids are like, well, I'll be a pastor.
02:29:31.940
It's not necessarily like this great calling of their life or like this great, meaningful
02:29:38.900
And some people pick that as a career within the American system.
02:29:42.260
Um, and that's why I like the, um, American superstructure that kind of like imposes itself
02:29:49.360
Like we've just, we somehow got to get out from under that and just get like a straight
02:29:52.940
biblical, uh, eternal model and an eternal mindset.
02:29:59.320
Like, I think this is what you're saying is saying like, yeah, I'm going to be a preacher
02:30:02.200
and whatever money I make for it or whatever, I'm just going to trust God.
02:30:08.480
Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.
02:30:10.620
And then all that clothing and all that food and all that shelter and all the basic necessities
02:30:17.320
Like first you do the thing, worry about the money later.
02:30:22.980
Even if that's by his people taking care of you.
02:30:25.240
But it's sort of like, I've heard you guys say this, like, you know, you just trust the
02:30:31.100
Like do what's, and I'm not saying like, you're going to be wealthy.
02:30:33.940
I'm saying God will take care of you and you will, you're not going to die.
02:30:37.420
Like, and well, and maybe you will, you know, maybe you're going to be martyred.
02:30:44.040
Would you still preach if you can't live the American dream doing it?
02:30:47.640
And if the answer is no, then don't sign up for it.
02:30:51.020
And if BlackRock keeps buying all of the housing, none of us are going to be living the American
02:31:01.440
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02:31:30.500
And maybe I got a problem with that because it's like, I just feel like they're saying
02:31:34.940
like you should be not wealthy is ridiculous to me.
02:31:50.780
My dad, my dad would get hit with like something terrible every like 10 years.
02:31:57.440
And then like, like my dad owned like 11 rental properties in my hometown and he was doing
02:32:02.580
And then all of a sudden they raised taxes and he gets hit with like 70 grand out of nowhere
02:32:11.740
All of a sudden he gets a triple bypass surgery because he has heart problems and he can't
02:32:17.360
take, he can't, he has to pay it all out of pocket because he doesn't have insurance.
02:32:24.580
Like three, four years later, our house and our business burn at the exact same time.
02:32:29.620
And he looks at me one day and he says, Zach, like, why won't God just let me get a leg up?
02:32:36.000
Like every time I start to do well, he knocks me back down a few steps.
02:32:39.700
And I said, have you ever considered that God doesn't like who you would be if you had
02:32:46.840
That's another idea about what money is and how people hold onto it or how they're so eager
02:32:52.800
And it's like, no, like this, I say it all the time, say to my kids, it's a thing that
02:32:57.200
you can get, but you have to, it's a thing that you use to do more of what you want to
02:33:02.180
do, not something to like live lavishly or like be ridiculous.
02:33:06.020
Well, I think that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, not to trigger the chat, but they're like
02:33:14.460
And that they're like the wealthiest dudes on the planet, you could argue.
02:33:19.560
Well, not just, not just that, but like the wealthiest dudes on the planet.
02:33:22.680
If somebody came up to me with advice, with life advice, and you're poor, I'm gonna be
02:33:29.780
I'm not listening to you because you haven't even gotten off of, I know, I understand that,
02:33:37.240
Most people, no, it's not about loving money, but it's like, if this is a basic thing and
02:33:41.260
you can't figure this basic thing out and, you know, maybe some people say, well, you
02:33:45.100
know, I've been doing this or that, or I can't figure it out or don't make it a priority.
02:33:49.200
Most people can't figure it out and they still want to preach to you.
02:33:52.000
But top, I got to push back on what you just said, man.
02:33:55.200
Well, because like, but you do take advice from a poor man every day, every time you
02:34:01.100
open your Bible, because Jesus stepped down and made himself a servant.
02:34:11.040
But this is like, all right, so this is monetarily poor.
02:34:16.480
I'm just saying, if you can't figure out some basic stuff, good luck talking to somebody
02:34:25.020
You're saying like by worldly rules, like, like, I'm not going to see you as I see that.
02:34:30.000
And listen, I'm not even necessarily talking about myself.
02:34:32.180
Like I'll sit and I'll talk with people about that.
02:34:33.820
But I'm talking about like when I'm thinking about in general, the person just walking by
02:34:38.100
a fat person gives you health advice on what to eat.
02:34:46.540
You're going to give me advice on how to live when you can't figure out how to live yourself.
02:34:52.640
It just seemed like it was always fat people like reprimanding me and telling me how to
02:34:57.960
Somebody with a mask that's telling you how to stay safe.
02:35:03.120
So I, but I, so being wealthy, it's another tricky conversation, right?
02:35:06.920
Cause I'm like, I'm not saying chase all the things of the world, but I'm saying like,
02:35:10.420
Hey, you know, figure out how to do stuff in the world to clean your room before you
02:35:15.380
And I feel like that's a little bit of your room.
02:35:16.860
If you can figure that out, we can talk to people.
02:35:19.400
Well, and I think there is a element of God qualifying men in the natural realm before
02:35:23.600
you with natural authority, before you trust them with spirit realm, spiritual authority.
02:35:28.460
There's, I think there's an element of that, but I just, I don't know.
02:35:33.080
Like when Jesus sends out the disciples, the first time he sends them out, he sends them
02:35:38.500
He doesn't let them take anything, but like the clothes on their back.
02:35:43.620
The second time he sends them out, he sends them out with money, with a sword, with all
02:35:47.720
the stuff, because they learned how to do it without the stuff.
02:35:54.600
I don't disagree with what you just said, Matt.
02:35:56.200
Matt, I think it happens both ways, I guess is what I'm saying.
02:35:58.760
Well, I think it probably happens the first way when you're 17, 18.
02:36:01.680
You should be working shit jobs at McDonald's and then you should figure it out.
02:36:06.220
They were all working men that had proved themselves in the natural realm.
02:36:09.420
And now they can be trusted with some spiritual authority.
02:36:12.520
Where it's like, that's what you're talking about with the average pastor, bro.
02:36:18.600
So that's another weird thing is like, how do they relate to the people in their congregation?
02:36:23.040
If they haven't raised families, like that's a huge thing, bro.
02:36:26.400
He hasn't raised kids into adulthood yet, but you're still, you still have little kids.
02:36:31.100
Like there's still so many trials you're going to go through personally.
02:36:34.020
It just puts you in a weird spot to be preaching to, uh, to people that have been through that.
02:36:40.560
People trying to meet you that haven't been refined.
02:36:42.980
Once again, I don't disagree, but then you do have issues with like, you know, Paul, you know, saying like, not everyone should marry.
02:36:50.080
And like Paul himself being single, even though we might think like he might've been married at some point, Paul is giving marriage advice.
02:36:59.180
Like, and so there's some level of it where it's like, when I'm just speaking from the word of God, that's one thing.
02:37:04.000
When I'm speaking from personal experience and I don't have it.
02:37:08.560
So I think it's both idea that, you know, one guy with the mic is responsible for everything.
02:37:14.640
Is there a place for young men who are clearly called to God and can preach and have young families, a role in the church?
02:37:21.040
Nobody's saying, no, I'm just saying this is another one of the dangers where you got one guy in charge.
02:37:26.160
The other day, uh, I'm going to, we got to wrap it.
02:37:33.800
The hot dogs wore off and we, we were talking about, uh, stereotypes.
02:37:37.100
We were just talking about stereotypes and these are not necessarily good things most
02:37:42.960
of the time, but you use them to survive in a way, right?
02:37:46.620
Like in this earthly realm, like you kind of like, well, you'll prejudge a situation and
02:37:50.060
that'll keep you for the most part, not just safe, but like, it'll keep you kind of like
02:37:58.060
And I, and I know this gets into weird territory, but that's, this is part of the pattern recognition.
02:38:02.060
Can you get very good advice from a poor person?
02:38:11.280
Well, maybe not about money, but maybe about some other stuff.
02:38:15.560
But bridges to sleep under which cats are safe to eat.
02:38:20.600
If they talk to you about the mistakes they made that that that's what caused them.
02:38:25.900
Guys, I, when I was talking about the, this is nice, shut up, man.
02:38:30.240
When I was talking about the barbershop thing, it's not, I'm not trying to like knock you
02:38:35.720
I just, I wish I'd rather see somebody like you doing the thing all the time, um, rather
02:38:45.240
But you know, if you're cutting hair and you are doing that thing too, I didn't mean to
02:38:51.560
I mean, look, cause to your point, like my buddies that work for like Eli Lilly, they
02:38:57.620
I'm just in a position where at work I can do that.
02:39:00.540
Like if you work for a major corporation, you're talking about Jesus, you're probably
02:39:05.020
Like I'm in a position where I can preach from behind a chair all day and ain't nobody
02:39:12.300
But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter what job you lose.
02:39:16.160
That's the thing about the great commission is there's no bar for entry.
02:39:26.300
Like somebody like an Ed Mabry, I mean, Matt, you and Matt, I guess have this similar occupations
02:39:31.220
where you're kind of, you could do this podcast thing too.
02:39:34.940
That's rare in most, most occupations, but Ed Mabry is doing something that's not related
02:39:41.640
And I'm like, this guy should be doing this all day, every day.
02:39:46.180
And he would, but he has to do this other thing.
02:39:48.620
I'm like, he will, I mean, it looks like his is just going to take a little time to
02:39:56.340
Like, like, no, I took zero, zero offense to that.
02:40:01.300
You guys are apologizing to me after you raked me over the coals so hard.
02:40:09.200
I have like these glimmers of remembrance, but I think you were, you were cool on the story.
02:40:13.420
It was my shameless plug for my podcast that I wasn't even trying to plug.
02:40:18.980
No, because I already, he doesn't even do it anymore.
02:40:28.180
So like, not to keep you guys any longer, but I do have to say, if you are ever interested
02:40:32.380
to talk to an Indiana resident about some weird stuff around here, I would be totally interested
02:40:39.960
Some, some, but there's, there's dude, there's a lot of tunnel stuff around here.
02:40:45.240
And my buddy Mike has heard some, like he had some weird prophecy stuff spoken about
02:40:50.920
Indiana from, from Ireland, India, uh, Britain, like all these places know that there's like
02:40:58.720
spiritual stronghold stuff going on in Indiana.
02:41:00.880
And I don't know how they know this or why they're talking about it, but it just keeps
02:41:05.620
And then you guys brought it up and blew my mind.
02:41:08.680
So I am, I am intrigued to, to hear more about that in the future.
02:41:18.780
You're the second guest today, uh, today that we had that is in Indiana.
02:41:28.020
I don't know where the heck, uh, they're in Indiana.
02:41:33.200
Wesley, uh, he's, he's the guy that worked on the, uh, the Meadow project with Tony
02:41:44.300
Like, yeah, it's a really weird place, but I mean, and then we have our, our buddy,
02:41:48.540
uh, Colin who's out in Indiana, but yeah, the cave systems, uh, the weird spiritual stronghold
02:41:55.480
Do you, do you know the tunnel systems built under Indianapolis?
02:41:59.260
Well, so I wonder, is it built or is it, is it a remnant of, or not a remnant, but an
02:42:06.800
Cause I don't know that cave system does stretch out to the West and it ends somewhere around,
02:42:11.920
uh, what's the one that's to the left of Indiana.
02:42:14.080
If you're looking at the map, uh, Illinois, Illinois, it ends in Illinois.
02:42:18.600
Um, and then of course, you know, there's that whole thing with the garden of the gods.
02:42:24.320
I would love to, but I think it's a little bit too adventurous for, for the taste of my,
02:42:29.380
my co-hosts here, uh, the both of them, but I want to go to these cave systems and I want
02:42:34.000
to, I want to try to understand what's going on there.
02:42:37.300
You want to do a documentary we will never release?
02:42:41.260
We need a documentarian who's like, yeah, I just do it for the love of the game play.
02:42:45.740
Uh, but yeah, I, we'd love to have to have you back to talk about that.
02:42:50.180
I mean, I can't, I can't talk too much to cave stuff, but I I've got some, there's some
02:42:56.740
Uh, just little things, but I don't know how it all connects, but yeah, I mean, may not
02:43:00.700
make for a great show, but it could be interesting if you guys ever want to talk again.
02:43:05.780
Well, this is a, it's been a great episode, man.
02:43:08.760
It just so happens that a lot of the things that are kind of on our mind end up just rolling
02:43:15.440
And, uh, I think this is an important conversation that, you know, I hope that I personally hope
02:43:20.720
you continue your podcast because whether it's at the church or it's at the barbershop or
02:43:25.320
it's, or it's, you know, on this podcast, um, that that's what the, the job is.
02:43:30.860
The job is, is making disciples of men and it's just another platform from which to do
02:43:35.000
And you never know what happens with, uh, with salty saints.
02:43:38.380
You might just be one episode where the thing catches fire and all of a sudden you realize
02:43:42.180
you're, you're talking to huge people and you're winning over souls for the kingdom of
02:43:47.040
And I mean, that's, I'll be quick, but like some of what we ran into, we were actually,
02:43:52.260
we were on, uh, life audio, which is a, they're, they're owned by, uh, Salem media, which is
02:44:03.980
Um, and like, we just ran into some things where like, they wanted us to treat it like
02:44:15.040
This isn't like, we're not trying to make a business out of this right now.
02:44:18.140
And so we just never really pursued it in that way, but I, I have been interested to
02:44:26.640
It was getting a little stale on the direction we were going, but yeah, I appreciate it.
02:44:31.720
Well, even in this show, uh, I can guarantee you there's somebody out there who this episode
02:44:36.360
spoke directly to, and this is going to help them in their journey, um, and their relationship
02:44:44.780
It's just a matter of, uh, of, uh, you know, not to put it in such crude terms, but volume
02:44:51.720
You're putting out information that helps people develop a closer relationship with God, put
02:44:56.960
out more of it, keep doing more of it, whether it's at the barbershop, whether it's at your
02:45:03.100
I mean, you know, the good news is it's already set up a salty saints is already there.
02:45:06.540
You know, you've already got this thing established.
02:45:09.800
And who knows, even if every episode only touched one person, isn't it worth it?
02:45:13.640
Well, it is, it is a business, you know, yeah, it's just the nature of, if you want
02:45:20.940
it to be something, then you're going to have to take it serious.
02:45:26.020
I think, and some of that here, Papa Steve says, ask God.
02:45:37.700
And man, like being a pastor alone, a lot of bandwidth, working a full-time job, a lot
02:45:43.320
of bandwidth, you know, like, and so it's just like, it's hard to balance all of it, but,
02:45:47.580
um, yeah, I, I'll, uh, I'll consider that heavily.
02:45:55.220
Well, I think that's a good place to, uh, to land it.
02:46:01.260
I appreciate you guys having me and, uh, talking about this, man.
02:46:08.220
Maybe Matt will sit in it, but until next time, guys, don't forget to obey, submit and
02:46:14.520
They bred with daughters of men, and they will do it again.
02:46:23.560
The end is written in the book, in the pages they foresaw.