Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 512 ｜ Responding to Steven Furtick’s Problematic Post

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Tuesday. I hope everyone is having a wonderful day and

00:00:15.880 a wonderful week. All right. Today we are talking about Stephen Furtick. So there were

00:00:21.120 a ton of news stories that I wanted to get to today. And yet I saw this post on Facebook

00:00:28.160 that I will specify in a little bit. And I was like, oh, I think I need to respond to that.

00:00:34.260 And there were even other stories under the umbrella of Christian news that I wanted to get

00:00:40.900 to today. And I'm not even going to be able to get to that because as I was preparing for this,

00:00:46.420 I realized, okay, this is going to take me the entire time. All right. I want to respond to the

00:00:56.020 offending Facebook post that he put out and that some people were talking about on Twitter. But

00:01:00.380 first, I want to set us up. I want to give us some context, not just about who Stephen Furtick is,

00:01:07.100 but also why, even before I read what the post is, why I take issue with this and really Stephen

00:01:17.000 Furtick in general. So Furtick is a very popular author and pastor in Charlotte, North Carolina.

00:01:23.680 He leads a church called Elevation Church. Their worship team produces music that is sung in

00:01:28.300 churches across the country. If you go to a contemporary non-denominational or Baptist church,

00:01:32.880 you have probably sung an Elevation worship song. They're very catchy. They're kind of like

00:01:38.780 hill songs. Furtick is very dynamic. If you have seen a video of him, he's very watchable. It's hard

00:01:48.760 to not watch the whole clip. And that's like social media gold. And so often his videos go viral or

00:01:56.060 semi-viral on social media. And it's easy to see why. He is very charismatic. And I mean that like in

00:02:02.040 the, not in the biblical sense of the word, like speaking in tongues. I mean that he is an excellent

00:02:08.200 communicator. It's again, very easy to see why he is so beloved by so many thousands of people.

00:02:15.640 When I first started taking Christianity seriously, I was in high school, like junior,

00:02:22.180 senior in high school. And I was reading and consuming everything I could, really without

00:02:28.400 much thought to whether or not it was sound doctrine that I was taking in. I just didn't

00:02:32.900 really have that kind of discernment. And I was eager. Like I was just very eager to learn more

00:02:37.860 about Christian theology. I was raised in a Christian home. I went to church every Sunday. I went to a

00:02:43.040 Christian school, kindergarten through 12th grade. I'm very thankful for both of those things and

00:02:46.920 both of my parents. But in particular, my mom is a very diligent studier of scripture. And so

00:02:54.680 the reason I didn't really, I don't know, make my faith my own until the end of high school wasn't

00:03:00.780 because of a lack of good parenting on my parents' part. It was, I don't know, it just became kind of

00:03:08.200 routine for me as it can when you are raised in a church in particular, maybe kind of like a formal

00:03:13.900 Baptist church. It really wasn't until I had a particular Bible teacher when I was a junior in

00:03:19.980 high school that I realized that there was this rich intellectual side of Christianity that I hadn't

00:03:24.700 really explored before. So I started reading Mere Christianity and C.S. Lewis and all kinds of,

00:03:30.980 all kinds of different authors. But I was also, you know, C.S. Lewis is great,

00:03:34.980 even though I disagree with him on some things theologically. I was also reading like Donald

00:03:39.720 Miller and The Shack and then also David Platt and Matt Chandler and Stephen Furtick and Francis

00:03:45.140 Chan and John Piper and Elizabeth Elliot. And I probably had some Joel Osteen sprinkled in there.

00:03:49.400 I mean, I was truly all over the place just because I wanted to know more. And in my mind then,

00:03:55.680 which is kind of crazy to think about now, I didn't see a whole lot of fundamental differences

00:03:59.360 between those people. So that just kind of tells you, and I want to make a note on this,

00:04:04.080 that kind of tells you about discernment and wisdom, how it grows over time and with the grace

00:04:09.440 and the power of the Holy Spirit. So before you, and I'm just speaking general, you, I'm not speaking

00:04:14.720 to any one person out there, but before you, or I should say we, judge someone for following a

00:04:21.220 certain teacher that we in, you know, our Christian discernment recognize as unbiblical, we have to

00:04:28.460 remember that we don't know where people are in their faith. Like it doesn't mean just because

00:04:32.660 someone is listening to a teacher that you don't agree with, or that you're actually discerning as

00:04:36.560 a false teacher. It might not mean that they're not really a believer. Maybe they need your

00:04:41.480 encouragement. Maybe they need you to lend them your discernment, but don't give up hope or offer

00:04:47.980 up condemnation to the new yet eager believer who maybe doesn't yet have the wisdom that you do.

00:04:54.300 Like I think back to myself in high school. And if I didn't have people take me under their wing,

00:04:58.520 if I didn't have people spur me on in my faith, I started going to a different church than my

00:05:03.300 parents when I was in high school. If I didn't have people who were encouraging me and building

00:05:08.620 me up and they were only, you know, lashing out at me or telling me, why are you reading The Shack

00:05:14.140 or why are you reading Donald Miller? You're so undiscerning. You're not really a Christian. 0.75

00:05:19.600 Like I could have, I could have, I don't know because, you know, it's God's providence that I'm

00:05:25.340 a Christian. It's not any effort on my own part, but I could certainly see that hardening me or

00:05:31.620 making me bitter or turning me off in some way. And so I think we have to be very patient. We have

00:05:37.840 to be very gentle. We have to be very gracious, not knowing exactly where people are or where or what

00:05:44.260 their background is. That doesn't mean we shouldn't say anything. That doesn't mean we shouldn't speak

00:05:48.180 the truth in love because we should, but we have to be careful not to offer up condemnation or write

00:05:53.280 people off just because they might be listening to a speaker that you now know when your mature

00:05:57.920 Christian faith is not someone that we should be learning from. I consumed all kinds of different

00:06:03.580 Christian and pseudo-Christian material in high school and college. And I thank God that even though 0.99

00:06:10.940 I've disagreed with these people on their social justice perspectives in the last few years,

00:06:16.900 that Nat Chandler, Tim Keller, and Reformed theology ended up being the direction I went.

00:06:23.280 And then, of course, that led to me knowing who people like R.C. Sproul and John MacArthur are

00:06:28.260 and understanding the intricacies of Reformed theology and Calvinism, not even realizing I was

00:06:32.680 Reformed or Calvinist before, or yeah, not even realizing that I was those things, even though

00:06:38.320 I believed those things until I actually had a name for them just a few years ago. Now, that's not to say

00:06:44.780 that I don't listen to people who are not in my particular Reformed camp because I do,

00:06:50.760 but I am thankful that I did not go the direction of Furtick and Osteen and the Prosperity Gospel

00:06:57.940 or even Donald Miller or someone like Jen Hatmaker or anyone over there. Now, why do I say that? Why do

00:07:04.720 I say that in particular about Stephen Furtick? I know there are a lot of you out there who really

00:07:10.080 love him. And there are a lot of things that he says that I really agree with, that I really agree

00:07:14.940 with, too. I'm sure, you know, he's probably conservative politically, ideologically, and all

00:07:18.760 that. Like, I haven't seen him say anything woke, and so that's not my contention at all. I've done

00:07:24.100 an episode on the Prosperity Gospel. We will link that in the description. It was specifically about

00:07:29.200 Joel Osteen. And, you know, some people, if you follow me on Instagram, you saw a few weeks ago that

00:07:35.660 people were taken aback that I said, you know, Joel Osteen is a prosperity preacher. They were very

00:07:41.860 upset by that. And that might be surprising to you. Most people know that, but a lot of people

00:07:46.580 don't. He's got tens of thousands of followers and thousands of congregants. So you can go listen to

00:07:54.500 that episode if you haven't already. Again, we'll link it. And we don't have time to do a deep dive

00:08:01.380 into Furtick. And like always, and I get pushed back kind of on the other side for not, you know,

00:08:08.280 going in for the kill and calling everyone false teachers. But I want to be charitable. I want to

00:08:15.460 give the benefit of the doubt and simply say what is, in my capacity right now, observably true.

00:08:23.500 So again, I want to be as charitable as possible. I'm not trying to, like, I just don't have the

00:08:29.060 authority or even the capacity to discover everything that might make Furtick a false

00:08:34.760 teacher, even though I know there are a lot of you out there that are saying, what are you talking

00:08:37.940 about? You know that. Well, I want to give the only thing that I can honestly give right now.

00:08:44.920 And again, that is what I see to be observably true, that Furtick is not an expositor of the word.

00:08:51.800 And that in itself for a pastor is really troublesome. And I'll explain what I mean by that in just a second.

00:08:58.820 Again, the reason I'm going to mostly leave my criticism there about the absence of expository

00:09:09.540 preaching is not because there isn't more to say, but because in order to fairly level deeper,

00:09:14.620 more serious criticisms, I have to have all the necessary information before me with context.

00:09:20.320 And I just don't have that. So I don't think that it would be right. What do I mean when I say

00:09:27.260 that Furtick does not exposit the word, the Bible? Expositional preaching is when a Bible teacher

00:09:34.100 exposes what the Bible says, explaining the original intent and meaning of the text.

00:09:40.940 So an example would be a pastor, say, doing a sermon series on Romans, going through a few verses

00:09:48.000 every week, digging into what the Bible says and what the passage means. Not simply what it means to

00:09:54.020 us, but what it actually means in light of the context of the chapter and the context of the

00:09:59.460 book and the context of all of Scripture, the context of the gospel and the context of history

00:10:04.480 that doesn't, you know, talking about all those different contexts doesn't have to take an hour.

00:10:09.400 There are quick ways to do that, and we'll talk about that. But context is important. Looking at the

00:10:15.880 original meaning intent of the text is important if you're looking at expository preaching.

00:10:20.460 There may be various ways to apply Scripture to our lives, but there is one true meaning,

00:10:27.360 which means faithful Christians and Christian teachers can disagree on some passages, by the

00:10:32.580 way. That's how you get multiple understandings of, for example, like the end times. But expository

00:10:38.420 preachers seek to find the meaning using the context that I just listed. I'm trying as diligently,

00:10:44.860 albeit fallibly, to understand, interpret, teach, and then apply the text according to that meaning.

00:10:52.300 So expository teaching preaches from the text rather than into the text. So it's drawing meaning

00:10:58.620 out of the text, not placing our subjective meaning into or onto the text. This is the difference between

00:11:08.300 exegetical and eisegetical preaching. Now, some of you know what all of these terms mean,

00:11:14.200 and for some of you, this is the first time that you're learning them, which is totally fine.

00:11:19.840 To exegete means to lead out of. So that prefix, ex, means out, like exit or exile, extract.

00:11:28.440 Eisegesis means to lead into. The Greek prefix, eis, means in. So expository preaching is exegetical.

00:11:38.920 It is starting with the text, then drawing the meaning out of it, using all the context that

00:11:45.540 we talked about. Eisegetical preaching is putting subjective personal meanings into the text. So

00:11:51.760 expository exegetical preaching seeks to view and present scripture as the authority rather than as

00:11:59.240 an assistant to whoever is preaching. The posture of the expository preacher is humility, recognizing

00:12:05.660 that there is no greater wisdom or comfort or hope or inspiration to be preached than the word of God

00:12:11.640 itself. That doesn't mean that he can't add biblical commentary. But again, he is starting with the

00:12:17.140 inerrancy and the authority of scripture. He's not starting with his own subjective analysis.

00:12:22.600 There's a difference there. Exegetical preaching is known to, is typically known to have these four

00:12:29.180 steps. So number one, observation. So what does the passage say? Number two, interpretation. What

00:12:37.480 does the passage mean? And that's, you know, where the context comes in. Number three, correlation. How

00:12:43.680 does the passage relate to the rest of the Bible? Again, I would say that has to do with context and

00:12:49.900 just our understanding of the general narrative of scripture and what the gospel itself says.

00:12:54.340 And then number four, application. How should this passage affect my life? So is there a sin

00:13:00.500 that you need to stop doing? Is there a command that you need to be following? Is there something

00:13:07.000 that you need to go do according to this text? Or is there a lie that you have believing that this

00:13:12.060 particular passage is refuting with truth? Is there something that you need to change internally,

00:13:19.800 externally, according to this passage? Is there an idea that you believed about God that

00:13:24.280 is clearly refuted in the Bible? And if that's confusing, if it seems like it contradicts itself,

00:13:29.820 I wouldn't say go into your own mind or go outside of the Bible to try to reconcile what seems like

00:13:37.140 two contradictory passages, but go into scripture. One example is Ephesians 2, 8 through 10.

00:13:45.120 By grace, you have been saved through faith. I mean, over and over again, just in those two verses,

00:13:50.620 we see that salvation is a gift, that it's not something we can earn. And then we look in the

00:13:55.060 book of James and we see faith without works is dead. How do we reconcile those two things? We go

00:13:59.940 into scripture. I've actually done a whole podcast on those two things that seem to be contradicting

00:14:04.860 each other and actually are reconciled in Ephesians 2, 8 through 10 itself. When we read that that faith

00:14:11.780 that is required for salvation is given to us by grace, and it is worked out then in works. And

00:14:21.760 actually in Ephesians 2, 10, it says that God has prepared the good works that we have been doing

00:14:28.720 beforehand. So the works that we are called to throughout scripture, but specifically in the book

00:14:34.740 of James, it's an outworking of that faith. It is not salvation itself. So again, we go into

00:14:41.600 scripture to reconcile what seems like a complicated idea or two seemingly contradictory verses. We don't

00:14:49.400 just discard one in favor of the other. We try not to rely on our own biases or what we want scripture

00:14:57.800 to say. We go deeper into scripture to try to understand how we can reconcile what may seem like

00:15:04.240 to opposing views in scripture. That was just a quick detour. Stephen Lawson, in my opinion,

00:15:11.380 is one of the greatest expository teachers of all time. He has a podcast called The Expositor Podcast.

00:15:17.000 He has a few podcasts, and I've heard him preach in person before. He's great. Highly recommend that.

00:15:23.100 So in expository preaching, the subject of the sermon is the text. This is in contrast to topical

00:15:30.840 teaching and textual teaching. A topical teaching is when you say, okay, today we're going to talk

00:15:37.240 about gossip. And you go find all the verses that have to do with gossip, and you preach on that. Or

00:15:43.020 textual preaching or teaching, which is when you preach from the text, but the text is more of

00:15:48.140 kind of like a starting point for a theme. So this could mean that a pastor says, we're talking about

00:15:54.640 2 Timothy 1.5 today, which is the verse about, you know, Timothy and his grandmother Lois, his mother

00:16:01.220 Eunice raising him in the faith. And they use that to discuss the importance of grandparents, even

00:16:06.000 though that's secondary to the point that the text is actually making. Now, let me say with that,

00:16:12.340 not all topical and textual preaching is unfaithful or bad. Like we, I mean, I'm not preaching, but we

00:16:17.840 talk about topical things and we look for the verses that fit into that topic. That in and of itself

00:16:23.020 is not wrong. It is totally possible to make a completely valid and biblical point about the

00:16:29.080 importance of grandmothers using 2 Timothy 1.5. It is possible to do a sermon series on the end

00:16:35.840 times, for example, and to go to various parts of scripture to do that series. That is not in itself

00:16:41.400 unbiblical or a mishandling of the text. One of the best and most comforting sermon series that I've

00:16:46.620 listened to recently was a sermon series by John MacArthur on the role of parents to protect and raise

00:16:51.860 their kids in the Lord. I mean, he talked about the history of child sacrifice, both literally and

00:16:58.700 figuratively, you know, sacrificing your child's mind to corruption in society and all of that. And

00:17:05.860 he drew from a variety of passages, but he never traveled outside of what the text actually means.

00:17:12.960 So topical and textual sermons can be biblical and edifying. As long as, as long as, and this is

00:17:23.240 whether it's expository, topical, or textual, as long as it is exegetical and not eisegetical, meaning

00:17:32.400 the teacher will seek to understand and convey the original meaning and context of the passage rather

00:17:38.660 than extract the verse from its context and give you a meaning that, you know, they want it to have

00:17:44.320 according to the topic or theme that they want to preach on that day. So what you'll see in

00:17:49.160 eisegetical preaching is a lot of, this is what it means to you, or this is what it means to me, rather

00:17:55.400 than simply, this is what it means, period. And as we've already established, biblical texts can and do have

00:18:00.960 a variety of applications, but only one true meaning. And so a faithful handler of God's word

00:18:07.820 will seek to understand what the text actually originally means and then offer up possible

00:18:13.040 applications. So someone who is not rightly handling scripture, you'll notice, will constantly insert

00:18:21.040 themselves or you in the text where you do not exist. So they will make you David in the story of

00:18:28.500 David and Goliath. They will make you Daniel in the story of Daniel in the lion's den. They will make

00:18:33.100 you the hero of the story and often depict God as your cheerleader, as your motivator, as your

00:18:38.760 accomplice, rather than the actual hero of every single story in scripture, which is God himself.

00:18:47.040 Every example of courage and faithfulness in the Bible is a testimony, not to human power or

00:18:52.180 potential, but to God's power and providence. So thank God we are not the heroes of scripture.

00:18:58.120 We are not the stars of the show. How much pressure would that be? We are not center stage. Our life

00:19:04.340 is not the main narrative. Our personality traits, our strengths and weaknesses, our lived experiences,

00:19:09.900 our feelings, while they all may be important, they all have a place, they do not determine what

00:19:14.980 the text says or how the story of eternity goes. God's great plan of redemption through Christ is the

00:19:23.100 thread that runs from Genesis through Revelation and has run read throughout all of history and to

00:19:29.540 today. So we are not the point. Christ is the point. It is his story, his glory, his gospel that is the

00:19:37.180 cornerstone, not us. That is the perspective of a faithful Christian teacher preaching the word.

00:19:44.580 And with that in view, you are going to find the faithful Christian teacher diving into all kinds

00:19:52.000 of very uncomfortable yet biblical topics that don't always make you walk away feeling cozy inside.

00:19:59.500 They will talk about hell. They'll talk about sin. They won't shy away from the parts of the Bible that

00:20:05.420 seem to depict God as someone who makes us a little nervous. And they'll extrapolate the hope of Christ

00:20:16.180 and his gospel and his glory in everything, because that's what every bit of scripture is pointing to.

00:20:23.220 2 Timothy 2.15 says,

00:20:25.320 Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed,

00:20:31.980 rightly handling the word of truth. So this is serious stuff, which is why I bring it up in

00:20:40.700 relation to Stephen Furtick. Without even dissecting every single Furtick sermon, you can easily observe

00:20:46.360 that Furtick is mostly, I would say, just because I haven't listened to every single sermon,

00:20:52.300 but I would say mostly from what I've seen, an eisegetical preacher. That does not mean that he

00:20:57.700 doesn't say good biblical things sometimes, or that you can't ever have drawn encouragement from him.

00:21:04.120 I've read and listened to things that he has said and have found myself nodding along, feeling inspired.

00:21:10.500 I mean, he has got a skill for communicating things in a way that hits home and is memorable. God gave him

00:21:15.500 that skill. That's great. But always trying to find the phraseology that sounds good or catchy

00:21:25.420 can come at a cost. It can come at the cost of truth, especially when your MO is to insert you

00:21:32.120 into the text where you simply do not belong. So Furtick sometimes infuses meaning into the text

00:21:39.940 that is not there, which leads him to sometimes draw conclusions and make statements that sound good

00:21:45.400 and maybe even sound godly, but are not biblical. So let me read you about the post.

00:21:52.840 They got quite a few people upset. And I think understandably, he posted this on Facebook

00:21:59.020 day before yesterday. He said, following Jesus doesn't change you into something else. It reveals

00:22:05.840 who you've been all along. What would it be like to see the you that God sees? Dot, dot, dot. So I'm

00:22:14.640 going to give you my thoughts on that in just one second. Okay, so we just read the post. Let me try to

00:22:21.640 give you, let me try to give Stephen the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he means to say that Jesus

00:22:29.780 changes you into who you were meant to be, who he desires you to be all along. That's really charitable

00:22:38.520 of me. And I believe that this quote, someone messaged me and said this is, it's a part of a

00:22:43.680 sermon. And I'm sure the video is somewhere. So I won't say that Stephen Furtick actually believes

00:22:48.800 what he said here. I will say that it was an error. I will give him the benefit of the doubt

00:22:52.960 and just say that he mistakenly or someone on his team mistakenly typed this out. They didn't think

00:22:58.140 through it. It sounded good. He meant to word it differently and did it. Okay, that's my charitable

00:23:02.000 interpretation of what happened here, even as I believe him to be an eisegetical preacher who,

00:23:07.960 if he decided to handle the word by preaching exegetically, I think that, I mean, it would be

00:23:15.640 amazing. He's already got the skill set there. Unfortunately, he chooses, I think, to be more

00:23:20.480 of a motivational speaker than a handler of the word of God. Now, this post, he did delete it after

00:23:28.640 some people questioned it. It started circulating on Twitter. People were sending it to me on Instagram.

00:23:33.800 So that's good that he deleted it, but only after 21,000 people liked it, which tells me that even if

00:23:40.040 Frederick sees the error in what he said, and I hope that he does, although I've yet to see an explicit

00:23:46.100 correction, many people don't see the error in what he says, which is why this is worth dissecting

00:23:52.100 publicly and correcting with scripture. So let's look at this again. Following Jesus doesn't change you

00:23:58.520 into something else. It reveals who you've been all along. What would it be like to see the you that

00:24:04.560 God sees? This is very easy, very easy to refute using scripture. Romans 6, 5. We know that our old self

00:24:14.240 was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we would no longer

00:24:20.520 be enslaved to sin for one who has died has been set free from sin. 2 Corinthians 5, 17. Therefore, if anyone

00:24:29.600 is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. You were dead,

00:24:38.280 Ephesians 2, 1 says, but God made us alive together with Christ. As verse 4 says, Ephesians 4, 17 through

00:24:46.420 24. Now this I say and testify in the Lord that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do in the 1.00

00:24:52.880 futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of

00:24:58.640 the ignorance that is in them due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given

00:25:03.220 themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way

00:25:08.740 you learned Christ. Assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is

00:25:14.380 in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through 0.66

00:25:19.760 deceitful desires and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds and to put on the new self, created after

00:25:26.860 the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. Ephesians 5, 8 through 9. For at one time

00:25:33.820 you were darkness, not just in darkness, you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.

00:25:41.340 Walk as children of light, for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true.

00:25:48.480 So we're not just improved versions of ourselves. We're not just the best versions of ourselves.

00:25:55.960 We're not who we always were. We are new. We are new creations. We are new creatures. We are not who

00:26:02.900 we were. Yes, we are in the same physical body. We have the same physical bloodline, a lot of the

00:26:08.640 same personality traits, but we are spiritually new people. We have a new father, a new spiritual family,

00:26:14.560 a new place of belonging, a new purpose, a new hope, a new destination, a new identity altogether.

00:26:19.960 That is so important because God is not a self-help genie trying to draw out the best,

00:26:25.480 most lovable parts of you so that you can feel good about yourself and become successful. That's

00:26:29.340 not who God is. God is asking you, sinner, to come and die, to take up your cross, to crucify yourself 0.99

00:26:36.000 and follow him. If you are in Christ, you are fundamentally changed from who you once were.

00:26:42.740 That doesn't mean you don't wrestle with your flesh, your old identity, your selfishness,

00:26:47.040 your sinfulness. It doesn't mean you won't be tempted and even give in to temptation. It means

00:26:52.720 that if you are a Christian, who you once were was a child of the devil and who you are now is a 0.98

00:27:00.660 child of God. Why? Not because of who you are or anything you've done, but because God in his

00:27:07.220 abundant grace, according to his will and his will alone rescued you. Because he sent his only son,

00:27:13.440 a sinless savior, to die a gruesome death on the cross on your behalf so that your sin could be

00:27:19.500 paid for forever so that you, a sinner, could be reconciled to a perfect and holy God. You didn't

00:27:27.580 have righteousness before Christ. Christ gave you his righteousness when he saved you. Second

00:27:33.120 Corinthians 5.21. For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin so that in him we might become

00:27:42.280 the righteousness of God. We became the righteousness of God through Christ. We were unrighteous before.

00:27:49.300 We are different people with different destinations, a different destination, a different purpose,

00:27:54.980 a different identity. Now we are, because of Christ, new. Now, I think that Stephen Furtick

00:28:03.580 knows this, but what he needs to publicly and clearly own up to, to eradicate any confusion

00:28:10.040 among the people who follow him, the millions of people who follow him, is that what he said

00:28:15.020 is not true. It is anti-biblical. It is anti-gospel. It is a very significant untruth

00:28:21.360 because it gets not just some peripheral theological issue wrong. But again, the gospel

00:28:29.040 itself, the gospel is that Jesus makes you not better, not the more authentic version of you,

00:28:36.080 but new. Jesus makes us new. He gives us a new heart, a new hope. And if you're a believer in Christ,

00:28:42.120 you have, by grace through faith, believe that Jesus died to reconcile you to God and was raised again

00:28:48.220 on the third day, trusting in Jesus as the Lord and master of your life. And you're thinking,

00:28:53.700 but I don't feel new. I don't have the emotions associated with having a new identity. I still

00:28:59.880 struggle. Maybe you're thinking with a depression or anxiety or the desire to sin. Maybe you still feel

00:29:06.600 like your old self, but you do believe and you want to follow Christ. Maybe that's you. Let me comfort

00:29:13.220 you. Let me reassure you by saying that nowhere in the gospel are we asked how we feel about trusting

00:29:19.480 Christ. Nowhere are our feelings the signifier of whether or not we are saved. Nowhere do we see

00:29:27.300 that in scripture. We still live in the physical flesh, which means we are going to struggle with

00:29:31.740 all of the burdens of this life and all of the burdens that our own sin places on us. But the

00:29:37.880 Christian life is determined not by, or it's distinguished by, it's defined by, not perfection

00:29:45.100 or by constant happiness, but by a grace driven determination to obey Christ and his word as

00:29:51.260 humbly and as joyfully as we can. Christians are called to both love and joy, but I don't think 1.00

00:29:57.700 either of those things are mutually exclusive with sadness and temptation to sin. Love can be emotional

00:30:03.120 and that's great, but ultimately it is a choice to put the God defined interest of others before

00:30:08.200 yourself. And joy is a commitment to thanking God for every heavenly and earthly blessing that we've

00:30:13.880 been given, rejoicing in God's sovereignty and goodness, even when we're sad. It is the hope of

00:30:18.700 heaven, not simply the fleeting pleasure of earth. Philippians 1 6 says, and I am sure of this, that he who

00:30:25.820 began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Christ. God did this for you. You

00:30:33.960 don't, you don't get to attribute your goodness or your potential, um, or God finding you because of

00:30:42.340 your personality traits or strengths, particularly lovable. You don't get to attribute your salvation

00:30:47.100 to any of those things. And thank goodness, because those things are so, uh, they're so unreliable.

00:30:52.860 They're so fleeting. They, they change. They're so conditional. Rather our salvation rests on God's

00:31:00.640 grace, thankfully. And by his grace, he has made us new. He's made us new creations, not just

00:31:08.200 improved versions of ourselves, not who we always were, but somehow manifesting, you know, a, a new

00:31:16.860 truth that we have discovered. That's new age stuff. That's not the gospel. And that's not going to

00:31:22.580 free you. That's, that's not going to free you. Um, thankfully the gospel is better. The gospel is

00:31:28.440 better than this Facebook post by Stephen Furtick. I hope, I have hoped that he comes out and he

00:31:33.060 publicly, um, he publicly corrects this. I think that a lot of people who follow him, uh, would really

00:31:38.900 benefit from that, but I at least wanted to try to, as humbly as I can, correct the record for my

00:31:44.000 listeners and viewers. Um, all right. I do want to play a few, uh, voicemails from you guys. I meant

00:31:52.360 to say this at the top of the episode, but I want to play a few voicemails from you guys. I asked for

00:31:56.740 voicemails telling me your millennial woes and what I mean by a millennial woes. Um, I did, you know,

00:32:03.300 all these Instagram stories on this last week or the week before I don't remember, um, about not

00:32:08.960 wanting to do these tiny tasks and getting what feels like paralysis surrounding, like taking

00:32:14.760 clothes back to Goodwill or listening to voicemails. I mean, it's very first world problems I realized,

00:32:19.760 but I think it has something to do with, you know, technology overstimulation. I think some of it is

00:32:25.680 generational, but a lot of you messaged me saying that you feel the same thing. You have like errand

00:32:31.000 paralysis or like trivial task, tiny task paralysis. And I feel you on that. So I just wanted to hear some

00:32:37.120 of your stories of that. So I'm going to play a few voicemails that you guys sent me.

00:32:42.800 All right, we're going to go ahead and play the first voicemail.

00:32:47.500 Hi, Allie. This is Elizabeth. I'm calling from California. Love your podcast. Um, so I have been

00:32:53.940 putting off changing my last name on my driver's license for almost two and a half years now.

00:33:00.760 My poor husband looks at my license all the time and really wants me to change my last name.

00:33:05.440 Um, and I changed it on my social, but haven't gone into the DMV to change it because who likes

00:33:12.480 the DMV? So yeah, hopefully I'll get that changed soon. Um, thanks again for your podcast,

00:33:20.340 man. I understand that is a hassle. That's a hassle. Also fun fact, kind of unrelated. Um,

00:33:27.340 I never change when my friends get married. I never change their last name in my phone. It's not

00:33:33.900 like, Oh, I don't like their spouses or I can't accept the fact that they're married. Obviously

00:33:37.300 has nothing to do with that. I just don't do it. And I still always think of them by

00:33:40.960 their maiden names. Even if they've been married for, you know, six years, they are still,

00:33:47.460 most of them are still their maiden names in my phone. And I really have to jog my memory

00:33:53.120 sometimes. Like what is their married name? Maybe that's a millennial task. I just don't

00:33:57.120 feel like doing, I don't know. Okay. Next voicemail. Hi, Allie. My name is Kayla and I

00:34:02.360 am, um, from Tampa, Florida. Um, this is like the realist. Um, and it's hard to pick one thing,

00:34:10.320 but probably the most embarrassing thing, um, is that I have a really hard time sending out

00:34:18.880 thank you cards. And not that I won't write them. So I will literally collect the addresses

00:34:24.740 and I will write them all. Like I've done this and then I won't send them out. Um, this is like

00:34:32.740 a thing, right? Please, please. I'm praying that this is a thing and it's not just me. Um, but I

00:34:39.920 literally, Oh, I don't know if it was for my wedding or something else, but I like got the addresses

00:34:45.900 of everybody that had gone and I wrote every single card and I put them all in the envelopes and I

00:34:52.200 addressed them. And then I never sent them out because like going to the post office or putting

00:34:58.560 them in the mailbox, even like, I don't even know. I was living at like a boarding school. So like

00:35:02.740 the situation was different for mailing. Um, like I was living with my parents who teach at a boarding

00:35:08.260 school. I need to clarify. Um, so anyway, it just was like one thing too many and they never got sent.

00:35:14.660 And I'm like still mortified to this day. Oh my gosh. Okay. I'm so glad that you said that

00:35:20.940 because that's like one of my deepest, darkest secrets that I have like a drawer full of thank

00:35:27.020 you notes. I'm so I can't wait for my husband to listen to this. So he knows that it's not just me

00:35:31.400 that I have like a drawer full of thank you notes from a variety of things, probably baby showers,

00:35:36.720 probably wedding showers, probably from my wedding. And I too addressed them. Put, listen to this,

00:35:42.620 put stamps on them and they never went out. Thank you. Thank you. My dear sister and new best friend

00:35:52.500 for admitting this because I've done the same thing. It's terrible. Why are we like this? I'm

00:35:58.400 not letting us off the hook because I do think that it can speak to like a character issue too.

00:36:03.000 I'm just letting you know. I'm, I'm right there with you. All right. I think we have time for one

00:36:07.040 more, even though I want to play like a thousand of these, cause these are so great. One or two more.

00:36:10.920 We'll see. Okay. Next one. Hi, my name is Morgan and I heard on your podcast about this

00:36:18.800 millennial errand phobia. And I have, um, have a funny little phobia to share. It's actually not

00:36:30.340 mine. It's my husband. He has this thing where he is incapable of putting his disposable contacts

00:36:40.380 into the garbage can. Where they end up is typically stuck to his nightstand. Um, I have found them

00:36:50.740 on the toilet seat, um, stuck on my kids sometimes on accident. I find them on my seat. Um, they just

00:37:03.520 tend to migrate. All right. Um, okay. That might be a different thing. So at one point, this is before

00:37:10.120 I did any of this, I did this thing on Snapchat back when I had Snapchat, I haven't had Snapchat a

00:37:15.560 very long time. So we're talking like 2015. Yeah. It must've been like right when I got married and I

00:37:20.920 would like, uh, I would like take pictures of things that like my husband would do. Like,

00:37:26.280 for example, put the like toilet paper roll on top of like the empty toilet paper thing and just say

00:37:33.480 like things husbands do. And that was like a little hashtag that I did for a while. That might just be

00:37:38.000 a things husbands do. Husbands do things like that. Why does their side of the bathroom look so 1.00

00:37:43.300 drastically different than your side of the bathroom? For no reason. It's like, I see you.

00:37:48.660 Why does it look like that? Like there's a bathroom monster that lives on the husband's side of the 0.99

00:37:53.360 bathroom. My husband is like, he's an organized person. He's a very clean person. And yet, like I,

00:37:59.620 you know, I grew up with brothers. It's the same thing. Why do guys' bathrooms always just end up

00:38:03.920 being so messy? I don't understand it. So that might just be like a things husband do, husbands do

00:38:09.840 type thing. Could also be millennial trivial task paralysis. Who knows? All right. Let's do one more.

00:38:16.140 Hi, Ellie Beth. This is Susan from Virginia. And I just wanted to tell you about something that

00:38:20.860 I've been procrastinating on. And it's a little embarrassing and kind of, um, aesthetic. But,

00:38:27.580 um, so about three years ago, I think in 2018, I got my haircut and I saved it to donate it and

00:38:36.360 put it in a Ziploc bag and stuck it in like my bin of mail. And, um, it didn't get mailed. And then

00:38:45.860 two years later, I got my haircut again to donate and put that hair with the other hair.

00:38:52.580 And it sat there for probably about a few months. And then, um, we were getting ready to move. So

00:38:57.800 we were moving, but I was like, I'm finally going to send this hair to the organization to donate it,

00:39:02.920 um, for someone to be able to use it. So I put it in a package, took it to the post office.

00:39:09.060 I mailed it, but, um, I mailed it at one of the self-serve centers and I guess I must hit the wrong

00:39:15.040 package type or whatever, but I didn't give it enough postage. So it came back. And so that was

00:39:20.660 a little over a year ago and it's still sitting in my van waiting for me to take it back to the post

00:39:26.100 office. And I don't know why, but the post office is one of those things that I just put off forever.

00:39:31.880 So I've had hair from some for about three years, some for about a year ago that I've been waiting

00:39:38.440 to mail in to be turned into a wig for someone who needs it. So, um, I think tomorrow I'm finally

00:39:44.420 going to go mail that. Yes. Have this admission be the motivator that you need. Again, no judgment

00:39:51.620 from me because I would probably do something like that. I've never actually donated hair because I've

00:39:56.360 been highlighting my hair since like eighth grade, but, uh, wow. Like that's, I'm glad that it's your

00:40:02.560 hair. I feel like if some, if your car got searched or something, someone be freaked out by that. Like

00:40:08.480 it's almost like a silence of the lamps type situation. If you've seen that, you know what

00:40:11.920 I'm talking about? Like it's a little creepy. It's a little creepy, but it is your hair. And so it's

00:40:16.940 not actually creepy, but it would seem creepy if someone was like, why do you have all of these

00:40:21.040 stray ponytails in your backseat guys, millennials, we got to get better. And I'm talking to myself as 0.94

00:40:28.740 well. Thank you guys so much for sending your voicemails. All right. We'll be back here tomorrow

00:40:33.040 with who knows what something good, probably something newsier political since we haven't

00:40:37.420 really gotten to that. We didn't get to that today. Uh, so I'll see you guys back here tomorrow.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - October 26, 2021

Ep 512 ｜ Responding to Steven Furtick’s Problematic Post

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