Ep 683 ｜ How to Date, Marry, and Parent Biblically ｜ Guest： John Mason
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Summary
How do we dress, date, get married, and have a family in a way that honors the Lord? How do we raise our children in the way God wants them to grow up in the faith? What does it look like to be a Christian in a counter-cultural world? How can we live out our faith in ways that honor God and His word? In this episode, my friend John Mason and I discuss these questions and more.
Transcript
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How do we dress, date, get married, parent in a way that honors the Lord, in a way that is
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counter-cultural? That is what we are discussing today with my friend John Mason. He is the co-founder
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of God First, Life Second. He is the creator of I Won't Stay Silent, which is a campaign about
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the struggle that men have with pornography and lust. He's doing amazing work. He sets an
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incredible example, especially in how he conducts himself and chooses his words on social
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media. This conversation is going to be so encouraging for you. I'm excited for you to
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hear it. This episode is brought to you by our friends, of course, at Good Ranchers. Go to
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goodranchers.com slash Allie. That's goodranchers.com slash Allie.
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John, thanks so much for joining us. For those who may not know, who may not follow you on
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Twitter, can you tell us who you are and what you do?
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Yes. Yeah. So my name is John Mason. I'm a youth ministry director. I've been doing that
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for about a year and a half. And so before that, I was an IT security analyst for about
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10 years professionally. Did that for a while. And now I'm doing youth ministry director. Now
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I am a youth ministry director. And so I also have a online community ministry called God
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First, Life Second, where I basically continue to put out information and truth about how
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we are to contend the faith as millennials and also specifically as parents as well. That's
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very important and how we have to represent Christ. So that is what I do.
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Yeah. Tell me about the transition from being in IT to being in ministry. How did you determine
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Yeah, that is a very interesting story. So I had came to visit where the church is I'm
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working at now multiple times over the years. And one time I came around 2016 and it was just
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a strong tug on me that I need to move here and I need to relocate and I need to go ahead
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and go into full time ministry. Of course, my first answer was no. I don't think that's
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I don't think that's God. Yeah, because that's just how it goes. And so after a while, talked
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to my wife and then we decided to make the move. And when we did, we actually dealt with
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very, very hard consequences where we were flooding. We put our house on the market. It
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was really, really tough. And so we had to go through all of that, overcome that. And
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then we finally made the move in 2020 into 2020. So it was a, it was one of those challenging,
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very, very challenging transitions. It was not easy, but all four of my kids at the time,
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four kids, we all moved up and we're still adjusting.
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Yeah. And before that you were, you were a believer. Have you always been a believer,
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like raised a Christian or what does that journey look like?
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So I was raised in church. I've been in church since I was four years old. Church I was in,
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however, was not preaching the gospel, did not preach Christ, did not. It was more of
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a non-denominational kind of word of faith church. And so I really didn't.
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More charismatic. It wasn't like all like full charismatic, but it was like bits and pieces
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More prosperity. I would say that more prosperity gospel. And so in that church from four all
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up to about 17. And it wasn't until about 17, some, somebody from a different country came
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in and did a small Bible study in that church that went over John chapter one. And in that
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small Bible study at 17, I got to say, after hearing that message at the beginning of church
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my entire life, I actually came to believe in Christ. And so that was, you know, very shocking
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to hear that you've been in church your whole life. You don't know who Christ is, but that's
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So. Wow. That's really interesting that it took all that time that you were in church.
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You didn't really ever hear the gospel, which is what the church is for. And it just took
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From a different country. It wasn't even from that city, so.
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And you know, that's such a, that in itself is a good lesson because it does seem like
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a lot of churches today, they think in order to draw you to Christ, they have to tell you
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what you want to hear. They have to tickle your ears.
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They have to kind of satisfy or satisfy just a few worldly desires or check a few worldly
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boxes. And then that will attract you to enough. And then they'll actually share the gospel.
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All you needed was scripture. All you needed was the gospel.
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One or two verses. And that opened up my eyes to Christ, clearly.
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And isn't that such like a more simple task of the church too, that you don't have to,
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you don't have to worry about keeping up with the world. You really can stick with the truth
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that has been true and sufficient for thousands of years.
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Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. No question about it. And it's funny because in our culture
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in America, you know, we run into the idea of being an American, being a part of the culture
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and being, you know, like you said, worldly. And that becomes a priority. And that was a
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priority in that church. It was, it really was. And so, um, I'm just grateful to God that
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he sent who he sent to come and do that Bible study. And now I'm here talking to you.
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Yeah. So very interesting story as well. I met my wife actually, believe it or not, on Facebook.
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Okay. Okay. Started with an inbox. Okay. Okay. We were friends, like your friend people
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on Facebook, you don't even know who they are. And then I posted something, um, something
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about, you know, a woman's hair or something like that. And it was something generic and
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she inboxed me and she was like, Hey, what do you mean by that? What are you trying to say?
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This and that kind of like checking me over my posts. And so I'm like, who is this? I don't
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even know who this person is. That's how I got started. Ended up exchanging numbers.
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Um, from that, believe it or not, it was changing numbers. We had a lot in common. We had the
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same convictions about our faith in Christ. And so we exchanged numbers and then had our
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first conversation. And then from there, we basically just kicked it off. Now we didn't
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do any dates, by the way, not one single date. We got to know each other by going in group
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like events with other believers and other friends. So she lived in your same area.
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Lived in the same area. And so you all started just hanging out together kind of with your
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friends from church. Yep. Friends from church. Yep. Got to know each other through that. And
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about a year later, we got married. Yeah. We knew it was the person. Yeah. So tell me a little
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bit more about that process because before we talk about like parenthood, homeschooling,
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we're going to talk about all those things. But I'm just curious because that's not the
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typical dating experience, even for most Christians. That's not, you know, not the dating
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experience that I had with my husband. I'm very thankful that we got married when and how we did.
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But of course, looking back, I'm like, oh, could we have protected ourselves more? Could we have been
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wiser in our dating relationship by doing what you just described? Because we spent a lot of alone
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time together. Could it have been healthier and better if we had spent more time in group? So tell
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me what that was like for y'all. Yeah. So what happened was that both her and I were both
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constantly doing that. And so it kept failing. We had boyfriend, girlfriend, and it kept failing,
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failing, failing, dating, trying to figure out who's the person and then doing it in our own
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strength, doing our own thing. And it didn't work. So both her and I were like, okay, we're done with
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dating. We're not dating anymore. We're just going to trust God, literally trust God that he's going to
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bring my spouse to me and we'll know who he or she is by trusting God and walking with the Lord in our
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relationship with him. And so because of those failures that happened prior to what happened to
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where we got to, where we got to know each other, that those boundaries were up really strong for
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both of us. We kind of went through the same thing. And so those boundaries allowed us to both at the
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same time agree upon, hey, this, we're not trying to talk. Cause I wasn't even, I really stopped
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looking. I stopped looking after the last relationship that fell. I just stopped looking and
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say, okay, God, I know you're going to bring me my wife. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to just
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trust you. And I know that if I trust you and walk with you, then I know I'm going to get exactly who
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you have for me. Like it won't be anything to guess. It'll happen the way it's supposed to.
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And that's literally what happened in less than a year of me trying to stop with the person I was
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with before my wife, less than a year. Here comes my future wife. And so it was just walking in faith.
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We talk about walking by faith. We do that a lot of times with houses, cars, a job, walk by faith to
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get this, to get your, you know, whatever you think is best for you. But we kind of negate that when it
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comes to walking by faith, when it comes to relationships, when we are Christians, we don't,
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we think we have all the answers and sometimes that ends up putting us in bad positions and we
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don't realize it till later. And so we just both trusted God and just God, you know, led it spiritually.
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Did y'all have any one-on-one dates when you were in a relationship?
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So you just got to know her in groups with people.
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And that's how, because some people I think would ask, well, how do you really get to know
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that person at all? Like how can you get to the point of knowing you want to spend the
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rest of your life with that person if you're only in groups? So it was just a lot of conversations
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Yep. A lot of conversations, a lot of time, understanding each other, what was important to us. That was an
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important thing. Our intentions about marriage. Those things were all discussed and those things
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were understood in those conversations and in those group outings. So, yeah.
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And what do you say to those, the Christian men and women? There's a lot of, it's mostly Christian
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women who listen to this podcast who are like, okay, I hear what you're saying about trusting God,
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Yeah. And there's got to be something I can do or like, how do I make this happen? And you know,
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it's not necessarily God's plan for every single person to get married. So like what's your
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encouragement or your wisdom to young Christians who find themselves in that position? They really
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want to get married and find the person that they hope God has for them, but they just feel so
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Yeah. I would encourage them. Number one, to look at yourself the way God sees you.
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So if you're single and your desire to be in a relationship, God knows that way deeper than
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you do, way deeper than you do. So you have that desire, but God knows what you really need and
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what you want. He knows it way better than you. So if you say, okay, God, you know what I need and I
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want, therefore your word, and I go back to the scripture. Your word says that basically lets us know that
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the man will initiate that. I don't have to go out and put myself out on the market. I don't have to act
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like this is something I got to chase or go after. No, I can actually prepare myself to be a wife.
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Start looking at my, what are the things I need to be looking at to make sure I'm lined up to be a
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wife? What are some concerns, some issues, some past traumas? What are some things I need to make
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sure are holding me and just continue working on that and continue to focus on your relationship
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with the Lord? And as you walk that out, God and his providence by his, by what he has designed
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for you, by his ordination will bring forth your husband. He will be drawn to you because,
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because God knows your desire way more than you do. So I would encourage those young ladies
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to not use the culture standards of putting yourself out there to try to attract a man
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rather than just use your time with the Lord as a time of preparation to be a wife. It really is a
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walk by faith thing. It could be something that's going to happen next year, next week. It could be
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something that's going to happen two years from now. It could be five years from now, but you have to
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trust God in that time and your emotions, your will, your passions, your desires. All those things have to be
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trusted in God's hands before it's put in a man's hand. Yeah. Now your wife did message you, but I
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guess she wasn't necessarily pursuing you romantically. Oh, not at all. She was like me, like, I'm not
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looking for anyone. Like, matter of fact, when we did meet in person and stuff, she was very off-putting.
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It was, there was nothing she was trying to be like, oh yeah, you see me? Because she was, she had it
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with being in relationships and it kept just being horrible. So she just was not doing it, period. I was in
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the same boat. So yeah, she wasn't, she just inboxed me literally to ask me a question. She was doing that to other
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people too. That's just how she is. She's like, so what you trying to say? You know, she wanted to get down to the
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bottom of the truth. So yeah, that's why she inboxed me. Yeah. So. And now y'all have five kids together, age nine to
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11 months. You said three boys and three girls, three girls and two boys. So tell us just kind of what that has been
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like raising kids in this crazy world, raising five kids. And I believe you homeschool all of
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them, right? Correct. So tell us just the challenges and the triumphs that comes with that. Yeah. I mean,
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it's a lot of challenges, a lot of challenges. So we had our first kid, uh, 2013. So we started
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married in 2011. So two years into a member, we didn't spend a whole lot of alone time. Yeah. So
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adjustment. Yeah. So here comes a child two years into our marriage. And so, um, we, you know,
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be a parent, do what you got to do. And then it comes the next child, next child. So we basically
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been having kids. We've been married pretty much. It's been almost little to no gap longer than a
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year and a half. Yeah. Um, where we haven't had a child come. So, so, um, yeah. So it's basically
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been being a parent, stepping up to the plate, doing what needs to be done, trusting the Lord with each
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child. Cause each individual child has their own need and issue and concern each child. And so each one of
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them needs certain attention. Each one of them need to be discipled in a certain way. We have to make
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sure they learn it in a certain way. So on and so forth because homeschooling. So, um, yeah,
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it's been a very big challenge. My wife and I have struggled to find a long time. It's, it's
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difficult with five kids, but we have to, and they're all at home continually. And so we have
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to be, make that a priority. And I would say that to any other couple who also is in the same position.
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Um, you have to find, like you might be intentional by finding time to be alone, whether it's, you know,
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time when the kids go to bed, so on and so forth. And we try to build our relationship off that.
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And so, yeah, it's been, it's been challenging. It's been challenging. I would say the homeschooling
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part is more, I'll say the homeschooling is more, um, because we, what we do is we do online
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homeschooling. So for our nine year old and our seven year old, they do online. They were
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in a charter school, by the way. When we first moved, moved where we're at now, we were in
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a charter school. And so that charter school was option C. Option B was, uh, was, uh, going
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to education, Christian education school. And then option A was, was homeschooling.
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But at the time we just couldn't do it. So we put them in charter school, couldn't find
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Christian education. And so we pulled them out of that place because as we know what's
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going on right now in schools, it just, it wasn't working. So we pulled them out. Now
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And what curriculum do y'all use? If you don't mind me asking.
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Yeah, it's, um, the home, the homeschool online curriculum is Enlightenham Academy.
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And so they have, uh, their own. And so the one that we're using is, um, Horizons for the,
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for the first grader, but my, my son who just finished first grade, uh, was Horizons. And so
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he went through that. It was good. I think it was really good. My wife enjoyed it. And then my,
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my daughter is doing online with everything's online. There's no books, everything, all the
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curriculums coming online. I'm not sure what curriculum they're using for the second grade.
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Yeah. And so you decided to make this decision because the charter school wasn't working, but
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she mentioned that even before you put them in charter school, your y'all's first choice
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was homeschool. Why, why did y'all decide that that was what y'all wanted to do?
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We feel like homeschooling is number one, is the primary way to educate and disciple your children
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because of the dangers is out in schools right now. And we are aware of that because where we go to
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church, that's, that's something that's putting the forefront and I'm thank God for that. But,
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and so we are aware of the danger. So we want to homeschool because that's the primary now at the
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ages that they are. And because we had just had another child, uh, it was challenging. So we said,
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let's, let's try this charter schools. We had a charter school in our, where we were, that we moved
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from. It's really, really good. A lot of teachers there were believers and had just got started before
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we moved like literally months. And so our daughter was there and it was, it was wonderful.
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Yeah. And so, um, we couldn't find that where we're at now and we tried it. It didn't work.
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So it was like, let's just pull, let's just do homeschool. Let's make it work. And so that's why
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we're doing it now. A lot of people say that they really want to homeschool their kids,
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but they just can't afford it. Um, what do you say to people who say it's, it's too expensive? We
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can't do it. Yeah. I would say it was first thing is you need to pray. Um, if you're going to
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prioritize educating your children, discipling them as well, cause that's what the whole point
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of education is discipleship. So as you're doing that, you're prioritizing that you need to pray
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to the Lord. Lord, this is what I desire to do for my, the children that you bless me with.
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This is my desire. You pray and you ask the Lord to lead you and guide you to make that happen.
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And if that doesn't happen, there's other options available. You have to do the best you can
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what you have. But the primary thing is this, you are the primary disciple of your children.
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Like that's your role. That's your responsibility. That's not the school's job. That's not the
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education school job. That's not the charter school. That's not, it's your job to make sure
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your children know if you keep that in your mind and decisions you make will then be, I think more
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God glorifying. If you keep in mind that God gave us this as a responsibility. So whatever decision
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I make after that, if I have to sacrifice, change jobs, if I have to do something else,
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if I have to go get extra jobs, whatever it needs to do in your, every household is different.
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Then you do that to make sure God's getting the glory and these, these children that God bless you
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with are being primarily discipled by you and not by some outside cultural institution.
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And, you know, yeah. And I know a lot of parents who reach out to me whenever we talk about homeschooling
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and they always want me to say this from them to parents who are worried about the financial
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aspect of it is that you can do what God calls you to do. You can do what you set out to do.
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Things that seem impossible, as you were just saying, are made possible by God. And it just depends
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on what is most important. Now, as you also said, every family is different. So I'm not speaking to
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every single situation, but in the same way that in a similar way that say you aren't working out
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because you're like, I don't, I don't have time. I don't have time to exercise. And then you decide
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to, and you're like, where did all this extra time come from? Well, it's actually just because you
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determined that that was a priority. You determined that working out was more important than scrolling
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on your phone for 30 minutes or sleeping in for 30 minutes. And it's not that there's new time in
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the day. It is that you decided that you could do it. And so you decided to do it. Right. It's the
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same way with anything, but especially when it comes to discipling your kids. If you decide that
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it is more important for your kids to be discipled at home than making the extra $50,000 or whatever it
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is, you'll make it work. People who make very little money make it work every day. Yeah, absolutely.
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That's a really good point. Yeah. And tell us a little bit more about how you guys navigate as a
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couple, the different challenges that you were talking about in homeschooling your kids, like
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how you encourage one another. How do you kind of stay focused on the task at hand when sometimes it
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probably does seem easier to just say, you know what, we could just send them to public school and not
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worry about that. Yep. For sure. So one of our children, Uzziah, he is, he just got diagnosed
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with autism. And so he's five. And so that's, that's our biggest challenge, getting him therapy
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and trying to get him to speak because he's not verbal. That and trying to homeschool all the kids
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is very, very challenging. It's very, very challenging. So my wife is an amazing woman and
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she takes on that challenge because to her, these are my children. I want to make sure they're safe.
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I want to make sure they're a disciple. I want to make sure these things are happening for them
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at the best level they possibly can be. And that's just who she is. And she'll give up everything she
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can to do that. She's an amazing woman. And so those things are all coming together at the same time.
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It's very, very challenging. So to encourage each other, what we have to do is we have to basically
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bring it back to the scripture. We have to bring it back to what God's calling is for our lives
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as a wife, as a husband, as a mother, as a father. If we bring it back to that, that's the source,
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that's the root. When those times get really hard, they do get hard. We can go back and be encouraged
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to know that this is a season. God has blessed us with these children for this season. All the challenges
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that are there because they're because God ordained them to be there. It's not an accident, right?
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We're not running into these things because it just popped up. They're here because God has allowed
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them to be here to strengthen us, to make our family who we are. And so we use those biblical
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foundations, those biblical ideas to kind of strengthen us, to be able to get through the
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challenges and the hard times of homeschooling.
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Yeah. Are you discouraged by the seeming inability or unwillingness of a lot of Christians to go back
00:20:41.660
to scripture? Not when it comes to necessarily just like the challenges they face, but when it
00:20:46.780
comes to a lot of the cultural issues that you and I both talk about, that you tweet about, that
00:20:53.260
primarily for the Christian, they're not cultural. They're actually theological issues. We're talking
00:20:57.660
about gender and abortion and marriage, sexuality, dating. Are you ever discouraged by how Christians seem
00:21:05.140
to be more worldly on these issues than biblical?
00:21:08.420
Yeah, absolutely. It's, I mean, the statistics that are out from Barna and other people who do
00:21:15.220
statistics, other universities do statistics, I mean, it's clearly showing that a biblical worldview is
00:21:20.900
just not a priority amongst Christians, for majority, people who profess to be Christians. And that's
00:21:26.580
reflecting in how we just absorb and take on, as a culture, Christian culture, these ideologies and
00:21:33.860
these ideas that are completely anti-Christ, anti-God. It is very discouraging. And so that's
00:21:40.100
part of the reason why I try to do everything I can with my platform that God has blessed me with,
00:21:44.980
which is awesome. I know you do the same thing with the platform God has blessed you with.
00:21:48.660
It's to continue to profess the truths of God and continue to point people back to the standard of
00:21:53.300
Christ because that's all we can do. It is discouraging. It's really difficult to watch because
00:21:57.780
it's a majority thing. Yeah. It's a majority. And we're talking about parents. So he's like,
00:22:01.300
if you're a parent, this should be important to you, right? You should be like, this should be
00:22:04.820
something that you'd be like, okay, this, I have to look at this from a lens from which God gave me
00:22:09.300
to be able to disciple these kids. But many unfortunately are not, not doing it. Yeah.
00:22:14.740
Why do you think the issue of LGBTQ gender, what people refer to as sexual orientation,
00:22:22.260
that seems to be a subject that for a lot of professing Christians,
00:22:25.780
they just don't want to be clear on, they'll kind of, you know, obfuscate, they'll beat around
00:22:31.380
the bush or they will just 100% compromise because, oh, well, God is love and we're just
00:22:36.340
called to love and God will take care of the rest, whatever that may be. Right.
00:22:40.020
Why do you think that is an issue that is so difficult for a lot of Christians to be clear on?
00:22:45.300
Yeah. I think it's an issue because we just, and I'm just going to say this, we don't have a spiritual
00:22:49.220
backbone. A lot of Christians would rather just kind of conform, which is not what the Bible says
00:22:56.020
we're supposed to do, supposed to be transformed, but they would rather conform because it's easier.
00:23:00.180
Yeah. So if I, if I don't bow to the LGBTQ agenda, if I don't align myself up with the ideas of,
00:23:07.940
like you said, love is love. I don't line myself up with that, that I'm going to be looked at as
00:23:12.660
those names that they call everybody who doesn't do that. And I'm going to be looked at as this and my
00:23:16.820
job may not like this because I posted this. And so it's all these compromises that allow you. And
00:23:23.060
so one of the things that I'll say this, that are happening right now amongst American culture,
00:23:27.460
I mean, Christian culture is that we've adapted all these ideologies and beliefs and kind of put
00:23:34.260
them into one and said, Christian, we've adapted progressivism, liberalism. We've adapted and pulled
00:23:40.340
from, you know, some Eastern meditation type, you know, we've adapted all these different religions
00:23:45.460
and ideas and said, well, I'm also a Christian, but I'm a Christian. And, but, but your worldview says
00:23:50.420
all these religions, all these beliefs are all the same. Like, for example, what happened with
00:23:54.340
the sexual revolution, how we ended up where we are now, we just kind of adapted with the flow.
00:23:58.980
Instead of going back to scripture and saying what sexuality is based on the word, we just say,
00:24:03.060
hey, you know, we've been doing this. We've been doing boyfriend and girlfriend. We've been doing
00:24:06.500
dating like this. We've been doing, you know, uh, it's okay for two men to want to be with
00:24:10.020
each other and get married. That's okay. It's nothing wrong with that. That's their business.
00:24:12.900
And so it's this ideas and concepts and ideas that come at you and you just adapt them and
00:24:17.460
culturally accept them rather than go back to the word. And in the statistics show that
00:24:22.340
most Christians are okay with that. And so that's, I think that's really the issue.
00:24:26.340
You know, I don't think a lot of people link it to what you just did, that it kind of goes back to
00:24:43.220
Christian compromise on, um, on, on dating, how we kind of have adopted the world's definitions or like
00:24:51.540
the world's model of dating and relationships and sex. I think that we kind of are more tolerant of
00:24:58.580
that. Um, but really that does lead to a lot of compromise on these kinds of LGBTQ issues,
00:25:05.620
because it does have to do, it all goes back to not trusting what God says about the body,
00:25:10.180
what God says about sex, what God says about gender, what God says about gender roles. I mean,
00:25:15.540
it's also feminism and all different things that have infiltrated the church. Even I would say
00:25:22.100
the conservative church in some ways. Um, and that really is kind of what placed us on shaky
00:25:28.500
ground when it comes to the rest of the sexual revolution. And a lot of people don't think about
00:25:32.820
it like that. They think it's, oh, it's fundamentalist to say that, but you know, that Christian men and
00:25:39.220
women should date a certain way or save themselves until marriage, but it's all kind of connected,
00:25:43.940
right? All kind of connected. What do you think about, and this is sorry to like spring this on
00:25:48.900
you. So, but the, uh, I think it was Joshua Harris. I think that was his name who originally wrote,
00:25:55.300
I kiss dating goodbye, which kind of like, yeah, I mean, it kind of set up a lot of Christians for
00:26:02.340
doing the whole like courting arrangement, a little bit of what you talked about that you did with your
00:26:07.540
wife without going on these one-on-one dates. Well, he has since like abandoned it. He doesn't even know if
00:26:12.340
he's a Christian anymore. He's apologizing for that. Uh, what do you, what do you think about
00:26:18.340
that? And people who say that, oh, purity culture in the church or pro courting, whatever in the
00:26:23.860
church is actually damaging and oppressive and bad. Yeah. That's crazy. Um, I don't,
00:26:29.860
Joshua Harris, I don't know why he decided to do all of that and recant what he said. I don't,
00:26:35.940
I don't know if his intentions were just to write a book and make some money and not really,
00:26:40.180
truly reflect biblical, you know, characteristics about relationships and biblical standards. Maybe
00:26:46.260
that's what it was. But, um, I mean, at the end of the day, you either believe in the authority of
00:26:51.380
scripture for your life or you don't. Yeah. If you claim to be a Christian, your faith has to be
00:26:56.500
founded on something outside of being in the culture of America because America is going to come and go.
00:27:01.140
It has to be something outside of, you know, today in 2023, you know, 2022,
00:27:05.860
it has to be something greater, something that's more fundamental, something that's more
00:27:09.940
foundational. And that has to be scripture. So if it's scripture that I'm founded on that,
00:27:14.420
I'm going back to Genesis and I'm looking at how God put a man and woman together and they come,
00:27:18.900
become one. And if that's the foundation, then everything else is an add on. It's an add on,
00:27:24.740
no matter what the culture does, it's an add on. So I think it's a lack of discipleship,
00:27:28.820
um, inside the Christian culture, inside Christianity in America, discipleship is not
00:27:35.300
happening. Therefore the script, the authority of scripture is not there. What's there is the
00:27:40.020
authority of culture. And so you just adapt and you just do what the culture does. And it's normal.
00:27:44.900
And so since it's normal, whatever comes from that normal, which usually destroys lives,
00:27:50.100
makes people worse when they get married, it's basically practicing for divorce. Essentially all
00:27:53.780
the boyfriend, girlfriend, breakup, boyfriend, girlfriend, breakup. God didn't design us for that.
00:27:58.580
For divorce. Yeah. He didn't design us for that. That's not what we're designed. Like he said,
00:28:02.340
in Genesis, one, a man and a woman come together, become one. So if you're becoming one with multiple
00:28:08.420
people over and over again, something's wrong with that. That's dysfunction. Right. And so we don't,
00:28:12.980
nobody tells us that nobody instructs us that in the church because we don't talk about it. And so
00:28:17.620
because we're not doing that, we just grow with the culture. We just go with the culture and the
00:28:22.100
culture is destroying itself as we are where we are now. Like you said, you know, we led up to where we are
00:28:26.340
now and we're just rolling with them instead of being the light in the darkness. Right. Instead
00:28:30.900
of shining forth the truth with our lives and living the standard of scripture, which is being
00:28:36.100
married, coming together, building the family, the family unit and prioritizing that in your life,
00:28:41.220
not being with a whole bunch of different people and then coming together with one person later on.
00:28:45.540
You know, and so it's, and if you look at the results of that, I talk about this all the time
00:28:48.980
on Twitter. You look at the results of that. It's just a bunch of damaged people. I'm one of them. I did the
00:28:52.740
same thing. It's just a bunch of damaged people. And people think that when you do that, when you
00:28:56.660
do the boyfriend, girlfriend thing, you try out, try out, try out, try out. And it's all going to be
00:29:00.660
good when you get in your thirties and get married. All that trying out just goes with you. Like,
00:29:05.860
because you're designed to be again, one man, one woman come one. That's the doubt. That's the design.
00:29:10.660
That's the purpose. So you're taking that, all the band, the baggage that comes with doing it in a
00:29:16.020
perverse way. Yeah. And it comes with you, right? Because the Bible talks about sexual sin being one of the
00:29:20.980
only sins where you sin against your own body and against God. So when you take that seriously,
00:29:25.540
you can't do what the culture is doing because you, you know what the consequences and the prices
00:29:30.420
are. Yeah. I think that some people, they look back at their experience with what is typically
00:29:36.500
derided as purity culture and they see some legitimate issues with it, which I can, I can see
00:29:42.580
that there's like a gracelessness and a legalism detached from, detached from our real true
00:29:50.340
motivations for purity, which is love for God and his word. And so some people were seriously burned
00:29:56.660
by that. They were told that if you messed up, then you're like damaged goods. No one's going to
00:30:02.020
want you. God is mad at you. I read, there was a book called Datable that I read growing up that
00:30:08.500
basically compared a person to a used car. So the less you have less and less value, the more that you've
00:30:16.020
done. So that's not pro gospel, but then swinging the other direction, which is what I think that
00:30:21.380
we've done, which is, well, it doesn't matter what you do, do whatever and you'll be fine.
00:30:28.340
And God loves everything that you do no matter what. So you kind of already have, but once again,
00:30:34.100
kind of bring us to the middle. What is the biblical perspective on pursuing purity truly as a Christian?
00:30:41.460
Yeah, I think you kind of stated it's really just pursuing God and pursuing holiness. If you do that
00:30:46.420
as a, as an individual believer in Christ, if God is the number one priority in your life and whatever
00:30:54.100
you do, whether it's being in a relationship, whether it's getting a job, whatever you decide to do,
00:30:58.900
it's to please the Lord. If you keep that at the forefront as the priority in your mind and your heart,
00:31:04.820
then whatever you do next, whatever you pray about next, whatever you desire next,
00:31:09.620
will then therefore line up with his word. I think that's what it is. And I think that
00:31:15.780
the culture building, the purity culture thing, like you said, the legalism part has destroyed
00:31:20.580
more hearts and minds than it should have. It's the, the, the intentions were good, right?
00:31:26.100
You know, do it the way God has said, but yeah, you're not going to get anybody to do that when
00:31:31.380
you're doing it legalistically. It should be grace. Like you said, it should be led by the spirit and
00:31:36.500
the word of God, your desire to please God. That's what I think the, what's missing is that.
00:31:42.020
And so, and so here's the issue. We're not teaching enough about God. If we teach the
00:31:47.380
attributes of God, if we're teaching people who God is, we, we talk about God. We sing songs about
00:31:52.420
God. We do all the things that are kind of like externally, you know, we do those things,
00:31:56.660
we do religious acts and religious sayings, but they don't really know this God. Not only,
00:32:02.660
not only knowledge, but also experiential. Yeah. Both of those things are important. So if you got
00:32:07.460
the experience of God, cause you're saved and you have the Holy Spirit in you, and then you know God
00:32:12.020
who he is based on revelation of God's word, then those two things will give you a passion for God.
00:32:17.700
And, and through that, you'll then live in a way that says, yeah, no, my purity is what it is
00:32:23.860
because I know God, I know Christ. And that's what I think has been missing is that, that not knowing
00:32:28.980
God is, is just kind of like out, it's kind of like fluff. Yeah. It's kind of like just religious
00:32:32.820
fluff rather than this awesome, real authentic, powerful experience of the revelation of God's
00:32:50.580
I think it's the same thing with modesty. A lot of people now deride the idea of modesty and like
00:32:58.340
a woman covering up or dressing modestly because they think that any form of modesty is legalism,
00:33:05.940
but it's the same thing. It actually, modesty is actually speaking to a state of the heart
00:33:12.580
that is then manifested through what we wear. So it's not exactly about how many inches above your knee
00:33:18.500
your skirt is, although those things matter. I mean, there are standards, but that's not,
00:33:24.180
the external is not primary. It's secondary. It's a consequence of what's in the heart.
00:33:30.820
Have you found that like talks about modesty are difficult to have or are not met with very much,
00:33:39.380
like a very good reception from even professing Christians? Yeah, absolutely. Unfortunately,
00:33:44.740
I think it's a, uh, adapting to the, again, cultural standard, um, feminism and the idea
00:33:51.380
that it's about you. Everything's about you. It's about what you want to do. It's your body.
00:33:55.620
Yeah. Your comfort. Yeah. Right. But if you're a Christian, it's not your body. It's actually
00:33:59.540
the Lord's body. If you look in that scripture. And so from a biblical perspective, you know,
00:34:03.140
that's not the case. So if the Lord is telling you in the word specifically to women that to be
00:34:08.340
modest and a lot of people like twist, we're talking about prosperity and being, I mean,
00:34:11.540
being, you know, being, um, acting like you have wealthy and actually you got a lot of money.
00:34:14.820
It's not talking about how you dress. Well, the reality is God knew exactly why he needed to address
00:34:20.020
women in scripture about modesty. Yeah. Yeah. It's not an accident. It's like, well,
00:34:23.460
what about the men? Okay. That's fine. We can talk about men, but God is not like slow. He didn't
00:34:28.500
like, well, I don't, I didn't want to address me. I forgot. No, he's addressing women specifically
00:34:33.700
because he knows the heart of women. He understands that women desire men and go back to Genesis.
00:34:39.700
Again, your desire will be for men. And so, because as now a Christian woman, now out of the darkness
00:34:44.740
into the light, not operating in the fall of being led by the spirit. Now, let me tell you what your
00:34:49.780
new desires are not to attract and draw attention. Right. Which now we do today is central central.
00:34:55.140
That's how we, it's not so much wealth. We can do that. All right. Opulence and wealth and, you know,
00:34:58.580
actually got a lot of money, but it really is central now because everything is sexual now.
00:35:02.260
Everything in our culture is drive our sexuality. And so today in our culture, that would be the same
00:35:06.900
thing as what they're talking about with the wealth and the brain of the hair and all the other stuff.
00:35:10.260
It's just basically look at me, look at me, look at me, look at me. And so God is saying to you,
00:35:14.580
you don't have to do that daughter of my daughter. You don't have to do that. You don't have to draw
00:35:19.700
attention to you. Your attention should rather come from your obedience to me and see if your attention
00:35:24.980
comes from that rather than drawing attention to your body or being central, then now not only do you
00:35:29.700
you glorify me, but a man that truly is mine will see you the way he's supposed to design to see you
00:35:35.300
rather than in the lust and flesh. And so that guy is directly addressing women for a specific reason
00:35:42.100
because he knows the heart of women when they're in a fallen state. And he knows now that you're in
00:35:46.580
the body of Christ. Here is now the new way as a new creation, how to see yourself and how to have
00:35:52.900
others see you and should primarily start with me. And so the discussion with modesty is difficult
00:35:57.380
because we have an entire generation of women that came up and said, do you, um, it's about you,
00:36:02.980
um, a grab hold of what makes you, you know, look good, you know, make sure you show off a little bit
00:36:07.900
something because that makes you feminine. That whole idea of femininity coming from, which, which is really
00:36:12.500
silly, exposing more of your body. So the more you expose your body, the more feminine it is. And I'm like,
00:36:18.400
wait a minute, that just doesn't make any sense. Who came up with that? Whose idea was that? Because
00:36:22.580
if I look at, you know, in history, it's like, okay, you know, men had on longer, longer gowns,
00:36:27.260
women had on long gowns. Everybody was just wearing kind of typical clothing. So why today
00:36:32.120
does somebody come to this idea? And I'm pretty sure it was a man that if you, if you have on less,
00:36:36.600
that's a woman that makes you feminine. And that's a lie. It's not true. Um, that's just,
00:36:42.000
that's just a man trying to get you to look the way they want you to look so they can look at you
00:36:45.700
and desire you in a way that's not godly. That's really what's happening there. And so, um, yeah,
00:36:50.520
the discussion of modesty, I will say I posted something a few years ago. Um, that was a video and I'll just say
00:36:56.200
like, there's a video of Christian men saying, thank you for dressing modestly because modestly to
00:36:59.900
Christian women and dress, not to unbelievers, but to Christians. Thank you for dressing modestly
00:37:04.160
because that helps me. I used to be a porn addict. I used to have issues with lust. And so I appreciate
00:37:09.280
you thinking of your brother by dressing modesty, man. I got so, it was on Facebook. I got so many
00:37:15.060
horrible comments, like terrible comments about my men are this, men are that. And so when I came to
00:37:21.160
conclusion, I took it down and I came to, it was only like two comments from women that were like,
00:37:26.200
hosting this as a sister in Christ. I appreciate that. Two out of hundreds, all of them were,
00:37:30.940
the rest of them were negative. I'm like, okay, what this is telling me is there are a lot of
00:37:34.900
women who have been abused by fathers, father figures, other men. And so all they see is that
00:37:42.240
abuse from a man, which is horrible, which they shouldn't have went through, but that's all they
00:37:47.320
see. And so if a man says, Hey, do this. And I appreciate it. It's like, no, you men are nothing.
00:37:52.900
You abuse us. You don't, you know, you don't, you treat us bad. You treat us horribly. And so
00:37:56.980
I figured, okay, we shouldn't just come from this direction of dress like this. Like you,
00:38:01.640
you know, just dress like measure the skirt, do it, do that. It's rather, and also it's a Christ-like
00:38:06.800
thing. So scripture talks about thinking of your brother and sister more highly than you think of
00:38:10.400
yourself. Well, if we know we live in a saturated, sexually saturated culture, that's, that's,
00:38:15.520
everybody knows that. And most men, including me, were introduced pornography at a very young age,
00:38:21.480
unfortunately, very, very young age. And today it's even worse because I was, I grew up in the
00:38:24.840
nineties. And so because that's just reality, as we come into a Christian context in our culture,
00:38:31.140
saying that, Hey, you know what? I know that sex is everywhere. Everything is about sex.
00:38:35.820
And my brothers could be struggling. They could be in a place. Some of them could be stronger than
00:38:39.240
others. Some of them could be struggling. Well, I'm, I'm going to think about them. It's not about
00:38:43.260
me. It's not about, well, this is my body. I'm sure it ain't about you. You can be to,
00:38:46.260
you know, gouge your eyes out. It is, it's not that attitude. It's the attitude of Christ that says,
00:38:51.040
this is my brother. So since this is my brother, I'm going to dress in a way that's presentable.
00:38:55.160
First of all, I'm going amongst other people to worship God. So I should be thinking about that
00:38:59.820
in the first place, but also because there are brothers and sisters who are struggling,
00:39:03.220
even sisters who are struggling. Let me not come in a way that could cause them to stumble.
00:39:08.060
Yeah. Wow. And you know, that's convicting for every Christian. Just when you're getting dressed
00:39:12.520
in the morning thinking, even if you're not tempted to, you know, like show everything off,
00:39:17.720
still having and everything you do, the mentality of Christ of, okay, this is not about me. How you
00:39:25.420
get dressed is not about you. How you take care of yourself is not primarily about you. Even though
00:39:30.320
it is you, you are still being a steward of the body that God gave you. People talk a lot about
00:39:36.600
self-care and things like that. Well, really the Lord is your shepherd and you are simply stewarding
00:39:43.840
the body responsibly that God gave you through rest and rejuvenation and things like that. But
00:39:48.800
it's not about you. Right. It's not about just what's making you happy and making you feel good.
00:39:54.140
It is worshiping the Lord. Right. And I think really that gets back to everything that we're
00:39:58.060
talking about. That is underneath when you're talking about sexual ethics, when you're talking
00:40:02.760
about dating, when you're talking about purity and modesty and whether we conform to culture standards
00:40:08.840
about identity and all different kinds of things, abortion, it all goes back to who you worship.
00:40:15.840
And I'm certainly not saying this as someone who, wow, I've got that taken care of. That is
00:40:21.540
sanctification. Right. It's conforming ourselves more and more to Christ and learning that Christ
00:40:27.580
worship is not something that you do on Sundays, but that you do in every, in every part of your life.
00:40:34.680
Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. And the gospel is supposed to infiltrate
00:40:39.440
all parts of our life. And gosh, God, give me the grace to do that better on a daily basis.
00:40:44.700
You mess up. Correct. Repentance. Yes. Yes. Yeah. How can people follow you, support you,
00:40:49.980
hear more of what you have to say? Yeah. So you can go to GodFirstLifeSecond.com. You spell it all
00:40:55.240
the way out. The Twitter page there. The Instagram is there. YouTube. We have a podcast. I just started
00:41:02.640
not too long ago. Podcasts down, Apple Podcasts and on the rest of the podcast. What's the podcast
00:41:06.780
called? God First Life Seconds. Spelled all the way out. God First Life Seconds. Spelled all the way
00:41:12.060
out. We'll put the link in the description so people can click on it. Yeah. Yeah. I just put an episode
00:41:17.060
up about a week ago. So y'all go check that out. So we have that. And on our website, we have,
00:41:23.060
you know, things that you can, like I said, podcast. We have an explanation of the gospel.
00:41:27.440
We have some challenges on there. We have some product that we sell that just kind of challenge
00:41:31.000
you and people who see the message on you on whatever you're wearing to just basically glorify
00:41:35.540
God. There's been moments where I've wear stuff and people look at me and say, hey, man, that's right.
00:41:40.260
Yeah. Yeah, that's good. And so it's just pointing people to Christ and yourself. When you wake up in the
00:41:44.800
morning, you know what? It's about him. And so that's kind of what God First Life Second was designed to do.
00:41:49.240
I love that. You know, people think that wearing a t-shirt or doing something seemingly, you know,
00:41:54.980
little like that, that's just insignificant, that it doesn't make a difference. But you really never
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know. I was just talking to you. I think you probably follow Neil Shinby. Yeah. And he was
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saying how he became a Christian, started down that journey because Campus Crusade for Christ had like
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set up a table at his college and then were passing out free C.S. Lewis books. And he took one of those
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and not started him on his journey. So someone did something that they probably saw as just totally
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commonplace and insignificant. Right. You never, you never know. You never know. God works in all of
00:42:27.200
that. Yeah. So thank you so much. I appreciate you taking the time to come on, encourage people to
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follow you, support you, check out your website and your podcast. Appreciate it. Thank you. I appreciate