Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - August 22, 2023


Ep 860 ｜ Should Christians Do IVF？ ｜ Q&A

Topics
child abandonment private Christina Kay-12 school expenses discipleship education choices
Hosted by
Allie Beth Stuckey
Mentioned
Popeye Producer Brie Wendy Christian K-12 Christina Kay C.S. Lewis Ketchup Chick Allie
Ep 859 ｜ Why You Can't Be a Gay Christian ｜ Guest： Dr. Christopher Yuan Ep 861 ｜ Did Dinosaurs Exist？ ｜ Guest： Ken Ham (Part One)

Episode Stats


Length

33 minutes

Words per minute

166.06

Word count

5,526

Sentence count

562

Harmful content

Misogyny

4

sentences flagged

Toxicity

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

9

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode of Relatable, we answer some of your questions about fast food restaurants, including: Which fast food restaurant has the best chicken nuggets? Is IVF a Christian liberty issue or not? And most importantly, where can you find the BEST Chicken Nuggets? Producer Breanna and I will discuss that at the top of this episode.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Is the cost of Christian education really worth it? 0.97
00:00:05.440 Also, is IVF a Christian liberty issue or not?
00:00:10.660 And most importantly, where can you find the best chicken nuggets?
00:00:16.580 Producer Brie and I will discuss that at the top of this episode,
00:00:20.680 which is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.
00:00:23.100 Go to GoodRanchers.com.
00:00:24.520 Use code ALI at checkout.
00:00:25.900 That's GoodRanchers.com.
00:00:27.060 Code ALI.
00:00:30.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable.
00:00:39.460 All right, we are going to answer some of the questions that you have today.
00:00:42.740 And I am also reeling in producer Brie to discuss some of these questions
00:00:47.120 because a few of them are just too complex.
00:00:50.620 They're just too much for just one person to answer, especially the first one.
00:00:55.660 Uh, the first question that I want to answer is which fast food restaurant has the best chicken nuggets?
00:01:03.940 That's just too much.
00:01:05.320 That's like really important stuff.
00:01:06.800 It's too much for me to answer on my own.
00:01:09.080 Yeah.
00:01:09.200 So, I don't know if you have thoughts that you want to be the first to share.
00:01:15.320 Do you have like just, what's your gut reaction?
00:01:18.440 Yeah.
00:01:18.980 Because I don't want to be influenced by others.
00:01:20.940 Yeah.
00:01:21.700 Um, my gut is telling me Chick-fil-A.
00:01:28.340 That was my gut too.
00:01:29.900 Oh, they, and they feel healthier when you eat them because they feel more real.
00:01:35.960 They're not.
00:01:36.980 I know.
00:01:37.880 I know.
00:01:38.620 Well, okay.
00:01:39.560 They just feel more.
00:01:41.580 Well, I think actually, you know what?
00:01:43.640 I think it depends on what is meant by healthier.
00:01:46.760 That's true.
00:01:47.360 Yes.
00:01:47.720 Because they are fried in vegetable oil.
00:01:50.800 Unfortunately, people think it's peanut oil.
00:01:52.840 There's all kinds of, you know, I don't know if it's soybean oil and all that stuff,
00:01:57.580 but you can tell, and I don't know if this makes it healthier, but okay, when you open
00:02:02.580 up a Chick-fil-A chicken nugget, it's like strips of chicken on the inside, you know?
00:02:07.800 Whereas if, I think if you opened up like a McDonald's chicken nugget, which I haven't
00:02:11.540 had in a long time, it's like mashed.
00:02:13.660 It's a sponge.
00:02:13.860 Yeah.
00:02:14.580 It's a little sponge.
00:02:16.200 Yeah.
00:02:16.980 Um, yes.
00:02:19.560 Yeah.
00:02:19.980 I don't know.
00:02:20.680 I don't know if all those theories about McDonald's nuggets are true.
00:02:23.920 Like the pink, like, like gel stuff that they say.
00:02:29.620 I don't know if that's true or not.
00:02:31.740 Um, I think it is probably just like chicken pieces mashed up, but I don't know.
00:02:37.320 Something crazy could be in there.
00:02:39.120 Yeah.
00:02:39.560 Um, but no, I think Chick-fil-A is the most, like, it feels the best when you eat it.
00:02:45.860 Yeah.
00:02:46.480 That's how they, that's why their marketing is brilliant because they do make you feel
00:02:50.380 like it's Christian healthy chicken and it's not healthy, but I do think it may be higher
00:02:56.380 quality chicken.
00:02:57.700 Yeah.
00:02:58.220 I think that's very true.
00:02:59.360 I think so.
00:03:00.600 Um, now growing up my favorite, I did not like Chick-fil-A because they do have kind of
00:03:05.940 a distinct taste.
00:03:07.460 Like, I don't know if it is.
00:03:09.680 It's kind of pickly.
00:03:10.860 Well, I like pickly.
00:03:12.380 Maybe I didn't.
00:03:13.080 It's kind of sweet.
00:03:14.360 Like the breading is a little sweet.
00:03:16.480 Yeah.
00:03:16.760 Yeah.
00:03:16.860 And I didn't like that growing up.
00:03:18.440 I loved Wendy's.
00:03:20.040 Like biggest Wendy's stand.
00:03:23.340 Are they that, that different from McDonald's?
00:03:26.520 Yeah.
00:03:27.240 They're different from McDonald's.
00:03:28.520 Definitely different breading.
00:03:29.700 I'm not saying healthier at all, but I would get like a 10 piece chicken nugget and just
00:03:36.540 eat that.
00:03:37.240 Also would get a number one, which is just their hamburger.
00:03:41.600 Number one, mustard and lettuce only with fries and a Sprite.
00:03:46.420 Mustard and lettuce only.
00:03:49.000 Yep.
00:03:50.180 Oh, I loved fast food growing up.
00:03:52.680 I loved it.
00:03:53.540 I love Wendy's.
00:03:55.280 Again, not huge fan of Chick-fil-A when I was little.
00:03:58.480 Um, yeah, it was probably Wendy's because Wendy's was close to our house growing up.
00:04:03.940 Um, trying to think what else.
00:04:06.100 Now, if we're going beyond fast food, Chili's has incredible chicken tenders.
00:04:13.680 Yes.
00:04:14.680 Do you have experience?
00:04:16.060 The chicken crispers.
00:04:16.860 Wait, is that what they're called?
00:04:17.960 I think they're crispers.
00:04:18.960 Yeah.
00:04:19.620 So good.
00:04:20.280 Yeah.
00:04:21.060 What do they do to those things? 0.72
00:04:22.540 They're so good.
00:04:23.440 It's the bread.
00:04:24.480 I don't know.
00:04:25.660 Yeah.
00:04:25.980 It's the bread and then their queso was good.
00:04:29.200 Chili's used to be like the haps, the place to go. 1.00
00:04:32.060 Had a lot of cool like memorabilia up.
00:04:34.980 Now it's changed like everything else.
00:04:37.460 Oh, you know who has good chicken nuggets?
00:04:52.100 Who?
00:04:52.520 Um, Shake Shack.
00:04:54.080 Really?
00:04:54.700 I've never had anything other than hamburgers.
00:04:56.800 I think they're newer on their menu because I think it's burgers, obviously.
00:05:00.680 But, um, yeah, they're pretty good.
00:05:03.200 And, um, one thing that I really missed when I was overseas was Popeye's.
00:05:11.400 Popeye's?
00:05:11.600 That's my guilty pleasure.
00:05:13.080 Oh, my gosh.
00:05:14.380 Okay.
00:05:14.640 I would have Popeye's in college sometimes.
00:05:17.580 Uh, that was the first time I'd ever tried.
00:05:19.620 No, no, no, no.
00:05:20.220 It wasn't Popeye's.
00:05:21.440 It was their arch nemesis, uh, Bojangles.
00:05:24.940 Have you had Bojangles?
00:05:26.020 I haven't.
00:05:26.620 Oh.
00:05:26.840 I've never been in a place where there was one, I don't think.
00:05:29.160 Yeah, yeah, well, I went to college in South Carolina, so it's similar to Popeye's.
00:05:34.220 I don't know if I've ever eaten Popeye's.
00:05:36.080 I'm definitely not against it.
00:05:37.380 I just don't know if I have.
00:05:38.480 You might be against it if you experienced the, how it's run.
00:05:44.320 Oh, it's not a pleasant.
00:05:45.960 Sometimes you're scared when you're there.
00:05:48.740 That's just all part of the ambiance.
00:05:50.520 Yeah.
00:05:50.880 Like McDonald's, too.
00:05:52.300 I feel like McDonald's is a scary place.
00:05:54.060 I saw, I always, I follow these, like, nostalgic 90s accounts, and I saw this video of, like,
00:05:59.840 an old McDonald's in the 80s.
00:06:01.740 It was so nice.
00:06:03.340 It was like you could, you know, actually go in and sit down and not be like, oh, my gosh,
00:06:07.660 am I catching a disease?
00:06:09.100 When you were in Scotland, did you ever go to a McDonald's?
00:06:13.080 Hmm.
00:06:13.600 I don't think so, because I'm not really, I've just never been a McDonald's fan.
00:06:17.000 I know some people do that.
00:06:19.700 They, in Europe, are very nice.
00:06:22.620 Really?
00:06:22.980 Yeah, they're, like, very, it's still fast food, but they're a little bit higher quality
00:06:27.220 because they outlaw some of the stuff that we still have in our food here.
00:06:31.080 Yes.
00:06:31.380 And they're just really clean and nice, and, like, it's all, like, everything's upgraded.
00:06:37.100 That's nice.
00:06:38.000 Yeah, so you get used to that, and then you come here, and you're like, oh.
00:06:40.800 We can't have nice things here.
00:06:41.640 I don't want to go inside a McDonald's ever.
00:06:43.520 Yeah, yeah.
00:06:44.480 I'm not looking down on McDonald's.
00:06:46.780 I've just never been, like, a McDonald's fan, and unfortunately, they aren't, like, anymore
00:06:50.940 the cleanest, nicest, nicest places.
00:06:53.320 Always, if you're on a road trip, you look for the quick trip.
00:06:57.780 You look for the Chick-fil-A.
00:07:00.640 Yeah.
00:07:01.880 And those are the places.
00:07:03.280 And racetrack.
00:07:04.960 You know, now McDonald's has that new commercial, and they say, if you go on a road trip without
00:07:09.360 going to a McDonald's, it's not really a road trip.
00:07:11.960 And I thought that was interesting, because I do seek out McDonald's when we're doing
00:07:16.800 road trips.
00:07:17.500 Yeah.
00:07:17.840 To eat or to just, like, stop?
00:07:20.680 To eat.
00:07:22.060 Oh, really?
00:07:22.620 Not to, like, go in, but it's just because, like, it's quick, and they're everywhere.
00:07:26.640 Yeah, it is quick.
00:07:27.220 That's the thing.
00:07:28.220 So, growing up in Texas, you had Whataburger.
00:07:31.540 Whataburger, and I like Whataburger, but it takes forever, because they are actually killing
00:07:39.840 the cow in the back, and they're processing the meat right there while you are ordering.
00:07:45.520 At least it's fresh.
00:07:46.800 Yeah, at least it's fresh.
00:07:48.080 So, that takes forever.
00:07:49.420 Now, you've had Whataburger.
00:07:51.300 I have, yeah.
00:07:52.240 Whataburger versus In-N-Out.
00:07:54.100 Oh, In-N-Out.
00:07:56.020 Okay, are you a Thousand Island gal?
00:07:57.780 Like, you like the sauce?
00:07:59.180 Yes.
00:07:59.600 The sauce is amazing.
00:08:00.940 They toast the buns.
00:08:02.680 It's all fresh.
00:08:04.280 Like, they don't freeze anything ever.
00:08:07.440 Interesting.
00:08:08.140 I didn't know that.
00:08:09.280 And the fries are really fresh, too, but I think there are better fries elsewhere, but
00:08:13.560 In-N-Out all the way.
00:08:14.960 But I'm from California, so I'm biased.
00:08:17.480 Yeah.
00:08:19.040 I like In-N-Out.
00:08:20.600 It also takes a long time.
00:08:22.420 But also, I do like their customer service, the family that owns In-N-Out.
00:08:27.000 They're a Christian family.
00:08:28.520 Yes.
00:08:28.820 They opposed a lot of the COVID stuff in California.
00:08:32.000 Yes.
00:08:32.500 They pay their employees well, too.
00:08:34.200 I bet.
00:08:34.840 Because you can tell.
00:08:36.200 And I think that's true at Chick-fil-A, too.
00:08:38.180 Yeah.
00:08:38.620 Because they rise to the occasion.
00:08:40.960 I just don't really like Thousand Island.
00:08:42.960 And if you don't like Thousand Island, like, it's not like there's a variety of things that
00:08:46.680 you can get at In-N-Out.
00:08:48.620 Yeah.
00:08:49.260 That's true.
00:08:49.880 It's a very small menu.
00:08:50.840 Yeah.
00:08:51.120 Whereas at Whataburger, you could get from 11 p.m. to 11 a.m. honey butter chicken biscuit.
00:08:57.960 You know, I was just talking to someone about that.
00:09:00.480 And I don't like them.
00:09:01.980 Because I don't like honey.
00:09:03.080 Because I don't like things.
00:09:03.540 You don't like honey.
00:09:05.060 I don't like getting, like, sticky things.
00:09:06.940 Brie, your name is almost B. And you, like, what? How is it even possible to not like
00:09:14.280 honey?
00:09:15.120 I don't know.
00:09:15.540 What don't you like about this? That's what I need to know.
00:09:18.300 Okay. It's super sticky. The first time I had it, it was a while ago.
00:09:21.460 It's super sticky. Is that what you're about to say?
00:09:24.720 But if it's, like, fast food and I have to eat it with my hands, I don't want sticky.
00:09:30.200 Oh, the honey butter chicken biscuit. Not just the honey.
00:09:32.900 Yeah. But honey in general, I guess I just don't really like the taste. But also, this is a
00:09:36.640 hot take, I think.
00:09:37.600 Okay. I'm ready.
00:09:38.760 I hate it on my sweet and savory mix.
00:09:42.160 Really?
00:09:42.940 Yeah. When people are like, oh, maple syrup and bacon. I'm like, no. They have to be separate.
00:09:49.460 If I go to a breakfast place and I have, like, pancakes and bacon, separate plate.
00:09:54.180 Separate plate?
00:09:55.140 Separate plate. They can't touch.
00:09:57.280 Really?
00:09:57.620 Really?
00:09:58.080 Yeah. It's like one of my puppies.
00:09:59.140 So what about, like, trail mix that has M&Ms in it? No.
00:10:03.600 No.
00:10:04.940 Wow.
00:10:05.340 I hate kettle corn because of that.
00:10:07.960 Really?
00:10:08.600 Yeah.
00:10:09.180 That's interesting. I didn't know that about you.
00:10:11.460 Yeah.
00:10:11.960 Okay. Any other hot takes on food?
00:10:15.860 Not that I can think of.
00:10:16.440 I hate ketchup.
00:10:18.200 Ketchup grosses me out.
00:10:18.740 Oh, I actually hate ketchup, too.
00:10:20.100 You do?
00:10:20.420 It's too, like, sweet.
00:10:22.720 Do you like milk? We talked about this the other day.
00:10:25.600 And milk is okay.
00:10:26.620 I would never drink it on, I think it's kind of crazy to just drink milk.
00:10:30.920 Oh, really? You think it's so, that's crazy?
00:10:32.980 It's wild.
00:10:33.960 It's wild.
00:10:34.400 People don't just drink milk.
00:10:35.780 I think there's a TikTok about that.
00:10:38.360 You're going to hate the promised land.
00:10:40.180 Overflowing with milk and honey, Brie.
00:10:41.940 Oh, my God.
00:10:42.880 I know.
00:10:44.240 Oh, no.
00:10:45.740 Milk has always tasted sour to me.
00:10:49.100 Every, like, it always tastes sour.
00:10:52.100 It just always has tasted bad.
00:10:53.680 Since I was a baby, my mom said I threw the bottle down.
00:10:56.880 I would never take milk.
00:10:57.560 Like, every kind of milk?
00:10:59.480 I mean, not chocolate milk.
00:11:01.440 Everything is made better with sugar.
00:11:03.680 I always, like, am the scene from Elf when they're, like, she's like, oh, you must like sugar.
00:11:11.120 And he's like, is there sugar in maple syrup?
00:11:13.220 Then yes.
00:11:13.780 Yes.
00:11:14.500 That's always the answer.
00:11:15.900 Oh, you like chocolate milk?
00:11:17.320 Is there sugar in chocolate milk?
00:11:18.500 Yes.
00:11:19.000 I love sugar.
00:11:19.520 Have you tried oat milk or almond milk?
00:11:22.080 Which I know are made with seed oil, but.
00:11:24.360 Well, almond milk is not always.
00:11:26.740 Like, you can get three trees almond milk, which I do.
00:11:29.900 Like, if I were eating cereal, which I don't eat that much.
00:11:31.940 But if I had to have, like, in a protein shake, I would use almond milk.
00:11:35.400 Yeah.
00:11:36.200 Three trees.
00:11:37.600 They are not a sponsor.
00:11:39.060 But I do recommend them because it's really only almonds and water.
00:11:42.620 Whereas the other ones, like at Trader Joe's and stuff, they do have all that, like, stuff in there.
00:11:46.960 But oat milk, I've heard, is terrible for you.
00:11:49.040 Yeah, I've heard that, too.
00:11:50.320 It tastes nice, though.
00:11:51.540 Huh?
00:11:51.960 Tastes nice, though.
00:11:52.840 But yeah, it is terrible.
00:11:53.600 I still remember the Super Bowl commercial from several years ago, though, where the, like, founder of Oatly was, like, playing a piano in the middle of a field or something.
00:12:02.000 Which is pretty impressive that that has stuck in my memory.
00:12:05.280 So I guess you did a good job.
00:12:06.220 Yeah, because I don't know what you're talking about. 0.99
00:12:06.640 At the time, I thought it was stupid. 0.99
00:12:08.660 But here I am still talking about it. 0.99
00:12:11.000 So way to go.
00:12:11.700 Okay, so very, very different question.
00:12:25.840 This is not a lighthearted question.
00:12:28.800 But that's what we do in these Q&A episodes.
00:12:31.120 Wide range of things.
00:12:32.580 The question is, is IVF a Christian liberty issue?
00:12:37.500 And what is meant by Christian liberty is that, is this just something that Christians can agree to disagree on?
00:12:45.360 Or is it really fundamental?
00:12:47.500 Is it really important?
00:12:49.020 So yes and no.
00:12:50.840 It's Christian liberty in the sense that I don't think it's a salvation issue.
00:12:55.720 I don't think someone loses their, well, I don't think someone loses their salvation at all.
00:12:59.700 But I don't think someone loses their salvation because they are a Christian and they go through IVF.
00:13:06.060 As I've said many times, Christians can be wrong about a lot of things and still be Christian. 1.00
00:13:11.100 Because we are all finite.
00:13:12.560 We are all fallible.
00:13:13.600 Every single one of us will enter into heaven with a long list of things.
00:13:17.640 Long list of ideas and held beliefs that we are wrong about.
00:13:21.160 But by grace through faith, we believe in the gospel.
00:13:25.480 And we have been saved by Christ.
00:13:27.480 There are a lot of things that we can disagree on.
00:13:30.220 That doesn't mean that there's not a solid biblical answer for it.
00:13:33.900 In the same way that we disagree on things as Christians, like eschatology,
00:13:39.700 what are the end times going to look like, Calvinism versus Arminianism.
00:13:44.680 These are all really important questions to which there is a right answer.
00:13:50.560 We cannot all be equally right.
00:13:52.720 We can't all have an equally correct interpretation of scripture.
00:13:56.220 We may not know what that answer will be exactly.
00:14:01.740 None of us can claim to know everything about scripture, claim to know everything about the
00:14:07.000 mind of God, everything that eternity has to offer.
00:14:12.560 But we can say, okay, our salvation isn't dependent upon these issues that we typically call secondary
00:14:22.380 or tertiary issues.
00:14:24.340 So someone can believe that IVF is fine and still be a Christian, but that doesn't mean 1.00
00:14:30.020 they're just as right as the person who says, well, biblically, it's actually, there are some
00:14:36.360 ethical questions with it.
00:14:39.040 So that's what I would say.
00:14:41.060 As far as Christian liberty, no. 1.00
00:14:44.360 No, it's not like there are multiple answers to the question, depending on how you look
00:14:48.860 at it.
00:14:49.620 But can we disagree and still be assured of our salvation in Christ?
00:14:53.840 Sure.
00:14:55.120 As far as IVF, yes, there are, I think, some worse ways to use it and some better ways to
00:15:00.920 use it.
00:15:01.360 I think the worst possible way to use IVF is to fertilize as many eggs as possible, get
00:15:06.300 as many embryos as possible, and then implant a couple, implant as many as you can, hope
00:15:15.160 that they take, and then put the rest of them on ice or destroy the rest of them.
00:15:20.020 Just giving yourself as many chances as possible to have an egg that actually implants and that
00:15:26.680 grows into the baby that you birth, not really caring what happens to the other embryos that
00:15:33.320 are fertilized, whether they are frozen in perpetuity or whether they are destroyed.
00:15:38.020 Like, that is a form of abandonment of your offspring because we believe that life starts
00:15:44.620 at conception.
00:15:45.480 We know that life starts with conception.
00:15:47.460 It's not a question whether or not human life starts at conception.
00:15:50.280 It does.
00:15:50.980 That's when unique DNA begins.
00:15:52.620 But it is the Christian belief, and I think the logical belief, that that is also when human
00:16:00.100 life has value.
00:16:01.200 If we say that human life has value at any point after fertilization, well, then it becomes
00:16:07.080 very arbitrary.
00:16:08.060 Who gets to decide?
00:16:09.600 Oh, you have the right not to be murdered, not to be discarded when you're at six weeks
00:16:14.620 gestation, when you're at 26 gestation, when you're six seconds before coming out of the
00:16:20.200 womb, not until you're two years old.
00:16:22.080 I mean, these are actually philosophical debates that are had among secularists who have no real
00:16:27.080 basis for why human beings matter.
00:16:29.020 But because we as Christians know that we are made in the image of God, Genesis 127, that
00:16:35.340 he formed us in our mother's womb with purpose and with love and through providence, as we
00:16:41.320 read in Psalm 139, we know that as soon as a human becomes a human, which is scientifically
00:16:46.420 at the point of conception, that human being has value.
00:16:49.500 It's made in the image of God.
00:16:51.160 Therefore, matters.
00:16:52.020 Therefore, what we do with that life matters.
00:16:55.580 And we also understand that we are called to be responsible for our children, that we're
00:16:59.420 called to take care of our children.
00:17:01.580 We read fatherlessness as a category exclusively of vulnerability and marginalization in the
00:17:08.580 Bible that God calls us to rectify, that God calls us to redeem.
00:17:14.420 He is the father of the fatherless.
00:17:16.240 And so child abandonment, refusing to steward your child by caring for them and caring for
00:17:22.200 their well-being is wrong, according to the Bible.
00:17:25.840 And that would be because we understand that these embryos are tiny little image bearers of
00:17:30.460 God in their first stages of life, placing our children on ice in perpetuity or destroying
00:17:35.500 our children.
00:17:36.180 I mean, that's the ethical, that's the moral, that's the biblical dilemma that people who
00:17:42.260 create these fertilized embryos through IVF create for themselves.
00:17:48.220 And you're stuck in a really, really difficult place.
00:17:51.640 And that's why I don't recommend IVF.
00:17:55.760 But also, if you, so the last, I would say the last problematic, the last problematic form
00:18:01.880 of IVF is when you implant all of the embryos, all of the eggs that you fertilize, you implant
00:18:11.500 all of the embryos that you have.
00:18:16.760 You give them all a shot at life.
00:18:19.240 There are fewer ethical qualms with that, but that's still not without its questions.
00:18:26.160 Because whenever you separate conception from sex, whenever technology takes us away from
00:18:34.760 what's natural to what's possible, there will always be questions.
00:18:38.240 There will always be gaps to be filled in.
00:18:40.600 That doesn't mean in every case of technological development that it's wrong, that it's unethical.
00:18:46.260 But certainly, when it comes to conception and the creation of human beings, there are going
00:18:50.620 to be questions about taking us from what's natural to what's possible.
00:18:53.660 And one of the issues with IVF is that there is a high attrition rate that you know going
00:19:00.480 into it that it is very likely that the embryos that you create will not survive.
00:19:07.640 They will be miscarried.
00:19:09.560 They won't implant.
00:19:11.800 They won't grow to fruition.
00:19:13.700 So you are taking a risk with that little human being's life purposely.
00:19:18.460 Now, of course, human beings who are naturally conceived in sex, in the, you know, in that
00:19:27.940 natural process, of course, there's always going to be a chance of miscarriage. 0.99
00:19:33.760 Miscarriage is very common, even through that natural process.
00:19:37.780 But there's an even higher likelihood of miscarriage when it comes to IVF.
00:19:42.780 So you are knowingly taking the chance, a higher chance, of the child dying in that process
00:19:49.820 by going through IVF.
00:19:51.640 These are questions that you have to ask.
00:19:53.960 If these are little image bearers of God, is that a risk worth taking?
00:19:57.240 And why are we taking it?
00:19:58.860 Is it simply because we want to become parents, which is a wonderful desire to have?
00:20:03.480 It can be a very godly desire.
00:20:05.280 But we can't conflate what we want with what's right.
00:20:09.600 We can't conflate what we desire with God's calling.
00:20:12.480 So just because we want something and just because something is technologically possible
00:20:17.680 does not mean that it's moral or biblical or right.
00:20:21.480 So that does not mean that I think that parents who have children through IVF, that they're
00:20:28.320 bad parents, that they're evil, that their kids aren't valuable, or I'm not even asking
00:20:34.120 you to regret your children.
00:20:38.020 Of course, you look at your children.
00:20:39.180 If they were conceived through IVF, you're still so thankful for them.
00:20:42.240 Of course, I wouldn't expect anything less.
00:20:44.640 You love your children.
00:20:46.200 And I'm sure you are wonderful parents.
00:20:48.320 It's not about that.
00:20:49.600 It's not about the value of your kids.
00:20:52.040 It's not about your quality as a mom or a dad if you went through these things.
00:20:56.200 But these are uncomfortable questions that we all have to ask ourselves.
00:20:59.620 And I know people say, well, it's easy for you to say because you didn't have to go
00:21:04.240 through that or you got pregnant easily.
00:21:06.360 I mean, people make all kinds of assumptions and say, well, again, you're going back to
00:21:11.740 adult desire.
00:21:12.940 Adult desire does not justify putting the well-being of a child at risk.
00:21:19.400 So yeah, that's what I would say about that.
00:21:21.160 I know that's long-winded.
00:21:22.200 So is there Christian liberty? 0.75
00:21:23.820 Certainly.
00:21:24.440 And that I don't think you lose church membership.
00:21:26.760 I don't think that you lose your salvation.
00:21:28.920 Certainly, if we disagree on IVF.
00:21:33.180 But there is, I think, a biblical answer to whether or not IVF is something that Christians
00:21:39.060 should engage in.
00:21:40.040 Um, how to overcome the fear of spending so much money on private Christian K-12 school?
00:22:01.440 Uh, yeah, I totally understand.
00:22:04.180 I totally understand that there is a high cost to private education.
00:22:10.040 To Christian education.
00:22:11.580 And that's simply not possible for everyone.
00:22:15.740 Um, however, also just keep in mind, and maybe this is a possibility for you that you've
00:22:21.620 considered, but Christian education doesn't have to be private education.
00:22:25.300 It can also be home education.
00:22:26.900 It can be hybrid options.
00:22:28.480 There are virtual, uh, virtual classes and different kinds of curriculum that you can look
00:22:33.100 at for Christian education.
00:22:34.480 And I know some people think, I can't homeschool.
00:22:37.000 That alone is way too expensive.
00:22:38.620 But honestly, most of the homeschool families that I know are not super wealthy.
00:22:44.000 They're making a lot of sacrifices.
00:22:45.820 Yes, they're living on one income.
00:22:47.620 They're making it work to give that home education for their children. 1.00
00:22:51.600 But, like, I honestly don't know many homeschool families who are doing it because they're just
00:22:56.780 rolling in the dough.
00:22:58.100 Because they're millionaires and it's just really easy for them.
00:23:01.120 Actually, I understand that they're making really big financial sacrifices by taking
00:23:06.400 away one income in order to stay home and educate their kids.
00:23:11.540 And it's not expensive to homeschool.
00:23:14.220 It might be expensive to take away that one income so mom can stay home and teach the kids. 1.00
00:23:19.420 But it's not expensive to homeschool.
00:23:21.520 You can do it in a very affordable way.
00:23:23.540 However, if that's not an option for whatever reason, you don't want to do that.
00:23:26.560 You really like this Christian private school in your area, which I think is great.
00:23:30.820 I went to a Christian private school, kindergarten through 12th grade.
00:23:33.540 My dad always said that he would work as many shifts as possible to ensure that his kids
00:23:37.640 got a Christian education.
00:23:38.980 My brother homeschooled for a little while.
00:23:40.980 So we had different things that we did.
00:23:43.440 But for me, kindergarten through 12th grade, like, let me tell you, I would not trade that
00:23:47.920 for the world.
00:23:48.540 Was it perfect?
00:23:49.520 No, it was perfect.
00:23:50.640 Did everyone that I graduate with end up staying a Christian forever and, you know, go on mission 1.00
00:23:55.200 for God?
00:23:55.900 No.
00:23:56.680 Some of them went to school up north and they decided that they knew better than their parents.
00:24:03.620 They knew better than their teachers.
00:24:05.080 They knew better than everyone else.
00:24:06.940 They weren't going to be like those, you know, backwoods hicks who believed in God and
00:24:11.720 things like the sanctity of marriage anymore, that they finally had it figured out.
00:24:15.560 And that really, it's these Christians over here who were brainwashed and the rest of the 0.99
00:24:21.040 world who got it right and, you know, became moral relativists and all of that.
00:24:26.640 And maybe some of them have made their way back.
00:24:28.740 Maybe some of them haven't.
00:24:30.520 But I did go to a very conservative Christian school and no Christian education, no education
00:24:36.860 guarantees that your child will end up rejecting Christ or being a Christian.
00:24:43.140 We don't we don't know.
00:24:44.800 No, no education guarantees a particular outcome.
00:24:49.060 But I will say from personal experience and also what the Bible says, as we've talked about
00:24:53.420 many times, like I would not trade my education for the world.
00:24:57.100 It laid a theological foundation for me that benefits me every single day, every single
00:25:06.560 day.
00:25:06.940 I think I use what I was taught in kindergarten through 12th grade in my job and in my life.
00:25:13.040 It is the reason one of the reasons I would say why I am able to write and to research
00:25:19.240 and to argue the way that I am, because we were taught that so persistently and insistently,
00:25:26.240 especially when I was in middle school and high school.
00:25:28.420 They emphasize so much the importance of understanding literature, analyzing literature, being able to
00:25:34.080 articulate that analysis and to be able to write persuasively and articulately.
00:25:39.660 Really, the people who went to my school, whether they did well in English or not, they went to
00:25:43.940 college fully prepared to be able to communicate well.
00:25:47.660 And so I'm thankful for that.
00:25:48.780 But really, more than just academically, I am so thankful that I learned the Bible in every
00:25:55.580 class that I took.
00:25:56.660 In every class that I took, there was a biblical lesson to be learned.
00:26:00.740 I'm sure some of the theology I grew up with in that school I wouldn't agree with today.
00:26:04.640 But I don't think if it were for my school that I would have been introduced as early
00:26:08.840 as I was to C.S.
00:26:10.720 Lewis and to apologetics and to deep theological debates and discussions that really helped
00:26:19.480 me form my faith and helped me grasp what Christianity really is.
00:26:24.320 People always ask me, how do you bring verses to top of mind so quickly?
00:26:29.020 How do you have this recall about this?
00:26:30.860 I can't take credit for it, so I hope you don't hear me sounding arrogant or anything.
00:26:36.040 It's because we were taught that.
00:26:37.920 We were taught that several hours a week at school, kindergarten through 12th grade.
00:26:45.220 That's why.
00:26:46.240 Like, I have that foundation that I didn't start when I was 25, but started when I was five.
00:26:52.560 And that makes a huge difference.
00:26:54.300 People who say, well, there's really no, there's no difference between a Christian education and
00:26:58.220 non-Christian education.
00:26:59.100 The discipleship happens at home.
00:27:01.160 Okay, like, let's just do a little math.
00:27:04.000 If you've got 40 hours a week at school and you've got a few hours at night with your parents,
00:27:09.900 if that, because you've got extracurriculars, a few hours on the weekend with your parents,
00:27:14.600 if that, because you've got time with your friends and you've got games and things like
00:27:18.240 that, how much are you really getting discipled as a child?
00:27:21.900 Like, if most of your week, if 40 hours of your week is being indoctrinated with a anti-God
00:27:29.760 or at the very best, a non-biblical, non-biblical education, and in most cases today, an anti-biblical
00:27:40.720 education versus having 40 hours a week where you are having, where you are getting a biblical
00:27:48.700 education.
00:27:49.200 Like, what's better?
00:27:50.600 What's better?
00:27:51.140 40 hours a week with an anti-God, anti-biblical education, or 40 weeks with a biblical education?
00:27:56.760 Which one's better?
00:27:58.000 And again, it's not necessarily about guaranteeing outcomes.
00:28:01.240 There are apostates and heretics that I graduated with who had the same education that I did.
00:28:06.160 And there are people I knew who graduated from public school who are amazing Christians
00:28:10.080 today.
00:28:10.900 Um, but so that's not really the question about like, okay, well, what guarantees outcomes?
00:28:16.960 The question is, what's our responsibility as parents?
00:28:21.460 What's our responsibility?
00:28:23.140 Our, our job is to steward our children well.
00:28:26.780 Our job is to disciple our children and what is good and right and true.
00:28:30.760 And yes, that includes, must include their education.
00:28:34.760 I mean, read Deuteronomy 6.
00:28:36.280 That's how important education was to God, that it was supposed to be a pervasive part
00:28:40.540 of their lives, not just something that we compartmentalize.
00:28:43.800 Like, oh, let's just give our kids over to the secularists for eight hours of the day and 0.99
00:28:51.980 hope to catch up with that in the evenings and afternoons, which again, I think is unrealistic
00:28:57.740 for most busy families.
00:29:00.540 That's, that was never, that was never the vision of education.
00:29:04.020 That's a misunderstanding of how the human mind works.
00:29:06.580 That's a misunderstanding of how I think the, the spirit works and how we are all created.
00:29:11.660 Of course, the more discipleship we get, the more Bible we get, the more theology we get,
00:29:18.280 the better.
00:29:20.000 Um, and so I, I don't think that there's an argument for, and I know that there are some
00:29:25.440 exceptions.
00:29:26.240 There's some exceptions, certainly.
00:29:28.380 Christian schools don't always have the special needs accommodations, et cetera.
00:29:31.380 But if you have the choice between a Christian education, whether that be private school or
00:29:38.040 homeschool and a secular education, if you have that option, it is a no brainer for the
00:29:46.580 Christian.
00:29:47.660 Your kid is not supposed to be a missionary in the public education system.
00:29:51.880 Okay.
00:29:53.040 They're kindergarten.
00:29:54.040 They're walking into a class.
00:29:55.580 They're not even big enough to hold up their shield yet.
00:29:58.040 And yet we're putting them on the front lines.
00:30:00.540 Look, they have their entire life to be in the mission field.
00:30:03.260 They have their entire life to be a light in the darkness.
00:30:06.720 Like we have a tiny, tiny window of time to equip our children with what is good and right
00:30:12.620 and true to prepare them for the battlefield.
00:30:14.740 And along the way, there's going to be small battles, but we're still going to be there to
00:30:18.920 protect them.
00:30:19.480 One day they will not have our protection anymore.
00:30:22.300 Let's get them as strong as possible, as theologically solid as possible, as apologetically
00:30:29.300 strong as possible.
00:30:32.280 Let's prepare them as much as possible.
00:30:33.760 Of course, that is going to require hours and hours of study and discipleship during the
00:30:39.680 week rather than just trying to fit it in between secular school and extracurriculars
00:30:44.040 when we can.
00:30:44.640 Um, so back to your question, how to overcome the fear of spending so much money on private
00:30:53.700 Christian K through 12 school.
00:30:55.620 Let me tell you something that my dad told me, Allie, there's a difference between an
00:31:01.440 expense and an investment.
00:31:04.840 An expense is just spending.
00:31:06.940 We all have expenses that we have to spend and we want to make sure that we're managing
00:31:11.320 those things well.
00:31:12.100 And then there are investments, which give us a return that matters more than what we
00:31:19.020 are spending or the value that we get from however much we're spending is so much bigger
00:31:24.920 and so much greater than the money that is being taken out of our bank account, um, that
00:31:33.300 it is worth it.
00:31:34.680 So K through 12 Christian education, whatever that looks like, is not an expense.
00:31:41.080 It is an investment and the return that you can get on that investment is worth it.
00:31:48.000 If you can do it.
00:31:49.300 And by the way, I know a lot of parents who they take it one year at a time.
00:31:53.900 They're not making millions of dollars.
00:31:55.720 They're just like, we're going to trust the Lord to provide this year.
00:31:58.920 We're going to trust the Lord to provide next year.
00:32:00.780 And they keep going and going and going because they know they're stewarding their children
00:32:04.260 well.
00:32:04.820 That's an investment.
00:32:06.400 It's not an expense.
00:32:07.760 And it is such a worthy investment.
00:32:11.780 Such a worthy investment.
00:32:13.160 There are fewer, uh, there are few greater investments that you can make than in your child's
00:32:21.640 Christian education.
00:32:22.560 Um, all right, we'll just go ahead and end on that.
00:32:26.200 Why wide range of things going on, uh, going on in today's episode, but I hope you benefited
00:32:30.700 from it.
00:32:31.340 Some controversial, maybe our first conversation about In-N-Out versus Whataburger might have
00:32:35.600 been the most controversial part of this for you.
00:32:38.840 Uh, who knows, but thanks again for sending all of your wonderful questions.
00:32:42.760 I really appreciate it.
00:32:44.000 All right.
00:32:44.600 We will be back here soon.
00:32:45.640 Hey guys, if you love this podcast, please leave us a five-star review wherever you listen
00:33:03.680 on Apple podcasts or on Spotify.
00:33:06.340 And if you haven't yet, please subscribe to our YouTube channel.
00:33:10.260 Thanks.
00:33:15.640 Bye.