The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - Mark Driscoll Vs. Matt Chandler & The Type Of Church Plants We Actually Need ｜ with Michael Foster

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00:00:40.760 Hi, welcome back to Right Response Ministries. You're listening to Theology Applied, and I'm

00:00:45.300 your host, Pastor Joel Webbin. In this episode of Theology Applied, I'm very privileged to welcome

00:00:51.060 back onto the show Michael Foster. Michael Foster is the co-author of It's Good to Be a Man. He's

00:00:57.140 pastor of East River Church outside of Cincinnati, Ohio. And in this episode, we talk, we really just,

00:01:04.940 Michael and I have become friends by the grace of God, and I enjoy his friendship. And we talk

00:01:08.720 on the phone probably about once a week, and we basically just did a phone call where we hit

00:01:12.700 record. That's basically this episode. We talk all over the place, but it's interesting. We talk

00:01:17.380 about Andrew Tate. We talk about Mark Driscoll. We talk about Matt Chandler. We talk about Acts

00:01:23.380 29, we talk about apostasy. We talk about wokeness. We talk about guys needing spines. We talk about

00:01:30.960 Presbyterian versus Baptist and why Presbyterians like me, even though I am a Baptist and all these

00:01:36.620 different things. We talk about biblical patriarchy and post-millennialism and the need for

00:01:42.720 confidence, not in the flesh, but in Christ, courage, boldness, and that we need men. We need

00:01:49.900 more churches planted. We need pastors and we need to move forward for the glory of God. So

00:01:55.820 if you're interested in kind of just a behind the scenes conversation between Michael Foster

00:02:00.680 and Joel Webin, well, that's what you're going to get in this episode. Tune in now.

00:02:04.820 Applying God's word to every aspect of life. This is Theology Applied.

00:02:14.560 All right. We are back with another episode of Theology Applied. I am your host, Pastor Joel

00:02:19.060 webin with right response ministries and in this particular episode i'm privileged to welcome back

00:02:24.040 onto the show michael foster michael thanks for joining us i'm thinking about taking my this

00:02:30.200 and tying it into a bow tie because you got to look a little you have your fancy chair there and

00:02:37.380 and this nice suit look how dapper you're looking and i'm here in my my my hoodie i feel well you

00:02:44.220 I have to try, but you're coming out with a documentary with Canon,

00:02:48.320 and so your credibility has already been established.

00:02:51.720 I have to work on mine.

00:02:54.400 Or my lack of credibility, depending on the circles.

00:02:57.200 Depending on how much you hate Canon.

00:03:00.980 It's good to be here. Thanks for having me again.

00:03:03.000 Cool. Thanks for coming.

00:03:03.940 Tell our listeners real quick, what is the name of the church that you pastor currently?

00:03:08.520 East River Church.

00:03:10.400 Lord willing, it would be the church I pastor to, I'd die.

00:03:14.220 Or at least a 10 till I die.

00:03:16.360 There you go.

00:03:17.060 And where are you guys located?

00:03:19.300 Batavia, Ohio.

00:03:20.460 So we're about 35 minutes from downtown Cincinnati.

00:03:23.360 Cincinnati's got a big road around it called 275.

00:03:25.800 It makes a big loop.

00:03:26.920 So we're about 10 minutes off the 275 loop.

00:03:31.380 And we were just talking offline before we started recording,

00:03:33.920 but your church has blown up.

00:03:36.660 You guys, you know, you started less than a year and a half ago.

00:03:39.660 You said December 2021.

00:03:42.000 Not 2020, but 2021.

00:03:44.220 oh you know i said to you wrong i've lost track of time covid time yeah it was i get it wait it

00:03:50.960 was 2020 yeah we started in 2020 so it's been two years but still yeah a little so barely over two

00:03:56.440 years and you guys are already over 300 people on on a lord's day that's awesome that's pretty

00:04:03.480 amazing what do you and you said part of that is because you had a lot of relationships and did you

00:04:07.880 grow up in cincinnati what was the connection there and you said your elders you planted with

00:04:11.480 two other guys and they had a lot of relationships and connections that it wasn't just all the

00:04:16.120 internet you know we want to be a man and we're following michael foster people that came out but

00:04:20.640 it was just a lot of local people that actually had real tangible relationships what what's your

00:04:25.840 background with cincinnati so um cincinnati is a tri-state area it's where kentucky ohio and

00:04:32.820 indiana meet all on the ohio river so i um i'm from i grew up all over the place but my family

00:04:40.240 settled uh in my as i started uh high school settled in lawrenceburg indiana which is right

00:04:46.720 on the river across from where the creation museum is creation museums in kutaki i grew up on the

00:04:51.140 other side of that so um when i became a creation when i was 17 i ran into some skateboarders

00:04:57.160 preaching the gospel i thought they back then skateboarders weren't a bunch of preppy losers

00:05:02.220 uh they're actually like kind of hardcore losers like dangerous people right um and so i thought

00:05:09.580 oh man i'm gonna get in a fight with skateboarders i just became a christian my friends didn't want

00:05:13.300 to hang out with me anymore because i wouldn't shut up about jesus and then this guy skates up

00:05:17.920 to me and says um do you know jesus well i had a a t-shirt on that said no no jesus uh no peace

00:05:25.480 right and it had both uh the n o and the n o w so it was 90s you always had all these like kind of

00:05:33.160 funny t-shirts or dorky t-shirts so i thought he was mocking my t-shirt but he wasn't he um

00:05:38.920 His name is Eric Tuffinsam. He's a pastor at Christ the King Church today. He had just became a Christian, and so had I. And we became friends. And me, him, and his brother went all around kind of the tri-state area preaching the gospel downtown, did a Bible studies, drove up, street preached out in Chicago, Minucca Pretty Green, Robert Townsend Homes.

00:06:03.740 we got all around and uh he went to calvary christian school and that was a local uh christian

00:06:10.920 school in the tri-state so they had people coming from all over the place including people in

00:06:14.460 cincinnati so there was a family that wanted to start a bible study and they asked my friend to

00:06:20.420 lead it so he came down i went with them and then i eventually took over it that bible study

00:06:25.400 was um my wife uh lived at the top of the street attended that's where i met my wife

00:06:32.100 And we started dating, not courting.

00:06:34.700 And it was in the middle of I Kissed Day and Goodbye.

00:06:36.920 It was a big controversy.

00:06:38.740 But anyhow, so then those Bible studies I led, these kind of community Bible studies,

00:06:45.800 were always somewhere between 30 and 100 people.

00:06:48.860 They got really big.

00:06:50.240 And then I became a youth pastor, and I taught a lot of kids.

00:06:53.240 And I continued to be part of a skateboard ministry that would have hundreds of kids,

00:06:57.880 like anywhere from 250 to 500 kids show up.

00:07:01.400 Uh, at each event, we'd set up a mobile skate park. They'd come skate it. We'd sit them all down,

00:07:06.320 uh, preach straight Roman's roads, right at them, tell them to go into hell to repent.

00:07:10.900 Um, so I, I knew a ton of people in Cincinnati for that reason. And my wife's from the East side

00:07:17.080 of Cincinnati at one of those Bible studies. Um, I met a young man. He's 13. His name was David

00:07:22.660 Pryor. Uh, he told me he was learning the guitar and asked if he would leave worship for us. Uh,

00:07:27.160 So he started leading worship for us.

00:07:29.380 David today is our pastor of liturgy, our worship pastor here.

00:07:33.620 Now he's well into his 30s.

00:07:35.780 His dad, Hank Pryor, he's from out here.

00:07:39.020 He's Appalachian.

00:07:40.200 He's a true east sider.

00:07:41.580 I met Hank back when I was 19 and fiery and, you know, didn't know when to shut up and back out of controversy.

00:07:49.500 And, you know, Hank was a big old Arminian back then.

00:07:53.840 And then when I became a Calvinist, he was offended by that.

00:07:56.800 But then he became a Calvinist and, uh, and Hank, uh, he's in his sixties now, him and

00:08:03.260 his wife are here with us.

00:08:04.780 Hank's one of our, one of our elders.

00:08:07.160 We have two other elders.

00:08:08.700 Um, and, uh, so, uh, we've got people that have deep, deep roots out here.

00:08:14.320 So when we started a church in 2020, there wasn't a lot of churches that were open or

00:08:19.080 the ones that had open that were reopening, set a bunch of dumb rules, red caved and lack

00:08:24.300 spine.

00:08:24.860 and, and kind of where it got around. And I would say still to this day, the vast majority that are

00:08:31.440 people that are out of church have no clue that I wrote a book. Um, don't know, know that I have

00:08:37.260 a podcast. Uh, um, I try not to talk about my social media stuff from the pulpit. It's just

00:08:44.700 a little too self-indulgent in my opinion. And, um, and so they're here because of relationships,

00:08:50.640 because what the Lord's doing. And that's allowed us to grow a church that's actually

00:08:54.320 making disciples of locals and not just attracting sycophants that are into the same kind of

00:09:01.480 boutique collection of of secondary subordinate doctrines right like so i would call uh to offend

00:09:08.920 everybody i'd call post-millennialism a subordinate a subordinate doctrine that that doesn't mean it's

00:09:13.880 not important it just means there's like a bunch of other doctrines you need to understand for you

00:09:17.760 to rightly understand of course it's subordinate yeah the creeds don't yeah you don't have to be

00:09:22.420 post-millennial to be a christian but it's a blessing it's an awesome doctrine and a lot of

00:09:26.980 times people what i've noticed what's going on right now is people are really into subordinate

00:09:32.180 doctrines and don't understand the foundations that they're built on so it leads them to all

00:09:36.860 sorts of weird unstable views and that that goes for patriarchy i have a lot of people that

00:09:41.700 you know are into patriarchalism but don't understand the doctrine of authority from

00:09:46.640 scripture they don't understand honor your father and mother they don't understand the decalogue

00:09:50.940 There's just a lot that they don't get and they need to be taught that.

00:09:53.620 So I'm blessed that we are a church that's not made up of a bunch of kind of single issue radicals, but rather local people that want a church that's open, that teaches the Bible, isn't afraid to speak to the issues of the day.

00:10:07.980 And we're not.

00:10:08.540 We'll go there.

00:10:09.200 We don't have a problem with that.

00:10:10.240 But we also don't want to be simply defined by kind of the hot topics.

00:10:17.060 We'll speak to them, but this is a church, and we work our way through the Bible passage by passage, and it's always relevant, right?

00:10:26.780 So that's what we've been doing, and God's been blessing it, and that's what we're going to keep on doing.

00:10:32.500 Yeah, praise God.

00:10:34.500 You know, our situation is similar in the sense that we planted just a few months after you guys, April 2021, and the church has grown quickly.

00:10:44.340 we're about 200 at this point we started with 20 in my living room and god's blessed us and we do

00:10:51.380 have a lot of people which i don't think is necessarily wrong and you weren't saying that

00:10:55.320 it's wrong but we do have a lot of people who are looking for a church that um that holds to some of

00:11:01.760 those second tier doctrines that are not you know it's not something you must believe in order to be

00:11:07.860 a christian but they're significant they matter so post-millennialism is one of those things

00:11:12.640 uh reform theology patriarch well patriarchy is tough pitch yeah for us credo baptism uh but

00:11:20.840 patriarchy is tough man that like i'd be curious to get your take that's one that i'm struggling

00:11:26.360 with when it comes to marriage counseling or uh pretty much anything like i i've always said

00:11:31.500 this is secondary you know like um in the past that's what i've said at this point um i struggle

00:11:38.380 to even preach the gospel without the patriarchal presupposition.

00:11:44.740 I don't, egalitarianism is not just a secondary doctrine.

00:11:49.180 It's a, I think it's a heresy.

00:11:50.840 I think egalitarianism is a world eating virus that destroys Christodom and everything that

00:11:57.900 we hold dear.

00:11:59.260 Like somebody can be pre-mill and be in my church and we can get along.

00:12:03.680 They can be all mill and, you know, we can get along, you know, but if somebody's

00:12:08.360 somebody's egalitarian, like, in six months, they're going to be under church discipline.

00:12:13.580 You know what I mean? Like, something. Something's going to happen.

00:12:17.020 Well, it's—so, consistent egalitarianism will absolutely destroy the core doctrines of the

00:12:23.880 faith. So, for a few examples. Egalitarianism and transgenderism are very similar in that they say

00:12:31.160 they deny the essential nature of sexuality right so um basically the the roles that they

00:12:42.140 see sexuality as roles that are almost interchangeable so a really simple way i

00:12:47.900 explain it is that um a woman can't be a father a father can't be a mother right like you can't do

00:12:55.880 it that it's because it's it's not a role that's interchangeable it's a role that's rooted in

00:13:00.680 in a set nature right a set binary nature you're male you're female and there's things that come

00:13:07.400 out of that so they end up denying that that has that that has a lot to say about whether jesus

00:13:14.020 in his resurrection is still male right um also you have so is is humanity uh does sexuality

00:13:22.760 enduring you know is jesus a true human like humans to be humans male or female right um

00:13:29.640 But even more importantly or more central, maybe lower shelf, is just that we're being reconciled to God the Father through God the Son.

00:13:39.300 And so you have federal headship, representative headship right there.

00:13:42.920 If you deny federal headship, if you deny that we fell on Father Adam and that we can be reconciled through the federal headship of Jesus to God the Father, then you're denying the gospel.

00:13:53.560 And so consistent egalitarianism is aggressively against that sort of hierarchy, which is intrinsic to the nature of W imputation, right?

00:14:07.080 And so, yeah, it's a big deal. Now, a lot of egalitarians are inconsistent. They don't actually follow it all the way through. So I think that's why I'd say consistent egalitarianism is a heresy because it ends up denying cardinal doctrines of the faith.

00:14:24.400 But I also just more practically any church that is teaching on how to be a man and how to be a woman, how to be a father, how to be a mother, you know, is is going to be annoying and irritating to a feminist and egalitarian.

00:14:42.860 it's going to lead to lots of conflict so i think it is one of those doctrines that if you want to

00:14:49.280 put it in a grand scheme in a subordinate category okay maybe in the grand scheme of all history

00:14:57.840 i don't believe that but it certainly isn't a subordinate it's under attack right now right

00:15:03.720 yeah it's something that the enemy is attacking so i think uh wherever whenever something's under

00:15:09.580 attack that's what we have to that's the place we have to defend and so we anthropology is huge

00:15:15.400 and i'm glad that there's a resurgence in it yep amen yeah it's um i i think it does when like you

00:15:23.340 said when consistently applied egalitarianism when consistently applied um it does eventually

00:15:28.840 present itself as heresy in doctrine but but pastorally it is almost immediately um a heresy

00:15:36.300 in terms of life guard your life and doctrine in terms of action like because um if if we're

00:15:42.320 going to allow you know uh somebody to be egalitarian in the church uh you know let's say

00:15:47.040 it's a married couple husband and wife and like we're you know uh we're we're egalitarian well

00:15:51.880 one thing that's probably going to happen if they're sitting under your preaching my preaching

00:15:55.500 then uh they're they're probably going to either leave because they're uncomfortable or the holy

00:16:00.620 spirit is going to be working and they're going to be repenting they're going to be changing well

00:16:03.840 what happens if the husband becomes convicted and he changes, but the wife doesn't? The question

00:16:09.680 is like, okay, well, what about impenitent sin? What about, can I pastorally sit down with the

00:16:16.600 husband and his wife and correct her for being insubordinate towards her? Her husband now has

00:16:21.420 this newfound conviction. He's saying, sweetheart, I love you and I was wrong. I led you poorly,

00:16:26.500 but uh but i want to lead you rightly and i i want to i want to display and model and embody

00:16:32.740 that that um that masculine um patriarchal godly uh christ-like masculinity for you and for the

00:16:40.340 kids and and she's not having it like is it is that sin like that i think that's what's funny

00:16:46.020 for me when we say like a doctrine is secondary but but consistent belief in the doctrine uh would

00:16:52.540 cause that person to, you know, to be discounting 1 Peter 3, 1 Timothy 2, 1 Timothy 3, you know,

00:16:59.460 Ephesians 5, 1 Corinthians 11, 1 Corinthians 14, you know, like if that person is saying,

00:17:06.220 you know, well, you don't have to believe this in order to be orthodox, in order to affirm the

00:17:11.700 Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, but by not believing this, I am regularly, in all practical

00:17:17.840 avenues, I am regularly disobeying some of the clearest black and white commandments in Scripture.

00:17:22.540 and not that are just mentioned once or twice, but all over the pages of the Old Testament and

00:17:27.420 the New Testament. And I'm driving my husband up the wall. And now the husband's coming and saying,

00:17:32.600 pastor, can you help us? And you've got your membership covenant that says, well, you're not

00:17:37.640 required to agree with us on secondary doctrine. You've basically just, you've covenantally just

00:17:43.520 given, and I'm not saying you guys do this, but I know some churches that the membership covenant

00:17:47.780 is so anemic you've just covenantally extended a license for sin uh and and you just like your

00:17:54.920 hands are bound there's nothing you can do absolutely i mean i think i've seen it happen

00:18:02.660 both ways we've honestly i've seen women come alive um and the and the husband is not i think

00:18:09.800 i think women are i've never seen that not once in my 10 years go ahead well i'm encouraged i like

00:18:18.000 hearing about this unicorn i'd love to find one in the wild one day um but go ahead well i see it

00:18:23.660 happen a whole lot um it tends to be middle-aged couples okay more than anything i don't know why

00:18:30.680 um i think so in your mid to late 30s a lot of people start to have enough perspective to see

00:18:38.240 where they screwed things up. And I think with kids, some of that stuff really comes home to

00:18:44.400 bear. And I've seen a lot of women want their husband to lead and want to follow them in kind

00:18:50.800 of a sweet spirit about it. And I think for me, probably what helps us accomplish that at our

00:18:58.960 church is that Emily and I have a really healthy, normal relationship. You know, my wife's really

00:19:05.960 sweet and they see how we react and uh interact and uh it's good i lead she follows but it's not

00:19:14.920 this sort of robotic robotic like macho you know you know anything like that and we we're just

00:19:23.420 happy we like hanging out together it's uh god has been kind to us and i think it's that total

00:19:29.160 ministry brought to bear on people both the preaching of the word and this us talking to

00:19:33.700 been invested in them i'm not feminists don't scare me they're just women and uh you know i'll

00:19:41.700 talk to them and and and love them and not and i'm not i'm not looking for a fight i think a lot of

00:19:46.940 men online have something to prove what do i i have i have nothing to prove to them you know i'm

00:19:52.260 i don't need to tell them they're wrong to for me to be right i'm willing to tell them that they're

00:19:58.100 wrong uh so i think there's kind of what i've i've just seen it happen a whole lot and then

00:20:02.840 me try to get the guys to step up. But a lot of them are so discouraged, lots of failures,

00:20:11.820 just the nastiness to argumentation that's happened in the past. It's a little hard.

00:20:17.140 So I see it go both ways, actually. And praise God for that. And I think just the word of God,

00:20:23.180 a real total sort of ministry. So I'll hit the guys hard, but I'll also encourage them.

00:20:30.180 I preached a Mother's Day sermon called Christian Women's Sin, and that was an accident.

00:20:36.780 I don't ever do stuff like that on purpose.

00:20:39.520 It was so funny.

00:20:41.000 It was Syntyche and Iodia in Philippians where there's these sisters or co-laborers in Christ, and they're at odds.

00:20:50.040 And the whole point I wanted to make is that here's a book that's on unity.

00:20:53.900 It's focused on unity, Philippians is, and here's two women fighting that threatens unity of the church.

00:20:59.000 and how often has a church been split by two women gossiping going to war a bunch of times they have

00:21:03.740 and i was like these are christian women these are christian women and someone needs to correct

00:21:08.480 them they need to be rebuked and they need to be corrected out of love so even christian women

00:21:12.760 can sin and i just went on to some of the sins of women gossip uh wine moms cat ladies you know

00:21:19.060 just go right down the line and and so then that i had planned that out and then i looked and my

00:21:24.740 wife said do you know it's it's mother's day this sunday i was like are you kidding me i was like

00:21:29.560 that's awesome you know so um but uh it was a couple women told me afterwards that like i

00:21:38.000 bristled when you said some things but i know it was true it was a little hard and so i just think

00:21:43.820 we just kind of come at everybody equally hard we we could we you know i was telling i was teaching

00:21:49.840 on modesty and explaining how modesty is like sound is volume um so a song that's too loud

00:21:59.540 you can't enjoy it right it's like static almost and a song that's totally turned down well you

00:22:06.020 can't enjoy that either and so modesty is subjective at one level where you're dressing

00:22:12.320 in such a way where a woman doesn't have to hide that she's a woman right women women shouldn't be

00:22:17.780 ashamed of their curves right but being comfortable with the shape that god's given you and flaunt

00:22:24.200 flaunting it are two different things right and and so we turn frumpy and modesty are two different

00:22:29.740 things that's exactly right yeah yeah women it's women should be beautiful and you can you can be

00:22:35.340 classy modest and beautiful right um actually classy looks way better um than than immodest

00:22:44.000 And so just speaking to the issue, telling women they don't have to be ashamed of their sexuality, but they also shouldn't make themselves into a spectacle, I think that's refreshing teaching because usually modesty is like you have to – it's got to be 10 inches for your ankles or whatever.

00:22:59.300 It's just these rules that in themselves you can cheat.

00:23:03.640 I mean, I, I, I knew some really, really loose Pentecostal girls growing up that wore their, uh, just for the, the viewing audience by loose.

00:23:14.580 I mean, they sleep around the Bible would call that whores.

00:23:18.820 Um, but, uh, but they, they wear their braids up and they got their little, their little Jean Jean skirts on and yet they're doing all sorts of crazy stuff.

00:23:29.640 you know like i think it's easier to have a sort of external law um a form that you can subscribe

00:23:37.720 to but when you get to those principles that like get you at the heart they'll that they'll follow

00:23:42.720 you know so i think one way we can minister to women right now is that we don't frustrate them

00:23:49.200 break their categories confuse them same way with men in other words they they think we're going to

00:23:54.500 say, they just have this sort of cartoonish monster of patriarchal teaching. And it's go

00:24:02.520 ahead and break their categories. And, you know, I think we do that with reformed people when they

00:24:06.740 find out that we're a reformed Presbyterian church are shocked. And that's because I'm not

00:24:11.680 up here using $20 words when a five cent word will get it done. You know what I mean? I don't say

00:24:17.840 Greek words if you don't speak Greek. What's the matter? Why does everyone have to say the Greek

00:24:20.940 work is the word is and they say they pronounce it all wrong you know so um i think it's it's a

00:24:27.100 little fun to to mess with people's cartoonish categories i think that that's part of how we

00:24:32.680 well i went down a rabbit trail with this haven't i but that's how we uh we we kind of start to get

00:24:38.660 to different segments is that show them that we're teaching the bible and the bible's the equal

00:24:44.980 opportunity offender to everybody yep amen and you know and with that you know with men i think

00:24:51.960 you know that like you're saying the stereotypes the cartoon image that they have of a patriarchal

00:24:56.480 pastor you know patriarchal uh masculine leader is you you just imagine a lot of guys think of

00:25:02.680 mark driscoll but i i think chandler was uh i think chandler was harder on on guys than driscoll or at

00:25:08.220 least comparable uh to driscoll i mean he's a guy who's you know boys who can shave and blah blah

00:25:12.400 like they both did it um driscoll yeah there's very i'll just say this there's very little

00:25:19.420 difference between mark driscoll and matt chandler in my opinion other than the fact that driscoll

00:25:23.720 is a more gifted leader um but in terms of character very different uh very little difference

00:25:29.920 between the two of them driscoll just got caught uh with some things and chandler i think i would

00:25:34.540 choose driscoll over i would choose driscoll over chandler if i was forced to make a choice though

00:25:40.000 I would.

00:25:41.480 And I think it's because of the pandering and slipperiness of Matt Chandler that I just couldn't take it.

00:25:55.900 I'd rather be underneath a straight-up narcissist that thinks he's the biggest, baddest man in the room than one that thinks that but pretends to be the most humble guy in the room.

00:26:07.580 I just think if I had to make a choice, I'm like, which, which, which I got to choose a poison.

00:26:14.280 I guess I'll choose this poison instead of this.

00:26:16.480 Yeah, arrogance and honesty over arrogance and sly.

00:26:23.060 Like, cause that's, that's all Acts 29.

00:26:24.660 I've told people this Acts 29, cause I was an Acts 29 pastor.

00:26:27.820 Acts 29 has always had one chief value and that is being cool.

00:26:32.480 and when chandler took over after driscoll um and they rolled out here's our new five distinctives

00:26:38.480 and one of them was humility and one of them was holiness um it was still make no mistake the chief

00:26:43.620 value was still being cool but what had happened is that in the culture the definition of coolness

00:26:49.280 had changed where being cool wasn't so macho and it wasn't so you know this and it wasn't so that

00:26:55.160 it was you know it was oh hey i i you know like a befuddled hugh grant pastor you know whatever

00:27:01.720 but that charming, you know, kind of, and because if it was really about holiness,

00:27:06.540 then you wouldn't have had Eric Mason, Leon's Crump, Brandon Washington, Dwayne Bond, all these

00:27:11.760 different wokesters, race hustlers that, that were right there on, on the international board,

00:27:17.760 buddy, buddy with Chandler. So it certainly couldn't have been about holiness. We know it

00:27:21.260 wasn't about holiness or Chandler wouldn't have had to sit down for using inappropriate joking

00:27:25.720 offline with a woman. And you know what I mean? Holiness was never what it was about. It was about

00:27:30.100 being cool. And, uh, and, and in the world, the verbiage was, you know, coolness had changed to,

00:27:36.180 um, to, I don't know, uh, to polite, you know, political correctness. So what's the,

00:27:43.940 what's a Bible where we can slap on that and call it one of our five distinctives, humility,

00:27:48.220 holiness, close enough, you know? So anyways, that's, you know, actually when I was always

00:27:51.900 about being cool still is, it was under Driscoll. It was just as much on at least Driscoll, uh,

00:27:57.180 you knew what you're getting you know like he he'd say i'm going to slap you in the face and

00:28:00.660 then he would proceed to slap you in the face whereas you know under chandler and some of the

00:28:04.940 new guys it's like i'm going to uh to give you a hug and then they slap you in the face you're like

00:28:09.020 what so anyway yeah well on that point actually my take on that since we're kind of freestyling

00:28:15.360 it tonight um yeah you know this is this is a thing that i'm struggling with right now i'll

00:28:22.540 admit is that you know my stars kind of rising i'm kind of ascendant or whatever online and

00:28:28.440 have a reputation and a personal brand all this nonsense and i i um i'm trying to figure out how

00:28:39.540 to so i i told you this a while back that i i was listening to a go t a uh interview go t a did the

00:28:46.820 song somebody i used to know was a real big hit and then he kind of disappeared and um and people

00:28:53.120 asked why he disappeared well apparently he just he said uh in an interview he said that he just

00:28:58.180 really cared about the music and and he said i like the influence i like to be able to influence

00:29:04.620 the music industry i just don't like the fame and that that really resonated with me because um

00:29:12.300 you know i i'm not really interested in being famous i think once upon a time i probably was

00:29:18.580 when you're young you just want to be important and that and fame seems like being important

00:29:24.280 but it's important to strangers right people that don't know you um it's not important to the people

00:29:31.160 that know you a lot of times the people that know you they they would love you if they're good people

00:29:37.120 they love you regardless if you were known or whatever and i've watched fame destroy so many

00:29:42.620 people and i don't want it to happen to me and i'm excited to have opportunities but i uh i've

00:29:50.320 just seen celebrity christendom just eat people alive and spit them up so part of what i'm trying

00:29:55.320 to figure out in this age of social media influence because what are you going to do

00:29:58.700 like the reason we lost so many churches to wokeism is that the good conservative pastors

00:30:05.960 weren't on social media they weren't on youtube they weren't on twitter they weren't doing

00:30:11.700 instagram stuff but all the wokesters the fraud guys they were they were they were very much they

00:30:17.560 had adopted that medium and and so they they discipled all the all these church members and

00:30:22.820 some of these decent pastors didn't even know that their church members had gone so woke you

00:30:28.820 know some of the pastors have but a lot of people had so then my thought was like well

00:30:32.620 you know propaganda is so thick out there there should be a counter voice someone should be saying

00:30:39.120 the truth on on twitter or instagram and even tiktok tiktok's not my thing but whatever if you

00:30:45.080 can get that map you know get the word out there uh get the word out there get the truth out there

00:30:49.880 push against the lies right and so i'm with you the one caveat though real quick about tiktok i

00:30:55.560 really would love for that to um legally be removed just because sure let's get the gospel

00:31:01.680 out to zoomers um but i don't want to do it while resourcing china to spy on us like tick-tock

00:31:07.420 i don't like go ahead sorry well yeah well i don't have tick-tock because it seems gay to me

00:31:12.920 so there's that uh but there you go but there's there's the communist angle there's the it feels

00:31:18.260 gay um right but uh two important angles i yeah i mean it's so if you're a gay communist you have

00:31:26.980 your platform. Um, but, but I think we have to have a voice online. You just like take things

00:31:35.160 like AI, you know, I've been playing around with a chat GPT. Um, I've got, I have a subscription

00:31:41.320 to chat GPT, uh, uh, dash four, and then I use it in my professional life to mess around with

00:31:47.320 things and just see what it can do. And I'm not a big advocate for it or whatever. I just want to

00:31:52.900 understand it because i think i really think uh this early ai reminds me a lot of kind of early

00:31:58.600 smartphones that the that it's not the same thing as the internet yet but it it's going to reshape

00:32:05.620 how people learn and do stuff it's going to totally change white collar um work i think we should

00:32:10.400 understand that i think pastors didn't understand social media they don't understand how it's shaping

00:32:15.100 how people think these like uh you know andrew tate is this um yeah i was going to ask you tell

00:32:20.740 me about that you recently did a talk that you came away tell us i did so i i've well so i talked

00:32:29.240 about it on cross politic but i'll use tate to tie back into this is that tate um is a pornographer

00:32:37.760 he is a kickboxing champion but he's kind of turned into this um enemy of feminism you know

00:32:45.760 enemy of the feminist society and it's it's kind of a an extreme cartoonish sort of macho thing

00:32:54.120 going on but tate's saying you know uh traditionalism is better men should want to be

00:32:59.640 excellent men should want to make money and men should appreciate beauty and want beautiful women

00:33:04.120 men should want to be successful men should want to be in shape and not fat and uh it's it's like

00:33:10.660 at stark contrast with the sort of uh just participation trophy fat you're beautiful no

00:33:17.000 matter what even if you're a dummy and settle like no ambition you know just the the kind of

00:33:22.420 mediocrity of our time and it's refreshing to young men and he was everywhere he's all over

00:33:27.580 tiktok all over instagram you know all these people are making clips of his talk he's he's

00:33:32.720 really he's really quick on his feet and even though he's living this hedonistic lifestyle

00:33:37.100 and there's so many things he says that's evil, calling out feminism for the poison it is resonated with young men everywhere.

00:33:45.620 And at my church's youth group, I said, so how many young men know who Andrew Tate is?

00:33:50.620 And none of them raised their hand at first.

00:33:52.480 And I was like, come on now.

00:33:54.540 And it was like – and I've looked into this and I don't care if your kid's homeschooled or not.

00:34:03.720 If their friend has a smartphone, they've seen a video of Andrew Tate.

00:34:07.440 He was like the most searched guy there for months.

00:34:10.980 And so Tate used – Tate red-pilled like millions of little boys into thinking feminism is terrible and wanting to be a macho man.

00:34:22.800 So it's hilarious to hear the big Eva type say, well, really hear all types.

00:34:28.580 Anyone that's kind of buttered up, well, don't you think Tate's a hedonist?

00:34:32.100 Yes, I do.

00:34:32.520 Don't you think that's bad?

00:34:33.520 I think hedonism is bad. Yes, of course. Well, we should just ignore them. Your kids aren't ignoring them. Your kids aren't. And so now we should say, you know what? Tate's right. Feminism is poison.

00:34:46.440 You know, now let me show you what biblical masculinity looks like. Let me show you what it means to be a man. And you know what? It is excellence. It's pushing yourself hard and everything.

00:34:55.360 we should we should grab a hold of it and say the truth but we've got all these people out there

00:35:00.720 that are influencing our children and we act like or our congregants we act like we just stick our

00:35:06.120 head in the sand and so the guys like us you know not that we've reached anywhere to the sort of

00:35:13.140 influence that tate's had in such a short period of time but guys like us are out there saying well

00:35:17.440 someone's got to tell someone the truth someone's there's got to be a contra voice you know it goes

00:35:21.180 out there and and then and then people find us and they're they're really refreshed by just simple

00:35:26.460 simple truth be bold have a spine be a man be a woman children are a blessing right get married

00:35:33.180 get married as soon as you can uh no the government can't tell you when to worship it's we're not

00:35:38.300 rocket science here right it's not that we can't hold our own theologically but like a lot of stuff

00:35:43.800 we're saying these things and and so now we we have influence how do we not go the way of gospel

00:35:49.600 coalition? How do we not go the way of the last 40 years? Or really, evangelicalism from the 1920s

00:35:57.980 on is kind of been a celebrity culture. It got paired together with the advent of teenagers.

00:36:04.960 That's why you had Youth for Christ and all that stuff. It's always kind of been mixed in

00:36:09.680 with the sort of youth culture wanting to be cool. I think it's baked in to evangelicalism

00:36:16.360 to some degree and how do we not repeat that that's something that i'm trying to figure out

00:36:22.220 that's why i've been very apprehensive about speaking at conferences unless it's it's kind

00:36:28.180 of a must or there's some sort of real like particular benefit that i'm after that's related

00:36:34.920 to kind of my mission but this is this i feel like is the battle for guys like us to to keep

00:36:41.280 our edge um to be sharp to be connected to our people and not let these things corrupt us because

00:36:48.440 man it is such a corrupting force and it concerns me all the time so there right there's there's a

00:36:55.120 thought that's great that's a great thought no i completely agree and um yeah the tides are

00:37:01.120 shifting and praise god for that people are getting red-pilled every day and people are

00:37:04.980 waking up and and you're right it's not like the sophisticated theological gymnastics is it's we're

00:37:10.760 not using you know all these 20 words and that's why our platforms are growing because people are

00:37:15.920 not listening to joel webbin because they think you know um joel webbin uh he's you know he's

00:37:22.740 read more theology books than tim keller they're listening to me um because because i always

00:37:28.520 describe myself like this i say you know even i'll even you know kind of poke fun at the fact

00:37:33.340 that i'm a baptist because i have a lot of presbyterians who listen to me and like me and i

00:37:36.320 say look you know that there's a bunch of uh mclarens you know presbyterian mclarens but

00:37:41.100 they refuse to leave the driveway this baptist uh pickup truck will actually will actually you

00:37:46.960 know put every piston it has you know actually firing and working and and we're going to go

00:37:52.000 somewhere and and i think that's what it is like i mean they're you know i've got a lot of

00:37:56.060 presbyterians in my congregation you know and and i'll even say you know i'll tip the hat you know

00:38:00.620 and say to you is, you know, Gerhardus Vos and Cornelius Van Til, and, you know, like, I mean,

00:38:06.000 you have some of the richest treasure troves in all of Christendom, but your pastors are lame

00:38:12.820 and cowards, and they won't do anything, you know, so if you can tolerate the Baptist,

00:38:18.060 and they do, they'd rather be with the Baptist, you know, that's actually gonna just say the

00:38:22.820 simple truths that, you know, the little boy, right, like Tate, Andrew Tate is just the little

00:38:29.040 boy saying the emperor has no clothes you know what i mean like he's not like he he's quick on

00:38:33.300 his feet he's charismatic you know and he's he's talented in good shape and good looking those

00:38:37.420 kinds of things but um he's he's not a rocket scientist you know i mean like he's you know but

00:38:42.980 but he's got a platform and uh and he's actually willing to say hey the emperor's um you know

00:38:50.120 completely naked and and he's actually willing to laugh like just mock the emperor and and turns out

00:38:56.580 There's a ton of people who have just been waiting for someone to let them do that.

00:39:00.940 And it's like, that's, I mean, that was Elijah.

00:39:02.920 That was, you know, like, like God has always had men like that who would, who would look

00:39:07.640 at the enemies, the people who were decimating the people of God and who were, and who were

00:39:12.140 mocking the triune God, like the people who just don't, they don't stomach it.

00:39:16.060 They don't put up with it, right?

00:39:17.240 Like David, it's, you know, so whether it's Elijah or whether, you know, against all the

00:39:20.920 prophets of Baal, whether it's Andrew Tate or whether it's, you know, or whether it's,

00:39:24.380 you know, you think of David, it's like this little shepherd boy and everybody's knees are

00:39:29.020 buckling, you know, and it's been days of the same routine, Goliath coming up. And it's not

00:39:33.840 just that Goliath is big and he's strong, but like David gets angry because Goliath is literally

00:39:39.100 mocking God. He's mocking the triune God. And David puts him in his place and says, you know,

00:39:45.420 you uncircumcised Philistine today, I'll cut off your head, feed your carcass to the birds. You

00:39:49.900 know like it's not winsome conversation it's it's it's real conversation that's like so like a

00:39:55.440 little you know like some guy like 80 robles he's not even a pastor 80 robles goes fishing and he

00:40:01.580 has his little company and he's a friend and so we talk and he's a great guy he knows his his

00:40:06.120 theology he's not dumb he's he's gifted he's a great guy he's got character but at the end of

00:40:10.740 the day he's just loving his wife loving his kids going to church as just a faithful church member

00:40:14.840 running his own business and uh and every free moment he has he's fishing and then every now

00:40:20.140 and then he'll come in sit in front of his his computer and put on a webcam and and you know

00:40:26.040 i just start talking and and get more views on some of his videos in the gospel coalition could

00:40:31.860 get on you know some of this why because he's just he's just pointing out the obvious he's

00:40:37.800 calling a spade a spade he's the emperor has no clothes so and we need guys like that he's got a

00:40:42.280 voice too he's got a great voice i'm proud to say i am subscriber 112 on 80 robles that's how

00:40:53.700 that's how far back i go to his youtube channel and i i don't know what is that now but someone

00:40:58.920 said you should check out my friend ad robles and so i went over there i watched one of his videos

00:41:03.600 i was like wow this is really good and um and at that time i think my youtube channel had which i

00:41:09.860 don't do anything on had like 2000 subscribers or something i was like well this guy should have as

00:41:15.680 many as i have you know now he's got way more um he's just really good i always tell people that i

00:41:22.000 am uh i'm presbyterian in theology and baptist in culture uh so uh i like i like a good fight

00:41:29.460 like a good potluck you know um and um and i'm not really interested in sweater vest christianity

00:41:35.820 is what I used to call the PCA guys, that you guys are southern gentlemen that won't get dirty.

00:41:44.340 And that's the problem.

00:41:45.760 These guys wear their sparring gear to fist fight.

00:41:48.840 They won't draw blood.

00:41:50.400 And I think as soon as right now we're at a turning of the tides, things are switching.

00:41:57.140 It's kind of hard to say what shape it will take, but the Gospel Coalition is on its way down.

00:42:02.720 No one really cares like they used to.

00:42:04.740 chandler sidelined driscoll is trying to stage a comeback but it'll never happen

00:42:10.560 and uh all those guys from neo-calvinism sort of excuse me neo-calvinism uh the young the

00:42:17.240 yeah those guys all those guys are kind of out of it um the the best of them got swallowed up

00:42:24.180 um by more traditional you know 1689 or or presbyterian denominations and they're just

00:42:31.180 kind of labor in a way but pretty much all the leaders got you're right all the leaders i think

00:42:36.060 got sidelined the guys who were part of the movement because i was one of the guys who was

00:42:38.920 a part of the movement i wasn't a leader i was i remember thinking you know i remember thinking i

00:42:43.680 was you know i was born at the wrong time you know that the whole you know reformed resurgency

00:42:48.180 you know this happened and i was in high school you know so i couldn't really i couldn't have

00:42:52.420 been a leader i couldn't have been a part of it so by the time you know i had planted a church

00:42:56.080 and you know was preaching you know um and those kinds of things and joined acts 29 it had already

00:43:00.900 have been going for, you know, 10, 15 years or whatever it had been, you know, and I'm coming

00:43:04.720 in late, you know, the 11th hour and these kinds of things. And I remember feeling bummed about

00:43:09.940 that in part because I was young and wanted to be important. Exactly what you said earlier.

00:43:15.080 But man, that was a mercy of God in so many ways because pretty much all the leaders in that

00:43:19.760 movement got sidelined. Now the followers, and I was one of the follower, I wasn't a big deal by

00:43:25.540 any stretch of the imagination. For the followers who were part of it, they all pretty much like

00:43:30.180 right down the middle like 50 50 split um half of them uh became confessional either 1689 or

00:43:37.000 westminster and the other half are apostate and that's about it there's no more the middle and

00:43:42.620 that's just i think that's like that is the headline of the story if we think of just the

00:43:46.340 last few years you know from like i think of like 2017 a lot of these you know and i understand

00:43:51.740 there are things earlier but in terms of like this visible you know fault lines like buddy

00:43:56.000 bauckham would talk about like the last six years five six years from like 2017 to present date um

00:44:01.960 it seems like the headline of the story what god providentially has been doing is just uh he's just

00:44:06.240 been taking away the middle ground choose this day choose choose yeah you know what i found this

00:44:12.060 morning i i almost posted it online i might post it but i i got um i got i've been banned from

00:44:19.000 comedy on the gospel coalition blog since september of 2011 wait you've been banned

00:44:25.080 september 2011 yeah that's impressive man you should get you should tweet that because that

00:44:31.460 right there you'll gain followers that's a that's a badge of honor and that's uh i was critiquing um

00:44:36.820 i was critiquing tim keller and um i was i started listening to tim keller in 2004 i think something

00:44:44.420 like that and uh and just go about the same time and uh you know early keller has a lot of really

00:44:52.860 good things to say and some of his his church planning manual is actually pretty good um at

00:44:59.700 least the the the version i have i don't know what it's like now i'm sure it's wretched but but i

00:45:06.220 remember i got his um bible study uh notes on romans and when it got to the part on homosexuality

00:45:12.980 in chapter one it didn't say anything about repenting of homosexuality he just skipped right

00:45:17.280 over it i was like you're in manhattan and you don't have anything that's talking about

00:45:21.840 repenting of homosexuality and like one of the more explicit passages in all of scripture.

00:45:27.100 But I started to realize that he was just kind of, he was very devious. And I had a similar

00:45:34.420 experience while I was in Acts 29. I left Acts 29 in 2008. In 2008, I planted a church,

00:45:43.380 Seven Hills Church in downtown Cincinnati with Acts 29. And what stuck out to me was two things.

00:45:51.140 was driscoll's was so angry all the time it just really stuck out how angry he was

00:45:57.140 and then also just all the guys what they said excuse my language but was how to have a kick-ass

00:46:04.860 worship service was this big talk in um the actually and i and it was a chat room that they

00:46:10.720 had for pastors back then it was a board this was before they had the city or whatever whatever

00:46:15.040 came after. But I just thought, yeah, I'm sick of this. I'm sick of everyone wanting to be cool

00:46:21.920 because there's nothing less cool than wanting to be cool. It's just like, it was just like so

00:46:28.460 desperate. And it was them wanting to be cool. And I think that kind of triggered me and opened

00:46:33.420 my eyes. And I started really like, what am I doing? What is this all about? And then I started

00:46:38.040 to look at Keller. And so I kind of went into hibernation for a long time and hung out in kind

00:46:42.540 of the the niche reform world and pulled out and and thought about it but you know it's it's kind

00:46:48.880 of funny to have like you wanted to be important and and went went into a degree of obscurity

00:46:56.840 and and now to have a platform where people lots of people care what i have to say

00:47:04.100 which is very strange you know um and or i don't know about you people treat me like i'm an expert

00:47:09.800 and everything. It's crazy. I get emails like asking me how to do all this stuff. I'm like,

00:47:14.520 I don't know who you think I am, man, but you are about to be disappointed. So, um, well,

00:47:21.220 even in that, uh, in the, you, you saw a screener for my documentary I did with Canada.

00:47:27.020 Yeah. Um, it was great. And I think in that, um, I just, I was thinking about how I was real,

00:47:36.120 I've got a sickness that I struggle with. And they caught me when I was pretty sick filming

00:47:41.720 part of that documentary. I look at the video, I'm like, oof, man, that's rough looking. I was

00:47:47.780 not doing well. And then they came to our house. And while my wife had made the inside of the

00:47:52.120 house perfect, my garage and my barn was an absolute wreck, man. And I was thinking, you

00:47:58.980 know what? This is good. This is good. The Lord will be honored by this because I don't have it

00:48:04.460 all together all the time and i definitely wanted to have it together and i wanted to be thinner and

00:48:09.300 i wanted to be healthier and i wanted my farm to look just right and didn't want it to look like

00:48:14.180 junk but you know what this is what real life looks like a lot of times you know and i think of

00:48:19.280 um that the the problem with celebrity is it's the same problem with pornography is that pornography

00:48:25.260 makes you think women look a certain way all the time you know and they don't and people think

00:48:31.260 pastors are always like awesome and never, you know, have it all figured out. And we're mature

00:48:38.060 men, you know, hopefully if you're a pastor, you're a mature man, but we're mature men growing

00:48:43.220 in sanctification and life is bumpy and life is messy. And I think wanting to bring, as we try to

00:48:49.500 help people transition out of feminism, out of wokeism, out of socialism, we need to help them

00:48:58.640 not lose heart by trying to live up to an ideal that no one actually lives. And I think that's

00:49:05.020 our challenge right now, because here's the word I hate. I hate this word, man. I hate it.

00:49:10.500 But we have to be authentic. We just have to be real. And the more that people talk about being

00:49:15.720 real, the less you can trust them. I mean, I put this out all the time, but it's like the car

00:49:19.720 salesman that says, listen, man. I'm going to shoot you straight. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to

00:49:26.040 you straight let me be honest with you okay let me tell you about this yeah you know and as soon

00:49:30.320 as someone says this is a real church for real people that church is fake don't go there like

00:49:36.120 like real churches don't say that real churches like just live it and so now what we have to do

00:49:42.040 is is use the opportunity that god's given us to minister to people to show them what real life

00:49:50.000 looks like patriarchy in real life is wonderful right post-millennialism applied because like

00:49:58.020 what i'd say the difference between you and a lot of presbyterians in my impression of you from

00:50:03.280 talking to you on the phone a bunch of times but i had the privilege to spend an avian with several

00:50:08.440 of your church members um out in austin not too long ago so i i i've got an impression of you

00:50:13.440 through your church members um i get the sense that the difference between you and presbyterians

00:50:18.280 isn't knowledge you have that it's willingness to apply it right that's it that's the whole game

00:50:23.660 right now is actually applying do something apply your knowledge live your theology out so

00:50:29.640 post-millennialism if it's uh if you're just arguing about it online whatever but if post-millennialism

00:50:35.460 means you're confident and you're not scared of this dark time and you're ready to take the bull

00:50:39.280 by the horns and this whole MGTOW men go in their own way so I'm not going to get married or they

00:50:43.680 might divorce me right post-millennialism means that you're bold right you trust god you know the

00:50:48.840 church is gonna have a victory that's what applied theology looks like and people need to see that

00:50:53.260 in your day-to-day life and so that's what we have to do we have you have to that's the challenge

00:50:58.560 to use the internet to to point people towards godly ministries where they can see whole life

00:51:05.240 lived out yep yeah we don't need a bunch of black-pilled guys you know who are just um

00:51:10.980 who are prophets you know fancy themselves to be a prophet and the son of a prophet and i saw this

00:51:16.200 coming you know back in this year and i saw that coming and i see the next thing coming and i've

00:51:20.720 always been right um but but it's like but it's not there's nothing hopeful it's it's not like

00:51:26.260 we can win or this is what we get it's like the world is going to hell in a handbasket and um

00:51:32.360 and i'm cool because i saw it 10 years before everybody else like um that's one of the things

00:51:37.260 i like i've just always loved about doug wilson um and you know i don't know everybody in moscow

00:51:42.480 and if everybody fits the bill you know but the guys that i've met in moscow uh and doug wilson

00:51:47.180 especially um i forget the exact term that he uses but it's like a jubilant um uh it's like

00:51:54.660 there's two different kinds of contrarians and one is a and one is a a joyful one and he's that

00:52:00.360 yeah right so like a joyful warrior whatever you know like uh but somebody who is you know who's

00:52:05.300 going to be satirical who's going to be sarcastic who's you know but who's going to have fun doing

00:52:09.740 it some guys that they're right the feminist isn't having fun the you know you know i mean like a

00:52:14.100 feminist is like an alcoholic right an alcoholic doesn't drink for fun uh they drink because they

00:52:18.300 have to you know they're desperate they're they're dependent they're weak they're they're pathetic

00:52:23.380 they're sick they're you know and and so is the feminist that you and and i don't mean sick in a

00:52:28.020 way that absolves them of moral guilt it's also sin but but yeah but they're sick that blue-haired

00:52:32.880 feminist is not having fun you know like there's a reason why they get memed i mean we literally

00:52:37.380 have memes you can right now everybody listening can picture like that that one chick you know

00:52:42.240 who's wearing glasses she's like yes you know and the other chick with the little funny hat you know

00:52:47.020 who's like falling down on her knees when donald trump is elected like i mean they literally are

00:52:51.480 like national icons we all make fun of them because and and we we make fun of them not just

00:52:57.580 because they're wrong. We make fun of them because they're wrong and miserable. Doug Wilson, like if

00:53:05.180 he, if it all pans out and turns out that he's wrong, at least he had fun being wrong. You know

00:53:09.780 what I mean? Like he's laughing, he's having a good time, you know, he's not taking himself too

00:53:13.280 seriously. So anyways, all that kind of stuff being said, yeah, you've got it. You've got to

00:53:17.900 apply your theology. And one of the things, one of the theologies that you have to apply

00:53:21.560 is that Christ wins. Even if you're a dispensational pre-mill guy, you know, like I would,

00:53:27.140 I would strongly advise you not to be. But even if you are still, it's like Christ wins. You know,

00:53:32.960 I mean, the only difference, I tell people all the time, I say the only difference between the

00:53:36.540 post mill and the Dispy pre mill, John MacArthur, and there's some really great guys on that side

00:53:41.820 who actually do stuff, by the way, like Daryl Harrison, God bless him. He does stuff, you know,

00:53:46.960 like Phil Johnson does stuff. And so anyways, but those guys, the only difference, we both believe

00:53:52.120 Christ wins. The difference is I believe that Christ will win through the church and they

00:53:56.360 believe that Christ will win despite the church. You know what I mean? That Christ is going to win

00:54:02.060 in the sense of like the church is in the ring. It's going to go all 12 rounds and Christ is going

00:54:06.640 to sustain the church as it's bruised and battered and it won't tap out. Praise God. But it's going

00:54:12.940 to be whittled down. It's going to be a remnant bruised and battered, but they will be saved by

00:54:17.000 the bell. Christ will get tagged in and he will decimate the enemy. But they believe Christ wins,

00:54:21.580 to be fair to the argument. But I believe that Christ is also going to win, but he's going to

00:54:27.040 progressively win by not just sustaining, but strengthening and building the church to where

00:54:32.180 each round it actually gets bigger, smarter, faster, stronger. And eventually the church

00:54:38.060 as the body of Christ, not separate, but as his hands and feet on earth, the church lays

00:54:43.900 hell's gates wide open because they can't prevail against it. So anyways, all that being said,

00:54:49.280 But if that's your theology, you don't just do hashtag that postmill while you're single and 35 and childless and don't have a job.

00:55:00.760 And you know what I mean?

00:55:02.840 Hashtag that postmill doesn't just mean Jesus is going to come in and get it done.

00:55:07.180 It means Jesus is going to get it done through his hands and feet.

00:55:10.280 And that's us in the world, the church, his bride, like his body.

00:55:13.980 And so that means we get to work.

00:55:15.500 real quick. And I'll turn it back to you. And I know we got to end, but I, I wanted to read for

00:55:19.740 our listeners. This is what I said. You guys will see this. I'm sure eventually, but you got to

00:55:23.780 watch the doc when it comes out, it'll be on Canon. You got to watch Michael's doc. Um, it's

00:55:28.480 for him and non's book on it's good to be a man, which I told you this offline, but, um, I was

00:55:33.320 really encouraged that you were like, Hey, non's got to be in it. We both wrote the book. We both

00:55:38.020 got it, you know, and that good on you. But I told Michael, I said, I watched the early screening of

00:55:42.020 your documentary. Great job. I said, here's my review. Why are you gay? And then I said,

00:55:47.460 here's my actual review. But it goes back to what Michael is saying. It goes back to what Michael

00:55:51.240 is saying about the simplicity, right? Like just applying simple Bible truths. I said,

00:55:56.780 here's my actual review. Michael Foster doesn't merely define manhood. He carefully lays out a

00:56:01.620 roadmap for attaining manhood. Undoubtedly, Foster provides a wealth of profound insights

00:56:07.280 into biblical masculinity. But I was most encouraged by the overwhelming simplicity

00:56:12.400 of this documentary. Manhood is weighty, manhood is hard work, but manhood is also surprisingly

00:56:18.240 simple. And by the grace of God, biblical manhood is attainable. That's what you did,

00:56:23.740 I think, in this doc. Praise God. That's wonderful.

00:56:26.980 You and Nan did it in the book, and you did it in the doc of just saying,

00:56:31.900 yeah, there's a bunch of $20 words, and yeah, manhood is not... We're not saying it's easy.

00:56:36.240 it's hard and especially hard right now because of feminism like it's hard for men to provide for

00:56:41.420 their families on a single income uh when when women are taking uh all the jobs like you have

00:56:47.900 to compete not just with other men you have to compete with other women and and the other men

00:56:52.600 these white knights are going to pay those women more than they'll pay you like the whole the whole

00:56:57.360 wealth you know wage gap is if anything it's the other way around and so it's hard but it's not

00:57:03.640 complicated there's it's like chopping wood chopping wood it's it's hard work you're gonna

00:57:08.560 sweat you're probably gonna bleed get some blisters but it's um but it's not complex hard

00:57:14.220 and complexity are two different things and you did that in that doc and you do that every time

00:57:18.740 i talk to you that's why i enjoy your friendship talking on the phone whatever you do is just

00:57:22.280 saying hey look this is hard work and we're probably going to take some take some on the

00:57:26.400 chin you know and i always think of the um green street hooligans i think was the name where he's

00:57:30.900 like sometimes you just got to get punched in the face once to realize you're not made of glass

00:57:34.560 yeah that was such a good and it's like some of these guys these pastors that just playing so

00:57:39.780 close to the chest it's because they've they've never taken a punch and i'd be willing to bet

00:57:43.400 some of them just never been punched in real life literally like that you know that they preach like

00:57:47.740 a guy who's never been in a fight and and uh but once you get hit in the face a couple times

00:57:52.580 right once you lose a third of your church which i've lost a third of my church like multiple times

00:57:57.280 throughout the last 10 years like once that happens it's just like man like i don't want

00:58:03.080 to be foolish i don't want to drive people away unnecessarily but um it's just it's okay like i

00:58:08.840 just want to be faithful and if that happens that happens like god is good i've never seen the

00:58:12.220 righteous go without bread like god is god's good my family's taken care of we moved across the

00:58:17.460 country some you know great friends came with us and god's blessing it again we already have people

00:58:23.100 we have a church things are happening so it's just like yeah it's just there's some scary things

00:58:28.880 but at the same time it's just do we believe christ wins and do we apply our theology and do

00:58:34.380 we are we going to go for it so any any final thoughts that you have michael yeah i'm thankful

00:58:40.100 that god in his mercy is raising up pastors that you know that we want to be masculine leaders

00:58:51.020 and we're not out here trying to prove that we've got it all figured out i don't need to be the

00:58:55.700 biggest baddest guy in the room um i'll probably outwork you though i don't i don't know if you

00:59:00.680 can keep with me but um but i i i'm i'm happy to see guys like yourself our friend uh dale partridge

00:59:09.080 um eric khan brian suve and then a bunch of pastors that nobody knows but we know

00:59:14.900 that are out there getting it done. I think, uh, as, as the, uh, as the man goes, so goes

00:59:22.260 the society. Right. And what we need is, uh, men back in the pulpit, like real men,

00:59:29.600 men with spines, men that, um, are willing to call it out and not be cowards, but men

00:59:34.260 that are also fathers and fathers. We know when to be rough with our children and we

00:59:40.460 know when to be gentle and compassionate, right? And that's what we need. We need guys that will

00:59:48.400 rip the wolves in half, right? With their bare hands and teeth, if need be. But we'll protect

00:59:55.440 the sheep, right? And I'm glad to see that's raising up. And that's why I think we'll see

01:00:01.920 a renaissance, a revival of godly masculinity. I'm confident of it. I've been, you know,

01:00:10.020 i've been patriarchal since 1999 right i've never i've never been a complementarian i've always been

01:00:18.600 against it um i i i got red pilled into patriarchalism through radical feminism through

01:00:25.840 reading shulamath firestone and the patriots or excuse me the patristics um back in uh a college

01:00:34.360 And I've been reading E. Michael Jones since 1999, been into all this stuff, reading radical kind of elements.

01:00:44.400 And, man, I am seeing things happen now that I never imagined in a million years would happen.

01:00:50.100 Like the people like, man, everyone reads E. Michael Jones now.

01:00:53.220 Some of your readers might or listeners might not know who he is.

01:00:55.540 But man, it's crazy. E. Michael Jones was like a radical Catholic that got fired from St. Mary's and wrote Culture Wars magazine and wrote a couple of really fantastic books on sexuality. To see him be commonly talked about by young men, it was like blowing my mind, man.

01:01:14.040 and a lot of the ideas that like i hear people use the word androgyny all the time i'm pretty

01:01:21.180 sure we're the one that made that word popular through our book and our podcast you're one of

01:01:26.780 the first guys i heard it from was your podcast yeah yeah i'm pretty sure but the thing is dude

01:01:31.860 i don't care who gets the credit i'm just sick of a bunch of feminine weak men i want i want you

01:01:37.880 I want a society that is godly, and I'm seeing androgyny talked about, effemacy is not a word

01:01:47.000 you used to hear. You hear it all the time now. You see guys that actually are reading some really

01:01:51.720 good stuff. Guys I know, go back to guys like William Gouge, who was a Westminster divine that

01:01:56.420 was a wonderful, patriarchal, godly man, very balanced and everything. So we see good things

01:02:03.200 happening. We see guys like, I knew Eric Kahn long before he even had a podcast. And I think

01:02:10.300 he said this online so I can say it. But I told Eric, I was like, Eric, you should start a podcast.

01:02:15.960 Your content's high quality. And I was like, here's what I did. And then he went and started

01:02:20.660 the Hard Man podcast. And I watched Eric and Brian explode on the scene. I think we see God

01:02:27.780 moving in young pastors and now moving in young men i think we have every reason to be optimistic

01:02:34.380 right like so i'm just happy i'm happy to be part of this time in history and i want us uh i want

01:02:42.820 us to pave the way for something that's more mature well-rounded and and willing to call a

01:02:48.540 spade a spade that's that's my final word also joel has a book coming up i don't know if i could

01:02:54.020 talk about it so but i i have written i have written a endorsement for it and it's really

01:03:01.680 good and uh and and so now now you got something to look forward to for the next episode of right

01:03:07.740 response ministries yep yes sir yep i yeah i'll announce more as we get closer to it but yeah i'm

01:03:14.440 excited it's it's funny because the book kind of has a little bit to do with the whole driscoll

01:03:18.800 chandler thing that we were talking about i you know i i really think that one one of the things

01:03:23.680 was um like driscoll would tell things like it is and he would say you know he would stick it to the

01:03:28.920 feminists and those kinds of things but i think it's um not having something to prove not trying

01:03:33.480 to be important and being able to do to have to do both to like men grow up but then also um

01:03:39.740 to to be able to like men are hurting right now and to be able to pastorally uh to love them to

01:03:45.860 have some compassion consolation and one of the things that i think got driscoll in big trouble

01:03:50.880 was um his message doesn't work in seattle um to to tell to tell all these men you need to be

01:03:58.100 single income providers your wife needs to be able to stay at home um and your kids all need

01:04:03.920 to be homeschooled or you need to pay for tuition for them to be in a private school

01:04:07.920 and you need to do all of that um and you have to do it here you also have to because he had two

01:04:14.280 messages that contradicted one was pagans the word pagan means someone who lives on the farm

01:04:19.040 you remember he would always say that pagan the pagan lives on the farm so you can't do that don't

01:04:23.720 be in flyover country be a missionary right so come here but also have a traditional rural mindset

01:04:32.060 but you have to do it in this city as a missionary and it just I think the reason Chandler didn't get

01:04:37.380 in trouble as quick as Driscoll is because he was in an easier context straight up Plano Texas

01:04:43.040 If you can't plant a church in Plano, Texas, God bless your heart, as we'd say in Texas.

01:04:49.480 All right.

01:04:49.960 Anyways, that's the last thing that I thought as you were talking.

01:04:52.700 I just want to say that.

01:04:53.380 But Michael, thanks for coming on the show.

01:04:54.560 I really appreciate it.

01:04:55.800 Yeah, it's always fun, man.

01:04:56.760 Thanks.

01:04:57.680 Can I be frank with you for just a second right here at the end?

01:05:01.020 Look, some of you guys, you're financially supporting this ministry.

01:05:04.340 And from the bottom of my heart, I say thank you.

01:05:07.320 I cannot thank you enough.

01:05:09.700 However, some of you, you just, you can't afford it. In fact, some of you, you shouldn't afford it.

01:05:16.860 Let's be honest. I mean, we're living in Joe Biden's ridiculous economy. Our nation and our

01:05:23.640 totalitarian political elites lost their minds over the last three years due to COVID. We have

01:05:32.040 written checks that we simply cannot cash. It doesn't matter if people change the definition

01:05:37.900 of a recession. We are living in a recession right now, regardless. Some of you are struggling

01:05:44.880 to afford a carton of eggs at the grocery store. You cannot support financially this ministry at

01:05:51.880 this time, nor should you, but you could still help us tremendously. I am asking you, please,

01:05:59.280 if you're willing to do so, take one minute of your time. Leave us a five-star review on your

01:06:05.520 favorite podcast platform, iTunes, Spotify, whatever that might be, this is the way the

01:06:11.620 system works. We want to be innocent as doves, but shrewd as vipers. We need to be strategic.

01:06:18.700 You leave us a five-star review, and our podcast shows up for more people. And the Word of God

01:06:24.740 and courageous theology applied in practical ways to every realm of life gets out there.

01:06:32.540 Help us get it out there. Thanks for tuning in.

01:06:35.520 You

The NXR Podcast - April 11, 2023

THEOLOGY APPLIED - Mark Driscoll Vs. Matt Chandler & The Type Of Church Plants We Actually Need ｜ with Michael Foster

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