The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - The Only Churches That Will Survive In America Will Have These 3 Characteristics w AD Robles

00:00:00.000 In less than a year, our podcast has gone from an average of 10,000 downloads a month

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00:00:23.480 five-star review on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks. Welcome back to another

00:00:29.180 episode of Theology Applied. I'm your host, Pastor Joel Webbin with Right Response Ministries.

00:00:34.820 In this particular episode of Theology Applied, I'm privileged to welcome back to the show

00:00:39.360 A.D. Robles. In this episode, we discuss three primary characteristics of local churches that

00:00:46.980 will endure the coming persecution to America. In 50 years from now, if America still exists,

00:00:54.080 if God is so merciful, there's three different characteristics that will cause churches to be

00:01:00.480 able to survive the coming persecution to our nation. Many churches have closed their doors.

00:01:07.480 Many more sadly will close their doors in the coming decades. But I guarantee you that there

00:01:13.680 are three characteristics that will make the difference. What are those three characteristics?

00:01:19.020 Tune into this episode to find out.

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00:04:54.700 Applying God's Word to Every Aspect of Life

00:04:58.900 This is Theology Applied

00:05:01.900 Welcome to another episode of Theology Applied

00:05:08.300 I am your host, Pastor Joel Webin with Right Response Ministries

00:05:11.080 And in this particular episode, I am privileged to welcome back to the show

00:05:15.160 A regular guest that we have on Right Response Ministries, Aidy Robles

00:05:19.480 Hey, how's it going? Thanks for inviting me again

00:05:21.920 You're welcome

00:05:23.100 tell our listeners just a little bit about yourself just in case they don't know who you are

00:05:27.340 yeah absolutely i got a youtube channel uh i got a podcast on the fight laugh feast network you can

00:05:33.200 find me if just by typing in my name on both ad robles r-o-b-l-e-s i'm also pretty active on

00:05:39.840 twitter if you don't like fighting you know you probably won't want to follow me on twitter but

00:05:43.520 if you like seeing uplifting stuff uh i'm also on gab i'll post pictures of my you know kids playing

00:05:48.740 little league or my my chickens or uh fishing pictures so if you like that kind of stuff you

00:05:53.820 know just like normal regular life i'm on gab as well cool yeah i think you posted something today

00:05:59.920 the day that we're recording this that said like twitter you know i go to twitter to fight i go to

00:06:04.140 gab to relax twitter's really good for fighting it is i mean it really is the way the algorithm

00:06:09.760 works you know it's it's very difficult to sort of uh block out anything like all the things you

00:06:16.160 don't want to see on twitter on gab it's really easy so like a lot of people say gab you know

00:06:19.940 it's full of haters and there's definitely a lot of aggression on gab no question but it's very

00:06:25.000 easy to curate it so what i've done at gab is just anyone who's got any kind of like hardcore

00:06:29.840 negativity i just i just block them i just mute them whatever and i've curated this list if you

00:06:35.000 look at my gab if you are on my side of it it's just like pictures of people's farms and fishing

00:06:40.680 pictures and stuff like that it just it's a very very pleasant place nice cool well so what i was

00:06:46.820 thinking for this episode is um kind of a prediction episode what will the church look like in the

00:06:52.740 future and more particularly like what type of church what kind of churches are going to make it

00:06:58.200 you know the in uh what is it in g n gmi not gonna make it i'm like sitting i like that one

00:07:07.340 Yeah, not going to make it. And so like what kind of church, you know, kind of maybe a white pill spin on it. What kind of church is going to make it? And I've thought of three things that I think that we could just kind of go back and forth and discuss the type of church that I think, you know, is going to make it.

00:07:25.560 Like I'd, I'd love to say, you know, like I'd love to do on this episode say, well, there's

00:07:29.100 seven things like being confessionally reformed and being covenantal in your theonomy and

00:07:34.540 presuppositional and patriarchal and, you know, and Kuyperian and, and that would be

00:07:38.980 nice and neat.

00:07:40.080 Right.

00:07:40.300 Yeah.

00:07:40.900 I like this.

00:07:41.380 So that, I mean, that's, you know, if I'm hosting a conference, which I am March 1st,

00:07:45.180 2nd and 3rd, Doug Wilson is coming and we got Foster coming.

00:07:48.140 And so like, I'm, I'm going to focus on those things because I think that's the right path.

00:07:51.600 Um, but you know, in the spirit of a big tent, ecumenical spirit, you know, I think that

00:07:58.460 like, okay, if we can boil things down to the common denominator, I think there are

00:08:01.880 three primary characteristics that pop into my mind of the type of church that, uh, that

00:08:06.900 I think would still be around in 50 years.

00:08:08.640 So if I, you know, I don't, I'll think about the title for this episode, but it'll probably

00:08:11.700 be something along the lines of, you know, um, the, the type of church that will survive

00:08:16.500 the next 50 years in America.

00:08:17.880 um so anyway so i i won't list them all up front i'll just start with one and then throw it to you

00:08:23.600 but uh one thing that i think is uh churches that um engage the culture engage society engage the

00:08:29.960 world around them they're not pietistic um so they're engaging the world uh but also they have

00:08:35.260 a certain optimism they think that they can win and i don't mean by that that they're uh that they

00:08:40.820 have optimistic eschatology like post-millennialism again that would be like one of you know if i if

00:08:46.800 that's you know that's my path i'm going to try to get guys to be post-millennial because i think

00:08:50.700 it's true but i'm not saying that you have to be post-millennial i'm thinking of like you know

00:08:54.400 um there were certain things that were wrong with this movement but like the joshua generation you

00:08:59.320 know in in a few decades past um you know there was a lot of good things that came out of that

00:09:04.800 and and for the most part a lot of these guys they they weren't calvinist they were arminian

00:09:09.300 you know kind of arminian decisionism baptist with the dispensational pre-millennial ingrained

00:09:15.240 eschatology. That's just the air that they were breathing. And yet they were raising their kids,

00:09:21.140 homeschooling their kids, raising them to know the Lord and not just to retreat, but to actually run

00:09:27.120 for political office and to try to change the fabric of society with a mindset that not that

00:09:35.160 Jesus is going to come back in 20, 30, 40,000 years, but that Jesus might come back in 50 years.

00:09:41.420 but they were thinking okay but 50 years my kids have to have to live uh during these next 50 years

00:09:47.260 and i'm going to have grandkids in these next 50 years so i'd like these next 50 years to be good

00:09:52.500 and and so anyway so that you know i think like even the dispensational so i'm not making it

00:09:57.160 eschological i'm saying even from a dispensational pre-mill standpoint which i would sharply disagree

00:10:02.260 with uh just like post-mill we're saying okay the trajectory overall is up but there are dips along

00:10:07.120 the way, I think we're in a dip right now. Well, you could be pre-mill dispy and say the overall

00:10:12.220 trajectory is down, but there are some spikes along the way. So why wouldn't you, because we

00:10:16.980 know in the last 2000 years, even if you're a dispensational pre-millennial, you can't argue

00:10:21.300 with history that in the last 2000 years, we've had some good moments. We've had some spikes where

00:10:26.400 things actually improve. So there's no biblical argument to say that that couldn't happen here

00:10:31.540 and that it couldn't happen now.

00:10:33.340 So no matter where you're at eschatologically,

00:10:35.820 I think that every Christian should believe

00:10:38.240 that we might be able to win a battle or two

00:10:42.740 and winning a battle or two

00:10:44.400 could make a world of difference for our children

00:10:46.640 and what kind of life, the quality of life

00:10:49.160 that they're gonna have.

00:10:50.580 And so I think, you know,

00:10:51.900 so I'm not saying every church

00:10:52.800 is gonna be post-millennial,

00:10:54.000 but I think over the next 50 years,

00:10:56.020 churches that engage the culture, society, politics,

00:10:59.620 and engage it with an attitude that that engagement matters

00:11:02.980 and that it's not just beating at the wind.

00:11:04.700 It could actually make a difference.

00:11:06.480 I think that kind of church will last. 0.99

00:11:07.900 I think any church that's pietistic, 1.00

00:11:09.900 that doesn't really engage the culture 0.95

00:11:11.480 or thinks that there's not even spikes

00:11:13.760 along a downward trajectory,

00:11:15.300 that there's no victory,

00:11:16.420 not even for 10 years or a decade,

00:11:18.420 I think those churches are gonna go the way of the dinosaur.

00:11:20.720 What do you think?

00:11:21.320 You know, I think if you think of the next 50 years,

00:11:25.000 you know, and if you think like I do

00:11:27.440 about sort of the economy and stuff like that,

00:11:29.620 you're not, you know, you're not doom and gloom necessarily. But I think most people kind of

00:11:34.900 agree that the standard of living that we've enjoyed for a very long time is kind of steadily

00:11:40.280 decreasing. And so over 50 years, that might go down even further, you know, and so that doesn't

00:11:46.120 mean we're all going to be, you know, starving to death, you know, or something like that. But it's

00:11:50.420 just like, even even today, like, I don't know how it is around you in Texas. But like, when I go to

00:11:56.540 the store today, it's a lot different than when I used to go to the store five years ago. It's like

00:12:00.220 five years ago, nothing was ever out of stock. These days, certain things are out of stock from

00:12:06.500 time to time. And it's not a big deal. I don't want to seem like I'm complaining. We still have

00:12:10.040 an abundance. We still have everything we need, but it's just different. And I think it's more

00:12:14.740 similar to what you see in other countries, where they don't have quite the standard of living

00:12:19.500 that we do in the United States, or at least that we've had. So as the standard of living goes down,

00:12:24.480 i think people you know you like they they do tend to like sort of uh cling to spiritual things

00:12:32.540 a lot more joyfully i don't know if you've ever noticed this like you've been on like a

00:12:36.320 a mission trip to a poor area whether it's in the united states or outside the united states like

00:12:41.140 the churches are just a lot more optimistic i think than than than some of the churches that

00:12:46.340 i grew up in in connecticut you know what i mean um and i don't know if that's just because

00:12:50.580 they're charismatic or maybe it's maybe that's part of it but i don't know i feel like people

00:12:54.840 like like they they they need a an outlet for positivity when things aren't quite going as well

00:13:01.820 as they want them to be and maybe that's part of it maybe it's just kind of a natural thing where

00:13:06.440 like you know life's a little tougher so you know you you kind of you lean on the church for more of

00:13:13.920 your joy you know you get together with people you hang out you do these things that maybe you

00:13:18.240 wouldn't do if things were better for you you know i mean things were going really well i don't know

00:13:22.700 if that's really real but to me i've noticed that when i've gone into poorer areas of churches in

00:13:27.700 poor areas church is a little different you know what i mean right yeah it's it's yeah that's more

00:13:33.480 positive but a lot of that does come from what you just put your finger on the communal aspect

00:13:37.320 it seems like the communal aspect that's it that's that's actually exactly what i'm thinking

00:13:41.000 of yeah because i think we you know part of it is like when you have so much stuff you're more

00:13:45.940 content to be alone so it's just like i'm just going to spend a quiet evening you know like like

00:13:51.200 a lot of americans when they think of like you know even on on twitter or social media like

00:13:55.400 describe you know the perfect evening a lot of people like the description that they would

00:13:58.880 um that they would you know put forward for the you know an evening that they would enjoy

00:14:03.660 would be an evening alone or or maybe an evening just with their spouse it would be you know i know

00:14:08.260 i'm like that right exactly yeah it would be a book or a glass of wine or watching a sunset or

00:14:13.300 in a hot tub or, but like none of them, one, one common denominator is that it's not this

00:14:19.160 big communal kind of thing.

00:14:20.820 Whereas like you think of Southern slavery, you know, in America and like part of the

00:14:25.380 reason why like the black church would have still even historically to this day, you know, 0.63

00:14:29.700 the overturned tones of this continuing, like traditionally really long services, you know,

00:14:34.920 like five hour long church services where it's just singing and singing and singing

00:14:38.620 and singing and preaching and preaching and preaching and preaching without getting into

00:14:42.280 any of the theology, like part of that does come over from like, all right, if, if life is hard,

00:14:47.060 six days a week, then on the Lord's day, it's like, this is a moment of reprieve and we don't

00:14:52.600 want it to end, but they spent it together. You know what I mean? Like, it wasn't like, Hey,

00:14:56.400 we just, you would think like, you know, I'm, I'm physically exhausted. I'm just going to stay

00:15:00.900 home and sleep all day. But that wasn't the mindset at all. It was like, I don't want to

00:15:04.080 waste a minute of daylight. I'm going to get with the saints, get with my brothers, get with my,

00:15:08.780 my sisters and we're going to spend, we're going to have some good old timey church and it's going

00:15:13.440 to be all day long. And so, so I'm, I'm with you. Yeah. And I don't think it's a matter, like you

00:15:19.600 said, it's not really a matter of eschatology. Cause I think of a lot of the people I'm thinking

00:15:22.740 of, you know, and my grandparents, for example, are one of them, you know, I used to go to their

00:15:26.040 house in the Bronx, you know, and, and compared to people in the Bronx, they were pretty well off

00:15:30.960 compared to like some people in the Bronx, but you know, like their eschatology, like they,

00:15:36.720 they didn't share what i what you and i believe about eschatology they thought they thought that

00:15:41.480 the world was going to hell in a handbasket you know but they didn't really act that way you know

00:15:45.500 what i mean they they had a family they they their family their kids had a lot of kids and they they

00:15:50.860 were playing for the future they were setting money aside they were doing this they were doing

00:15:54.080 that they were they were had an expectation of you know we you know we we need we've got to make

00:16:00.160 moves here you know what i mean even though their theology was not that way it was sort of like you

00:16:05.180 know christ is coming tomorrow probably and i think i've heard my grandmother even say that

00:16:08.320 many times um it really wasn't like that it's just they were making moves in their own way

00:16:15.740 and they felt like you know like christ was on their side and they could do what they needed

00:16:21.800 to do and they had confidence in the future they had faith in the future um so yeah it's it's a

00:16:28.400 very interesting dynamic because you're right it really doesn't have a lot to do with their

00:16:33.420 formal eschatology. You know what I mean? Right. Yeah. That's interesting. I think you're right

00:16:38.840 about that. Going into the future, the next 50 years, people are going to be looking for that

00:16:42.680 a bit more because there's a lot of Blackfield people out there, Joel. I don't know if you've

00:16:45.280 noticed. There are. There are. A lot of them are Christians, sadly, or at least professing

00:16:49.620 Christians. But yeah, so I think post-millennial eschatology is on the up and up. I think there's 0.95

00:16:54.920 a resurgence. So I think we are going to find more post-millennial churches. And I'm excited

00:16:58.640 about that because I think it's biblically true, not just because it's fun, not just because I

00:17:02.260 think it appeals to young men, which I do think it appeals to young men. There are all the pragmatic

00:17:06.660 reasons and all, you know, all, but ultimately I think that it's true to the scripture. I think

00:17:11.060 it's what the scripture teaches. And so I want to see that become a more dominant, you know,

00:17:15.620 eschatology. And I think that's going to happen. But my point is, I think if I'm getting down to

00:17:20.120 the common, you know, the lowest common denominator, I think it's simply going to be

00:17:25.180 people who believe it's going to be not so much anti-premillennialism. I think it's going to be

00:17:33.600 anti-pietism. It's going to be anti-retreatism. And it's going to be people who are engaging the

00:17:41.220 world. They think that the church actually has potential to change the world, even if they think

00:17:48.240 that's only going to be temporary. Even if they think Jesus is going to come back in 20 years,

00:17:53.440 but um uh but we can uh we could make the next five years better and five years uh a five-year

00:18:03.400 improvement matters it matters for me for my wife for my children for my grandchildren and

00:18:08.920 it's worth fighting for so i think that's like that's one of the things that honestly you can

00:18:13.080 kind of get a you know i'm thinking 50 years you know but you can get a really good five-year gauge

00:18:17.940 of what the church is going to be like by just looking at um kind of like the the pink pill

00:18:24.660 you know conservative world outside of the church because because that's really you know that's i

00:18:30.680 mean the church is just it's it's embarrassing how behind like right now i think the church is

00:18:35.580 more woke than the world and it's because the church is always like five to seven years behind

00:18:40.040 so so the like there are guys like like establishment regime big eva guys who are

00:18:46.500 literally like they're more woke than the average person that you meet at the grocery store and it's

00:18:50.500 and it's not because that person at the grocery store wasn't that woke they just they were that

00:18:55.620 woke in 2020 and they're just up with the times you know but jd greer still hasn't got the memo

00:19:01.380 you know what i mean like it's it's isn't that embarrassing like yes but it's true it's it's

00:19:10.420 like so it's so true so my point is like i think like the church is going to come out of wokeness

00:19:14.680 and this is so sad to say, like, but why am I confident the church is going to come out of

00:19:19.240 wokeness? Well, first, because I think Jesus is Lord and he's the head of the church and he's not

00:19:23.740 going to abandon us. But secondly, I think the church is going to come out of wokeness in

00:19:27.540 approximately five years because the culture as a whole is coming out of wokeness and the church

00:19:32.620 usually follows the culture five years behind. Crazy stuff, man. Crazy stuff. All right. So

00:19:39.740 anyways um okay so the second one that i was thinking is law and gospel so the first one is

00:19:44.220 engaging the world not being pietistic and being hopeful you could still think overall the

00:19:49.960 trajectory is down in terms of your eschatology but thinking that we could make a difference now

00:19:54.820 and that difference matters um so even if it's only going to be better for 10 years or 20 or 50

00:19:59.140 so i think that's number one number two i think is churches that don't just preach the gospel but

00:20:04.220 also preach uh the law so why don't you talk to us a little bit because you've had experience with

00:20:09.200 this. You were at Tim Keller's church for a while, you know, may he rest in peace. I think Tim Keller

00:20:13.380 for the record, I think he would agree with this. I think he's with the Lord right now. I think that

00:20:17.020 he was regenerate. I think that, uh, like first Corinthians chapter three verses eight through

00:20:21.340 11, you know, like I think not everything Keller did, but a good bit was wood, hay and stubble,

00:20:26.720 especially towards the end of his ministry was burned up. He suffered much loss, but he himself

00:20:30.880 is saved. Um, you know, and so I think Tim Keller is with the Lord. Um, but I think Tim Keller

00:20:36.420 probably had some regrets. Right now, I think he's in eternal bliss, but I think when he first

00:20:40.640 saw the Lord, there was some apologies that were taking place for some of his latter ministry.

00:20:46.640 But all that being said, so I'm not trying to pick on him because I know he just recently died.

00:20:50.860 But my point is, Tim Keller is kind of the pinnacle, the epitome of what I would call

00:20:56.340 not gospel centrality, but gospel myopticism, gospel onlyism. Can you talk about problems with

00:21:02.620 that preaching the law here's the thing i think that especially men there there's a need for like

00:21:11.120 a like a practicality to the faith as well so so it so listen you know a simple faith you know

00:21:18.360 that's a beautiful thing you know and you trust in the lord for your salvation that's a beautiful

00:21:23.440 thing you know and it's part of the commission you know we're baptizing uh the nations in the

00:21:28.560 name of the father the son and the holy spirit so that's like obviously we we've got to focus on

00:21:32.560 on converting people uh to the faith that's that's for sure um but i think men especially like

00:21:38.300 there's a i think people get men get frustrated when it's like you know you ask questions because

00:21:45.400 i remember i used to ask this question so like okay now what what do i do you know what i mean

00:21:49.960 like and and basically the answer that i would get is like well you just come to church on sunday

00:21:55.020 and you sing these songs and you know and you know maybe we'll talk about your struggles with

00:22:00.220 sin and that's about it but there's that's not about it you know what i mean because the commission

00:22:05.780 itself a whole half of it is about teaching them to observe everything that i command and so um i

00:22:12.740 think that that what you're what you're kind of referring to here is that the churches that'll

00:22:16.360 survive are actually going to be teaching are going to be doing the second part of that commission now

00:22:21.640 the question that i have is are they doing it for good or for ill like are they teaching the right

00:22:27.040 way or the wrong way right are they are they teaching you but but i guess your your point is

00:22:31.280 to survive one way or the other whether it's a solid church or not a solid church they're going

00:22:36.460 to have to be doing that you know they're going to have to it's not going to be enough to have

00:22:40.460 the sentimentality uh to survive in the next 50 years right i think that's kind of what you're

00:22:45.980 driving at right yep and i and i think part of that obviously i prefer they teach correctly

00:22:49.740 right but i think part of that is what you just said in terms of like men needing to have you

00:22:55.180 know be practically told what to do i think a lot of that uh was we were able to assume in like you

00:23:00.840 know a neutral world where there wasn't quite as much opposition sure and with a better economy

00:23:05.840 where it was just it was easier to provide for a family easier to get a job more people you know

00:23:11.260 just it was just what you did you got married you know typically in your 20s you had a few kids you

00:23:16.820 bought a home but now like those things aren't givens anymore like now it's like really hard to 0.80

00:23:21.880 find a woman um that you trust enough not to ruin your life that's why like you have the whole red

00:23:27.740 pill manosphere you know on the secular side of things that is totally not christian and like

00:23:32.560 their advice they're they're giving law they're giving practical you know uh steps for men and

00:23:37.740 and those steps are get a vasectomy in your 20s don't ever get married and and i get it i mean

00:23:43.680 it's it's totally it's not red pill it's black pill like they're you know they're totally wrong

00:23:47.840 But I get the sentiment because what they're thinking is, um, if you marry a woman, you've just given her a loaded gun. Um, you, you've just like, you have just, uh, given someone the, the authority and the power and the ability to completely, uh, destroy your life.

00:24:04.900 And statistically speaking, it's more likely that she'll do it than that she won't right now.

00:24:10.600 You know, so I think my point is in the world that we now live in, because Christendom has been, you know, leaving the port and going out to sea because of our rebellion and our apostasy, because of those things and because God will not be mocked and a man reaps what he sows and we're living in a worse world because of it, there are a lot more men who need direction than they used to.

00:24:31.640 and they don't just need like man up, they need to be told how to be a man. What, you know,

00:24:36.260 practically, what does that mean Monday through Saturday? How do I get married? How, how do I

00:24:40.920 discern whether or not this, this woman's going to marry me and then take half of my stuff, you 1.00

00:24:46.160 know, and, and, you know, so anyway, so I just think, yeah, I think that trust Jesus, he died

00:24:52.800 for your sin will, will not be enough churches that only, you know, Keller always preached the

00:24:58.720 first use of the law. So here's the law of God and here's how it functions as a mirror that

00:25:03.680 reflects to you, your fallenness, your, your shortcomings, your sin. And then here's the

00:25:09.220 gospel. Here's Jesus and how he did all those things that the very things that you just failed

00:25:13.560 to do. Um, and all that was true, you know, and then he's like, here's Jesus. And this is how

00:25:17.740 Jesus fulfilled those things perfectly on your behalf. So trust in Jesus. That's a, uh, almost

00:25:22.780 a great sermon. I wouldn't say that's wrong at all. I would just say it's incomplete. Then what

00:25:27.280 what I think we're going to see over the next 50 years is churches that then add to that

00:25:31.400 the third use of the law that says, so here's the law. This is how you failed. This is why you need

00:25:36.240 Jesus. Here's Jesus. This is how you fulfill these things in your place, not just substitutionary

00:25:41.080 death, but substitutionary life. Now let's go back to the law in its third use as a lamp unto our

00:25:46.720 feet, a light unto our path, something we delight in that shows us the way not to the way to

00:25:51.780 salvation, but the way from salvation to further sanctification that shows us not just that we're

00:25:58.560 sinners and we need Jesus, but now that we have Jesus and we're responding in gratitude for the

00:26:03.060 free gospel of grace, it shows us how to live. I think that's going to become, I think that

00:26:09.420 especially young men will not tolerate a Tim Keller type church 10 years from now, 20 years

00:26:16.380 Yeah. Yeah. And the thing and the thing about this is that, you know, up until now, like guys like Tim Keller have been very good at it kind of like not disguising what they're saying, but making it sound good, because like if you told the person like, you know, yeah, you know, I'm never going to I'm never really going to tell you practically what to do.

00:26:38.260 like that's not important people would see right through that right so they'll say things like

00:26:42.500 well you never actually move on from the gospel you always need the gospel you need to preach the

00:26:47.040 gospel to yourself every single day and um you need to every single passage it's just really

00:26:51.820 about the gospel and you need to think about that and it's like well that sounds like like to some

00:26:55.940 people especially to new believers that sounds okay that sounds pretty good i guess that makes

00:27:00.600 a lot of sense you know because i'm always going to be you know fighting against my sin and i still

00:27:04.580 do struggle with my sin so i guess i do need to just focus on the gospel every single day

00:27:09.240 and the thing is though that like i think you're right like when when when when times are somewhat

00:27:15.920 normal you know somewhat you know you can kind of assume a certain set of morality i mean i remember

00:27:21.060 when i was growing up you know which was not that long ago i'm not that old yet joel you know but 0.87

00:27:25.620 but when i was growing up it's like everyone kind of knew that like homosexuality was a deviant

00:27:30.860 lifestyle even if they didn't think it was a sin they didn't think it was you know anything really

00:27:35.520 wrong with it it was something that you want did not want to do you didn't want to do that it was

00:27:39.760 deviant you know even even degenerates didn't want to degenerate that much you know what i mean so

00:27:44.980 in the 1960s we knew that even a dude a man having long hair was degenerate like that's why a guy

00:27:50.920 would grow out his hair exactly 100 so i guess so i guess my point is like when everyone's kind of

00:27:59.560 working with the same assumptions you don't like you can kind of get away with some of that stuff

00:28:04.760 but you're right like these these days you know especially men are struggling with like lots of

00:28:10.460 basic basic stuff and they're turning to youtube to basically guide them and and that's that's a

00:28:17.900 day youtube is is not this is i like youtube don't get me wrong i there's a lot of cool stuff on

00:28:23.000 youtube but there's a lot of garbage on youtube garbage and i don't know man have you noticed

00:28:28.360 Joel some of these like 0.87

00:28:30.200 Manosphere types I don't even know if they technically

00:28:32.200 Would still call themselves Manosphere types but they

00:28:34.080 That's how they kind of came up

00:28:35.420 Lately have been talking 1.00

00:28:38.140 About how good some of these trannies look 1.00

00:28:40.160 I don't know if you've noticed that there's a few 1.00

00:28:42.280 Guys that have been doing that and I'm like

00:28:44.060 I don't even I kind of

00:28:46.300 Just stay away and I probably should

00:28:48.100 Michael Foster's been talking to me and saying Joel you

00:28:50.180 Should probably so do you know who Rolo

00:28:51.880 I think Tomasi is his name do you know who that is

00:28:54.340 I've heard of him I don't really know anything

00:28:56.160 So he just I we'll see

00:28:58.200 by the time this comes out i'm gonna i'm recording i'm going on his show this friday he invited me

00:29:01.820 to come on his show so i really don't have any idea what i'm getting into because i like i don't

00:29:07.360 know that the whole the whole secular manosphere i've heard from like foster has told me a few

00:29:12.020 things brian silvey you're telling me some things right now so i feel like i'm getting a little bit

00:29:15.880 of prep but i've just met like andrew tate like i've never listened to a single thing from andrew

00:29:19.840 tate you know what i mean like i know i know his name i you know so no i do not i saw a few things

00:29:25.520 of recently and i i i put on my muted words on twitter i don't want to see any more yeah

00:29:30.260 anyway yeah point is the point is though that that uh if we're talking about churches that

00:29:36.480 are going to survive it's going to be churches that have answers to some of these questions

00:29:39.880 right and again hopefully they're good answers hopefully it's like it's more than just you got

00:29:44.340 a man up you know you got to be a man like that's that's that's nothing that's not that's not anything

00:29:48.480 um but uh because otherwise they're going to find these answers somewhere else and

00:29:52.760 there's a lot of very bad answers out there for a lot of these basic questions yep i completely

00:29:57.420 agree yeah man up that i think you know that that phrase man up like it came from somewhere

00:30:03.080 and when it first you know originated it probably made sense because yeah what was being said you

00:30:08.860 were talking to some effeminate you know and it was probably you know something a father would say

00:30:13.520 you know to um a son you know who's maybe he's sure 11 12 years old but and and i don't think

00:30:19.820 that's wrong, um, because he's telling him do, when he says man up, he's saying for one, um,

00:30:26.280 the boy knows what a man is, right? We're currently live in a culture that can't define

00:30:31.140 what a woman is, you know, or, or a man, you know? And so, um, but that was at a time when

00:30:36.180 people were saying man up, you know, once upon a time, um, it, you know, you could assume that

00:30:41.280 somebody actually knew what a man was. And so what you were saying is, um, uh, you were basically

00:30:46.220 saying obey the law of god um for you as it pertains to you a man you're right now you're

00:30:51.520 sinning you're being effeminate you're being cowardly you're being lazy or whatever it is 0.51

00:30:55.860 you're being rebellious or disrespectful or um whatever it is or you're you're not um you're 0.97

00:31:00.460 not being chivalrous and and uh and you need to be a man uh son you need you need to man up well

00:31:06.700 now when you say man up um it's like what is that what is it so that so guys who just say man up but

00:31:15.200 don't teach you what it is to be a man that won't work. And then guys who say, well, Jesus was the

00:31:19.340 perfect man in your place. So you don't have to be one that gospel centered preaching that dog

00:31:24.940 won't hunt either. You know? So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And the thing is like, you know, obviously like

00:31:29.760 most people aren't like totally brain dead. They understand that, you know, men have, you know,

00:31:33.940 male parts and, you know, things like that. But, but you're right. There is basic confusion about 0.68

00:31:40.420 what's a man supposed to be doing like what what what what is when a man and a woman uh get together

00:31:46.000 and they form a family like how do they divide up that labor what's supposed to happen like what's

00:31:50.760 the what's you know like that stuff i mean people people are totally confused about that stuff

00:31:57.140 you know what i mean i think a lot of people a lot of guys still have it in their gut they they know

00:32:01.320 they're supposed to be the provider but like they've been propagandized so much that they

00:32:05.240 think it's almost like it's like sexist to even like try to assert that or to you know to to to

00:32:10.740 to push that too hard you're totally right like i like i think like the i don't know what a woman 0.58

00:32:15.940 is kind of stuff yeah there's some wackos out there that pretend like they don't actually know

00:32:20.000 they do know but but there's a lot of confusion about what we're supposed to be doing what men

00:32:25.440 are supposed to be doing what women are supposed to be doing what they're not supposed to be doing

00:32:27.720 right yep i agree so i think you know law and gospel like we can it's it's never anything less 0.59

00:32:34.140 than the gospel, but that's, you know, that's been my hobby horse for a few years now is just

00:32:39.160 saying, okay, like if we really want to be gospel centered, um, with a gospel centered sermon is not

00:32:44.480 a law and gospel, amen, let's go home. Like quite literally for it to be gospel centered,

00:32:50.200 it's law, gospel, law, like the gospel is in the center, right? And like, so the gospel is flanked

00:32:56.020 on not just the front end, but the front and the back on both sides, right? It's like an Oreo

00:33:01.020 cookie you got you know you got two little chocolate law pieces you know and then you got

00:33:04.700 that white creamy gospel in the center and so yeah and and that's that is like that's the way

00:33:10.180 the bible works it's here's the law of god um and and in its first use it's like oh my goodness

00:33:15.900 that's that's god god's a thrice holy god that's his perfect standard and uh and i have not lived

00:33:22.120 up to that oh my goodness um woe am i you know like i'm a sinful man depart from me and then it's

00:33:28.720 like, you know, gospel, right? It's white pill. Here's Jesus. He actually, all those things he

00:33:33.140 did for you, right? But then the immediate response is, well, if, you know, 1 John 4, 19,

00:33:37.660 we love because he first loved us. Well, if he loved me freely like that, while we were yet

00:33:41.460 sinners, Christ died for me. In the midst of my sin, he loved me. He paid the price. Well, then

00:33:45.640 man, I can't help but love him back. And I want to show him my love. So Jesus, I love you. What

00:33:51.940 can I do to show you that I love you? If you love me, obey my commandments, you know? So then it's

00:33:57.700 right back to the law and but now fueled by grace not trying to earn his love or earn salvation but

00:34:04.780 rather a response of gratitude for the free salvation we have by grace alone through faith

00:34:08.720 alone in christ alone and and you'll fail inevitably and then you go back to the gospel

00:34:12.900 and you go back to the law and you go back to the gospel and you go back to but this idea that um

00:34:16.760 that the law only functions in its first use initially to get a person to realize they're a

00:34:21.760 in your center so that they'll get converted that and and and then it's just kind of that it's and

00:34:26.940 now we're no longer under law but grace that is um that is such a horrible exegesis of scripture

00:34:33.500 um and but a lot of guys but like a lot of christians have believed that and people i've

00:34:39.000 just noticed people are coming out of that like like in droves right now like guys who say hey

00:34:43.780 we're not we're no longer under law we're under grace yeah you're not under if you're a christian

00:34:48.020 you're not under the law in terms of condemnation. That does not mean that the law is no longer God's

00:34:53.880 universal standard for morality and the light of our path and the lamp unto our feet, the direction

00:35:01.800 that we should orient our lives towards. That's not what Paul meant in Galatians when he says

00:35:06.700 we're no longer under law but under grace. He said we're no longer under law as our final judgment,

00:35:11.440 as our condemnation we very much are still led by the law as a guide as a compass um and and so

00:35:18.720 uh anybody who's preaching you're no longer under law but under grace we're antinomian there's no

00:35:24.280 place for the law here except for just to convince people who aren't saved yet that they need jesus

00:35:29.060 uh i really think like those churches are going to go the way of the dodo bird and already are

00:35:33.660 like people are leaving those churches i i think so and honestly honestly i do think i think you

00:35:39.060 kind of kind of mentioned this a little bit earlier but the a lot of the woke stuff is is

00:35:45.000 an attempt to sort of fill that void uh of of of of the the law on the back end of the gospel kind

00:35:52.300 of thing because that's appropriate that's totally appropriate uh but they didn't want to fill it

00:35:56.940 with god's law they wanted to fill something else and so they that's that's why a lot of these 1.00

00:36:01.260 churches went woke you know if you notice a lot of the people that are like the wokest people out

00:36:05.600 there they're like these gospel centered people that that before would never ever preach about

00:36:10.300 the law and they thought that was that was that was not right in fact i had a guy tell me to my

00:36:15.240 face this is like a low-level gospel coalition goon told me um directly and said you're never

00:36:22.060 satisfied you're never satisfied ad first first you told me that i i never brought up the law now

00:36:27.480 i'm bringing up uh the law and and you're against it and i'm like what are you talking about because

00:36:33.760 what he was doing was he was he was misquoting the law you know he was right you know he was he

00:36:38.240 was saying things that you know you know you know what the woke people do you know the you know

00:36:43.180 right uh let uh justice roll down like waters you know and that means uh you know social uh

00:36:49.180 programs student debt right right you know what i'm talking about so so but so so i think a lot

00:36:54.500 of the woke stuff was almost like a self-conscious move saying you know we can't just do this thing

00:36:59.740 where there's no there's no uh uh discipleship there's no like now what now what do i do i'm

00:37:06.460 saved what do i do now like they couldn't just stay there and say we're gospel centered nobody

00:37:11.200 was buying that anymore so they had to do something and so churches decided and i think

00:37:15.560 i think they i think a lot of churches made this decision it's either you go woke

00:37:19.380 or you've rediscovered the law and a lot of these guys are like christian nationalists now you're

00:37:24.760 right that used to be an 829 you know some of these guys you know what i mean yep yep we talked

00:37:29.400 to them regularly you and i um yeah no that's exactly what happened it's like um like it's the

00:37:34.840 same as the the new calvinist movement um you know like the young reformed and restless like you can

00:37:39.540 you can basically everybody who was young reformed and restless and i was you know i was on i was a

00:37:43.620 little bit too young to be a part of you know but i was on the back end of that i was acts 29 for a

00:37:47.620 little bit all the young reformed and restless guys uh pretty much split right down the middle

00:37:52.020 50 50 uh 50 of them apostatized and you know 50 and then 50 of them went confessionally reformed

00:37:58.840 in our either like 1689 or Westminster, you know, and more liturgical and regular principle of

00:38:04.800 worship, you know, and that kind of thing. And most of them cessationist and kind of dropped

00:38:10.240 the, you know, the Wayne Grudem, John Piper kind of continuationist Calvinist, new Calvinism thing.

00:38:15.280 Same thing with gospel centered. So this is a little bit more than just the young reformed

00:38:21.600 and restless Acts 29 Driscoll Chandler group. This is like had some older guys like Keller,

00:38:26.320 this is your gospel coalition you know nine marks you know the gospel centered uh movement

00:38:31.200 same thing um uh they they pretty much all over the last few years instinctively realized

00:38:37.920 um the gospel is supposed to be um accompanied with god's law it's law and gospel law and gospel

00:38:46.520 law and gospel and uh half of them embraced law but it was uh man's law which was um antithetical

00:38:54.220 to the law of God. Social justice is, it's not that we don't like justice. We don't like social

00:38:59.900 justice because it's unjust. It's not biblical justice. The other half though, at first, I don't

00:39:05.320 think they responded well. Like good guys that you and I like, and you and I probably were part

00:39:11.640 of this a little bit. Our first kind of line of attack to the wokeness of embracing this law,

00:39:18.800 our first line of attack because we were so steeped in the gospel centered um you know myopticism

00:39:25.040 our first line of attack was um uh this is the galatian heresy this is legalism you're adding

00:39:30.980 works to the gospel that should have never been our line of attack we should not have said uh this

00:39:36.720 is bad because it's um it's a twisting of the gospel it's adding works to the gospel of free

00:39:41.080 grace it's legalism it's um no that that shouldn't have been that i think we shot ourselves in the

00:39:47.440 foot. And we're recovering now, but I think we could have beat the woke thing probably two years

00:39:52.840 faster. I think we could have been done with this two years ago. And now we're coming out of it,

00:39:57.220 but we're coming out of it because we're finally employing the right biblical attack. Instead of

00:40:01.300 saying you're conflating the gospel and adding works to the gospel, because some guys were doing

00:40:05.320 that saying like, if you don't believe in reparations and you don't believe the gospel,

00:40:10.820 okay, well, that's a Galatian heresy. That's adding works to the gospel.

00:40:13.140 Oh, sure. No question.

00:40:13.720 But a lot of the woke guys weren't, the worst of them were doing that, but a lot of them weren't doing that. They were careful enough to not conflate works with gospel. And so then we kept insisting, well, you are inflating works with gospel. You are being a legalist. When they actually weren't. The line of attack we should have used is, we should have said, the works that you're adding, you're not conflating with the gospel. You have a distinction between gospel and works.

00:40:37.760 the problem is that the works although distinct from the gospel are the works of the devil

00:40:41.820 they're demonic works evil works they're not good works this you know what i mean that should have

00:40:47.180 been that should have been our answer and it took you're dead on it took us two extra i in my

00:40:52.640 assessment two extra years to like john harris is on that train now like he he's like he wasn't

00:40:59.000 always there though he wasn't always there you know he wasn't always there and so it you know

00:41:02.880 and john and we could say that about john he'll watch this and he'll laugh because he's he's a

00:41:06.440 good friend but like it took him it took me a little you know i wasn't quite as much as john

00:41:10.620 but um but anyways it's you know it took us a little bit to realize oh wait a second the the

00:41:16.040 biggest problem with this is not a perversion of the gospel a perversion of the gospel is a huge

00:41:21.260 problem but a lot of guys weren't a lot of them were doing that you're right and and in fairness

00:41:24.840 and in fairness to john a lot of these guys the worst of them were definitely doing that 100%

00:41:31.160 guys were doing that that's true yeah so so yeah there were some dudes out there doing that but

00:41:36.300 but a lot, but not everyone. And the ones that weren't doing it were still wrong.

00:41:39.840 Yeah. The guys who were saying the whole gospel that they were doing it, they were,

00:41:44.020 when you start saying the whole gospel and the whole gospel means reparations and, and, you know,

00:41:50.220 and, uh, universal income and whatever. Um, and you're saying this is the gospel, um, or that you

00:41:57.760 can't be saved apart from, then that is the Galatian heresy adding works to the gospel of

00:42:02.120 grace. And the worst guys were doing that. And John nailed them on it. And he was, he was right.

00:42:07.240 Absolutely. But, but the minions, they're followers, right? So you've got a few elite

00:42:11.720 guys who are doing that. Um, but, but most of the guys are the followers. And, and I would say the

00:42:17.500 majority of guys actually weren't doing that. Um, they, they actually were, uh, had a clear

00:42:23.320 distinction between law and gospel. The problem is that their law wasn't God's law. And it took

00:42:28.480 us a while, I think, to figure that out. So anyways, all that being said, I think moving

00:42:32.040 forward, you're absolutely right though, that like God used in his mercy, he used COVID, he used BLM,

00:42:38.160 he used the whole woke thing from 2017, 18, 19, and then really, you know, climaxing in 2020.

00:42:44.460 I think he used that for, we couldn't beat the wokeness by just saying Galatian heresy,

00:42:50.980 Galatian heresy, because that didn't apply to everybody. So then what we had to do to beat it 0.54

00:42:54.960 is we actually had to, uh, to go back to the law of God. And, and the beauty is that now coming

00:43:00.260 off of this, um, you've got a lot more churches like mine, you know, that, that, um, that preach

00:43:06.140 law and gospel. So that's good. Absolutely. No, I think, and what's interesting about the two

00:43:11.880 things we've brought up so far, you can see sort of like, there's going to be a dichotomy. There's

00:43:16.200 going to be churches that are solid that survive, and there's going to be some evil churches that

00:43:20.220 survive that are doing these things just the like the bizarro like anti-christ version right

00:43:25.860 bizarro superman and they're going to be and they're going to be the regime churches they're

00:43:29.140 going to be the churches for you know essentially you know the people that are on capitol hill kind

00:43:34.600 of thing you know that that kind of thing um and eventually they'll die out too but right that's

00:43:39.740 what's going to happen but they'll they'll be the bad ones that last the longest you're absolutely

00:43:43.000 right and we and let's explore that a little bit more but with the third one now uh the third one

00:43:47.640 that i was thinking of is third characteristic of churches that i think will last for 50 years

00:43:51.920 is uh churches that feel old um churches that have like some kind of traditional historic

00:43:58.780 um you know um uh old tried and true trusted credible uh sentiment you know that that i think

00:44:09.000 as you know this gets into like technology it gets into ai it gets like as the world continues

00:44:14.360 to progress and more and more things become digital. As the world becomes more digital

00:44:19.380 and becomes, Michael O'Fallon would love this, you know, digital currency. And, you know,

00:44:25.020 as the world becomes more digital, digitized, and there's more things that are doctored and

00:44:31.200 tweaked and twisted, I think there's going to be a yearning for what is true. What is true?

00:44:38.120 What is true? What is authentic? What is real? What can I trust? And so on the bad side of

00:44:44.040 things, the bizarro world, you know, uh, upside down world, but churches that, that mimic God's

00:44:49.060 design, but in the opposite sense, but they last because they're still mimicking his design. 0.99

00:44:54.240 Um, I like, that would be the perfect example of that would be like, um, like an Episcopalian

00:45:00.140 church where, you know, you're walking in with like, like a 400 year old Bible, you know,

00:45:05.080 being carried. And there's like three altar boys with, you know, lit candles walking behind the

00:45:09.780 priest and, and there's thrones up on the stage and stained glass and chandeliers hanging. And

00:45:15.140 it's glorious. It's this cathedral. I mean, it's beautiful. It looks legit. And then the guy gives

00:45:20.280 a 15 minute homily on why, uh, Paul, you know, when he cast out the demon of the slave girl,

00:45:26.260 he was wrong to do that, you know, and, uh, whatever, you know, and, and the dude is, 0.52

00:45:31.700 you know, and the priest is actually gay and his boyfriend is sitting on the front row.

00:45:35.960 and i say that like as some um random you know illustration but i actually actually knew a priest

00:45:42.380 like that when i was pastoring when i was pastoring in california we met at an episcopalian church in

00:45:48.060 the evening and the priest was gay and uh and his boyfriend would sit on the front row and i remember

00:45:53.180 going to one of the services and it was a 15 minute homily where he said the the apostle

00:45:57.380 paul was wrong for these reasons um in this particular text so anyways all that being said

00:46:01.960 but the the aesthetic looked trustworthy it looked you know and so when you're when you're

00:46:08.440 sitting on youtube all day you know and and and watching tiktok and and your work is um is is in

00:46:15.020 an office bunker underground where you don't see the light of day you know no sunlight and it's

00:46:20.420 everything is on the computer and in ai and virtual reality and all this kind of stuff as in

00:46:26.280 it's progressing. And then you can go to the sun gloriously cascading through a stained glass

00:46:32.920 window of a church that's 300 years old, the building. And there's these old rituals that

00:46:39.020 they've been doing for, you know, for centuries. Even though the actual content of what's being

00:46:45.040 preached is antithetical to the Bible, the veneer feels legit. It feels legitimate and

00:46:51.500 uh, and, and it'll, that'll be, take longer to, to come down. What do you think?

00:46:57.060 Yeah. Yeah. I think that's, I think that's interesting. I also think, um, even besides

00:47:02.880 just the aesthetic of the actual physical building and stuff like that, um, the, the liturgy like

00:47:08.980 actually is going to make a big difference too. Like if you have a solid, you know, you know,

00:47:14.380 somewhat ancient liturgy, you know, where you do things like, you know, you sling the Gloria

00:47:21.080 a pottery or you do catechisms questions or you know i don't know what what people are doing but

00:47:26.940 what i'm saying is like as as the world gets at least it seems to get more chaotic you know at

00:47:33.860 least what you see online you know what you see on tv and what they what they push what they push

00:47:38.180 is more chaotic anyway um i think that people are going to be attracted to having a sunday uh lord's

00:47:45.240 day that is predictable that is beautiful that is uh constant that has the feel of constants you

00:47:53.040 know it's like it's just this is what we've been doing for a long time you know people have been

00:47:57.500 singing you know the glory pottery for hundreds of years people have been singing you know um

00:48:02.480 doxology for however long you know i don't even know when these songs were invented but i'm just

00:48:07.880 saying like i think people are gonna be attracted to that as things get more and more chaotic

00:48:12.740 Like, especially online, because a lot of the things that are happening online with AI and this whole idea of, like, trying to get people to plug into this metaverse thing.

00:48:22.240 I don't know if that's ever going to work, but it's something they're trying.

00:48:25.180 You know, all this digitization of everything, it's a way to introduce all kinds of chaos.

00:48:31.200 You know what I mean?

00:48:31.940 It's just a crazy.

00:48:34.040 Anyway.

00:48:35.040 Yeah, I think you're absolutely right.

00:48:35.960 So I think people are going to be attracted to that kind of thing.

00:48:37.520 they're not going to want to go to the the the the the church where like anything can happen

00:48:43.320 and so there's like there's like uh skits and in concerts and stuff because that's just like

00:48:47.600 everything else that they know you know what i mean and the world always does it better you know

00:48:51.640 and so yeah um yeah i yeah this is a spectacle for spectacle's sake it's not really like for

00:48:56.780 anything it's just right so you're you're copying the spectacle in a place where it's inappropriate

00:49:02.820 there's no way you're going to do that right right yep so i think liturgy and like that kind of

00:49:08.080 feeling of of a connection to the past is going to be important you know what i mean i think and

00:49:14.060 actually a lot of the things that are happening right now they're trying to disconnect you from

00:49:17.540 the past they're trying to disconnect you from your ancestors they're tearing down the stats

00:49:22.180 statues of your ancestors they're renaming buildings or renaming you know bridges you know

00:49:27.720 all this stuff. And that all is intentionally disconnecting you from your history. And I think

00:49:33.000 that there's going to be pushback there for sure. Yep. I agree. So as a recap, the three things,

00:49:38.820 you know, one is guys who believe engaging the culture, the world, politics, society matters,

00:49:44.560 and that you could actually experience success. And it doesn't necessarily, you know, necessitate

00:49:50.160 that you're post-millennial and you're eschatology. But if you think Jesus is coming back in 20,000

00:49:55.420 years or in 20 years. Um, the post-millennial believes the trajectory overall is up, but there

00:50:01.460 are dips along the way. The Dispy pre-mill guy, you know, on the opposite, you know, of the spectrum 0.53

00:50:06.540 of eschatology, he believes the trajectory is down overall, but even he believes there could

00:50:12.300 be spikes along the way. And so anybody who believes, um, that, that, uh, even from a Dispy 0.97

00:50:17.620 pre-mill standpoint, anybody, regardless of eschatology, if they believe that engaging the

00:50:21.720 culture matters, that pietism be damned, uh, engaging the culture matters and that it could

00:50:27.160 actually be successful, uh, that our engagement, uh, it matters because it actually by God's grace

00:50:33.200 could make a difference. I think that's going to be, um, a big factor. The second one, law and

00:50:39.260 gospel, not just, uh, Jesus was Jesus so that you don't have to be Jesus. Thank God for Jesus.

00:50:44.900 Let's go home. Um, but, but, uh, no, here's the law. Here's how you're a sinner. Here's Jesus.

00:50:49.640 This is how he fulfilled it. In light of his free gift of grace for you, fulfilling the law in your

00:50:54.840 place, you now love him as a response. And those who love him will obey him and he has commandments

00:51:00.980 and here they are. And so in gratitude, not trying to earn his salvation, but in response of gratitude

00:51:07.380 for his salvation, we're seeking to obey in order to demonstrate our love. We show our love to Christ

00:51:13.020 through obedience. If you love me, you will obey me. So preaching law and gospel, particularly the

00:51:17.840 third use of the law, not just the first that reveals that you need the gospel, but then the

00:51:21.640 third use of the law as a response to the gospel. And then the third thing is churches that have

00:51:29.240 some kind of history, some kind of tradition. I think confessional churches will do particularly

00:51:35.240 well. I think the building, the cathedral, if you got it, great. Praise God for that.

00:51:41.220 But I think if you're meeting in a barn, like a Western hoedown country line dancing place,

00:51:47.560 where I'm currently meeting in Wahlberg, Texas

00:51:49.820 with cows around and stuff like that.

00:51:52.900 But having like a robust liturgical worship service,

00:51:57.060 which we have, it's simple church

00:51:59.000 in terms of the aesthetics.

00:52:00.780 I think aesthetics matter, angels in the architecture.

00:52:03.660 I'm down for that, but it's just what we have right now

00:52:05.880 in the providence of God.

00:52:06.840 And we're grateful for what we have.

00:52:08.600 But even if it's simple church in terms of the building,

00:52:11.140 you can still have robust, historic, rooted, grounded church

00:52:16.220 in terms of just your liturgy and your worship, your order of worship and the way that you preach

00:52:22.500 and those kinds of things. And I think that with technological advances and people constantly

00:52:28.040 pulling the wool over you, institutions constantly, everybody's lying to you. All the time people are

00:52:32.960 lying to you. So to have something that feels rooted and timeless and tried and tested and true

00:52:38.960 will go a long way. So I think those are the three things that I thought of.

00:52:43.280 Any final thoughts on that or final word?

00:52:46.220 I think all of these things, you know, when you when you think about it all together, I think people are going to be looking and they're already doing this, looking for like an authenticity to everything.

00:52:58.760 You know what I mean? Like, I know lots of people still go to mega churches. I don't think that that kind of thing is going to survive into the future.

00:53:07.060 And one of the big reasons is because it's very difficult to do the community thing or even to to to to to be quite honest.

00:53:15.660 Like it's very difficult to to to to to even like really pastor people or even like to even do the basic stuff right in that content.

00:53:26.480 I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's very difficult.

00:53:29.020 And so and I think that a lot of I think automatically some of the kind of like traditional feel of church goes out the window when you have 10,000 people in your church, you know, and video screens everywhere like a stadium.

00:53:42.920 So anyway, all that to say is that I think people are going to, the stuff on, look, internet is part of real life.

00:53:51.340 I'm not going to say to do the thing where it's like internet's not real life.

00:53:54.580 But with AI content creators and, you know, all kinds of lying content creators, there's like a, there's one common carnivore diet content creator that presents themselves as a man, but it's actually a woman.

00:54:08.980 Oh, okay, okay.

00:54:10.080 anyway whatever like the point the point is like there's all kinds of lying going on and deceptions

00:54:15.500 and things like that people are gonna i think rebel against that to some degree and they're

00:54:21.200 going to they're still going to consume online content of course but the voices that are too

00:54:25.620 easily manipulated by or copied by ai like you know if i type in ai uh right now chat gpt you

00:54:33.060 know give me an article about uh the latest event you know in the style of gospel coalition it will

00:54:38.120 be identical to what you'll find from gospel coalition that's going to go the way of the

00:54:41.380 dodo nobody's going to want that anymore right they're going to want you know more authentic

00:54:46.680 style online content but i think they're also going to want just in real life people real

00:54:52.240 life people that they could hang out with that they could grab a beer with if you're presbyterian

00:54:56.360 if you're you know if you're baptist maybe grab a grape juice or something like that we have wine

00:55:00.260 for the lord's supper because we're biblical and i drink beer and you know this ad we have drank

00:55:04.540 beer together i do know this that's why i said it but i'm one of the minorities i i admit that

00:55:09.260 anyway but my point is like they they're gonna want to have people that um that you know it's

00:55:17.320 they're they're serious about the lord um but there's there's as little pretense as possible

00:55:22.560 i think sometimes you know i'm not saying this is true of every megachurch i've never been to

00:55:25.960 every megachurch but when i go to megachurches you know you've got the the greeting team and

00:55:30.860 you've got this and everything seems very contrived now every church usually has that

00:55:35.240 they'll have someone that goes up to new people and and but when it's in a smaller context it just

00:55:39.760 does not feel the same you know what i mean it does not feel the same have you've ever visited

00:55:45.020 a smaller church where you kind of had the idea that oh this is the guy that they send a new folks

00:55:49.680 to talk to them like it just it's different it's different from a megachurch to a smaller church

00:55:55.860 anyway i i think all this stuff is all about human connections and like authentic connections

00:56:01.760 because what we get online and what they're trying to push on us is all inauthentic i mean even down

00:56:07.380 to like the sexuality like they're trying to push transsexuals that's inauthentic obviously to say 0.78

00:56:12.840 the the best about it right it's inauthentic right yep i think that that's the common denominator 0.99

00:56:18.840 with all the things you just said you know yeah uh-huh you're absolutely right i think um one

00:56:24.740 thing on the megachurches. I was just thinking, you know, megachurches really became a thing

00:56:28.980 in the Bible Belt and Southern California would be another hotspot. But megachurches became like

00:56:35.880 the church growth movement, Bill Hybels, you know, like large, like, I mean, technically,

00:56:40.280 you know, like Charles Spurgeon, you could argue that he had a megachurch that, you know, the London

00:56:43.840 metropolitan tabernacle, like, so there have been some big churches. I think the church of Antioch

00:56:50.060 was probably pretty big, the church in Jerusalem. So like, I'm not, you know, neither you or I are

00:56:54.280 philosophically inherently against mega churches, but in terms of mega churches being, being so

00:56:59.020 common, a dime a dozen, that's relatively new, um, a new phenomenon, uh, that you can track back

00:57:05.060 to pretty much the eighties and nineties. However, what I was going to say is that, um, one thing

00:57:09.700 that's radically changed, uh, is, uh, is the internet. Um, and that, uh, that a lot of reason

00:57:17.240 why the mega church appealed to people is because they wanted to be able to, um, to slip in and

00:57:22.860 slip out and have an experience without the community. They didn't go to a mega church

00:57:27.560 because they wanted a community with 10,000 people. You go to a context of 10,000 people

00:57:31.660 because you don't want community because you're just a number that you can, um, you can't go,

00:57:36.680 you can't go to a church of 75 people and show it 15 minutes late and not be noticed

00:57:41.100 for being late. You know what I mean? Like, like you're, you better be on time. And you also,

00:57:46.380 if things are uncomfortable or you don't like it or you're bored or whatever, like you can't,

00:57:50.200 You can't slip out without it being kind of.

00:57:52.680 Well, I'll tell you, this is, I'm sorry to interrupt you, but this is so, this is, and it's not from, it's not typically, well, maybe it could be from a place of judgment, but I'll tell you right.

00:58:00.980 One time recently I was, I have a new church.

00:58:04.540 I don't know if I, if I told everyone in the audience this yet, but you know, just a church, a local church just in my town.

00:58:09.920 So I was driving an hour and it was a great church, but it was an hour away, you know?

00:58:13.760 So anyway, so I, we just started going to this church and my, my family was out of town.

00:58:19.040 i even forget where they were doing but i was all alone and so i went to church that day and um i

00:58:25.640 just started feeling really ill you know in the middle of the service and so i just i skedaddled

00:58:30.980 right and i'll never forget it like i got a text after church was over from my from my buddies like

00:58:37.500 dude i saw you leave are you all right and it wasn't from a place of judgment it's like is

00:58:41.740 everything okay kind of thing he saw me because there's only like 50 people at that church right

00:58:46.700 exactly well and that's what i'm saying so my point is like pairing that with the internet

00:58:50.780 when when the mega church movement church growth movement bill heibel's that kind of thing

00:58:55.040 saddleback you know like when that really was becoming a thing um and praise god saddleback

00:58:59.800 you know was just voted out of the sbc and so that you know that's hopeful there's a lot such 0.58

00:59:03.640 a white pill man that's great news but it's great news let's let's take it and celebrate the lord 0.93

00:59:07.760 um but with that um you know when when that was becoming a thing the mega church church growth

00:59:13.320 movement thing was really lifting off um you you did not like yeah sure like maybe you you the

00:59:19.260 internet was a little bit after that coming on the scene but it wasn't like it is now

00:59:23.800 it was not um podcasting was not a thing youtube was not a thing um and and all those things are

00:59:31.020 getting better they're all youtube's getting better you know streaming services are getting

00:59:34.800 better twitter you can do twitter spaces now and and all these and so my point is if that's all

00:59:40.040 somebody wants is just an experience. And typically the person who goes to a megachurch

00:59:45.540 wants the invisible experience, the unnoticed, slipping in unnoticed experience. My point is

00:59:52.780 that the type of person who goes to a megachurch, I'm not saying they're going to leave a megachurch

00:59:58.340 and find a small church. I'm saying they're just not going to go to church at all. I think that

01:00:02.180 over the next few years, that person, they're just going to listen to YouTube, right? They're

01:00:08.000 just going to watch youtube they're going to listen to podcasts they're going to you know

01:00:10.640 uh be following really there's no difference there's no difference that's my point from

01:00:14.960 their perspective exactly exactly and so my point is that i think now like the internet and all these

01:00:20.320 spaces these little virtual communities pseudo communities online have become so uh dialed in

01:00:28.300 and and and have improved so much in terms of content experience uh being able in the chats

01:00:34.780 and stuff like that, to engage with people and talk as you're listening and all that, like,

01:00:39.080 why get out of bed, you know? And so I think that the only, you know, the megachurch is going to,

01:00:45.160 I think it's going to become extinct. I really do. I think that the only thing that's going to

01:00:50.900 endure is when I'm thinking I got to get out of bed. Well, for me, I won't use me as an example,

01:00:56.800 because for me, it's I need to worship the Lord. I need to lead my wife and children. I also need

01:01:00.860 a paycheck it's my job you know so they're a little different for you my situation is a little

01:01:05.100 but the person the average person who's a member at covenant bible church the church that i pastor

01:01:09.180 in central texas when they show up um they're they're showing up because they're thinking um

01:01:15.000 it's the lord's day um and uh and i need to take the supper i need to eat the bread i need to drink

01:01:22.500 the wine i need to sing and address one another not just god that i can do privately while

01:01:29.220 listening to a worship CD or CDs aren't even a thing anymore, worship, whatever. Um, you know,

01:01:34.820 but like a song on, on Alexa, you know, whatever at home. Um, but no, I, I'm commanded to address

01:01:40.320 one another, uh, the saints with Psalms, hymns, and spiritual. So I need to sing to people.

01:01:44.920 I need to eat bread, drink wine, um, renew. It's a covenantal renewal ceremony. I need to renew

01:01:52.000 the covenant. I've broken the covenant this last week, renew the covenant with the Lord.

01:01:55.120 uh remember my baptism um i and i need uh my kids and my wife to be washed in the word to be

01:02:02.220 physically present there um i you know those those and i need to uh check up on these people

01:02:08.060 that i love and that i know and shake that i need to touch them and shake their hand and ask them

01:02:13.000 how are you doing and go to lunch with them and blah blah blah and uh i think like that's

01:02:18.120 that will never get replaced the metaverse cannot replace there's no substitute for that that will

01:02:23.780 never go anywhere. That's Jesus' model. And if it ain't broke, don't fix it. So that's going

01:02:28.740 nowhere. But you look at the average megachurch, seeker-sensitive kind of church experience,

01:02:34.340 and I'm looking at that, and then I'm looking at Twitter spaces, and I'm looking at Jordan

01:02:38.380 Peterson lectures with the Daily Wire, and I'm thinking megachurch, it has a short expiration

01:02:46.540 date. That thing ain't going to last much longer. Yeah, this has been interesting, though. Honestly,

01:02:51.560 haven't really considered uh too much about what uh what kinds of churches will actually make it

01:02:57.900 um you know they're gonna make it you know then this is interesting i think i think there's some

01:03:02.080 some good stuff here cool well thanks so much for coming on the show ad and uh let our listeners

01:03:06.420 know how they can follow you yeah like i said uh youtube uh fight laugh feast you could just type

01:03:12.180 in my name ad roblez and uh i'm on twitter at ad roblez media um and also gab same same handle

01:03:19.820 there cool all right hey the church that you found did you find a presbyterian church no

01:03:25.900 again it's baptist again yeah that's hilarious there was a presby there's a presbyterian church

01:03:31.960 pretty close that we were going to go to but they uh they went super crazy covid nazi and a little

01:03:37.660 bit woke so not gonna not gonna fly yeah we've got plenty of presbyterians in our church because

01:03:42.960 some of them went woke but but a couple of them didn't go woke they um but they they so overreacted

01:03:49.620 to COVID. Yeah, that's a big thing in Presbyterian circles, the COVID overreaction. Yeah, this got

01:03:55.820 so bad that they weren't even singing. They didn't even sing. They said, well, you just got to hum

01:04:00.040 to yourself because you don't want to get the aspirate. That's exactly what this church in

01:04:05.040 town, they're OPC, they're not woke, but yeah, same thing. They bifurcated, they went to two

01:04:11.680 services intentionally, not because they had so many people, but they had a mask required service

01:04:17.060 and then a mask optional service, but, um, but then, you know, the, the mask service, there was

01:04:22.220 no singing allowed in that service. And, and so, you know, and so people just saw that, you know,

01:04:27.480 and, and it's, you know, and I'm talking like it's 2021 now we're getting closer to 2022 and that's

01:04:34.540 still going on. And so, uh, people are like, all right, well, yeah, Joel's not going to baptize

01:04:38.820 our infants. And so we've got to figure that out. You know, we'll, we'll get them baptized in the

01:04:43.360 middle of the night by some presbyterian minister but we're going to go to a church that we're going

01:04:47.160 to go to a church that has some some faith and and some spine yeah so yeah 100 yeah but it's but

01:04:52.980 it's a it's a solid little church and i'm pretty excited to have a uh a five minute drive and i

01:04:58.320 can actually hang out with people in fact we did last sunday we hung out with people after church

01:05:01.900 because we didn't have an hour drive back home you know yeah that's awesome how long did you go

01:05:07.040 to the other church the one that was an hour away how long were you there yeah for like four or five

01:05:11.400 years oh i i've been telling them that i'm leaving to to go closer to home for like three years but

01:05:18.500 they were they were probably still really sad when you finally pulled the trigger yes they definitely

01:05:23.040 were um and they didn't believe me because i just been saying it for three years you know

01:05:27.580 right um but finally we did it and i had a chance to preach there one last time and i'm sure we'll

01:05:32.560 be back up for like you know picnics or things like that because they're a solid group of people

01:05:36.820 it was it was a really kind of a bittersweet thing for us to be honest but you know had to happen

01:05:42.320 well enjoy this church for you know six months or so until you move down here and uh join

01:05:46.500 well god bless man all right later take care

The NXR Podcast - July 25, 2023

THEOLOGY APPLIED - The Only Churches That Will Survive In America Will Have These 3 Characteristics w AD Robles

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