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Greatest Theology Newsletter on the Planet

[00:00:03] Mark: We didn't.

[00:00:04] Remy: Great.

[00:00:04] Mark: This was perfect. This was just. Let's. Let's visit and catch up.

[00:00:10] Remy: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Pastor Mark, thank you so much for willing to. Being willing to come back on to the show, huh?

[00:00:21] Mark: Absolutely. Thanks for the opportunity.

[00:00:24] Remy: Yeah, you're. Your episodes were some of my favorite last season.

Some of my favorite that, that I, that I've ever.

[00:00:40] Mark: Thank you.

[00:00:40] Remy: Yeah, I actually, I started watching a.

An ex Mormon and so many Mormons deconstruct into atheism, which is sad because they're just as lost. Right. And that's, that's so depressing. And I got to watching this girl on YouTube named Alyssa Grinfell.

[00:01:11] Mark: I think, yes, she is the up and coming ex Mormon influencer, if you want to call her that.

[00:01:17] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. She. I mean, I have watched probably most of her videos start to finish and there's long man. They're like, she puts out really long form content, but it's so captivating. And I'm trying to get her on the show honestly, just to chat, but she doesn't respond to my emails.

[00:01:37] Mark: Mine either, so we're the same boat.

[00:01:41] Remy: But I was watching one of her videos and it was something she said and I don't know if she worded it exactly like this or kind of like this, but it made me realize her videos that if you're a woman in the LDS faith, the best you can hope for. The best you can hope for is.

And it's, it's. I'm sorry, this is harsh and it's like a hard way to put it, but the best thing that there is for you in eternity is to be.

[00:02:15] Mark: A sex slave and perpetually pregnant. Propagating your worlds. Yeah, yeah.

[00:02:22] Remy: And that's it. And like that's for LDS women. That's like, that is LDS men are the ones that get all of the, all of the blessing. You get to be a God of your own planet and do all this.

LDS women, you get exalted, but your only purpose is to provide spirit children to populate the world. And you talk to LDS people about this and they. I've tried it a few times and they get really defensive because it's a very offensive thing to say. But then you ask them questions. You say, well, what does Heavenly Mother do in our daily lives?

Are we allowed to pray to Heavenly Mother? No. And then here's the real big one. Is there only one Heavenly Mother?

LDS doctrine doesn't actually clarify that.

[00:03:17] Mark: It doesn't. It is one of the most under expounded upon doctrines but overly embraced doctrines of Mormonism. And when it comes to specifically women that are leaving the church today, I would say Alyssa is really resonating with them because she's helping them unpack some of the trauma that they've experienced while in the church. And one that most would not have realized was just this trauma of like, you're on this path that you really felt was all about your physical family and bringing them together in this forever family. But the plan of salvation doesn't really work that way. You don't actually get to live with your physical family forever because they need to be doing the same thing as. As their own unique husband, wife, divine being entities propagating their own lives. And so, yeah, the whole facade of Mormonism and its forever families doesn't actually work even in their plan.

[00:04:20] Remy: It's heartbreaking. It's. It's really heartbreaking.

So you guys launched when. When we last spoke, we timed it to sort of coincide with the launch of a new thing y'all were doing called Jesus is Enough.

How's that going? Tell me about that.

[00:04:43] Mark: Yeah, so the crazy idea came about three years ago to film a number of ex Mormon now Christians sharing the stories of how they left Mormonism for biblical Christianity. And our crazy plan was we're going to film a bunch of content, produce it, and distribute it all within a year. We are two years in and we're still working on getting that content distributed. So last January, in the January of 2024, we did launch our first episode. And after that, it was about once a month until the summer and took a break. And we just released our seventh of nine episodes. Two more will come out in December to wrap up the story of Eric Briggs and his wife Emily. Three kind of episodes for their story, but overall, the reception has been very positive, both from Christians who are using it as a tool to better understand how to witness to and engage with Latter Day Saints. But we have also really hit our target audience of those that have one foot in and one foot out and really just need to almost see a different path that they could take, rather than going the path of so many before them into atheism or agnosticism. Recently we had a comment on one of the YouTube videos where a woman, frankly, it this way. She said, thank you for showing me a better way to go astray. And at first I thought that was a really intriguing comment. And then I thought about it more. I'm like, you know what? She's right. That's really what this is. And that's how we designed it is there is so much ex Mormon atheist angry content out there that does not lead people into a relationship with Jesus. And so we designed it to be the alternative for Mormons that are struggling in their faith to watch these. And we're finding them both. Those that were already headed out, those that are on their way out, those that didn't know they were on their way out, are reaching out to us in many different ways, directly through YouTube, over social media, by email, phone calls. We really try and leave our door open in as many ways as possible.

[00:07:03] Remy: That's awesome.

Really having the impact that you all were hoping for here.

[00:07:11] Mark: Yeah. In some surprising ways. We weren't sure with putting it onto YouTube as our distribution platform, what kind of viewership it would receive. And it has not necessarily received a viral viewership. The most views on any single episode right now are about 20,000, but maybe the average is 5. And what we would have to say is they are quality views in the sense that we are hearing from people that are saying, like, I have watched this whole thing with my family or with my extended family, with my congregation as a witnessing tool, or for families that are unpacking their faith, they pulled it up on their living room TV and watched the whole thing together multiple times. So we would say they're very quality views. And with the number of people that have watched, even the number that are reaching out for a time, we could not keep up with. And I went to our board of directors saying like, hey, we put this stuff out there and people are responding and I can't keep up with all of the people that need guidance as they're leaving Mormonism. And one of our board of directors said, mark, that's not a good problem. That's like having a suicide helpline that we've been advertising for. And people are calling and we're saying, no, nope, we're too busy working on more content and more advertisement to actually deal with you. And so we actually slowed down our distribution, slowed down any, any paid ads behind it. We're just coming back to doing that now because the blessing of saying this, this is being blessed by God. People are resonating with the content is. We were able to bring on three part time interns. They are all still in training to be Lutheran pastors. And now they are each serving 15 hours a week from their location in Mequon, Wisconsin. And it is just a cool blessing because we brought kind of a full time pastor on 40 a week really just to do evangelism. And they Oversee our social media channels. They respond to emails, they do phone calls, they meet with local missionaries. It has been a huge blessing this year.

[00:09:17] Remy: That's really awesome. That's so great to hear.

How are, how are the, how are the other arms of the ministry still doing, still doing well, I suppose y'all. Y'all still get out and do door.

[00:09:32] Mark: To door stuff and they really are. So we are gearing up for our annual mission trip to Gilbert, Arizona. We take a group of Lutheran high school students or college students on this one. Yeah, Gilbert, it is a very heavily Mormon populated area. So that'll take place in January. And then we're already gearing up for a new location, Idaho Falls, Idaho. We'll be going to this summer. We're expecting about 150 participants in that trip. And so we're going to be knocking on thousands of doors, planting gospel seeds. So that arm is really through our Be ye Perfect ministry website. So it's a much less direct approach to Mormon evangelism where Jesus is enough. We're trying to reach one foot in, one foot out. Struggling Mormons. Be you Perfect is designed for those that are still deeply ingrained and entrenched. And so one of the things we're going to be doing differently this year is we're actually teaching folks how to use the story of the prodigal son, or as I like to refer to it, the prodigal sons in a dormitory to door conversation to really show the two different ways we can be lost either in outright sin, rejection of Heavenly Father, or in self righteousness as a rejection of Heavenly Father and his grace. So two ways that Mormons traditionally tend to go. Truth in love. We're just doing presentations all over the country. Still got lots of opportunities to do one day or two day long workshops or presentations. Just lots of folks wanting to get better equipped and empowered to get out there either going door too, or just in their really relational evangelism lives.

[00:11:14] Remy: Yeah, yeah, I had, I had some missionaries reach out to me. They. I don't know why they haven't blocked my number. They really don't give up, which is amazing to me.

But let's see right here.

Oh yeah, they invited me to go to their church, but I had a, I had a chili cook off at my church and I wasn't, I wasn't.

[00:11:53] Mark: Gonna miss the chili cook off, man.

[00:11:54] Remy: No. So here's the thing is the aalc, my denomination, we do our pastors conference every year over whatever week Reformation falls on.

[00:12:08] Mark: Nice.

[00:12:09] Remy: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I don't know, the guys with kids kind of hate it because it's like you can't, like, go trick or treating with your kids or whatever, but.

[00:12:16] Mark: Oh, okay.

[00:12:17] Remy: Yeah. Otherwise, you know, pretty great. The problem is we, at my church, we hold the chili cook off on Reformation Sunday and. Okay, usually I'm not there for Reformation Sunday because I'm doing this conference. Right. Yeah. But this year, it. The stars aligned and it worked out such that I had to get on the plane on Monday morning after Reformation Sunday, and I was able to. To get my chili in. I didn't even place, but, you know, it was a great chili.

[00:12:48] Mark: Sorry, man.

[00:12:49] Remy: Yeah, it's okay. It's okay. There was a. There was a very vocal block of children voters. We let everybody vote and so, like a whole group of kids got together and decided to vot for the same guy. So, you know, what can you do? What can you do?

[00:13:06] Mark: I missed out on critical future politics block voting.

[00:13:10] Remy: Yeah. Honestly.

Oh, man, that's great. Yeah. So what do you do? What would you recommend someone do if the LDS missionaries knock on their door, reach out and invite them to church?

[00:13:24] Mark: Yeah, if. If, you know, usually the. The invitation to church takes a little bit of time. So they must know that you've met with missionaries in the. And now they're kind of making that. I tell folks not to hesitate to go and observe a sacrament meeting. I would not encourage them to participate in the sacrament. That would be participating in really a pagan ritual because it is not a Christian sacrament. And go as an observer. And I usually use that as an opportunity to kind of do a reverse invite and say, yeah, I'll go and observe your service if you would come with me the following week. And because I'm not a traditional parish pastor right now, where I have be at my church every week preaching and teaching, I've done that quite often with missionaries and other Latter Day Saint friends here locally in Nampa, where they've gone with me and then I've gone with them. And it gives us great things to talk about. What were some of the differences that you noticed? What was a message that you heard that resonated with you? What was something that you heard that you were confused about or concerned about? And I have found that it leads actually to some really valuable conversations. It gives you something very specific rather than just talking about whatever.

[00:14:35] Remy: Yeah, I, It's. I don't.

I'm gonna sound really sexist.

I can't avoid that. I'm sorry.

I think it's easier for me to talk to the elders than the sisters, the. The male missionaries than the females.

Because the men, we used to live in a different part of town, and it was not great. And that was where all the male missionaries are. And where we're at now is a nice part of town, and it's where all the female missionaries are.

[00:15:15] Mark: So interesting.

[00:15:17] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's a safer part of town or whatever, which, you know, good for them, cutting down the liability.

[00:15:22] Mark: Yeah, yeah.

[00:15:23] Remy: But for, like, the past four years, all the missionaries I've interacted with have been female. And I have found that with the male missionaries, when you give them pushback, when you give them anything to chew on their result, the result is either they shut down and leave, or they are willing to actually chew on it and talk to you about it and kind of engage. Men, I think, are a bit more, you know, you've got to hunt the boar or whatever. So men, I think, are a bit more willing to kind of come to blows with it, and they're willing to actually talk this out with you.

The female missionaries, I found when you start giving any kind of resistance, any kind of pushback, well, here's what your teaching says and here's what you're telling me, but here's what the scripture says, and we can even look it up in your Joseph Smith translation. It's going to say the same thing.

You know, as long as we avoid this, like, two chapters or whatever, it's. It's going to largely be the same thing. And, you know, they.

They immediately all just start parroting off their testimony over and over again.

And then they. It's like they go. It's like they go into, like, safety mode.

Does that make sense? I've only ever really seen that with the female missionaries. I don't know.

[00:16:43] Mark: Yeah. And. And I think the. The missionary training is. Is. Is continuing to change. They're really trying to do more to prepare both genders to be able to give more articulate answers. But there's a lot of informal training that missionaries are now receiving. There is a online Facebook group that a bunch of former missionaries created that is really helping missionaries do counter apologetics with all of the Christians that are being trained to witness to them. And we are finding with. We call them our please open the door participants, those folks that are very actively engaged, not just waiting for someone to knock on the door, but actually reaching out to Mormon missionaries to come into their homes. They're just finding that more and more of them are actually better prepared to engage in conversations and sometimes maybe over. Prepared for the conversations that they're having. But yeah, I've experienced that too, Remy, where they just drop their testimony over and over again. As this is the definitive thing that I've been taught, when I get backed into a corner, my testimony, nobody's going to get past my testimony. And it is frustrating. And so often I'll say, hey, you've given that to me three times already in this conversation. Let's. Let's go somewhere else with this.

[00:17:59] Remy: Yeah, I remember one time we. I got into a pretty good, like, sort of theological back and forth with. With a young. With a young man, a missionary, and he was there with his partner. They were sitting on my couch, and I was sitting across from them on a love seat, and we were just sort of kind of going back and forth with everything and. And they got into this like, you know, God is a. God was once a guy, you know, he was once a man just like you, and now he's. Now he's this God or whatever. And I said, well, so that means God is flesh and bone like me. And they were like, yeah, isn't that wonderful? And I said, yeah, great. Can you read these words of Jesus for me real quick? And of course, you know, like, right where it's going, right? And it's like the Lord is a spirit, and you, you know, you must worship him in spirit and truth. And they both sat there after they read this and, like, they look at it and the one guy, like, flips back like a page and he kind of reads a little bit in context and flips back forward. And the other guy's, like, looking through his little booklets that he had with him for some stuff. And then after a minute, I mean, it was.

It was at least a minute of actual silence while they consulted their, like, books and whatnot. And then the one guy was like, well, we gotta go. Like, that was it. They didn't offer to pray, nothing. They were just like, we gotta. We gotta head out.

[00:19:24] Mark: And I wouldn't see that as a complete loss. You know, in a situation like that, a seed of doubt was planted that is going to be put on their shelf. So going back to the Jesus is enough episodes. So many of those stories, what we've really recounted is how it wasn't just one conversation, one time with one Christian or one Christian pastor that God used to plant seeds, but it was multiple conversations, multiple interactions with law and gospel content that God used to free them from the darkness of Mormonism. And I really think that helps us as Christian witnesses. To be patient and to be persistent and to realize that some of the conversations may end with an awkward minute of silence and then they just get up and leave. But that conversation is going to be one that they remember, not just for the next week, month, or the rest of their mission, but for the rest of their lives. And then somebody else is going to say something and God's word is going to continue to be given to them.

[00:20:29] Remy: It's one of the, one of the things that you said last time you were on that was really impacting for me was this idea of like just being a link in a chain. You know, you just want to be one more link in the chain. It doesn't matter if you're the first link or the last link or more. More than likely one of the countless middle links, but just be a link in the chain. And I have found that that helps not only with evangelism to Mormons, but just evangelism in general. Right, because.

[00:21:01] Mark: Absolutely, absolutely.

[00:21:03] Remy: Yeah. So it's third article stuff, right? Like, I believe that. I cannot believe it's the Holy Spirit that does the drawing. All I have to do is be a link in the chain for that person and let God do the God part.

[00:21:15] Mark: Yeah, absolutely. Maybe to give you another picture to dwell on. That has been for me personally and then for our minist, something we've been clinging to recently.

A couple of years ago, four years now, my family and I took a trip to Tucson, Arizona. And in Tucson there are forests of saguaro cacti. So these big giant ones that look like they've got arms waving at you. And my oldest daughter, Bella, really was captivated by the saguaro. And she said, dad, I want one of these. Well, you can't buy a full grown saguaro. Like they're, they're like a state treasure. But you can buy seeds. And so she bought a packet of saguaro seeds and when she was in the car on the way home, she's like, dad, it says that it could take up to four years before you will ever see any growth. I was like, wow, saguaro cacti farmers are some dedicated, patient people. So she got a little pot and planted the seeds in the soil and placed it in our windowsill. And there it sat. And there it sat. And every time I would dust or clean the windowsill, I started to pick it up and throw it in the garbage. And inevitably one of my children would remind me, dad, it said it's going to take time, up to four years. Well, lo and behold, three and a half years in this last Easter, the week before Easter, I was cleaning the windowsill once again, and I thought to myself, oh, no, wasn't expecting that. I thought it was mold now growing in the little pot, but it was actually a little tiny bud of the cactus peeking its way through the soil. And over the next few weeks, it grew quite a bit so that it actually broken all the way through. And now, lo and behold, six months later, it's almost. Almost an inch tall in those six months. And what it really taught me was when it comes to Mormon evangelism, we are often not going to see growth for a very, very long time. It's a lot like cactus farming. It's a little bit prickly, it's a little bit slow. But we need to be patient and we need to be pers.

Over the last year, we have been seeing over and over again how the faithful witness of Christians for decades is now bearing fruit. And we're even really shifting our mindset as a ministry where we're still going to 100% be a seed planting ministry first and foremost, but we are also trying to position ourselves to be better prepared for those little buds and the growth that needs to be watered. You know, it makes me think of Paul's words where he's talking about, you know, I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. And we've mostly been doing the seed planting, and now we need more Apollos to come along and help water it, but all the while trusting that God is the one that is going to continue to do all this work. And so that, that I. We're calling it the Parable of the Cacti now in our ministry, and we're getting a lot of mileage out of it, just encouraging our Christian witnesses to go and plant those little cacti seeds.

[00:24:18] Remy: That's so. That's so beautiful. That's so great.

I really love that. The Parable of the Cacti. I'm keeping that. That's great.

[00:24:29] Mark: Yeah, you can steal it, man.

[00:24:30] Remy: Yeah, yeah, I'm going to use it. I actually, I think I have to preach coming up in a couple of weeks, maybe a week. I don't know. I'm going to. I'm going to sneak it in there somehow, though. Nice.

That's so. It's so wonderful.

It's encouraging. Have you.

On that kind of. That theme of the planting the seed, and it takes so long for it to grow. Have you had anybody come interact with you during this? Jesus is Enough and say, hey, actually I ran across your content before. Has that happened yet.

[00:25:08] Mark: As far as content prior to Jesus is enough or.

[00:25:11] Remy: Yeah, yeah, like somebody, you know, maybe once they start seeing what you're about, it's like, oh, this is familiar to me.

[00:25:22] Mark: Yeah, you know, we've had a few that would say like, hey, over the years I saw your Be Perfect social media posts and they're making the connection. We do not try to make the connection for them that all three of these ministries are connected to Truth and Love.

We're a little more open with Jesus is Enough than Be Ye Perfect. Because at first we really created Be Ye Perfect so that it was not obvious that we were a Christian outreach. We wanted this to be very non threatening, not anti Mormon. And if they saw it as connected to truth and love, they would right away say, oh, this is anti Mormon. So some folks have connected with us through all three of our platforms. Now I've got a ex Mormon now Christian friend that he said, yeah, it was really truth and love. I ran into some of your content on there, then ran into it on Be Perfect. Now I've been watching the Jesus is Enough episodes. You know, recently we've been blessed to actually be able to connect a number of individuals with local Christian churches so that they could go and worship there the first time, including here in Idaho. At my local church, a lady reached out that lived like eight minutes from my house. She came and worshiped with me and my family the next week at our church. Oh, wow. Cool, cool, cool. Local connections taking place.

[00:26:37] Remy: Yeah. That's so great. That's so great. It's.

I don't know, man, it's so beautiful to see, to see that, to see.

I like this. There was this moment at my first ever Lutheran service and the Pentecostals won't admit this to you, Pastor. They'll never admit this to you, but it's a lot closer to Mormonism than they want to believe. Believe the, the Pentecostal theology. It's. It's holiness theology, right? And at the end of the day, that's what Mormonism is. It's a holiness theology.

And so to, to that moment, I know it was certainly tough for me the first time. And it's sometimes, man, it still is. Sometimes it just gets you. It just hits you just right, you know, where you, where you. I don't know how Yalls corporate confession sounds, but when you go through that, you know, sin against you in thought and word and deed, what I've done and left undone and you just, like, really lay it all out there, and you're like, God, I am garbage. I am garbage. And then to have that guy stand up there and say, hey, you know what? As a cult and ordained minister of the Church of Christ, I forgive you. And it's like, to hear that doesn't.

[00:27:55] Mark: Get better than that.

[00:27:56] Remy: No, man, it just washes over you, you know? Like, I remember thinking one time.

One time I was going up to the rail, and I was thinking, man, how can God love me? I'm a sinner. How can God ever forgive me? And I. I take communion. I receive the body and the blood, and I'm walking back, and I can still kind of taste the wine on my lips. And I think, like.

Like, God can't forgive me. And yet he just did anyway, you know, like, he just steps in and does.

[00:28:31] Mark: How cool is that?

[00:28:32] Remy: It's so great. And I love seeing other people, like, also have that. That, like, light bulb, you know?

So good.

[00:28:43] Mark: Oh, absolutely.

[00:28:45] Remy: That's so great.

So, I mean, outside of. Outside of that, what else is going on with you? How's. How's things?

[00:28:54] Mark: Yeah, it's good. You know, this year, spending a lot of time writing scripts for Jesus is Enough has been a new opportunity for me as a Lutheran pastor. So that's been fun. The kids have all gotten to be involved in acting in B roll.

So the reenactment scenes, all my kids, my wife, a lot of friends and family have been in it. So that's just been kind of a cool thing for the family. The kids are getting older. They love going on mission trips and being a part of the work that we do. My son actually got his driver's license today, so that's going to change everything in our house.

[00:29:31] Remy: Mostly your insurance premium.

[00:29:33] Mark: Mostly the insurance premium, yep.

And then really just traveling all over the world via Zoom, just having opportunities to present to either Christian congregations via Zoom or in person person. But recently, a lot of former Mormons that we're connecting with over Zoom got a group of ex Mormon Christians in Kenya that reached out to us. And so an ex Mormon Christian Kenyan pastor is training with me to really be able to serve his former people, his Mormon people, better. And so meet with them, go to Kenya every Friday afternoon, and I come back a couple hours later. So it's a great way to do ministry.

[00:30:17] Remy: That's amazing.

[00:30:18] Mark: So one of our goals at Truth and Love was to really make more of a global impact in the last year, and we didn't do a lot of very specific plans, but God keeps sending people our way, including the Kenyans.

[00:30:31] Remy: That's so wonderful. That's so great. And Africa especially is like one of those places where, like, Lutheranism really works.

[00:30:41] Mark: You know, once they hear it. One of the joys of this zoom thing is we do a back and forth translation. And so I'll be sharing law and gospel content, and anytime there is just a sweet nugget of the gospel, I just wait for the translation to go through and then they break forth with amens and like, clap. And I'm like, they get it and they love it and they understand why this is such a blessing. And so many of them coming out of a Mormon background where it's been a conditionalized grace, a conditional gospel, a you've got to do all this work when their lives are already very difficult to begin with. And now to hear, like, when it comes to this one thing, my eternal relationship with God and having a home with him in eternity isn't about me and eventually figuring out how to take care of myself, but it's about one that's done it for me. I don't think there's any greater joy as a missionary than just getting to share pure, unadulterated gospel with somebody for the first time and them, like, rejoicing in it.

[00:31:45] Remy: Yeah, that's so cool. That's really great.

You spoke earlier about how there's a little bit of, I guess, like, counter apologetics that, that a lot of missionaries are leaning into on their, on their side. Is there any.

Have you run across any counter apologetics or any of your people or teams or whatever that you've heard of run across a counter apologetic? That was like a bit of a stumper. Like, is there any novel argument where you've been like, oh, that's a good one, actually?

[00:32:22] Mark: Yeah, I think sometimes the one that Christians run into is if they try to use the Book of Revelation to say that we have a closed canon, they'll say that, you know, do not add anything or subtract anything from this. And. And Christians have used that to say that this is all of God's revelation. Well, turns out there is a part of the Book of Deuteronomy that says something very similar. And so they've been taught in their apologetic to say, all right, so does that mean we have to throw everything out after the Book of Deuteronomy? And that often for Christians that are a little bit unprepared is a stumper for them? I would say, excuse me, if we get that on air. Others that maybe Catch them. Really come down to, what about, what is it about God and his love for us that causes him to choose some people for eternal life and not others. They really want to get into what they have heard about Christians believing in double predestination. And sometimes for Christians, maybe even Lutherans that don't have a great understanding of that false doctrine, they're like, well, I don't even know what you're referring to. And what they're really alluding to is it seems like that God played a divine game of duck, duck, dam and was just duck, duck, duck, duck, damn, randomly sending people to hell, and they can't believe in a God like that. And I don't either. And so sometimes that provides me with an opportunity to say, yeah, you're really responding to Calvinistic tulip theology, and I don't adhere to that. And so that sometimes is. You need to know not only Mormon doctrine and a little bit of. Or a little bit of Mormon doctrine, but a whole lot of Christian doctrine in order to be able to respond articulately. I'm trying to think of others that are. Are stumping our Christians.

One would be just, is there a need for a specific leadership structure in the church? And I feel most are very comfortable saying, no, there isn't. This. There has to be the top president, prophet guy on top with two people under him and then 70 under him. But when Christians sometimes hear about. About that part of the restored gospel, that one of the things that was restored was the hierarchical leadership struggle. Yeah. It's almost like the papacy and this was one of those places where Joseph Smith just begged, borrowed, and stole from other things that were out there at the time. And really, to allow Christians to see that Peter didn't drop the ball. He wasn't supposed to be the pope or the prophet. He was to be a disciple and an evangelist. And. Yeah. Did. Did people drop balls along the way? Absolutely, but not in the way that the great apostasy supposedly took place.

[00:35:33] Remy: Yeah, yeah, it's those.

It's funny that those are the objections, because I feel like as Lutherans, we are uniquely positioned to answer all of those objections. Right. The Book of Concord does not outline a canon of scripture, so you're not gonna. You're not gonna catch me out on that one.

[00:35:56] Mark: Yep.

[00:35:57] Remy: You know, I.

The why? Why? To why. The why does. Why does some. Why are some saved and not others? Because God saves some and others damn themselves. Okay, great.

[00:36:10] Mark: Yeah, moving on.

[00:36:12] Remy: Yeah, moving on. Yeah, yeah.

[00:36:14] Mark: And, you know, not always satisfactory to Christians in general. Or Mormons specifically. They want to say. Well then. Oh yeah, then why, why this one and not that one? And that's the, the crooks. Theologum, as theologum as it's called.

[00:36:29] Remy: Yeah, yeah. And you know who, you know, who knows? Not me. It's. That's above my pay grade. But you know, they, I'm sure they have their own, they have their own questions, their own crosses to bear that are much the same way, you know.

Yeah, I don't know. That's interesting. It, it's like the, it's like that you have to know. You, you don't, you don't learn what fake money looks like. You learn what real money looks like and then you can tell.

[00:36:56] Mark: Exactly.

[00:36:57] Remy: You know, you may need to know some Mormones to converse.

[00:37:01] Mark: Well, exactly.

[00:37:03] Remy: But you really need to try to.

[00:37:04] Mark: Do their counterfeiting very well and, and make their, their fake money gospel look like the real thing. So it. Yeah, yeah, it is good to know both.

[00:37:13] Remy: Yeah, yeah. That's fascinating.

That's really interesting.

Wow. What are you guys doing? More of the Jesuses Enough. I know you said you had like a whole year of recording and.

[00:37:30] Mark: Yeah, we've got two more, two more episodes coming out in December of 2024 and then we've got a lot of additional supplementary content that we're working on producing. We've got a series of key biblical terms that we're unpacking. So Christian doctrine from a perspective that really understands the Mormon world. So we've got a bunch more of those to write a number of core differences blogs where we're really not just looking at a single doctrine, but kind of some of the underlying theological things that make Mormonism what it is. Maybe a simple one to think about is biblical Christianity is really focused on becoming increasingly dependent specifically on the person and work of Jesus Christ, where Mormonism is really focused on becoming increasingly independent, more focused on yourself, really an underlying theme in so much of its theology. So really trying to unpack that so that someone that's in this in between place of like, well, it's not this and it might be this. What are the differences? Trying to help them really understand those. A lot of additional supplementary video content, additional Q and A type pieces with each of the interviewees. But we're going to really put a pause on recording and producing the full length episodes for a time just so that we can catch up and really do a better job of following up with all the people that are reaching out. At some point we will probably go back and Record a few more episodes to fill in the blank a little bit more diversity when it comes to the demographics that we're featuring in the films. But Eric and Emily's wrapping things up. I think we saved some of the best stories for last and some of the best law and gospel opportunities. So we'll see where it goes from here. I've enjoyed being a script writer, but I also am excited to just get back to being a good old simple missionary with words and zoom.

[00:39:28] Remy: Yeah, I was thinking the very first long form episode that I watched, I heard your narration and I was thinking like, man, I bet that took forever too. Like, how much time must Mark have spent recording?

[00:39:42] Mark: We greatly under anticipated how long each episode would take to produce and we're so thankful to our production company, company that we've partnered with, and just Brian Urbaneck of Goldwing Productions and his heart and passion for this project as well. He has become a dear friend and colleague in this work.

[00:40:01] Remy: That's so good. That's so awesome.

I've heard it said that Utah is probably the least Christian and most pagan place in America.

Is that a hard, hard agree from you?

[00:40:21] Mark: Yeah, I would say in many ways it is because and it's fascinating because they would think they are and they would say we're one of the most Christian.

[00:40:30] Remy: Well, even probably a lot of outsiders would say that as well. Maybe even a lot of Christians would say that.

[00:40:35] Mark: Yep. Yeah. And you know, there are a lot of folks moving into Utah. It's a beautiful state. So a lot of folks moved in during COVID from California, Oregon, Washington that were looking political refugees they call themselves at times. And so the population density of active Mormons is below 50% in Utah currently. And really for the almost for the first time ever in its history continuing to go down, more and more folks are leaving the church. And so I would say in that sense, it's becoming an increasingly atheist state. Very secular, worldly. Salt Lake City itself is just, you know, you drive around, you see all of the flags for all of the different progressive movements because if you abandon one false ideology for another, you went from believing in specific religious dogma to now I just want to live for myself, live for the things of this world that Alyssa Greenfeld that you talked about earlier, she had a video earlier this week where she was talking about the difference between the way that she views her body as a Mormon and now as a atheist.

She had viewed it as, well, my body is a temple, which we as Christians would actually agree with. And now she says my Body is an amusement park. And she showed all of these different photos of herself smoking various drugs, using mushrooms, dancing, drinking.

Now my body is for my own enjoyment. And so often, often when Mormons leave the church and do not seek out God in a true relationship, they embrace the exact opposite of what they had before. If I was going to try and find freedom and life in keeping the rules, now I'm going to find freedom in life, in breaking the rules and in a sense of salvation. And so that's going back and maybe making this connection to the parable of the prodigal son. That's really why we have chosen that for our door to door evangelism tool as we are meeting both of those types of Mormons, the deeply ingrained pharisaical Mormon that is saying, father, the reason you should reward me is my faithfulness. All of these years I've checked boxes, I've been obedient. And then there's those that have left the church that are more like the traditional, what we call prodigal son that have said, you know what? I want nothing to do with you. I just want your stuff. I want to go out and use my body in whatever way. Both of them need grace. Both of them are lost just in their own way. Ways.

[00:43:15] Remy: It's so, it's so fascinating because as you were just saying that just then, I was thinking, well, you know, I'm going to try and find meaning in keeping the rules. And that's not it. Now I'm going to try and find meaning and breaking the rules. And that's not it. And it's. Well, where do you find the meaning? And I mean, you really do just find it. It's in Jesus. Right?

[00:43:37] Mark: It's just.

[00:43:38] Remy: The meaning is just in Jesus. That's it. You know, there's no, there's nothing more, there's nothing less.

[00:43:45] Mark: It's just y. Jesus is enough.

[00:43:49] Remy: Jesus is enough. Yeah. Wow.

[00:43:52] Mark: Wow. Someone should make a ministry with that title.

[00:43:55] Remy: Roll. Roll credits. We. We got it.

[00:43:59] Mark: We. We got there. Yeah.

[00:44:00] Remy: Yeah. No, I mean, but that's, that's really what it is. And I don't know. That's so key. I think it's so. It's so interesting because the devil really only has the one trick. You know, it's, it's. It's an incredibly effective trick because he's been using it for, you know, however long we've all been here. But it's just the same trick, you know, did God really say right? And.

[00:44:28] Mark: Yep. And then the moment on the Lie.

[00:44:30] Remy: Yeah. And the moment. The moment you mess up, he's like, well, God actually said, right. You know, and it's. Yeah, it's.

Have you found that this ministry has helped you?

I maybe I've already asked this with non Mormon evangelism as well. Like, if you bump into someone and they're not.

[00:44:52] Mark: Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. So I don't go to coffee shops a lot. I really should. Every time I go there, I get into great witnessing conversations. So my son was doing his driver's test and it happened to be at Panera. So I stopped in there for a few minutes, and as I was waiting in line to get a drink, I saw a guy sitting at his table crying over a Bible.

And I said, hey, are you a Christian pastor that's just frustrated about your sermon? And he thought that was funny and said, no, I'm just a Christian that still hasn't figured out this whole Christian thing. And he said, I've been so focused on trying to do great things for God, and I'm realizing I will never be able to live up to my expectations or his expectations for me. And I said, said, did you grow up in the Mormon Church? He said, no, but close to it. And really talked about growing up in kind of a workspaced religion. And he's still recovering from it. And it was great opportunity to share Jesus with him and then also share some witnessing tips for serving his Mormon friends and family in the area. So it really has. And I would say anytime I'm on an airplane, talking to the person next to me, whether they're Mormon or non Mormon, it has really, really allowed me to become more adept at contextualizing the gospel. In whatever circumstance. I find myself to really listen, ask a lot of questions, rather than going into it thinking, oh, I know what this person believes. I know exactly the type of person they are. But hearing their own personal story, hearing what makes them tick, what makes them, where their identity is found, and so much of that is applicable across the board. And just certain things like trusting in the power of God's Word. That has become a big part of Mormon outreach. That's a part of every outreach. Patience and persistence, prayer, not thinking you have all the answers. Acknowledging when you don't have all the answers, that goes a long way with anybody when it comes to outreach.

[00:46:59] Remy: Yeah, the.

The power of God's Word, man, that.

[00:47:04] Mark: That's.

[00:47:05] Remy: That's. Somehow I got in trouble with Christians for that because it. With Lutherans nonetheless, on the Internet, because I said, you know what if I Had a gay friend who decided that they wanted that because. Because of conversations with me or with someone else, their parents, whatever. They said, you know what? I'm going to give this church thing a shot. And they chose a progressive mainline like the elca because they could keep their homosexuality and still go to church and feel good. But that ELCA church had the lectionary, and this person was read large swaths of scripture every week.

You know what? That's a win for me. That's better than nothing. You went from zero Bible a week to like three or four chapters a week. Good.

You know, it's something. And I have people get mad at me about that.

[00:47:57] Mark: Huh.

[00:47:58] Remy: You know, everybody wants. They want a big fancy conversion story, I guess.

[00:48:03] Mark: Yeah. May not be as tidy as that. So many of the ex Mormon stories are not. Like, there are times when we're putting together the episodes where I'll have other members of our team look at it, and they'll be like, ooh, that doesn't seem right.

You should take that out. And I'm like, no, that's part of their story. We can't curate it into this nice little tight little package that we want God to follow. No. There are certain times where God used some pretty unexplainable circumstances to get people to see one thing or another, and all of those were connected in that chain. And if we're saying, like, nope, this chain, we're a little bit uncomfortable with the. It's a little too rusty. It doesn't work as well. And we break that one out now the whole chain is broken. I want people to be able to see the fullness of the way that God works. Now, there are times, for sake of brevity, that we do have to cut things, but we're not cutting things because we're uncomfortable with them. If you watched Eric's episode, I really appreciated Eric Briggs story where he. One of the things that he realized the church so often did was whitewash their stories and sanitize things, whitewash the stories of Moses and Abraham and David in the Bible to make them heroes and to sanitize the fact that they were sinful human beings. That at times God used some terrible circumstances, some terrible decisions in their lives as part of his way of justifying or bringing them into the family of faith and then sanctifying.

And in these stories, we see that over and over again. Like, we want to cut the messy out, but God works most effectively in the mess.

[00:49:43] Remy: Yeah, yeah. And, and, and not always. Not always the way we want him to, you know, I think, I think about my own coming out of Pentecostal theology and into Lutheran theology and, and you know, depending on, I guess, just, I mean, I would say like the sacraments were a big part of it. Once I, once I came around on the supper, you know, that was, it was, it was kind of a. I came around on Luther and then I thought, well, I like what these Lutherans believe. And I started to kind of come around on the sacrament and I thought, well, if I'm in a be a Lutheran, I'm just going to believe the things Lutherans believe. And I just kind of dove in and eventually like I did come around on all of it, but like it wasn't. There wasn't ever this big aha moment where I'm holding the small catechism and I'm like, ah, you know, of course this is it, you know, it was like. It's like a bunch of. It's, it's a bunch of small moments. It's a bunch of. It's like the shelf thing is so great because that's really what it's like. You just, you put things on the shelf and eventually there's two many little things to ignore and they sort of snowball into a big thing, you know.

[00:51:03] Mark: Yep. And then so much of our work now, when the shelf is broken is picking back up a few of those things. Some of them, they're like, I don't even want to look at that anymore, like temples.

But like, what is the proper place of the temple in the Christian life?

Where does revelation come from?

Who is our authorities?

What do we do with our money? Do we have to tithe? Do we not have to tithe? What about the sacraments? We're holding each one of those back up and we can't do it all at once. And we need to understand that for some, this may take years to unpack. One thing I'm increasingly realizing is that at times we might be a little bit too quick to invite a ex Mormon to come to public worship where especially in Lutheran worship, they're going to hear and maybe see things close communion, union in certain denominator or certain parts of Lutheranism. Like what you're inviting me and now you're telling me I can't participate in this gift. Yeah, yeah. And so that can often be a roadblock. Even just the Lutheran understanding of baptism can be very, very confusing. So often I'll say to Christians, yeah, get your Mormon friends into a Bible class. Get them into a foundations, a Bible information Class, adult education, then start inviting them to public worship.

[00:52:25] Remy: We have a guy who is a member of our church and he's prior military and not a crowds person, not a people person. Definitely deals with something like that, with stuff like that because of his time in the military. He is one of these kinds of guys, sweet as can be, greatest guy you've ever met, but like, not a. Not gonna willingly go out into crowds, not gonna willingly, you know, put himself in any kind of situation. And he got invited by a member to our men's breakfast group that meets one the first Saturday of the month. And he just kept coming to that and he came to that a couple of times and then he went home and started reading his Bible. He had his little Bible from the service, you know, the little Niv pocket New Testament or. And he started reading it and he would come back with questions the next week. Boom. Or the next month. This is what, this is what I've learned in the meantime. And you know, we work through them and all this. Pastor Joe would. And we, I mean this went on for. Had to be eight months to a year. And then one Sunday he showed up at church, you know, and you give it. He then, you know, he wasn't there for a little while, but then he would show up at like Easter, you know, or Christmas, you know, and now a couple years later, and he's there every single Sunday, rain or shine. You know, it takes time. Yeah.

[00:53:55] Mark: There's your. There's your slowly blossoming cacti.

[00:53:59] Remy: There it is. Wow. There it is.

Wow. That's so great.

That's so lovely.

Pastor Mark, thank you so much for stopping by and talking to me.

[00:54:12] Mark: You betcha. Man. I love traveling back east, so it was fun to come for a visit. And I'll be back home for dinner. So it's great.

[00:54:19] Remy: Perfect. Perfect timing.

If people want to have you do some kind of a presentation at their church, either live or zoom or what have you, how can they do that?

[00:54:31] Mark: Yeah. So definitely check out all our resources on tilm.org, so truthinloveministry.org is where all of the content is housed, but I'll give you my personal email if you want to reach out and talk to me about an opportunity. So it's Mark M A R k p I l m.org so markpilm.org reach out and love to discuss with you all about empowering Christians to witness and proclaiming Christ to Mormons and would love to work with others on that.

[00:55:04] Remy: That's wonderful.

If people want to get involved in any other ways, Obviously they can. There's the book that Mark Carter wrote.

[00:55:14] Mark: So go, go to tilm.org and order yourself a book. Take one of our multiple online classes. We have a podcast, the Witnessing Christ Podcast, that you could subscribe to. We're walking through similar content that I did with you last year on sin, grace, faith and works. The three interns are talking through those with me right now. And then, yeah, just keep praying about Jesus is enough. We're trying to find ways to get it into more homes, so financial assistance is always appreciated it as well.

[00:55:45] Remy: Very good, very good. And of course, share everything that you guys put out.

[00:55:51] Mark: Just share, watch it, share it.

Other than the few books in the store, everything's free. Go and use it.

[00:55:57] Remy: And it's truly amazing too, the impact that just sharing has.

[00:56:02] Mark: It does.

[00:56:03] Remy: I'll go on Twitter and I'll ask for money or something or buy my merch or whatever, but I always put on there. If you can't do that, I don't want you to. But if you could share it because the sharing is really impactful.

[00:56:19] Mark: Absolutely.

[00:56:20] Remy: Every end. Yeah. So very good, Mark. Thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

[00:56:28] Mark: Have a lovely day.

[00:56:29] Remy: God bless.

[00:56:31] Mark: Awesome. Thanks, man.

Today I'm joined by Ryan Howard, an LC—MS DCE (Director of Christian Education), to talk about youth ministry.

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[00:00:04] Remy: Thank you so much for joining me on Lutheran Answers.

How you doing?

[00:00:11] Ryan: Doing okay. It's been kind of a crazy couple of weeks. We had a really big wedding at our church, and we were involved in that. It was our. Our senior pastor's daughter got married, so.

[00:00:24] Remy: Oh, wow.

[00:00:25] Ryan: Really big deal. And my kids were in it, and we were in it, and we were doing all kinds of stuff. And so that was last week, and then this week we've been trying to recover, and of course, you know, my kids got sick, of course, and all that. So crazy. And we also have family in Florida, so we've been worried about them, but they're all okay. Everyone's good.

[00:00:47] Remy: Good, good.

[00:00:49] Ryan: So how are you?

[00:00:50] Remy: I'm all right, man. Tired. Just, you know, working and school and everything else. Just getting through it. Thank you for asking.

[00:00:58] Ryan: Yeah, of course.

[00:01:00] Remy: So we were talking a little bit before we got started here, and you're a DCE, and you come from a long line of DCEs, or educators in general, I guess.

[00:01:10] Ryan: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:01:12] Remy: Recap that for me.

[00:01:13] Ryan: Yeah, so I. I've been a DCE for almost 10 years now.

I'm currently serving in the Houston, Texas area. Before that, I was in. I was on Long Island, New York.

That's a. That's a distinction. You can't say in Long Island. You have to say on Long Island.

[00:01:30] Remy: Okay.

[00:01:32] Ryan: What I learned that I'm not from there, but. Yeah. So I got my DCE certification at Concordia University in Chicago, and that was great. My father is a DCE now. He does primarily music ministry.

He's an organist and choir director, but he also did youth ministry before that. And his parents were both Lutheran educators. My grandmother taught kindergarten for, like, 40 some years.

My grandfather was a teacher and then a principal in Lutheran schools for a long time. And. Yeah, so it's kind of run in the family. This Lutheran education has always been a part of who I am and. And hopefully will continue for a long time.

[00:02:23] Remy: Yeah. Good. That's awesome. What's your favorite part about being a dce?

[00:02:29] Ryan: I love.

I love lots of. About being a dce. Probably one of my favorite parts is the awesome people that I get to work with, like other DCEs and other pastors, you know, being able to connect with other Lutheran teachers and. And learn from them and grow with them and talk to them. And, you know, you're the. The ministry team that I have, you know, and even my. You know, it's just me and. And my pastor at my church, which is great, but, you know, just in our District, we have other DCEs and other workers and professionals that I get to connect with regularly. And, you know, the Lutheran world being kind of small, I really enjoy that because I really love meeting people and seeing what they're doing and, and yeah, just we're all, we're all going about the same mission in lots of different ways and it's really cool to, to see what other people do and, and grow with them.

[00:03:29] Remy: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

For those not in the know, what is a dce?

[00:03:36] Ryan: Yeah, yeah. So stands for Director of Christian Education.

And it is a. In the lcms, it is a commissioned minister.

So I am not ordained. I do not have the collar. Therefore I cannot, you know, do the cool pastor stuff like communion or, you know, absolution or anything like that. But I can teach. It's a lot of teaching.

I. So at my current call, what I do is I, I run the youth ministry, so I run youth group and youth Bible studies. I do teach a lot of confirmation classes.

You know, I'll sub in for pastor if he can't do an adult Bible study one week and, you know, visit people and hang out with them and especially kids, youth, you know, help. I help run the Sunday school, make sure all the teachers know what's going on, all that stuff. So it's a lot of education, a lot of, you know, making sure that others, you know, equipping volunteers to teach as well, making sure everything's on the up and up, evaluating the curriculums that we use and all of that stuff. So, yeah, that's primarily what I do. And I also get to, you know, play games a lot because I work with kids and kids love to play games. So we get to play games and eat pizza and have fun and, you know, go to church and just, and enjoy life.

[00:05:12] Remy: What's, what's the most, like, nerve wracking part do you think of being a dce?

[00:05:20] Ryan: The nerve wracking part is when, you know, the normal nerve wracking stuff of life happens and, you know, you have a lot of fun with kids. But then also, you know, teenagers especially go through stuff and they go through stuff fairly intensely. And so, you know, you never know when, you know, a young man comes to youth group one week and you can tell, you know, something's going on and you pull them aside maybe and you find out the real stuff that's going on in life that he's not gonna, you know, share all the time. But, you know, if, if he trusts you enough to talk to you about it, you know, that's great. And I love being there for him. But also, man, some of these kids are going through some tough stuff.

[00:06:06] Remy: Yeah.

[00:06:07] Ryan: So that's, it's, it's fulfilling and also really hard.

[00:06:11] Remy: How do you build that trust?

[00:06:15] Ryan: I find you, you keep showing up a lot. A lot of teenagers are. They're very, you know, if they want to know that you're going to be there and they'll get, they get burned by people leaving. They get burned by, you know, teachers, you know, they move on. They, they're no longer with their favorite teachers or even, you know, they have family members leave or pass away or things like that. And, you know, other churches, you know, pastors take calls, people leave, you know, this, that and the other thing. So the more that you can say to them, well, I'm here, and then prove it by being there, they'll. They'll trust you a little bit more. So, you know, a lot of times that looks like, you know, going to their sports games and choir concerts and theatrical shows and stuff, and then just being there on a Sunday, like, yeah, I'm here. We've got, we've got Bible study every week. You know, I've got it and I'll be here and I'll keep being here. And eventually they start trusting you and they start showing up, too, because you're, you show it up and they, they keep showing up.

[00:07:30] Remy: I'm sorry, I'm taking notes.

[00:07:32] Ryan: Yeah, yeah, you're good.

[00:07:33] Remy: I, I realized very quickly into this conversation it was going to be a note taking conversation for me.

[00:07:42] Ryan: Probably good that it's being recorded then, so you can make sure you don't miss anything.

[00:07:47] Remy: Yeah, yeah. Show up for your people, man. That's huge.

So you mentioned the youth and doing the youth groups and whatnot. Do the kids, do you find that they want contemporary worship? Do they want liturgy? Do they care?

[00:08:05] Ryan: They do care.

I've got a great mix of both.

There's some kids that are. So we have two services at our church, one of each, you know, you could say, and I've got some kids that are, that they're at that 8:00 service and they love it, and that's the one they want to be at. And then, then there's others that are at the, you know, 10:30 service and they love that one. And, you know, in our church, at least, the difference is not. We, you know, we do liturgical things at both services.

[00:08:35] Remy: Right.

[00:08:35] Ryan: You know, so the first service is, you know, straight up out of, you know, whichever setting we're using that Month. And the second service is the same things just with, you know, know, guitars and diff, slightly different words, but it's the same.

[00:08:49] Remy: Gotcha. Gotcha.

[00:08:51] Ryan: Yeah. And they care and they, and they like having, you know, options. I think they, they enjoy, you know, and, and again, a lot of it is about their, their people. You know, if they've got their friends who go to one service or another, then they'll, they'll, they're like, no, I need to go to the early service because that's where the people that care about me go.

[00:09:12] Remy: So you mentioned their people, their friends or whatever. I guess that's. And it may be because you're at a Lutheran school, so I guess maybe it's a bit different than public school kids who maybe. I'm sure you have a few of those as well. But it seems to me then that it's very important to build sort of a culture with the kids in your youth group, in your confirmation class, so that the kids they're being peer pressured by are other Christian kids who are peer pressuring them to come to one worship service or another, as opposed to like doing drugs and driving fast cars or whatever.

[00:09:53] Ryan: Right, Right. Yeah. Actually, we have a good variety of different public schools around here that we pull from, so. And it's actually, I could go into a whole other tangent about seeing the shift in education over the last few years, but that's a, that's beyond me sometimes. But the.

Yeah. With knowing that they have a group at church that wants them to be at church, you know, and all not just kids, but like adults.

[00:10:26] Remy: Right.

[00:10:27] Ryan: You know what? Like, if they know that there are adults at church that like, like seeing them and like talking to them. It's so funny. One of the, one of the teenage girls that I have has formed a really strong connection with our pastor's mom. Oh, wow. And she's in her 80s, but they love talking to each other and they love having conversations with each other. And so that's one of those relationships that like, yeah, she only sees her at church, but like, she makes sure to go talk to her at church. And that's like a really cool relationship that she has that's, you know, know intergenerational and that it's that kind of stuff when we're talking about the body of Christ. You know, the more time goes on, the more I realize, like, you know, in the 90s, I think everybody tried to silo everybody and we just, we shouldn't do that. We should just have everybody be together.

[00:11:17] Remy: You do you know, know or know of Josh Craig?

[00:11:22] Ryan: I've heard of him, yes.

[00:11:24] Remy: You know, do you know Maddie Craig from Twitter? Madeline Craig?

[00:11:27] Ryan: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:11:28] Remy: Her husband, he's a dce and I've had him on a few times. And that's his big thing is like a holistic family approach that we shouldn't be segregating people by age or whatever else. Like we should all be here together. And that the more, I mean, and especially because nowadays with so many blended or broken families, you never know what kid out there needs a mom, what kid out there needs a dad. And the church as like just overflowing with moms and dads and grandparents and cousins and brothers and sisters that are just ready, you know, to absolutely pull you in.

[00:12:09] Ryan: Yeah, yeah. And we saw that play out absolutely. With. We had a couple of brothers who, their father, you know, sadly passed away from cancer, you know, right when I got here. And so I didn't have a super established relationship with them. But there are other, you know, men in the church. You know, we try to have our elders make sure that they are always talking to them and saying hi and, you know, trying to form those relationships, you know, because it's, it's hard. And they, they, they, they don't have a dad right now. And it's like, that sucks. But like they know that there are people at church that, you know, love them and care about them at least. And, you know, we start there.

[00:12:51] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Not to shift gears too hard here, but how do you teach? How do you teach confirmation? I would just say how do you teach? But that just seems too open ended.

[00:13:11] Ryan: Well, how do you teach Confirmation is not that much, not that much better. Not that much better. But I can, I can give it a shot.

We use, is it. Peter Bender wrote a whole thing for confirmation. We use his stuff.

But our pastor has taught confirmation for years. And so he gave me his notebook. Like, he's like, copy this when I got here. And so I made a copy. So it's got all of his notes on the side and stuff. So we always, we go through the catechism. You know, we always hit, you know, it's so it's two years and we hit the commandments every year because you always can. And then you do creed, Lord's Prayer, you know, baptism, Lord's supper, you know, kind of weave it all throughout the whole thing. And we just meet every week and we try to, you know, get through a little bit of it at a time. And usually we go down Extreme rabbit holes. Um, because that's what kids do. You know, you're talking to them and you're teaching them stuff and then they go, but wait, doesn't that mean this? And so then you end up in a completely different, you know, area than you did before, which is just awesome. Like, it's. I love being able to, you know, go with them on those journeys and figure out what do they want to know? Like, if they're asking questions, let's follow that and see where it leads. What does the Bible say about that? Like, that's extremely, you know, important and good that they are getting those questions answered. So we always try to make them think a little bit beyond what's just kind of there on the page. So. And we always try to make sure that they are looking things up in, you know, we want them. By the end of the two years, I want them to know how to use their Bible so they can go find things and go look at, you know, if they, if a question comes up, you know, we teach them about using concordance and what that looks like and what that means. And we do it in a really fun, cool way. But it's helping them learn how to, you know, look at the, look at it.

[00:15:22] Remy: What's the biggest stumper a confirmation kid has given you going down a rabbit hole?

[00:15:31] Ryan: Well, the, the, the big one that I still, you know, can never satisfactorily answer is, who are the Nephilim?

That's always like, I don't know, like I know what some people say that they are, but I don.

[00:15:47] Remy: Yeah, that's a good one.

[00:15:50] Ryan: You know, there's usually. And usually, you know, you usually. I've got the big class on the problem of evil and you talk.

[00:15:56] Remy: Sure.

[00:15:57] Ryan: When we talk about Job, like, wait, Satan was talking to God in heaven and he let him do all that stuff. Like what? Like, you know, that all of those things that plague, you know, adults, like, it's the same, it's the same stuff.

[00:16:14] Remy: That's. So who do you think the Nephilim are? Not kidding.

[00:16:20] Ryan: I don't know. I always think of, I always laugh because I think of the, that Russell Crowe Noah movie where they were rock giants.

[00:16:27] Remy: Yeah.

[00:16:27] Ryan: And like, I can't get that out of my head. So I just go that they were rock giants. Sure. Does it matter? No.

[00:16:36] Remy: I lean towards the boring and non supernatural view. And the only reason I lean towards that view is because the Bible says that everything procreates after its own kind, that everything can procreate after its kind and angels and humans are not of a kind. They're not of the same kind. So how could they procreate and have.

[00:17:02] Ryan: That makes a lot of sense. It's a pretty sound argument.

[00:17:05] Remy: It's the only thing. It's literally the only argument that keeps me on the.

On that. But, you know, I don't know, man. Kids are crazy. What's the crate speaking? What's the kids say? The darndest things. Have you ever had one just let off with something truly unhinged? Like, what's the wildest thing?

[00:17:29] Ryan: I'm sure you know, it can absolutely come up with something. The one that always pops. It's not unhinged. It was just like, I had a. It was. And it's not even a member of my church. We had a family that was visiting because they were in town for. They were visiting family, and their kids came up to the children's message. So this kid is about, you know, four.

And I. I forgot. I don't even remember what the topic was, but I was talking about, you know, do we ever do bad things? And. Yeah, we do. You know, that's called sin. And this kid raises his hand and he goes, because I know why we do bad things. It's because of the devil. And he just, like, yells, devil, like, really loudly. And he goes. And he's down there, and he's gonna stay down there.

[00:18:14] Remy: Yeah.

[00:18:16] Ryan: I'm like, you say it, kid. Say it with your whole chest.

[00:18:19] Remy: Like, that's.

[00:18:22] Ryan: Yeah, the devil. That kind of stuff. Our.

[00:18:26] Remy: Our pastor, he'll.

He'll be doing the children's talk, and so he does this thing where he gives him a bag, and the next week, the kid has to bring the bag back with a random item in it. And then he uses that to. Off the cuff a children's sermon based on whatever he's talking about.

And you think, boy, that's really, really great. But his secret trick. And don't tell him I told you this.

[00:18:56] Ryan: Is this Joe?

[00:18:57] Remy: Yeah.

[00:18:58] Ryan: Okay.

[00:18:58] Remy: Yeah. His secret trick is that a lot of times he'll pivot, okay. So he'll be like, oh, a transformer. That's really cool. You know what that reminds me of? And then, yeah, he could just pivot to whatever he wants. So it's a good little misdirect.

[00:19:13] Ryan: I like it.

[00:19:13] Remy: But he. He'll have kids that'll. That'll go off and just like, start talking. Like, he'll ask a question, and they're just. They're on their way. They're talking about something and they're going on and on, and if ever it's a little boy that is going on and on about something, Joe will look at him and go, do you want to do this job?

[00:19:33] Ryan: You can.

[00:19:33] Remy: You can do this.

[00:19:37] Ryan: Here. Here's the. Here's the vestments.

[00:19:39] Remy: You go, you. You do this.

[00:19:42] Ryan: Yeah.

[00:19:42] Remy: No, it's all funny. You know, it's. We laugh about it. It's all fun and games, but I usually have gotten a lot of guys into the ministry.

[00:19:52] Ryan: Yeah, well, hey, that's great. More power to him. I. I have to laug and I have. You know, the little girls will always be like, I have to tell you something. I have. I have to ask you a question. And then I go, okay, what? And do you like my dress? It's sparkly. Like, it's just, you know, stuff like that. And I have to go, that's great. Can we talk about it later? We have to pray now. You know, kind of a thing.

Like, I need to, like, validate them and acknowledge them for wanting to contribute, but also, like, let's keep it on Jesus.

[00:20:24] Remy: Yeah, yeah.

[00:20:25] Ryan: And.

[00:20:25] Remy: And that's a. That's a fine line to walk, especially with younger K kids, because, like, you don't want to do damage. You know what I mean? Like, you don't want to just shut them down.

[00:20:36] Ryan: Right.

[00:20:36] Remy: You know?

[00:20:37] Ryan: Yeah, yeah. I'm usually. I'm Usually come find me after service and we could talk about that. Yeah. And then they do, and then it means that I'm stuck there for a good extra, you know, five to ten minutes after church is over. But that's fine. I don't care.

[00:20:54] Remy: It's.

It's the best time to talk to kids, man, when they're that age, because they have this amazing, like, internal logic. It's like dream logic that their thoughts kind of follow, you know, and it's always so much fun for me to like. Like my nieces and nephews and the kids at church or whatever to talk to them about. To talk to them about stuff and just kind of try and figure out, like, how are they making the leaps? How are they making these connections to things, you know?

[00:21:27] Ryan: Yeah. My own. My own son is almost 4, and so he, like, he's get. Kind of getting to that part now where he's starting to make connections in his mind. And, you know, he'll bring up something that happened two weeks ago, and I was. And I've forgotten completely about it, and I go, wait, right. What?

[00:21:45] Remy: Yeah. And you have to wonder, like, he probably also forgot about it until like, just now, something reminded him, right? And it's like things are starting to click over. Yeah, that's great. My cousin, when he had his kids, they're in their 20s now, I think. Are. How old are they?

No, they're graduating high school, so they're 18.

[00:22:10] Ryan: Okay.

[00:22:11] Remy: And when he first had his kids, they're twin boys. And I asked him about a year into it, I was like, man, how is it, you know, it's been a year. How is it being a dad? And he said, he said it's kind of like having a dog that just gets smarter every single day.

[00:22:30] Ryan: Right? That's true. It's true. They, they, they. They're growing up and they're getting smart. And you're like, wow, I'm so proud of you. But then also like, oh my gosh, you're getting smart. Like, yeah, yeah.

[00:22:43] Remy: And then it's like, pretty soon, like, like you're gonna have, you're gonna have a man on your hands, you know?

[00:22:49] Ryan: Right, right. Well, and that's the thing, right? Like, I've worked with kids my whole career, you know, but it's different when it's my own because like, the thing about kids at church is eventually, like, at the end of the day, I have to give them back to their parents, Right? But like, with my own kid, I am the parents. Like, I have to give him back to me. Like, he's, he's my own. There's nobody else for him to go to unless grandma's visiting. Like, that's it. Like, so it, it's just, it's incredible. Like, how much I thought I knew about kids versus actually experiencing it in real time with my own children is like.

[00:23:35] Remy: Yeah.

[00:23:35] Ryan: There's so much that I don't actually know. And that's been, it's been good for me to realize that.

[00:23:41] Remy: Yeah. Yeah.

I took a class this last semester on confirmation, specifically and teaching confirmation. And one of the things the instructor drilled home for us was like this idea of a whole life confirmation.

You start early, teaching anything you can, and the goal isn't necessarily to teach more, but to teach deeper as they get older, if that makes sense. So he talked about how his kids and his grandkids, by the time they were four or five years old, they have the Lord's Prayer. They've got that memorized. Do they know what it means? Can they tell you about it? No. But does that really matter at that age? No. Right. It's like laying foundation and then we're building over the course of Their life. I just kind of wanted to run that by and get your thoughts.

[00:24:44] Ryan: Absolutely. I would agree with that 100%.

And my, you know, my. I see that in my own kids. We say the Lord's Prayer every night before bed. And my son is almost 4, and he can say it. He can say the whole thing. And, you know, part of the. Part of his issue is, you know, keeping him on task. Like, you keep your hands folded through the whole thing, you know, we're saying, yeah, don't start wandering over there, you know, is that. But, you know, so he could say, and then my daughter is one and a half, so she doesn't have all of her words yet, but she does have some. And so you'll hear her hit. It's really funny that every once in a while she'll get trespasses and she'll say. And she'll say the word trespasses with us. And it's the cutest thing hearing a one and a half year old say trespass is.

[00:25:37] Remy: So there are, you know, and there are people that say that you can't teach a kid the Lord's Prayer at one and a half, at two, at three. But we're teaching. We're teaching, like, preverbal infants sign language. You know what I mean? Like, how many parents out there teach their kid, like, the sign for, like.

[00:25:54] Ryan: Milk or whatever, you know, please and thank you and all that. We did that too. And like, and I agree, like, and this applies to not just like infants and toddlers, but teenagers, too. Kids are way smarter than most people give them credit for, which is like. And that's the other thing that I, like, love about being a DCE and love about, you know, the job that I get to do is that, like, I get to see regularly how awesome all of the kids can be and how smart they are. And, like, when they get it, you know, when a light bulb turns on, you're like, yes. Like, that's such a cool moment. But, like, it can happen as, you know, young as one and two. And, you know, even in, you know, middle school and high school, they get it. Like, they, like, they can be taught. And like, I think a lot of adults just kind of assume, like, they want to assume that kids already know things.

Like, they're like, you should know this by now. But it's like, well, how are they supposed to know it if nobody ever bothered to teach them?

[00:26:59] Remy: Yeah.

[00:26:59] Ryan: You know, you know what I'm saying? Like, we had. At my last church in New York, we had a.

We would have the teenagers, you know, they would.

To get a job. They would. We'd have them help with the custodial stuff at our church. So we had a cleaning crew of. Of teenagers, and we would have some of the ladies in our congregation just get super upset if, like, something wasn't perfectly clean the way that they wanted it to be clean.

[00:27:29] Remy: Right.

[00:27:30] Ryan: And I would often have to be like, okay, but did you, like, teach them how to do that? Like, he's 14. Like, does. He may not have been ever taught how that goes? Like, if you want to let him know exactly how you want those baseboards cleaned in the sanctuary, like, teach him. Like, he probably could figure it out because he's smart. But if you want it done exactly the way you want to go, you got to, you know, you got to teach them. And generally speaking, for the most part, they are open to instruction and they are open to learning.

I. I've. I've yet to meet a kid that doesn't actually enjoy learning as long as it's done in a way that, you know, speaks to them. You know, they might hate school, but they love learning, and that's a very different thing.

[00:28:20] Remy: Yeah, it is.

Yeah, it is.

So with this, like, holistic approach, I guess, of you want to, like, always be, like, teaching ABCs, always be confirming with regards to things like how do you keep confirmation from being, like, graduating Christianity as a dce, I'm sure that's something you've spent time thinking about.

[00:28:54] Ryan: Absolutely. Yeah. It's. It's. It's probably my biggest, like, thing that I fight with is when people just treat it as, okay, I've. I've graduated. I've checked all the boxes. Yeah, right. The. The thing that drove me nuts, and this was a New York thing primarily, was they would talk about. And because Long island is such a Catholic area, they would. They would talk about making your sacraments right. Because in the Catholic Church, they get communion at, like, 2 or, like, second grade. Not 2, second grade, like, you know, super early. And then, so, like, they make their communion and then they make their confirmation, and then, like, they make, like. So they view all of the sacraments as these, like, checkboxes. And so they would. You would have people that just, like, show up to our church, our Lutheran church, but, like, all they know is Catholic. And they'd be like, okay, I've gotta put my son in confirmation because he's old enough now and he's got to make his confirmation. He's got to do it. And anybody who ever said that like, you know, seven times out of 10, they. You would never see them again after confirmation Sunday. Because that's. That was just their attitude. They're like, this is a thing that I have to do because it's like what I was raised with. It's what everybody around me does. It's like they. They check the box. It means I've done this. It means I'm good. I fulfilled my obligation to God slash my family, slash.

[00:30:28] Remy: Right.

[00:30:28] Ryan: You know, cultural expectations, and now I can move on with my life and I don't have to think about that anymore. Drives me absolutely insane.

[00:30:36] Remy: Yeah.

Yeah.

[00:30:39] Ryan: And so part of. Part of it is, I think we have done a slight disservice to confirmation in that we put it in June usually, and we make the kids wear robes and we have a special ceremony. It looks a lot like a graduation when you do it that way, because they have. There's another ceremony that takes place in June where they wear robes and they. It's very similar. So, you know, trying to, I think one just like a practical thing is doing it at a different time of year.

So in New York, I moved it to the fall. I moved it to Reformation Sunday.

[00:31:17] Remy: Oh, nice. Yeah.

[00:31:18] Ryan: Which was cool. And now here we do it on Palm Sunday.

[00:31:23] Remy: Okay.

[00:31:23] Ryan: And the reason we do it on Palm Sunday here is so that they can take communion on Monday, Thursday coming up. So. Which is always really nice. So. But so that kind of removes it from graduation.

But then, like, the other thing is you have to, like, have something else for them to do, like after. You know, you can't just be like. And now you just. You. Now you come to youth group. Well, you know, sure. But like, they can also go hang out with other people. You know, like, just hanging out is fine, but it's not like the end all be all. But the kids who, you know, get themselves involved, you know, maybe they want to start helping in the worship service in some way by. They want to be. I have a couple of girls who want to be readers. I have a couple who help out with our, you know, technology. They help run the, you know, slideshow and the. The sound board. And, you know, I have some. Who. We have all of our confirmation kids do acolyting. And then there are some who are like, I really like doing this. Can I keep doing it even though I'm not in confirmation anymore? I said, absolutely, yeah. You know, keep. Keep lighting candles. It's great.

[00:32:33] Remy: We only have all.

[00:32:34] Ryan: We only have two candles, so it's not hard. Go for it.

Except at Christmas. Then we have six.

[00:32:42] Remy: Yeah, right.

I think it's interesting that. That note that, like, we dress it up exactly like graduation, time it with graduation, and then we're like, why do these kids think it's a graduation?

[00:32:56] Ryan: I know.

So it's. Yeah. Kind of a thing. The last couple of years, we haven't even had them wear robes on confirmation.

And that was primarily because they were.

Most of the kids that got confirmed were late service kids where. So things are slightly less formal. They still looked nice. I made sure that they weren't wearing holy jeans or anything like that. But so, yeah, it just. And it ended up not being a big deal.

You know, I think people can make a big deal out of stuff like that. And it's like, okay, but you'd rather them make a confession of faith than not. Right. So let's. Let's maybe remove a couple of obstacles to that.

[00:33:44] Remy: Yeah.

[00:33:45] Ryan: So, yeah, so we'll see. It's. It's going to be a constant struggle as long as the. The world is vying for their attention. You know, the pressures of school and their friends and sports and all these other things, you know, it's always going to be hard to have them see that being a part of a church community is a priority.

But like I said, I keep showing up, so, you know, I'll be here whenever you want to come. Like, let's go.

[00:34:16] Remy: How do you.

How do you combat that, man? Because, like, one of the hardest things is when parents put their kids in, like, travel ball, and it's like every game is on a Sunday. We have. We have one guy, he's on our church council, and his son does. Does like little league travel ball.

Every time of the year he's doing a different sport, but he makes his kid go to church. And if they're going to miss church for a game, he finds like, a church that has like an early morning or a late Saturday night service, and they go, good.

So, I mean, how, like, how do you get. How do you get parents to prioritize church? You know, because if they don't, their kids won't.

[00:35:03] Ryan: Right. And that's the thing. Right. And I think a lot of parents don't realize exactly how much of an impact that they have on that. You know, they. They say, well, my kid wants to be in, you know, travel volleyball, so I guess that's what we have to do. And it's like, well, no, you're. You're the parents. You can say. You can say no. Right. Like.

[00:35:27] Remy: He'S Got this little. This little 4 foot 5 dictator running the house.

[00:35:33] Ryan: And I. And I. I totally understand the struggle. Like, my son yesterday asked to. Our school has this little soccer program, and he asked to be a part of that. And it's like, we would have to pay extra money to do it. And I'm not sure we have it in the budget right now, but I'm like, how do I tell him that I can't afford to do this right now? And it, like, the struggle with it is rough. Like. Like, I get how rough parents have it sometimes. Like, saying no is hard to do. Like, I don't discount that at all.

But I think a lot of parents don't even try it. It doesn't seem like they, you know, they give an effort. They just. They go with whatever their kid wants to do.

And they. They're like, we will adapt and we will adjust everything around them.

When it should be the kids adjust everything around you. You know, I think my parents did a decent job of that.

You know, I was in. I was in marching band in high school, which took up a lot of, you know, time during the week, but it wasn't. It never took up a Sunday. And I think that was probably why my parents were okay with it, because they were like, as long as you're still coming to church with us, you know, like, that's. That's a priority. And they. They made sure that was clear from day one. So I'm trying to make sure my kids know from day one church is a priority. We always go to church.

And I'll let you know, we'll. We'll have to revisit in a few years. And I'll let you know how I'm doing on that.

[00:37:05] Remy: Sure. Yeah. I remember my. My brother when he first became a dad.

This was six or seven years ago now.

And they were just. For the first four or five months, they were just having the hardest time with this kid until finally they went to my mom and they were like, what are we doing wrong here with this? You know, he's just. He never naps when he needs to. He's always awake at the wrong time. And, you know, all this. What are we doing here? And my mom told him, look, you. Y'all have been here. Y'all have been here. The kid just got here. Yeah, the kid adapts to you. You don't adapt to the kid. Right? He's joining you. You're not joining him. And so you have to, like, approach it that way. And they, like, God bless them. They have kept that mentality throughout this kid's entire six or seven years, man. And it's. It's wild. He's old enough now to, like, talk and have conversations and whatever, and he'll want to go play something or do something. And my brother will just say, hey, that's not what we're doing right now, buddy. And he's like, oh, okay.

And that's it, you know.

[00:38:23] Ryan: Cool. Yeah.

So, yeah, I think sometimes. So that, to me says, you know, there are some parents that just don't try. Right. Like, they. They don't want to give it a, you know, a shot of trying to make sure that the kid is, you know, adapting to their schedule. They're like, I'm gonna. I need to give them everything because I didn't have everything when I was a kid.

Is it. You know, that's a real temptation, but at the same time, we have to be like, okay, but, like, you know, the sports thing, you know, to circle back on that. Like, so many people treat their kids like they're gonna grow up and become a superstar NFL athlete. And.

[00:39:07] Remy: Yeah.

[00:39:07] Ryan: You know, and many kids who live in Houston, Texas, will, like, this is a hotbed of football recruiting down here. Right.

And I go, you know, okay, there's probably a 1 2% chance that your son makes it to the NFL.

You know, probably a higher percentage that they will play in college, which everyone likes better. But that's. You know, there's that. But, like, there's a 100 chance that they will be judged on the last day when Christ returns. Right.

[00:39:43] Remy: Right.

[00:39:44] Ryan: Like, that is a guarantee.

[00:39:47] Remy: Yeah.

[00:39:48] Ryan: And what are we doing about that? Like, that should be the most important thing. And I love sports. Like, I love. Watch, like, football. I'm a huge football fan. I love going to football games. I love watching football. It's great.

It's not more important than Jesus.

[00:40:05] Remy: Right.

[00:40:05] Ryan: And. And I have to keep saying that, and I will say it till I'm blue in the face.

[00:40:09] Remy: It's.

[00:40:10] Ryan: It's.

[00:40:11] Remy: It's something. I think I've probably talked about it in.

In record interviews. I've. I've been recording a lot for this next season. I don't think this is. I've released anything where I've expressed this thought yet, but I have recorded a lot of interviews, and I think quite a few times now this season. I have probably said something to the effect of we don't even look at nearby churches when we're sending our kids off to college.

It's not even a factor in the math. When we're sending our kids off, we're sending them. First off, I would be nervous to send my kid away from home that, like, far away from home for an education like that.

But to, like, not even have a church set up, you know, like, we like. But looking for a good church for your kid to go to on Sunday while they're away at college should probably be, like, your first consideration as a Christian parent is where will they be fed spiritually? Where will they be nourished spiritually before anything else. But we don't even. Like, it doesn't even occur to people. And when you bring it up, people think you're crazy.

[00:41:26] Ryan: Right, right. We had. So we had a program at my church in New York where we actually had a fund that was set up for scholarships for kids going off to college. And in order to take advantage of those funds, they had to sit through a class with me about, you know, keeping your faith going in college and, like, make a plan of, like, what church are you going to go to? And how are you gonna, you know.

[00:41:54] Remy: Yeah.

[00:41:55] Ryan: How are you gonna follow up on these things? And that was. That was a requirement of them receiving those scholarship funds was for them to do that. You know, I don't have that now. I will say a lot of the kids from my church have been going to Texas A and M, and there is a strong Lutheran presence at Texas A and M University.

So anybody listening to this podcast, if you want, like, I could hook you up with Lutherans at Texas A and M. I know some of them. It's great. So there you go.

[00:42:27] Remy: Yeah. Yeah. Well, there's a buddy of mine, he's a pastor up in Lynchburg, Virginia, and. Right. Liberty University. Jerry Falwell, all that. And he has. He has quite the college age sort of group going, and they're all like, Liberty students, you know, and so you have, like, Baptists from all over the world coming to, you know, Baptist Mecca. Liberty University.

[00:42:55] Ryan: Right.

[00:42:55] Remy: And they end up getting invited to some weird liturgical thing that they've never been to before, and it, like, opens their eyes. And now he's got, like, this whole little group of, like, hardcore catechized Lutheran College students.

[00:43:11] Ryan: Nice.

[00:43:12] Remy: Yeah.

[00:43:13] Ryan: That's awesome.

[00:43:15] Remy: Yep. We. The first time we ever went to his church, we were up there. I have a lot of family in Lynchburg. And the first time we were ever visiting his church, we went up there, and on his church sign, he just had baptism saves, like, right here in the middle of Baptist country. And I was like, yep, great.

[00:43:34] Ryan: I Love that. I love that. Oh, that, that reminds me. I, I drove by, I'm about to, I'm about to go on a rant, maybe. I don't know.

I almost got out of the car because we. So we have a, a Lutheran camp down here in Texas, Camp Lone Star, and we go there every year for a confirmation retreat, which is great. I love it. There is an ELCA church not far up the road, and we were leaving, and this is the only reason I didn't stop is because we were leaving and I was exhausted and I had to get the kids home. But we drove by this ELCA church and their sign said, on the ELCA church, it said, baptism is an outward sign of an inward reality. And I was like, are you kidding me? Like, I, I, I almost stopped the car and I was like, I need to go talk to this pastor or something. But I'm like, no, I gotta get the kids home. It's not, it's like, oh, you've been influenced in the wrong direction. Oh, I mean, I could have told.

[00:44:39] Remy: You that about the elca, though.

[00:44:42] Ryan: I know. I, but like, just, just seeing it, like, I expect that out of a Baptist church.

[00:44:46] Remy: Yeah.

[00:44:47] Ryan: You know, but still, I was just.

[00:44:49] Remy: Like, at least pretend to be Lutheran.

[00:44:52] Ryan: Right.

Yeah. Have we made any progress on that petition to change the L in their name to something different?

[00:45:00] Remy: I think, I think. Okay. I think it's going to drop naturally. I think it's going to come out naturally. Yeah.

[00:45:06] Ryan: This is going to be the ECA.

[00:45:08] Remy: Something or like maybe the eac, the Evangelical American Church or something like that. But I really do think that L is going to drop sooner than later. I think they actually, one of their own people did put forward a, A thing about it. There was some, some ELCA meeting, committee meeting, something somewhere that Bishop Eaton was a part of where they actually did discuss removing Lutheran from the name to be more ecumenical.

[00:45:37] Ryan: Great. Go for it. Have fun.

Yeah.

[00:45:42] Remy: Yeah. That'll be a, that'll be a great day.

[00:45:45] Ryan: Yeah. Lutheran Twitter will be on fire that day. That'll be.

[00:45:50] Remy: Oh, yeah. Overjoyed. Overjoyed. Which, you know, Lutheran Twitter is on fire most days, but, like, it's the.

[00:45:57] Ryan: Wrong, it's the wrong Lutheran Twitter is the only reason I'm still on Twitter.

[00:46:03] Remy: Oh, man. Gosh. I wanna, I wanna leave Twitter so often. Yeah, it's, it's.

[00:46:09] Ryan: But then you have, like right now, like, do you. I follow Don Stein.

[00:46:14] Remy: I love Don.

[00:46:15] Ryan: He's great. He's posting something from the Formula of Concord every single Day. And I'm like, I love this. This is great.

[00:46:22] Remy: Like, yeah, great. Great.

[00:46:25] Ryan: Keeping me on Twitter.

[00:46:27] Remy: He's, he's actually going to be my very first interview this season. Awesome. Two weeks from. Two weeks from now.

[00:46:35] Ryan: Okay, cool.

[00:46:36] Remy: Look forward to it. Yeah. Love, Don.

So how do you put together a Bible study? You mentioned that sometimes you got to do that.

How do you do it?

[00:46:49] Ryan: I. The way that we do it around here is we're trying to go through just like, books. So right now we have a Tuesday morning Bible study for our, you know, retirees, those who don't work and they are going through the book of Joshua.

And so it's. We, we read part of the book of Joshua and then we dive into it. And it is, it is such that it usually will take us two or three weeks to get through a chapter because, you know, we talk about something that leads to another thing, that leads to another thing. And those rabbit holes that are so prevalent in confirmation are also there with the adults. Right?

[00:47:32] Remy: Sure.

[00:47:34] Ryan: So it's a, you know, we have a big, like, I try to come prepped with where could they go? Like, what questions could they ask here, right? So like when, like we just talked about, we just got through the fall of, of I. You know, so shortly after Jericho, they, they, they route Jericho and then they, you know, everything's great except Akin stole some stuff. So then they lose the next battle, right? And just like the implications of, well, why did God care so much about the devoted things? And why was that such a big deal? And why did that, you know, why did they have to brutally destroy everybody in the city? Why is God's mean like that? Right? You know, like that kind of stuff. And like, it'll take weeks to talk about some of those things. And it's like, you know, let's talk about justice. Let's talk about, you know, the fact that the people of Jericho and I were doing some horrific stuff and yes, really needed to not influence the people of Israel. And then they did anyway and it was like, you know, so I just, I try to come prepped with, you know, as much as I can, but it's, it's really a lot of like, here's the, here's the Bible. I've got my, the Luther. We, we use everybody's got a Lutheran study Bible in our, you know, whether they've got one of their own or we've got a bunch. So they can look at the same study notes that I look at.

And like, then I will be like, okay, so here's, you know, outside sources from that that I can bring in to kind of explain those things a little bit. But, you know, it kind of helps them to look at some of those things. I love the Lutheran Study Bible. I think it's great.

And so we will talk about the notes, and we'll talk about that, and we'll see how long it takes us to get through Joshua. So in the hour. In the hour that we have, if we only get through a couple of verses, and that's what we do.

[00:49:28] Remy: So do you. Have you ever been putting it together and been thinking, like, yeah, this is the question they're definitely going to ask. This is the thing they're going to get hung up on. And so you really prep for that. And then they're just like, no, that's fine. And they blow right by it.

[00:49:44] Ryan: Oh, yeah, totally.

I forget when this happens. Most recently, it was, I think, a. We would. Something had to do with baptism. And I was. I was just waiting for those who had a Baptist background to kind of come forward with the. Okay, but, like, you know, you know, bringing up all of the Baptist arguments. But we had just kind of done it relatively recently because my pastor went through a whole series on different denominations. So we did that. But. So I was. I was, like, ready to, like, argue about baptism with people, and then they, like, nobody was argumentative that day. And I was like, oh, okay, cool.

[00:50:30] Remy: You're, like, trying to, like, start a fight.

Jim, what'd they teach when you were growing up?

Yeah, that's great.

What's your favorite part of being a dce?

[00:50:47] Ryan: It really is like, you know, just the people. Like, the people are the hardest part. And also my favorite part. Right. Like, I often jokingly say, you know, ministry would be so easy if it weren't for the people.

I say that often. But, like, it's true. Like. But, like, this is kind of like what we were created for.

Like, we were created to be together, right? Like, it. The biggest thing, the. The first problem with creation was that Adam was by himself, right? So, like, we were meant. We were meant to have other people, you know, not just marriage, but also, like, just people in general. And so we were, you know, we were created to be with others and to do life together. And like, when. When Jesus established the church and on Pentecost, like, they were always together. They were always talking with each other and, you know, doing all that stuff. And. And so I love doing that, even though, like, it gets hard sometimes because you have people that, like, the hard things that they go through. And then, like, when you get treated like garbage because they don't understand, you know, there are people who will betray you, and there are people who will, you know, as much as you've talked to them about so many things, they just. They won't come the next week or whatever, and they, like, it hurts. Like, it hurts. And, like, people will just leave and they'll. They'll decide they don't like it here anymore and they'll go somewhere else. And it's sad.

Not. And I haven't even gotten into, like, church politics and conflict and all that. Like, that's a whole other. That's a book I'm gonna write someday, I think, is church conflict, because I've. I've seen a lot of it, but it just, like, so people are really hard, but, like, they're also the best, you know? Like.

[00:52:45] Remy: Yeah.

Yeah. When you.

When you.

When you see what you're doing, make a difference, you know?

[00:52:57] Ryan: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Like, when a kid, like, makes a connection in confirmation class, they're like, oh, like the. Like, that's why you said that. I'm like, yes, that's why I said that.

[00:53:11] Remy: Like.

[00:53:13] Ryan: Like, the light bulb moments are so, like, cathartic. Like, just like, oh, thank you. Yeah, thank you, Jesus. They got it. Like.

Like, I know that. Like. And, like, especially, like, I know that, like, it wasn't necessarily because of me that they got it. You know what I mean? Like, God is using me to teach them, and I'm happy to do it, but, like, you. When. You know, it's like, oh, yeah, like, the spirit has, like, worked in their heart and they've understood something. Like, you go, God. Like, that's so cool when you do stuff like that.

[00:53:51] Remy: Like, yeah, yeah.

[00:53:53] Ryan: I love that, man.

[00:53:54] Remy: And I. And it's oftentimes, too, where it's like, you. You're up here doing this thing, you know, God has you in this place. You're called to this ministry. You're doing this thing.

And, like, you. I don't know.

For me, anyway, it feels a lot of times like I'm like, man, like, when you see God do something and. And really work, it's. It almost feels like God's doing it, like, in spite of me, you know?

[00:54:31] Ryan: Yeah.

[00:54:31] Remy: And it's like. It's like, man, like, God is just really out here using whatever vessel he gets his hands on to do whatever work he needs done, and it's like, he can't be stopped, you know? Like, he's God or something.

[00:54:48] Ryan: Right, Exactly. I can't tell you the number of Sundays that, like, pastor and I have both, like, shown up in the morning and we're both like, I'm not feeling it today. Like, it like, today's gonna be rough. Like, we just kind of got to get through it and then, like, we get to the end of the morning and usually we're like, that was one of the best, like, Sundays we've had in a while. Like, worship was really good and the hymns were awesome, and the, like, pastors, like, like, I don't really, Sometimes he'll be like, I don't even really know what I preached. But, like, everybody said it was good. Like, that kind of stuff. Like, it just like, usually it's like, when we're not feeling it, like, then I think we get out of our own way and we realize, like, how much God is doing.

[00:55:32] Remy: Doing this thing.

[00:55:33] Ryan: Yeah, it's just so cool.

[00:55:34] Remy: And, like, how comforting, too, knowing that, like, God is going to do his work, you know, regardless, you know, he's the operating force, you know?

[00:55:49] Ryan: Yep.

[00:55:50] Remy: Very cool.

Very cool. Ryan, thank you so much for coming by.

[00:55:55] Ryan: Absolutely. Man, this has been great. I love talking about church. This is fun.

[00:56:01] Remy: Yeah. Well, you're welcome back anytime, anytime you want to. Come on, we can chat about whatever conflict.

[00:56:09] Ryan: Yeah, maybe we'll do it. Oh, man, I, I, we don't have time to get into it, but, like, who I've been through, I've been through some doozies, so.

[00:56:19] Remy: Well, you know, we're, we're all just a bunch of sinners, you know?

[00:56:23] Ryan: Right, right.

I thought about, I was. So we were. A couple weeks ago, we, so we've been talking about, like, Heroes of Faith. That's been our current sermon thing recently. And we did Samson a few weeks ago, and I'm like, I gotta come up with a children's message for Samson.

And, and, and like, Pastor's point that he was making was like, Samson is like a jerk. Like, he's, he's such a terrible guy.

[00:56:52] Remy: Dude.

[00:56:53] Ryan: He's not a good dude. And God uses him anyway. So I was like, okay. So when I'm, when I do the children, I didn't end up doing this, but I thought about, like, getting up there, sitting down and being like, what's up, sinners? Like, but like, the young kids would have just like, not gotten that at all. Like, it just. Yeah, but like, that's how it is. Right? Like, we're just like, God is doing great stuff and we just gotta let him.

[00:57:18] Remy: I remember Samson was a It was definitely, definitely. I want to say I had started seminary and I was reading, reading through.

And I get to, like, the end where he's, like. Where he's blind and he's pushing the.

The. The wheel or whatever.

And.

And I remember getting to that point and thinking, like, he kind of earned it, bro. Like.

Like, dude was a jerk. Like, he was absolutely not. Because we. I think we have this tendency to play him up as some kind of, like, Hebrew superhero, but, like, he was actually a huge dick.

[00:58:09] Ryan: Yep, yep. Really? And well. And that was so pastor's point. I'm going to sum up his sermon that he made, but it was a really good point that I didn't. I never really thought of before.

Samson's whole life, he, like, he would look at something and he'd go for it. Like, Delilah, she looks great. I want her. The other woman that he married, she looks great. You know, that lion. You know, I'm that honey. I'm going to eat that honey. You know, whatever he saw, he went after. It was only after he couldn't see anymore that he realized that he needed to follow what God was doing.

[00:58:45] Remy: Yeah.

[00:58:45] Ryan: And it took his eyes getting gouged out, and I was like.

[00:58:48] Remy: I was like, whoa, wow.

[00:58:50] Ryan: Like, that's me, too. I need to not look at stuff like God. Like, God, like, I don't want my eyes gouged out, but, like.

[00:58:57] Remy: Right.

[00:58:58] Ryan: God let your vision, not mine, basically.

[00:59:02] Remy: So, yeah, that's good. I'm gonna actually steal that and.

[00:59:05] Ryan: Yeah, right. Write that one down.

[00:59:07] Remy: Yeah. I really am awesome, Ryan. Thank you so much, man.

[00:59:12] Ryan: You bet.

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Greatest Theology Newsletter on the Planet

[00:00:00] Remy: Reverend Deberny. Thank you so much for being willing to come on my show and talk to me.

[00:00:09] Rev. Deberny: Oh, it's a pleasure. Thank you for having me on. I love to, love to talk to fellow Lutherans about our faith, about the church and anything I can do to help.

[00:00:20] Remy: So to get this started, just sort of generally around what we're going to be talking about. If you could introduce yourself.

How long have you been doing ministry? Where are you at currently? Where'd you graduate from? Tell us a little bit about yourself.

[00:00:35] Rev. Deberny: Oh, I love talking about myself.

[00:00:38] Remy: Don't we all.

[00:00:39] Rev. Deberny: So my story, I like to say in the LCMS I would be what you call a system guy in that I just kind of went through the system. I, I grew up in an LCMS congregation out in Buffalo and Niagara Falls and I knew when I was seven years old I was going to be a pastor.

It's the divine call. God just calls you and I think that kind of is an example of that. I saw my pastor, he came to visit us. We, it was a school associated with the church and the pastor would visit every day and I saw him like that. That's, that's what I want to do. And I've had a lot of support, I had a lot of support from family, from friends. This is a vocation that you should pursue. So I went through the system. After high school I went to a Concordia, Concordia Nebraska where I studied conc. Computer science but also the pre seminary program, getting my Greek and Hebrew, all that done, graduated in three years with the Bachelor's of arts. And then you had to make the choice which seminary you're going to go to. And fortunately the computer science degree actually turned into a career at Concordia Publishing House. I developed software for a church management called Shepherd Staff. And so the choice of where I would go to seminary became easy because I had a side gig at in St. Louis. So I went to Concordia St. Louis for a Master of Divinity education and for after two years I got my vicarage assignment. And that vicarage assignment was kind of crazy because that was the 2020 year, which if you remember that was during the COVID pandemic. So I actually found out where I was going on vicarage at home, no call Service, over the TV. It was crazy. I was called to Garden City, New York which about, I would say a 30 minute drive east of New York City, Manhattan. And I spent a year there learning about, you know, what it means to be a pastor with the field experience.

It definitely was a fit for me. I didn't know if I was going to be coming back to New York. But I remember our district president. He was not district president yet, but he came to visit me during vicarage and he gave me the old like, so where do you think you would fit in as a pastor if you were to come back to our district? That kind of talk. Right.

And so after my fourth year we received our call assignments and sure enough I returned to the same district. And now I am a pastor at Grace Lutheran Church in Mastic Beach, New York which is about 60 miles east of the city, so further east on the island. And I am now in my third year. So two years ministry have not scared me off. God be praised for that. He has been with me in my ministry and I thank him every day. I thank him for the support I've received. I got called to a wonderful congregation. Grace is a filled with faith filled people and people eager to hear the truth. And they have been receptive of me and taking good care of me and that's a blessing. I know many pastors that have had a rough time their first call, but that was not my case at all. God has been with me during my journey. A little bit more about me now that I'm in my third year. The district said, oh, we can make that guy do stuff. So in April, in April I was nominated as the junior pastoral counselor of the Atlantic District lwml. So I work with the L. LWML in, in devotion giving and counseling. And I go to a ton, tons of events to help with that. Go ahead.

[00:04:09] Remy: I. I'm in the aalc.

[00:04:10] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:04:11] Remy: And we don't have the lwml. Yes. I always imagine that it stands for Lutheran Women. Mim Lutheran. What does it actually stand for?

[00:04:21] Rev. Deberny: It is the Lutheran Women in Mission. That or you, or you could say the Lutheran Women Missionary League. They've kind of moved to the first name, but the acronym actually stands for lut. Lutheran Women Missionary League. The institution is kind of how I would describe it. It's a way to create grant money and distribute it to certain ministries throughout the country or within the districts. So. So for example, you know, there may be some fundraising a church needs for a ministry project in the community and they can't raise that money themselves. And so the LWML all gets together and say, okay, we're going to do as a district, we're have these little mite boxes, these little tiny boxes that we put in our churches and you put a dollar in and it all the LWL headquarters and it funds these grants and every year we may have like 20, 25 different missionary grants. And we vote at the meeting which ones get priority. And then we go down the list. It's kind of a grant funding institution. And of course there's many other things there. It's the lwml. Basically the way you should think of it is if you were a lady and the lcms, you are part of the lwml. If you are a woman, you're part of that. And so we have lots of gatherings together as Christians should gather together, not just in their church, but the church at large. We have, we're gonna have a upcoming event in October which all the women from up the Hudson Valley and on Long island, that's the Atlantic district, Hudson Valley down to the city and then out to Long Island. All the churches get together and they meet together and I get to help lead some, some little sermons during that time, some devotions. It'll be a good time.

So that is what my role was as the LWMO pastoral counselor. Also in year I have also been nominated. Well, I guess appointed would be the better, better word. A circuit visitor. Now, the way the LCMS is structured, we have districts throughout the country. We have a 35. Think about 35 districts in our country or. And then we have. Each district is divided into certain circuits because the idea is we don't want pastors to be lone wolves by themselves. You know, we want them to have fellowship with other pastors. Pastors need pastors, after all. And so the way to solve this is we divide districts into circuits because a district could be an entire state, right? The eastern district is half of Pens or all, almost all of Pennsylvania and half of New York state. And there might be a hundred plus churches in that area. And it's hard for pastors to, to get together all in one place. And so they're divided into circuits maybe of eight churches, 10 churches, even five churches, for the point of them getting together, not only for voting and, and creating resolutions that would go to district, but also for fellowsh.

Circuit is out on Long Island. It's eight churches that I get the opportunity to, to care for, to love on. And we meet once a month and discuss church big business, but also discuss things happening in our world. And there's some pretty crazy things happening in our world right now. You know, asking questions like how do, how do we preach about politics?

You know, it's kind of, it's kind of cool not having to decide that all on your own, but being able to bounce ideas off of Other pastors. Yeah, that's pretty cool.

[00:07:41] Remy: Gain the input of other guys. Yes. Like how they're doing it, what's working for them.

[00:07:45] Rev. Deberny: Yes. I think that one of the biggest dangers for pastors is again, this lone wolf mentality of I don't need anyone's help. I'm just, I'm just going to do my own thing. And when you do your own thing, you kind of lose sight of what the church is supposed to be.

The apostles did not do their own thing. Rather they gather together, they figured out, this is what we believe, this is what we're going to teach, and we're going to be consistent on that. And then Paul comes along and says, okay, going to correct some things to make sure that we are all united.

That's what the church is supposed to be. That's what Lutherans take pride in so much. It is a doctrinal, at least conservative Lutherans anyway, doctrinal unity. And the way the LCMS is structured is supposed to foster that, that confessional identity. That's the word I'm looking for. It's con. We are confessional. We share the same confession. And our circuits help with that for sure.

[00:08:37] Remy: Gotcha. So what are some responsibilities that you would have as a circuit visitor?

[00:08:45] Rev. Deberny: So there are a few things and fortunately I'm only my first year, so some of the big stuff has not come up yet. But for example, first of all, my role is to be sort of a pastor of pastors. So if a pastor needs some sort of counseling or needs to confess of sin to someone, certainly he could go to our district president or he could go higher up. But the point of circuit visitors to kind of be lower on the rung to help with that, to know he'll. He'll know me personally because he's part of my circuit. So to counsel him on things that, you know, people, pastors will call me with certain problems in their congregation that either they just need to talk about, because sometimes people don't need solutions. They just, they just want to talk and, and hash things out. And I'm there to be kind of a sounding board for them. But some of the bigger stuff is if there is a debate in the congregation and they need someone to be kind of a third party conflict resolution, my name can be called on. Of course, once again, it could go all the way up to district. But our district precedent has 90 churches to take care of. And so it can be hard for him to get to every single situation. So once again, I'm kind of extension of his arm, kind of a middleman, if you want to say that, to help him do his ministry of caring for pastors. And one more thing, a circuit of Israel might often be called on. Again, I'm on a circuit with eight churches and if, you know, in the lcms, another congregation could call a pastor just like, just like that and could be sent somewhere else and that creates a vacancy. And all of a sudden a congregation doesn't have a pastor to preach on Sunday. And my name can be called on to fill that in. Right. We, you know, I, after my service is over, we come and have a 12 o'clock service at a different church and I can, I can fill in until a replacement is called.

[00:10:37] Remy: So you're, you're a younger fellow.

I think I've got a good decade on you.

[00:10:48] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:10:51] Remy: I'm sure other pastors in your circuit are older than you, have been in ministry longer than you.

Is that weird? What's the, what's the dynamic like when these guys call you for help or for advice or just to listen and you're thinking, golly, this guy has been doing this as long as I've been.

[00:11:11] Rev. Deberny: Alive, you know, so, yeah, so there, there's a couple, a couple of things. There's a, there's one pastor who has been a pastor for less time than I have in my circuit, but it still is double my age. So, you know, he has the life experience, but it really, I found that the age difference has not been much of a problem because we really build like a, a framework of trust with each other. Right. We're able to be comfortable with each other. I'm friends with these guys and they're friends with me. And so, you know, we look past the age. I find the older guys oftentimes look to the younger guys for, for guidance, for inspiration because, you know, they're towards the end of their ministry. They know that the future of the church is, is the younger folk. And so oftentimes they'll look to see where my head is at and what I'm thinking. And again, my job isn't always to give answers. Right.

[00:12:08] Remy: Right.

[00:12:09] Rev. Deberny: Yeah. Okay. A guy, a guy who's been the ministry for 40 years wants to call me up and, and wants my advice on something. Probably not. But a guy who's been the ministry for 40 years who, 40 years, who's upset about something in the congre need someone to talk to, that can be my role. Absolutely. And if they ask for my advice, I'll give them my advice. But sometimes they don't Sometimes they just, you know, need that pastoral support because it's really hard for a pastor when you're not a pastor and you're just a parishioner. You make friends in the church and you just go and you find people you trust in the church and you find people you can confide in and talk to. But with a pastor, you can't confide in your flock.

[00:12:46] Remy: That's right.

[00:12:47] Rev. Deberny: You can't really be as much as pastors want to be friends with your congregation, you can be friendly with them, you can go to the church potluck even. You might even open a beer with them once in a while. But you can't confess your deepest, darkest secrets or sins because who knows where that's going to go. That's what the pastors are for, fellow brothers, right? To, to care for each other. And that's my role. I've been appointed circuit visitor. And, you know, I think the other pastors are just glad it doesn't have to be them. They don't have to do it. I get to do it. So. But that's a good question. That's a good question, Remy.

[00:13:22] Remy: It's interesting this, this, I, this, it's something I think about a lot that like you can't be friends with your parishioners, you know, and, and I think it hits, I think it hits a little bit different in the AALC just because we're so small. You know, we've got, we've got as many churches nationwide as, you know, you guys would have in like a district. You know, we're. And so when you're separated from the nearest AALC pastor by, you know, a four hour plane ride, it's like, it's something, you know, the, and the, I don't know, the need, I guess, for friendship, for fellowship that you're really, you're, you shouldn't get, you know, in your congregation. You're not going to get there because these people don't need you to be their buddy. Right? Like your, your congregation, they don't need a friend, they need a shepherd. They need a pastor.

And that's what you're called to do. So I, I do think about that a lot. I think that's got to be difficult, I guess, I guess friends is up there. But we, one of the things we wanted to talk about were like the needs of pastors.

And I guess fellowship is, is what I'm reaching for here. I guess that's a, that's a pretty strong need in, in pastoral ministry for guys in Ministry, it's just good fellowship, right?

[00:14:53] Rev. Deberny: Absolutely. Again, loneliness is real for pastors.

And a lot of times they won't tell you that because a lot of times it gets in the way. Just think, if I were just to bear my soul to you right now, it make a lot of listeners uncomfortable. Because I'm a pastor, they're supposed to look at me as a reflection of Jesus, someone they can trust and rely on and come to me and be like, I need to confess my sins. Will you give me forgiveness by the authority of Jesus? That's, that's my role. And so pastors will often just put on a brave face, which is why, once again, it's so important if we cannot have this fellowship. And again, when I say you can't be friends with your parishioners, I don't mean you're separated from them, you never talk to them, you never, you know, watch the football game with them. You can. It's just, I describe full friendship as. It's a, it's a two way street, right? It goes both ways, 100%. And so there's a certain degree of.

[00:15:52] Remy: Intimacy that you're never gonna have.

[00:15:55] Rev. Deberny: Exactly. It's a perfect word. You know, you don't have that intimacy with your parishioners. In fact, that might even. You know what, Remy? I'm gonna use that now. Now, I don't think I'm gonna say you can't be friends with your congregates, you can't be intimate with them. And so that's why it's so important to be intimate with fellow pastors. In fact, when I was in the seminary, before I left, they, they kept hammering home, you need someone. Find someone in your circuit or maybe even from the seminary that you're still friends with. Find someone that you can bear your soul to, because it'll be tough. We're pastors are still sinners too. And when we have to rely on ourselves, I like to say everyone has holistic health.

And when your mental health suffers, when you're struggling, maybe you're angry at someone or you're anxious or just overwhelmed, your physical health suffers and so does your spiritual health, and the whole thing can fall apart. I have seen the disastrous end of multiple congregations because a pastor simply just relied on himself.

And I think the honesty here is we realize we're broken people and we can't do it ourselves. And so looking to Jesus, we look to the people that Jesus has sent to us, our brother pastors.

[00:17:16] Remy: What are some of the other needs that you have Noticed among pastors, your time as a circuit visitor.

[00:17:25] Rev. Deberny: Oh, man. I don't want to get into too many specifics because again, sure, you know, I want to keep things private, but certainly I think that there are the needs that, that every human being needs. I mean, putting food on the table is one. It is dealing with family drama.

Pastors have that too.

It's dealing with disappointment and, and broken relationships, whether it would be in the congregation or outside of the congregation. You know, when family members die, when financial troubles come, the things that we all go through in a day to day life, these are things that happen to pastors that they can't really complain about to you because it's not our role. Certainly there's, there is, there's definitely, it definitely goes deeper than that, but I'm gonna leave it at that for now.

[00:18:17] Remy: Sure, sure.

So you were, you said you were born in New York, in Buffalo, is that right?

[00:18:27] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:18:28] Remy: All right. My brother in law is from Buffalo.

[00:18:30] Rev. Deberny: Okay.

[00:18:33] Remy: That's it. That's the only connection I have to Buffalo. There, that's the only thing I know about it is that my brother in.

[00:18:38] Rev. Deberny: Law'S, you know, it's. New York is a strange place because when people think of New York, they think of the city. Of course I think of Manhattan. They think of, you know, just hustle and bustle, Buffalo and everything. Everything west of the city, up the Hudson Valley and the rest of the state. And New York's a big state, is more rural. Not quite rural, but sub rural. We made up that word kind of describe a lot of New York. Buffalo's not that big a city. It actually has more of like a countryside atmosphere. People are friendly in Buffalo and people work together. We have tons of snow. You probably know that about Buffalo. Snow in the bills. That's all we got, snow in the Buffalo bills.

But then it was interesting being raised in Buffalo. I went to college in Nebraska, so I got more of that rural kind of, of attitude. And then I went to Long island with snow also. Then I went to Long Island. Let me just, let me talk about a little bit what, you know, what, what people usually think about New York, what the people are like there. Because being a pastor on the east coast and Remy, you kind of know this being from new North Carolina, the people in New York, people have such a negative stereotype, right, that they're, they're mean, that they're impatient and, and I'm not going to say there isn't some credibility to those claims. What I have found out about the true New Yorkers on Long island and in the city is that if you are one of them, you are in. They will love you to death. If you're not one of them, they don't really care about you. Right. I've got my problems, you got yours. Let's just leave it that way. But if you are one of their friends or part of their family, they will throw so much love on you, you can't even. You're one of them. Stop. That's how my congregation has been. They're a bunch of New Yorkers. And you think, oh, they're probably rude and impatient. No, they're some of the most loving people I've ever met. They have welcomed me as part of their family. They, they trust in me so much, it's humbling.

[00:20:40] Remy: I have a, I have a, I have a thought on this, and this is something that I've maintained for years and years and years, and that is that New Yorkers, specifically, but I, I know, like, New Yorkers, kind of in the Southern mind. New Yorker is like the, the archetypal Yankee. He's a guy from New York City. Yes.

In my experience, it's been. People from New Jersey are the most of the Yankees that I meet. But I, being from the South, I have this idea that Southern people are incredibly nice.

Very, very nice people. They are not at all kind.

They are not kind people at all, but they're very nice.

Whereas northern people, not very nice, not nice at all, but incredibly kind. Right. Like, you know, not going to give you any time of day, walking past you on the street, not going to say hi, not going to make small talk with you, because I don't care. But when it comes down to it, like, if you need something from me, I got your back. Right? We're in this thing together. Whereas in the south, it's the other way around. I will small talk with you all day long.

[00:21:55] Rev. Deberny: Yeah.

[00:21:56] Remy: But the exact moment you actually need something, I'm going to gossip about that instead of helping you. Right. Like, I don't know, does that make sense?

That's the way it is.

[00:22:06] Rev. Deberny: I think you're dead on. I think most people on the inside aren't kind because we're all sinners. Right. I think some people are less honest about it than others. You know, I, I, People gossip wherever I know this hot. Again, as you're talking about the small talk, right. You know, hey, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna present a nice, nice front, front to you. That's, that's the word. Thank you. New Yorkers don't do that. They're just honest with you. I don't care about you, and then I won't talk to you. Right. But. But again, as Christians, right, When we build that, the relationship, no matter where you are, they just. They just buy into you and love you. And. And then you really see that honesty shine with the New Yorkers, because I've. I. And this is so humbling my congregation. New people come to me and say, pastor, I will follow you wherever you go. Just tell me where we're going so I know where we're going, and I'll follow you. And I'll be like, we're supposed to be following Jesus, but I guess I'm following Jesus, so you're following me. I guess we're all following Jesus. That's good. I'm like, that is so honest that I didn't even know how to handle it. That's the kind of people the New Yorkers are. And it's awesome to serve there. And of course, there's many other different things about New York. I mean, the food is awesome. We're right by the beach. I mean, and it's pretty awesome. I will also say my brother goes to school down in North Carolina, and the only time I have unironically been called a Yankee is when I went to a Lutheran church in North Carolina, and they pointed me out during the sermon like, there's a Yankee here amongst us. I like.

[00:23:39] Remy: Yeah, I love it. I love it. That's so great.

Yeah, you're not. So where you're at, I mean, I know, like, New York's a big state, but you're a lot closer to home than you could have been, I guess.

[00:23:53] Rev. Deberny: Well, I am within the state. I'm about eight hours away from home, from Long Island. The big thing is you got to get through New York City. And New York City, unless you're driving through at like, three in the morning, it is basically a wall of, you know, car traffic death.

From where I am about 60 miles east, most people work in the city. A lot of people work in the city. So they'll commute maybe an hour and a half, two hours to get to the city. Either they'll take the train or they'll drive in. And it can be. It can be real rough. I am literally on an island sometimes, and it feels like I'm trapped. But, you know, again, it's. It's that very Italian family atmosphere of, if you're one of us, you're in again. Once again, the food is great. And it's because it's Italians. They give you a lot of it. My congregation, they just throw food at me. And again, it's just been.

[00:24:46] Remy: That's so great.

[00:24:46] Rev. Deberny: Loving. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Every. Every church. Every church has got a nuanced culture to it. Every part of the country. And we can take pride in that. Right. It doesn't have to be. It doesn't have to be like, oh, only the real Lutheran churches. Only the real Lutherans are in the Midwest or only the real churches are in Iowa. We can have real Lutherans on the coast, too. They just. Yeah, I'll talk more about that in a second. But you were saying something, Raymond. Sorry.

[00:25:12] Remy: I mean, but, like, you could have gotten a call, though. You could have gotten a call to, you know, know, New Mexico.

[00:25:17] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:25:18] Remy: You know, like, you're within the state.

[00:25:21] Rev. Deberny: That's right. And actually, one of the reasons for that is it used to be during.

[00:25:27] Remy: The call process, Yankees are so hard to deal with. They were like, we need to.

Our own.

[00:25:32] Rev. Deberny: Yeah, kick me out. It used to be in the call process at the seminary that you had no say at all where you're going to end up. There's 6,000 congregations in the LCMS, and you just pray. You get a call. Call when you. When you leave. Associate pastor, a soul pastor could be at home. Could it be far away from home? It could. Could be separated from family. Who knows? But nowadays, because, you know, we're having a little bit of a pastor shortage, we're needing more and more pastors. And that's one thing I pray for all the time, that we. That we have more pastors to the church. There's a little bit more. Say a little. I can say a little bit. When I. When I was in my fourth year, my last year of seminary, the cold director came to me and said, okay, what part of the country do you think you would like to go?

And I actually said east coast, partially because my family is there, but it's where I was getting to before. One of the reasons I really wanted to come back here is because I see the need, the need for pastors and the need for pastors here on the East Coast, a need for Lutheran pastors to bring the truth. I heard all the time through my time at seminary. You don't want to go to the coast. It's Nineveh over there. Right. You got all these pretend Lutherans. They don't want our doctrine. Just stay in the safe safety of the Midwest, which The irony is now it's not that so safe in the Midwest either because you know, the world comes for us all.

But I had a different philosophy. I said, so that just means these, the coasts need pastors and any good pastors who want to bring the truth and not compromise on Lutheran doctrine instead of, you know, recycling the same pastors and over, maybe I should be sent there. And so, so that's what I said to my call director. Send me to a place where I am needed, to a place they will hear the gospel. And I went to this church and I got so little resistance. They wanted to hear the truth. And now two and a half years later, we delight in a Lutheran doctrine. We delight in what we believe. You know, they need a little clarity as we all do. A new pastor, right? It was actually a four year vacancy before I got there. So it had been four years without a pastor.

Fortunately there was a fill in guy. But it's not quite the same as having a callback pastor.

[00:27:50] Remy: And sure.

[00:27:51] Rev. Deberny: And I, I went and preached and teach Lutheran doctrine, preached and teach the gospel and they were willing to learn and grow, learn and grow with me at the same time. And it's been a blessed couple years for sure.

[00:28:04] Remy: You wear your clerical out and about?

[00:28:06] Rev. Deberny: It depends. I will almost always wear it when I do church business, so obviously funerals, weddings, if I'm traveling for church business, sometimes I will wear it on visitation. I will always wear it on.

I, I like the shirt and tie when I do Bible studies because I, I would miss, I have all these ties, right. And I want to have a chance to wear them at some point because I'm not, I'm, when I'm a clerical guy, I'm also, I'm not really a colored clerical guy. Like the pink, the red, the green, I'm gonna wear a clerical, I'm more black and the white collar. So, you know, I miss the fashion sense. So I will, sometimes I'll wear like a suit to some, like some events, but most of the time on church business I'll wear the collar because it's a good identifier, you know that, Remy, Right? It's a good identifier who I am. I got to be careful where I wear it. You know, I wouldn't wear it at a kid's playground or I wouldn't wear it, you know, at the park because obviously there are some negative connotations with that and we can, you know all about that and I'm sure your listeners do too. So you have to be wisdom where you present yourself, but in everything you do, including what you wear, you should be pointing to Jesus. Jesus. That's another thing about pastors. I, I could rant about a billion different things and I probably. You probably think you want me to do that.

How you present yourself, it's my job.

[00:29:28] Remy: Easy.

[00:29:28] Rev. Deberny: That's right. How you present yourself is really, really important as a pastor.

If you have a ugly hairstyle or maybe, maybe a too attractive hairstyle when you're up there preaching, what are they going to be focusing on? Maybe not quite the words, but you know, what your hair looks like, or if they, if you don't take care of your hygiene or, you know, if, you know, it's just you neglect your physical health. People notice that and it distracts from the message you're supposed to give. I don't want people to see me when I'm up there. One of my best professors at college once told me, peter, when I preach a sermon, I want to be invisible.

That's pretty cool. I don't want people to see me. I want people to see Jesus. So. And what I wear and how I conduct myself and how I talk, you know, do I have a, A rude mouth? That distracts. I want to point to Jesus in everything I do, for sure.

[00:30:24] Remy: Wow.

Yeah, that's.

Yeah, that makes me feel ashamed.

I'm so bad at that.

I'm so bad at that. I pointed Jesus in like 30% of the things.

[00:30:43] Rev. Deberny: And thanks be to God, God by his mercy, he can use us through that 30% that we don't need to be picture perfect pictures of health. And even through our mistakes, even when sometimes we can distract from the gospel, I don't say everything perfectly sometimes. I really, really. I was, I was born with a sarcastic tendency and I, sometimes I like to do like the whole roll my eyes kind of like, oh, look at all these other Christians, blah, blah, blah. I get sarcastic and, and, and that's not Christlike. And sometimes people hear it and it distracts and I have to pray for forgiveness. I'm a sinner too, just like you, Remy. And even in my imperfections, God can use me. Here's the cool thing, Remy.

God doesn't use perfect people to do his work.

How humbling it is that God uses imperfect sinners to do his work. And that's where the power of the Holy Spirit comes from. It's not us. Cause if it was us, we could see how, how much of a failure we would be. It's all God.

[00:31:45] Remy: I, I like to often think about Paul.

And how Paul says he's the chief of sinners. Okay. So Paul says, I'm. I'm the worst one. I. I'm the. I'm the worst sinner. And God still loves me, still saved me, can still use me, and I'm the worst, worst. And I like to remind myself that that's in the Bible, which means it's true. Which means that Paul's the worst, which means I'm not. Right? So, like, if God can use Paul, God can use me.

[00:32:21] Rev. Deberny: Yes, I would. I would throw something out there. Now, this might be my take on that verse.

[00:32:25] Remy: Don't destroy my hopes that I. I.

[00:32:28] Rev. Deberny: Would say that is it possible that he's the worst sinner, sinner, and I'm also equally the worst sinner? That we are all the worst sinners.

[00:32:38] Remy: We are all the worst.

[00:32:39] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:32:39] Remy: Yeah.

[00:32:40] Rev. Deberny: And that, you know, there is no hierarchy amongst sinners. I appreciate a sermon on this recently. I use the illustration, right, okay. You have a pencil thief, and you have a person who takes a gun to a store and robs it. Who's the worst sinner?

Who. Who had the greater sin? And the answer is they are both equally sinful because they both have equally failed to keep God's. And so there is no hierarchy amongst sinners, which should make us very humble, but should also once again, point us to Jesus and our need for him. No one should say, well, at least I'm not like that person.

Because we are.

[00:33:21] Remy: Yeah, we are. Yeah, it's.

And it's. It's frightening, I think how easy it is to be like, oh, man, thank God I'm not that guy. But, like, you're right. Like, we. We're all that guy, you know, whether you want to be or not. I. I remember one time, Joe, my pastor, had me preach, and the lectionary text was the. The parable of the sewer. And, And I said, you know, which. Which seed do you think you are? You know, that Jesus sowed here? Which one do you think you are?

Are you the one that grew up on, you know, on with the. With the tears and got choked out? You probably are. Are you the one that grew up on the rocky ground and has no root and will wither? You probably are. Are you the seed that was thrown on the. On the path and the birds came and got it before it could even take root? Like, probably. That's like, that's the thing, man. It's. It's only by the grace of Jesus that you're the good seed sown in the Good soil, you know, know, it's. Don't. Don't think like, oh, man, I'm that good seed. You know, like, no, brother, you're the seed on the path. You know, I'm the seed on the path. I need Jesus to put me in the good soil.

[00:34:38] Rev. Deberny: And that's one of the cool things about our Lutheran theology. It's all a gift every day of our lives. I like to teach in new member classes because it's sometimes hard for us to understand the whole beauty of the gospel. And there are a lot of Christians who struggle with this. You know, we can talk about the sacraments being gifts, but we can go into that if you want. But let me stay on topic. Everything is a gift, including every time we say, I believe in Jesus.

Because Paul says, you cannot even confess that Jesus is Lord without the Holy Spirit. Right? It. It all. It's all a gift. And this where our Baptist brothers kind of get a little confused. They like to go to Romans and say, confess with your heart that Jesus is Lord and you'll be saved. See, you have to make a confession. It's you. But then I'll point right to First Corinthians and says, hey, you can't even make that confession unless you have the Holy Spirit in you. So that confession of faith only comes from God, only comes from the Holy Spirit. Every good work you do is a gift of the Holy Spirit. As we hear that they are prepared for us in heaven, the Bible says before we even do them, we can't stroke our own egos. And by the way, that kind of pulls me even more towards the Christian faith over others, because other religions out there, they really try to stroke your own ego, make you. You feel important, make you feel like you can do something, contribute something, that you are a meaningful part of the universe. What does the Christian. Christian faith do? You're dead in your trespasses. Beg for forgiveness.

Yeah. And the beauty of the Gospel is we know that Jesus gives us that forgiveness even though we don't deserve it.

[00:36:17] Remy: Yeah.

Do you. Being in New York, I feel like your probability is higher. Do you ever get mistaken as a Roman Catholic?

[00:36:26] Rev. Deberny: All the time. And it's hilarious because you. I don't know if this is just gonna be radio, if no one's gonna see my face, but I look pretty young. I grew out the mustache and the longer hair. I look a little older, but a couple years ago, I looked probably like I was 17 years old doing hospital visits, wearing the collar. And so even though I looked so young, I would still have people go, hello, Father. How are you doing? And I would.

Instead of correcting them, you know what I do? I just lean in and say, I'm doing well, my child. How are you?

I always.

[00:37:00] Remy: So this is my own little sarcastic streak, you know, like, you know when people are like, hey, Mr. Daburna. And you're like, Please, Mr. Du. Bernie is my father. I'm Peter, or whatever. You know what? I like that whole trope when someone says. When someone's like, hello, Father, just be like, please, call me dad.

[00:37:14] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

Yeah, it's funny to talk about that. Both my parents are Doctors, so it's Dr. DeBurney and Dr. DeBurney. My brother is in med school, so he will be Dr. DeBurney. My sister's a nurse, and I'm working on applying for my doctorate of ministry. So I won't. You gotta get it, you know, so I don't have to be the one not Dr. De Bernie in my family.

[00:37:40] Remy: That's right. Could you imagine. Could you imagine letting all of the other Dr. De Bernie's down?

[00:37:45] Rev. Deberny: That's right. That's right. Even my. Even my signature. If I sign contracts or something, it looks like a doctor's signature because I just copied my. My dad's style, which is like the half squiggle or something, because you don't put enough effort in it. But no, it's good. I had a. I had a very faithful family. I'm. I'm a success story of what it looks like to raise someone in the faith. You know, again, they. My parents were. Well, actually, my mom was LCMS growing up. My dad was like, assembly of God. He was Pentecostal.

[00:38:14] Remy: Oh, wow.

[00:38:14] Rev. Deberny: And so he married into the Lutherans, and he did the old Lutheran married and conversion switch in and. But one thing my dad got really right is he insisted our family goes to church every Sunday. We are going to church, and we're going to raise our children in the church. And you are what you eat. I was exposed to church, and I was exposed to the fact that church is more important than sports, more important than theater. It is the most important thing. And I grew up with that foundation, and so here I am. And I would encourage any parents listening to this, right? You what you show your kids. That means something if you prioritize soccer over church. I can't. I can't force parents to come to church. I can't. But if you really think that you want, no matter what, for them to believe, then we should take the steps to produce that fruit. Of course we can't. We cannot control how our kids end up in the end. Right. But I think there is wisdom in how we raise our kids. Instead of just saying, hey, church is a once a month, a Christmas, Easter kind of thing. We. We prioritize it. Not again. I'm a success story of that, becoming a pastor. And you know, my. Both my siblings are Christian and I rejoice in that, you know. So again. But again, I give all the credit to the Holy Spirit. It's been God working through me. And I.

Here's another topic I talk about real quick.

It makes me humble.

It also fills me with a sense of duty because I know many people that weren't blessed like I was growing up. Again, I had two doctors as parents, so I was well taken care of. I had faithful parents. I had both parents. I know many of my congregation that don't have both parents. And I wouldn't say I feel guilty about it, but I feel a sense of, okay, God has given me so much. It's time to work for him.

I always quote the parable of the talents. You know this parable, right. Where the Master gives one person five or two, another one. And the focus of the parable is the. The one slothful servant who buries it in the ground. But you have to remember that the two that were given five and two, they made five and two more. To whom much is given, much is desired. And so I see of all the blessings I've been given, this is what motivates me each and every day, even through the hard times of being a pastor.

God has blessed you so much. Let me bless others with what God has given me and show that faith. And this is why I try to be patient with others, you know, patient with those that may not have had a chance to grow up in the faith like I did, patient with other who may not have had two parents or may have had not as bountiful, may have had struggle to put food on the table. I care for all these kinds of people. I want to be patient and loving to them and a reflection of Jesus, us. So that's my.

You want to act me out in a play. That's my motivation.

[00:41:19] Remy: So what.

What are some things I want to kind of circle back to your experience as a circuit visitor.

[00:41:28] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:41:29] Remy: And the time you've been doing that, just sort of being a sole caregiver for soul caregivers. Right. And what are some things that congregants that. That the, that the laity that the parishioners can do to support their pastors? What do you like? What are. What are needs pastors have that the congregation can provide but often don't think about?

[00:41:52] Rev. Deberny: Yeah, these are good questions. The first thing I would recommend is treat pastors like real people.

You know, be willing to let them go home and rest on a Sunday. If you can't, if it's emergency, it's emergency. Right. But, you know, sometimes remember that, hey, pastor, you want to. Right after the service is done, you want to come and hang out with us for four more hours? You know, sometimes a pastor might feel pressured into that. Not to say you can't offer them once in a while, but remember that we work sometimes six, seven days a week, and we need rest, too. Another thing I would say that I've learned as a circuit visitor is we also need to care for the pastor's wives.

A pastor is not a pastor without his wife. And the two are one flesh, the Bible says. And so if the pastor's wife is having a hard time, the pastor is probably having even a hard time, too. I like to say a lot of time, the hardest profession in the church is the pastor's wife. Because at least the pastor gets all, like, the accolades. Oh, pastor, good sermon. Oh, pastor, thank you.

[00:43:03] Remy: It's. It's important, I think, especially for parishioners to realize too, that. And so I'm going through seminary now, and this is a conversation. I actually had this conversation literally earlier today with my own wife that there, there are people.

People go to her and like. So in my congregation, where I'm at now, I'm a. I'm just a guy, but I'm on the church council and, you know, I'm in seminary and they support me through that and all.

And a lot of times when they want to talk to me about something, when people in the church want to talk to me about something related to the business of the church, church, they talk to my wife.

And we were talking about this today. It's because I feel like, I think that they don't think they're going to be able to really, like, talk to me about it, but they can definitely talk to her, and then she can talk to me about it. And we were talking about this exact thing that, like, when you get called as a pastor, when your pastor accepted the call to your church, his wife did not accept a call to your church.

[00:44:21] Rev. Deberny: Absolutely.

[00:44:21] Remy: His wife is not your pastor. Pastor. And if you have something that you need to talk to your pastor about, do not talk to your pastor's. Wife, you know what I mean?

[00:44:32] Rev. Deberny: Like yeah, the word we use for that is triangulation. You are making a triangle. And, and absolutely your wife didn't ask for that. And it's, it's, it's a burden pastors bear on their shoulders. I mean the business of the church. But, but problems or drama, like a lot of time I don't want to hear it, but it's my job and so I will gladly receive it. But as you said, your wife didn't ask for this kind of thing. So what I would tell a congregation is realize that you know, even though it may feel like oh, the pastor's too busy or maybe it might be something confrontational, I don't want to talk to him about it.

The pastor's wife is not a person to go to. In fact, I recommend to some pastors, hey, I love when pastors wives are active in the church. That's awesome. Part of the, you know, they lead the Bible, the, you know, the youth Bible study or they help with the music ministry or something. But don't be ashamed for any, any wife to say, you know what, I'm gonna take a step back, I'll come to church, I'll bring the kids and then we're gonna go have them go home and have lunch. Right? We're just gonna have a health, healthy boundary there. And that's one thing I would, I would recommend to congregations realize that there, there should be healthy boundaries because the idea that we are here to care for you, but it's not quite the same thing as true friendship. Right. I wish it was not the case but that the relationship is a one way street. I just want to give to you. And you know, and again it varies by pastor for pastor. I know there's some pastors out there would say, oh, that's ridiculous. Pastor Deburning, my wife can, wants to be involved in everything and that's awesome. But I know probably far more pastors wives who are burdened and exhausted, exhausted by the, the ministry because even though they didn't sign up for it. And so I think it's helpful to just keep that in mind when we want to care for pastors and their wives and you know, give them a meal once in a while and not, not like a meal like hey, let's go out to eat pastor, drop off a dinner at their house, right? Let them, you know, drop off a pizza and just say enjoy this pastor and whoever, whatever his wife's name is. I don't want to pressure you, but Just, Just relax with each other. Be a human being just for a little bit. It's not often we get.

But that's what I would recommend. I think it's important for us all to remember for sure.

[00:46:58] Remy: What, what it advice would you have for people for young men who are thinking about going. You mentioned this. You know, the LCMS needs pastors. You have young men out there maybe listening to this and thinking, maybe I could do that. That. What. What would you tell them?

[00:47:19] Rev. Deberny: Oh, man. You know, you're gonna let me go on this. I'm so excited.

[00:47:23] Remy: Yeah, go ahead.

[00:47:25] Rev. Deberny: There is no greater vocation on this, on this planet. This is the office of the holy ministry.

I love when I go to hospitals and there's a person there I'm visiting who has no family left.

And I come and I'm a reflection of Jesus, Jesus to this person. I've had people in hospitals weep in front of me because there is someone who has remembered them, who cares about them. And I'm not just some social worker. I bring Jesus body and blood to them.

I bring Jesus to them. I bring true hope.

Will you have someone like that when you're on your deathbed? Will you be all alone? I ask that myself all the time. And I don't want that for myself, so I don't want that for others either. And the. The church needs pastors that are capable. You know, I was a software developer before I became a pastor, right. I was good with computers and tech and all kind of stuff. And certainly I could be making more money working in California.

Yeah, but the church has need.

[00:48:36] Remy: That's right.

[00:48:37] Rev. Deberny: I have found men really want to be need needed.

That's why I think it's so. It was for me. It was. Why do I want to become a pastor? Because I see a need for other pastors. I see a need for dynamic preachers. For preachers of the truth, by the way, not just dynamic preachers, because Joel seems a dynamic preacher. Preachers of the truth.

And so I felt that need when it comes to the divine call.

I mentioned when I was seven years old, I felt the pull to become a pastor. Not everyone has that experience. But if you find yourself over and over thinking about this, you know, the church needs pastors. What about me? Ah, maybe not. Okay. And then. And then a week goes by and. And you see, oh, there's no one to fill the vacancy of my church. The church needs pastors. And you think about that again like, ah, nah, probably not me. And then it happens over and over and over. Maybe this is the divine call. I like to think about the story of Samuel and Eli. Do you remember this? When Samuel was a wee little kid living with Eli. And then God calls Samuel and Samuel wakes up and says, oh, Eli called me. So he runs to see Eli and he was like, that didn't call you go back to sleep. And again it happens. God calls Samuel and he goes, Eli. And over and over and over until Eli realizes it's God calling him. Say to God, speak for your servant hears. And again God called and Samuel said, speak for your servant hears. The divine call for pastors, I find is just like, like that. It's not just a one off thought, but it comes over and over and over again. And I would, and I would tell young people, considering maybe this is, maybe this is one call right now you're hearing, listening to this interview, God's calling you right here, that there is no greater vocation on the planet to deliver God's grace, God's love to people, people that so desperately need to hear it. I don't think I can remember. My life's not that long, but I don't think I can remember a time where God's gospel has been more near needed than now. You look at our schools, public schools, completely stripped of religion, right? Religion's. Religion's gone. Which, you know, ironic. It says, you can do whatever religion you want, but we're not going to teach anything in school. And what, Guess what happened?

Suicide rates in our kids skyrocketed. Anxiety, depression, skyrocketed. Our kids, our young adults are begging for hope, begging for truth. I have people come, strangers, you know, maybe a relative related to one of the members. They're looking for a baptism and they come into my office and they don't even know why they're Christian.

The simple answer, like, you know, the resurrection.

They tell me being a Christian is about being a good person. It's, it's about, you know, being a righteous person and being a decent, decent, decent folk. No, being a Christian is about, hey, when I die, I'm going to get my body back one day and there's nothing more important than that.

[00:51:35] Remy: That's right.

[00:51:36] Rev. Deberny: The need for this teaching is, it's just present everywhere because no longer can we just assume that, you know, school's gonna teach about Jesus. People are just, you can't just assume people know about Jesus anymore. It's fascinating. This idea that religion is commonplace in our world is gone. And so the need is great. And so we need pastors willing to meet that need. And I tell you, there's nothing more important.

Now, that's like the big overview.

I also want to tell you, like, more logistic kind of things, if you're interested. You know what it means to be a pastor. At least let me talk from an LCMS point of view. First of all, as of now, there's probably not a better time to be a pastor because the demand for you is so high you're not going to have a hard time finding a church. And I know from experience when I was at seminary, they made sure that the church I was sent to could pay me. Right? You know about churches that just can't pay pastors. And so I know a lot of people who are scared of the ministry because they're afraid that I'm not going to be able to support my family. So the LCMS does a really good job of finding congregations that will be able to support new pastors. And for the churches that can't, that's where people like circuit visitors come in and vacancy pastors come in and retired pastors come in. So I, as a pastor have never felt like I was being ripped off, off or that I, I couldn't care for myself or I was being taken advantage of. And, and this is what the district presidents are there for, to make sure pastors are cared for. It is a lot of work. It's a lot of time, a lot of energy to come. Pastor Remy, you said you were, you were. I don't know. If you're in seminary, you're going to seminary, to education, you're in seminary. It's a lot of work. I don't know if the aalc, they do Greek and Hebrew there, but learning Greek and Hebrew can, can be challenging. But, you know, I'm not the smartest person in the world and I was able to do it right. You know, it just, it's just, it's just effort. It's just time. And if you believe this, if you believe it's worth it to be a pastor, if you believe the need, you'll do whatever it takes. And I found that during four years of education, it was a lot of hurdles, but I came out feeling prepared. I didn't feel like it was going to be overwhelming for me. And I know I've got people in my, in my court, on my team. This goes back to the beginning of our conversation, right, that you don't want pastors to be alone. How about new pastors being alone? Absolutely not. New called pastors there to be supported. It's why our circuits are so important. I mean, I remember my circuit visitor called me up, like, week one of my call. How you doing? Need help with anything? Where can I help? We're meeting this time. We want to get to know you. I was swallowed up immediately. And so, you know, as challenges come, as a pastor, I didn't feel alone, though.

[00:54:25] Remy: The.

[00:54:25] Rev. Deberny: The. Yeah, the difficulty is when pastors purposely take themselves away from others. But absolutely, I felt people welcoming in when I first became a pastor. Sorry, that was a long rant, but that's. That's my perspective. Oh, thank you. I appreciate that.

[00:54:45] Remy: Give me just a second.

[00:54:46] Rev. Deberny: No, Remy might cut this out, but little dead air, little family interruption, which is good, actually, by the way. I don't know if we'll cut this out, but I love family interruptions in church, in the service.

I love little kids running around during the service. And I know some people, they're like, oh, they should be behaved. They should sit in their seats. And little kids in the church means that the church has a few future. And Jesus said, let the little children come to me. And so sometimes I have kids belting out screaming during the sermon. Oh, I couldn't hear you, Pastor. Don't worry. I record the sermon, and the microphone is right by my mouth. So if you couldn't hear something, you listen it to it again, and you'll get it there. And, you know, we get. We get children's messages with, like, 20 kids coming up, and. And people feel encouraged. They say, wow, this is. We. We want to be the church for families. Families. If we refuse to be, then our church will die out. And. And so again, I. I never embarrass parents who have kids that cry out or.

Because it's very embarrassing for parents sometimes with kids that when their kids start acting up, oh, I'm not. I'm not welcome here. I don't belong. It's the last thing I want for parents to think for sure.

[00:56:08] Remy: It's. It's so wonderful. Our little church in North Carolina here, where I'm at, we.

We get a lot of kids. Yes, a lot of kids. And it's so great how, like, there will be a young kid, like a toddler, who will drop a toy or something, a crayon or whatever, and it'll roll, like, down the middle aisle and, like, onto the other side. So it's like three pews down and on the other side of the. The aisle, and this little toddler will get up and just run down, and there is an adult there with, like, a Fresh coloring sheet and more crayons just ready to, you can sit with me for a little while. And it's so, it's so beautiful to watch, man. There, there are kids in our church that will sit with anyone, like anyone on a Sunday.

And no one minds, no one minds that there's that, that, that, you know, David is going to sit with us today, you know, and we, you know, even my wife and I will have, you know, they'll just be random, random kids that aren't our kids that are just like, hey, you know, Ms. Samantha, can I sit with you and Remy today? And it's like, sure, yeah, whatever. And it's so sweet to watch how like the whole church, like is a family, works together. Yeah, yeah.

[00:57:35] Rev. Deberny: This is what people want out of church. Now, of course, the truth, the gospel is the most important thing. But you are a stranger coming into a church for the first time and you see a family.

[00:57:48] Remy: Yeah.

[00:57:49] Rev. Deberny: This is what the stereotype is about the church. If you're an atheist, you're outside the church. So the church is a divided bunch of people, a bunch of hypocrites that don't care about me, that don't love me. But what you just described, Remy, which is a beautiful picture, almost made me start tearing up a little bit, right, that, wow, this is a place I could bring my kids that would love on us, care for us. A home away from home is what the church should be. And that's how churches explode. Now.

Numbers aren't that important. I know some people get really obsessed about the numbers of the church, growing the church, church growth movement. I think the quality of love in the church is more important than the number for sure.

[00:58:25] Remy: Absolutely.

[00:58:26] Rev. Deberny: And, and, but there it is, right, that, that your church feels like a family. And that's what the early church was like. Remember the early church, it was a bunch of people in a. Someone rich person's house, maybe 10 people. And they had a copy of Paul's letter that was just newly copied for them and they read it out loud and then they had the Lord's supper and then maybe the overseer or whatever they want to call it, the bishop came and said, hey, who, whose kids we need to baptize this week? Right. And he would make rounds from church to church to church. Church and the church was a family together, sticking together. Literally in the midd midst of persecution, literally in the midst of complete denial. Our world is getting close to that, by the way, where people do not put Christians on a pedestal anymore. Religion is not important. And so we need to stick together more than any other time. And if you want new people coming into the church, they need to see that this is a place where there's love, there's family, and there's hope. So I love to hear that, Remy. That was a great thing.

[00:59:28] Remy: It's also why it's so important for parishioners, like when.

When new people show up. Go. Go out of your way.

[00:59:38] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:59:39] Remy: Go out of your way.

[00:59:40] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[00:59:40] Remy: You know, I. I want. I want. And I keep trying to. I can't get the council to go for it, but I want to do host families. Okay. Because especially. And you'll maybe. Well, maybe not in New York. York, but where I'm at in the south, it's big box Baptist churches everywhere.

[00:59:58] Rev. Deberny: Oh, yes.

[00:59:59] Remy: And Lutheran worship is not.

[01:00:02] Rev. Deberny: Yes.

[01:00:02] Remy: It's not a thing. And so what I want are, like, different families to sign up to be host families. And when a visitor comes in, an usher will greet the visitor. Hey, how you doing? Have you ever been to a Lutheran church before? A lot of people have. When they show up to us because they're military and they're coming, they're looking for something from back. Back home. Right. But a lot of people haven't, they just walk in off the street. No, I'm looking for a new church. I saw this one. I figured I'd try it. And when you run across someone that's never been to a Lutheran church before, and they're from the south and they're used to a Baptist church to say, well, great, come with me. This is the Jones family. Please sit with them. And they'll guide you through the liturgy. They'll help you with it. You know, if you have any questions at any point in time during the service, you can ask, and they're here to answer. And like, I, you know, I. I think it's a good idea.

And it, you know, it takes the.

The pressure off, you know, I. So I'm a Lutheran. I'm halfway through seminary.

I've been a Lutheran for six or seven years now, and I still get confused when I leave my little AALC church and go to an LCMS church and they're using a different worship setting than the one I'm used to.

[01:01:25] Rev. Deberny: Yes. You know what I mean?

[01:01:26] Remy: And I know what I'm doing.

[01:01:28] Rev. Deberny: Yes, that's right. That's right. So imagine if you're not not just brand new to Lutheranism, but brand new to the church. And one thing I. One thing I think we take for granted all the time. Is, you know, we can sing heaven hymns. A lot of people, hymns are like what I. I've never heard of liturgical settings for music. I. I don't know how to read this. In fact, I sometimes say for granted, some people don't even know how to read sheet music. I learned. I had a. I had a music class when I was six years old. I learned the piano again. It's one of the one I go back to. I've been blessed so much, and sometimes I take for that for granted that other people have not that had that advantage. And you'll see a lot of people, people don't open their mouth when music comes. They don't sing because they. They don't know how. And so being around other people who are singing, maybe they might open their mouths just a little bit and follow along. In fact, this is kind of a cool thing.

One thing I learned the seminary, and I'll share with you a lot of the time, the way Christians learn, Lutherans learn things like the liturgy, things like what we believe. It's actually not really through a new member class, which is important. We should have those. We should have specific teaching. I just had a new member class yesterday. A lot of the time it's just by being in worship. I had someone come in about a year and a half ago. You know, he was having a tough time, and he came for counseling, and, you know, slowly but surely he warmed up to me. And then he started coming to worship. And I could tell, you know, he didn't really have much of a church background. And so, you know, we would do things like the Nicene Creed, and he would just kind of stand there and be like, I don't know what going on. Then he would come for a few months, month after month. And then all of a sudden I noticed he was saying the Nicene Creed with us. And now it's been a year and a half, and he's boldly saying the Nicene Creed with us. Right? And he may not have had that whole new member class to walk through every single article of the Creed, and yet he is boldly confessing the faith of our church. That's how many people learn. And as you were saying, Remy, maybe we should have. Have people next to you in the pew to walk you through it and even just to do it with you. Our worship is done more often than it's taught. And I. I think this is how a lot of the time the early church got started. You know, we. Again, there's a house church, and someone walks in doesn't know what's going on, and. But I'm friends with this one guy, and so I'll be a part of this. And I see all this. This, the Holy Spirit working, and I slowly am learning just by seeing the worship happen. And then I become part of. Part of the church. So, Remy, I think it's a great idea having a. Even a committee of, hey, make sure no one sits alone. And sometimes as a pastor, I have a little bit, you know, I sometimes flex my authority a little bit, and I'll say to a family, hey, that one woman sits by herself, could you sit by them next week?

I point out someone, and they delight in doing that. Sometimes people just need to be. If you don't ask, sometimes it doesn't happen. So sometimes just asking is a very powerful tool, too. But. Yeah, absolutely right. Me, I'm all on board with what you're saying.

[01:04:37] Remy: Pastor. I know we're getting close to your. Your cutoff time. I know you have an obligation. So I just want to thank you for taking the time to sit with me today. This was such a joy.

It was so great having you here. Any. Any parting thoughts? Anything you would like to leave us with?

[01:04:56] Rev. Deberny: I always delight in talking to other Lutherans, meeting other Lutherans. I was just at the seminary yesterday or two days ago for a symposium, theological symposium. So a lot of pastors gathering together from all over the country. I love to see, you know, the fact that not only are we united in the way we do worship, but more importantly, the way what we believe. But I love to see, also see little quirks of different congregations. The fact that I was called a Yankee in North Carolina, I love that. I think that's awesome because I see the. The personality and I see the. The joy of different congregations. And it's so inspiring that we really are confessional together. We are together. You know, I come from New York and, you know, I've got people in my congregation. I got Pakistani families, I got African American families coming to worship with us together.

It's just awesome to see all the different cultures come together, united in Christ. And it's a pleasure, Remy, to talk to people like you that are also so bold and in your faith. And I hope this inspired someone who was listening. And again, anytime you want to have me again, I'd love to talk, love to share any of my.

My young insights. Again, only 27, but by. By the Holy Spirit, I'm speaking to you right now, but it was my pleasure. Thank you, Remy.

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[00:00:03] Remy: I would love to just keep geeking out with you all night.

[00:00:08] Chris: Anytime.

[00:00:09] Remy: Chris, welcome to the show, man. Thank you for being here.

[00:00:12] Chris: Thank you.

Glad to be here.

[00:00:16] Remy: So I think we have a pretty comprehensive talk tonight. I've got my show notes up here in front of me. We have a pretty comprehensive talk tonight about all sorts of things, I guess just your own sort of journey to Lutheranism and then to, you know, leading your family and. And, you know, father led faith formation, things like this, which is wonderful and something I really want to discuss. Overall.

[00:00:47] Chris: I. I actually grew up in the ELCA Lutheran Church.

[00:00:52] Remy: Okay.

[00:00:53] Chris: Which wasn't the nightmare that it is now, but it was still. I mean, you know, we had some female pastors, like, associates growing up. Right. And I remember even back in Sunday school, you know, my, My teacher would take biblical stories and try to give scientific explanations for things. And so, you know, I. I remember one time she had this story how, you know, Moses led the Israelites across to the Sea of Reeds rather than the Red Sea, and that it was much easier to cross.

And so, you know, my teenage mind, I was like, well, you know, that doesn't really solve your problem because then you have Pharaoh and his armies drowning in a shallow sea of reeds.

[00:01:45] Remy: Yeah.

[00:01:45] Chris: So one way or the other, you know, something miraculous had to happen.

And it. It was definitely miraculous that I kept my faith during that time because, you know, it just. It seems like everything was going against it. But as. As I grew up, I. I started to question infant baptism. That was probably the. The biggest struggle I had.

And I decided I wanted to go look for a different church because I just didn't like the direction the ELCA was going. Sure. So I ended up at a Mennonite Brethren Church, Anabaptist.

And there, I mean, they welcomed me in.

And it. It's still a church that I love the people there. And, you know, there's a few guys that I'll meet with every week for Bible study. So, you know, I keep in good contact with them. I. I actually just saw the pastor that church about a week ago.

But over the course of, like, the last or the. The. I was there about 17, 18 years, and I just struggled with this idea of someone being baptized and saved as an infant. And it. It got to the point where my main struggle was, you know, when do we enter into this covenant? You know, do you enter into the covenant upon baptism as a baby or upon profession of belief? You know, because Jesus had talked about being born again. So I was like, well, you Know, if you're born again, that means that at some point you make a decision for Jesus. And is that the point that you enter into the covenant?

And that's.

[00:03:43] Remy: That's fascinating. If. I'm sorry to interrupt, but if I could. Why.

I mean, why is that the conclusion, you know, that if you're born again, it means you must make a decision. And I don't know, maybe it's just my own post Lutheran mind, like, now that I'm like a Lutheran, I can't wrap my mind around that thinking. But, like, you didn't make a decision to be born, why would you make a decision to be born again?

You know, it's weird that at the.

[00:04:17] Chris: Time, I mean, you're.

Well, you're led through this idea that baptism is your public profession of faith. It's your first act of obedience. So it's. You look at it entirely from the perspective of this is something I'm doing for God instead of something God is doing for me. And I think that was sort of the key thing that had to open up in my mind was realizing that, hey, baptism is not my work. It's the work of the Holy Spirit. And then, you know, the thought of what a beautiful picture it is that an infant can be brought into the kingdom having done no works on their own. Yeah. So they. They truly can't boast, you know, because their. Their salvation was entirely a gift of God. And I. I guess once I started seeing it from that perspective, you know, the.

It. It started getting a lot. A lot easier. I started seeing baptism, you know, pretty much everywhere in scripture. And yeah, you know, Chris. Chris Roseborough was probably one of the keys to that because, I mean, it's kind of a long story. But, you know, one of my business partners that I went into business with was an atheist.

And it's funny, the other business partner was Jewish. So it kind of sounds like the beginning of the joke when you have a. A Christian, an atheist and a Jew going into business together.

But he and I, the atheist, we'd get together and play chess every. Every week or a couple times a week, especially, you know, once, you know, once we went into business for ourselves, you know, he could find excuses to take breaks pretty easily. So every time we got together, we'd get into discussions. And I mean, he's super intelligent guy and he's an honest guy. So when we'd have discussions, he'd actually think about stuff.

[00:06:30] Remy: Right.

[00:06:31] Chris: And so over the course of time, you know, he eventually came to faith, and he ended up joining a Lutheran church.

And so he was the one that introduced me to Chris Roseborough.

And at the same time, well, I listening to Chris and I got to tell him this at the issues etc. Conference. I was, you know, it's is. It's not often that you get to, you know, go up to someone who's had such a. An influence on you and actually let them know, hey, you've had this influence on me, especially without sounding really corny.

But the thing that he really helped me with was the idea that God had means of grace that he used even in the Old Testament.

[00:07:27] Remy: Yeah.

[00:07:27] Chris: And so, you know, he talked about, you know, Naaman being baptized, and so I had to really go back and study that. That passage.

[00:07:36] Remy: Yeah. And you know what?

[00:07:37] Chris: You know, you come to realize Naaman not only got healed from his leprosy, but he came to faith. And what an amazing, you know, thing that was. And of course.

[00:07:49] Remy: What'S amazing about Naaman, I'm sorry, in that story in particular, is that the healing for him is an afterthought. Right. It's not even the primary thing.

[00:08:01] Chris: Right.

[00:08:02] Remy: He comes up out of the water and the first thing he says is, surely your God is God. You know, like, amen.

So sorry.

[00:08:12] Chris: Anyway, well, and then.

No, well, I mean, the. The thing is, is the fact that the Lord, you know, made him use the Jordan river instead of the rivers in Damascus. You know, there was nothing magical about the Jordan river itself. So it's obviously the Lord's, you know, word upon the water.

And.

And then, of course, you know, Moses lifting up the bronze serpent.

[00:08:38] Remy: And you said, there's nothing magical about the drilling river. You said, there's nothing magical about the Jordan river in and of itself. There's dispensationalists everywhere right now losing their mind.

Like, all the people at the church I grew up in are like, wait, there's a disturbance.

[00:08:57] Chris: Yeah, I know. I have friends that take great pride in the fact that they've been baptized in the Jordan River. And I mean, nostalgic wise, I.

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't call it a baptism. I'd be like, okay, I went swimming in the same place that Jesus got donked.

[00:09:17] Remy: I wouldn't mind waiting in it, you know?

[00:09:19] Chris: You know.

Yeah, I figured I already got re baptized once. I don't want to do that again. I kind of feel. I kind of feel like Timothy, you know, getting circumcised and baptized. Well, I was baptized, you know, twice.

[00:09:35] Remy: The Mennonites re baptized you.

[00:09:37] Chris: So, yes. In order to join the church, you had to be re baptized.

I looked at it as a. Since it was a public profession of faith, that was an opportunity to invite my non Christian friends and relatives and we got to do it in a lake.

When I was getting baptized, there was a thunderstorm. So that was interesting.

[00:10:02] Remy: Wow.

[00:10:02] Chris: You know, I kept thinking the entire time I could be going home right now too, in the spiritual sense.

But yeah, being baptized in the lake is, it's kind of a cool experience. You know, nothing to take away from the baptismal font inside the, the nave of the church, but definitely the lake with everybody, you know, standing on the shore. You know, there's, there's a, a nostalgic experience to it. I think one of the, the issues though is then you can only get baptized when it's warm out. And you know, generally there's only a couple times, you know, a year that groups of people could be baptized. So it's like you're pushing it way off.

[00:10:51] Remy: Yeah.

[00:10:52] Chris: You know, where I, I think, you know, if someone's going to get baptized upon profession of faith, well, it should be, you know, soon after profession of faith.

I remember, I mean, that was one thing that.

Oh, go ahead.

[00:11:09] Remy: Sorry. That's all right. I remember one time, me and my buddy Quentin and his wife Megan and my wife, we were all at my house and we're going through the small catechism together because they had just gotten married and she was a Christian but wasn't quite sure or maybe she wasn't a Christian. He was kind of feeling it out and she, I guess, kind of wanted to be, but wasn't sure where she landed on everything.

Maybe nominal Christian sort of background. But they were over at our house and we were going through the small catechism together and we just like literally started at the beginning and just worked through the whole small catechism over dinner in a couple of hours and it was like 8:30 at night.

And she, we get to the end of it and she goes, this makes sense. This seems true to me. I've never been baptized. How can we do that? And so I called my pastor, Joe, and I said, hey Joe, my buddies are at my house right now and his wife wants to get baptized. How soon can we do that? And I'm asking Sundays out, like which Sunday in the future can we plan this for? How soon can we do it? Joe says, can you meet me at the church in 15 minutes?

And so that's what we did.

[00:12:29] Chris: That's amazing.

[00:12:30] Remy: We packed her up in the car, we drove over to the church. And it's like 8:30, 8, 45 on like a Tuesday night. Nobody else around, just me, my wife Quentin and Megan and Pastor Joe. And we baptized her right then and they're good to go.

[00:12:47] Chris: That's amazing. Yeah. See, and I remember as an elder in the MB church, getting into an argument with the other elders over baptism because, you know, first off, you know, my son, he professed faith at 7 and I really wanted to get him baptized. But in the MB church, they, they treat baptism as almost in the same way as the Lutheran Church treats confirmation, where you, you have to go through a baptism class, you have to fully understand what baptism means, you know, and if you don't understand the faith the way that they think you should understand the faith, or if you don't profess it right. Well, then they, the elders reserve the right to deny you baptism.

And, and I argued with them. I was just like, well, where is that in Scripture? Because I said, quite honestly, if Philip was sitting next to the Ethiopian, you know, and the Ethiopian points to the lake and says, you know, why should I get baptized? I was like, man, if Philip was midnight brethren, he'd be like, well, you know, first off, we have to gather the elders and they have to determine whether or not, you know, enough to get baptized. And we're looking probably next spring.

[00:14:12] Remy: Not to disparage because they're faithful men. They are faithful men and they are acting according to their conviction. But it's funny to me that like, I'm sure a large amount of this, we have to make sure you understand what baptism actually is and what it means before you get baptized. I'm sure a large amount of that curriculum is actually teaching people how to read away what the Bible says baptism actually is, you know.

[00:14:42] Chris: Well, and also just the ability for a seven year old to stand up in front of the congregation and give a testimony for why he, you know, believes what he believes is. I don't, I don't know too many seven year olds that can do that. Yeah, but I knew his, I knew his faith was sincere.

He got particularly convicted over James 2:10. You know, as far as if you have kept the entire law but sinned at just one point, you're guilty of breaking all of it. And so that was sort of the first time that he really, you know, realized that, hey, I, even though I, you know, haven't done tremendous sins in my life, I have still fallen short of the glory of God.

[00:15:31] Remy: Wow.

[00:15:32] Chris: And so his, the only thing that he could say is, I want to be baptized, because I want to be part of God's family.

And, you know, I, like I said I had to. I had to keep arguing in order to get him baptized. But I'm glad, you know, they finally relented because that would, you know, we probably would have left the church if.

[00:15:52] Remy: Yeah.

[00:15:53] Chris: If they hadn't.

[00:15:54] Remy: How old is he now?

[00:15:57] Chris: He's gonna be 18 next month.

[00:15:59] Remy: Amazing.

[00:16:00] Chris: So, yeah, he's. That. I don't know if you remember the. The picture of he and I with Chris Roseborough and.

[00:16:07] Remy: Yeah, I did see that.

[00:16:09] Chris: So he's the incredibly large young man that was sitting on or standing on the other side of Chris Roseboro. He's.

Yeah, he's about 6 to 250. He's gonna be.

[00:16:19] Remy: That's awesome.

[00:16:20] Chris: Left. Left guard this year for his high school football team.

[00:16:25] Remy: Amazing. So, yeah, I was in band.

[00:16:30] Chris: Yeah, I was. I was a journalist major, so I, you know, I was on school newspaper. And that was. That was how I got dates, you know, because I. I used to write puff romantic pieces for the school newspaper.

[00:16:51] Remy: My biggest fear is that I'm going to get a call to a congregation one day where the main, like, cultural cohesion of everybody in the congregation is like the local sports team or like sports ball, and I don't know anything about sports, and I'm going to be like, oh, my gosh, I have to learn football right now.

[00:17:12] Chris: Well, he's. He's thinking about going to either Concordia Chicago or Concordia Seward, and he'd really like to play football.

[00:17:23] Remy: Yeah.

[00:17:23] Chris: So, you know, I guess wherever he can have the opportunity to play football. I like the idea of Seward because, like, everybody in Seward seems to be a big fan of the football team, but he wants to be a pastor, so.

[00:17:38] Remy: Oh, that's great.

[00:17:39] Chris: I think having a big hulking lineman for a pastor could be. Could have its.

[00:17:44] Remy: I think it's wonderful. I think it's wonderful. I think we need. I think we need more men like that guarding the sheep. I. I love it. I'm down for it. I think. I think the times. The times are a come.

[00:17:57] Chris: Grew up even. Even when we were at the MB Church, he was going to a Lutheran day school because we just couldn't, you know, take putting him into the public school. And so that was, you know, one of the few schools that we knew about that was K through 8, which was pretty reasonably priced. And I didn't know a whole lot about Lutheran doctrine at the time, but, you know, I was like, well, you know, it can't be too bad.

So it for any of those churches that have the schools that are wondering whether or not their schools, you know, have an impact. They have an impact because, you know, by the time he was, what about 6th grade is when we decided to make the transfer.

[00:18:47] Remy: So, so how did you, by the.

[00:18:50] Chris: Time he was in eighth grade, I was actually teaching at the school.

[00:18:54] Remy: How'd you end up Mennonite brethren? Like, that seems like, that seems like a weird place to land, just in general.

[00:19:04] Chris: Oh, man.

Back in the day before, they had like match.com and some of those, they had services that you could call up, you know, to get matched. And there was, there was some, some Christian dating service. And I was single that I just decided to give it a call because I wasn't, you know, as a computer nerd, you just don't go out and meet people.

And the young lady that I talked to on the phone that was trying to sell me on this service, I wasn't about to buy the service because I found out it, you know, cost more than the, the car I was driving. I was like, this is just, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to pay that kind of money for something.

[00:19:52] Remy: I'm going to be honest. I was really, really hoping that this was, like, this is how I met my wife, and she was Mennonite brethren. I was really hoping that's where we were going.

[00:20:04] Chris: No, but she, she turned out to be local and she invited me to her church, and this was her church. And the thing that I got impressed with was that the pastor seemed excited to actually see me, you know, the church I had grown up in. I don't think the pastor even knew my name, right? And, and they were just very welcoming. So, you know, I, I acclimated to them really well. And then, I don't know, I, I, I, I've always had some kind of a gift for teaching. So, you know, I started out in their college and career Sunday school class because they didn't know where to put me and ended up teaching the class. And the next thing I know, I was teaching the adult Sunday school class. And then, you know, once I got married, then they asked me to be an elder, and so elders got to preach sermons. So I was able to preach sermons.

And, you know, that's, that's pretty much how I got into it. I was one of the Bible studies that I led at that time.

A friend of mine convinced me that I should, you know, start jamming with him and a couple other Guys from the Bible study. So we started playing in a Christian band, and, you know, next thing you know, we.

We. We toured as far as Topeka. So I guess that's about, you know, an hour away, so.

[00:21:34] Remy: Nice.

[00:21:35] Chris: That was our claim to fame. We got to play at Starlight Theater in Kansas City. We were playing in what they call Rock the Light, which was like a big Christian rock music festival.

And we didn't get to share the stage with Casting Crowns, but Casting Crowns was at that. That festival. So we felt like we'd gotten some type of fame. But.

[00:22:02] Remy: Right.

[00:22:03] Chris: So while I was there, I, you know, I played harmonica and sang on the worship team.

And I think that was. That was one of the things that kind of led to the beginning of the end because, you know, eventually they started, you know, playing worship music that Chris Roseborough was actually talking directly against, you know, with Hillsong and.

[00:22:25] Remy: Yeah.

[00:22:25] Chris: And Bethel.

And when I raised objections to that, I got scolded for raising the objections. Wow. You know, one thing about playing harmonica is that, you know, people look at that as, you know, if you ever want someone to feel the presence of the Holy Spirit, you start playing a soulful harmonica piece in the middle of a Christian song. And I guarantee you, people will come up after that, and they will tell you, oh, I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit.

So that made that. That really kind of.

[00:23:00] Remy: No, ma'am. That was the blues.

[00:23:03] Chris: Right. Well, it just made me uncomfortable because I felt like instead of worshiping as a congregation, you know, we were creating, you know, 300 different individual worship experiences. And so then you had people that, you know, they're like, oh, can you guys play this song? And it's like, man, we're not taking requests. It's not. It's not a concert.

[00:23:23] Remy: Right.

[00:23:24] Chris: You know, it's supposed to be our time of worship.

And the first time that I actually went into the Lutheran church that we ended up at and participated in the worship service, you know, I was like, man, this is. This is congregational worship. This is. Yeah, this is how it's supposed to be.

I don't know. You talk about how I met my wife. I did meet my wife in one of our. Our concerts. So she was a groupie.

She's probably. She's probably gonna watch this. But, yeah, she was a groupie. She came up to me after.

After the concert and you guys for.

[00:24:09] Remy: Your last show and a half.

[00:24:14] Chris: And. Well, I mean, that. That. I figured the whole experience was worth it if it got me to be able to meet my wife.

[00:24:22] Remy: Amen And.

[00:24:23] Chris: And she was. She was going to the Midnight Brethren Church, but she. She grew up Catholic, and so she.

She had to get baptized in the Midnight Brethren Church as well. And. Wow.

[00:24:37] Remy: Yeah.

[00:24:38] Chris: I think she just did it because they asked her to. I don't. I don't think.

I don't think it was. I think she. She had a more orthodox view of Baptist baptism than I did at the time.

[00:24:53] Remy: It's crazy, man. It's like.

It's like, you know, my wife is a Catholic, and I'm like a super extreme Anabaptist Protestant, and we wish there was a tradition that met in the middle, and it's like, boy, howdy, wait until I tell you.

[00:25:13] Chris: There you go.

Yeah, well, like I said, if it wasn't for the school, you know, we wouldn't have been introduced to the church. And so then I, you know, I met with the pastor, you know, several times, and at that point, I think between my conversations with him and just reading and listening to issues etc, and, you know, just Christian radio in general, you know, I'm one that I can, as I'm programming, listen. Listen to podcasts. So I. I think a lot of that just kind of seeped in over time, and whenever I learn something new, I have a tendency to want to teach it to someone else.

So that it stands to reason that, you know, I like teaching Sunday school. And.

[00:26:12] Remy: So you ended up. You ended up teaching at this Lutheran school.

[00:26:18] Chris: Yeah.

And were you still.

[00:26:22] Remy: Were you still Mennonite Brethren or had you gotten all the Way Lutheran at that point?

[00:26:27] Chris: I. I had gotten all the way Lutheran. So it was.

[00:26:30] Remy: Take me through. Take me through getting to all the Way Lutheran real quick.

[00:26:36] Chris: Okay. Well, when I finally had the epiphany about baptism, and then, you know, we had these. These struggles with, you know, being scolded for the music that we were playing. And I. And I felt like, you know, I really can't continue on on the worship team.

And I just. I got to the point then where when I. When I met with the pastor, I was like, I think we're ready to switch. So, I mean, this is a big deal because we. We moved, you know, because we. We've always thought that, hey, you know, whatever church we go to, we want to live right by so that we can be involved in it. So we moved across town, and, you know, I had to go through adult catechesis, which it was kind of funny because, you know, I. I knew everything going into it, so it was sort of a matter of just kind of you know, going through and getting green lit, and, you know, I was so excited just to be able to take communion because, you know, that as far as I'm concerned, that was then my first real communion experience. You know, that was.

That was the first time that I, you know, was able to receive Christ in his fullness, you know, and that.

That was a powerful moment for me, you know, but maybe it's because of the relationship I had with the pastor, but he. He just kind of vouched for me along the way. So, you know, we were probably members of the church for about four months before they made me an elder.

And then, you know, we had the senior pastor at the church leave. And the one that I. I was friends with was the associate pastor. And so I used to help with the adult Bible class.

And once Covid hit, I lost every single programming project that I had for the year. So everybody's budgets completely dried up, and they're just like, oh, I'm sorry, you know, we can't move forward with this. So I had nothing going on. And the.

The eighth grade teacher took a job in Indiana. So he was the last male teacher at the school.

And so it was actually my wife that suggested that I teach, because she's like, why don't you talk to the principal and see if you can teach the religious class, the religion classes for middle school?

And.

And I was like, well, you know, give it a shot. Maybe we can trade it for tuition. And my. My son was a eighth grader at the time, so I got to teach his. His religion class.

[00:29:39] Remy: Oh, wow.

[00:29:40] Chris: And, you know, the.

The pastor vouched for me, and they, you know, went ahead and said I could teach. I don't. I don't know that.

I don't know that that's a usual. A usual circumstance. And I'm sure it wouldn't happen anywhere else. It just was sort of.

Everything kind of came together with it, and.

[00:30:04] Remy: Amazing how God does that.

[00:30:06] Chris: Yeah. And I guess the way I pitched it, too, was, you know, I was sort of tangentially going through Pastor Bender's Lutheran Catechesis book, where I wanted to focus on the scriptures associated with things, because to me, you know, scripture is always where I connect to the most. You know, I. I love the catechism, and I always make sure that, you know, we. We cover all the doctrines in the catechism and that we read in the catechism.

But, you know, the scriptures have the narrative, and I think, you know, especially among the youth, you know, they. They connect to the Narratives of scripture, you know, when people can actually become real, then.

[00:31:06] Remy: Right.

[00:31:07] Chris: Some of these doctrines that you talk about, you know, they actually take on life.

So I wanted to make sure that as we went through the catechism that we were connecting it with scripture. And I think, you know, Pastor Bender's Lutheran catechesis book does that really well.

So I did that for the seventh graders and for the eighth graders we did sort of a comprehensive dig into to Peter in his ministry. So we studied First Peter, second Peter, and, and then of course Mark and Portions, Acts.

And the, the primary memorization for the 8th graders that year was to memorize the full book of First Peter because, wow, First Peter is one of those books that has about every, every piece of doctrine that you're ever going to deal with. And it's, it's, it's not, you know, as far as books go, it's, it's not a hard one to memorize.

So, you know, the way, the way I figured it is that if they get that committed to memory, then, you know, they'll, they'll have all those different doctrines locked away.

But I wanted to make sure that they really got to know Peter and, and through that, you know, have a deeper understanding of Christ.

[00:32:35] Remy: Yeah.

How long did you teach for?

[00:32:39] Chris: But, yeah, I got to, I, I taught for a couple years and then, you know, I started getting busy again with programming and they at that point had hired another male teacher. So I do, I just think it's, it's really important to have the, the male influence in the school. You know, it's, it's harder and harder to find, you know, male teachers.

And you know, I thought it'd be a little bit, you know, different for the kids too because, you know, I wasn't, I wasn't a typical teacher. You know, since I have spent my life out in, in the business world, you know, it's like we could actually talk about real world things.

[00:33:27] Remy: Right.

[00:33:27] Chris: And it's kind of shocking, you know, even in, in a Lutheran school, you know, where the kids are at on some of these subjects. You know, the, the seventh grade class in particular was a, a real struggle because, you know, a lot of them spent a lot of time in front of Tick tock and so they just had taken, you know, I don't even know how they, they got there, but you know, the, they were fully on board with, you know, abortion and they were absolutely shocked, you know, when I called it a sin.

You know, it's, I, I definitely stirred, stir the pot, you know, and Bringing up, you know, some of the subjects.

But it's, it's important because you can find out exactly where they are in their faith just by, you know, the worldview that they're presenting.

[00:34:32] Remy: Yeah, did. So that led you to being the catechist at your church, the being a middle school teacher?

[00:34:44] Chris: Yeah, well, I, as. When my son went through catechism, I was a parent helper. And then when the, the senior pastor had left, the associate pastor, I, I just sort of tagged him with him.

[00:35:07] Remy: Yeah.

[00:35:08] Chris: And then the church kind of hit some, you know, financial difficulties and they decided that they could only have a senior pastor, that they couldn't have the associate pastor. And so they, they hired an interim to come in and the interim kind of undermined the associate pastor and pushed him out.

And so I ended up being sort of the sole catechist for a while because the interim pastor lived about a half an hour away. He didn't want to come back.

[00:35:43] Remy: Why wouldn't the church just hire the associate to be the senior? He's already there.

[00:35:49] Chris: I, that was, believe me, that was something that I really had wanted to happen because.

[00:35:58] Remy: That'S, I mean, that's so upsetting.

[00:36:00] Chris: They didn't feel.

Yeah, it's, it's, it's actually crushing because they, they had no cause to fire him. You know, they had no cause to vacate his call. So instead of, you know, taking those kind of actions, they cut his salary way back.

And it was all, you know, in the, the name of, they wanted someone that was more dynamic. You know, someone who are you select had some more application to them.

No, that was, I'm shocked. That's the toughest thing is because, like I'm saying, well, I'm someone that, you know, would never think about changing churches. You know, it's like the one time I changed church, it's because I had a fundamental change in my view of theology.

[00:36:52] Remy: Right.

[00:36:53] Chris: And, and so then I figured that was going to be the church we're going to be at forever. And so when they did this, I'm just like, well, you know, I've been led to believe that you guys think that this is, you know, the, the pastoral call is, is not just a call to the ministry, but a call to a specific congregation. And if that's true, what you're doing is undermining the call of God.

[00:37:15] Remy: Yep.

[00:37:16] Chris: And so in this meeting that they, they had to cut his salary, I stood up and said, you know, gave an alternative plan in which, you know, we could afford to, to keep him as the senior pastor and get rid of this interim. And, and so then everybody kind of turned on me and next thing I know, you know, it's like I'm no longer teaching adult Bible class. I'm no longer teaching, you know, at the school. And they, they at least let me finish out the year as a catechist because, you know, the kids already lost their pastor. I was like, you know, they can't lose their, their catechist as well.

[00:37:59] Remy: It's so I wonder, I mean, not, not that it would have gone over honestly any better, but I often wonder because I hear about situations like this all the time where these kinds of, like the politic of the church happens, right? And, and people get sort of pushed out in this way. And I always hear about like, like what you did, you stand up and say, hey, look, here's an alternative. But it's not what the people want. And very rarely do I ever hear. And I, I don't think it would necessarily be any more effective, but I wonder what it would, the outcome would be like if someone had just stood up and been like, hey guys, what we're doing here is wrong. And there's judgment for this.

There's judgment for this. You know, you're, what you're doing, what you're doing is against God and he will judge you for it. If not here, he may, you know, this church may prosper and you think you're doing wonderful because of your prosperity, but your, your prosperity is in spite of your disobedience, not because of it, you know.

[00:39:10] Chris: Yeah, and I, I, when, when we resigned the church and I resigned the elder board, that, that was pretty much how I left it. You know, I just, I didn't think that the church could move, move forward and heal unless they, everyone, you know, repents.

And you know, I, I couldn't believe that they were so willing to, you know, crush someone who had served the church for.

He was, he was there for at least 20 years, man. And no, I not touch. I mean, he's a dear friend. So, yeah, you know, I, I, I couldn't see that. You know, I had a real difficult time just having that happen to my friend and my sense of loyalty and, but fortunately there, there was a, another LCMS Lutheran church, that spot just a half a mile away from there. And the associate pastor ended up attending there before he received his latest call.

And so we, we went over there as well. And so this pastor and the pastor of that church, they both have been really instrumental in, in propping up Dominic, my. My son, you know, and helping him, you know, solidify like, you know, what ministry looks like, especially that, you know, they. They have a very biblically masculine view of what. What a man should be in. In Christianity, you know, so, you know, it's. It's not. It's not like the, what. The Andrew Tate people, you know.

[00:41:06] Remy: Yeah.

[00:41:07] Chris: You know, it's like we draw our masculinity from Christ himself. You know, he's. He's the quintessential male.

[00:41:13] Remy: Amen.

[00:41:14] Chris: And.

And so, you know, the. The pastor of this church is not afraid to. To speak up when things need to. To be said.

It's very.

It's. It's more formal than I've ever been used to, you know, so I. I love it. I mean, the. The regard for.

For the. The sacrament is. Is much higher than I had ever experienced. You know, it. It seems like among the. The popular pastors, they. They tend to rush through the liturgy, you know, and communion, where, you know, they speed through the words of institution. You know, where the church that we're at now, you know, it's like you actually, you'll. You'll bow for portions of it. You'll join your flag for portions of it. You know, it's.

It's taken with ultimate reverence, you know, that's what should be, I think.

[00:42:27] Remy: So right now. And this podcast is probably not going to air anywhere close to right now, just so you know, but right now I happen to be going through a class on catechism and teaching the catechism. We read this book by Charles Arand Arend. I don't know. I have read half a dozen of this man's books now in my seminary education, and I have yet to be impressed by any of them.

Charles, if you're listening, you don't have to pad the word count in your own books, buddy.

They're just. He's just. He just. Golly, he just has to keep on writing.

And we read this book that he wrote on catechism and, and like, the history of the catechism and modern. Like, the way the modern catechesis works. And like, basically what I took away from this book, and it's a very short book, but what I took away from it is that catechism was really, really, really effective until Christianity became legal.

And then after Christianity became legal, catechism just kind of went to crap. And it's impossible, basically, to catechize even the clergy, much less the laity.

How do you. How do you catechize kids? How do you do it? How do you do it in a way that, you know, it sticks?

[00:44:01] Chris: I mean, you have to start young first off, you know, and that's with memorization. You know, Dominic was involved with Awana when we were at the other church, which, you know, anytime I hear somebody memorizing, like, one verse at a time and like, disparate verses and they become their life verses and stuff, I roll my eyes. You know, it's. I. I can't. I can't stand to have something in my brain that's out of context. You know, it's like I have to know, like, right. Where does this fit into everything?

But when you're talking about little kids, they. They can't figure out how it fits into everything. So the best thing for them to do is just get God's Word in their heart, you know, so memorizing the catechism, memorizing scripture, by the, by the time they get to be in elementary school, you know, that. That becomes like a really easy exercise for them to do.

And to me, once they have all that information, you know, locked in their brain, you know, then as they start, you know, getting to, I don't know, maybe fourth grade, they, a lot of times will have the. The logical capabilities to start making some connections.

So, you know, when that, when that stuff is locked in their brains and they start making connections later on, well, then suddenly all. All of that scripture that they know and all that catechism that they know suddenly has meaning.

[00:45:43] Remy: Yeah.

[00:45:44] Chris: So we, So I, I'm seeing the fruits of that now, you know, as far as now, now that I have a high schooler.

[00:45:52] Remy: Yeah.

[00:45:52] Chris: You know, his, his capacity for, you know, theology is incredible at this point, you know.

[00:46:01] Remy: Right.

[00:46:01] Chris: I'm. I'm always excited, you know, when, When I can ask him, you know, questions and he actually gets, like, the nuances, a particular passage.

And I. Part of being a catechist is you, You. You teach in such a way where you, you ask questions, because even if they don't know the answer, at least the neurons are firing. And so they're thinking, you know, when they, when you get to the answer, that they have a better chance of holding on to it. And if they're able to get the answer, it locks it in.

[00:46:34] Remy: Yeah, it's. You know, it's funny through. Throughout the course of this class, and I'm about halfway through right now at the time of this recording, that's basically what we've. The conclusion we've all come to is that you start young with Getting them to just learn it, you don't have to understand it, you don't have to know what it means. You just need to be able to repeat it at the drop of a hat. It just needs to be in here somewhere, locked away that you know, it's. And once you know it as you get older, then we can work on like basic application. And then once we go from there from basic, like first order application, the fourth commandment, I'll obey my parents means obeying mom and dad. We can get this when we're 8, 9 years old, that's fine. As we get a couple of years on from that, we can sort of go second level application to teachers and my friend's parents. When I'm at my friend's house, I have to obey his parents, right? And, and eventually. So like the idea is lock it in when they're young and then we can teach them application and as they get older, we can abstract that application further out, you know, into sort of the world until, because, you know, you, you do have to be developed, I think, to a certain point. I mean, I don't think this is just scientific fact. You have to be mentally developed at a certain point to be able to conceptualize abstract ideas apart from yourself. You know, things like the future tense, you know, and delayed gratification, you know, these sorts of things. But the ability to abstract out the Ten Commandments or the Apostles Creed and how do we apply these things, you know, in our life anyway? Yes, start young. It's the, the, the amount of, the amount of work that people do in creating catechetical literature and catechetical programs to try and get into two middle school years. What is actually a lifelong diligence study and application is mind blowing. And it's never shocking that it doesn't work.

[00:48:55] Chris: On the thing that's sad to me is that a lot of parents think that they've done their job just by taking their kids to confirmation class or, you know, taking their kids to church and Sunday school.

And they don't, you know, feed into them the rest of the week.

And you know, I generally give them homework, you know, which it's rough. And I feel for the kids having to do, you know, regular school work on top of doing confirmation homework. But the way I did it, I always did it so that the parents had to get involved, you know, so when they did memory, you know, instead of having them recite memory to me, which I think can be completely nerve wracking for young people, I assign that task to their Parents, you know, And I said at the very beginning, like, obviously, you can lie to me and say that your kid knows the scripture, right? If they don't, but what good is that, you know, what's the point of taking your kids to confirmation if you're not going to actually learn the scriptures that are required, you know, So I trust between us and God that you're doing the. The role of helping them get this memorized and checking off their memorization.

So it was a matter of trying to relieve the stress of the kids and yet get the parents involved. I always wanted the parents to be there, so I forced the parents to sign up.

So I had to have at least one parent at every single class, you know, and, you know, part of that's discipline. You know, you want. You know, kids tend to behave a little better. One of the parents is there, but it's also so that the parents can listen because, yeah, they need it, too. And you'd be surprised at how involved, you know, when the parents, like, when all of a sudden their ear perks up and they're learning something and they're interacting with it. Then next thing you know, they're making comments and they're involved in the class. You know, that's.

That. That's what you want. Because, you know, hopefully then when they're driving home, they can have a further discussion about, you know, whatever it was that we talked about.

But yeah, I think that's the thing that probably shocked me the most, is the lack of parental involvement.

[00:51:35] Remy: Yeah, and it's. And it's honestly one of the most, I think, important factors in catechization specifically is parental and familial involvement.

A funny aside, we have one of our guys in the seminary alts is in Mexico, and where he's at, the Catholic church down there charges for confirmation, and they charge a significant amount of money. So you. You pay and it's like, it's a deposit and like, you know, you get it back mostly or whatever. And, you know, they have a whole way that it's not, you know, simony or whatever, but it's. It's still, they charge a significant amount of money. And his Lutheran church was able to grow by simply charging less money. They were offering it for free, but no one would come because, you know, for whatever reason, I pursued value. But when they started charging but less money, then people came because it's a deal now it's a deal. And he said that they had amazing parental involvement because the parents are like, look, we're shelling out $300 for this thing. You're gonna know it, you're gonna learn it. And he said their church has just grown by leaps and bounds. And also like the Catholic Church, you get the money back at the end or whatever. But it's. Yeah, he said that, that was just, it was one of the ways that they were able to get parents involved was by charging. Because now that the parents, now the parents have something on the line here. They, you know, they have their money on the line. And you want, you know, your kid needs to pass the catechism because you're paying good money for it.

[00:53:29] Chris: Wow. Maybe. Maybe that's what I'm doing wrong. Cause I don't charge for anything, you know.

You know, I, I always figured I, I don't want to hinder the gospel. So, you know, everything that I write, I have out there on my blog and, and people can read it and, and I still hope that, you know, people will have it in their heart to buy the books.

But, you know, I, I think, I think sometimes, you know, the, the books are. It's a different experience. You know, some of the Bible studies that I teach, you know, we'll use the books and, and reading from the book is, is a completely different experience than reading online. But I just didn't want to hinder it so that, you know, if somebody wants to be able to go online, you know, they can do it and, and, you know, use it as a resource.

I mean, I, I mainly, mainly started it, you know, for my family.

[00:54:25] Remy: Yeah.

[00:54:27] Chris: When Covid.

[00:54:32] Remy: Let's dive into this. Let's dive into. Well, there is one point on the outline here that I actually want to hit before we dive into father led and like, family faith formation before we get into that, which will probably be the rest of our discussion. I think I do. An interesting point on the outline we have is that you also taught high school Bible class at the Mennonite Brethren Church, and the comparison between the youth there that went to public school versus the youth in the Lutheran school, Lutheran Church.

I'm just curious about that.

[00:55:16] Chris: Well, the big difference is you're more focused on apologetics and faith establishment than you are with getting into the finer points of Scripture. You know, I, I still, you know, God's word does its work. So we spend, you know, most of our time in God's Word. But, you know, when you start asking questions of high schoolers that are public school students, they have a tendency to have, you know, different kinds of questions.

And it's, it's unfortunate, but you know, there's. Several of the kids started getting into, like, the transgenderism that was.

There's a. I. I know three or four of the girls that, after they left high school, you know, decided that they were guys.

And I was like, man, I.

I don't know what they were picking up in school or online or whatever it was that.

[00:56:28] Remy: Yeah.

[00:56:29] Chris: You know, was making this.

It just. It just seemed incredibly unusual to me.

And so I. I don't know. I guess I. I had a much lower expectation, and I was. Especially in. In the Mennonite Brethren Church, since baptism is viewed as this. This thing that you do when you've reached a certain level of faith and you want to profess this faith. You had a lot of the kids that were not getting baptized because they would say, well, I'm just not sure that I'm ready to make that commitment.

[00:57:15] Remy: Wow.

[00:57:17] Chris: And. And I was like, no, please, just. Do you believe.

Do you believe Jesus is the son of God? Do you believe that his righteousness, you know, pays the penalty for your sin? If so, you need to get baptized.

[00:57:30] Remy: Yeah.

[00:57:31] Chris: You know, and that. Yeah, it. It was. It's a much different experience.

You get a lot more of the arguments of, well, you know, the thief on the cross next to Jesus didn't get baptized. And it's like, yeah, well, you don't. You don't prove a rule, you know, by its exception, you know? Right.

It's like you. I maintain that the thief on the.

[00:57:59] Remy: Cross was, in fact, baptized.

[00:58:02] Chris: What's that?

[00:58:03] Remy: I maintained that the thief on the cross was baptized. What. So what is baptism? Baptism is the promise of God given to you via the water and the word. What did the thief on the cross receive? So Jesus said. He said, remember me in your kingdom. And Jesus said, today you will surely be with me in paradise. Jesus received the promise of God, okay. Through the word of God, who is himself living water. The thief on the cross was literally baptized by Jesus's words. Thank you very much. Next. Next. Objection.

[00:58:37] Chris: All right. Yeah.

The. The living water part probably wasn't the.

I probably wouldn't have come up with that. That's good.

Yeah, I. I just.

The way. The way I always looked at it was that Jesus didn't give the command to go out and make disciples, you know, through baptism, until after the resurrection. So, yeah, I. I assume that the thief on the cross was one of the Jewish insurrectionists. And that's, you know, the fact that he recognized Christ as Lord meant that he was circumcised.

So a circumcised Jew professed faith in Christ. You know, if, if Christ declared that he was saved, he was saved.

[00:59:26] Remy: The. I find a lot of the. Not to devolve down into like a baptism discussion, but I find a lot of the Anabaptist sort of problem with baptism in the New Testament is that they view and as a temporal link and not a, like, not a causal link. You know, so like it says repent and be baptized. And what it is, the and is associative. We're putting these two things together. Repentance and baptism are one concept in the New Testament. Repent and be baptized, they're the same thing. The and is an associative link here. But a lot of times they view it as like a causal temporal link where they're, without realizing it, unconsciously inserting the word then in there. Repent and then be baptized. But there's no. Then there's no. The two things are one thing, repent and be baptized. You know, he was tall and strong. If I were to say that he were, he was tall and strong. No one thinks he was tall first and then he became strong because he was tall. No one like, no one thinks that. But for some reason with baptism we got to put that little then in there.

[01:00:45] Chris: Well, and part of that I think is they, they look at repentance as a one time event.

You know, it's like I realized I was the sinner. I repented of my sin, Christ saved me.

[01:00:57] Remy: Wow.

[01:00:57] Chris: And now that I'm saved, I'm always saved. So there's no need to continually come back and repent, repent, repent.

So they don't, they don't see it as an ongoing action. You know, if you, if you say to them, remember your baptism, they're not thinking on the promises of God. They're thinking about an event that happened in a lake somewhere.

Geez. So it's, it is, it's a, it's a different mindset. And so I, I think when people get in these discussions, they have to define their terms.

[01:01:33] Remy: Very important. And I.

[01:01:36] Chris: Often people just kind of talk past.

[01:01:39] Remy: I, I kicked the Mary hornet's nest on Twitter here yesterday.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some guy was like, God doesn't have a mom. And I was like, her name is Mary and the disrespect will stop. You know, and it really kicked the hornet's nest because. And it's. Because you're exactly right. It's defining of terms when people say, when I say God, I'm referring to deity. There's only. There's only like the one deity, right? There's only the one being in three persons. And that being does in fact have a mother. In one person. Jesus does in fact have a mother. So it's, you know, the way we describe the communication of attributes, I would say it's perfectly okay to say God has a mother or God died on the cross. God bled for you.

One guy was like, oh, so by your logic, God poops? And I was like, brother, you're going to be really shocked when I tell you this.

It's going to blow your mind. But yeah, yeah, for 33 years, 33 solid years, God pooped like once a day on average. Yeah, 100%.

And, and it's because when I say God, I'm thinking of deity, right? The. I'm thinking of the, like, the one immutable deity.

But when they say God, they're specifically thinking of, like, God the father.

You know what I mean? And, you know, so you, you often, you say God has a mom. And they're like, the father doesn't have a mom. And it's like, well, no, but the Son does. And the Son is just as much God, isn't he? Right. And that's, it's so funny. I always ask these people when they get upset, they say, you know, God doesn't have a mom. And I say, is Jesus God? It's my first question every time. Is Jesus God? And they say, yes. And I say, does Jesus have a mom? And they say, well, yes. And I. Okay, well, QED God has a mom. Next question. You know, but yeah, it's a fundamental difference in thinking, I think.

[01:03:47] Chris: Yeah, I mean, it's, it's strange because I, I think sometimes, you know, Baptist, Anabaptists, they have a tendency to go in the opposite direction with Mary where they, they're like, oh, she was just, just a sinner.

Yes. But she is still a, a blessed woman and we still hold her in high regard. And the, the fact of the matter was that she was a willing, you know, vessel, you know, for God. She raised him in the faith. And she, as far as parents go, you know, she and Joseph did everything that the Lord had them do.

[01:04:29] Remy: Yeah.

[01:04:30] Chris: To, you know, maintain Christ's purity. So, I mean, it's like they did everything that they were called to do.

[01:04:37] Remy: Huge win of the Catholic Church is holding up the holy family on their own feast day as the model of a family, holding up Joseph as the model of a father, Mary as the model of a mother.

This is a, this is really, really wonderful and something that I think we kind of, you know, lose. You want good examples, good biblical examples of how to be a parent. It's Mary, it's Joseph. This is. This is how, you know, you look at St. Joseph, it makes me cry. Like, every time I think about it, where it says. It says that he sought her to put a. Sought to put her away quietly because he didn't Even in this, thinking that somehow she had betrayed him and gotten pregnant outside of wedlock with some other man when he finds she's pregnant.

Even. Even in this. In his, like, most, like, his hardest moment, even in this, he doesn't want to destroy Mary. He still wants to protect her and love her and serve her in this. And, like, what a beautiful. Talking about masculinity. What a beautiful picture of being a godly man and showing love and sacrifice to the. Even when you're wrong, do you still want to be faithful and love and protect and, you know, we. I think we lose a lot when we.

When we disregard the holy family. You know, it's not just. It's not just that, you know, they. Oh, Mary, you know, oh, Mary was just a sinner like the rest of us.

Yeah, okay, Mary was a sinner, but I don't think you can honestly biblically say just like the rest of us, because Gabriel says most highly favored among women.

That's, you know, that seems to be very distinct.

[01:06:29] Chris: The scriptures prophesy.

I mean, nobody else can have the claim that they were prophesied about in Scripture except for John the Baptist. You know, Mary.

[01:06:42] Remy: Yeah. There's Jesus, there's John, and there's Mary.

[01:06:44] Chris: Genesis, chapter three.

I mean, that's. It's amazing that, you know, she is the seed, the. The woman who produces the. The holy seed. You know, Eve. Yeah, Eve thought she was that woman.

So, you know, Mary's. Mary's elevated higher than Eve.

[01:07:03] Remy: Yeah, there's the con. The. The connection between Mary and Eve is very, very early in Christian history. It's very, very early. Another very early connection with Mary is the Ark of the Covenant. Because what's in the Ark of the Covenant? It's the manna. It's the law, and it's. It's Aaron's staff in the Ark of the Covenant.

And these, The. The representation of how that, you know, how that is God and justice and provision and grace and all this stuff. But at the same time. Or is it Moses's. Is it Moses's staff? I don't know. Anyway, but I think it was there and stuff. The idea that Mary is the new ark of the covenant because by carrying the Christ child, she is also carrying all these things. God's grace and his love and his provision and his law and all these other things she's carrying within her in her womb. You know, there's all kinds of these different connections to Mary. So the idea that Mary was like just another, that it could have been anybody, she's just another sinner, is kind of preposterous. You know, like she's very specifically chosen, very specifically honored.

You know, not that we should pray to Mary, heaven forbid, but the idea that we should disregard Mary is so off.

[01:08:31] Chris: No, I think she's someone to be highly esteemed.

The Jews lifted up Sarah. I think, you know, Christians should lift up Mary. Now the other one that bugs me is the way that the Protestant church treats Peter because they have a tendency to treat him as almost just above an idiot. You know, where in all of my studies, every question that Peter raised shows that he has a deep seeded knowledge of Zechariah, Isaiah.

So I mean, he knew, he knew his scriptures and you know, just, just because he was a fisherman doesn't, doesn't mean he was a Neanderthal, you know. And you know, Jesus, you know, he, he may have teased him, but you know, he teased all of them. You know, I, I figured he teased James and John, calling them sons of. You know, I mean, I, I love the fact that Jesus gave them nicknames, you know, that. Yeah, that just goes to show that, you know, Jesus was someone that was really, you know, a good friend as well as our Savior, you know.

[01:09:53] Remy: Yeah, yeah, it's. Peter was a bit brash though. Peter, Peter was a bit brash for.

[01:10:02] Chris: Could be.

[01:10:03] Remy: For as well, for as well thought as he was. Peter was also very much a let's act now kind of guy.

[01:10:11] Chris: Definitely.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm gonna, I, I just think that the.

Oh, go ahead.

[01:10:20] Remy: I'm gonna pause it real quick. I have to take a bathroom break. Give me like two minutes.

[01:10:25] Chris: Okay.

[01:10:27] Remy: I'm not actually gonna, I'm just gonna let it record, but I'm gonna.

[01:10:34] Chris: It, it.

[01:11:32] Remy: Sorry, you, you have the honor of being the first very long one I've ever done. So.

[01:11:39] Chris: Yeah.

Cool.

[01:11:42] Remy: Yeah.

So Peter kind of brash?

[01:11:49] Chris: Well, I, I just think it's, it's one of those things where because Peter is lifted up as the first Pope in the Roman Catholic Church, you know, the, The Protestant church wants to dismiss him and because the Protestant church holds Paul in such high regard, you know, The Roman Catholic Church wants to dismiss him.

[01:12:11] Remy: Right.

[01:12:11] Chris: And I always, I always figured it was a little bit ironic because in the Roman Catholic Church, you know, priests needs to remain, you know, single and celibate, and yet their first pope was married. Yeah. And Paul, you know, in the Protestant church, in the Midnight Brethren Church, they used to have these discussions, you know, saying, oh, you know, we were trying to figure out who could be an ex elder, and we were thinking, you could, Chris, but you're not married.

And I was like, you don't have to be married to serve, you know, and in fact, you know, I said, when I do get married, my time for serving is probably going to be limited. Right. You know.

[01:12:51] Remy: Yeah.

[01:12:52] Chris: So you guys should be taking advantage of me now. But, yeah, I just thought that's ironic because they, they lift up Paul to such a high degree and, and Paul was single. So according to their rules, Paul couldn't have even served as an elder, let alone an apostle.

[01:13:10] Remy: Yeah.

Yeah. Well, it's funny, it's, it's funny how they flip flop on that. Right? Because like the verse that the Romans lean on for the celibacy of the priesthood is where Paul says, I wish you could all be like, I am.

You know, but they're not gonna, they're not gonna lean on.

[01:13:31] Chris: Yeah.

[01:13:31] Remy: On Peter, their first pope being married, you know, and I think probably a number, a number of popes and priests after that also. You know, there's a, like, you can definitely see the celibacy accretion come in to the church historically.

So.

[01:13:52] Chris: It'S, I mean, it's unfortunate. You know, some people are called to be single, some people are called to be married. You know, I figured I was called to be single. You know, when, when my wife came up to me after that concert, I was, you know, I was pretty surprised. I just had assumed at that point that I was going to stay single. So.

Yeah, I mean, she was, she was the answer to many years of prayer. But yeah, you know, my prayer was always, you know, I, I want to be married if being married helps me serve you better. Right. You know, it's like if, if, if I can do ministry best as a single person, then I should do ministry best as a single person. But if being married is, you know, God's will for me, then that's, that's what I wanted.

So, yeah, I mean, real blessing. I, I, just. Completely unexpected, you know, I didn't become a dad till I was 38, so.

[01:14:59] Remy: Wow.

Wow. God bless, because I'm 36, so we we don't have kids. We've been married 11 years. We still haven't had kids.

So. Yeah, God bless. There's still time.

[01:15:17] Chris: You know, that's.

Yeah, you know, we, we're at the, the thought that, you know, if God wanted to give us 10, we'd be happy with 10. You know, he, he gave us the one. And you know, Dominic kind of broke everything on the way out. So I think he, he kind of torched the place so that we couldn't, couldn't do it again. But that's great.

[01:15:46] Remy: So it has been.

It. It has. Then I guess if your prayer is God, let me be a husband or a father if it helps me serve you better. I guess it has. I think that that sort of segues us nicely into father led faith formation and you know, family devotional life and how do you, how do you do that? Walk me through it.

[01:16:23] Chris: Well, I think it has to be baby steps. You know, one of the reasons why I try to keep the blog down to about, you know, 10 minutes or so. I mean, obviously you can discuss a whole lot longer than that and you can add in hymns and other prayers and stuff like that, but you know, this, it's hard for families to set aside, you know, carve out like regular time. And so I think it's, it's best to do something that you can form a habit around, you know, and so the best way to do that is to, you know, keep it short and have something that builds.

So, you know, for me, my biggest struggle. We used to do portals of prayer and that, that's okay. I mean, I even know some people that, that write some of the, the articles for portals of prayer or the devotions for portals of Portals of prayer. But it's, none of them are tied together. You know, it's like you're, you bounce around all over scripture.

There's, there is no cohesiveness a lot of its application. You know, to me, application is like my least favorite form of study, you know, because I, I think applications like dessert. You know, it's the thing that you get to. Once you have a good understanding of the passage itself. And so the better you understand the passage and, and who it was written to and who wrote it and why.

Well then, you know, the applications kind of draw themselves after that.

[01:18:05] Remy: Sure.

[01:18:07] Chris: So to me, portals of prayer just didn't, didn't cut it. You know, it, it was too, too much fluff, too much application. I wanted something that was systematic in the way that it went through, you know, books of The Bible.

And the problem with that is that everything that I found out there was far too academic.

[01:18:33] Remy: Yeah.

[01:18:34] Chris: You know, and I, I don't think you can do that in a family setting, you know, for the most. I mean, if your kids are super geniuses, then, yeah, I guess if you can, you can dig into, you know, some of the. The more academic.

But what I was looking for is just something that would consistently go through, you know, a book at a time, always keep things in context. You know, I, I have a scripture reading at the beginning. I have a question to, to ask, you know, because like I said, I'm. I'm a catechist at heart, so it's like, I, I think you always open with questions just to get people thinking. And, and usually, you know, if they dig into the. The devotional text, they can come up with the answer pretty easily.

But, you know, the goal is just to, to get them thinking in the right direction after reading the scripture passage and then, you know, have, have just a few minutes of. Of reading something about that passage so that they get a better understanding and then closing it with a prayer. And I, you know, prayers in the Anabaptist church, a lot of time are really long and flowing, and, you know, I admire some of the people that I know that have the ability to pray these really lengthy prayers.

I love the fact that when the disciples asked Jesus, you know, what should we pray? Jesus gave them a super short prayer.

Whenever we go to, you know, family members for dinner, you know, it's like, always look at me and ask me to pray. And I think everyone thinks I'm gonna go off into some long prayer, but it's always, you know, just sort of the common table prayer type thing. Yeah, yeah. You know, because I don't want to. I don't want to be the one that holds people up from eating.

[01:20:38] Remy: You know, we. At every. At every single family gathering, they're like, all right, let's all hold hands and bless the food. And every single time, everyone just, like, they're bowing their heads and they're all, like, looking over at me like, seminary boy, you know, And I'm always just like, jesus, thank you for the food.

Amen.

I don't know what you want.

[01:21:07] Chris: Well, at least you have to cross yourself and say, in the name of the Father, Son, the Holy Ghost, Amen.

[01:21:12] Remy: That's right. That's right. I start doing it in Latin just to throw them.

That's great.

So were you able to find such a resource or did you have to.

Did you have to create such a resource.

[01:21:32] Chris: Well, that's it. I created it.

I don't have a lot of patience to do a lot of research.

So if I have a vision of how I think something should be, I just go ahead and do it, you know, and for me, because I'm a nerd, you know, it's like my first instinct is always, well, if this is helpful for my family, it could help other people. So I'm going to throw it out on the web. And then, of course, it uses my software to run. So, you know, when people want examples, you know, that they can look at for my software, I can say, oh, here's one.

But yeah, I mainly do it, you know, just for my own family.

And it. It began because my wife went into the hospital right at. Right at the beginning of COVID And the crazy thing, she didn't even have Covid. She had a lung infection. And maybe the lung infection was the result of COVID I don't know. But her entire left lung got filled with infection.

And she's a. She's a nurse practitioner.

She works for University of Kansas Health System. And, and she's a. In the neurosurgery department.

So she's, you know, she's brilliant. She just decided that, well, hey, this infection doesn't seem to be getting better on its own. Maybe you should take me in to be seen. And obviously it was causing her way more distress than she was letting on, because when she let me know this, it was Good Friday going into the weekend that everything locked down. So when I took her to the emergency room, I. I dropped her off, and it's like they wouldn't let me go into the emergency room. I was like, okay. So I went home thinking that they were just going to give her antibiotics and send her home and that I'd be just going down to pick her up. And all of a sudden I get this phone call saying that she's going to have to have three different surgeries over the next two months and that she's in a real dire place, you know. So we went from thinking, you know, here she has the remnants of some type of cold or something to, man, she's going to be in the hospital for an extended stay and have to have all these surgeries.

So that was right when they wouldn't let anybody come in to visit.

And it fortunately, because she worked at the hospital that she stayed in, you know, one of her co workers came by and grabbed her tablet and that's. That's when I started Posting the stuff online so that, you know, she could FaceTime with us and we could still do our family devotions and have a sense of normalcy.

So. But that's it. I mean, you know, you develop a routine.

She recovered. Yes. Okay.

[01:24:38] Remy: Just on us.

[01:24:39] Chris: It actually was quite miraculous.

[01:24:42] Remy: Happily ever after.

[01:24:43] Chris: She had one.

Right. She. She had one surgery and she started getting way better after that. So she was only in the hospital for two weeks and came home. But, yeah, we. For a while there, you know, it was. It was pretty dire. And then when all this news came out about COVID you know, then you. You started to panic because nobody understood what Covid was at that time. And one. She was. She was just about to get released home, and her transporter got tested positive for Covid. And at that time, when you tested positive for Covid, you were locked down, isolated from the rest of the hospital. Yeah. So because she got exposed to it, she had to go into the COVID wing of the hospital. And so essentially she's getting exposed to everybody else who has Covid. And at that point she's like panicking, thinking, you know, I don't know that, you know, here I thought I was coming home and now they're putting me in with sick people. And so, yeah, it was. It was definitely a trying time.

[01:25:48] Remy: I. Right. Right near the beginning of that. It started right near the beginning of that when it was. It was clear that there was something going on. And we weren't sure if it had made it to the United States or not. But it was. It was February of, I don't know, 20. So we were wondering if it. It was right around the time where we weren't sure if it was in the United States yet, even though it had likely been in the United States for months now.

But I got really sick with the flu. But I tested negative for the flu. I'm convinced it was Covid. I've never tested positive for it, but I'm convinced that's what it was because I had all these incredible flu like, symptoms, but I tested negative for the flu. But I went into my job, provides a primary care physician, urgent care for employees. And so I went into the clinic, as we call it, and they. One of the first questions they asked me, they said, have you been to China in the last six months? Or you've been around anyone who's been in China in the last six months? And my buddy had just brought his wife over from China three months prior, she had just moved over here from China, and we had just celebrated Chinese New Year.

And that year it was a hot pot. And so we're all dipping our food in this communal broth and eating it, you know, whatever. And so I told the lady, I was like, actually, I just shared a hot pot with a Chinese girl who got here from China six weeks ago.

And the lady, she stops and she looks at me and she goes, sir, this is not a joke. And I was like, ma'am, I'm not kidding.

I don't know what to tell you.

Serious.

[01:27:49] Chris: She probably still tells people about that, too.

No, that's crazy. Was she from Wuhan?

What's that?

I said, was she from Wuhan? Is that the.

[01:28:04] Remy: No, no, no, no. She was from. She's from. She's from Guangzhou. But it's. As I understand it, Guangzhou is really not very far from Wuhan. Like, it's close enough that it matters, so.

[01:28:18] Chris: Oh, wow.

[01:28:20] Remy: Yeah. No, it was.

[01:28:22] Chris: No, that was a crazy time.

[01:28:24] Remy: It was. Man, it was like the whole world fell into a fever dream.

[01:28:29] Chris: Well, and for those that, like, didn't take it seriously, I mean, I. I didn't take it too seriously, but my. My friend and business partner that was the atheist turned Lutheran, he got Covid. And after he recovered from it, it caused a zytacon storm in his lungs and, like, scarred up his lungs to the point where he had to go on a ventilator. And he was in a coma for a couple weeks. And we wondered, you know, when he came out of it if he's still going to be the same guy. And so. And it just.

If it affected you, it affected you big time.

[01:29:10] Remy: Yeah.

[01:29:11] Chris: You know, he was.

He. He was pretty sure that he was not long for this world. And I'm. I'm so glad that he survived it and that he stayed intact because, like, like I said, he's one of those that I meet with usually Tuesday mornings.

[01:29:30] Remy: Yeah.

[01:29:31] Chris: And I tell you, man, just glad that.

[01:29:38] Remy: I remember telling my wife, in the heat of it, as sick as I was, after I got back, the doctor told me at the clinic, she said, I don't know what this is. Everyone keeps coming in super sick, but it's not the flu. And I'm just prescribing symptoms, trying to keep up. Right. So I got like eight different prescriptions for, you know, the. The muscle ache and for the congestion and for the cough and for the upset stomach and all this. And I'm taking all these medications or whatever, and I remember being a couple nights in and laying in bed. It's like the middle of the day. And my wife came and checked on me and she said, how are you doing? And I told her. I was like, I think I'm gonna die. Like, I legitimately think. And you know, guys, they're like, oh, when they get sick, they think they're gonna die. But, like, I really thought I had never been that sick in my life. It's to this day the sickest I've ever been. I legitimately thought I was gonna die for a couple of days there.

[01:30:45] Chris: Yeah, some of those early strains were pretty bad.

I don't know. And it did such a number on churches. I know our church. I don't know if your church closed down at all. Ours did, you know, for. I don't know, it was about four weeks. You know, originally they talked about two weeks to slow the spread. You know, we thought we were being charitable.

And, you know, the pastor still came and did the service and so they did it online.

[01:31:14] Remy: Yeah.

[01:31:15] Chris: And I can. I can just remember feeling, you know, almost start by the time I was able to come back and have communion and just missing the fellowship with other people. And even when you got back, you know, it's like nobody shook hands. You know, it's me, like, shaking hands and giving hugs and stuff is.

[01:31:37] Remy: Yeah.

[01:31:37] Chris: Is a big thing, an important thing. And, you know, I just love having conversations to. People hate the masks. And people were so mean about, you know, the masks. Like, you know, you need to make these required. And, you know, I'm telling you, it's like that, that became a test for orthodoxy. You know, it's like, if you don't agree with me when it comes to masking up or, you know, social distancing or whatever, then you can't be a Christian. You're not charitable, you know, or as it started to be politicized, you had the other side saying that, well, you know, you have no faith in Jesus if you're wearing a mask. And I just, like, I don't know. I mean, some people are afraid, you know, some people aren't. And instead of dividing over it, you.

[01:32:26] Remy: Know, not to be like, weirdly political about it, but what I thought was interesting was this was the first big flip flop that I saw happen in real time. Like that. I can remember that so clear in my memory was because Republicans, I remember at the outset, Republicans were like, guys, we should all just wear a mask. It's common sense. And Democrats were like, look at Trump and the Republican dictators trying to force everyone to wear masks. It's a police state. And then like, he gets out of office pretty early into this thing and everybody flip flopped on the issue. And now Democrats are like, oh, you gotta wear a mask to love your neighbor. And Republicans are like, oh, Biden. I was like, what in the world? Like, I remember when the Republican position was wear a mask, you know, or.

[01:33:16] Chris: Get the shot too. Yeah, they flipped up speed.

[01:33:21] Remy: That was Trump's thing.

[01:33:23] Chris: Right.

And when the shot first came out, you know, I got the first two doses or whatever. I didn't get any since then. But I, you know, I don't know, I, I never even thought about it before. I always got my flu shots and stuff and.

[01:33:39] Remy: Yeah.

[01:33:40] Chris: You know, and then of course you had dispensationalists saying, are you taking the mark of the beast?

[01:33:45] Remy: It's like, no, I have a whole article of that on my website.

[01:33:53] Chris: Oh my goodness.

[01:33:54] Remy: Oh man. Dude, any. If you're a dispensationalist, anything is the mark of the beast. If you try hard enough, you know.

[01:34:01] Chris: Right one, and everybody's the Antichrist. It's like a constant, you know, Pin the tail on the Antichrist.

[01:34:08] Remy: Yeah, well, everybody's the Antichrist.

Everybody's the Antichrist except for Donald Trump.

And it's wild to me because, well, unless of all the people that are going to be the Antichrist, it's going to be Donald Trump.

[01:34:26] Chris: Well, especially because I've heard dispensationalists now talk about, well, you know, he had a head wound.

Beast is supposed to have a head wound.

So, you know, and he, he had the Abraham Accords, you know, he's, he's supposed to enact a covenant in the Middle East. And I'm, I'm like, no, you don't understand. Daniel, chapter nine.

[01:34:57] Remy: Man, it's so crazy.

[01:34:59] Chris: I can't wait till I do. Daniel.

[01:35:02] Remy: It's so crazy because like the dispensationalists especially that I grew up with, I remember the scaredest I've ever been was in fifth grade we had a guy come and talk to. I went to a Pentecostal Holiness Christian school. And in fifth grade we had a guy come and talk to us about the temple and how the Jews have everything they need to rebuild the temple, like all the supplies, the bricks and everything. And it's on standby and they're just waiting for whatever, you know, something thing and that when that thing happens, that's the end of the world. And then they're going to rebuild the whatever. And I was so scared. But years and years and years later, probably two, two years Ago or so I realized they've already. The third temple has already been built. Like the Antichrist temple has already been built on that spot. It's the Dome of the Rock, dude. They have a mosque on the temple ground. How is that not the Antichrist third Temple?

It's been built, guys.

[01:36:03] Chris: That's a good.

Well. And even that like the idea.

I don't know. I always encourage people to go through my study in Hebrews, you know, that's the basis for the.

[01:36:18] Remy: Available for members only on the Lutheran answers table Talk. Get a membership. It's there.

[01:36:25] Chris: Nice plug. There you go. Thank you.

But the. The building of. The building of the temple, if. If you look at it in. In light of. Of Hebrews, there's nothing to desecrate because it would. It would never be holy to begin with. You know, it's like, oh, yeah, reinstituting the animal sacrifices is tantamount to crucifying Christ all over again. So they can build a building and they can kill animals in it, but it doesn't take away sins. It doesn't.

[01:36:55] Remy: Yeah.

[01:36:56] Chris: You know, it's an abomination to begin with. So there's.

[01:36:59] Remy: I'm of the opinion.

I'm. I'm of the opinion that God won't even let it happen because Christ has already done the thing. There's.

[01:37:10] Chris: There.

[01:37:10] Remy: I think God sets hard limits on humanity. There are just things that we are not allowed to do that will never be allowed to do. Trespass, the speed of light. There's just a hard limit, you know, And God says thus far and no farther. Like he. Like he says with the sea, he says to humanity. And I think that's one of those things. There's not going to be another Jewish temple with animal sacrifices because Christ has already done the thing. There's a Talmudic story of where they have the scapegoat and they tie a red scarf around it or like a red ribbon around the scapegoat, and they send it into the wilderness after putting the people's sins upon it. And when the scapegoat comes back, the. The red scarf is white. When it finds its way back to the camp. And that's how they know God has forgiven their sins.

Because the. The red of the. Their sin has been turned white as snow. Whatever.

And there is. In the year of Jesus death, they send out a scapegoat with the red scarf. And when it comes back, it's still red.

And there. There is much Jewish speculation about why wasn't the scapegoat accepted well, it's because Jesus was the scapegoat that year, you know, once and for all.

And so anyway, I just. I'm of a firm believer that these. That these things just won't happen anymore. God's put a hard limit on that. I think there won't be another Jewish temple. There won't be the whole idea.

[01:38:46] Chris: And the whole idea is predicated upon a later writing in the book of Revelation and an interpretation of Daniel 9 that says that the.

The final seven promised by God through Gabriel to Daniel is a future seven and that it's referring to the Antichrist, you know, in this covenant that the Antichrist is supposed to declare, when, in fact, you know, when you study the rest of that promise, it's all about Jesus, you know, and to put this gap in there between the 69th and the 70th seven just doesn't even. It doesn't make any kind of sense, Biblically or otherwise. I mean, can you imagine if the Lord told Jeremiah, you know, you guys will be in Babylon for 70 years, and then, you know, 2,000 years later, he's like, oh, yeah, I meant to tell you there's a gap between the 69th and the 70th year. I don't think that would go over real well.

So, you know, I think that final seven was referring to Jesus and his ministry. And the abomination that causes desolation was the crucifixion. You know, it was the. It caused the earthly temple to become desolate because he inaugurated the new covenant. And then the final three and a half years after that was the rest of the promises God fulfilled to the Jews. And there's a.

A big shift in Acts, you know, where they go from preaching to the Jews to preaching to the Gentiles.

So I. I think at that point, it's like all of those promises given by Gabriel were fulfilled. And one of the things in my Luke study, I. I just pointed out the fact that Gabriel was the one that delivered the message to Mary and to Zechariah.

And, you know, that's like a bookend. You know, that's the only other time Gabriel shows up in Scripture. And so I look at it as a bookend, saying, hey, you know that promise that I made to Daniel way back in the day? Well, it's. It's coming true now, you know, and he uses the language at the end of Malachi in reference to John, you know, as if to say, you know, how God's been silenced for the last 400 years. Well, you know, here we're picking right back up where we left off. You know, this is, this is giving me the fulfillment for everything. And in Matthew, he has the magi come out and give the gifts.

And Daniel was the chief of the magi. So, you know, I just look at that as, you know, whatever astrological signs that Daniel had put down, you know, saying that the Messiah is going to come at this point in time. And they were looking to see if his prophecy was coming true because he was so well respected as the seer of, interpreter of visions and prophetic or a prophet of the Lord. Sure.

So, you know, I think that the magi is, as a testament to the promise of Daniel or promise given to Daniel coming, coming true.

[01:42:11] Remy: That's awesome.

[01:42:12] Chris: Now I'm excited about going through Daniel. After I get through Jeremiah, I'll be going through Daniel. I've been systematically, you know, I wanted to cover the post exile prophets. So I, you know, I did Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, and then I did the, the post exile, you know, history books of Nehemiah, Ezra, and then I threw in Esther and, you know, from there we started going through the, the pre exile prophet. So, you know, Zephaniah and Habakkuk.

[01:42:49] Remy: And now has anyone actually read Habakkuk?

[01:42:52] Chris: I figure, oh yeah, Habakkuk's a great book. I mean, it's short. It doesn't take.

[01:43:00] Remy: I've heard, you know, I've heard too.

[01:43:01] Chris: Long to get through it.

[01:43:02] Remy: I, I've heard it's great, but I don't, I don't think I've actually read any. It's one of those books where you're like, oh yeah, Habakkuk. Yeah, that's in there. That's in the list of books.

[01:43:14] Chris: It's.

Well, and it's, it's one that gets referenced in the New Testament. You know, there's a part in Hebrews I think that I think makes a veiled reference to Habakkuk.

No, no. I loved your podcast on Jonah. I, Jonah is one of my favorite Old Testament prophets. You know, I wish, I wish I was in on that discussion because the only thing I would have added is that Jonah's deliverance from the great fish would have terrified the Ninevites because they worshiped Dagon. You know, Dagon was a, their fish God, Poseidon or Neptune or whatever.

Yeah. So Jonah being delivered from the great fish would have been a sign. You know, Jesus dude said Jonah was a sign to the Ninevites.

[01:44:06] Remy: God is constantly, constantly delivering elves to Pagan deities just like personally hand addressed delivering huge losses to pagan deities. It does not stop. The, the train does not have brakes.

[01:44:24] Chris: Yeah. Exodus was filled with it.

[01:44:26] Remy: Yeah.

[01:44:27] Chris: Even to the point where when you finally get to the, the Red Sea, not the Sea of Reeds.

Amen.

Israel is camped right before the temple of BAAL Zephon, the Lord of the sea.

And so that's when, you know, Pharaoh gets it in his heart that like, well, he, you know, he may have destroyed all the Egyptian gods, but, you know, surely being backed up to the sea, we can appeal to the Canaanite BAAL and you know, goes after the Israelites. And so the Lord, you know, this, he's. He separates the sea and drowns the, the Egyptians, you know, and BAAL Zafan's temple is destroyed. And you know, God is the victor. I mean, throughout the entire. Why I'd even say in the New Testament, because proclaiming Christ as Lord is God's conquering of the Caesars. But.

[01:45:31] Remy: Well, yeah, they called the Christians atheists, you know, because they had all the gods and we only had the one. And so they called us the atheists because we only had the one God. And so they told Saint Polycarp, they said, all you have to do is denounce the atheists and we'll let you live. And he turns to the Coliseum and says, away with you atheists, to all the Romans, because he's saying, you know, your gods aren't even real, you know.

[01:46:04] Chris: Yeah.

[01:46:07] Remy: Constant God, just winning. I love it.

[01:46:15] Chris: So much winning.

[01:46:17] Remy: You're not.

[01:46:18] Chris: That's why Trump loves our God. There's so much winning, so much winning.

[01:46:22] Remy: You won't know what to do. You're not going to be able to stand it. You're going to be like, we're so sick of winning.

That's great.

Oh, man.

How do you just to close us out here, how do you structure family devotions?

[01:46:47] Chris: Well, for us, we do it in the evenings just because my wife goes to work at like 5:00am and you know, I'd never be able to get my son up that early unless it was football season and, you know, evening time, everyone's sort of a captive audience, you know, so we can have a fruitful discussion. But I imagine, you know, every, every family is going to have their own time that they do it. You know, maybe it's around the dinner table.

The, the key is just that you find a, a consistent time and let it be a habit, you know, because the, it gets to the point where, you know, at least for, for My son, you know, he, he looks forward to it, you know, so he's, he's the one that is like, oh, is it time for devotion? So it's, it's just, it becomes something that they, they bank on. You know, there's so many things, things in this world that, you know, kids just experience change all the time.

[01:47:56] Remy: Yeah.

[01:47:56] Chris: That. To have, you know, certain, certain things that are fixed, you know, and the nice thing about having it on the web is that, you know, even if he's away at, you know, like he went to Vocadio a few weeks back, you know, so we can, we can still do them over FaceTime.

But yeah, I just, I, I think the, the routine is, is really important. And then, you know, every day I, you know, try to tie things back to the, the previous day. So there's always context and that's, I mean, that's really about it. You know, I think if, if kids see that parents actually believe in this stuff, then they do too. You know, it's like.

[01:48:50] Remy: Yeah.

[01:48:50] Chris: And you can tell when someone believes in it because they, they're dedicated to it. They take it seriously.

You know.

You know, obviously no amount of apologetics when somebody into the kingdom, it's, you know, the gospel is the power of God and the salvation. So, you know, the more time that you can spend, you know, actually dealing with the words of God. The words of the word of God does its work.

[01:49:22] Remy: Amen.

Amen.

Chris, thank you so much.

[01:49:29] Chris: It's as simple as that. I don't.

Oh, man, it's my pleasure. Thanks for inviting me.

[01:49:36] Remy: Yeah, man.

[01:49:37] Chris: So. And thanks for including my, my study and your, your membership.

[01:49:45] Remy: Yeah, I hope.

[01:49:46] Chris: Yeah. Thank people.

[01:49:47] Remy: No, I mean, you're thanking me, but I need to be thanking you because. Thanks for giving me the content before we go. Anything we can plug for you. There's going to be at least 35 people that will hear this. So, you know, not to brag.

[01:50:05] Chris: I just, I mean, if people, if people go to labellife.com that's the, the, the study site. And then, you know, I have a resources drop down that has a books area that has the different books that I have. You know, I, I do them all through Amazon. You know, I'd love to do them through cph, but I don't know how to go about that route.

[01:50:32] Remy: It's. So it would be too expensive.

[01:50:37] Chris: Yeah. You know, I, I just tried to send them a, a brilliant, if I may say so, idea of how they can do their shipping so that it would reduce the price of their shipping and be more friendly to people that want to order.

And I just, I never heard anything from them, so it's kind of disappointing to me because I, well, I would think that they would want people to order stuff.

[01:51:03] Remy: All those, all those prices, though, that you're seeing on the front end, like, they're. That.

Never mind, never mind. 8th Commandment. God bless them. CPH, they're doing God's work. They're putting out, you know, they're putting out great content. So God bless you, cph. If you can afford cph, then you should definitely support them.

[01:51:25] Chris: They're great.

And if you can't, go to my place or my site and get stufflife.com.

[01:51:35] Remy: It'S cheaper than CPH.

[01:51:38] Chris: There you go. I should put that on the site.

[01:51:41] Remy: You should.

Chris, thank you so much, man.

[01:51:45] Chris: Yeah, thanks, Remy. Take care.

Today I'm joined by Gage Garlinghouse to discuss his work on Sacred Hours and the Lutheran Sanctoral Calendar.

• Just & Sinner

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[00:00:01] Remy: Hello and welcome to Lutheran Answers. Today I am joined by Mr. Gage Garlinghouse. Gage, how are you, bud?

[00:00:07] Gage: I'm doing well, Remy. How are you?

[00:00:09] Remy: I'm doing well. We know each other because of the aalc. Yeah, yeah. We.

[00:00:16] Gage: To your chagrin.

[00:00:17] Remy: Yeah. We've met at various conferences and conventions. In person, we've hung out.

We have.

Sorry, my cat. We have.

We've had several classes together.

[00:00:32] Gage: Yeah.

[00:00:33] Remy: During which.

[00:00:34] Gage: Your chagrin.

[00:00:35] Remy: Yeah.

[00:00:35] Gage: Well, you're.

[00:00:36] Remy: I was gonna say you're actually not the worst person to have a class with.

[00:00:42] Gage: That's a win. That's a win.

[00:00:44] Remy: Yeah. Yeah. There are others worse, but it's great because I can just kind of springboard. You can be real smart and I can just kind of springboard off of that and look smart, and so that's what I like.

[00:00:55] Gage: Oh, that's unfortunate, because I was hoping this would be the reverse.

[00:00:58] Remy: No, no, no.

The only other thing I really know about you gauge is that you pretend to have a girlfriend on the Internet. So.

[00:01:11] Gage: Hi, Anna.

[00:01:11] Remy: I know you'll listen to this, so tell me.

Yes, that's right. Anna.

Yeah. Really creative, Gage. Good job.

[00:01:24] Gage: Wait until you hear her middle name. It's even less.

[00:01:28] Remy: Is her last name Smith?

[00:01:30] Gage: No, no, her last name is a lot more creative. But her first two names are Anna Marie, which is.

[00:01:37] Remy: Which totally not made up.

[00:01:40] Gage: Oh, she gets so mad. She's like, this is so basic. I sound like a boat.

[00:01:46] Remy: It would be Maria, though, right? It would be Anna. Maria would be a boat.

[00:01:52] Gage: Probably. I don't know. I like. I don't know anything about them.

[00:01:56] Remy: Before we get into it, I do want to say you were instrumental in this.

[00:02:00] Gage: I was. I was.

[00:02:01] Remy: This is great. I love this.

[00:02:03] Gage: I'm so glad.

[00:02:05] Remy: If people don't have this, they need to get this. It's from the old Justin Center. Yeah. Product placement. Wonderful little book. A lot easier.

[00:02:16] Gage: Just so we're clear, we don't get any of the money?

[00:02:18] Remy: No money? No. Jordan keeps all of the money for himself. So, yeah.

[00:02:26] Gage: Justin center totally makes enough money for him to do that.

[00:02:29] Remy: Yeah. Yep. Please don't kill me, Dr. Cooper.

[00:02:33] Gage: So.

I love you.

[00:02:38] Remy: That's okay. He doesn't listen to this.

[00:02:40] Gage: It's fine.

[00:02:40] Remy: As long as no one tags him, we'll be.

[00:02:42] Gage: But his wife does.

[00:02:44] Remy: Oh, that's true.

[00:02:48] Gage: Who is lovely, lovely woman.

[00:02:50] Remy: Truly lovely woman. And Dr. Cooper himself is very nice. I have often been within it several yards of him, and he's been very nice.

[00:03:02] Gage: So he's talked to me. It's Amazing. Wow.

[00:03:06] Remy: Wow. Yeah. Yeah. I. I went up to him at the National Convention this last year, and I was like, oh, hey, Dr. Cooper. I'm, you know, I'm Remy Shepard. And he was like, oh, yeah, you're the guy from.

Yeah. You know, you do good. You do good stuff. And I like, oh, man. You know that. It meant a lot. It meant a lot.

[00:03:25] Gage: Is that. Is that what happened when you reached out to Pastor Roseboro, too, about being on the show? It's like, no.

[00:03:30] Remy: Roseboro listens to my show faithfully. Rose.

[00:03:33] Gage: Rose.

[00:03:33] Remy: A big Lutheran answers Stan.

[00:03:35] Gage: Okay.

[00:03:36] Remy: Okay.

[00:03:38] Gage: To be honest, that doesn't surprise me.

Yep.

[00:03:43] Remy: Well, hang on.

So, Gage, tell me a little bit more about yourself. How long have you been a Lutheran?

[00:04:00] Gage: Well, the short of it is technically my whole life. The long of it is bits and pieces. I can give you the full story if you want, but.

[00:04:09] Remy: Yes.

[00:04:10] Gage: Okay. So I was born to a family. The Garling Houses have always been Presbyterian for as far back as I can trace.

[00:04:19] Remy: Okay.

[00:04:19] Gage: Because we married one Scottish lady right before the American Revolution, and apparently she was pretty enough to make us convert.

[00:04:26] Remy: Yep.

[00:04:27] Gage: So. But we have a history of. Every woman we've ever married is Lutheran.

[00:04:32] Remy: Hmm.

[00:04:34] Gage: Don't ask me how, but it works out. And it worked out with my parents, too. So I was baptized in the PC USA in the hopes. Yeah. To be fair, the pastor was great. The church body, not so much.

[00:04:47] Remy: I'm sure the pastor was a very nice woman.

[00:04:51] Gage: I would have been baptized again. Not really. Not actually want to make this clear. Not. But.

[00:04:58] Remy: But maybe. I don't know. I don't know.

[00:05:02] Gage: Who knows? Maybe she was secretly a Mormon.

[00:05:04] Remy: Definitely, definitely would not have been baptized again. Unless.

[00:05:08] Gage: Yeah, it's like one of those Roman things where Father has actually been saying the wrong words, and all of a sudden, three generations of a family have never been baptized.

No, I was baptized in the PC usa, But after that, it did not have the intended effect of trying to get my family to come back to the church.

And so my mother went, okay, I'm raising him Lutheran. Well, she was raised in the old alc, so all she knew was the elca. So I spent most of my life in the elca.

And I like to describe the parish I was in is one of the one was in is a parish that the bishop just kind of ignored.

The pastor there was too conservative for her to do what she wanted. So to tell you, the kind of guy he is, he bought me my first book of Concord.

[00:06:02] Remy: Oh.

[00:06:02] Gage: It's like, this is who Hilariously, the other pastor told me, don't bother with it. That's just a seminary textbook, which, oh, wow. Tells you the attitudes you're dealing with here. But I was in the elca. I've wanted to be a pastor my entire life. This pastor was training me and went to the 2018 youth gathering, which is the one in Houston. And for those who don't know, this is the one where Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton walked out on stage with a trans child and the child's mother and proudly supported it.

That's the famous part. The part that got me when I was there was Nadia Bolsweber came out and took the baptismal liturgy, one of the most beautiful pieces of work the church has ever been able, by the grace of God, to produce.

[00:06:49] Remy: Right.

[00:06:49] Gage: Completely changed it. Made it the most heretical, liberal mess you've ever heard.

And I got back and I told my pastor, I don't. I don't know what I believe right at the moment. I know it's not that, though.

[00:07:05] Remy: Oh, gosh.

[00:07:07] Gage: And so he said, okay, I understand.

And I left the elca. And then I never. I like to say I never stopped believing in God, but I definitely stopped believing in the church. I was like, well, if that's the church, I'm good. Yeah, I will find my own way.

But as the Lord is want to do, he smacked me over the head really quickly and told me to knock that crap out.

Still does that regularly, by the way.

And he sent me a girl at the time who was not great on theology, but she regularly attended her church. The one thing she was definitely was a Christian.

And I like this girl enough to go, you know, I should probably figure this whole thing out.

So it gets me to read the Bible for the first time, and I go, great, I believe this. Now let's find some people who believe this.

And then in the greatest act of providence, in a weird way, Covid happens. And so now I have an unbelievable amount of free time to go and research other church bodies. And also everybody's livestreaming their services now, so I can go and listen and watch. Yeah, so I. I watched Baptists, Presbyterians, Methodists, the whole. The whole gambit.

Unlike you, I never spent any time with the Charismatics, though.

[00:08:31] Remy: Oh, man, missing out.

[00:08:34] Gage: That was pretty quick out.

I take that back. I think I watched one Assemblies of God service and the lady up on. Was it a lady? I don't remember.

All I remember is they started speaking in tongues, and I went, wait, what? Nope, I'm good.

[00:08:52] Remy: Should have Bought a Honda.

[00:08:55] Gage: I'm more of a shoulda bought a Kia kind of guy.

[00:08:58] Remy: Amen, brother.

[00:09:00] Gage: So we. So I start watching these services.

Baptists get ruled out pretty quickly because while I didn't understand justification as a Lutheran would, I did have enough Sacramentology beat into me to know this doesn't seem right.

Then I go to the Methodist, because that's what my girlfriend was.

I left pretty quickly after reading some Wesley. He does have some great.

[00:09:24] Remy: Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You're smarter than me. And I just want to know if you're gonna back me up on this. Wesley, terrible theologian. Really, really not good theologian. People, like, get super hyped about Wesley and I cannot figure it out.

[00:09:41] Gage: So he's great. If you want to be in a Reformed Arminian, and by that I mean buy into some of Calvin's points, but still be an Arminian.

[00:09:51] Remy: Right.

[00:09:52] Gage: But for example, in his explanatory notes on the New Testament, which is a Wesleyan standard, that's as close as a confession of faith as they get. Think. But they use them like the Anglicans use their formularies.

[00:10:04] Remy: Oh, okay. Yeah.

[00:10:05] Gage: So it's that kind of a tradition. It's one of their standards. It's those. It's his standard sermons, and it's the Articles of Religion that he revised. So he took the Church of England, revised their articles, and those are their standards.

[00:10:19] Remy: And just like the Church of England, you don't actually have to believe any of it to be a Methodist.

[00:10:25] Gage: To the Global Methodist's credit, you do.

[00:10:27] Remy: Oh, good. Okay.

[00:10:28] Gage: So. So the Global Ma. Now, grant, it's still a little loosey goosey, but they will actually require you to believe things.

[00:10:35] Remy: Good, good.

[00:10:36] Gage: Yeah.

But like in his explanatory notes on John 3, because if you want to understand Wesley, you have to understand his idea of the new birth. Like, that's. It was just in the water.

And he explicitly says baptism is not the new birth.

[00:10:51] Remy: Oh.

[00:10:52] Gage: And that's all he says, by the way. He doesn't even deal with what the water in John 3 is. He just says, it is clear. It's not baptism. Anyways, moving on to this other thing.

[00:11:01] Remy: Yeah.

[00:11:02] Gage: Wait, what?

[00:11:03] Remy: Yeah, it's not. Well, here's the thing, Old John, it's. It's not that clear, actually. Yeah.

[00:11:09] Gage: And he says it like, it's just obviously. What. What else could it be? So I always laugh when I see Wesleyans defending baptismal regeneration because I'm like, okay, Calvin, I see what you're doing.

[00:11:21] Remy: Yeah, it's like, it's like reading through just about any Reformed study Bible. Yes. And then you hit, like, first Peter 3, 20 tons of notes. First Peter 3, 21 crickets. First Peter 3, 22 tons of notes.

[00:11:37] Gage: Well, because the new birth is mentioned, so I know this isn't about Methodism, but I just have to.

[00:11:43] Remy: It's fine. Yeah.

[00:11:44] Gage: The new birth isn't talked about in that term a whole lot. Like it's you must be born again is brought up a couple of times now. The actual theological meaning is all over the place. But you would think that for a guy whose entire movement is based upon the idea of preaching to people about the new birth, living out the Christian faith, and truly being given a new heart, you'd think he'd have some more to say about John 3, where Christ explicitly says, you must be born again.

Nope.

[00:12:22] Remy: Just gonna. Just gonna let that one hang.

[00:12:25] Gage: Yeah. And it is so weird because he gives some notes, and I disagree with all of them, but besides the point, he gives some notes and he's genuinely being a very. I'm gonna upset every Methodist with this one. He's being a very good Calvinist in how he goes about dealing with some of these things.

[00:12:41] Remy: Just so you know, as we continue down the John Wesley rabbit hole here, this is. The show is not called Methodist Answers, so fire away.

[00:12:50] Gage: True entire sanctification, Am I right?

[00:12:54] Remy: Yeah, Yeah. I had a teacher at my charismatic high school. I went to a charismatic Christian high school associated with my church. And we had. We had hired a Methodist teacher because Charismatics, much like Anglicans. This is also not Anglican Answers.

[00:13:09] Gage: You can believe anything you want to be an Anglican.

[00:13:11] Remy: So, yeah, you will. You can believe anything you want be charismatic. That's why they're so full of heresy. As long as you can roll around on the floor during the emotional music, you're. You're in, bro.

[00:13:21] Gage: Yeah.

[00:13:22] Remy: So we hired a Methodist, which I.

[00:13:24] Gage: Couldn'T, by the way.

[00:13:25] Remy: Yeah, yeah.

[00:13:26] Gage: I never could. I always thought it looked stupid.

[00:13:28] Remy: No, I mean, you know, I've done it. It's kind of fun. So we.

We had a Methodist.

[00:13:33] Gage: I'll take your word for it.

[00:13:35] Remy: And she. She upset everybody when she started talking about, you know, sort of Wesleyan perfectionism in this entire sanctification, this idea that she could go without sinning. Really.

[00:13:48] Gage: Charismatics got upset about that. Interesting.

[00:13:51] Remy: Yeah.

[00:13:51] Gage: Praise God.

[00:13:52] Remy: Yeah. Because she said. Because she. Well, she. And she specifically, I think, said during, like, a teacher devotion that she was sinless now and really upset some people.

[00:14:03] Gage: That reminds me of a story that Our beloved father and president of our seminary, Bishop Lyons. Bishop Curtis Lyons, who's just an angel.

He likes to tell the story of one time he came across a man who. And I think he said he was a pastor who said, I don't sin anymore.

[00:14:23] Remy: Wow.

[00:14:23] Gage: And I'm just like, teach me.

[00:14:27] Remy: Yeah.

[00:14:27] Gage: What am I doing there? To quote the Desert Fathers, how does. How do I become all flame like you?

[00:14:34] Remy: Yeah. Honestly.

[00:14:35] Gage: Which is legitimately some advice they give, by the way.

[00:14:37] Remy: You.

[00:14:37] Gage: You must become all flame.

[00:14:40] Remy: I'm scared to know what that means.

[00:14:43] Gage: It's. What they want is for you to. To participate more in God. So the whole point is, like, when they say all flame, imagine, like, Holy Spirit, fire on Pentecost kind of flame. Not, oh, no, I'm in hell. I quite literally am all flame, though I guess based on the wording, that does fit.

But no. So I spent some time with the Wesleyans, mostly his girlfriend. I am just very. I want to know.

She was not, at least at the time, theologically a Wesleyan. She was just blank evangelical. But she attended the Methodist Church, and I just couldn't with Wesley. Entire sanctification was one. Sacraments were another. It's just the basic run list that every Lutheran will give about why they're not a Wesleyan. So that leads me to Presbyterians, because I'm like, oh, well, my grandfather was one. Maybe I should look at it. He doesn't seem like.

I look at him. And a couple of problems arise.

The nearest conservative Presbyterian church is not a realistic, like, location to drive to, which, unfortunately, is a practical concern. How am I supposed to be in a Christian community I can't be a part of? Yeah.

And then also this. Honestly, it's the same issues that I had with Wesley. I couldn't get behind the sacraments. Well, baptism regenerates, just not at baptism. Wait, what? What.

[00:16:12] Remy: So what you're saying is that baptism is an outward sign of an inward cha.

Wait.

[00:16:21] Gage: And then also just double predestination. So, again, all the same stuff every Lutheran will say.

And at this point, I'm feeling kind of. Kind of doomed. Like, well, what. What am I gonna tell her?

Well, then I discover the magic that is the papacy, Orthodoxy. And by magic, I mean they have really pretty art. Mm.

But as I soon discovered, too Western to be an Easterner and too Protestant to be a Roman.

[00:16:52] Remy: Mmm.

[00:16:53] Gage: And as I had just experienced, apparently I'm too Catholic to be a Protestant. So now I really feel just doomed.

And so I'm not considering Lutheranism at this point because, again, All I know is the elca. I don't even know the Missouri Synod, aalc. Anything exists at this point, which is to my shame, considering, like, half of my family was a part of a Missouri Senate church. So that's to my shame.

Mea culpa. But so I start looking, and the only thing I can find is Anglicanism.

And I'm like, well, cool. They've got. I've also discovered the fathers by this point, so now I'm like, just especially about baptism. Very convinced that this. It's not even just my understanding. This was the Catholic understanding.

Small C here for those just listening.

But I started looking at Anglicans, and as we just said in. Unfortunately, you can really just run the gambit and be an Anglican. You can be a charismatic Anglican, though all the other Anglicans will deny that one. You can be. You can be Rome without the Pope and be an Anglican.

[00:18:06] Remy: You can be Rome with the Pope and be an Anglican.

[00:18:09] Gage: Yeah. Thanks to Benedict, you can now be Rome with the Pope and be Anglican. Although I don't think they'd say that, but whatever.

You can. You can be Calvin with bishops.

[00:18:21] Remy: Mm.

[00:18:22] Gage: And be an Anglican, which, admittedly, I always found to be the most attractive because it felt the most honest to the. To the formularies. But.

And it's not to say that what Anglicanism does. Well. They. They don't. They do well. They really do. The problem is they major in the accidentals and not so much in the. The substance. To quote a very dear Anglo Catholic friend, they're called the Articles of Religion, not Articles of doctrine for a reason.

And to go back to the Presbyterian point, the nearest Anglican church that isn't the Episcopalians is, like, an hour away.

[00:19:02] Remy: Right.

[00:19:03] Gage: And it, like, has seven people attending regularly.

In their defense, it's a church plant, so I can't get too angry about that one. But.

So I'm legitimately like, well, the Anglicans feel like the ones I agree with the most, but there's no Anglicans here. And the only way for me to be an Anglican is to be in communion with people who ordain women.

And that's like the. Don't talk about this issue.

So at this point, I go. And I quite literally rediscover that Book of Concord my pastor had bought me. And I say, out of respect for you, I will read this book. I read it, and I'm just like, wow, this is awesome. It's just such a shame nobody else seems to believe it in the world.

[00:19:46] Remy: Oh, no, we need better marketing.

[00:19:50] Gage: Yeah, that Sounds like the perennial Lutheran problem.

But that leads me to YouTubing videos about Book of Concord. I find Dr. Cooper's videos. I interestingly don't find the AALC because of him somehow missed that he was a part of the aalc. But I did find confessional Lutheranism. And by this point, the point I have determined I'm a confessional Lutheranism.

I am confessional Lutheranism, by the point.

[00:20:21] Remy: All right, well, the show's all yours, bud. I'm going home.

[00:20:25] Gage: I am the Lutheran answer.

God help us all if that's true.

No. So I. By the time I've realized I am a confessional Lutheran, that girl breaks up with me, and thankfully, God gave me. I now have a church to go to, but. And so I'm looking at the seminaries, I'm looking at Fort Wayne, St. Louis, and it's just personal problems, other issues that mean I just can't go right now. But I feel this call to be a pastor. And I'm still dealing with the breakup. And my beloved cousin is finally tired of listening to me mope. And so he tells me, gage, you need to do two things. Number one, get interested in sports so we have something to talk about. I did. And number two, get on Twitter and complain like a normal human being.

I did get on Twitter, didn't complain about the breakup.

I don't think you would probably know better.

[00:21:26] Remy: All right, Internet, go ahead and search. It's Alightone.

[00:21:33] Gage: Watch me, like, watch me have complained about it and just not remember it at all. Well, that prompts me to start following some Lutherans, which leads me to people like, starting with Dr. Cooper, but also you on your old account and your pastor, who.

And then Joe reached out to me, asks if he could send my number on to, at that point, Bishop Lyons, because he is the presiding pastor at that point.

And that's how the AALC was given its institutional penance, as I like to call it.

And how. How Pastor Stoner was given his own personal penance.

[00:22:10] Remy: Poor Dean.

[00:22:12] Gage: Poor Dean.

[00:22:13] Remy: One time, it was a guy. I want to say it was like the. The pastors conference last year, where he mentioned that he was, like, taking you home.

[00:22:23] Gage: Yeah.

[00:22:24] Remy: Because I guess you're on the way to wherever he's going.

[00:22:28] Gage: We're both in Ohio, so. Right.

[00:22:30] Remy: And so he was like, yeah, so it's gonna be four and a half hours in the car with Gage, and then another hour and a half by myself. And I said, well, Dean, I don't know what sin you committed.

[00:22:39] Gage: Oh, did he Say three and a half.

[00:22:42] Remy: He always like that.

[00:22:43] Gage: It was like cuz it's from, let's just say from Toledo to Minneapolis is.

[00:22:50] Remy: Like 10, 11 hours and notoriously, notoriously small bladder Mr. Garlinghouse has stopping every hour and a half.

[00:23:03] Gage: I wish I had an excuse like that.

No, that poor man. I ride with him to events and ride with him home from events. I truly want to know what horrible sin he committed that even the Lord said, no, no, no, you penance.

[00:23:23] Remy: You should, you should do him a favor, Gage. Just fly to just fly.

[00:23:28] Gage: I did, I did. But to be fair, he gets free labor out of me.

[00:23:32] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I, I do my best, man. And I, this is, this is probably going to sound terrible and know I apologize and I, I do my best to not do labor, especially like the pastor's conference. Cuz like I'm an adult with a full time job and a family and like stuff and so when I go to like the conference I want to be on vacation and it's just, it's so brutal when like I get there and it's like, oh, we can't go to the hotel for seven hours because you got to work. It's like, oh geez, I do it, I do it. You know, I love them. I'm, I'm proud to help but man, I really like going to the hotel room and taking a nap after that flight.

[00:24:16] Gage: Yeah. The one nice thing about arriving with pastor Stoner is we arrive at night so I get to sleep because it's late and we're not going to the church or the convention center a day early. Yes, we get there a day early so we can set up, do all that stuff and then we leave after everybody but the clergy commission has left because we've torn down and packed the car and everything.

[00:24:40] Remy: Yeah. And honestly, I would love to spend 18 hours in a car with Dean.

It's fun. Pick his brain because like the he.

[00:24:48] Gage: Will deny this and I will be getting a text as soon as this goes live.

But the man is Mark.

[00:24:55] Remy: Clip.

[00:24:56] Gage: Really smart.

[00:24:57] Remy: Oh yeah.

[00:24:59] Gage: Incredibly smart. Incredibly pastoral.

[00:25:03] Remy: We are so blessed. Our little association is so blessed to have all of the men that we have. I mean we have some truly wonderful men.

[00:25:12] Gage: And then there's us.

[00:25:13] Remy: Yeah, unfortunately. Look, somebody has to drag down the average. You know what I mean?

[00:25:19] Gage: Hey, somebody like, like I said, institutional penance for what? I don't know, but don't know.

[00:25:28] Remy: So you discover Lutheranism and my pastor Joe gets you into the aalc.

[00:25:34] Gage: Yes, he.

[00:25:35] Remy: Wow.

[00:25:36] Gage: So by this Point. I had discovered the ALC had a seminary, and I started thinking about it, but I know absolutely nothing about the aalc. You know how they have the jokes about as soon as you start talking to a girl, she does, like, the complete stalker. Dive onto all of your social medias, who have you ever talked to kind of stuff. I did the exact opposite with the ALC and was just totally. Yeah, the vibes seem all right.

[00:26:04] Remy: And it's good vibes. It really is.

[00:26:07] Gage: They are.

Although.

Yeah. So Joe sends that. That Pastor Joe sends Bishop lines a message, and I'm at work, and I get a call, and obviously his number's not my phone anymore, but Verizon tells me Curtis lines. I'm like, okay, who is this?

So I let it go to message and starts talking, and he's like, I'm the presiding pastor of the aalc. I was given your number. I'm like, what?

[00:26:39] Remy: Huh?

[00:26:41] Gage: And he says, call me back when you get the chance. I'm like, cool. Will do. Like, two hours later, I get another call from the guy. I'm just like, hello. Hi. Ends up inviting me to the general convention back in 2022. Yeah, 2022. And immediately, by the way, after that phone call immediately puts me on stoner. It's like after one call, I am stoner's problem.

[00:27:09] Remy: He was like, I'm not dealing with this.

[00:27:12] Gage: Which, fair enough. The man had earned his rest, and then he ran for seminary president.

[00:27:19] Remy: Yeah.

[00:27:20] Gage: Because he's a saint and just can't stop.

Yeah. But one phone call was all it took for him to go. This feels like a stoner problem.

[00:27:32] Remy: So, Gage, I just want to say, for anybody listening at this point in time, we pick on you, but we love you so much.

Guys like you, man, you really are the backbone of our little association. Just out here, out here doing the Lord's work.

[00:27:47] Gage: Nah, I am just so grateful because I realized we haven't even talked about our topic yet, but I'm just gonna brag on the ALC for a little bit because, Lord, we can't do that enough.

It's just so wonderful. You. We get together maybe once as a. As a body, once a year, and then all the laity, not even all the lady, but as a whole body every couple years. And it's just.

It genuinely feels like, oh, you're the family I've been looking for.

[00:28:19] Remy: Yeah.

[00:28:20] Gage: This. When you. When we get together, you read about how the early church was in the book of acts and how they cared for one. Everything. It's like, wow. This is who these guys are.

[00:28:31] Remy: Yeah.

[00:28:32] Gage: Like, wow.

[00:28:33] Remy: You can, you can just sit. This is something. So this will be my third pastors conference this year and.

Yeah. Nice. And you can, you can just go and sit down with anybody, whether you know them or not, and just immediately you have found a friend and a brother that you know is just right there. It's so amazing. I can't describe it, but.

[00:29:04] Gage: And the laity, at least in my experience, are also like that. So this past summer, our seminary hosted a practicum at Ascension in Ames, Iowa. If you're in Iowa and looking for a church, Ascension, actually there. We have several churches in Iowa, two of which are named Ascension.

[00:29:21] Remy: Either one is fine.

[00:29:22] Gage: Yes, both of them. Wonderful.

But we were there because the pastor there, Pastor Twydo, had a little area that could house us. And the ladies of the church came, they cooked for us, they took care of us, made different church members stop by and my goodness, you would have thought you were their long lost grandson.

Even some of our older seminarians, who I think were older than some of the ladies were still the long lost grandson. It's like, yeah. Oh, you poor, precious little thing. I will care for you. It's like, thank you. I don't know who you are. I don't know your name yet, but thank you.

[00:29:57] Remy: Yeah, it was great.

[00:30:00] Gage: And that's how that's been my experience, the alc. See, now that I've said that though, and especially Stoner, I feel like I'm just gonna get dragged behind the SUV this year. But. Oh, well, I'm not allowed to say nice things about him, I don't think.

[00:30:13] Remy: Well, no, it's okay because this isn't going to air until much later.

[00:30:19] Gage: Yes, I am free.

[00:30:21] Remy: Yeah, so you're good. Until at least whatever next year's thing is.

[00:30:26] Gage: I'm going to wake up one day and there's just going to be Pastor Stoner outside my door being like, what did you say about me? How dare you spread rumors that I am a loving, caring and pastoral human being.

I have a reputation to uphold.

[00:30:40] Remy: I went to in 2019, I was brand new to the AALC.

[00:30:46] Gage: And there was a Joe that brought you in too.

[00:30:48] Remy: No, it was Roseboro.

[00:30:51] Gage: Okay, that makes sense.

[00:30:52] Remy: It was Roseboro. I wanted to be whatever that Rose bro guy was. And I said, there's no way. This little church body has like 80 churches. There's no way there's one near me. And there was one five minutes from my house and I was like, I was still just fresh enough out of the charismatics to be like, well, that means something, I think. And to this day, I still think that.

[00:31:13] Gage: Oh, yeah, no, that there's. There are moments where we can just straight up say that was divine providence.

[00:31:17] Remy: Yeah, absolutely. So. But that I had started was the Sunday before Reformation 2018. My wife and I went to Christus Victor. We sat down in the pew, and there on our little bulletin inserts, it always says, whoever's preaching that day. And it said.

It said sermon, Pastor Christina. And I was like, oh, this ain't gonna work.

Isn't what I thought it was.

[00:31:46] Gage: Oh, that Roseboro is not as equinox as I thought.

[00:31:52] Remy: No. But it turns out his name is Joseph Christina, and he's a dude. So that actually did work out just fine.

[00:31:59] Gage: And the literal St. Francis of the AALC.

[00:32:02] Remy: Really, honestly. Honestly. And so I ended up getting invited. Joe told. Well, Joe doesn't invite you to things. Joe tells you to do things, and you do them.

And so he told my interactions.

[00:32:16] Gage: That sounds about right. Yeah.

[00:32:17] Remy: It's 100.

[00:32:17] Gage: He's just straight up told me, give me your number. I'm giving it off to the same pastor.

[00:32:20] Remy: So that's how I ended up in seminary. I went to breakfast with him one time the next week. He was like, hey, you're assisting with the service today. I was like, brother, this is my second Lutheran service ever.

Ever.

But, you know, did it anyway. And then at the end of that, he was like, great, so here's how you enroll in seminary. And I was like, what? So anyway, now here I am. Awesome.

Yeah. So Joe tells me that we got invited to a Hold the Line conference in Charlotte, North Carolina. There was an LCMS church being pastored by an AALC guy.

[00:33:01] Gage: Okay.

[00:33:02] Remy: So we.

[00:33:03] Gage: We go there.

[00:33:04] Remy: And that was the first time I met Pastor Stoner. He met me at the door where, fun fact.

[00:33:11] Gage: He get in his hold the Line conference. He talks about the 2018 youth gathering where I. Where I was at.

[00:33:17] Remy: Oh, amazing.

[00:33:18] Gage: That's one of the things I had to. I'm copying my. The little guidebook they gave. Give you so he can use it in that hold the Line conference.

[00:33:27] Remy: Yeah. So it was. It was actually Lines and Cooper that were given the talks at that. Okay, okay. But Stoner met us at the door, and I did. People were paying, like, a registration fee at the door door, and I was completely unprepared. And he was like, oh, don't worry about it. You're good. And he just sent me in. And that was my first ever experience With Dean Stoner. And then also my first experience with Dr. Lyons. I started talking to him, and it's like drinking from a fire hose.

And also, do you hear the angelic.

[00:33:59] Gage: Choirs every time he speaks to. Or is that just me? Okay.

[00:34:02] Remy: Yeah. No, really, you do there. I mean, there has never been, like, a more holy and humble man, I think, on this planet than that guy. What a. What a wonderful guy.

[00:34:13] Gage: Amen.

[00:34:13] Remy: So anyway, yeah, man, we're halfway through this thing, man. Let's. I wanted to talk about. I wanted to talk about this and product placement.

[00:34:24] Gage: Buy my book. Yeah, buy Gabriel's book, actually, realistically, by Pastor Matthew Fenn. He is a fellow injustice there. Also an ALC pastor, the general editor of this. Of this book, myself and the other editor, Mr. Lancaster, just helped him out. We added things. We. We contributed things. This really is pastor. This was Pastor Fenn's main book, but it was an honor to get to help him out with it.

[00:34:52] Remy: Yeah. Also, I love that guy, too. Yes.

[00:34:56] Gage: By the way, buy the book.

[00:34:57] Remy: Yeah, buy the book. Dr. Cooper needs a second house.

[00:35:01] Gage: Could you imagine if Justin Sinner actually made him enough?

[00:35:05] Remy: It would be. It would be something.

[00:35:06] Gage: He would be ecstatic.

[00:35:08] Remy: Yeah. Yeah.

So this book, for those that don't know, has a couple different lectionaries in it, and in those lectionaries has various feast days and saints, and you have become something of the liturgical calendar guy on Twitter.

[00:35:30] Gage: Yeah.

[00:35:31] Remy: How did that come about?

[00:35:34] Gage: So before we even start work on sacred hours, this was right before I officially. This is right before I graduated from Capital University with my undergrad.

I was trying to figure out what to do with my life.

I was already scheduled to go to seminary, and that wasn't the issue. It was more. So I wanted to get my head. And this is very counterintuitive language because it's not me who gets my soul. Right. It is Christ. But we do still have to figure out, I'm a Christian, what does it mean to live like a Christian?

What does it mean to live as one who has been baptized and bought with Christ's blood? And so where that started for me was, well, I should probably be reading the Bible and praying more, which you should always.

And in it, I notice in Acts, chapter two, the. The brethren, when they got together, they said the prayers. The article there actually is important.

They. They read the sacred writings, they broke bread, they said the prayers. Well, that got me wondering what the prayers are.

And so it got me starting to pray. What's called the daily office, which is what sacred hours Is.

[00:36:47] Remy: Is.

[00:36:47] Gage: It's a book about the daily office.

Well, during the daily office, as you pointed out, it is like the divine service, like the Mass, Communion, whatever name you want to give. The liturgy has propers, and it has. Excuse me, it has ordinaries. The propers change week to week, month to month. They are proper to that day. The ordinaries are the things you go in. I know I'm singing the Kyrie today. I wish pastor had a better voice, but I know it's coming.

So things like the collects, the readings, the hymns are propers.

Those propers are influenced by the time of the church year, by what Sunday you're on. We're in. When we're recording this, we're in Ordinary time, which does not mean the Sundays are ordinary for your listeners. It just means they are ordinal. They're just numbered.

So all of that changes. And the other thing they can change based on is, is today a feast day? Is it a commemoration? What is it? And so that gets me wondering, well, what are these feasts? What are these commemorations?

And that sends me down a very large rabbit hole of trying to inculcate into my life a liturgical way of being so trying to live with the rhythm of the church, trying to live with all this. And also, just side note, I majored in history, so talking about dead people, it's just kind of my thing.

But at this point, Sacred hours is not a thing. And I take a look at good old lsb, which has matins and Vespers, which is what the daily offices in it. And the Missouri Senate has their own calendar of saints, commemorations, and feasts. And like, this is perfect. This is what I wanted. And so I spend about a month just trying to keep up with that. And I have this note. I'm like, you know, other people should really just know what the church is doing today or what the church wants us to think about today. And so I start posting about it, and. And then I expand that calendar to include things that Missouri just didn't have on it. And then sacred hours happened, and I went overboard, and here we are.

[00:39:05] Remy: When are you doing your doctoral study on any of this?

[00:39:09] Gage: Oh, this. This is my hob. This is a hobby horse, man. The calendar, the liturgy.

Yeah, this is a hobby horse. The. The thing I. If I get to do my doctorate on is actually symbolics.

The Confessions are really what brought me back to Lutheranism. I love them.

But, no, this is the hobby horse. The calendar, the saints, and then specifically the common service as it's called is my big hobby horse. And I could fill a whole program about the Common Service. But I'll spare you.

[00:39:44] Remy: Don't actually tell me more.

[00:39:47] Gage: Oh, okay. So the Common Service for just. Let's just stick with lsb because I imagine that's what most of your listeners are familiar with.

[00:39:56] Remy: Okay.

[00:39:56] Gage: The Common Service was a liturgy put together by a committee of the.

Actually, let's move back. American Lutheran history with Gage.

We American Lutherans actually start before America is even a country.

[00:40:11] Remy: Okay. All right, let's go back. Lutheran history with Gage.

[00:40:18] Gage: In the beginning.

No. So Lutheran's been in this country for a very long time, though. We've been a very minute population. We actually started here as a bunch of Danes who got lost trying to go to Newfoundland.

[00:40:32] Remy: That happens a lot with them where they get lost going somewhere and end up in America. What's up with that?

[00:40:38] Gage: I don't know. But that is the first recorded moment of Lutherans being in this country.

[00:40:42] Remy: Hor for sailors.

[00:40:44] Gage: A stout. Which you'd think would be the exact opposite.

[00:40:47] Remy: Right.

[00:40:49] Gage: The Vikings great at terror. That's actually why they ransacked everybody. They just got lost and they didn't have the.

[00:40:54] Remy: They were bad.

[00:40:58] Gage: But then New Sweden is a really the first major establishment. And then that guts gets conquered by the Dutch, which then gets conquered by England. But fast forward. There are sporadic Lutheran congregations throughout this country and Lutheran bodies start forming the. The three major ones that we hear everybody talk about are the General Synod, the General Council and the Synodical Conference. The General Synod is.

It is the predecessor of the ELCA just in terms of history, but the methodology is pretty much the same thing too. It was just. You have the name of name Lutheran on your sign. We want you coming.

The General Council were people in that body who said no, being Lutheran means something. And then the Synodal Conference was Walther and all those guys out West.

But the Common Service comes about as Lutherans in America decide, we want a common way to pray. We want a common liturgy. Hence the name. So the best and brightest of the General Council, the General Synod, and at the time the Senate, the United Synod of the South.

Yes, there were enough Lutherans in the south to constitute their own church body, apparently.

[00:42:12] Remy: Amazing.

[00:42:13] Gage: Yeah. Shocking to everyone who's ever been to the south, honestly.

But they get together and they form a committee of the best and brightest of Lutheranism. Outside of the Synodal Conference, the. The Canonical Conference really wants nothing to do with us because they think we're all a bunch of liberals, to put it bluntly.

So they. They start going through and they look at the Lutheran liturgies that were brought over by the Prussians, the Saxons, the everybody, and they realize this is not the full liturgy. See, what had happened was thanks to rationalism across the seas. You start with when Luther did his Deutsche Messe, he did not translate everything into German. Some things were left in Latin. The things that got left in Latin got dropped during the age of Rationalism.

[00:43:06] Remy: Oh, wow.

[00:43:06] Gage: Which is why if you look at, like, Muhlenberg's liturgy, when he came to America and proposed one, it's just all the things that got translated into German, he cut out all the pits that had been Latin. It's not that he didn't think they were important, it's just he didn't care about Latin.

[00:43:21] Remy: Can I. Are we getting there? Can I ask what were the Latin bits?

[00:43:25] Gage: Things like the Introit, actually. The Introit, actually, it's a lot of the propers in a lot of places. But there were actual ordinaries. And I'm trying to remember what they were. It's been a minute. Forgive me, but there were bits that were left in Latin.

Oh, hymns. A lot of hymns, too, got left in Latin.

[00:43:43] Remy: Wow.

[00:43:45] Gage: Which, if you ever want a great resource for the Latin hymns that are in English, the Liber Hymnorum, which I believe is put out by manual press, does a great job of collecting some of those.

Anyways, this committee gets together and decides we want, for the first time, because this wasn't even something the Swedes or Danish or anybody any other Lutheran church had done yet for the first time, to take the entire Western liturgy and put it into the common tongue.

And so they started doing it. They looked at the church orders, that Chemnitz, that Luther, the Melanchthon, that Bugenhagen, everybody worked on.

And they assigned some more importance, like if Chemnit's name was attached to it, it was kind of more important than some random German in Bavaria.

[00:44:30] Remy: Sure.

[00:44:31] Gage: But other things like that. And they came up with the Common Service, which for your listeners would be divine service setting three in lsb, Matins and Vespers. The Common Service refers to all three.

And this really did become the universal Lutheran liturgy in America for a good bit of time.

So much so that even the Synodical Conference, though, they thought the people who put together a bunch of liberals looked at it and said, actually, this is better than what we're doing.

So in their second or third hymnal, they actually adopted it alongside their old Prussian liturgy. And then by the time you get into tlh, the old Prussian liturgy is just gone and they're just using the common service.

And then you get to the issue of LBW and it just introduces a whole bunch of new stuff. But the common service alongside it came with a lot of propers, things like that. And again, it was their hope that this service would be a way for you to inculcate yourself not only in life of prayer and with the scripture, but also with the church.

And the matins and Vespers, by the way, in sacred hours are the common service, Matins and vespers.

So with just musical differences. The common service, by the way, is just the text, different hymnals, different people were allowed to do the settings that they wanted.

So we get all that and I get interested in it. Then Mr. Lancaster and I start working together and then we meet Pastor Fenn, all get together and because of my interest, a lot of the calendar and one of the lectionaries is me.

So.

[00:46:20] Remy: So we get which lectionary?

[00:46:22] Gage: The Saints David and Solomon lectionary.

[00:46:25] Remy: Oh yeah, I love that one.

[00:46:27] Gage: It's the whole point of that lectionary is every month you pray all 30, 150 Psalms, you read all the. All book of Proverbs, and then you will work your way through the Old and New Testament entirely throughout the year.

The other one comes, the other lectionaries are very flexible. One meant to be, how much time do you actually have in the day?

[00:46:48] Remy: Right.

[00:46:48] Gage: And then the other one is called the daily office Lectionary, which we got permission to just borrow from the acna's Book of Common Prayer.

[00:46:57] Remy: But I have to, I have to ask not to rabbit hole us again, but because it's called the Saints David and Solomon lecture. Do you think Solomon is a saint?

[00:47:09] Gage: I.

[00:47:11] Remy: Do you think he ever truly repented?

[00:47:14] Gage: See, I fall in the camp. I'm go lay out my cards. I fall in the camp. I do think he wrote Ecclesiastes and I actually tend to think he was. I tend to think actually that Ecclesiastes is his repentance. It's just an old Solomon.

I know there is some debate about who wrote Ecclesiastes and I don't want to get into that, but it really does read like.

The other reason I think is he does identify himself as a king of Israel who lives, who's ruling from Jerusalem. And realistically that gives us technically three options, but Rehoboam doesn't count.

And David, I don't see a reason for David to have written Ecclesiastes.

[00:47:55] Remy: Right. Well, he says son of David.

[00:47:57] Gage: Exactly.

[00:47:58] Remy: In verse one. In verse one, he just says.

He just says the son of David ruler in Jerusalem.

[00:48:05] Gage: Yeah.

[00:48:06] Remy: He doesn't identify himself as over Israel.

[00:48:11] Gage: What am I thinking of then? Because I thought he did.

[00:48:13] Remy: Well, he does. Later in the text. He does. Okay, later in the text, but in verse one, he doesn't.

But the Septuagint nonetheless inserts over Israel there in verse one, even though it's not there in our earliest attested Hebrew texts, which is fascinating.

[00:48:32] Gage: I'm not gonna do the Septuagint debate. There are people smarter than me on that one. But I do. I think that Solomon wrote it. Regardless. We do get a huge chunk of our Old Testament from Solomon, a good chunk of Proverbs, some of the Psalms.

I'm gonna just say it and say Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon. And the more I read about it, I'm kind of convinced Job, too, But that's another. It's a. There's much smarter people than me to talk about that one. But it really does read like a discourse on the application of Proverbs.

[00:49:10] Remy: And. And I have also. I've also heard it said. And I'm not saying that this is true.

[00:49:18] Gage: You heard it here, folks. This is Pope Remy.

[00:49:22] Remy: Yeah.

[00:49:22] Gage: Speaking ex cathedra.

[00:49:24] Remy: Yep. This is. This is the true Lutheran understanding that all Lutherans subscribe to, by virtue of my having said it here on this show. But I've. I've heard it.

[00:49:34] Gage: I'm ready to add it to the Book of Concord. Don't worry.

[00:49:37] Remy: The Book of Concord? Add it to the Bible.

I've heard it said.

[00:49:44] Gage: The New New Testament.

[00:49:45] Remy: That Job is. Is a Hebrew fable.

[00:49:52] Gage: That wouldn't surprise me.

[00:49:53] Remy: That was written down for us.

Inspired by true events. Maybe, maybe not.

But it's definitely like the. The dating is like, well, it's got to be older than Abraham.

[00:50:07] Gage: Yes. You know, so the argument I've heard about Solomon writing it is obviously this comes with a caveat. All scripture is breathed out by God.

[00:50:17] Remy: Yeah.

[00:50:17] Gage: The Holy Spirit. Whether Solomon wrote it by hand or not, God, the Spirit did inspire it.

[00:50:23] Remy: Yep.

[00:50:24] Gage: So that comes with the caveat. But the. The argument for Solomon usually goes that the story of Job in some sense happened in Canaan. Because if you. If you read Job, it. It's definitely not in Israel. Well, it's in Israel, but it's not in Israel.

It reads older than the kingdoms.

[00:50:46] Remy: Yeah.

[00:50:47] Gage: And yet if you go through it, Job and his friends, for all intents and purposes, are quoting the Proverbs. All the freaking fracking time.

And yet the friends are usually just misapplying it or making this idea, this nugget of wisdom, an actual maxim that it's like, well, if I live exactly to the T. Right.

[00:51:08] Remy: Yeah.

[00:51:09] Gage: And so that's what it really reads like. And honestly, if we buy, if we believe that, if we believe Solomon wrote Ecclesiastes, the end of Job also makes a little more sense for Solomon because Ecclesiastes ends with fear God.

Just let it go. Fear God?

[00:51:24] Remy: Yeah.

[00:51:24] Gage: And Job? How does Job end? Well, to quote. Was it Mark Twain? No Mark Twain comment on Christianity. Anyways, there's a. There's an English author who comments on Job being the worst tragedy ever because it's. It just ends with God saying, I did what.

What say do you get? And they're mad because it doesn't solve the problem of evil which seeth and cope, but.

[00:51:49] Remy: Right.

[00:51:51] Gage: God said it from a whirlwind. I don't care.

Ex cathedral gauge. God talks only from tornadoes and fire. Tornadoes, dude. This.

[00:52:04] Remy: This religion is so metal. I love Christianity. God, dude.

[00:52:09] Gage: Well, at the very least, we eat the body and drink the blood of our Lord after having been literally bathed in his blood.

[00:52:16] Remy: So somebody on Twitter one time said they were like, if Jesus had been a Roman citizen instead of a Jewish citizen, he would have been beheaded. He would have been executed by beheading.

[00:52:27] Gage: Yeah.

[00:52:28] Remy: Rather.

[00:52:28] Gage: That's why Paul was beheaded.

[00:52:30] Remy: And I was like. I was like, God, dude, could you imagine how awesome our church art would be?

[00:52:37] Gage: Well, I mean, look at how it be. Look at. So on the day of recording this. This will tell your audience it is St. Denis Day. St. Denis of Paris. Yeah.

[00:52:45] Remy: They're all gonna know what day it is. Specifically now.

[00:52:49] Gage: Well, you will if you buy the book. If you buy sacred hours or just Google it. It is the traditional day, but buy the book.

[00:52:59] Remy: It's. It's great.

[00:53:00] Gage: I'm not biased or anything, but St. Denis was a Christian martyr. I believe he was the first, according to church tradition.

Bishop of Paris. And he was martyred by beheading.

If you look at any art of St. John the Baptist, it's either he's wearing his camel skins or he's holding his head.

[00:53:21] Remy: Yeah.

[00:53:23] Gage: St. Paul was executed actually for that exact reason. He was a Roman citizen. They couldn't crucify him.

[00:53:28] Remy: Yeah.

[00:53:28] Gage: So Nero just chopped his head off.

[00:53:31] Remy: There's. There's quite a few pictures in church history of various saints holding their heads.

[00:53:39] Gage: Yeah.

Because.

And dealing with the saints because, like, the reason we remember these saints. The reason we have these days is not because St. Paul was some awesome guy. He was. Who just, like, made such an impact on history that he himself is worth remembering.

He did. I. I realized I picked the worst possible example.

Let's go with St. Denis. St. Denis. It's not. The St. Denis himself was some awesome guy, and he was actually like, they beheaded him for a reason. But the reason we remember these saints is because in their lives, we can talk about God, his grace, what it means to walk as a Christian. The saints are meant to be, to us, an example, but also a lens for us to look at what God does. And in my opinion, one of the best examples Here is St. Augustine. Right. Take aside the fact that the man was just brilliant. De Trinitate on the City of God. Set those aside. The most popular work of his is probably his Confessions.

And why is that? Well, it's because it's this man genuinely going through his own walk with God and seeing the grace of God in his own life. Yeah, right. Anybody who's read The Confessions of St. Augustine can tell you he's going narrative and narrative. And then all of a sudden, he gets, like, horribly melancholy for a little bit and just starts going, oh, I'm such a fool. Why? What was wrong with me? Why? Why couldn't I see? Lord, what have I done? And then he's back, and then my lovely mother.

[00:55:20] Remy: Right.

[00:55:20] Gage: Which is true. St. Monica is wonderful. But the whole point is to see that. The whole point of the saints and seeing them as a witness is to testify to the faith, is to testify to Christ.

That's the whole point of, for example, Hebrews 11 is look at the. As we like to call it, the great hall of faith. Looking at these saints from the Old Testament and seeing the work of God throughout history and seeing these men and women who were willing to put everything on the line for a guy who, according to the secular world, was just some Palestinian Jew who liked to lead a revolt and got crucified for his troubles, when in reality, he was so much more. And we see that in their lives.

But I'm sure somebody's gonna say, that sounds great, but that sounds a little Roman Catholic to me. Right.

We can talk about the liturgy, and we'll get that same response. So it's okay.

So if you wouldn't mind, I think it would be worthwhile because there is scriptural precedent for us to not only remember the saints, but also have to feast, have feast days.

There is scriptural precedent for this. There is Scripture. And according to our confessions, there's precedent for this.

And I guess it's also worth saying in Lutheranism, we don't. In Rome, we have like the three tiered level of feast day. So you have the solemn feast. So this is Christmas, Easter, I believe.

I believe the assumption of Mary's up there.

[00:56:58] Remy: There's gotta be a Marian one.

[00:57:00] Gage: Yeah, there's a couple of the really important ones. And if I remember correctly, these overlap with what they call holy days of obligation.

So the days you go to church, you go to Mass, period. After that you get your regular feasts and festivals. And then after that it's kind of more like the, the memorials.

In Lutheranism, the way the tradition is developed is we really only have two groupings, but one of the groupings kind of does have that separation. The first is commemorations. So this is like 99% of the saint days. You, you might mention them in like the collect of the day, saying, thank you Lord for their witness. It's worth remembering them. So in our tradition, St. Denis is a commemoration.

We're not the Dennis, the Denison. We're not the denizens.

[00:57:49] Remy: We're not the denizens.

[00:57:51] Gage: Yeah.

So actually Saint Luther, his day is a commemoration as well, so.

[00:58:00] Remy: Oh, wow. You mean we don't worship Martin Luther?

[00:58:03] Gage: No, no. Thank God for him. But I'm so glad he didn't write the Augsburg Confession. I'm just gonna leave it there.

[00:58:13] Remy: Thank God.

[00:58:14] Gage: Melanchthon, too.

[00:58:15] Remy: I was on a Catholic podcast recently and, you know, he kind of asked about Martin Luther and I was like, dude, if you ask any Lutheran theologian who their top five historic theologian is, Luther's probably not even in the list.

[00:58:32] Gage: Like he's from the 20th century.

[00:58:36] Remy: Yeah, he's in like, nobody's top three. Right. Like, everybody's top three is going to be like Kimnitz, Gearhard, Pieper, Walther, or.

[00:58:45] Gage: Some German guy you've never, never heard of.

[00:58:47] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's not even Kal, obviously.

[00:58:51] Gage: Answer.

[00:58:53] Remy: Far from far, far from worshiping him. He's not even our best theology guy.

[00:58:57] Gage: No, he's not. Luther is at his best, actually, when he's talking about the Old Testament.

There's a lot of. Within Lutheran scholarly circles, it's pretty much agreed if Luther was alive today, he'd be an Old Testament professor.

[00:59:11] Remy: Yeah, his pastoral letters too. Really wonderful. Really. The brash Luther that people see from his very few polemical writings where, where he was so reckless with his language and they like to hold that up as true. Luther, you should read his letters. He's got thousands of letters that he wrote to parishioners.

And he is not brash, angry Luther. He is.

[00:59:37] Gage: And that. That is Luther. The table talk, which is pretty much what everybody cites, aside from a handful of works. That.

[00:59:44] Remy: Which is all hearsay, by the way.

[00:59:46] Gage: Yes.

[00:59:47] Remy: All secondhand.

[00:59:48] Gage: The table talk. It. I find it to be ridiculous that we translated it in Luther's works.

[00:59:54] Remy: Yeah.

[00:59:54] Gage: I think it's stupid. I think it needs to die.

It's not that there isn't some funny stuff in there. There really is. Yeah, but it's not.

Don't take it as if this is certainly what Luther said. This is certainly what Luther believed. And to be fair, Luther changes. He does over his life. He develops. In some places he gets worse, some places he gets better.

It's like everybody likes to talk about the theology cross theology of glory distinction. And it is a. It can be a very helpful distinction.

[01:00:26] Remy: It's a single throwaway line.

[01:00:27] Gage: And.

[01:00:28] Remy: What do you mean.

[01:00:31] Gage: Like. And it's not even just like, this was Luther while he was being Luther. Right. This isn't at the time Babylonian. This is, if I remember correctly, 1518 at the Heidelberg Disputation.

[01:00:43] Remy: It is.

[01:00:43] Gage: Yeah. It's the Heidelberg one year after the 95 theses, which, if you've ever read, are the least Protestant. Protestant document on the face of the planet. He spends the whole time defending the Pope because he's like, the Pope can't be this stupid. Right?

[01:00:56] Remy: Yeah.

[01:00:57] Gage: Fun fact. He was.

It's.

[01:01:00] Remy: But yeah, it's still. It's. It's a single throwaway line from a still pretty Catholic Lutheran.

[01:01:06] Gage: Yeah. And don't get me wrong, it can be a very useful thing. The Spirituality of the Cross book, modern classic.

It uses it to great effect. Also, it can be used to just say anything I don't like is theology of glory.

[01:01:21] Remy: Yeah, it's. But screens and worship. Theology of glory.

[01:01:25] Gage: Yes. I'm actually okay with this one. I'm okay with this usage. This gets the gauge seal of approval.

[01:01:31] Remy: I have seen.

I have seen screens used to very great positive effect.

[01:01:38] Gage: I haven't. But it's mostly because it was just put. They were put up poorly and it was distracting.

[01:01:43] Remy: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[01:01:44] Gage: It's like the. The TV you just hung. It shouldn't be like diagonal, guys. Pick vertical or horizontal. Pick one.

The z axis has no place here.

But no. So Luther. Luther deals a lot with us and he is a commemoration. He's a very important commemoration. Don't get me wrong, it'd be like, but he's just a commemoration. And a way to think about this, in a sense, is if. Imagine you go to a Dominican Catholic church. It's run by the order of preachers, the Dominicans, and it's the feast day of St. Dominic.

They're gonna make a big deal out of it, like it's their founder. But also, it's not as big a deal as Christmas, as Easter, as the feast of Saints Peter and Paul.

It's important to us, but it is still just a commemoration.

[01:02:42] Remy: Right.

[01:02:42] Gage: The next step up for us, though, is a feast festival. And that distinction, by the way, is not clearly defined it. What it sometimes is, is a feast is a singular day. Festivals, multiple days. But some people just throw the term around either way.

[01:03:00] Remy: Sure.

[01:03:01] Gage: And those would be feasts are things like Saints Peter and Paul, Saints Matthew, St. John, Holy Innocent, St. Stephen, Reformation Day, All Saints.

[01:03:14] Remy: Right.

[01:03:14] Gage: Things like that are feast days for us.

There are three feast days, however, that are given very special place. So if we had a place of, like, solemnity, which I actually think could be a useful distinction for these three up here, it's specifically Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost.

[01:03:32] Remy: Right.

[01:03:33] Gage: Like the three feasts, two of which are the most attended services of the church. Pentecost kind of got beaten by Mother's Day.

[01:03:44] Remy: Which go to church on Pentecost. Also an important. An important feast day.

[01:03:48] Gage: Yes. Well, no. The most attended church services are Christmas Eve, Easter, and Mother's Day.

[01:03:54] Remy: Yeah. Wow.

[01:03:55] Gage: Pentecost is not in. If I remember correctly, Pentecost might be in the top 10. Usually, though, it's. I'd be willing to bet, because confirmation, which, if you do confirmation on Pentecost, don't distract from the fact that it's Pentecost. Don't make everything about Confirmation, please.

[01:04:11] Remy: So I do have a question.

Triduum festival or liturgical season?

[01:04:23] Gage: Complicated.

Complicated. For those who don't know, that would be Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday. But realistically, Easter vigil.

And the reason it's complicated is because, language wise, it feels strange to call this a festival.

Traditionally, festivals are a little more joyous and a little less solemn.

But I also hesitate to call it a season because technically, Lent has ended by the time you get to Palm Sunday. Lent does technically end, Right. Traditionally. This is a weird anachronism. Traditionally, in the West, Lent has ended with Palm Sunday. Your Lenten fast, however, does not end until Holy Saturday.

Traditionally, it would end at noon on Holy Saturday.

So you've gone through all this stuff, but the Reason it's hard is because Holy Week is a special beast unto itself in the liturgy of the Church.

[01:05:24] Remy: Right.

[01:05:24] Gage: It is the only. Holy Week is the only thing that can displace. Well, Easter, too, but Holy Week is the only thing that can displace another feast.

So I want to say it's the.

It's a Marian feast, which, by the way, Lutherans have retained Marian feasts.

[01:05:46] Remy: Love, Mom.

[01:05:47] Gage: I knew you were gonna say that.

But no, Our lady unfortunately gets to displaced. So I believe. I want to say it is the Feast of the Annunciation, but I could be wrong.

And if it happens during Holy Week, it actually gets bumped to after the octave of Easter, which would be a festival, by the way.

So Holy Week is a very weird time liturgically, because it's also.

Those three days have liturgies unlike anything else in the church here. Because in a lot of ways, as important as Easter is, the Easter liturgy is just a really fancy, divine service.

[01:06:29] Remy: Right.

[01:06:30] Gage: To put it bluntly, whereas the Easter vigil is the divine service, plus literally four other things.

Good Friday is its own beast. It's like Tenebra is a weird service, and then Maundy Thursday is just a weird service.

[01:06:51] Remy: Yeah.

[01:06:51] Gage: So the calendar can be weird.

[01:06:54] Remy: And it's. And it's the. The fact that each one of these things has their own liturgical colors or no liturgical color.

[01:07:03] Gage: Yes.

[01:07:05] Remy: You know, I think sort of the fact that each service of Triduum. Triduum as a whole, but each service is its own unique, independent thing, I think kind of keeps it from being a liturgical season.

[01:07:20] Gage: I would agree. If anything, Holy Week, maybe you could call it a liturgical season, but it's weird. And like you said, colors are weird during Holy Week.

You could have. I think Monty Thursday has.

Traditionally, it's either scarlet or it's white.

[01:07:40] Remy: Mm.

[01:07:41] Gage: It's weird. Good Friday has nothing.

Although most people just wear black.

[01:07:46] Remy: Mm. So we. We. I think, start black right on Good Friday.

[01:07:56] Gage: Easter vigil is white. That. That one's a lot easier, by the way.

[01:07:59] Remy: Yeah.

[01:08:00] Gage: Easter can either be white or gold. I like gold, because gold is reserved for two days of the church year in the West.

But so we. In Lutheranism, we don't have those. We have those two divides of commemorations, feasts, and then special feasts that we really should just call something else. Never being blunt.

And the practice really does originate with the Jewish church, with the church before Christ.

And we see this.

Our Lord isn't just God in general here, institutes the Passover for the Jewish people in Exodus and Then as soon as they head on out, he also starts, he institutes two other major feasts, the feast of Pentecost and the feasts of Booths or Tabernacles. These three feasts are the pilgrimage feasts of Israel. So all the people were meant to pilgrim to where the tabernacle or the altar of the Lord was.

Fascinatingly, these three feasts actually continue in the church. Pentecost is the easiest one. It's. It's Pentecost.

No points for guessing that Passover becomes Easter and then the, the Feast of Booths actually just. It's our tabernacles becomes Christmas because it is God tabernacling now with us.

So these three major feasts do continue in our Christian, in our Christian church, in our Christian tradition.

But the Lord also institutes other feasts or, and festivals. In Leviticus, you have the seven main ones. You also have Shabbat or the Sabbath, which is a feast, it's not a fee. It's. It's weird.

[01:09:46] Remy: Yeah.

[01:09:47] Gage: So we, but we have this precedent. And then the Jewish people themselves add to this as a liturgical calendar. Think Hanukkah.

And it's not that this was necessarily a bad development. In fact, in John 10, our Lord is speaking specifically of Christ here.

Attack. It goes to the feast of the dedication, which is the dedication of the temple for Hanukkah. So we know our Lord actually participates in this man made tradition of this feast commemorating.

[01:10:16] Remy: So you. Jesus celebrated Hanukkah?

[01:10:19] Gage: Yeah.

[01:10:20] Remy: Wow.

[01:10:21] Gage: Yeah, it was Hanukkah because Hanukkah was.

I'm trying to. I don't remember how many years before Christ the Maccabean revolt was, but no Christ as far as. Unless John 10 is speaking about something we have lost all historical record of. Right. And for anybody who wants to go check it out, it's right after the Good shepherd passage. It's like this random paragraph that says, and then Jesus celebrated like the feast of the dedication. It's like, wait, what?

So he celebrated Annika. So we have this. And we also have precedent for saying, well, this isn't just a one off thing, because our Lord also makes use of the synagogues, which were a human development.

And so we have this precedent. And now the church is spread out and Christ has ascended into heaven. The apostles are spreading the word and we start seeing them keeping remembrances, especially the Lord's Day, which becomes the new Sabbath. So Sunday.

But other feasts, other commemorations start popping up. And if you read the church fathers, they'll talk about the martyrs and the blessed Saints and the apostles and remembering them. This is where you get the tradition of. This is where relics grow out of. Actually, every altar used to be built over the tomb of the martyrs as a symbol of what we believed. That just develops into what becomes relics. But we start getting this. And by the time of. And I'm going to make all of the conspiracy theorists go nuts for this one. By the time of Constantine, actually, things do start to get cemented. The lectionary itself is developing and the calendar is developing alongside of it. The lectionary also has Jewish roots. It grew out of the synagogue service.

At the synagogue, they would read. There were traditionally two readings. There is one reading from the Torah and then one reading from the rest of the Old Testament.

Just. And just like we would put the emphasis on the Gospel reading, they put the emphasis on the Torah reading.

And so our lectionary develops out of that.

And by the time of Constantine, these things do start to get cemented. And then a century later, at least in Jerusalem, we know that a set calendar and set of readings had been established within the Armenian, or Armenian. Armenian liturgy. And we know this because Saint Cyril of Jerusalem invited pilgrims to come to Jerusalem and some of those pilgrim reports, reference readings and other things that had been established. And by that point, they actually said had been established by tradition. So they've been around for a little bit.

[01:13:10] Remy: Yeah.

[01:13:12] Gage: So we know that as the liturgy develops out of the Jewish service, our lectionary and our calendar does too.

And as the church continues to grow, Christians choose to remember these. These blessed saints that the Lord has blessed us with. And it keeps going. And by the time. But like all good things, it's ruined by Rome. So.

[01:13:40] Remy: Deal with it. Catholic answers.

[01:13:43] Gage: So by the time we get to the time of the Reformation, these saint days, these holy days of obligation, these feasts, have morphed well beyond trying to remember these saints, trying to live with the rhythm of the church, trying to use them as a remembrance. And it was. Now, if you don't participate in saint, just keep using Dennis. If you don't remember St Dennis, who was actually a big deal during the Middle Ages, if you don't remember St. Denis, you're sinning, and that's time in purgatory or some other mess. And they've evolved into an abomination that just completely obscures the Gospel. Luther talks about this in the preface to a small catechism, and he says, the people know about saint days. They know what days they need to fast and when they need to feast, and all this stuff. And yet they don't know the first thing of the faith, and rightly so. Luther gets really mad at the calendar.

The lectionary develops, and he has no issue with the lectionary. He actually thinks that's a really useful tool. But he gets mad about the calendar because it's obscuring Christ in a lot of ways. And so he infamous, infamously cuts pretty much every saint day from the calendar because they had morphed into an abomination. Yeah, with a few exceptions, specifically the feast days. So Luther was no puritan. We still had Christmas, we still had Easter, we still had Pentecost.

We retained other major feasts of Christ like the baptism, transfiguration, ascension, things like that. We retained both the Nativity of and the martyrdom of St. John the Baptist.

We retained actually several Marian feasts, so the Annunciation, the Visitation. And then to recognize saint. The Blessed Mother's role, we actually gave her. Also, we recognized her Nativity and her dormition.

I would actually love to see The Nativity of St. Mary come back. It was the reason we kept it, by the way. Part of it was to mirror St. John the Baptist.

We celebrate three nativities in the church here traditionally. Mary, Christ and St. John.

So I'd love to see that come back. But we. Luther retains these. He also retains a couple of feasts that are really popular with people, to put it bluntly. So All Saints Day gets retained, and I think this was a really smart one considering Lutheran theology of what actually is a saint. Yeah, All Saints Day is brilliant to retain, but it does partially seem like Luther might have retained it because a lot of people just really liked it.

That being said, he. I don't. As far as I know, he never directly speaks against it, so.

And the same with St. Michael's which we actually just had at the end of last month. St. Michael and all Angels is. Was an incredibly popular feast. And if you look at your lsb.

[01:16:42] Remy: Still kind of is.

[01:16:43] Gage: Honestly, it is. If you look at your lsb, it's considered one of the principal feasts of the church year, which in LSB meat terms means you're supposed to actually replace whatever is on Sunday with that feast. Right.

There are a few feasts like that in lsb, but we also retained other days. So specifically the apostles and the evangelists, we kept. So those major figures of the New Testament, those major events of Christ, and then also a couple others Luther kept. Otherwise, though, the calendar pretty much just gets stripped because again, people are now worried about, have I prayed to St. Thomas Aquinas enough, or have I prayed to St. Denis enough? Have I. Have I remembered the fast of St. Mary of Egypt?

[01:17:27] Remy: Right.

[01:17:28] Gage: And so now it's back. The calendar is meant to be reoriented to Christ feasts.

Moving forward, however, Lutherans began wondering, should we keep the calendar beyond just these fasts or these feasts?

And we start to see that, especially in America, it starts to develop alongside the common service, and you start to see names get added, specifically biblical names, and the church fathers most of the time. So, like, St. Augustine and St. Ambrose are almost always there. Moses usually gets thrown on, but, like, very slowly, it starts to build back up.

And you still, however, see some of that hesitancy from Luther in modern calendars. So if you look at your LSB calendar, most of the people on it are either Luther himself, Right.

Some very, very early church father, or some random guy from the Reformation, admittedly.

And then a lot of Old Testament saints.

And that's one thing I'll praise LSB for, is it does give recommend recognition to those Old Testament saints. But there's a lot of hesitancy to encourage the New Testament saints.

[01:18:44] Remy: Right.

[01:18:45] Gage: Which is a hesitancy I threw completely out the window with sacred hours.

[01:18:48] Remy: Yeah, I was gonna say. I was going to say that there's still a lot of hesitancy retained, you know, in the calendar until Gage.

[01:18:56] Gage: Yeah. And my reasoning for this is thus Luther got rid of them for a pastoral reason.

We have now, however, reached a point in the church where most congregants don't know church history, don't know their fathers in the faith, don't have these examples. And honestly, in a lot of ways, live secular lives, except for like an hour on Sunday where I. Where I go to church and maybe some day part during the week where I get. Where I open my Bible, gotta clean the dust off it, after all. And maybe I say a couple of prayers at meals.

But we've reached the point now where it's the exact opposite of Luther's day. It's not. The people know too much about the saints. They know nothing. They know nothing about the faith. There's a. There's a great Charlie Brown cartoon that was made. And Charlie walks up to his sister and says, what are you writing about? And she's writing an essay. And she says, I'm writing an essay on church history. And the very last panel is my. The church began in 1914. I think it is when Pastor Blank is born and it's her pastor. And it's like, yeah, that's how people look at this.

And again, the point of the saint is not to remember the this guy is awesome, or this gal was killer.

Even though, to be totally honest with you, most of them are like, St. Moses the Black is one of the coolest dudes to have ever walked to face the planet.

Or St. Lawrence has the funniest death I have ever encountered in my life.

[01:20:29] Remy: The greatest death.

[01:20:30] Gage: Yes. For those who don't know, St. Lawrence is a Roman martyr, and he was burned alive as he was being burned alive. However, he told his captives, you can turn me over now. I'm done on this side.

It's hilarious.

St. Francis was also apparently well known for his humor.

But it's not because these guys are awesome. It's because they give us an example. As St. Paul sells the Corinthians. Follow me as I follow Christ.

[01:21:01] Remy: Right.

[01:21:02] Gage: And that's what the Saints should be. We are not an isolated group. We're gonna be spending eternity with the Saints.

[01:21:11] Remy: Yeah.

[01:21:12] Gage: And we. You, first of all, they can serve as examples. And also, if you don't know the Saints, you don't know where the church came from, which leads us to repeating the same errors like we mentioned at the start of this program. We have issues with, like, the charismatics, reviving Arianism, modalism, restorianism, everything. Hell Reformed already did Nestorianism, but.

But we're still dealing with all. Sorry. Specifically Zwingling. I. I have to be kind.

[01:21:39] Remy: Eighth commandment, Cage.

[01:21:40] Gage: Yes. Eighth commandment. Zwingli was a heretic.

But.

Oh, I live by this rule. The line between heresy and heterodoxy is the line between Zwingli and Calvin.

[01:21:53] Remy: Oh, that's. Yeah. Okay.

[01:21:54] Gage: I. I live by this rule. I will not call Calvin a heretic. But Zwingli definitely was. I will.

[01:21:59] Remy: Calvin a heretic. I'll do that for both of us.

[01:22:03] Gage: Okay.

[01:22:04] Remy: All right.

[01:22:04] Gage: As long as you get the hate mail, that's fine. Yeah. Which. But no. I. I have a queer subscription to the part of Table Talk where Luther talks about Zwingli's death, and that's the only part I think should have been translated into English.

But St. Paul tells us, follow him as he follows Christ. He is the example. It's like, imagine walking behind your dad, your little kid, and it just snowed outside. I don't know how much experience you have with snow down south, but never seen it. Okay, well, for everybody else, like a normal person who has experienced snow or sand.

Yeah. Sand can work for this, too. Imagine your dad is walking in front of you and he's leaving footsteps. And then you as a little kid in the snow, you're trying to get in them so you don't have to trudge or in the sand, you're trying to put your footprint inside your dad's. That's kind of what's going on here. It's not that the saints are worth anything on their own. They're worth something because they're in Christ, and they're worth something remembering because they can point us to Christ.

And that's a beautiful thing.

We talk a lot about lexerrandi, lex credendi. The law of prayer is the law of belief. What you do, you believe what you believe. Hopefully you're doing.

And I'm not here to get into the worship wars part of that debate, though Lord knows I have opinions on it.

The point, however, is even more than that, the way you live just period. Not just what we're doing in worship. The way we live reflects our faith.

I'm a Christian for more than just an out. I hope for more than just an hour in the week.

And so I want to try to steal a term that was used by a liberal, but it's actually a good term. I want to sanctify the time.

St. Paul talks about redeeming the time. And the only reason I don't use that phrase here is because I'm saying something different than what he necessarily says, kind of.

But I want to sanctify the time. I want my day, my hour, my life to point me back to Christ. I want to live in the rhythm of the church because she is united to Christ by his blood. She is his bride. And so by being united in the church, I am united with Christ by virtue of my baptism and just the fact that he's really cool and hasn't let me go yet, just to put it bluntly, because Lord knows he dragged me kicking into this. I It's a Pastor Roseborough likes to say he was dragged against his will into being a Lutheran. Well, all of us are dragged against our will into him.

[01:24:55] Remy: Yeah.

[01:24:55] Gage: Thankfully, his will wins. So praise him. But we want to sanctify the time. We want our days to remind us of Christ. We want to build our lives around Christ. And the calendar allows us to do that. It allows us to remember. Maybe today is just some day during ordinary time, and there's really nothing special on this random Tuesday afternoon.

But then you can look and go, oh, today the church remembers this Saturday saint who gave his life for Christ. And all of a sudden now you're back thinking about sacred things. You're now thinking about someone who is standing before the throne of God, praising the Lamb for eternity and can look at his example. It's the same thing with sanctifying space. That's why we put crucifixes up. That's why we have religious imagery. We want to live as though we are not alone with Christ. Christ is always with us. But so too is the Church Triumphant.

[01:25:57] Remy: Right?

[01:25:58] Gage: We are not alone on this earth. We are not alone in the Church.

So why should we live like that?

And why should the devil get any of your time? Why should Satan, who is the cosmic temper tantrum throwing baby, he is, get any of your respect in time? And by taking our focus off of Christ and putting on anything else, that's what we're doing. It is idolatry, as Luther says. Now, because of our sinful flesh. We do that all the time. I'm not saying, to go back to our Wesley discussion, I'm not saying you're not gonna do that. You are.

[01:26:36] Remy: You should strive against it.

[01:26:38] Gage: Yes. And the Church has given us a way to kind of strive against it. A tool that we can use for our own sanctification and to sanctify and redeem the day. It is. It's something you should do. And a great way to do that is by making use of some sacred hours.

Roll credits.

[01:27:03] Remy: Gage, in closing, what is your favorite saint or feast day?

[01:27:09] Gage: Oh.

[01:27:12] Remy: Or least favorite. We can go the other way on it. Which one do you just be like?

[01:27:17] Gage: My least favorite day is. I think the elca. The ELCA commemorates Calvin. I think that's stupid.

[01:27:22] Remy: Oh, that's my least favorite too. Now. You're welcome.

[01:27:28] Gage: No favorite saint. That's really hard. So I'm gonna give two that are on sacred hours that should have been in the lsb. It's kind of silly that they're not because Luther wrote a whole hymn about these guys, Jan von Essen and Hendrik Voss or John and Henry.

They are remembered on. I have to look real quick.

I'm looking in sacred hours.

July 1st. They were the first martyrs of the Reformation. They died Lutherans in Belgium, having been burned at the stake for their faith. And when Luther finds out about this, he writes an entire hymn. And it's a beautiful hymn. It's called A New Song, Now Shall Begun Be Begun. And he writes a whole hymn talking about them and about how the work God has done in them is now complete.

There are other. By the way, there are other Lutheran martyrs too, like In England, Robert Barnes gets killed by Henry because he's a Lutheran.

Stuff like that. Which should be on the LSB calendar.

[01:28:32] Remy: Yeah.

[01:28:33] Gage: And I have Pastor Will Whedon's approval because he has said that on issues, etc. So from the words of the man, dude, yes. I would have gladly given all my time just for a minute of his.

Probably them. In terms of feast day though, it's.

Liturgically, it's kind of hard to beat the.

The vigil of Easter is such a beautiful service and in many ways it is probably the most beautiful service just out of the church here, period. So I guess I'll say that. But you know, anyone will do.

[01:29:09] Remy: Yeah, I don't know, man.

[01:29:10] Gage: I'm.

[01:29:10] Remy: I'm. As far as beautiful liturgical services go, I'm really partial. Like Trinity 14.

That's what's.

[01:29:18] Gage: What's the. I'm now I'm looking. What is even the copy for Trinity14?

[01:29:21] Remy: I don't know.

[01:29:25] Gage: Okay.

[01:29:25] Remy: It's green. That's all I can tell you.

[01:29:28] Gage: It is green. It is green.

It's Trinity. The Sundays after Trinity. Easiest liturgical coloring. They're very easy.

[01:29:38] Remy: Yeah. Well, it's 14. It's got to be near the end. We gotta be.

[01:29:42] Gage: It's in the middle because you have 20 something possible Sundays after training. Yeah. Most of the time we don't go that far though. It's a. It's really just. When does Easter. Cuz Easter is.

Praise God for Easter. I am so glad I don't have to calculate when Easter is gonna be though.

[01:29:58] Remy: Yeah. The Orthodox get it wrong every year and I'm shocked.

[01:30:02] Gage: I think they're gonna get it right next year. I think next year is the year we'll see.

Probably not. Yeah. And then there's even a subset of the Orthodox who get it even more wrong.

[01:30:14] Remy: They're going to be typing in the comments. They're going to be like, we just calculated different. Sure you do, fella.

[01:30:19] Gage: Sure you do. No, it's going to be. God's divine energies have infused themselves into the calendar according to sacred tradition. How dare thou, Westerner.

[01:30:30] Remy: Wow. Yeah.

[01:30:31] Gage: No, that's true.

[01:30:32] Remy: That's. That's a good point.

[01:30:35] Gage: Palamus, man. It's in there, I promise.

[01:30:37] Remy: Yeah. Going to go. I'm now going to leave the Lutheran Church and go join some random autocephalous ethnic micro Synod.

[01:30:46] Gage: Yeah. You know, listening to myself talk, I realized actually all of this is awful and in vain and solo. I should really just go back to just being Bible only. So I think I'm just going to join the Amish.

[01:30:59] Remy: Oh, no, just go ifb, Dude. Just go ifb.

[01:31:03] Gage: No, because then I don't get a nice hat.

[01:31:05] Remy: Oh, that's true.

[01:31:07] Gage: And that's probably vain. Which maybe that's why I need the Amish.

[01:31:09] Remy: Yeah. Well, Gage, it's been a wonderful time talking to you, sir.

[01:31:16] Gage: Thank you for having me.

[01:31:17] Remy: Thank you. You're welcome back on the show anytime.

[01:31:21] Gage: Well, we'll see if anybody actually wants to listen to this voice.

[01:31:24] Remy: I'm sure a few people will.

[01:31:26] Gage: Probably my girlfriend.

[01:31:27] Remy: Aww.

[01:31:28] Gage: Who exists, I swear.

[01:31:30] Remy: We love you, Anna Gage. Thank you, sir. God bless.

[01:31:36] Gage: Thank you. God bless you, too, Remy.

Here's what we talked about:

• The Last Boil

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[00:00:03] Cory: I'm about to be in the show.

[00:00:05] Remy: Oh, you're on the show.

[00:00:06] Cory: I'm on the show now. Oh, okay.

[00:00:08] Remy: Wow.

Corey Laughlin from Twitter.

I always said. I always said Laughlin.

[00:00:17] Cory: Everybody does. I get used to that.

[00:00:19] Remy: Sure.

I guess Laughlin would be like. There would be a U and a G H instead of just an F.

[00:00:27] Cory: Yeah, that's what I mean. There are. There are Laughlins out there that are. That are Irish or Scottish descent.

I'm not those.

What are you. What are. Comes from a different. So, dad. So Laughlin comes from, actually French Laflamme.

And before that. Before that, it was.

It was Kemner. Q U E M E N E U R Ken, here's the story, please.

So Papa Urvay or whatever came over from Britain, from the extreme northwest of France, and he moved to Canada, moved to Quebec, and he set up on the Ile D'Orleans in the St. Lawrence Seaway, just north of or just northeast of Quebec City. And he was tired of. As the story goes, he was tired of boats running ashore on the island. It's a pretty big island in the middle of this gigantic river, essentially. And so he started building bonfires to act as kind of an ersatz lighthouse.

And so they started calling him La Flamme. Was French, at least at the time, or maybe still is for bonfire or slang for campfire or bonfire or something like that. And so then it just kind of stuck. And so we've seen actual documents of Louis Kemner D. Leflam, which means that just call D being called being or being said, said, like Leflam. So eventually it just.

It got Anglicized.

They were happy living in Quebec until the Homestead act happened. And then all of a sudden, they ended up. All of a sudden they ended up in Vermont.

Funny how that works. And then made their way down to. Unlike all the cool Acadians and French Canadians, they didn't keep going to go to Louisiana. They stopped in Kansas. And here we are.

So that's Dad's side of the family. Well, that's where the name comes from.

Also has a fair amount of Welsh in there. And Mom's side is 100% German, therefore, you know.

[00:03:03] Remy: Excellent. What are you drinking? What is that?

[00:03:05] Cory: I am drinking spent Oktoberfest. Because it is the last day.

It is the official last day of Oktoberfest, because I believe Oktoberfest runs through the first Sunday in October, if I remember correctly. Not that my mom's family is from northern Germany. In fact, we're going There in December. Um, my mom and my brother and my son and. And my, My niece, we're gonna go visit the. We're gonna go. We're gonna go and. And remind ourselves why we left in the first place.

Why the family left. I suppose.

[00:03:40] Remy: Amazing.

I. I'm drinking Modelo.

[00:03:44] Cory: Nice.

[00:03:46] Remy: But I'm doing it in my. This is. I don't know if you'll be able.

[00:03:50] Cory: Oh, nice.

[00:03:53] Remy: It's the Last Supper, but it's a crawfish boil.

[00:03:56] Cory: Crawfish boil. I love it.

[00:03:58] Remy: Yeah, look, that's. That's totally Tony Shasheries right there.

Cajun seasoning on the table.

[00:04:07] Cory: Yeah, that's nice. That's. That's beautiful.

Good stuff. I like, I like Modelo, but it's just kind of. I had this for the. We had a.

Like our district men's retreat this weekend on Friday and Friday night and Saturday through. And so I've got a couple leftovers.

What was that?

[00:04:33] Remy: Tell me about your district men's retreat.

[00:04:35] Cory: Oh, so we have a.

Actually have a decent sized house out in the center of the state and every like late September, early October.

Yeah, we do like a Friday night and Saturday men's retreat. And this year we talked about classical Lutheran education with the headmaster of Concordia Academy, Wichita.

Okay.

[00:05:03] Remy: Okay.

What were your thoughts and feelings going into that? What were they going? How did you change? How did you grow? Tell me more.

[00:05:11] Cory: I mean, I learned a lot.

Headmaster Snyder did a talk, mostly it was a history lesson on where education, where the roots of education really started and what the different philosophies in education were going down through history. Because when you say classical education, that's not really a terribly well defined term. And so he broke it down from the Greek era through the.

Through the cathedral schools versus through the university, through going from what would be more of a general college education to actual subjects and this, that and the other. And talked about different philosophies and stumbling blocks along the way in terms of why we need to kind of reclaim education nowadays in the, you know, in the modern context. Also.

Also too much to our chagrin found out that. That the concept of public education was started essentially by the Lutherans of Northern Germany.

[00:06:23] Remy: Awesome. Amazing. Amazing. And probably so that everyone would be able to study the Bible.

[00:06:29] Cory: Yeah, right, Absolutely.

Rather than keep it was to put it in the hands of the. Of the. You know, it was the whole left hand, right hand kingdom thing. Right. So they. So put the chart. The schools in charge of the left hand kingdom to keep the. Keep the church, let them make sure they study the Bible and not have to worry the church about the day to day operations in schools.

[00:06:53] Remy: Amazing.

Amazing.

[00:06:56] Cory: To which one of the pastors, to which one of the pastors, when he dropped that bomb on us, went, mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

Too much laughter.

[00:07:10] Remy: Yeah, yeah. We. Public education is not the same, I assume these days as it would have been.

[00:07:19] Cory: I know.

[00:07:21] Remy: At its genesis.

[00:07:23] Cory: No. And it's, it's so I'm. I'm only say tertiarily evolved with Concordia Academy Wichita being. I'm the chess coach there. But only because. Only because my son graduated out of high school like literally the year before they started there. And I really kind of wish we'd had.

[00:07:46] Remy: What a dorky school. The chess coach. Get out of here.

[00:07:51] Cory: I played when I was in high school and then I got out of college and I played some more, a little bit just as a hobby. And then a friend of mine who ended up moving from being kind of an adjunct professor at WSU at Wichita State University, when I say wsu, that's the term I'm defining, to being a math teacher up at one of the suburbs, essentially Valley center, which is a northern suburb of Wichita, and found out that she'd inherited the, the chess, the chess club as part of being the math teacher. And she asked me if I wanted to help kind of get it off the. Off the ground. I said, sure. And I was there 17 years.

We won six state titles.

I outlasted her.

[00:08:46] Remy: Just get her off the ground.

[00:08:48] Cory: Yeah, I outlasted her as a sponsor. I outlasted the next person as a sponsor. And when the third person who is the sponsor decided that they weren't going to do it anymore because they wanted to spend time with their kids, were a younger guy and his kids were just getting up to that age of doing stuff. I was like, all right, I'm going to call. And my son was in the second half of high school. And so I was like, you know what? I'm not breaking in. I'm not breaking in another sponsor.

We're going to take a break.

So we took a break and Henry graduated and then kind of got the itch again. And Concordia Academy started up a couple of years ago and I asked them, is this something you'd want to do? And they're like, yes, like, okay.

So last year was our first year and we have a grand total of four people in the club considering there's, I think only 12 people, the 12 kids or 13 kids at the school. I think we're doing okay.

[00:09:43] Remy: I think that's a pretty good. I think that's a pretty good talk then about vocation, huh? And just doing, doing what's in front of you. Doing what God puts in front of you. Is that as a, as a man and you strike me as a pretty driven man and a father. Is it, is it fulfilling to, to just do the work God puts in front of you? Is that fulfilling in your life?

[00:10:09] Cory: You know, it's been a, there's been a lot of. I've had a lot of issue trying to figure out what that is.

And I don't think I'm alone. I think there's a lot of people that have that. And especially when you actually don't have that metaphysical worldview and you wonder what am I supposed to be doing? And regret starts to creep in and did I miss my window or what if I was supposed to do this or that or the other. When you have that metaphysical physical worldview, it's a lot easier to like, oh, okay, I'm supposed to be. You see the, you see the positive breaks I think a bit more than the negative ones.

And yeah, I grew up.

My mom was. My dad was a truck driver. My dad fixed appliances and then he was a truck driver and then he fixed appliances again and then my mom did one year of university but this was back in the, in the 60s and that was. There wasn't a whole lot of scholarship money available and she didn't, you know, and her family wasn't terribly wealthy so she got to do one year at Emporia State University studying chemistry and then had to give it up. And so she was, I, I joke that she is the, she is the smartest. She is the smartest school cook slash janitor I've ever known. I make. If anybody who's familiar with Dilbert remembers the trash man from Dilbert who is the, the running joke is that he's the actual genius among everybody in the, in the comic. And it's like, right, that's kind of my mom.

But she was also not, she was never, if she was bitter about it, she never ever showed it right. She, you know, she, she's person who like I, she could do pretty much whatever she wanted and she just wanted to do was, I would say just survive. But no, she, she saw the, she saw where there was value in, in, in being home. The reason she took, the reason she took the job.

And yeah, I had a. Ostensibly a two income family growing up, but the reason mom took the job she did was because she would be home by the time I got home, before I got home from school. So she was there early. So it was like my brother.

[00:12:38] Remy: Are you an only child?

[00:12:39] Cory: What's that? Oh no, I have one brother.

[00:12:42] Remy: You and all him.

[00:12:43] Cory: Indiana? No, I have one brother seven years older than me. So. So essentially by the time I could go to school he was already well big enough that he could make sure that I got on the bus, you know, so.

So yeah, he's. So yeah, then, then when I got home she'd be home and so it wasn't, it didn't. Even though she was working, she was at home when she really. When she needed to be so. And she was good at. And she really saw it. As time goes on and growing up, you see a lot of things that with your family and I'm sure this isn't at all unique to me by any stretch of the imagination, but every family has their issues or if every family has their problems of having to take care of this person or this person or that the other person or maybe multiple people.

And you think that that's just the way things are until you get out into the world a bit and you realize exactly how much your parents did to really help everybody else, not only in the family, but in the community.

My dad's parents, my mom was.

I was over at my grandma and grandpa's house pretty much every other day growing up and then mom was taking care of her mom and with who had. Was the only. Was the child of. Out of five who is.

I don't want to say saddled but who had that, who took that responsibility and took care of Grandma? Damon.

And then when my dad's mom suddenly started developing dementia, moved her in with them and didn't. And you know, she, she would grouse about things every once in a while but not very much as, not as much as, not as much as I've groused about my problems in life.

You know, it's like she, she was, I was talking at the, at the retreat this weekend just to, to some of the people and saying my mom was one of the most, maybe the most unflappable person I've ever met.

I mean we'd get mad when she needed to get mad as a parent, but did not, never, never panicked, never had like a freak out moment. You know, if I, if I felt that, you know, you've, it was not a helicopter parent by the stretch of the imagination, by any stretch of the imagination. But she didn't know. But also wasn't like, wasn't negligent in her duties. It was, you know, instead of, you know, like, me falling off the bike and, oh, how are you? You know, are you okay? And stuff like that, it was just like, how's your knee?

[00:15:30] Remy: Right. Yeah. Get back on it.

[00:15:32] Cory: Is it bleeding too bad? No. Okay, you're good. You know, understood, acknowledge the situation and deal with it in an appropriate manner. And that was the way mom did. And from that I was fortunate to receive the skill of being able to cope in crisis situations of like, okay, when things are truly going bad, it's like, all right, abcd. These are the things that needs to. Need to happen. You know, drive through it. And then, then when, when the pressure's off, then it's like, okay, I'm going to go into that room and completely lose my, Lose my mind for a bit by myself.

Just give me, you know, a couple hours and we'll be fine then. And we're fine. So it's. She was. And always. And she's always been a good godly Lutheran. Lutheran woman, raised Missouri Senate.

[00:16:31] Remy: So you' you're womb to tomb.

[00:16:35] Cory: I'm not exactly womb to tomb.

Womb. And then I went on Rumspringa, for lack of a better term, as all.

[00:16:48] Remy: Good French Canadians do.

[00:16:50] Cory: I don't really want to associate myself with the Anabaptists, but here we go. No, no. What happened was. So, yeah, I was raised at St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Clay Center, Kansas, and, you know, good LCMS raised. Link in the description was that.

[00:17:10] Remy: I said link in the description.

[00:17:12] Cory: Link in the description. Yeah, we can put their pastor, Sara is doing a wonderful job there, but, you know, confirmed the whole thing. Graduated high school, came down to Wichita to go to university, and I was literally fooled.

Suckered into joining an ELCA church. I'm not kidding.

[00:17:35] Remy: Oh, no.

[00:17:37] Cory: Because I got here.

[00:17:38] Remy: Oh, no.

[00:17:39] Cory: So what happened? And it's like, you have to give some credit to the LCMS church that I grew up in, especially when you're talking that this was in the 80s, in the early 90s, and so it wasn't that far removed from Seminex. Right. But they never preached against Seminex or against the ELCA or I never heard anything about it. Now, of course, I had to do with the fact that, that St. Paul's is the only Lutheran church in town. So it wasn't like they were, you know, there wasn't like any sort of competition with an ELCA church in town. Or anything like that. So there was no need to. And there was a lot of other LCMS congregations, you know, north, you know, there in Kansas and the Lynn and Palmer and. And Hanover areas and stuff like that.

So.

So I had no idea that this.

The. At the magnitude of this.

I came down to university and somebody like, my first week there is like, oh, you're a Lutheran. You want to go come to church with me on weekend. On this weekend? I said, sure. And. And so I went. And the pastor there at the time was a. Was a very conservative, you know, very nice lady. No, no, that was later.

Not even kidding.

No, actually they were. They had. When I started going, they had an interim pastor, and he was. I can't remember his name, but he was actually pretty cool. And then the pastor that they. That they called and got was a. Was Pastor Joe Wald. And I will not broker any. Any slander against Pastor Joe Wald, who is a. It was kind of reminds me for us Twitter fans of, like, John Christensen, same kind of. Same kind of vibe. Yeah, like the loyal. What's the term? The loyalist. The loyal opposition.

He's a good conservative pastor within the elca. And it did happen. And so, once again, it just kind of drove it through. I didn't realize how big of a deal this was when I asked to transfer my membership. Except when they said, are you sure? When the search hit over, like, are you sure? I'm like, yeah, yeah, think so, anyway. Oh, no, I met my wife there.

[00:20:03] Remy: So did anybody. Did anybody at home, church, give you a heads up, like, at all?

[00:20:09] Cory: No, they didn't give me the, like, Mom. Mom was like.

I would have expected mom to be like. I don't think she was terribly well educated into what the. The actual issue was either. I mean, I mean, she knew. She knew about the split, but I don't think she didn't. Hadn't gone it. You know, you didn't have Wikipedia. You couldn't look up the history at the time. You're kind of going this by word of mouth. And of course, pastors are, you know, even. Even the midst of that are trying to abide by the eighth commandment. So they don't want to let themselves get to, you know, get too loose at the top of things.

But, you know, there was kind of a. They're not really the same. And I'm like, I've been, you know, and I'm like, well, I've been. And, you know, they use the small catechism. I haven't heard anything openly Heretical. I think we're fine. Okay. Mom was like, he's pretty much the same. I think mom was. Yeah, exactly. I think mom was like, well, at least he's going to church.

And the other thing is, the other half of my family, my dad's half of the family was all Methodist. So it's like. I'm sure mom was doing the calculus of, well, it could be worse.

It could be worse.

[00:21:25] Remy: He could be one of those Methodists.

[00:21:27] Cory: No, actually, but the thing is, I spent a lot of time. It's like, I don't talk down Methodist. If you notice on Twitter, I don't talk down Methodists very much at all, just because I hung around with them so much growing up.

Once again, it was like, 99.9% of the time you're preaching out of the Bible, you're going to be okay. And so sometimes I remember being at some and we were always there for special services or there was, like, weddings or maybe anniversaries or something like that. I've been to more than my share of services at the Methodist Church in Clay center, and there was anything there that made me want to nail anything to a door.

It was like, okay, this is good. Sometimes you get a little bit heavy on the social whatever, but okay. I mean, that's kind of their vibe, and you just deal with it and go on. And they never looked at me sideways, knowing even full well that we were Lutherans. So it was cool.

There were worse communities in town.

So I have nothing but. I say nothing but fondness. I have plenty of critique, but I've had good experiences with Methodists so far in my life, let's say so far.

[00:22:53] Remy: Give me two seconds. I'll be right back.

[00:22:55] Cory: Roger that.

[00:22:57] Remy: My wife nailed this chili.

[00:23:00] Cory: Nice.

So what's the. So good. What's the base on? I mean, I mean, just. Just a beef. Ground beef chili or. Or.

[00:23:09] Remy: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So.

And sure, yeah, I'll. I'll just cut that little bit out. We'll pick up right here. That's my podcast. I can do what I want. Of course.

Yeah. No, it's. So I start with onions, and I saute down some onions and then add garlic and then add ground beef. And I get the ground beef good and cooked and drained and cooked some more.

While that's happening, I am steeping some dried chili peppers. It's called chili, not beanie. So we're putting chili in it.

Right. And so we.

I steeped some dried peppers. This time it was Guajillo, New Mexico. And ancho.

[00:23:58] Cory: Nice.

[00:23:59] Remy: And I let those steep up, and then I threw them into the. We got one of those nutri bullet blenders.

[00:24:06] Cory: Yep.

[00:24:07] Remy: So I threw it in there with a half a ghost pepper and some chipotle peppers and adobo sauce. Blended all that up really good into a paste.

[00:24:17] Cory: Cool.

[00:24:17] Remy: And then I put my chili paste in my ground beef, let that go for a minute, add some red wine, let that reduce down a little bit, and then I do my spice pour.

[00:24:29] Cory: Take some notes. You're doing it a little different than I would do. Than I do it, but that's okay. I mean, that's why I'm taking notes. I'm like, oh, yeah, I should probably use more fresh peppers. I mean, I use plenty, but I use, like. I should use, like, dried. No, I should use like. Like guajillo and arbol or, you know, stuff like that would be. I have. In the. In the pantry. I just haven't. Didn't. Anyway, go ahead. I'm sorry.

[00:24:50] Remy: Always. Always adds a really, really nice flavor. Really nice flavor. A good complex heat. Yeah. But, yeah, so I add all that. I do my spice pour. When I do my chili paste, I do my spice pour in which my. Because I'm using actual chilies, my spice pours mostly just garlic powder and cumin. Yeah.

And then. Yeah. After it kind of sits for a minute, I'll add in some beef stock and get it to where I want it, and then just kind of let it simmer and come together.

[00:25:18] Cory: There you go.

[00:25:19] Remy: Tomatoes. I'll put tomatoes in it.

[00:25:21] Cory: Right. I do the. So I've been working on a recipe this fall.

Some friends of mine. So it's like two weeks ago, I think, was the. Or, no, it was last weekend. Last weekend was the.

There's always a big chili cook off in Wichita, like last week of September, first week in October. And we always. Me and some of my friends go down and of course, we're absolutely brutal. You know, we walk around and try the chilies, and, you know, it's a two. Yeah. I mean, we don't go to numbers, but we. But, yeah. Where it's, you know, so it's like, oh, liquid smoke, lovely. You know, sort of thing.

And we. Anyway, we'd been. For years, we'd had this idea of what if we. What if we did the most bougie chili that we could possibly think of.

And so after, like, two or three years of talking about, I actually started.

I came up with a. Came up with an idea. And so here's my. So here's my overwrought chili.

Start up by browning up, searing some short rib, oxtail, and flatiron steak.

[00:26:40] Remy: Okay.

[00:26:41] Cory: All right.

And then. And there's a reason for those three. Well, which we'll get to that. And then. Then, you know, with some of the salt, with some of the fat that renders off. I add that renders out of that in the browning as I pull the meat out, and then I add some flat and make a roux out of it, because I have to make a roux out of everything.

[00:27:02] Remy: Okay.

[00:27:03] Cory: And so to thicken that up. And I brown it. Not like as much as I brown for my jambalaya, but I brown it. You know, some get the vegetables in. So I've got. And then I do the. Doing the classic French mirepoix. So onions, carrots, and celery. Yes, there are carrots and celery in my chili.

But then also.

[00:27:20] Remy: All right, that's anathema, but yeah, some belt in here.

[00:27:26] Cory: But also bell peppers, jalapeno peppers. And then this last time, the last round of innovation on this, I started adding habanero to give it more kind of back end heat, because the jalapeno is nicer up front, but the habanero is good on the back. But I might have to go with guajillo. That might. Guajillo. And ancho would add some nice smokiness to it. That sounds.

[00:27:53] Remy: It does, yeah.

[00:27:53] Cory: It's something I have to do for the next round.

[00:27:56] Remy: It's kind of so. And it's kind of a sweet smokiness, too. Yeah, very nice.

[00:28:02] Cory: Yeah, Yeah. I mean, I've worked with ancho before, and I don't know why. I just spaced, and it's like, why don't I just rehydrate some peppers and throw those in, too? Anyway, so then, yeah, sweat out the vegetables, you know, add the garlic, add the tomato. Add a one tin of crushed tomatoes.

I do add beans. I add. I have one can of black beans because I like black beans. Because I. Not because.

And just because I like black beans. I like the. And it's not. I have so much meat in there. Now.

[00:28:34] Remy: We left. We left chili behind at a mirepoix, so.

[00:28:37] Cory: No, no, no, no. But then you add this, you know, then you add this.

Then I add. I want it. I usually add a lager, but I have used wine before. Like, use it. Reduce that down.

[00:28:48] Remy: Yeah, yeah.

[00:28:49] Cory: But I like to use a lager instead. I think that's more.

That's more online with the flavors that you're looking for. And then reduce that down. Then you add the stock, put the meat in and the spices, of course.

And then. Because I don't want to be on it for eight hours, he was doing.

See here, That's Hannah in the background.

I don't want to do it for eight. Have it cooking for eight hours. I actually cook it in a pressure cooker.

And an hour. Once I get it up to pressure, it's a hundred. It's a. It's an hour 15 once I get it up. And once I get it up and whistling and then take. Reduce the pressure off, and you have. And you have chili. So I know it's. It's. Wow. Yeah. So that's the. We were. We were literally going for. For. What would Anthony Bourdain make if he were making chili? Was. Was the idea. So, yeah, it's supposed to be. But here's the really funny part is the spice mix that I'm using is literally like a McCormick spice mix. Like, copycat. Like, it's all fresh stuff I mixed.

[00:30:00] Remy: But the McCormick spice mix, honestly, pretty good flavor, right?

[00:30:06] Cory: See that? See, when we're at the chili cook off, that's what we always say is everybody's trying to bring their own. Do their own weird thing. And our criteria when we're at the cook off is, could I sit and eat and watch a football game? Game? We're eating this.

[00:30:21] Remy: Could I go through a bowl or.

[00:30:24] Cory: Two or three of this watching the Chiefs play? The answer is yes. Then, then. All right, then. Then you. You're getting my vote. So that's.

[00:30:32] Remy: Why Do I want to throw a dollop. Do I want to throw a dollop of sour cream on this thing and go to town?

[00:30:38] Cory: Yeah. Yeah. Throw some cheese and, you know, some cheese and crackers on it or whatever. You know, whatever you're. Whatever you like to do. You dress it. Dress it up however you want afterwards.

So, yeah, that's the chili I've been working on. Oh. And then my friend of mine convinced me to go a little further afield to throw some actual chocolate in there right before I throw the. Before I put the lid on, too. Just like 2 ounces.

I could probably go with 4 ounces, but just to add a little bit more depth of. Of flavor to it and add a little bit of texture.

So that's actually a good idea.

I'm using, like, Ghirardelli 60%, because just you can get it. But, you know, but like you said, probably like a 70 would probably be better, maybe even 80. If you're not worried, that's a good idea. If you're not worried about bitterness, you could push it up to the really, really dark stuff, but.

[00:31:44] Remy: Well, you don't have to. The. The. Depending on the heat level you get in there.

Because capsaicin binds to the same receptor gene or whatever in your mouth that chocolate does.

[00:32:03] Cory: Really?

[00:32:05] Remy: Yes.

So depending on the heat level.

[00:32:10] Cory: Heat.

[00:32:11] Remy: And chocolate go really well together because you taste the chocolate more because you're not losing so much of it to those receptors. So, like, a buddy of mine gave me a Ghirardelli brownie earlier that he made and, you know, like, out of a box or whatever, right?

[00:32:28] Cory: Yeah.

[00:32:28] Remy: And I took a bite of it, and it was good. You know, it was good. It was a brownie. And then I ate a ghost pepper that I had on hand.

And this was earlier today.

I ate pepper that I had just. Yeah, it's what we do. And I let the heat. I let the heat back off a little bit. I'm still on fire. It's still brutal. But I'm. I let it back down after about 15 or 20 minutes, after it had backed down a little bit, I ate the rest of the brownie. And I'm telling you, it was night.

[00:33:01] Cory: And day, the most amazing brownie ever. Then at that point, it.

[00:33:06] Remy: Yes, it was. It was. And it just. I don't know. It's so rich. It was so, like, rich. I don't know.

[00:33:13] Cory: Yeah. And the fats are going to be helping.

[00:33:15] Remy: They go well together.

[00:33:16] Cory: It probably helped kill, you know, some of that residual fire, too. And. But really. But, yeah, those receptors are already.

Now I have to try that. That sounds really interesting. So you're so. Are you like, me, like, if I'm cooking with this pepper, I need to eat it to see what it's. See what it. What it actually tastes like.

[00:33:32] Remy: I. Yes. I got that from Gordon Ramsay. This is now. This is now. Food or answers. I got. I got that from Gordon. I got it from Gordon Ramsay where he said.

He said that you need to eat everything raw before you cook with it so that you actually know what it tastes like.

[00:33:51] Cory: I had a co worker give me about a half a pound of Scotch bonnet peppers about a month ago or three weeks ago. And. And I was gonna make it. I knew what I was gonna do. I was gonna make Jamaican jerk pork with it because I had a recipe for that. But I. You can't get. You know, Scotch bonnets aren't really an easy get.

And so. But I'm like, I'm the same way. And the same. The same co worker has given me, like, she grows, like, type, like, bird eye, bird's eye chilies, you know, Thai chilies every year, too. And I've gotten those from her. And I've eaten before. I cooked with those. I ate one of those raw, and for a couple of minutes, I thought I had made a tremendous mistake in my life. And then it kind of went away. And so I'm like, no, I have to do this before I cook with the Scotch bonnets. I had to eat one. And Veronica was here.

She's finally figured me out enough that she's just like, all right, go for it.

I'm here to root for you. And, I mean, it's an end. Scotch bonnet is like a habanero. It looks an awful lot like a habanero, but it's sweeter than a habanero. So it's a really pleasant, nice, peppery flavor. It just. It's just.

It's just sitting there sweating. That was a really good pepper, you know, but once you cook it, that's how.

[00:35:09] Remy: That's how the. The ghost is. The ghost pepper is probably my favorite pepper right now. I grew one this year, and I've just. It's been so much fun to use in everything, but. But it's got a really floral, really fruity.

[00:35:23] Cory: Oh, nice.

[00:35:24] Remy: Almost kind of like herbaceous kind of note to it. It doesn't really taste like a pepper. It tastes. It tastes like herby, but it's very sweet, kind of in this sort of floral kind of way.

And you get that.

I mean, 15 seconds, Corey, 15 seconds, just long enough to be like, oh, I taste it. That's really good. And then it comes up from the back, and it drives all rational thought of your mind. It is the hottest thing when I.

[00:35:56] Cory: Ate the Scotch bonnet.

[00:35:57] Remy: Technically, it's the third hottest.

[00:35:58] Cory: Yeah, when I ate the Scotch bonnet, I was like, you know, it's like there was an immediate burn, but I'm like, oh, this is doable. You know, it was more than a jalapeno, but, like, yeah, this is doable. And flavor's really good. And, yeah, it's about the same thing. Like, 15, 20 seconds, and then. Then crawling up the back of your throat and through the top of your mouth. And I'm like, oh, that's a thing. You know? And I went through a beer, a beer and a half, and. And one good swing of swig of full fat milk, and then I was, okay.

[00:36:32] Remy: So for me.

So they say they Say so the capsaicin's in oil and the heat, the heat you're already feeling. The heat you're already feeling. You're not going to stop. There's no way to stop it. Once it.

[00:36:47] Cory: Yeah, either.

[00:36:48] Remy: Once it's down to the receptor, you're feeling the heat, buckle up.

[00:36:51] Cory: The best you can do is wash.

[00:36:52] Remy: Away, not feel any more heat. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So there. Because capsaicin is an oil like olive oil. There's. You can do things like full fat milk or ice cream which bond with the oil and drag it down your throat. Yeah, well, yeah, because the only thing you can do. Yeah, the other thing.

[00:37:13] Cory: Water does you no good. Water is just like, oh, that's nice and cool. Right? Why did it.

[00:37:17] Remy: And then.

[00:37:18] Cory: And then as soon as it goes away, it comes right back because it didn't wash. Anything spreads around.

[00:37:21] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So breaking apart the oil, for me, that's been the better. That's been the better method. If I, If I eat a super hot chili and I am just not game for it right then for whatever reason, a swish of lemon juice around the mouth usually does pretty good to break up a lot of that. The acidity of the, of the lemon juice will break up a lot of that oil.

And then alcohol also does it for me. I'll take a swig of beer or a swig of wine and swish that around my mouth pretty good. And then, you know, that'll also do a good job.

[00:37:55] Cory: Yeah, the carbs are kind of. Yeah, the beers are pretty good. Milk is the best.

I mean, full fat milk or. I don't know, you've probably seen hot ones once or twice. And I think Alton Brown did half and half when he was.

[00:38:16] Remy: I didn't have half and half really works. Half and half works.

[00:38:21] Cory: You want something that. Yeah, something that can. That oil will be a bit soluble in, so. And not just breaking it down, but just dissolving it and carrying it away. You know, this water will just slip right over it and it doesn't matter.

So it just stays right where it is. So do we want to talk about Lutheranism again or do we want to keep talking about food?

[00:38:37] Remy: Because before people hate me too much.

Before people hate me too much.

[00:38:42] Cory: That's like people from.

Ask them about the cookies. You know, whatever.

[00:38:47] Remy: Ask him. Corey from Bread Twitter.

[00:38:51] Cory: Yeah, that's what I'm known for. Even though it's like I don't do nearly as much baking as I know as, as like Maddie, Matty, Craig and, and, And Pastor Jeremy probably does more than I do too. It's just that when I do it, I do. I end up doing like the really, the really technical, challenging stuff just because I. Just because I. I want to see if I can do it and then I post pictures to it because I. I need the attention.

[00:39:26] Remy: That's it.

[00:39:27] Cory: I'm sure, I'm sure Maddie bakes. That's why I have the podcast board every day. But she's too busy, too busy with, with actually working, you know, dealing with the kids and everything else. Being a mother to post things on my kids out of the house. I could take pictures of whatever I want. Cats, food, whatever.

[00:39:43] Remy: So Maddie, Maddie, I think, I think she gets. She gets the affirmation and the value from her children and her husband. Whereas you and I, we get our affirmation and value from the Internet strangers.

[00:39:58] Cory: Yeah.

[00:39:58] Remy: And the fake Internet points out of.

[00:40:01] Cory: I mean, the. Veronica tells the story of like she. Because when we were early married, she would come home and she would. She was trying to do the good housewife thing, you know, and come home. And even though she was working at the zoo, she was a zookeeper. She was senior keepers, amphibians, reptiles at Central County Zoo. Oh, wow. And she would come home and fix something and it was always good.

And then not very long into the, into our, into our marriage, I decided I wanted to make jambalaya. I think. Or no, it was etoufe. Before I made it jambalaya, I made etouffee. I just looked up, looked up a, A emerald Lagasse recipe, you know, and, and online. And I put it together and she's like, took one fork full of it and she's like, this is your job now.

You do this.

So this is better than anything I've ever made. So. So, you know, and I don't mind.

[00:40:56] Remy: Yeah, we.

My mom was a teacher all my life and she used to never use the bathroom during the day. She's a fifth grade teacher and she was very proud of the fact that she would not use the bathroom during the day.

Yeah, she is super proud of this. And she.

[00:41:15] Cory: Waiting for this punchline, had one of those.

[00:41:18] Remy: No, no punchline.

[00:41:20] Cory: Okay.

[00:41:20] Remy: She had one of those giant, you know, those giant bugs. Like they used to sell the giant, like 87 ounce travel mugs or whatever.

[00:41:29] Cory: Yep.

[00:41:29] Remy: And she would get that boy and fill it up with like a half a gallon sweet tea and ice and sip on that all day and never once go to the bathroom. And then at the end of the day, she would go to the bathroom after all the kids were gone. But she would hold her water all day long until eventually, after years and years of doing this, her bladder had gotten distended and moved like out of place.

And so she ended up having to have a pretty major corrective surgery. And she did all of the cooking at home up until that surgery, at which point my dad had to do the cooking. And he had never cooked in his life.

But my dad is a mathematician and a very brilliant, very driven man. And so he sat down and learned everything about cooking that you could possibly imagine. And when he first started cooking, those first few meals were terrible.

[00:42:25] Cory: Right.

[00:42:26] Remy: But after about two and a half weeks of cooking, my dad was the only person that we would eat right. You know, his food.

[00:42:32] Cory: Yeah, he won, he won the full time job.

[00:42:36] Remy: He did, he did, man. And it was my mom. My mom still gets upset because there was some time when I was like 13 and, and dad went somewhere and mom cooked and I, she was like, you don't like it or whatever. And I was like, oh, it's not the way dad makes. It's not as good as the way dad. And mom was like, this is my family recipe. I taught your dad this.

[00:43:01] Cory: Oh, I've had, I have, I have one friend from. Who's. I've. We've talked about this friend before, but she, she challenged me to bake posca bread for Easter.

And because she, her family is. Or half of her family is Ukrainian. And so, and so I went and researched this and I made this and I made this bread. And she, you know, and the first time she tried it, she's like, she was absolutely, say aghast that I got it right the first. She's like, my, okay, my grandma would adopt you. You know, you get, when you get to compliments like that, you know, you did it right. Yeah. She's the reason I started doing pierogies at Christmas too. She's like, came to visit around, around Christmas time and I was like, wanted to do something nice and so I made pierogies and I, and I had to do them, but I had to do them my way. And I, you know, doing the research, probably much like your dad. And I'm doing, okay, what goes into pierogies? Okay. Mashed potatoes and cheese. Okay. And so, but then I was like, well, if I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do. I did like, I did not just mashed potatoes. I did potato puree where I pass it through the sieve, through a sieve and add a bunch of butter and cream and stuff to it. And then I use gruyere cheese, because I was gonna make. I'm gonna make French cuisine pierogies.

And I'm like, it can't be too far off. A gruyere is a decent hard cheese. It's going to be, you know, fairly close to the same flavors. And, yeah, once again, she had it the first time, and I was waiting for the. For the commentary on. On. On it not being right. And she's just like, I give up.

You're making all my pierogies now. I'm like, cool. You know, even though that's awesome, I like the challenge. I love being able to. To surprise people. That's part of what I. Going back to vocation. Hey, let's go back to the thing.

I like it because it's a really easy way to let people know that you actually care about them. And the whole. Because food is so much a part of everybody's day, right? And it's so connected to your emotions, whether you like it or not.

And making anything, like, the hardest thing I've ever made, like this probably beef bourguignon, and had the most steps, I should say, but once you get it down a couple of times, I could say, make the jambalayak blindfolded now, but pretty close, although I might have to tape up my fingers afterwards.

But it's when somebody like that. Somebody's going through something really tough, and they wax poetic about times with their grandparents or stuff like that, and having this food, and you can, like, show up and get. And get in the ballpark, you know, and not even trying to get. It's like, I know this. This isn't going to be, you know, a home run. Not to use too many baseball analogies, because the Royals are still playing as we. As we record this or not they playing today? Yeah, they're probably playing right now.

But, you know, you just get it in the park that it's recognizable as the food that you put it, you know, and if you can get it. If you can get it into the infield, so much the better, right? And people realize that, like, oh, wow, you went out of your way. You know, it's like, I like to learn new things anyway, so it didn't. It feels, you know, it's not. It's not a burden to me. You know, it's not a. It's not for. I know for a lot of people, it would scare them, and I'm just like, oh, cool. I get to learn something new and Give you some good food.

But it really lets people know that you're thinking about them and you really care. And so that's why I, like, I've got dozens of people that are like, okay, this person wants this. This person for their birthday. And I need to actually have a spreadsheet for this stuff.

Whenever somebody's birthday is coming along, it's like, I don't even tell them happy birthday anymore. I just message them and I go, cake.

And they know that that's like, okay, what cake do I. I'm asking them, what cake do you want?

And I have one friend who's just to be a smart ass, looks up the most technically challenging cake that he can find.

He gives me a new challenge every year. And in fact, his birthday is coming up towards the middle of this month, so I'm going to get that order here pretty soon.

But.

[00:47:35] Remy: Food too, I think, is such a. Especially sharing food together with one another. It's such a very core Christian thing too.

[00:47:44] Cory: Yeah.

[00:47:45] Remy: You know, we read in the New Testament about the. The love feasts that they would have where, you know, we're all getting together at least once a week, maybe more, sometimes every day in some places, and we're all bringing food and we're all sharing a meal together and having fellowship, you know, and that's. It was such an essential part of the church biblically. And then the early church, you know, the Apostolic and the Apostolic Fathers after that. Such a. Such an important and central part of Christian identity and Christian religion has been getting together over a meal, you know.

[00:48:30] Cory: Yeah. And I mean, our entire. It's like our entire religion's based around a meal, you could say, especially. Especially our. Especially our rendering of it as Lutherans, you know, so we place a great deal of importance on that meal.

And so if that meal's important, well, other meals are important too. So every church thinks they have the best potlucks.

And all of them are correct in some degree.

I'm sure that to somewhere, someone, somewhere, Lutefisk is the perfect potluck meal.

Just not to me, but to somebody, not to you French Canadians, just good Germans.

That's not a French Canadian critique.

That's a German versus a Scandinavian Lutheran critique.

[00:49:28] Remy: Oh, yeah. No, I'm saying Lutefisk is just never going to be good enough for you French Canadians.

[00:49:32] Cory: Oh, no, Lutefisk is never good enough for anybody. I'm. No, it's good enough for somebody. It's just not gonna be good enough for me.

I pride myself on being Able to try anything. I'll try anything food related once and I like it most of the time. I'm pretty good at seeing the good in things. But even I have a line somewhere.

It's, I prefer the good German, you know, potluck. I have good sausages or some good schnitzel and some spaetzle and some good slaw or sauerkraut. I for years said that I had somehow missed the sauerkraut gene.

I just didn't like sauerkraut. And then literally within the last five years, it finally hit me what the whole point of sauerkraut is. I think I finally had let somebody talk me into a decent German, you know, like a vice versa or something, with some sauerkraut and had it and some mustard. And I was like, I get it now. Okay, all right. I get it now.

[00:50:49] Remy: I think a lot of it too is like, is the quality of the sauerkraut. We just had our Oktoberfest and a German lady put it on Rita and she just made her own sauerkraut. Just started, you know, fermenting the cabbage, however long ago and just made her own sauerkraut right up front.

And so we have this homemade sauerkraut. And it's so good, you just like, you just eat it. You could just eat it. It's okay to. You want to eat it, you know.

[00:51:18] Cory: So I think you don't really realize how that sour. How, how that, that sour, bittery, you know, how that. I mean, it's just pickled cabbage is what it is. And, and pickles are good. And you realize what the point of that pickle is to cut through.

The point of that is to cut through the richness of the meat and such. And you're just like, oh, okay, balance everything out.

So, yeah, I've rediscovered the sauerkraut gene within myself. I've made my ancestors proud.

[00:51:49] Remy: So getting back to your ancestors and the sauerkraut gene, Elca, take me on your spiritual journey.

[00:51:57] Cory: Okay, so getting back to this story. Yeah, so I was over at this, at. At the CLCA church in town through my undergrad.

Got married in that church to my wife. We're still married.

And then Pastor Wold retired and that's when the nice lady took over.

And the thing was, and there were some other things that went on with that church. There was, not to use any names, but there were. There was somebody who was prominent in like the later leadership of that church, who was, who was having.

Who was for to not to mince words, breaking the seventh commandment. And there was no. And it was pretty much an open secret. This was happening. And there was no. There was not even an inkling of church discipline. And then between that and then the pastor, their pastry, whatever we want to call her once again, we're trying to give her a fair shake. But the sermons kept getting.

They were definitely. They all had a political kind of bent to them. And actually the breaking point wasn't even me. It was my wife who was, say, raised ELCA and still considers herself an ELCA Lutheran. But. But this woman was giving a sermon on the woman with the issue who had been bleeding and touched the robe and made it sound. Basically made the entire. Through the entire sermon made it sound like Jesus had to act like this misogynistic man to this woman to be accepted by the crowd or whatever, even though he was going to show mercy. And we're driving home from that and Nan Veronica is like, that's not my Lord. That was not my. That's. She is making. This woman is making things up. You know, this is. And. And that was kind of the. That was pretty much the end of it there, you know, between the other things that had happened. It was. And that it was just like, why are we still here? And so we stopped going. But then the problem is when you stop going, it's like then the inertia kind of unless you immediately go and find someplace else. You know, you get used to sleeping in Sunday mornings. And so we did that for a while, but then we had our son and it's like, well, we need to find something to do. And so we tried several different non denominational churches in the Wichita area at the suggestion of this friend or the other.

Some of them were better than others. Once again, I'd go in with a hard ear of how are we addressing the gospel here? And it was never, like I said, if you're actually preaching from the Bible and you have at least some education, 99.9% of the time, you're not going to say objectionable.

But it came to a point where we had been going to this one church for a while and you know, some friends of Veronica's had invited us and people seemed nice enough and there was a praise band, you know, there was a drum kid on stage behind plexiglass, you know, in the whole thing. But. And so, yeah, and it's really funny when. Because I think this discourse had happened on Twitter this last week about the praise music or the hymns versus. Versus Contemporary Christian music, that thread and the people in. And I had to. I felt it when somebody is. Somebody said, the people who complain about hims being.

Hims being.

Corey. What's the word? Being boring, you know, had never. You know, when you're seeing contemporary Christian music, you're saying the same. You're singing the same phrase 50 years, 50 times in a row. You know, you're not even going through different verses.

It was that. That was our experience. Like, God is love.

God is love. You know, for like, 10 straight minutes. And the drummer gets his solo in, and the guitarist gets his solo in, and, you know, it's just like, okay, this is. This is maybe not the worst concert I've ever been to, but can we at least get to the teaching?

We'd been there for a while, and I was like, okay, you know, the people are nice enough, and whatever. The pastor then came to talk to us, like, after, you know, one day after service. And here's where I realized exactly how Lutheran I actually was.

I realized that the Holy Spirit had not departed from me because of this. And I didn't really just realize I hadn't. And I had learned it so well that I didn't even realize that I was being Lutheran.

And the guy walks up to us, and he's like, hey, you've been here. Nice to see you again. You know, you guys have been here for some months. You know, I think you guys are probably ready to, like, officially join the church, and I think we need to get you guys baptized. And I immediately said, we've been baptized.

[00:57:34] Remy: Amazing.

[00:57:35] Cory: I mean, just. No, we've been baptized. He goes, yeah, but you are willing to make that commitment to here? You know, you make the commitment. No, no, no. We've. We've been baptized.

And. Yeah, but you're. And he's still trying to sell it, and. And I. And I didn't realize how.

How I. How bad I doubled down, and he's. When he's. And he pushed it for the third time because. No, but I really think it would be better if you did this again. And I started reciting the Apostles Creed.

[00:58:06] Remy: Amazing.

[00:58:09] Cory: One baptism for the remission of sins. We've been baptized, and he didn't. After that. We stopped going, like, very shortly after that.

Then a little bit later, when my son was playing soccer and we got in with the team with my brothers where my nephew was playing, and they were organized out of this Missouri Synod church on the east side of town. It was a bit of a drive.

And then eventually, you know, and so we went to there a couple of times, but it was a bit of a drive. And they're a little bit saying they weren't quite as liturgical.

They were a lot better than the non denominational church. But you know, it's still a little bit informal.

Excuse me for that. And then one day I did a Google search. It was like, is there any Missouri Senate church is like closer so I don't have to drive all the way out to.

Out to Greenwich. And they and Greenwich Road. And I looked and there's like a half mile from my house is Grace Lutheran Church. Like Louis Walk.

[00:59:20] Remy: Amazing.

[00:59:20] Cory: Okay, cool. And so happened to be the pastor there at Grace Lutheran Church was a certain man named Jeffrey Boyle, who is now a professor at Concordia at Fort Wayne. He's actually teaching at the seminary now.

And so that. And so I walked in and got some really good. And immediately it was the full liturgical experience. Like the church that I grew up in was followed the Divine Service 3 or 1, 2 or 3 depending on what the week was.

But we didn't have a processional with a crucifix or incense or stuff like that. And so I got there and I got this.

It was a lot like the church I grew up in, but better. But it was a little bit more. Even more serious about it. And that's what I liked. I talked to lots of people when they talk about the different services that they go to, like the Baptists and their services and friends that I have there in different automations. And it's like. And I understand that there's some churches that are like people go there to be joyful. Like life is hard enough and I need to go and rejoice in the Lord.

And I get that. I get where some people might need that might be the need for that particular community.

I have no doubt that somebody really. That people really look forward to that. Especially if life being so hard. Me, I have the opposite problem. It's like my life is actually pretty good and I'm really bad at being really, really prideful. I don't know if you could tell from Twitter, but I need to be brought low and I need to and not brought low in the way that the Baptists would do it.

And to be challenged to just do more. I need law and gospel, right. And that's why I love the service. You immediately start with the corporate confession and absolution and then you get into the word and get into the liturgy and then it's like any good Lutheran, any good lcms or AALC Church. I'm sure you're getting long gospel every week.

And by the end of that it's such a simple message that it's.

This sums up like 95 plus percent of my engagements on Lutheran Twitter, is that I don't understand why this is so hard of a concept for everybody else to understand.

Back to the pride again, right? So it's like the Presbyterians. Well, obviously because of this verse and this verse, the double predestination or whatever else. And there are some very, very, very faithful, good, faithful Calvinists out there in the world and even, even on Twitter, you know, so I don't want to.

[01:02:38] Remy: Like talk it down and well educated.

[01:02:41] Cory: And well educated and, and, and yes, I have not read Calvin.

[01:02:45] Remy: Very smart.

[01:02:47] Cory: I have not read Calvin and the people, the couple that I'm thinking of in particular. And then they, if they, if they end up seeing this, which they might because they're the kind of, kind of people that would watch a Lutheran podcast just to see my. Probably just to see my chubby butt on it.

But they've told me that Calvinism is caricatured pretty badly. Of course, so is Lutheranism too. So I probably owe them that much to at least kind of read it at some point. I don't fear that I'm going to be changing my votes anytime soon, but because in the popular, in the actual day to day application of it, man, they're just a. I just, I see more problems than I see, than I see solutions for it. Like the assurance that they're looking for with it. And I get why, why that assurance is comforting. But you don't have to, you don't have to do the mental gymnastics to that point to get it. To get that assurance, you just have to go with this is what the word said and stop there. And you're there.

[01:03:55] Remy: Yeah.

[01:03:55] Cory: You don't have to prove to yourself through, through re. Through your own reason that, that, that's enough. You just have to go, that's enough.

[01:04:05] Remy: Also, no shade against my boy John Calvin. But Calvin's writings, how boring. Just like, just, just he was a lawyer turned theologian. How boring do you think his writing is?

[01:04:22] Cory: You could get me talking about lawyers turned theologians within our own synod. Oh, sorry, not within our own Senate anymore.

That's the, his writing.

Yeah. I don't know.

[01:04:40] Remy: Calvin's writing is exactly as boring as you think.

[01:04:43] Cory: It's that bad, huh? Okay. I had a friend of mine, the friend who challenged me to make Pasca. She was raised Roman Catholic and has lapsed essentially. And I went to visit her a few weeks ago, and we were having a fairly deep discussion about theology and as deep as she could go. But it's amazing. I mentioned this at the men's retreat this weekend. It's amazing to.

To the average catechized Roman Catholic that a moderately well catechized Lutheran sounds like a theological student.

Yeah, sounds like an actual theologian. Because she's saying. She asked me, in all honesty, in all seriousness, just like, have you ever considered actually just studying theology and getting into it for real and getting a degree, whatever else? And I was like, if I did that, I'd have to read Barth, and I don't want to read Barth.

[01:05:47] Remy: You have to read so much more. There's so much reading. There's too much reading. It's. I mean, there's not too much reading. There's probably not enough reading.

[01:05:54] Cory: But, like. Like, I want to. I wish I could hang with your boy Cooper, but, man, that's like. Like, I've got. I've got.

[01:06:00] Remy: Nobody can hang with Cooper, dude.

[01:06:02] Cory: Well, no, I know he's got to.

[01:06:03] Remy: Be one of the smartest. One of the smartest men I've ever met.

It's. It's mind blowing having him as a professor in class. It's insane because he just knows. He knows, like, he has this encyclopedic knowledge of church history and church fathers, movements within the church, doctrines that people. I mean, he just. He'll straight up be like, has anybody ever heard of this really obscure theologian that no one has ever read because his work isn't even in English yet. And he died in, like, 586. And we're like, no, Cooper, nobody's heard of that guy, you know, and he's like, oh, well, he had this really interesting theory on the atonement. And you can see how that later influences, you know, some other guy you've not heard of. And it's just. It's insane. It's. I'm like, how do you. He just spends all his time, like, studying. I don't know how he does it.

[01:06:52] Cory: Yeah, I don't know. He's apparently. Apparently has time to do yo yo tricks, you know, I'm like, how do you have.

[01:06:58] Remy: Super genius dude? He's a super genius. He. What it is. I can tell everybody the truth because I actually know Cooper personally. I have his phone number. I call him. I hang out with him whenever we're near enough to hang out. He is a very good dude. I can tell you the Jordan and this I hate to put this out here on the podcast because it's actually going to wreck him. It's probably going to ruin his whole career.

[01:07:23] Cory: Oh, whatever.

[01:07:24] Remy: But he. He has that drug from Limitless, the Bradley Cooper movie. Was it Bradley Cooper? Yeah, it was. It was Bradley Cooper. He is the limitless drug. He takes.

[01:07:35] Cory: He takes the.

[01:07:37] Remy: He takes the magic.

[01:07:38] Cory: The.

[01:07:38] Remy: The limitless drug, and it, like, magically, he can use 100% of his brain, and the rest of us are down here with just like 8 to 10.

[01:07:45] Cory: Is he dealing?

I get it on that.

No, no, no.

[01:07:54] Remy: I wish I've tried. I want the limitless drug.

[01:07:59] Cory: There's a guy.

[01:08:00] Remy: There's a guy in my town that says that he has the limitless drug and he's willing to sell it to me, but I'm pretty sure it's actually just crack cocain.

[01:08:08] Cory: Guy is selling.

[01:08:09] Remy: He doesn't look like he takes the limitless tr.

[01:08:11] Cory: I was. I was gonna make it. I was thinking. You were talking about Joe for a second until you. Until you said that.

[01:08:17] Remy: No, no, no, no. I'm talking about the homeless guy that.

[01:08:21] Cory: Hangs out at the church.

Oh, boy.

So we could talk about.

[01:08:30] Remy: Thanks so much for.

Oh.

[01:08:35] Cory: Right. I mean, this is.

[01:08:36] Remy: We've blown through an hour, man.

[01:08:39] Cory: I'd say. I didn't even get to talk. I wanted to talk about all of our Twitter friends. It's like, congratulations, Here I am, episode two.

Episode two.

Because I did want to talk about. Because I mentioned this in the notes. It's like everybody. You can't get on Twitter any day. Or X, if you want to call it that now. Everybody's like, this is so toxic.

This is so toxic. I'm going to call it Twitter. Going to call it Twitter until somebody says. Until somebody says it's cringe. And then I'm going to call it Twitter even harder.

No, but the thing is, like, the reason I'm on Twitter now is because of all y'all. You know, it's.

I. I stay away. I try to stay away from the outreach machine part of it. I'm. I'm usually successful, but now that Concord Carry is back, maybe not so much for going forward for a while, until I adjust, but there's a bunch of people there that. That's where I can get a hold of you, you know? And it's like, I don't want to lose. I don't want to lose the ability to get a hold of you or Joe or the Stoddards or the Lawrences and shout out to Nevin, wherever he is, out hunting this weekend with the kids, out of the wife and out of the country. You know, there's like all these people like all scattered over and around the country, around the world and we can meet up and actually have, have, have fellowship essentially. You know, have, have civil conversations and, and not, not, you know, not crawl up, you know, not get in each other's faces about things and actually have. It's like we're the whole other than, other than the few, you know, the few real rabble rousers out there and everybody knows who they are and they even know who they are and that's why they do it. I'm thinking like Concord, Carry and Metz and you know who go out, the Texans really who go out and troll for the Lord within our group.

It's always a good time. Even when things get contentious. Like even the thing about that Joshua Steele was talking about last week, the question about.

Right. Difference in right.

If it would be preferable for a Lutheran to go to a Lutheran church that was using contemporary worship rather than not go to church at all.

And on one level that's a really obvious, that's a really obvious answer. It's like, no, you've got to go to church. You're part of the church whether you like it or not.

You got to go and hear the word and participate in the church.

But Carrie had the thing, well, if the form has changed, then the doctrine has changed. And it was the point he was making and it felt like it was going to get out of hand, but it didn't because believe it or not, we're all adults and, and sometimes we can even use little magic black box for something that's not completely self destructive. And it's just really fun. Yeah, yeah, it's a good, it's really, it brings so much say, confidence. It's not the right word, but it's nice to know, especially like we're having this issue in Wichita right now where we're trying to get the different churches together, especially with regards to Christian education because there's a couple of churches that have schools and we kind of want to set up something like the Catholic diocese has in terms of reciprocating tuition sort of deals to encourage a Lutheran education. Right. But you have that sort of a shared identity like within the Catholic diocese, whether you're going to, within Wichita, if you're going to Cape and Mount Carmel or you're going to Bishop Carroll or whatever, you're still Catholics. And the Lutherans have been even LCMS Churches are kind of fragmented to each other, and we're trying to build that community. And I'm very hopeful about this because of, believe it or not, Twitter, because once we sit down and we can actually talk about things, we realize exactly how much we share in common. And when we get something wrong, we can take that, say, church discipline, but we can take the gentle instruction and come back and be better about it.

There's a bunch of people on Twitter that I really hope I get to meet someday. And I don't know why we would ever have a Twitter meetup. Sounds like maybe the most insane thing that anybody could ever ask for.

[01:14:04] Remy: It sounds like the. It sounds like the exact thing my parents would never let me do.

[01:14:09] Cory: Right.

[01:14:11] Remy: For good reason.

For good reason.

[01:14:15] Cory: But it's like, do I. Do I need to crash an AALC thing just so I can meet you and you and Joe and Jordan, I mean, and Lisa, of course, you are.

[01:14:23] Remy: Totally allowed to crash AALC things.

[01:14:25] Cory: I'd have to.

[01:14:26] Remy: I mean, somehow.

[01:14:30] Cory: What's that? I'm sorry.

[01:14:31] Remy: I mean, no, not necessarily.

In just a couple of weeks, we're having the pastors conference, you know, and I'm sure no one would mind if he stopped by for.

[01:14:43] Cory: Where are you having your.

[01:14:44] Remy: Minneapolis.

[01:14:45] Cory: Okay. That's still a little bit of a. Yeah, I was like, I'm a good Midwesterner. I could drive that. But I. You know.

[01:14:55] Remy: Corey, I am going to go ahead and cut her off here.

[01:14:58] Cory: All right. I was just going to ask you about how the. How the.

[01:15:00] Remy: Thank you so much.

[01:15:03] Cory: Thanks for having me.

[01:15:04] Remy: I'm sorry.

[01:15:04] Cory: I'm sorry we haven't been. I'm sorry. For a little bit. All over the place compared to some of your. Some of your others. But no, I hope. I hope you get at least an hour's worth of good material here.

[01:15:16] Remy: Well, I've recorded an hour and 15 minutes, so I think that that's at least an hour, so thank you, sir. And I'll put a link to your Twitter and everything down there, and we'll see you on the Internet and we'll see you in the discord.

[01:15:31] Cory: Okay.

Today I'm joined by Lutheran probate attorney Jen Gumble of Organized Afterlife!

Check out Jen's amazing services at Organized Afterlife!

Follow Jen on X: @JGumble

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[00:00:00] Remy: This episode of Lutheran Answers is brought to you by our sponsor, Dial A Podcast. Dial A Podcast, proud sponsor of Lutheran Answers, provides a simple yet powerful solution to bring your church's sermons and Bible studies closer to those who might be a step away from the digital world. Getting started with a local telephone number is easy, allowing anyone to listen to your content with just a phone call at their convenience. It's an excellent way for congregations of all size to extend their reach. Get started with a 30 day risk free trial at dialapodcast.com and ensure no one misses out out on your church's messages.

Not the best show in the world, but I just keep it light.

Jen, thanks for conversational. So, yeah, thanks for coming on.

Let's see. I do have show notes here that. See, if I were better at this, I would have the show notes up already.

But we are going to discuss a couple of things. Memento Mori, Vacation as Vocation as a legacy, and anything that we can fit within those topics, including why you're a Lutheran, how these things are distinct in Lutheran theology and practice.

But to get us started off, your thing is organized afterlife. You are a probate attorney, huh?

[00:01:32] Jen: Yep. Probate and estate planning attorney.

And the.

There, there's a couple parts of that where you, I get to kind of see the results of people's lives, you know, on a daily basis.

And then kind of the importance of education, having an estate plan that works.

[00:01:55] Remy: Okay.

[00:01:56] Jen: So that's where the online stuff comes into it. Um, almost. I, I joke with people. There needs to be a Dave Ramsey of death.

[00:02:03] Remy: So that's nice. Oh my gosh. Can you please. That is so great. A Dave Ramsey of death. Can you please? That should be like your whole brand. That's amazing.

[00:02:18] Jen: It's like, it's like I say, I say in three words and everyone gets it. It's so funny.

[00:02:23] Remy: Yeah.

A Dave Ramsey of death. I'm writing that down. There's no particular reason I'm writing that down. I just think that is so great. Oh my gosh. It does, it does encapsulate everything you do. Huh? Because like now I totally get it.

[00:02:40] Jen: Yep.

[00:02:41] Remy: I totally get it. Wow.

Even though you're a probate attorney, how often do your friends and family ask you to go to traffic court for them?

[00:02:50] Jen: I've, I've done it a couple times.

Just probably more recently in my career I've been able to, to really niche down. But for a long time I was a, I was a small town attorney.

[00:03:01] Remy: Oh.

[00:03:01] Jen: And so like, like, I loved estate planning. And probate, but every once in a while, you know, like, I've been a city attorney for some small cities and, you know, traffic court for family, and I was successful.

[00:03:16] Remy: I.

I'm. I'm always amazed. I. It's going to sound like I get tickets all the time. I don't. I've used this guy twice in, like, the last 10 years. But there's this guy in our town, and I don't know. I mean, I assume it's legal because he's an attorney, but he. He'll just be like, he called me because I submitted her. I. So look, I rolled a stop sign on Thanksgiving, and there was no one on the road, no one anywhere except the cop literally hiding in the bushes watching the stop sign because it's the most run stop sign in our town. And it was Thanksgiving Day, and he.

[00:03:55] Jen: I know those type of intersections.

[00:03:56] Remy: Yeah, yeah. He had to work Thanksgiving Day and hated it.

[00:04:00] Jen: Yeah, yeah.

[00:04:01] Remy: And my registration was expired, and I hadn't gotten that taken care of.

[00:04:08] Jen: Right.

[00:04:08] Remy: Because I had a check engine light. And in North Carolina, you're not going to pass an inspection with a check engine light. And so I had to get my car inspections. I had to get my car fixed before I could get my inspection. And then in North Carolina, it's tax and tags together.

[00:04:23] Jen: Oh, my God.

[00:04:24] Remy: So when this guy pulls me over, it's Thanksgiving Day, and he's got to work. He writes me a ticket for rolling the stop sign for out of date registration, and then he writes me a third ticket for having failed a previous inspection because of the check engine light, which I didn't even know you could get a ticket for.

[00:04:43] Jen: Right.

[00:04:43] Remy: And so I called this little. This little local attorney in town, and.

And he was like, yeah, send me 200 bucks. It's done.

And I was like, okay. So I literally just sent me a link online. I paid him 200 bucks. A week later, he sent me an email and was like, hey, it all got dismissed. I was like, do I have to go get my car inspected or show proof? He was like, no.

I was like, okay. I don't know what he does, but it's. I assume it's legal and right, you know, I guess I don't want to know what he does anyway. Attorneys, y'all are like magic to me, the way y'all make things happen.

[00:05:19] Jen: That's why I went to. That was part of the reason why I went to law school. It's like, I want to know the magic.

[00:05:24] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. What is the magic exactly Is it just knowing the law? You just know the law really well.

[00:05:31] Jen: Right. Well. And especially, especially being a probate attorney. It's, it's like you just, you just understand the bureaucracy of it really well.

And then, you know, like, there's all sorts of different kinds of law that are just like different types of people gravitate towards. You know, like there's kind of your standard. Like I, you know, like some people will be like, I watched lawyer shows growing up and I just always like to argue and blah, blah, Bl. And I was never that person. I, you know, I was like, I like teaching, but. But I don't have the energy for teaching kids in a classroom.

[00:06:05] Remy: Right.

[00:06:06] Jen: Thank God. I figured that out pretty quick.

And so I just like, kept on like, okay, like, older, older, older. And then I shadowed an attorney in my hometown that did estate planning and probate and all that, you know, kind of all that stuff. And I realized he was teaching. He was teaching adults that would come in, like, really interested in the answer. And I was like, oh, yeah, that's. Yeah, let's do that.

[00:06:29] Remy: So, yeah, that's neat. It's funny you say that, like different types of bureaucracy and knowing it. You know, I had a buddy who, another lawyer, tangent, who had, he went on a mission, trip to Africa, met a woman, fell in love. They got married.

[00:06:49] Jen: Oh my God.

[00:06:50] Remy: They had kids. Yep, yep. And then he, they tried to come over here. She cannot get a visa. They go, they do all the paperwork. They do every kind of paperwork and they get turned down. And so then they, they try it again and it's always the interview where they were failing it. No.

[00:07:08] Jen: And they were already married.

[00:07:09] Remy: Yeah, yeah.

[00:07:10] Jen: With kids. Oh my God. Cuz my, yeah, my husband, My husband has a green card. And we did the interview and that was. And, and it was like the easiest. And I kind of had a theory of, you know, because my husband's from Germany and I kind of had a theory. I kind of had a theory that there's. I think there's, there's some maybe systemic justice, you know, like, certain countries are easy time of it and some countries don't.

[00:07:33] Remy: Absolutely. Some countries have an easy time of it and some don't. I'm. I'm 100% certain of that.

But yeah, he, they struggled. They failed the interview three times, and on the third time they were told, she's never, she's never getting a visa now. Like three strikes and you're out. It's not happening.

[00:07:52] Jen: Yeah. I mean, it is. Yeah.

[00:07:54] Remy: Yeah. So they they contacted an immigration attorney and he had her a visa inside of like, two, three weeks.

[00:08:03] Jen: Yep.

[00:08:04] Remy: Boom. Done.

[00:08:04] Jen: Yeah, it's. And you know, the bureaucracy, you know, the ways to, like, appeal stuff, you know, that. You know, the. You just know how to get around the system.

[00:08:12] Remy: Yeah.

[00:08:12] Jen: And. Yeah. And then you just help people through the system.

[00:08:16] Remy: Yeah.

[00:08:17] Jen: I watched minimize.

[00:08:18] Remy: I've watched a number. A number of my friends in immigration, specifically. A lot of guys I went to high school with ended up marrying women from China, which is like a weird statistical anomaly.

[00:08:31] Jen: Yeah.

[00:08:32] Remy: But I've watched quite a few of them struggle through that. That process on their own. And then my. My closest friend, he's also watched it, and I told him about our mutual friend Paul with his wife from Africa. And so my closest friend, he just got an immigration attorney up front, and she was over here lickety split.

[00:08:51] Jen: Yeah.

[00:08:52] Remy: So it's wild, man.

[00:08:54] Jen: Yeah.

[00:08:55] Remy: The whole. The whole system.

[00:08:56] Jen: Yeah. Well. And kind of in my area of it, people.

People. I think. I think almost everyone I run into, unless they've been through it before, are shocked at, like, what do you mean? I have to go through probate for my husband. I'm his wife. Why would I have to do that? You know, why would you have to do that? It's me. It's. It's all based on assets being stuck in someone's name.

And then, you know, one of the things that I harp on a lot is you. People. People can. People can have legal documents and they can still have legal messes that are on the table because it's. It's. Estate plans are an organizational system. It's like, okay, here's how my stuff should transfer or where, you know, like, who should do that? All the rules for that. But you're at. It's what your assets say.

So like, a great example is like, people will sign a will and think, okay, now I'm out of the bureaucracy of it. It's like, no, no, no. This is for the bureaucracy of it. This is telling the court system, I want to do something different than what the law would do if I didn't have a will, but it's still for.

[00:10:07] Remy: Right.

[00:10:07] Jen: And then, like, if you're like, if you own your house together, great. But does it have the magic language on the deed to transfer automatically? Maybe, maybe not. And then I have to do stupid probate.

If, you know, if it was a house that, you know, someone bought as a single person and they got married and they never. They never updated how the house is owned.

[00:10:28] Remy: Oh, wow.

[00:10:29] Jen: That can Go all haywire. Like, it's all what these assets say. And, and that's what determines whether or not you have to go through the court system.

[00:10:38] Remy: So my wife and I own two cars together. We're both on the title together.

They're both our cars that we own. Just flat out, if I were to get in a wreck on the way home from work tomorrow, there's no guarantee that a. She's getting what, like the insurance payout from the vehicle or like that she's keeping.

[00:10:59] Jen: It depends on. It depends on exactly what that car title says and what.

Because I know, I know up here, like, I, I've always, like car title has to say something. But always check with vehicle services because that's like their. That's their gig. And I never. I never quite remember it because we. Because up here in Minnesota, conjunctions on the car title mean a whole lot. You can have, and you can have or. And one means survivor gets it and one means it doesn't.

But every state kind of has an amount that says, okay, after a certain amount, or, I'm sorry, under a certain amount. And if you don't. And if you don't have real estate, you don't need to bother the court system with it. And for most families, it's like, oh, thank God, you know, like, lots of things can transfer automatically, but if what is like, stuck in that person's name is. Is small, then, you know, then you can bypass the court system because it's just not enough to bother the court system with it.

[00:11:57] Remy: Oh, that's neat. That's. That's. That's good to know.

[00:12:01] Jen: Yeah. Yeah, but I like, there's lots of culprits for this stuff. Like.

[00:12:05] Remy: Yeah.

[00:12:05] Jen: You know, like how the, how the house is titled, what the cars say, what the. My. Yeah. My husband's also working, so he might pass back and forth. But another one is like fun money accounts. You know, like, sometimes spouses will have, like, not the joint accounts. And I'm like, okay, but like, who do you have your spouse's beneficiary? Because you die, that's frozen. The bank's going to say, hey, that dead person ain't walking in the door. And I need someone with, like, legal authority. And just because you're the wife doesn't mean I always pick on husbands dying first. But just because you're the wife doesn't mean anything.

[00:12:40] Remy: You know, I think statistically we do.

[00:12:42] Jen: Yeah. Oh, yeah. The statistics are way, way in favor of the wives surviving.

[00:12:48] Remy: Yeah, it's. Cause we're dumb.

[00:12:51] Jen: Well, yeah, yeah, yeah, something like that. I think like just health wise, right. Like, like lifespans are shorter and then like, like between couples, a lot of, you know the. Statistically men are usually like slightly older than women anyway. And then so it, yeah, it's in. And I harp on it as a gender issue, you know, like women, women are the ones who bear the brunt of this, you know, like they're the ones who are stuck going through probate. They're the ones who are caring for parents. They're the ones who are doing their parents probate. Like it's just, it falls on what's the.

[00:13:30] Remy: I have, I gotta, I gotta start writing down questions now.

What's the, like what's the biggest shark out there picking on these recent widows and. Or widowers to be like the vultures? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The people that smell the blood.

[00:13:49] Jen: Yeah. Well I think the biggest one that we just consistently see are, are people will call, sniffing around to see if you're going to sell the house, you know, like, oh, you're interested in selling the house, sell it to a flipper. And I'll field those calls because I'm publicly an attorney for someone's estate and I'll be like, you know, yeah, that's great. But that's so rare that they can't find a normal buyer and they should be getting fair market value. Why, you know, why should they sell to you for a discount? Just because they're in a bad position. You know, there's a lot, there's a lot of like just old school, biblical, Old Testament, like just stuff that comes in.

[00:14:28] Remy: Yeah.

[00:14:28] Jen: You know that you're like, I'm sorry this widow isn't just like fall off the, you know, fall off the truck.

[00:14:35] Remy: Yeah.

[00:14:35] Jen: If you can just like, you know, make some profit off of that. So. Yeah.

[00:14:40] Remy: Golly, yeah. It's wild. It's wild that there are even profit bearing industries around. Like widows, you know.

[00:14:50] Jen: Yeah. But, but also like funerals. I mean. Yeah, funeral homes. You know, like on the one hand there's a lot, there's a lot of discussion of like of, you know, because I kind of keep my eye on some of the conversations in death services and you know, like, like probates aren't cheap. Court, you know, court has fees sometimes they're crazy.

One of the big scary things is some states will have the court system take a percentage of the estate as the fee.

Some states will let attorneys take a percentage of the, of the estate as a fee. And Minnesota doesn't let either the attorneys or the court system do that.

You know, we got, we have to earn our fees.

[00:15:33] Remy: Right.

[00:15:33] Jen: We have to show our work.

[00:15:35] Remy: That's good.

[00:15:36] Jen: Yeah, but, but it's a, it's a real burden. I mean, you talk about some other. Like, I, like I'm in Minnesota, but Iowa lets attorneys take, we call them statutory fees where it's a percentage. Or California lets the court system take statutory fees where it's a percentage and it's, it's super expensive just for kind of normal people with a home, you know, and vehicles and some bank accounts, maybe retirement. And it's, it's a big problem.

[00:16:11] Remy: It's.

Could you turn down, like, I would want to turn down a statutory fee if I were an attorney just like out of, out of principle, you know, like, just because it feels like it's like those, those big class actions. You have these big class action lawsuits, and the ones that are making all the money are the attorneys for the defendant and the attorney for the class. They're making tons of money. And then I get a check for $6.08.

[00:16:39] Jen: Yeah, well, I mean, there's a, there's also a whole discussion of, you know, because we're a highly regulated system, like regulated industry. And so a lot of those, you know, part of their business model is like, they're also taking a lot of cases to court where they don't win. Right. And so that all. So, like, it has to come all out in the wash. Statutory fees for probate. It's a little, I mean, it's just something that we don't have in Minnesota. So it's easy for me to sit back and say, like, that's awful for you guys to do it. And to some extent I, I do think that. But then, then again, it's like, well, what's their business model? But.

[00:17:15] Remy: Right.

[00:17:15] Jen: But it, but it also, like, I. Probably one of my biggest concerns with it, I guess, as a system is it doesn't incentivize, like, truly guiding people to say, how can we minimize all of this stuff? You know, like, just to take, you know, like, I, I'd rather show people how to minimize this and pay me less in the long run.

[00:17:38] Remy: Right. You know, so you Christians, I have to. I have a death question for you. Yeah.

Let's say my. And this, this, this might be a state by state thing, maybe not. I don't know. But let's say my dad runs up a thousand credit cards to the max and he dies, and then they call me and they're like, hey, your dad died with all these credit cards. You got to pay them off. Because I'm gonna tell them, no.

[00:18:16] Jen: Yeah, no. Yeah, I tell people. And, you know, again, like. Like, you. You hit on it. Like, there's a lot of this type of. Like, particularly this area, this type of law, like the law of death that is very state specific. But there's some. There's some basic rules that's applicable in any state, and one of them is you can't inherit debt. Now, you can't. Like, your inheritance can be affected by debt because those creditors have to be paid off before you can inherit.

But simply because you're a relative, they can't be like, don't you feel bad your dad left all this crap, and don't you want to make it right? They're not supposed to do that. And there's actually, like, federal creditor rules that have laid that out of, like, don't do that to grieving people.

[00:19:04] Remy: That's good.

[00:19:06] Jen: Yeah, that's good.

[00:19:07] Remy: My. When my grandfather died, there were people calling my dad. This was back in 1980, something. There were people calling my dad about his, you know, his credit cards or whatever. And, you know, well, you have to pay him off. And, you know, I mean, I guess, like, if you accept. Accept. If you accept the terms. You know what I mean? If you agree to do it, then you're. Then you're in for it.

[00:19:29] Jen: Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of, like, hooks, right? Like, if you're a co. Signer on something, right? If you're. If you're. If you're like, the executor of the estate and you mess up, you pay somebody and there isn't enough to go around. That's why, like, that's why, you know, families are. Families are like, well, do we have to use a lawyer? I'm like, technically, no, the judge doesn't care if you fill out the forms. However, if you pay someone off too fast, then you're gonna be personally on the hook for screwing up.

[00:19:57] Remy: Right.

[00:19:58] Jen: And, you know, so you probably. It's. It's worth it to get a little in the room. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:20:08] Remy: It's like, how many. How many times have you. Have you done this? And the, you know, the average person, it's. I've never done this before in my life.

[00:20:15] Jen: And it's.

[00:20:16] Remy: The probate attorney says, great. Well, I've done this, you know, a thousand times.

[00:20:19] Jen: Yeah.

[00:20:19] Remy: This year.

[00:20:20] Jen: Every day.

[00:20:20] Remy: You know.

[00:20:21] Jen: Every day. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yep.

[00:20:24] Remy: How does.

Okay, last fun probate question, then I want to get to the theology questions.

Have you ever seen someone just, like, be really petty and encourage all the fighting in, like, their, their will or whatever?

[00:20:40] Jen: Oh, oh, man.

[00:20:41] Remy: Just like, I want to leave this in the most confusing and uncomfortable way specifically so that everyone has to fight about it.

[00:20:49] Jen: Oh, that's a good question. The lovely thing, I'm, I'm in a, I'm in a situation where I get, I get to refer the family fights out.

[00:20:58] Remy: Oh, beautiful.

[00:20:59] Jen: Like, yeah, I tell people I, you know, hey, look, I help, I help families fight bureaucracy. I don't help, I don't help families fight family. If you need that, you need it like a real lawyer. Well, real lawyer, but like, you need a lawyer who, who was like, I watched LA Law and I, I always argued with people and that's why I went to law school. And I'm like, I didn't do. I didn't go to law school for that. I went to law school. Like, get you through the crap, you know? Yeah, so. So yeah, let them figure out how.

[00:21:26] Remy: They want to do it and then, and then I'll help you do it that way.

[00:21:29] Jen: Right?

[00:21:30] Remy: That's all right. We'll just clip around. That sounds good.

No one will even know that this, this skips. It's just. This is gonna be like five. A five minute jump that no one's gonna know about.

So how does being a Lutheran, first off, how did you, have you always been a Lutheran? How did you get there? Walk me through that.

[00:21:58] Jen: I, in some ways feel a little bit like the Missouri Senate princess.

[00:22:03] Remy: Okay.

[00:22:04] Jen: I had. So my great grandfather was a Missouri Senate pastor back when they were still speaking German. The FBI knocked on his door as a part of family Lord. During the whole switch over to English back In like the 20s, 30s, he was a, he was a pastor in western South Dakota between Pine Ridge and Rosebud.

I. We're kind of, we're kind of dead with Lutherans. Not incredibly pious, but very, but very, like, opinionated on theology.

[00:22:36] Remy: Excellent.

[00:22:38] Jen: Yeah, yeah, we're the fun ones. We're the fun ones. So, yeah, I grew up. Grew up. Missouri sened.

And I attended. I veered a. Veered off the Missouri ascended path when I went to the Association Free Lutheran Bible School.

Yeah, I was with. Yeah, so I was with the pious Scandinavians and I was. Yeah, I was with the good folk over there, though. Yeah. But through that met my husband, who is a, who is a German from off the boat. German. Lutheran. So that was kind of funny.

[00:23:16] Remy: Oh, wow.

[00:23:17] Jen: Yeah.

[00:23:17] Remy: How's that? How does that work out?

[00:23:19] Jen: Good.

[00:23:21] Remy: Yeah.

[00:23:22] Jen: Yeah.

[00:23:23] Remy: Does he. Does he have strong opinions about American Lutheranism and. Because, I mean, it's like. It's like, right from. Right from the source here, you know, for him.

[00:23:33] Jen: Yeah, well, and it's. I mean, because. Because he, like, a lot of people grew up in the. In, like, the ekd, ekl.

[00:23:45] Remy: I forget that, like, the state church.

[00:23:47] Jen: Like, the state mainstream. And so there's a lot of Calvinism, you know, like, mirror. You know, it's why. It's why my forefathers left, you know, so.

So. So, like. And. And, like, we are both very, like, anti Jason Gooda. I went to school with Jason Gooda.

[00:24:05] Remy: I'm also anti Jason Goodham.

[00:24:07] Jen: Oh, yeah, sorry. Yeah, sorry. No, no. I'm going to use his phrase of anti generic American Christianity. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I would say I'm much more like, like, theologically opinionated. Like, we're. Our oldest is currently in confirmation, so we've been comparing notes on, like, what was your confirmation? Like, what was. And I'm like, mine was a lot more rigorous than everybody.

Missouri Stud is no joke.

[00:24:38] Remy: Are you guys. I'm. I'm studying right now in sim. We're going over confirmation. This. That's what I'm. The class I'm taking this quarter is like, catechesis and teaching.

[00:24:48] Jen: Oh, sure. Yeah.

[00:24:49] Remy: How to catechize. And confirmation is, like, the smallest part of this class because it was like, look, if that's the only time you're doing it, then you're not doing it. Right.

[00:24:59] Jen: Right. Yeah.

[00:25:00] Remy: Are you guys. Y'all are big on, like, the running through it at home and making sure, like, we're.

[00:25:06] Jen: We could be better.

[00:25:08] Remy: It's good to everybody. Geez.

[00:25:10] Jen: Yeah. I mean, we could be better. We're not nearly. Nearly as good as, you know, we should be or, like to be or, you know, all the things. But. Yeah, but also, like. And this is something of, I think, being Missouri Senate. You know, I'm. I grew up in the 80s and 90s, so that was a particular generation within the Missouri Senate. And part of our Sunday school in catechism was like, yeah, so how you. Like, how are you gonna not be a Nazi? How are you gonna be an actual Christian?

So it was like, yeah, and it's something. I teach Sunday school in our local church, and I get to do this now with my sixth graders, but give them the hiding place and be like, hi. Hi. You're going into confirmation. So this is Christianity, right? You know, like, It's. Yeah. Yeah. So in our, like, having hard conversations with. With God and. And theology and the particular Lutheran way to approach and handle it, which I mean, like, daily I have, like, that's my job. Right. That's my day job. Is difficult conversations. You're gonna die. Let's talk about that.

Or, you know, your person died. Let's. Let's get through it. And.

And there's so much of that that Lutheranism is. Is able to, like. Like, it. It doesn't just have an answer for it. It's okay not having the easy answers for it or it undermines the easy answers that Don.

I tell people, I think that. Well, so when I was in high school, my dad died of very quickly, catastrophic cancer. Just kind of.

And I tell people that if I wasn't raised Lutheran, if I didn't have, like, the Lutheran answers of not having easy answers to that, you know, to something like that, if I was in a megachurch, I'd be a Nyla. Like, I'd be like, yeah, this is all crap, and everything's all crap.

[00:27:19] Remy: And it's really crazy how that. That. How to. How sort of pop theology.

[00:27:27] Jen: Oh, there's so. It's so prevalent, and it's so damaging.

[00:27:30] Remy: Yeah, yeah, it. And it just. It does not survive first contact with.

[00:27:35] Jen: Right.

[00:27:35] Remy: Just anything.

[00:27:37] Jen: Right, right. I mean, like, the. The fact that, you know, I could be in a church that wasn't just. Just a. Kind of normal. Well, it just wasn't like, just like a. Hey, we get together on Sundays. Mainstreamy church. You know, it was. It was like, no, we actually believe this stuff.

[00:27:56] Remy: Right.

[00:27:57] Jen: But then also, like, hand in hand, like, bad things happen to good people. We don't know why, you know, Job. Yeah, let's talk about Job. That's a book we can talk about in, like, with Sunday schoolers, you know, like.

Or, like. Like, why. Why did the Holocaust. You know, like, we don't have an answer to that. We just know that we have to love our neighbor. That's all we know. You know, we know where we go. We know that this work is done, and all we're here to do is love our neighbor. And that's. That's it. And if I didn't. If, like, there's no way I'd survive what I went through when I was a kid or just my day job if I didn't have, you know, that kind of framing.

[00:28:40] Remy: Yeah, it's. It's interesting. I. One of my guests, he's actually recorded for this season as well, but I had him on season two, I think, Pat Flynn, he's a philosopher and a Roman Catholic. And one of the things he pointed out was that. Yeah, it was a very good interview, but one of the things he pointed out was that it seems as though, regarding the problem of evil, we live in a world that is evil. Like, it's. There's not so little evil that there's not a problem of evil, but there's also not so much evil that we all don't just kill ourselves right away. You know, there's. There seems to be just enough bad things in this world that it tests and purifies your faith rather than, you know, turning you away. Yeah. Driving you into despair or anything like that. There's. It seems as though the world is still somehow engineered to produce saints, you know?

[00:29:54] Jen: Yeah.

[00:29:55] Remy: I find that very compelling.

[00:29:58] Jen: That's it. Yeah. That's a really interesting.

That's a really interesting place, you know, that life can still be beautiful even in the midst of the worst.

[00:30:08] Remy: Yeah.

[00:30:09] Jen: Yeah.

[00:30:11] Remy: Does your. Does your job helping people with. With probate things and this sort of end of life and all this. Yeah.

How often does this afford you an opportunity to share the love of Christ? And what does that look like in your day job?

[00:30:30] Jen: Yeah. So, like, if we were, you know, generic American Christianity, right. I'd be like, hardly ever. Because it would have it. Right. Because it would be like, well, how many like, persons doing their will have I brought to Christ?

None.

[00:30:46] Remy: Right. None.

[00:30:48] Jen: But. But the kind of relief I can give to a widow who is at a bank and the bank is saying, you can't pay the employees of your business.

The relief that I can bring, there's a lot of. And this is what I'm really, really kind of excited to delve into is all of these end of life issues, like, how do we view death, how do we view legacy, how do we view, like, all of these mortality, all of these things. And there is kind of this, this pop view, Instagram Y view. It's a. It's a very popular kind of thing to say of, like, well, death is a friend and death is a duh. You know, like, you know, trying to. Trying to make, like. Make it pretty. Yeah. Paper over it. Paper over it, exactly. Like, make it pretty and it may somehow like, like ease the transition of it. And then. And then this, this also, you know, it. It's not totally crazy or incompatible with Christian view because, okay, you die and you're. You're with Jesus. Yay. You know, but. But there's so Much of, like, the reality of the separation. That it's like, no. That, like, there is a reason why this is the negative. There's a reason.

[00:32:05] Remy: Yeah.

[00:32:06] Jen: You know, why. Why it's the bad. And so, like, every, you know, every time that I'm, you know, putting someone's estate plan in place and they get it, and they're gonna have an easy. Like, I know as they're doing it, I'm like, you're gonna get all of this lined up the right way, and you're gonna be, what your family's gonna be one of those families that come in and they're like, this was easier than I expected. Or when I'm helping, you know, when I'm helping that person and release the funds to pay the employees or doing my online stuff where I'm like, here's how you actually get an estate plan that works. And you know that money you're paying is actually going to get the result you need it to, like, all of that stuff. I'm like, I'm helping people control, like, the only little bit that they really can to love the neighbors closest to them.

And. And like, I. I'm incredibly angry at death. I. I have nothing but. But just, like, vicious anger towards it. It's the separator. It is. It is from the devil. Like, I. I just hate it. And it tracks, you know, like, it. It tracks. It. It steals people's, you know, like. Like people's people from them. And, you know, it's there. There's nothing shiny, you know, natural, like all of those buzz phrases for people to kind of grapple with it, where they spin it positively. I've. I've never found any of that.

Yeah, and now it's like my. Like, now I'm just, like, constantly. My day job where I'm fired in it, and it just. That stuff doesn't track. But the idea that it's the separator, like, yeah, it. That does track. And. And the fact that I can ease one little corner of it, you know, you know, for my neighbor, is incredibly. It's empowering, but it's also like, you know, it's. It's the good. It's that Good Samaritan view of, like, you know, here's a jacket. Here's a jacket.

[00:34:10] Remy: Yeah.

So let's talk about those things that you're excited to talk about.

[00:34:22] Jen: So I go on podcasts to talk about estate planning, and I love doing that because I, you know, that again, it's the jacket to my neighbor. Right. It's Like, I'm, like, I'm gonna show you how to ease this for the people closest to you.

But. And it's all coming from this Lutheran place. It's all coming from, you know, from, you know, my particular view of all these things, but I. But it's never directly talked about, and so I'm like, yes, I can.

[00:34:51] Remy: Let's go, let's go. Let's be direct.

[00:34:55] Jen: So, yeah, you just. What do you want to talk about?

[00:34:58] Remy: So there were a couple of things that you had mentioned, Gosh, just a few minutes ago.

And now I'm struggling to put my hands on any of them, but it's a lot.

[00:35:14] Jen: Fire hose.

[00:35:16] Remy: That's okay. Let's go. Let's go with.

Let's go with Memento Mori and just sort of, I guess, the practical side of. Of remembering death.

Does this sound like a good direction?

[00:35:39] Jen: Yes. Yes. Let's start there. Yeah.

[00:35:40] Remy: Okay.

[00:35:41] Jen: Yeah. So momentum, worry, which I'm not, like, I don't. I'm not an expert in, you know, but. But I, you know, look into it. It's, you know, and it's this idea that. That remembering death is a thing, you know, the. The people who are really into it. There used to be an Instagram nun that was really, really, like. That was her deal, you know, like, skulls and. It looks very gothy. Right. And emo and all of that.

[00:36:11] Remy: It does.

[00:36:12] Jen: And, yeah. And I think it's this really odd juxtaposition that. That seems like it shouldn't work, and if you veer too off to one side of it, it absolutely doesn't work.

But. And this is why Lutheranism, because it can handle the, like, the messy line of it to stay on. That's incredibly messy and seems incoherent where, you know, death is. There's nothing positive about it. It is nothing but the separator, you know, but also the fact of. Or the fact in the truth, you know, in Psalms, it's. It's like, number your days so that you may become wise. I'm horribly paraphrasing it. That's no official translation that I am quoting.

[00:37:01] Remy: It's the official Missouri Synod translation, everybody.

[00:37:04] Jen: No, no, no. Don't. Don't put that on them. Nope. Don't put how I just framed it on them. But this idea that, like, kind of like remembering, like, the way I see it as being scriptural, beneficial, like, edifying, all that stuff, is that you're constantly trying to remind yourself of your own limits and your own station and place, and that's something that's really hard to forget, especially in our American, like, view of the world of, you know, you're the star of the show. And this is something I struggle with constantly. You know, I'm also, like early 40s, so it's. It's the prime of life to struggle with it. But, like, you're not.

You're not. You're not the. The main character. You're not, you know, and. And you don't get to create your kingdom.

[00:37:59] Remy: Right.

[00:38:00] Jen: You know, and this is what I see on the daily. You know, this is why I get so hyped up about it is.

And I think a particular generation struggles with that. But. But this notion of, well, I'm going to construct my kingdom, you know, the business I made, the.

The station I had in life, the reputation I had, the. The wealth I created, the land that I bought, you know, all these things are like.

Like approaching it as if it's your kingdom that you get to control and dictate forever.

And when really it's like, no, that's.

And remembering your station, your limits, makes you wise, where you're saying, this isn't my kingdom. This is something that I get to be a part of, and this is something I can use to help my neighbor, and maybe my neighbor are my kids, my adult kids who might take this over or maybe don't want to have anything to do with it. But, you know, anything that we do isn't a kingdom to ourselves. It's not our. It's not a monument to ourselves.

[00:39:10] Remy: Yeah.

Yeah. Wow. What.

So then we. You're right. We're not. We're not trying to build a monument to ourselves.

We're not going to. Right. The. The sands of time are very good at very quickly eroding any of that.

So what we do hope to leave then is a good legacy. Do you want to talk about legacy?

How do you leave a good legacy?

[00:39:44] Jen: Yeah, how do you leave a good legacy? Well, and I think oftentimes the way we talk about it, particularly in American culture, is that idea of, like, we're building a monument to ourselves. Like, did I do something so grand, so important?

You know, did I have enough notoriety where I'll be remembered for, you know, first, for that I'll just be remembered. And it's almost like chasing an immortality that doesn't exist.

[00:40:13] Remy: Yeah.

[00:40:14] Jen: And there. There's often times in my job where I'm like, oh, yeah, well, like, I know Jesus was talking about, you know, you lose your life, gain it again. I'm. I butcher also. All apologies to Free Lutheran Bible School. This is my lack of, like, I was like, Bible verse reference. Memorization is middling to all.

[00:40:40] Remy: It's a direct reflection.

[00:40:44] Jen: Should have gone to the right Concordia is what I should have done.

[00:40:48] Remy: I. I am calling Dr. Jason Gugu right now.

I have his phone number.

[00:40:57] Jen: So. Yeah, but like, you, you know, you. You. You gain your life by losing it and vice versa.

[00:41:03] Remy: Right.

[00:41:03] Jen: Like that. That's. That's. That was talking about a specific. That was in a specific context, but also, like, in my daily job, I. I can't tell you how many times I'm like, yep, it's. That tracks where, you know, maybe I'm talking to a business owner who has. Who has a child, who's been involved in the business, who's now in their 50s, and they still don't want to turn control over to. And it's like, well, then what is this for? Like, okay, so you die if you can't, like, loosen your grip just slightly right now. Someday your hand's going to be forced open.

[00:41:43] Remy: Yeah.

[00:41:44] Jen: And, you know, and the. What you think is this kingdom and monument to yourself is gonna be gone in six months. Like, what are we doing here?

So there's just so much of. On the daily that I'm like, yep.

[00:41:56] Remy: That traps well in that kind of context, too. Specifically, the legacy that you end up leaving. You want to have some great. Oh, man, it's, you know, Big Bill of Big Bill Auto Wash, you know, car salvage, an Italian restaurant or whatever. And you think this is what you're leaving, but the legacy that you end up leaving is actually Big Bill was a controlling, bitter old man who didn't know when to let go.

[00:42:24] Jen: Right. Yeah. Yep. Or, you know, like, I'm in a region of Minnesota where we just deal with a lot of farms, you know, and that can be an incredible like.

Like standard American view of what a legacy can be. Wow. We've had this farm in our family for 100 years, and look at all the cows. And yes. You know, and planning helps. Helps perpetuate that, too. But, like, it's so much of, like, what are we doing here? Like, what's the point of all this? You know, Is it to have your name on some sign, you know, three generations from now? Or is it, you know, or is it take, take, take, and your farming, kid, has given you everything and you can't let go, you know, like, what.

There's so much of, like, you know, you need to reframe what the point is, you know, and vocation Is kind of again and again is the piece that inserts itself to say, yeah, this isn't about building a monument to yourself, it's how are you serving your neighbor. Whether that's your farming kid, your non farming kid, the kid in the business, the ones that aren't, the kids that depend on you, the kids that don't, the kids that shouldn't be depending on you, but you know, like, what are you doing and using, like the, like. I think about legacy is, you know, you take what you have.

You know, some of us have kids, some of us don't. Some of us have notoriety, some of us don't. Some of us have wealth, some of us don't. But we all have, we all have ways, you know, we all have the specific gifts, all the things that you talk about in vocation of what we bring to the table that can move other people's, for people forward, that can serve other people and focus, like just kind of getting your mind right to understand, okay, that's what my legacy is, is how am I moving other people forward? Those are the ripples that last, you know, like, okay, like I, if my kids, you know, like, like understand, understand their place with God, right? Then that has ripple effects that I can't, you know, that I can't control. And like praise God, you know, right? And so like, if they, if they understand, like, like the whole justification, it's finished. It's not their work, they're not chasing that. They just have to go love their neighborhood. That's. Those are effects that, you know, that are boundless. But I happen to have four kids. Lots of people don't have kids. You know, like one of the, one of the biggest impacts on me being a German, Lutheran, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, right? Like, just like the witness of being, of being like, okay, do you understand Christ well enough to understand that when someone offers you power, you do what Jesus did. You don't take it, you don't like seek it, you don't chase after it. You love your neighbor. You love your neighbor. You love your neighbor. And how can you love your neighbor even when they aren't your crowd, even when you are told they are your enemies, even when you're told that they are suspect. How do you love your neighbor? And that has ripple effects that affected a kid in 1990 in South Dakota. You know, we all have ways that we can impact each other. And so often we're like, well, what happens if I don't have kids? What happens if I don't have wealth? What Happens if I'm not known. What happens if my ambitions aren't fulfilled? And that's the cultural way of talking about legacy. That doesn't track.

[00:46:07] Remy: It's.

It's interesting.

Legacy is. Vocation is interesting as a topic. I'm preaching tomorrow at my church, and I'm going over Ephesians 5, 22, 33 is what I'm preaching on. And that is Paul's big Wives, submit to your husbands.

[00:46:34] Jen: Oh, good.

[00:46:37] Remy: That's.

[00:46:37] Jen: That's like advanced preaching, right? It's like that verse.

[00:46:41] Remy: I picked it.

I could have. I could have picked any other text in the lectionary. But it's so funny because all of the texts in the lectionary that day are all about false religion. Their lips are near me, but their hearts are far from me. All of them. There's an Isaiah verse, Psalm 40, 14, Mark 7. All of them are about you, Pharisees, who are near to me with your lips, but far from me with your heart. So Israel, who sings my praises but hates their neighbor. You know, Psalm 14, how long will these godless people draw near to you with their lips? Is kind of the. It's the thrust of every passage. And then right in the middle of it, you have Paul saying, wives, submit to your husbands. And it's so interesting because it doesn't seem to fit with the rest, but it does, because Paul says right near the end, in verse, like, I think 32, he says, hey, just so you know, I'm talking. I'm using marriage to explain to you how to be the bride of Christ. I'm not talking about your marriage. I'm talking about your life with Jesus. And it's so. It's so interesting because. Because the whole thrust of all of these passages, even the marriage one, because after the marriage one, he does children and parents, and then he does servants and masters. And they all had the same thrust. And the thrust is, you're not living for yourself. And you're also. You should not just be living for the hell of it.

You are living for other people.

That is, as Christians, that's what we do. That's. How do you submit to the lordship of Christ? How do you submit to God? It's by loving your neighbor.

It's by loving your neighbor. You're not living for you, you're living for them. You're living for Jesus. That's, you know, you're not really a part of it.

[00:48:47] Jen: Yeah, yeah, well. And there's so much that we can't control of that, you know, like this is something that, like, I struggle with because, you know, I went to law school. That opened a world of like, I have a law school classmate who's the lieutenant governor of Iowa. I was extraordinarily involved in. Yeah, I was extraordinarily involved in politics. I door knocked against a current nominee for vice president. You know, like, I was really, really involved in politics. And there's so much of any ambitions, you know, like human ambition, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. And I always have to couch it because I also am Lutheran and you know, Lutherans, I think we have a natural aversion to it because of those reason, you know, because of the negative of it.

[00:49:45] Remy: Right.

[00:49:46] Jen: Where ambition is, you try to. You're trying to build yourself up. You're trying, you know, in the midst of it, you are not serving neighbor. You are crushing neighbor, you know, to be on top.

And you know, the kind of gin.

[00:49:59] Remy: You don't understand.

You don't understand. Once I get on top, I'll be great. I'll be. I'll be the best. Yeah. Just. I just gotta get there first.

[00:50:09] Jen: And you see it and I mean, this was kind of a weird way, but it, but it was one of the best examples of. I'm like, oh, yeah, that's like the kids get. It is like you think about. You think about sports. Like, that's the whole point, right? There's a winner and a loser, right? Second place is first. First loser, all that stuff. And so, like, anytime the Olympics come. Come on. It's. It's like this constant conversation of the, of the typical way legacy is talked about. Like, they broke the world record. They set their legacy. And it drives me nuts every single time because I'm like, okay, so in four years, someone else breaks the record and the legacy is poof. Up in smoke. Like, we just talk about the things that are an absolute mirage of any of it. And this was the first Olympics where you see stuff like, oh, what are some. Like, if you're watching on YouTube, you might notice that I'm a Timberwolves fan.

So, like the relationship with Katie and Carl Anthony or not Carl Anthony Edwards, where like these relationships that built up that were celebrated in the Olympics, or Simone Biles reaches out to Jordan Childs, who's. Who. Like, if I understand the story right, Jordan Childs is like, no, thank you. I have no interest in this whole rat race of trying to be an Olympian. And Simone Biles is like, I understand that, but do you want to train for it in a totally different mindset of just, like, doing your best, you know? And that's what legacy is, where you're reaching out outside of yourself, you know, to say, like, you know, how are we moving each other forward?

What can I do to serve you? You know, to serve the people around me, you know, like. Like, it's so much bigger than. Than a single person or a team. It's. It's moving others forward versus trying to scramble your way to the top.

[00:52:10] Remy: I'm taking notes.

How would you explain legacy to your own children?

[00:52:19] Jen: What are. What. How are you using what you have to move other people's. Other people forward?

Stop. Full stop.

And so it's like whether or not. Whether or not you end up having kids, whether or not you. You end up having wealth, whether or not you become a homeowner, you know, like, whether or not you're known or famous or reach your ambitions or fulfill your dreams, any of those things, you know, you will have things in your life, talents, you know, things. Things that you can use to help your neighbor.

And that's all it is. That's all it is. And so it means everyone can do it. Like, there's. There's no entrance fee.

[00:53:10] Remy: Are you telling me that we need to. I like how you love God and love our neighbor.

[00:53:19] Jen: I. 100%.

[00:53:21] Remy: Wow.

[00:53:22] Jen: 100%. That's all it boils down to.

[00:53:25] Remy: Amazing.

[00:53:27] Jen: Yeah. Such wisdom attracts.

[00:53:29] Remy: It does, man. It does, though. That's the. That's the thing. Is. Is it.

It's really not. And I mean, that's. That's the. It's the thrust of, I think, so many things that Jesus even, you know, said that we have written down for us here. Or, you know, like the. Like the.

The parable about don't. When you're invited to a feast, don't go and pick, like, the high place or the seat of honor, you know, go pick the low spot, you know, because that way, if anything, they come to you and say, no, please, you need to move up to a higher spot, to a better spot. You know, it's this. How do you. How do you esteem yourself? And where you esteem yourself should always be behind where you esteem other people. It's a good. I think it's a good metric for learning how to love your neighbor and dealing with your neighbor. When you.

If you can get that. If you can get that gut check, if you can let the Holy Spirit gut check you every time you pass some kind of a judgment on someone where you're thinking, like, oh, man, you know, wouldn't want to be that guy, you know, glad, you know, whatever. Immediately you should, you're, you need to figure out why you're thinking that way because it's not correct. And then what can you do to help drive that person forward, you know, if they really aren't, if they really aren't in a good place? You know, you see a homeless guy and you're like, oh, you know, but you should know that's not that, that's the attitude we should have. You know, what do you, what do you need?

[00:55:06] Jen: Yeah, well, right, because we, we see a, we see a homeless person, you know, someone or like we see anybody who, who is in need.

[00:55:16] Remy: Yeah.

[00:55:17] Jen: And we see the lack, we see the possibility of the lack of control.

Right.

And this is something that just, I run into so often of where people think they get to have control over things they don't get to have control over. And then like, you know, because I happen to be. My daily, my daily vocation, you know, is the one place, the one slice of life that is tailor made for you to have a little control here, you know, and use discernment and, and go serve your neighbor with, with this, you know. Right. But when we see others in need in any respect. Oh, and, and actually this actually is a great segue into another topic to cover is how we deal with people in grief. Right. So let's take it from the homeless. Like, let's take it from like that physical reflection. But like you, you see a 40 year old mother of, I'll say four, because I have four kids. And I'm just gonna say that's a big family because it feels like it.

[00:56:19] Remy: So how many. Hold on, I put a big pause. How many brothers and sisters did you have growing up?

[00:56:27] Jen: Two. Half brothers?

[00:56:28] Remy: Yep. Okay, cool. So I have this theory that I read online somewhere and it is a big family is always your family growing up plus one. So you had three kids in the house growing up. Now you have four and you're like, that's a big family.

[00:56:48] Jen: That's a big family.

[00:56:49] Remy: Yeah.

[00:56:50] Jen: Yeah. Well, another theory that, that like small families make big families and big families make small families, which I also think like, like kids in a big family are like, I'm good with one or two.

[00:57:03] Remy: Yeah. It was so it was so much chaos having eight of us. Right. But at the same time, if you ask them what's a big family? They're going to be like, oh man, nine, ten kids, you know, it's just more than whatever I had.

[00:57:19] Jen: So let's say you take you know, a widow who lost her husband shockingly, like, totally tragic circumstances.

And what is our natural reaction? We take a step back or, or we are like, oh, God, like, I don't have control over my life. I need to. I need to work on that. Like, I need, I need, I need, I need. Like, I don't even need to finish the sentence right. It's. I need, I need. How in this situation am I getting. Am I getting what I need? What, what, what do I need to send this person so I feel okay about it and can move on with my life? You know, and. And we have such a dysfunctional view of legacy, of control. Like, it's all interconnected of, you know, our station that we get to control. Blah. You know, what is death?

If I do the right things, then I can stave it off. Or, you know, like, I will be the one who lives into their 80s and then dies peacefully in their sleep. When I'm ready.

[00:58:22] Remy: When I'm ready.

[00:58:23] Jen: Right when I'm ready. And, you know, I did the right thing. So Jesus is going to bless me in that way.

You know, like, it's a very. It's a very prosper, you know, theology, you know, mindset. But we, like, as Americans, that's what we're constantly being fed, whether it's from the Christian or not. Like, we just are fed bad. You do the right things, you get the right results. Go do the right things.

[00:58:45] Remy: Well, I mean, that's. That's America too. That's just the whole. That's the whole country. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps. You work hard to get it. Yeah.

[00:58:52] Jen: And so we're confronted in these scenarios where we. We are confronted with the reality that, like, you don't get. No, no, like, yeah, be a good steward so that you can help your neighbor, but you don't get to control a lot of this stuff.

And you, like.

And so you get confronted with a widow where her husband suddenly died in a tragic accident. And you take a step back, you know, of like, ooh, I need to rationalize this. I need to make it compute with the idea that we can control. So how did they screw up that I don't screw this up too?

We come with a how can I help myself first? And if that means, you know, sending something that makes me feel better, great. And this is something that, when my dad died, you know, I. I guess I got to see the brunt of it. My mom, like, I saw my mom and myself bear the brunt from too many people of. They were shocked that someone in their early 50s who wasn't a smoker, who led a clean lifestyle, went to church, you know, was an elder. All that good stuff be gone. Basically like that. And so many people, you know, took a step back or what, you know, or we're. We're like, obviously working out their shock and grief on us. I. I have this thing of, like, yeah, I would really like if Lutherans. This is my one. This is my one beef on Lutheranism. And it's just a cultural thing. It's not a theological thing. I think this is better theologically. Can we have funerals? More like. More like Irish Catholics where, like, you take the grieving people and you're like, you know what? You guys go sit down at a bar, Even if you need something, let me know, and we will go talk about how great that person was. And anything you need, you just sit there and we will get you anything you need. Instead of the grieving line. I hate the grieving line. I'm like, great, we're working out our grief on the people closest. And Barrett, you know, like, we're not mourning. Like, yeah, maybe I have a. Maybe I have the bat. Like, maybe I'm the. I'm seeing it wrong. But.

[01:00:58] Remy: No, I don't think you are. I don't think you are. Well, and especially because, like, there's. There is this intrinsic kind of selfishness within people. So there is this, how do I make myself feel better? Even if it's at the expense of the woman that just lost her husband? Or there's the other, like, oh, well, how can I make it better for them? Even though you're thinking that you're not being selfish, but, like, what you're trying to do is, like, be a hero.

You know, how can. How do I fix this? And it's like, well, you know, you don't, champ. Jesus does.

[01:01:38] Jen: Exactly. Exactly. It's. It's. Yeah, it's. It's like, okay, if. If you're presented with an opportunity, like, there were.

In my scenario, there were a couple of families that were just.

Just like, just amazing examples of this.

In my own life of there. It was like an open door policy with one family. It was my best friend's family when I was in high school. We ended up going to Bible school together and sharing the dorm room. She brought me over to the AFLC side where her parents were like, open door, you know, Jed needs to cut, like, yup.

And then another family in our Missouri Senate church who were like, it was small things of like, okay, you guys are in the hospital, you know, kind of that same open door mentality. Or we like months later, specifically inviting us out of like, hey, we're going to a concert. You want to come too? You know, the things that, that the people who just looked at the situation of like, that's awful. I hope that doesn't happen to me. Okay. I sent a card. Yes, sweet. Bye.

[01:02:48] Remy: Right.

[01:02:49] Jen: And I can move on with life. And they didn't, you know, and, and just like incredible, you know, or like fixing things around the house, you know.

[01:02:58] Remy: So the, the way that you actually help people.

So, so, so you're telling me the way you actually help people through this is by loving them.

[01:03:11] Jen: Correct? Yes.

[01:03:13] Remy: Yeah.

[01:03:14] Jen: Right. And what's love? It's, you know, it's service, which means you take a step back and you wait to see what they actually need versus what, what you expect they need.

[01:03:25] Remy: Or want them to need.

[01:03:28] Jen: Right. Or you're comfortable, you know, like the things that are comfortable. There's a lot of like Facebook, like, I don't like saying like Facebook mommy groups, because that's a terrible derogatory term is that it's more like just, just like women in different scenarios, like a Lutheran, like I'm part of a Lutheran one, and then a hyper organizing one, because you might guess I'm a hyper organizer.

[01:03:53] Remy: Excellent.

[01:03:53] Jen: But, yeah, but like periodically people will say, like, I'm estranged from this family member and their spouse died. What do I do? Or, or my neighbors, you know, my, my neighbor, my elderly neighbor is dying. What do I do? Right. And, and the first thing is, is take a step back and figure out what they need versus what you need. You know, if it's that estranged, if that's, if that's your estranged loved one, it's not about like rectifying the relationship. Like, don't use this, like, don't use this as an opportunity to rectify the relationship. Just use it. Just say like, okay, is there something I can do that can lighten their burden?

And that's really, that's really, like, that's what you do. Like, that's how you mourn. With those who mourn is, is what. Is, what is their particular burden? Is there. Am I in any position to be able to do that? And if I'm not, everyone gets to pray. Everyone can do that. And you know, so, so that's always the mindset to bring into it.

[01:05:00] Remy: I think sometimes too, like with an estranged relative, I think sometimes maybe the best thing you can do is nothing.

Maybe the Best thing you can do is just absolutely nothing beyond reaching out and saying, hey, Craig, heard about your dad. I'm really sorry. I know things haven't always been the best, but if you wanna talk, whatever, and then leaving it at that.

Cause I mean, especially, like, if you have something like that, like a difficult relationship, trying to repair it, use that moment as a jumping point to repair your relationship is probably gonna do more harm than good.

[01:05:40] Jen: Right? And I think a lot of people, you know, in good faith, right?

[01:05:46] Remy: Yeah. You know, but they want to do the right thing.

[01:05:49] Jen: They want to do the right thing, but they're. They're putting themselves, you know, in the center, right, of the, of the grief and the served, right? Like, like centering is kind of a buzzword, but it's, you know, there's a lot of cliches and buzzwords I use because they're true. They, they track when you. When, When.

When you get down to brass tacks with S. Hits the fan like it does. And, and centering is, you know, don't center yourself when someone dies.

Center the people who should be centered. You know, the spouse, the, you know, the ring, you know, like that. The vocational ring is, you know, you know, and so, yeah, you were a co worker and that's gonna impact you and that's gonna affect you. And sometimes it's very practical ways, and sometimes it's very like, gut ways.

But then also, like, don't center yourself. You're not the one to be centered. You are not in that inner, you know, like, you, you're on the outside of the ring. You're not in the inner. Inner of the ring. So center the people who need to be centered. You know, serve them versus trying to see how you can be served.

[01:06:59] Remy: It's.

I would also like to say it's really amazing how oftentimes. And this goes for actually just about.

Just about every situation in life that you, that you run across, but especially something like this. It's. It's amazing how frequently just really doing nothing can be the right call altogether. You know, if a, If a co worker dies, you know, and, you know, all right, yeah, I knew. I knew the guy. We, you know, we said hey to each other every day for, for, you know, however long. But, like, we weren't best friends. I never hung out with him or whatever, you know, that. Do you.

Do you need to do something or do you need something for you to do? You know what I mean? Like that, that difference in there. Is there something the family needs? Is there something the family needs you to do, or is there something you actually just want to do for you?

[01:07:56] Jen: You know, and something like in these Facebook groups where it comes up, a common one, I say is like, just mark something on the calendar, you know, down the road, where it's out of your brain now and all of that, but it's not out of theirs where you can do something for them, you know, just. You know, just to bring up a bright spot, you know, hey, hey, if you're on the level. If you're not on the level of getting coffee together, don't use now to get on to ask to go out for coffee. That's silly. You know, remember your vocational relationships, people.

[01:08:32] Remy: That's right. That's right.

[01:08:34] Jen: But if you are, then say, okay, they have a busy time right now. And so I'm gonna put something on the calendar so that I am the one making. Making the steps. This is how I serve. I am taking the initiative. I am putting it. I'm. I'm making that my burden, not theirs, that I will reach out to them in six months and say, hey, you want to grab coffee? I missed you, you know, I'm glad to see you. When, you know, and. And the people get different. People get different, you know, and. And remembering that, like, oh, my friend's different now that she lost, you know, that she lost her parent.

Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's to be expected. And. And having the, you know, like, is there a relation? Is. Is there a way that. That we can have that relationship? Being different people now, you know? You know, just be the one to bear a little bit of the burden for them.

[01:09:27] Remy: I, like, reach out.

I like the.

Like the. The Jewish tradition of the. The sitting Shiva.

[01:09:41] Jen: Yeah.

[01:09:42] Remy: You know, let's just. Let's just go over to, you know, Mary's brother died. Let's just go over to her house and sit.

And whatever she's doing, we're doing. She's just sitting there quiet. We're sitting there. She's crying. We're gonna cry with her. You know, let's just.

[01:10:03] Jen: Yup. And they. They get to be in the driver's seat, you know, like, they. Yeah, and this is. This.

[01:10:10] Remy: I'm just. I'm just an outlet to help you process.

[01:10:13] Jen: Right, Right.

[01:10:14] Remy: Yeah.

[01:10:15] Jen: Right. And this is something, you know, the generic American Christian church again, I think if I hadn't been raised Lutheran, that, like, I don't know if welcoming the tension, but is so comfortable in the tension, accepts the tension, you know, where my pastors weren't going to feed Me easy BS answers, you know, they were like, no, we're just here, you know, you're in the midst of confirmation. We're here.

[01:10:40] Remy: Yeah.

[01:10:41] Jen: You know, and not like, oh, we're gonna, we're gonna feed you some, some of the, the trite crap that doesn't track. Like, like what I hated. What I hated is a 14 year old girl who lost her father. And I was like, my dad was a girl dad, you know, I was a dad's girl. And like, like, and the thing that I hated was when people say, well, he's in a better place or he's with Jesus now. I like, I literally wanted to break faces, which is why Jesus made me a five foot.

Because he's like, I don't think I want you any bigger than you are, child.

[01:11:20] Remy: Pitbull energy, Chihuahua body.

[01:11:22] Jen: Exactly. Exactly. That's. That's right. That was. Yeah, that worked out well. But to like that, that sentiment would make me so angry because I'm like, so you're telling me Jesus doesn't, doesn't want.

Because I need my father.

[01:11:38] Remy: Yeah.

[01:11:39] Jen: I need my father and I don't, I don't have him. And that's not, there's no walking that back.

[01:11:45] Remy: That's a better place.

[01:11:46] Jen: Wanted this, right? Yes. And I'm like, yeah, I get that. He's like that, like God ended the separation, but now I'm separated.

[01:11:56] Remy: Yeah.

[01:11:56] Jen: You know, and, and so some of the trite stuff that gets thrown out that's just like, it's maybe not all the times bad theology. Sometimes it's a straight up bad theology. You know, they're an angel now what?

But sometimes incomplete theology, right? Yeah. If it's all good because this, you know, like Jesus needed them more.

All right, well that's kind of, that's bad theology, number one. And number two, like, like, then why did Jesus raise Lazarus? Why did he mourn with. Why did he tell us to mourn with those who mourn? Like, it's because all of this is a separation and he defeated death so that we don't have to be separated from God, but we still. Like, until, you know, until I feel like I'm very, I'm very opinionated theologically except for revelation. Maybe that's a Lutheran. Maybe that's a very Lutheran thing to me. I don't know.

[01:12:52] Remy: I don't know. I'm pretty opinionated on it.

[01:12:54] Jen: I know a lot of. Yeah, right. Usually the pastors are.

But like, like until, until, you know, everything's been restored. Until everything, all is Worked out physically, all of it. Like, we will have the separation and the fact that there is a God who hates this as much as we do. Yeah, like that tracks. That's like.

[01:13:17] Remy: And that's so key.

Yeah, that's so key that God hates, like God hates this too, you know? And I mean you. Yeah, you do have to wrestle with them. Why does he allow these things to happen? But I mean, ultimately the solace is he's on your team.

[01:13:38] Jen: Yes.

[01:13:38] Remy: Because if it's, if it's. Jesus just needed your daddy more. Well, now Jesus isn't on your team. Jesus himself, he's the bad guy. Because. Yeah. Because I need, I need my dad, you know.

[01:13:50] Jen: Right, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, like being again, again. This is the third time I've said this. If I, I don't. I think that if I wasn't in Lutheranism being catechized in the Lutheran, you know, small catechism, all of that. If I, if I didn't have that, that worldview in that storm, I wouldn't be Christian, I'd be a nihilist, I think. You know, like, I would be like, nothing matters. Nothing matters. Nothing matters.

Because it's like this was never supposed to be the way it was. This is not normal. This is not natural. We weren't supposed to have death. And it made God so like, angry that he had to fix it and he would do anything to fix it.

[01:14:36] Remy: Yeah.

[01:14:37] Jen: You know, and it's like, okay, yes, that tracks, you know, that, that makes sense to a 14 year old girl, you know, daddy's girl who lost her dad.

[01:14:50] Remy: That's tough. I, I couldn't.

[01:14:52] Jen: Yeah.

Like, also, maybe this is why I was German American, you know, like, but also, like, like, you know, it brings up the question of like, well, why did good things happen? Bad things happen to good people. Why does God allow xyz? He's. He's the controls everything and yet can't. Can't control this. Like, why couldn't the crappy dad have gotten cancer? You know, you know, like all of that stuff, but you know, but also like Luther, you know, German, Lutheran. Like I was at 10, 12, 13, was being like, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was hung by the Nazis right before the Americans who did. Like, bad things happen because this is a fallen world. Like, this is not the world that God created. This is the world that he.

[01:15:38] Remy: Sin destroyed.

[01:15:39] Jen: Sin destroyed. Right? Sin, death, separation, it's. It's all the same stuff to me. It's all, to me, to me, it's like the venn diagram for that stuff doesn't overlap. It's. It's a perfect circle thing. And. And this, you know, like, it.

This is not how God wanted it to be, but he. He loved us, wanted relationship with us, and so he couldn't have robots.

[01:16:06] Remy: Yeah.

[01:16:06] Jen: And so. So that meant that. That there had to be a choice, and it got chosen and now, you know, and so it's just part of. Part of the equation. And God hates it as much as we do.

[01:16:26] Remy: Do you have people that come to you professionally? And I'm certain the answer is yes, that I just found out I have terminal cancer and I've got X amount of time, and I'm trying to get it in order and outside of the. Outside of. Of the physical. Prepare them for death. Yeah. What other ways do you. Do you try and help prepare these people for death? Like, is there.

Do you. Do you ever feel the need to, like, emotionally, like, their other.

[01:17:02] Jen: Emotionally connect?

[01:17:03] Remy: Like. Yeah. Like, the people around them that, like, you know, you're meeting with this guy and his wife, and it's like, look, now when this happens, we're getting everything in order, but you're gonna go through some stuff, you know.

[01:17:14] Jen: Yeah.

[01:17:14] Remy: How do you help people prepare for death? It's got, like, it's got to be holistic. Right.

[01:17:20] Jen: Surprisingly, I haven't found it to be.

[01:17:22] Remy: Really.

[01:17:23] Jen: Yeah, I haven't found it to be. And I don't know if. I don't know if that's a me thing or if that's, you know, like, I'm a bit of a cold fish. Maybe I don't like emotion, and maybe that's part of, you know, part of what, you know, what I experienced. And. But.

But I also think that that's maybe part of my vocational calling. Right. Is that. Is that.

[01:17:57] Remy: You'Re not their counselor, you're not their. Their pastor.

[01:18:00] Jen: And I think there's. I mean, my. Periodically. And where I work, all the attorneys do this. They do estate planning, probate. Like, we're all constantly dealing with death on a regular basis. And so periodically, we'll just be like, hey, I'm having a rough day because of xyz. Like, this is our daily. You know, but also, like, my vocational calling is I want to minimize the bureaucratic bleep.

You know, I want to take. This is the one thing we can take off the table. Let's take it off the table so that you have more space, ability to deal with the other stuff. Right. And so my vocational calling is let's take this crap off the table.

And that's why, like, I'm so passionate about it.

That's why, like. Like, being a lawyer is my day job, but then outside of when I go home, I'm working on my website. I'm trying to, like, educate people, you know, doing all the. All of this, you know, be the Dave Ramsey of Tess. Because if people understood the basics of how this worked, you could say, okay, this is a way that, like, I can control. I can love my family. I can love the people closest to me so that, you know, all the things. You know, all the ways that I can leave a legacy. All those things we talked about that are not just the money. I can take this bureaucratic stuff off the table so they have more space to remember those things, acknowledge those things, work through the emotional stuff. You know, like, I'm not holistic, but I'm pulling a huge burden off the equation.

[01:19:48] Remy: Right.

[01:19:49] Jen: So that they can holistically deal with all the crap.

[01:19:52] Remy: Sure.

Yeah, Absolutely.

Absolutely. And that's. I mean, and that's such a big.

It's such a big part of it. The. The whole, like, the. Is dealing with the estate and all the stuff and all the. All the bureaucracy of it is such a big. The only other part of it that I think that is. Is as big and as difficult to deal with is, like, the funeral arranging.

[01:20:18] Jen: Yeah.

[01:20:18] Remy: You know, and it's like these are the. These are the. These are the two things that you have to deal with right away, and they're the two things that no one's.

[01:20:26] Jen: In a mind frame, too.

[01:20:27] Remy: Yeah. Emotionally, mentally, spiritually. They're the two things you want to deal with the absolute last.

[01:20:33] Jen: Yes, absolutely.

[01:20:35] Remy: Yeah.

[01:20:36] Jen: Yeah, yeah. It. It's. It really, like, it really sucks. And that's part of. That's part of my job is when people, you know, especially the. Especially widows or widowers, where they're like, what do you mean, I have to go to the courthouse? What do you mean, I have to be executor my spouse's estate. We. We're not a blended family. Why would I need to do any of that?

[01:20:54] Remy: Yeah.

[01:20:55] Jen: You know, and. And it's like this. This comes at the worst possible time. Like. Like most of the people I deal with have never dealt with legal stuff. They've never dealt with a lawyer. And. And. But they're forced to because there are assets stuck in a dead person's name, and the only way to get it out is going through the court system.

And. And so, yeah, it. It sucks because it's stuff that it comes at the literal worst possible time.

[01:21:23] Remy: Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, absolutely the worst possible time. Yeah, yeah.

It's, I mean, it's, it's good work, though, and it's, it's tough work and I think, I think you have to be suited for it. I think, I think you really have to have a kind of distance maybe.

I don't know. I, I, I worked in animal control for four, four and a half years, something like that. And I mean, I, you know, there, there's the, oh, yeah, we get a. Pets adopted and you know, there's all that. Oh, we found your, we found stuff. We found Fluffy. We brought him home. But then there's like, there's the animal abuse cases. There is, there is the not animal abuse cases. There are the, there's like the murder cases and the child abuse cases and all of that where we had to come in and seize animals and all of that is all tied in together. And so you get to see all of that too, you know, and it's, I just was always really, really grateful that I'm like hard adhd, because it's just, that's interesting. Out of sight, out of sight, out of mind. It's gone.

[01:22:49] Jen: Yes. And I've never, like, I've never, never been diagnosed. I don't know. But I, but I totally relate to that of like there, there's a particular type of brain to be able to say like, and now I'm onto this and now I'm onto that.

[01:23:04] Remy: Flipping a switch and we're. Yeah. I mean, I definitely think that, like, I think still, emotionally, you're processing it all in the background, even if you're not actively thinking about it.

[01:23:18] Jen: Absolutely. Yeah.

[01:23:19] Remy: Is like, there are times where my wife, my wife has been like, why are you in such a bad mood? And I'm like, I'm not in a bad mood as I slam the cabinet, you know, and I don't even realize.

[01:23:29] Jen: Like, it's in to take some stock.

[01:23:32] Remy: So, like. Yeah, it's, I mean, I think that still happens, but like, it's, it's definitely a huge blessing if you're the kind of person that can sort of box things off. Yeah. And, you know, go from box to box in your mind. Yeah.

[01:23:47] Jen: Yeah.

[01:23:48] Remy: I think it takes a special kind of person to do, to do the hard jobs, you know? And yeah, I think what you do is probably a hard job. It's not something I would want to do.

I don't. You've never, you've never had someone walk into your office and been like, man, this is the best day of my life.

[01:24:05] Jen: Right, Right. Yeah. Although. And this is actually, like, it ties it back into your life.

This is like, literally one of the most gratifying parts of my job. Well, one of the most gratifying parts of my job is saying, like, we're done. Like, you don't need to call the lawyer. We have walked through the bureaucracy. Things are settled. You have access. You have what you like. I love that part.

But also, like, the estate planning part, there's a shocking number. Like, I need to start, like, just like, making marks and, like, under my desk or something when people go, oh, this is such a relief. Like, oh, this is finally done. Now, part. Part of my soapbox of estate planning is like, okay, like, so, like, the common misconception is, like, you sign your legal documents and that's just going to rule the day, Gets you out of probate, blah, blah, blah. It's like, no, no, no. It's. It's your assets. This is just your structure of organization. And if your assets say what they supposed to. What they're supposed to do, that's the magic sauce. That's when I'm. I'm talking to your family. I'm like, yeah, we got to do a couple things, but that's. That's it. And so, like, both.

When I'm, like, doing. When I'm. When I'm doing an estate plan and the families, like, now we understand what's going to happen. Now we know how we control that. Like, this is such a relief. Or when I'm working with the families and they're like, I thought that is going to be a lot harder than it was. I'm like. And I'm thinking, oh, it would have been. But I'm like, no, because you're. You're not only did your person actually go to the step because, like, the. The. The statistics are awful. It's like a third of people do any legal documents. And, like, just. Just my. Just me. Anecdotally, I would say half the people who have legal documents, we still have to go through probate. We still got to do other stuff. Because they didn't connect. Like, they didn't. No one explained it to them. No one. Like, it's not talked about a lot where you do the legal documents. But then what do your deeds say? What do your beneficiary designations say? How does all this stuff fit together to follow the plan? Like, I. I use the analogy of a closet. Like, you hire a lawyer to get a great Closet system together. You know, that's your will, your trust, your health care, like, all these documents.

And then. But then you have to make sure that your assets, you know, the deeds, the beneficiary designations are. Are, like, pointed in the right spot. So you're. So your things, your sweaters, your jeans, your stuff are in the right spot. And if they're not, then I still have a lot of bureaucracy I have to slog through. But it's so gratifying when I have the families who are like, oh, this is a lot easier. I'm like, yeah, it is, because they got it done, right? It worked.

[01:26:40] Remy: It's like, I can hire you to come in and label a bunch of buckets and put them all in my closet, but if I leave all of my clothes crumpled up, piled on the floor, the buckets aren't doing me any good.

[01:26:52] Jen: The buckets aren't doing you any good. Like I tell people, look, I. I create your closet system. You take your laundry and dump it on the floor. Your family's gonna have a mess to clean up. Like, that's something you have.

[01:27:02] Remy: I can't just write on the back of a napkin moments before I croak. My buddy Dave gets all my stuff, and then I kick it. He doesn't actually. He doesn't get anything.

[01:27:12] Jen: Well, it depends. There are some states that actually, I call them napkin wills, but the technical term is holographic will. Okay, don't ask me how that. Like, I don't know how that's the term at all. But we fully. There are some states that will take a fully handwritten will as the last will and testament. And, like, that's the. That's the legal hoop to jump to be an effective legal document. Now, this is what. Yeah, this is one of my favorite favorite topics.

So. So, like, a will only talks about some of your assets. It doesn't talk about everything.

Because some assets already know where to go because of deeds and beneficiary designations. But the assets that are stuck, that don't know where they go, they're just like, Remy died, and it's in Remy's name. And this. There's no other document with this asset that says where it goes. That's where a will comes in.

And to be a will to be, like, a legally enforceable will to mean anything to say, like, okay, yeah, this is where it's supposed to go next. Then it has to jump particular legal hoops, right? So some states, it's like, well, if you fully write it like, that's Enough protection for us to believe that, like, you meant this. You meant it, right as your will.

I. I like. I like being in Minnesota a lot. Because our probate laws are, like, they're. They try to get things as black and white as they can. They don't like controversy. And that is my wheelhouse and feels very Midwestern. Yes. Oh, for sure.

Actually, interestingly. So California lets you do holographic wills? Apparently Michigan does, too, because Aretha Franklin died, and she kept writing, like, on her barka. She just kept, like, handwriting wills. And there was this big fight because everyone's like, well, which was the last one? And then the sun was like. But she told me, so there must be one missing. And it was just, like, a mess. And I was like, we don't play that game. Do you have two witnesses or not? If you don't have two witnesses, no go. Like, I don't care if you notarized it. I don't care. Like, I get. I love. Like, I get people who are like, you know, either mom, or like, they come in and they're like, hi, Jen, I'd like to talk to you about estate planning, but I had this document notarized. I'm like, that's adorable. That means nothing.

Our state does not care. And I'm glad.

[01:29:25] Remy: Yeah.

[01:29:27] Jen: So, yeah, no, it's. It's interesting.

[01:29:30] Remy: What.

What are the most important steps that I need to take to protect my family in the event of my own untimely death?

[01:29:39] Jen: Yeah. Okay. So, number one, take estate planning seriously. I think a lot of people don't.

A lot of people. Their criteria for, you know, I see it all the time. I have a lot of.

As far as estate planning goes, I have a lot of competitors. As far as probate goes, I have a lot of feeders.

And what I mean by that is there's. There's lots of options that talk about. And they're getting more and more all the time where it's like, you look, you can get a will without an attorney. You can get, you know, you can get documents without an attorney. This is great. This is amazing. This is like. This is like getting.

This is opening the field up to people. Okay. Yeah, but, like, low cost shouldn't be your criteria on this. Getting it right should be the criteria. And I also see people spend a lot of money and still not get the result they need to. Like, this isn't about. This isn't about, like, getting a document and thinking you have peace of mind. This is about, like, actually getting a result for Your family, where you're pulling the bureaucratic crap off the table. So, number one, take it seriously.

It can be an investment. And it's something that I can get a little bit astonished when people are like, well, but you don't do a wool for $30. No, I don't.

But then I'm like, but how much do you spend on a weekend at the Dells? How much do you spend on beer money? I'm German Lutheran. So that's part of the budget, Right? Like. Like what? Okay, did you buy. Did you go buy. Did you go to John Deere and buy a gator? Those are fun, right? How much did you spend on that? You know, and so it's like, what? You know, like, take it seriously and then get educated. Because, like, I. I hate our industry. I hate the industry. I hate it. It's massively disturbing to people because most people are like, okay, well, I can Google. And then I'm being offered free wills, $30 wills, you know, like, avoid an attorney. Do it on your couch. Da, da, da. You're offered all of these options with no real way to understand. Okay, like, I just don't want to get that. I want to get something that works. How do I know how to do that?

You know, or, you know, you say, okay, yeah, I understand. This is going to be an investment. So I'm going to call to attorneys. And most people have never dealt with attorneys before, and that's intimidating. And it's a little bit like. It's a little bit like, you know, you're off to see the wizard, you know, and you don't know if he's just like some. Some doofus. Right. And you have no way to gauge that.

[01:32:16] Remy: Yeah.

[01:32:17] Jen: Right. And so you just kind of cross your fingers and hope. And that's what I hate is, like, that's where we're at, is crossing your fingers and hope. And so that's why. That's why there needs to be a Dave Ramsey of death. That's why, you know, people. Yeah. Need to have just a little bit of knowledge to say, like, okay, I understand.

Like, how to get an effective estate plan, how to vet an attorney so I'm not paying a doofus for nothing.

And then what I do after the signing to make sure my plan actually plays out. So I'm ta. I'm actually taking this thing off the table for people.

[01:32:50] Remy: Where, Jen, where can I learn all of this stuff? Tell me.

[01:32:57] Jen: Yes. Okay, so I have a. I have a website organized afterlife, and I do online courses that's like, that was the thing where. Because I was like, I should write a book, but a lot of people write a book and people. But that's not changing this industry at all.

And what I also found, because I'm only actively licensed in Minnesota, but I took the bar in Florida, which is diametrically opposed, like, very opposite ways of viewing how things should work, just because states do that.

And what I've seen is that. Is that kind of what the average person needs to know to be able to confidently take steps forward so that they know how they actually go get an estate plan, but then they know what they need to do, so it actually works and plays out that kind of base level of knowledge. Is it that that's the same anywhere in the country? You know, what is a will do? What is my beneficiary designation? Do what. How do. How can I. How can I find a good attorney versus a doofus? You know, that kind of stuff.

That was. That's all the same. And so I just. I put together. I have a couple of courses. One's on. Here's the steps you need to take so that you have a plan that works. And then for, like, adult kids that are dealing with aging parents or really any loved one, and they're like, okay, I can't do their plan, but I'm going to be dealing with their mess. What does that landscape look like? What are the legal issues? What is it like nursing home care and taxes and all that stuff? What is.

I just need to know what that's like instead of Googling all these things. And what am I not, you know?

[01:34:36] Remy: Right.

[01:34:37] Jen: So, yeah, I have online courses which you can find on the website. There's a little green tab in the corner that you can click to learn more about those courses.

[01:34:45] Remy: Excellent.

Very good. Jen, this was a great time.

[01:34:51] Jen: Yeah, it really was.

[01:34:52] Remy: I think we tried to do this, like, a long, long time ago, and it didn't pan out.

[01:34:58] Jen: Yeah.

[01:34:59] Remy: But I'm really glad we got together. This was a ton of fun.

I learned a lot. I got a whole page of notes here, so that's exciting. I have aging parents myself, and so I'm probably going to be checking out your stuff.

[01:35:17] Jen: That is the legal field guide to helping aging parents. Yep.

[01:35:20] Remy: Excellent. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for your time and your.

[01:35:26] Jen: Absolutely.

[01:35:29] Remy: Just your knowledge, your wisdom and your beautiful theological insight. And I'll make sure to put links to everything organized afterlife.com and everything in the show. Notes for folks.

[01:35:44] Jen: All right, thanks so much.

[01:35:46] Remy: Yeah.

This episode of Lutheran Answers features Patrick Flynn, a Catholic philosopher and author, discussing philosophy, theology, and arguments for and against the existence of God. The conversation begins with an exploration of distinctions in theology, such as the Lutheran view of imputed righteousness versus Reformed perspectives, and transitions into the philosophical utility of distinctions, particularly in arguments for God's existence.

Flynn presents Thomas Aquinas' metaphysical arguments, emphasizing the real distinction between essence and existence, which supports a classical theist understanding of God. He explains Aquinas' cosmological argument and the philosophical necessity of a singular, ontologically independent being. They also discuss the problem of evil, both as a challenge to and support for theism, and critique weak arguments for and against God's existence, particularly those rooted in scientific materialism or misrepresentations of philosophical theology.

The episode emphasizes the limits of human comprehension regarding God's nature, advocating for humility and a recognition of divine transcendence. Flynn introduces his book, which systematically compares naturalistic and theistic explanations for reality's metaphysical features, arguing that theism offers simpler, more robust explanations.

• Pat Flynn's X

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[00:00:00] Remy: This episode of Lutheran Answers is brought to you by our sponsor, Dial A Podcast. Dial A Podcast, proud sponsor of Lutheran Answers, provides a simple yet powerful solution to bring your church's sermons and Bible studies closer to those who might be a step away from the digital world. Getting started with a local telephone number is easy, allowing anyone to listen to your content with just a phone call at their convenience. It's an excellent way for congregations of all size to extend their reach. Get started with a 30 day risk free trial at dial a podcast.com and ensure no one misses out out on your church's messages.

I had actually just read a thing today by a Scandinavian Lutheran pastor where he was talking about how a lot of the critiques leveled against Protestantism, generally by Rome and generally by the Orthodox, a lot of their critiques of our soteriology, tend to disappear when you take the tact that God did not impute righteousness to us, that God doesn't impute righteousness to us, because this is a big point of contention between a lot of Protestants and a lot of the other apostolic traditions is the idea of imputed righteousness. And he points out that nowhere, at least on the now on the Presbyterian end and on the Reformed end, the Westminster Confessions do specifically state that God imputes righteousness to people.

But he points out that the Lutheran Confessions do not say this. The Lutheran Confessions say that God imputes faith to people, that God gives us the gift of faith, and then he nurtures that faith and then he counts that faith as righteousness. And like, what an important distinction that is because then we get away from the like, legal fiction theory or whatever where God just pretends you're righteous.

[00:01:59] Patrick: Yes. And I think that's a distinction that makes a difference. What facilitated this for the listeners who are just hopping in, as we were. It's funny we're going to be talking about philosophy, but we started off kind of trashing philosophy, right? Sometimes a lot of philosophers are, are clever without necessarily being wise and they play the distinction game, right, where they just make a bunch of distinctions. But one can, can ask, is this a distinction actually makes a difference? And sometimes it does. Sometimes the sort of the finest little distinction can make all the difference in solving like a huge problem.

So in one sense, philosophy can be like the most useful thing ever because it can help you to hunt around for that. And by distinction we just mean that there's, there's a breaking of identity. That's all distinction means, like that this thing is in some sense not that thing. And there's many distinctions, right? There's conceptual distinctions and virtual distinctions and real distinctions. There's real distinctions with separate separability and real distinctions without separability. So there's lots of distinctions within the family of distinctions. Right? So it can get a little. It can get a little tedious. But eventually, if you do philosophy long enough, you. On the sort of. The good side of it, you realize, oh, wow, okay, now I see why this was. Was necessary because this really helps me to solve, like, this really big issue, this little teeny distinction as you solve this really big issue. Right. So.

So I would. I would encourage people not to be, like, too put off by all the distinction making that philosophers do, because I think there's been huge payoff and real advances and understanding and knowledge have come from that. At the same time, when it comes to just arguing with people on Twitter, it can be. Yeah, it can just be a bunch of.

[00:03:33] Remy: Well, so I think the prime example of the thing that gets on my nerves is when.

When I talk to a Calvinist and you say, well, John 3:16 says, God so loves the whole world, because they argue that God only loves the elect, and he doesn't love anyone else, he hates everyone else.

And so you say, well, John 3:16 says, God loves the whole world, that whosoever should believe in him, Whosoever should believe in him. And they say, oh, well, in the Greek, it's better rendered that all those that believe in him. And I'm like, okay, well, that's. I don't know if you know this, but that's the same thing.

That's. That's just.

[00:04:16] Patrick: That might be a distinction without a difference. Right.

[00:04:18] Remy: That's just a harder way of saying the same thing. So, like, I don't know.

Yeah. So I hate when people do stuff like that. But at the same time, I think a lot of times you'll see someone lay some groundwork, theologically or philosophically, where they'll draw a very careful line and it feels pointless until we start getting into second and third order consequences and we kind of get down the line from this thought, and then it's like, oh, now I see. Now I see why that division was important. Now I see why we.

[00:04:53] Patrick: Yeah, yeah. And just to tease how this plays out in philosophical approaches to God, which I know is what we want to explore here, we can look at, you know, St. Thomas and his distinction between the essence of every finite, contingent individual and its existence. Right. Now, this is a controversial thesis, and it's. But it's a. It's a thesis that has been adopted and accepted by some of the most brilliant philosophers and theologians, Catholic and Protestant, right?

And if this distinction is correct and it's a real distinction, so Aquinas is saying this is not just a conceptual distinction, meaning it's not just distinct in how we think about it, but the distinction is in extra reality, extra mental reality itself, right? It's in the thing itself, right?

If that. If he's correct about that, he doesn't just assume it, he argues for it. Several lines of philosophical motivation.

If it's true that it is not of the nature of any, you know, finite individual like myself or you or a rabbit or whatever to exist, that its nature doesn't guarantee, somehow guarantee or demand its existence, well, then this pretty quickly sets you up for a cosmological argument, right? Of, of. Of legitimately asking why does this thing exist? Right? Now the question of why does. Why does this thing exist is legitimate because there's nothing about its nature or essence. Explain that, right? So now you start to look for an extrinsic cause of that thing, right? And what Aquinas does, just to kind of condense one of his approaches to God, is he says, look, if you're going to terminate the hunt for ultimate explanation here, you're going to have to get back to something whose essence just is its existence, a being of pure existence or pure actuality, right? Otherwise you have a sort of causal series where there's this property, the prop. The causal property of existence that is always sort of on land. It's always being borrowed or derived, but there's nothing from which it is ultimately on lend from. And he thinks is. That's. That's absurd. That's not an acceptable philosophical position for various reasons. And then once he has a being that is pure existence within his sort of metaphysical scheme, he thinks you can derive all the traditional divine attributes. You can conceptually unpack divine simplicity and immutability and omniscience and omnipotence. So this is this. But it's all like, in a sense, like this grand philosophical approach to God of Aquinas hinges on a pretty like, fine little distinction, right?

Very fine distinction, right? Now, I think it's also a sort of distinction. It can be motivated through common sense and common experience. But it's certainly it's, you know, it's not something that just occurs to everybody, right? So that's just an example where there is a distinction that people might not think about that that might be quite deep in the weeds. But has I Think enormous implications right down the line, natural theology and philosophy of God, stuff like that.

[00:07:53] Remy: It's interesting the, I like, I like sort of the ideas of contingency. I think it, I like the idea that like if a thing doesn't have to necessarily exist and yet it does exist, then we do have to ask, well then why does the thing exist? Right? And there has to be, there has to be something, a central thing issuing existence, right? Like a bank has to issue money for there to be money. No one just holds money and it's like, oh well, it's a dollar because we have to have dollars. And so there are naturally dollars, right? Or whatever. It's, there has to be, there's an issuing authority, right? There is something that gives the thing. But when we're talking about this idea of the, that from once we get to this, once we get back to this, there must be this sort of issuing authority, there must be this being of existence, this being that is existence, and then from this we can derive all of the other attributes of God, et cetera.

How does that differentiate? How would that differentiate? Or does it differentiate our God from, from say the idea of the Brahman, which is, as far as I understand, literally exactly, that just the Brahman is existence and it exists and all things issue from it and all things are absorbed back into it.

[00:09:22] Patrick: Yeah, great question. So I want to make sure we circle back to the contingency argument because Aquinas's argument is a sort of contingency argument. But the cool thing about his approach is I think he actually has a more robust framework where he can explain why something is contingent and also why even if something is necessary, it might still need a deeper explanation. I want to circle back to that. But to answer your question, the answer is maybe nothing, right?

So I mean there are Hindus that are classical theists, right. And they're, they're pretty close to what, you know, many Christians, not all, because not all Christians are classical theists these days. I think that's a shame. Yeah, I think that, I think classical theism is where good philosophy winds up. And part of what I think demonstrates that is the fact that there have been many philosophers, many different traditions that get to the same result. Right, right.

You know, pagan thinkers, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Hindu. So now once you get into the weeds, there can be certain differences, but they're pretty fine grained. I have a very good friend, one of my best friend is a Hindu, he is a classical theist.

And so he thinks that, you know, God is one and absolutely simple. And, you know, the creator of every. Everything else. That's not all Hindus, by the way. Right. But that's, that's what, that's what he is.

But some Hindus might be more deterministic. They might accept things like modal collapse, such that, you know, God had to create. So the universe is itself a sort of necessary being, but it's still a necessary being that ultimately is dependent on God for its existence or occurrence. Whereas. So you will find differences, if not necessarily in the immediate conception or nature of God. God's relation to the world might be a bit different among these, these traditions. And again, that's a, that's a, that's a pretty deep and important discussion.

[00:11:27] Remy: But.

[00:11:28] Patrick: Right. No, insofar as, you know, that's, that's kind of why natural theology is cool. That's why I've always liked it. Because the idea of natural theology is we're theology being the science of God. Right? Is we're just trying to do it with our own natural powers. Right. We're not assuming revelation and we're just kind of working from the data of common experience that philosophers do, using the power of reason to try to search out the necessary conditions for, for things. Right.

And. Right. It doesn't mean it's easy. It doesn't mean people always get it right. But it has been very cool for me to see how many other thinkers and how many different traditions and how many different time periods have really converged upon not just the existence of God, but a particularly robust conception of God.

[00:12:14] Remy: Right.

[00:12:14] Patrick: Where God is radically transcendent, one uniquely unique, simple, omnipotent, omniscient. It's not exclusive to the Christian tradition. Even if it is, you know, most, I don't know, well known or associated there. It's by no means exclusive to that. You do find that in other traditions. Right. But then you also find other traditions that are more pantheistic or panentheistic, where they think that the sort of entire universe is the ultimate being. Those. That those are not classical theistic. But you find those as well, obviously. Right.

[00:12:45] Remy: I, I'm not too surprised that the, the, some of the core Christian doctrines of God and ideas about God would be universally found among other traditions. I mean, it's, it's like I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised when we run across some civilization's, you know, trigonometry tablet and they're describing trigonometry in the same way that then The Greeks would, 2,000 years later, completely disconnected. Like, I'm not I'm not shocked by that because, like, math, Math would seem to me to be like a universal constant. It's a truth to be discovered. It's not a thing to be invented. We're not making it up. Like, if you have two items and then you get two more items, you now have four items. There's not, you know, there's no, there's nothing to be invented or argued or debated. You. It. It just. It is what it is. Right. And I imagine God is the same way. So if you're doing any serious thinking about God, it's. To me, it's really not shocking that you're going to stumble onto the exact same conclus as someone else, because you're not, you're not inventing something, right? You're. You're finding something.

[00:14:20] Patrick: Yeah, I agree. And, you know, even though we come up with certain conventions, like what the symbols are that we use and stuff like that, I'm certainly a realist when it comes to math, but related to theology. Yeah. I don't want to say. I, I don't want to claim that, you know, every philosopher came to the exact same nature of God. That's not true. But there's a lot of people that are in the kind of same general ballpark or neighborhood. Right.

[00:14:42] Remy: And that's.

[00:14:42] Patrick: And it doesn' not shocking. Yeah, that's not shocking. Right. And the divergences are understandable because, look, thinking about God is hard, man. Yeah, we're thinking about, like, fundamental reality, right? Like, there's, there's no reason to think that this should be easy, but it is cool to see that when you have the most brilliant minds working hard on it, there is this general convergence. Like, you know, you have Plotinus, right? And like, yeah, there's some differences, but if you read, like, Lloyd Gerson's interpretation of how plus thinks about God, like, it sounds really, really similar to how Aquinus thinks about God. Right? And of course, you know, there's. There's borrowed thoughts here and there, but you have other cultures and other times where. And even in contemporary philosophy of religion, man, you, you have philosophers, I think, that, like, are kind of coming upon the same or similar results. And I've talked to these philosophers and I've said, hey, like, are you from. Do you know, like this. This other guy has said this, like, a really long time ago. And they're like, no, actually, I wasn't aware of that.

And I. And I think they're being honest about that. Right? I think that they're just like, really intelligent guys that are thinking hard about fundamental reality and converging upon that result, you know, sort of once again. And to me, that's. That's. That's cool, man. I think that's like, kind of confirmatory.

[00:16:02] Remy: Yeah, it's pretty compelling. It's pretty compelling.

It's also not shocking that there are differences and variations in sort of where everyone ends up.

Because we're also attempting to conceptualize something that is, I think, my.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but just my own personal theology. But we're attempting to conceptualize something that is, I think, beyond human conception. Right? Like the fullness of God. There are certainly parts of God that are accessible to us that must be accessible to us for our salvation. Right. And then you certainly, you have the incarnation and. And all of that, but the actual, actual, like deity.

Right. I think is beyond what we can. What we can even in our. In our own minds. Think of. Like I was talking to a Unitarian about this, and I asked him to picture God in his head. Picture God for you Calvinist listeners don't do that. That's a violation of your second commandment there. But picture God in your head. And when you picture God in your head as however you want to picture him, a ball of light or a guy or whatever you want, whenever you picture God, he is in a void of some kind, right? White or black or whatever, he's just in a void.

But before all creation, God wasn't in a void.

There's no void for God to be in. God is the only thing. Before all creation, there's only God. There's no void that God can be in. There's no locality for God to be in.

He just simply is. And he's the only thing there is. And you cannot, no matter how hard you try, you can't picture that in your head.

[00:18:18] Patrick: Right.

[00:18:18] Remy: Like it's something we can talk about.

[00:18:21] Patrick: Yes.

[00:18:22] Remy: It's something we can understand sort of linguistically, you know, conceptually. Maybe we can, but you can't actually.

[00:18:30] Patrick: Yeah.

You can't picture it. Right. And this is. Here's a distinction, right? There's a distinction between conceptual ideas and perceptual ideas. You can't image God because God isn't a material being to be imaged. Right.

Whereas conceptual ideas, same thing. Like you can't even image triangularity. You can image a particular triangle. Right? Triangularity, right. Is something that we have an understanding of. We know what it is, but anytime we have form a picture of it, we use imagine, you know, our Imagination, it always becomes particularized as this particular triangle or that particular triangle, right? And that's an important distinction because I, in philosophy of mind, because I think that it's our conceptual ideas that points to the immateriality of the intellect and ultimately the immortality. Whereas the perceptual ideas are the things that we kind of share with the lower animals and stuff like that. But related to your point, it's absolutely true that we cannot fully grasp in our understanding the complete essence of God. That's totally correct, right? That is beyond us. And for many of the, I think of the best sort of natural theologians, they think we kind of get to God in like one of two ways. One is the way of negation, right? That we can figure out what God is by saying what God is not, is not, right? God is not finite, God is not composite, God is not contingent. Now these are all true of God, right? These aren't, these aren't untrue things, but they don't give us like a totally super rich conception of what we're talking about. The other way that we can make true statements about God is the way of analogy, right? When we say that God is powerful, he's got power in a way that is something like the way that we understand power, but in a, in a, in the mode of divinity, right? A completely different mode, same thing. When it comes to God's knowledge, God has something like knowledge. And this is the idea of analogical language or analogical predication using stretch concepts, stuff like that. And to motivate this a little bit, we can think about the ideas of, of. Of a limit, case versus limit simplicity. This is a little technical, but I'll, I'll try to explain it as simply as I can because I think it's really helpful. So just imagine, imagine a bunch of polygons. It's an ordered series of polygons with, you know, each one has. You have increasing number of sides and angles, right?

[00:20:58] Remy: Okay.

[00:20:59] Patrick: And what is that converging towards? Clearly it's converging towards a circle, right? But a circle itself is not a member of that series. Right?

But it's also clear that that series is converging towards a circle. So you would say the circle is the limit case instance of that series. It's something towards which the series converges or points to, but is not a member of that series itself. Yet there has to be some similarity in the difference, right? Otherwise it wouldn't make sense to think that it's. The series is actually converging towards the circular circle. So I think when natural theology is done, right, God ends up being the limit case instance of certain ordered series, right? The limit case instance of existence, of power, of knowledge, of any sort of perfection that isn't inherently, that doesn't inherently come with a limit or bound. Right. But when you understand him as a limit case, then you understand that what you're saying of God is not to be predicated in the same way that we would typically use it of us univocally, right? It's, it's analogically using stretch concepts and stuff like that. So, so that allows us to say very true things of God. But the point is that at the end of the day there's a tremendous mystery right there. Like these things are, these things are true. We can know it through the power of natural reason, but we still really do not understand it, right? We really do not understand it.

[00:22:18] Remy: We can see, we can see what our own, I want to say like our own knowledge or power, etc. Points to. We can see, we can see where this is going. But at the end God is still wholly other from us.

[00:22:40] Patrick: Yes, right. And an idea that might be a little bit helpful there is, you know, when we think about power is just the ability to sort of make or produce, but whenever we exercise our power, we always sort of work on pre existing material. I mean, it sounds weird, but even when I, when I raise my arm, I'm working on my arm. Right?

[00:22:57] Remy: Right.

[00:22:58] Patrick: Whereas whatever God's power is, he doesn't work on anything, he just brings it about. Right?

[00:23:04] Remy: Yeah. Wow.

[00:23:05] Patrick: That's that. That is like the limit case instance of power, right?

[00:23:08] Remy: That's ultimate power.

[00:23:09] Patrick: So like you're more powerful to the extent that you have to work on less and less stuff. But everything that isn't God always has to work on something, right? But God works on nothing. He makes it to be the case that there is any stuff, right. To begin with. So that's kind of an idea of what we mean by this sort of limit case instance, right? Of that's what, that's what the ordered series of producers is or power bearing agents or whatever is pointing towards with respect to fundamental reality. Right.

[00:23:35] Remy: That's amazing.

That's amazing. That's really good.

[00:23:40] Patrick: Pretty cool stuff, right? Yeah, yeah, I think it's good, I think it's good to keep that mystery there, you know, with respect to the transcendent, because it keeps you humble and a respect and like man, there's just a lot of things about this world that are just really really hard and difficult to figure out.

But I think having that sort of transcendent anchor point that we can. I think we can prove, you know, philosophically that it's there even if we can't, you know, conceptually unpack all of its infinite riches.

It just, I don't know, man. It provides, I think that that right degree of hope and confidence and reverence and awe. One of the mistakes that I think is. Is made a lot of times in philosophy and theology is just this, this anthropomorphizing God. Right. Of just, of just having this two. This picture of God that is far too similar. Right. God is just sort of like a very souped up being. Right. But not the truly radically other transcendent foundation of all reality. I think that's where a lot of philosophical theology and just, just straight up Christian theology starts to go awry. Right. When it's, when you, when you. I don't know what. I don't know. There's different reasons that people wind up there, but I think that that is a major mistake. Right?

[00:25:03] Remy: Yeah.

[00:25:03] Patrick: And it has a lot of negative.

[00:25:04] Remy: Implications because God's not. He's not just a big man, you.

[00:25:08] Patrick: Know, I would hope. Yeah, certainly not.

[00:25:11] Remy: But that's. You're right, though. That's like a lot of the place, a lot of the place where we go is that God, that God is just.

He's just a bigger me. He's just a bigger, more powerful me.

[00:25:22] Patrick: Right. Or maybe, you know, he's just like, you know, a very powerful spirit or something like that.

[00:25:29] Remy: Yeah, right.

[00:25:29] Patrick: Well, I mean, this body, I mean.

[00:25:32] Remy: And this is even like, this is the root of so many different heresies. The one that really springs to mind for me is like Mormonism where God is just. God is just some kind of ascended. Ascended being. I too can ascend to, you know.

[00:25:48] Patrick: Yes.

[00:25:49] Remy: And it's like, yeah, yeah, God. God isn't just big you. He's. He's wholly other. He's completely different.

[00:25:57] Patrick: Yep. And this is why maybe this will help connect what we were talking about before with Aquinas's argument. I'll try to, to connect some dots here. Right. Is that okay? So there's. You have the contingency argument. People might be interested in this.

For God, pretty classic argument, has, has ancient roots. Leibniz is kind of the guy who really starts to give this a lot of steam. And the contingency argument goes something like this.

There are contingent things, and by contingent things, we mean they're modally contingent. They exist in some but not all possible worlds, again, they exist, but it doesn't seem like they have to exist, right? So we want some sort of explanation for why they exist.

And then what the advocate of the contingency argument has to do is they have to motivate some sort of causal or really explanatory principle. This is sometimes called the principle of sufficient reason. And that says that, hey, there's an adequate, you know, reason or explanation for why anything exists and has the attributes it does, either from an extrinsic cause or the principles of its own nature. And so you motivate that principle. I think it's a true principle, by the way. I spend a lot of time motivating it in my book. And if that principle is right, then you can kind of just wrap it around all the contingent things and then you can say in order to get a non circular explanation of why there's anything of the type contingent, we need something that is necessary to explain all the contingent things. Something that has to exist no matter what, right? It could not, not exist. Right, okay, so that's kind of cool, but like what is this necessary thing, right? And this is where a lot of contingency arguments kind of get a little bit stuck. There's, there's some good stuff in the literature of showing how you can kind of move from necessity to divinity. But there's also a number of atheists, professional atheist philosophers and literature to say, you know what, I actually agree with that contingency argument that you just, that you just did, which I think is great philosophical progress, by the way.

But I'm just going to say that necessary being is like the universe or some part of the universe, or some initial physics singularity, like that. The singular, whatever, right?

And this is where I think just, just doing a little more metaphysics up front is really helpful. So we go back to Aquinas, right? And he's, he's got his theory of individuals. He's a hylomorphic guy, right? So he thinks that all me and you are hylomorphic compounds, compounds of form and matter. These are the two principles that make us be what we are on one level, the deepest level, what we are.

The existing pat is comprised of an essence element, the essence of humanity particularized in me, and the existence element or the actuality element, right? And what's cool about Aquinas's theory is this, is that if he's right, you actually get an explanation for why things are contingent, right? It's not just a mystery why things are contingent. Things are contingent because they're composite, because their essence does not include or guarantee or entail their existence, right? So that's nice. We actually get a nice deeper explanation. But then moving further, you get a sort of principled stopping point of not just a necessary being, but a being that is truly ontologically independent because we don't just want, like, necessary beings or necessary truths. Aquinas maintained that something could be necessary, but it could still depend on something more fundamental, right? Just imagine that God just created for all eternity something that just had to be there, a pop tart, right? So. And it's invincible or whatever, right? So it's necessary. You can't get rid of this thing, right? It's just created and secured by God from all eternity. So it exists in all possible worlds, right?

[00:29:27] Remy: If I.

[00:29:28] Patrick: If I could.

[00:29:29] Remy: If I could, just for my own layman's sake, the idea of something being necessary but still contingent would be like gold standard dollars. Like the dollar is necessary for commerce and trade, but is still dependent on the gold that backs it to be valuable.

[00:29:53] Patrick: Sense of necessary, right? The necessity we're using here again is a sort of modal necessity that if something is necessary in the sense, it has to exist in all possible worlds. Possible worlds. Semantics is just a way of trying to tease out modality, right? Which is just notions of contingency and necessity and impossibility and stuff like that, right?

So we say that God is a necessary being because we say in all possible worlds, all the ways that reality could have been, God would have to be there, right? That's what we mean where I'm not a necessary being, I'm a contingent being. Because we can easily conceive of a way that the world could have been where I'm not there, right? My parents never met or something like that. So there's nothing that, like, demands that I have to be in the world, right? So I mean, there's lots of necessary truths to find deeper explanation, right? There's. There's mathematical truths that we explain with, you know, deeper axioms and stuff like that. So the idea is that just because something is necessary in a sense, right, doesn't mean that it's automatically exempt from finding a deeper explanation. So what I'm saying is, like, what the theist wants is not just necessity, that's a part of it, right? The theist wants is true ontological independence, something that can stand entirely on its own and does not in any way depend on anything else apart from itself, right? That's what we mean by God. And Aquinas gives us that because of his distinction between the essence and existence of real distinction between the essence and existence of any contingent individual. And he says, well, whatever the ultimate reality is the ultimate. I liked how you put it before the issuer of existence. Right. This thing would have to be something whose essence just is its existence. Right. And this would be a simple being. Right. It's not a. It's not a being that is compounded of a finite essence element and an existence element or a potency and act. Right. And this is a nice theory because it allows us to say that existence exists, which seems a little weird, but that it is also God. Right?

[00:31:50] Remy: Right.

[00:31:51] Patrick: And if anything seems to be like the sort of thing that could just exist of its own accord, it would be that. Right. That seems like a principal difference maker. And that's what we want ultimately. What sort of thing would be the right sort of thing to anchor all the other things that just don't seem to be the right sort of thing to give us an ultimate explanation of why anything is here and not nothing instead, if that makes sense. And Aquinas's theory, I think, really gives us that. But in. In giving us that being whose essence is his existence, he's going to rule out the possibility of any naturalist explanation. Right. And this gets back to how Aquinas unpacks the divine attributes. Right. He thinks that, for example, I'll give you one way he does this, right? He thinks that if. If a being's E is his existence, then it's a being that is simple and self subsistent. Right. Its essence is just pure existence, and it exists of its own accord because its nature just is to exist, to be. Right. And then he'll say, well, there can only actually be if there. If there is one of these beings, he's hyper. He. He presents it as a hypothetical at first. There can only be one. Why? Because if you tried to have multiple entities like this, it would actually contradict the nature of being simple and self subsistent. And this is a simple thought experiment. Imagine there's two of these beings whose essence just is existence. Well, if there's two of them, there's some difference, some difference trivially between the two of them.

[00:33:11] Remy: Sure.

[00:33:11] Patrick: That means. That means there's some feature that one of them has that the other lacks. But to have a feature is to have a feature. You know, it's a feature of something. So now you have a feature that is ontologically grounded in a deeper reality. And now you Have a composite, a complex being again. So you're not even talking about a simple being. Right. Little complex, but I think Aquinas is really on the mark there. They says it's actually the nature of subsisted existence that prohibits multiplication. Right. So if there is a being like this, it's one and only one. So he actually is able to secure a radically unique monotheism. It isn't just that there happens to be one God. He argues, given the nature there must be of this being, as there has to be and can only be one God. And I think that's a great result.

[00:33:55] Remy: It's the idea is the idea that. So you say if there's two beings, there must be a difference. Right. One of them must have some kind of attribute or facet or delineating factor.

[00:34:07] Patrick: Rightly feature.

[00:34:09] Remy: Yeah.

[00:34:09] Patrick: Right. Yeah. And then that feature is ontologically grounded. Right. We have a metaphysical complex.

[00:34:14] Remy: The idea. The idea is that if God is compounded of different features, then he is necessarily contingent, like I necessarily. I mean, he must be, because in order to be compounded of features, something must put the features together.

[00:34:32] Patrick: Yeah. That is a different argument of Aquinas. Certainly he thinks that. He thinks that all composites do point to an extrinsic unifier, and we can unpack that as well. But for right now, he's just running a kind of hypothetical of, okay, if there has to be an ultimate reality whose essence just is his existence. Right.

[00:34:49] Remy: Then we can't have two or one realities. Yeah.

[00:34:52] Patrick: Could there be more than one of them? And then he. And he gives you that. That argument in his own words. I've sort of rephrased it, but that's the. That's the essence of it, if you will. But then he actually runs that back through into a cosmological argument because he says, well, look, there's actually a lot of things in this world that we actually have multiple instances of. We have multiple instances of humanity and rabbit essence and this or that. So whatever those things are, they're not the fundamental reality. Those are contingent things. Right, Right. And then he sort of runs. So that's actually one way that he establishes the real distinction. Because he argues, like, if there's something whose essence just is his existence. Right. There could be one and only one. So then for anything where there are multiples, it must be the case that there is a real distinction between its essence and existence. That's one of the philosophical lines of motivation he uses to. It's called the multiplicity argument. I think it's actually pretty convincing. And then once he has that, it's kind of cool because what he does then is, okay, well, these things are contingent. Their essence does not, you know, demand or include or guarantee or entail their existence. So now we need something that can explain them. Well, the only thing that can also explain why there's anything like that would be that there has to be a being whose essence just is his existence. So that it turns out that hypothetical reality is not. Is actually hypothetical, that's actually actual. Right. So he starts out with the hypothetical to motivate the real distinction, then uses the real distinction to demonstrate that the hypothetical being is. Is actually a necessary condition for all that other stuff. Does that make sense? It's a little. Little complicated, but it makes sense. Clever.

[00:36:27] Remy: It makes sense. It makes sense. We start out. We start out with the hypothetical, and the hypothetical leads us to actual.

Yes, actual thinking. And then the actual thinking proves that the hypothetical isn't actually hypothetical at all.

[00:36:45] Patrick: Yeah, that's right. The hypothetical gives us a conceptual impossibility which Aquinas thinks is a real impossibility.

[00:36:51] Remy: Right.

[00:36:51] Patrick: Which then he uses to argue for the real distinction, which he then uses to feed into a cosmological argument to demonstrate the actual reality of the original hypothetical. If you can see that kind of chain of reasoning there, that's his De. If anyone wants to know what I'm talking about, that's Aquinas's De and day Dante at Asentia on being in essence.

But the. But the upshots of that approach of doing the kind of. The more heavy metaphysics up front is again, you not only secure robust monotheism, but then, like you. You really kind of rule out any naturalist alternative because if you just follow Aquinas and now granted, like this requires that you actually take on Aquinas's metaphysical system, right? Which is broadly Aristotelian and Neoplatonic. I think it's a great system. But if you have that system in place, then I think you can pull out all the other divine attributes and show that the only candidate, if you will, for this fundamental reality is God. It can't be any natural, finite, bounded entity or anything like that. It can't be the universe, can't be some initial physical state or anything like that.

[00:37:52] Remy: Do you think that that's the best argument for God? What is the best argument for God? You wrote a book on it.

[00:38:00] Patrick: Yeah, I did. Yeah. So that's super misleading because that's not the argument that I present as the best argument for God. I think it's a darn good argument.

[00:38:08] Remy: Yeah.

[00:38:09] Patrick: And I think it's actually demonstrative if you're working within Aquinas's metaphysical system. I think it's a true demonstration. I think it's a true demonstration.

[00:38:19] Remy: And I.

[00:38:20] Patrick: Can I. Yeah.

[00:38:21] Remy: Can I pause it, actually, before we get to what you think the best argument for God is? What do you think is.

Can we do the positive and negative for and against, like the, the worst argument against. The best argument against. Worst argument for.

[00:38:38] Patrick: Yeah.

[00:38:39] Remy: Best argument for.

[00:38:40] Patrick: For sure. For sure. Yeah. Okay.

[00:38:43] Remy: So that feels like a lot.

[00:38:44] Patrick: I'm gonna say, like any, any. All right. Aside from the one I'm going to talk about, I would put Aquinas is right up at the top of really, really good and convincing again. There's always more work that has to be done. There's objections, blah, blah, blah. That's nothing new. And that's like general contingency arguments, I think are really powerful. Right. The Leibnizian, I think that they just, you know, have certain hurdles that can be overcome easier if you take this sort of metaphysics approach, Aquinas's approach. But I would. I would defend the contingency argument for sure.

What is the worst argument for God? Oh, my gosh, this is tough because I try to avoid these, you know, what is the worst argument for God? How maybe can I give you, like, the worst of the best?

Because I try to focus mostly on, like, arguments I think are pretty promising, but maybe, maybe it's the one that I'm, I think is, like, pretty good, but I'm not, like, the most confident in. Okay.

I would, I would probably say various moral arguments for God. Right. I think are in various ways strongly contestable or at least you have to do a lot more work to get them through than I think a lot of even professional philosophers have currently done. I develop a kind of moral argument in my book, but it's in relation to my concerns and skepticism about a lot of the. The kind of more prominent moral arguments say. So that's. That would be my kind of. Okay, there's. There's promise here, but I'm just not as confident as many other. The philosophers who push to moral arguments for God.

Best argument against God is the. Is that. That actually ties into my book.

But I'll set that one aside. I'll hold on to that. It's the problem of evil. Right. Just a broad pro. Problems of evil, different ways, obviously. It's that I can't imagine.

I mean, there's there's, look, there's. And I'm not saying that that's the only objection against God. There's lots. You have coherence objections, you know, various paradoxes, omnipotence paradoxes and stuff like that. I, I think those are more easily dealt with, though. So I think the problem of you was the best one against God, the worst one against God.

Oh, man. There's. I mean, there's different types of objections, right? So there's lots of really bad objections against arguments for God, which is not itself necessarily a direct argument against God, like the what caused God objection or something like that. And it's like. Well, if you've been paying attention to the conversation we've been having, that's the point. You'll be able to see why that doesn't make sense.

[00:41:28] Remy: Right.

[00:41:28] Patrick: Like, the arguments are showing there must be something that has to be uncaused to make sense of all the causable things. What sort of thing could be uncaused? And then to ask like, what. What caused the thing that must be uncaused is just conceptual.

[00:41:40] Remy: It's just stupid, right?

[00:41:41] Patrick: It's just stupid. It's the, it's the. Tried to be polite about it, but it's the.

[00:41:45] Remy: It's.

[00:41:45] Patrick: It really is a bad objection right now.

[00:41:47] Remy: It's. Could God. Could God rock so heavy he couldn't lift it?

[00:41:50] Patrick: Right.

[00:41:50] Remy: It's. Well, I don't know. Could he make a square triangle? You know, no, we're.

[00:41:54] Patrick: And that's. That. That's one of those paradigms that's like an omnipotence paradox. Right. And I think you can work through. And there's trickier ones than that. But, like, those, Those would be coherence of theism objections. Right? And then, yeah, the, the standard response there is that, well, no, a stone by nature is always inherently liftable. So, like, what's going on here is just sort of a trick of language. You don't see that what you're talking about is actually an impossible trick of a good.

[00:42:15] Remy: Also, could, like, could the. Could the answer. Could the answer to that also just be, like, maximally. Yes, in all cases? Like, could God make a stone so heavy he couldn't lift it? Sure. Could he then lift that stone? Sure.

And, you know, is that a. Is that a.

That's a. You know, that's a contradiction. Okay. But, you know, you're not God and he makes the rules and you don't. So just, like, deal with it, you know.

[00:42:41] Patrick: Yeah, I don't take that approach. I mean, Some people do. I think that the standard one that we went over is. And I actually developed the standard response in my book, and I go through different coherence objections and stuff like that.

I think contradictions are just negations of being. I think it's just the very nature of being that just sort of grounds the rules, if you will. And God is pure being itself. It's just sort of the nature of existence. Right. That. That it's. It's ontology that ultimately grounds the contradictions are ontological impossibilities. Right. Not just logical. Right. So they just. They can't. They can't attain. So, yeah, I'm. I'm hesitant to go the route of accepting that there can be contradictions. There are some people that do that, but I think that creates a much bigger mess that I don't particularly want to try to pick up. And I just don't think you have to go that direction, if that makes sense. Right.

[00:43:36] Remy: Yeah, no, it does.

Can I tell you what I.

[00:43:39] Patrick: So the best argument for God? Oh, yeah, yeah. You go ahead. Yep. Yeah. Yeah, you tell me. Yeah.

[00:43:44] Remy: Okay. This is what I think. Worst argument for God. Okay. Just in general, overall, not talking, just philosophy. Yeah.

[00:43:54] Patrick: Like, you might have seen this on Twitter yesterday.

[00:43:56] Remy: Right. When someone is just like, you know, I just. I just feel it. I just know. You know, I just know. I think that's. That's probably the worst argument for. Worst argument against is, I think, always the scientific arguments.

[00:44:15] Patrick: Mm.

[00:44:19] Remy: Because, I don't know. I. I've. I've sort of had. I've sort of had this idea for a few years now that the philosophers are better both for and against God than the scientists, because the scientists are so bound by just what is right here in front of me, and they cannot get past these preconceptions. And I mean, if you can explain humanity and the entire universe through evolution and just slapping enough time on something, and maybe it'll work. Okay, that's fine. But, like, you still, like, we're talking about contingency a lot. You still haven't dealt with that. You still haven't dealt with the fact that. That this. This whole universe came about in the way it did, in the method that it did, that resulted in you and me for no particular reason at all.

[00:45:13] Patrick: And I think there's an annoying philosophical distinction again between etiology and ontology. Right. So science deals with the etiology, how one physical event leads to a producer, another physical event. Ontology is asking, why are there any physical events at all?

[00:45:25] Remy: Right. Why are there any physical events?

[00:45:27] Patrick: It's just a conceptual restriction to how much science can, can answer. Right. Once you understand that it's gonna, it's gonna put constraints on how much the scientists can, can bring to these. It's not say they can't bring anything, but it's. You're, you're right. That many of them think that they have a lot more to contribute than they actually do.

[00:45:44] Remy: Right, yeah, that's what I'm going for. Yeah, that, that there's, that there are natural constraints to physical sciences.

Probably most telling is in the name. Right. That they're physical. That like there are there, they're dealing with stuff.

And a lot of. Maybe, maybe it's just because the presupposition here is that stuff is all there is, you know. Right.

[00:46:12] Patrick: And that's certainly not something that science gives us. That's something that somebody would be feeding in.

[00:46:16] Remy: Yeah. You have to assume, you have to assume this sort of raw materialistic idea that there's only stuff. And I don't even know how you can do that when you come up with that idea that there's only stuff. And the idea that there's only stuff is actually get this, not stuff.

You know what I mean? Like the idea that there's only the physical is itself not physical.

But I don't know, I don't know how they get around that actually, now that I think about that, and that may sound really stupid, but it seems like a pretty big barrier to me.

[00:46:53] Patrick: Yeah, yeah, no, I think it is. And the smarter atheists realize that. That's why they will motivate naturalism. And naturalism is just a philosophically developed form of atheism as a philosophical project. And they will, you know, say, hey, we should kind of fill out our ontology or whatever with, you know, in accord with what, you know, the best of science has to offer. But they don't say that it's science itself that is giving us the non existence of God or something like that. Right. They're, they're motivating it philosophically. And different philosophers have different motivations for that. Right. They might think, for example, now this will, I'm sorry, you finish yours and then I'll get it because this will lead into my book. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They might think, for example, here's the best, here's the best argument against God. Right. Something like this. Right. If two theories explain just as much, believe the simpler theory, theism and atheism explain just as much. But atheism is simpler. So believe Atheism, right? So that would be an argument. You have to support it, of course. And I think that that's a very interesting argument. I think it is one that is actually worthy of serious attention when it is presented by serious atheists. And it sets up for my book, which I think is the best argument for God, because I essentially, I attempt to like, do judo on that argument. I try to reverse it, right? And I say, okay, here's the real deal, friends. Atheism or naturalism?

[00:48:20] Remy: Can you, can you lay out and support that argument?

[00:48:23] Patrick: The atheistic one? Yeah, well, we'll, we'll get there. Here's. So here's, here's my, my thesis, right? I say, well, naturalism can only explain some of what theism can, but only when strapped with vastly greater complexity. And I say that that's the best argument for God, which is a reverse of the naturalist one. Now to, to support these arguments, to evaluate them, we have to ask, well, what needs to be explained? Right? And this itself opens up a debate. It opens up a debate on like, well, what, what is the data that we need to explain? And there's a good amount that's agreed upon, but not all of it. But we'll call this metaphysical data. And metaphysical data is a sort of stuff that we have good reason to believe is a, is real, is that is an actual feature of reality kind of at the common sense level at the beginning of our investigation. So what would some examples of this, of this be? Well, contingency, right? Most of us just have this deep intuition that there are some things that are contingent that are here but didn't need to be here, right? Moral features of reality, consciousness, rationality, order, stability. So call these broad features of reality. What a philosopher needs to do is they need to have a theory, a metaphysical theory that can explain these types of things. These are the types of things that really get fed into science as assumptions. They're not things that science itself confirms or tells us much about, right? They're kind of just, they're just, they're just too deep down. And what I argue in my book, what I do in my book is I literally just go through all that data and say, okay, well, what's the naturalistic explanation? And then in some cases, I'll admit, okay, there's, there's, there is some explanation here, but the theistic one is a lot better and it's a lot simpler. Here's why. In other cases, I'll be a bit punchy and I'll say, actually, naturalism has no explanation at all. It really doesn't. Right. For contingency. I think when it comes to the question of contingency or why does any, you know, metaphysically finite composite being exist, I don't think naturalism can give a good principled explanation there. And I'll say that only theism can. So that's literally the project of my book is just like section by section, chapter by chapter, like looking at some piece of metaphysical data and saying, okay, what is, what does theism offer? How does theism explain this classical theism? And then is the naturalistic one as good? Is it better? Is there a naturalistic one at all?

So, yeah, I can substantiate that argument, but that's, it's all my book, right? Not like shamelessly promote it, but I spend an entire book, go read the book to detail. It's a lot. Because it's a lot, right? There's a lot that goes into each one of those, you know, considerations, right? Whether we're thinking about contingency or rationality or order or stability or the problem, Evil and suffering too, is the final chapter in my book. And I do argue that theism actually can give a better explanation of that even. And then the naturalism, which is probably the most provocative chapter of my book. But I thought it was important and I still think it's correct.

[00:51:20] Remy: Has anyone ever presented you with an argument against God? I think I maybe even asked you this last time. That gives you any serious pause?

[00:51:29] Patrick: Yeah, man, that's an, that's a good question.

I mean, here's the deal. The deal is, you know, for, for your listeners aren't familiar. I spent most of my, still, most of my philosophical life as a naturalist, right?

So in a sense, I was already kind of familiar. It's not like I haven't discovered any new atheistic voices or anything like that, but I, I like, I wasn't ignorant of what really smart naturalists were proposing, right. As arguments for their position against God and stuff like that.

So what happened is over time, I just, as I went deeper into that paradigm, I just realized, man, I just don't think naturalism explains much of anything particularly well. Right. Whether we're talking about, you know, the qualitative dimension, the conscious dimension, the moral dimension. I know I said that was the weakest, but I still don't think naturalism has a particularly great account of, of moral realism, at least, if it's not. At least not a super contrived one. Certainly the question of why anything exists and not nothing, instead and even suffering evil, the more I thought about it. So. So, you know, the first thing that happened to me in my shift was naturalism just sort of started to crumble. And then, you know, as I started considering the other side, there were a number of arguments initially fascinated me, but then I did drop them because I thought that there were good, you know, atheistic objections to them, particular formulations and stuff like that.

I think, you know, we all have our biases and prejudices, but I think I'm, like, pretty committed to just wanting to know what's true. Right. Not hold on to arguments just. Just for the sake of it. Like, if I think that there's some good objections and there's lots of arguments out there, like, there's, you know, there's arguments about the Kalam cosmological argument. Now, whatever begins to exist has a cause. The universe began to exist, therefore the universe has a cause, et cetera, et cetera. Pretty popular argument. And there's a lot out there about whether the universe began to exist and whether there can be infinite causal chains that are accidentally ordered. And there's lots of paradoxes that are put out there to. To show that it produces absurd or contradictory results. There's also a lot of responses to it that when I look at that argument or I see objections there, I just have not made up my mind on it. You know what I mean?

[00:53:57] Remy: Yeah.

[00:53:58] Patrick: So in that sense, like. Like, I have paused around different arguments if, you know, as I've really tried to think very hard about God. Like some I. I, like, I've thought about really hard. Right. For a long time, and they've only gotten stronger. And certainly not in recent memory have I encountered any, like, objections. It makes me, like, totally, you know, think I need to reconsider this. You know, like, Linus's arguments and stuff like that. Right. The problem of evil I was obviously very familiar with in many different forms even before I became a theist. Right. So it's not like this was like, news to me. Right. It's like the difficulty answer your question is like, there was little that was sort of news to me on the philosophical front. Right. Like, I was already really familiar with the really smart guys presenting the best objection. So. Right.

[00:54:47] Remy: I guess a better. A better question then would be, so were you an atheist prior to being Roman Catholic? Are you raised Catholic?

[00:54:56] Patrick: Yes. Yes. Yeah, I was an atheist, so I was baptized, but I. I had no religious upbringing.

[00:55:02] Remy: Okay.

[00:55:02] Patrick: I lost whatever kind of little cartoon faith I had really, like, late middle school, definitely by, you know, High school and then I was, you know, pretty, you know, I wasn't, I wasn't your annoying, I was not your annoying atheist. I was really just a guy who thought that naturalism was the best picture in town. And I just wanted to try to make sense of the world. Right.

[00:55:25] Remy: So then I guess, I guess that's where I was.

[00:55:27] Patrick: Yeah.

[00:55:27] Remy: The better question then is what was, what was the biggest hurdle to overcome is probably a better question than are there any arguments that give you pause? What was the hardest one for you?

[00:55:37] Patrick: Yeah. To get around evil. Of course it is. Of course it's the problem of evil. Right.

[00:55:41] Remy: Simply, simply put, what is the problem of evil? If God real, why bad thing happened.

[00:55:46] Patrick: Yeah. If God is so great, why does all this stuff suck? Right. That's the not precise, you know, formulation. If you want to get technical, we can. There's, it's, it's a family of arguments, right. You have logical problems of evil which are meant to try to expose. There's actually something completely incompatible about God and negative states of affairs. Those are pretty punchy arguments. I think that they can all be defeated and I think a lot of philosophers realize that those arguments can be defeated. So the debate is kind of moved more towards evidential or abductive arguments from evil. And the idea there is, okay, maybe evil isn't like strictly incompatible with God, but just look how much stuff sucks. Doesn't this make better sense if God doesn't exist? And if God does exist. So it's supposed to be an evidential game, right? Like this seems to just be a better fit on atheism or it seems to be obviously much better evidence for atheism. Again, maybe it doesn't strictly disprove God, but let's just, let's just be serious about it, that, that, that sort of approach.

So yeah, I think that's the, I think unsurprisingly, that's the, that's the best one, right. That I think points in favor initially, it only initially towards ac. Atheism. But I think once you think about it very deeply and seriously and respectfully for a long time, I think it starts to actually point the, in the other direction.

[00:57:07] Remy: I think it was the last time you were on this show with me that you said regarding the problem of evil, that things do suck, but like just enough to make saints.

You know, it's not so bad that we all just kill ourselves right away. And it's also not so good that there's no adversity, but there's just enough adversity to really drive home the righteousness. Right. There's just enough bad to make the good that much better, I think is.

[00:57:48] Patrick: Yeah, yeah. It's just. It seems that the way that all the evil and suffering could have been distributed in the world, it could have been far worse in certain respects, certainly far better as well. And this is a point Trent Doherty makes in his very good book, the Problem of Evil and Animal Suffering. He argues that it seems like that it's been fine tuned for something. Right. Call it saint building or soul saving or something like that. Right. Peter van Engwegen developed something like this as well, a bit different. Right. But the general, the general, certainly the traditional Christian idea is that God permits this providence of suffering.

Why? Well, we don't have to think it's just for one reason. That's. I think that's a mistake in the. Probably don't think that there's just one reason for all of it. But certainly one reason I think is important is that suffering might be the best or only available means to bring us to that point of repentance and justification and make us holy and make us saints and all this and all that stuff. Right. So there's all these sorts of theodicies. I think that's right. I think you have to tell us a story about seemingly gratuitous evils which you can. Which I do in the book Evils, where it's hard to see that it could serve some, some greater justifying purpose. So you need something in your theory to explain that. I go into that in, in my book. Right. I think there's again, a number of different considerations that can help anticipate that from a theistic framework. And again, it's not just one thing, but. But many. Right. But then I think the really important thing to ask here is not just can theism explain this sort of distribution pattern of suffering and the types of suffering. Right. I think it can.

But can naturalism really explain it? And this is in my book, I, I developed this, an argument that it really cannot, not without great.

Without being greatly contrived and complicated. And I have a. A paper in a academic volume appearing probably sometime next year that will, that develops this argument further. And it's a little bit technical, but it's, it's. It. Let me give just the sketch of it so people, maybe this will just get people interested. Right. So if you are a naturalist generally, you're committed to several important, you know, theses. Right. One is the idea of source physicalism. And source physicalism is the idea that the physical realm, whatever that is, precedes and causes and determines the mental realm, the qualitative realm of the. The realm of what it is likeness, including the. What it is like to feel pain and this or that. Right.

Again, this is going to be a very condensed, simplified version. But the argument is essentially this, okay? If that's true, if. If everything about us is sort of kind of coming from the bottom up, right? And that the mental realm doesn't play any sort of causal role or influence. This is why many naturalists are committed to a view and philosophy of mine called epiphenomenalism. That whatever else the mind is the qualitative dimension, something sort of just floats atop its physical base. It doesn't exert any downward causal influence, okay. On what the physical stuff is doing. The physical completely determines the mental. Right? All right. If that's right, then naturalism has a couple of problems. One, it doesn't really have a good explanation of why the mental realm emerges at all or evolves at all. Because it's not playing any functional role, right? It's not playing any functional. But not only that, if it can't explain that, it certainly can't explain or doesn't explain hardly adequately why we have the types of feelings that we do if they're causally irrelevant, why do I suffer? Or why does it hurt when I get pricked with a pin, right. If. If the physical stuff can just do all of it, right? And I don't need to feel anything to get my joints in the right place. And why do I. And why do I have that feeling? Because what the feeling is is causally irrelevant. I could feel like I do when I hear the Bonnie theme song when I got hit by a pin, but as long as my joints are in the right place, it doesn't matter what the feeling is. Right?

[01:01:48] Remy: Right.

[01:01:48] Patrick: So when you get into the. The inner lot, this is what I argue about. When you get into the inner logic of naturalism, we actually get into the weeds. When you look under the hood and you get off of the. Just the kind of. The kindergarten perspective, right. You suddenly realize, oh, no, naturalism really doesn't have a good explanation for why there's any qualitative feelings of suffering, just feelings of suffering at all, or why they're distributed the way they are or why they tend to harmonize with behaviors that would be justifying of that. Right. And it all has to do, again with the sort of inner logic and deeper principles of natural. And once you see that, you realize like, wow, it just seems to be an incredible coincidence that you have these sort of, these links. This, they call it. They call it psychophysical harmony. Right. Like, naturally doesn't really seem to have an explanation of this. But if you talk about the problem of suffering, it's. It's that feeling, the feeling of suffering that needs to be explained. And you can't just point to evolution here because again, this problem is deeper than evolution. Right. It's way like evolution can't touch this. Right.

[01:02:51] Remy: That's what, that's what I was gonna. That was my initial thought was like, if, you know, the stove is hot and I touch the stove and it hurts, so I move my hand, I'm experiencing suffering. The physical is exerting on the mental. But what's the point of me feeling bad feelings?

And it's, well, so I move my hand off the stove. But if good feelings can produce the same. If they can produce the same feeling.

[01:03:15] Patrick: Had nothing to do with you moving your hand. That's the point, right?

[01:03:18] Remy: Yeah, exactly. Well, and I oftentimes have moved my hand before I have the feeling.

[01:03:23] Patrick: Yeah.

[01:03:24] Remy: You know, I mean, just on a purely physical level.

[01:03:27] Patrick: But if the result can be achieved.

[01:03:30] Remy: Yeah, if the result can be achieved with a different feeling, though, there's no reason why the feeling evolution. What I'm saying is that evolution doesn't explain it being bad feelings because we could have evolved it to be good feelings too and had the same outcome.

[01:03:48] Patrick: Selective pressures can't solve this problem. As I argue in my book and in the paper and for people who are hip to these issues in philosophy of mind. Yes, that argument is assuming epiphenomealism, which many naturals assume. But I show how you can run the argument with different positions in like reductive functionalism, whatever. I think the same problem results. So the point is, is like, look, all right, if that's right and naturalism really doesn't have an explanation at all, then even if, like, you don't think the theist has a super great explanation, I actually think you can give a very good theistic explanation. Takes a bit of time, but I think you can give one.

Some explanation is better than none. Right?

[01:04:23] Remy: So, yeah, right.

[01:04:25] Patrick: Evidentially, it's still going to weigh in favor of theism if you, if you take all the steam out of the, the naturalist sale, if that makes sense. Right.

So, yeah, that's, that's how I do that. And I know I haven't given the theistic theodicy, but again, like, I, I always try to be careful when responding to probably because there's so much there. And I hate to be the guy that says like, go read my book. But you know, it's, there's a lot there and it's a tough problem. I think the, not just classical theism, but Christianity has the resources to deal with it. I really do can give a good explanation, a very hopeful one at the end of the day, but it deserves a sort of careful reading and attention and stuff like that. Because every time I'll do something I probably will forget something and be like, oh yeah, so maybe really important thing, right?

[01:05:08] Remy: Maybe maybe not to get too, too far into the weeds or detract too far from the book necessarily, but what moved you, I guess personally to Christianity specifically or maybe even Roman Catholicism as an expression of Christianity? Yeah, an accurate expression of Christianity.

[01:05:33] Patrick: Yeah. Good questions. Well, I mean, you hang around with these Thomistic philosophers for a while, you start getting very interested in Christianity because that's sort of what they're doing. And some broadly philosophical considerations, actually, I think kind of coming from that Thomistic standpoint, which is very Neoplatonic, it's a very, it's a very beautiful view of the world. And I don't think beauty is like the ultimate thing, but I think it, it can be indicative or suggestive and it could certainly be a tiebreaker in certain respects. Right? So if you're a classical theist, you think, okay, God is not just pure being, but he's pure goodness. Because Aquinas holds the convertibility principle that goodness just is being under the aspect of perfection or desirability. So any being that is pure being is going to be pure goodness. He can start to ask some, I think, cool questions like why would God create, right. If he's just this being of just absolute perfection, goodness, he doesn't need to create. Right. And Aquinas would say something like this, you know, you know, a being can enjoy its goodness in one or two of, one of two ways. It can just rest in it or it can share it. Right. And God creates to share that creation is an act of pure loving gratuity. Right?

So that's cool that, that I think that kind of gives an anticipation of why God would create, but also why God wasn't necessitated to create. I think we can avoid modal collapse. I think the Trinity helps with that as well. That God is internally self diffusive, right? With the Trinity, the life of the Trinity. So he doesn't necessarily need to be, doesn't necessarily need to be externally self diffusive. But he decides to, he decides to create. He wills that this world exists and if. Okay, that's right. But this world is a world of natures, and he lets those natures operate according to the kinds of things that they are. Right. God isn't just some, you know, guy that sort of winds up a big mechanism and then tinkers with it as he goes. He just supplies being right to the natures of things. You know, puts actuality into the essences, if you will. Right. So he's not going to be constantly tinkering or miraculously intervening because that would kind of make nonsense of creation. And God being perfect isn't in the business of nonsense. And some of those beings, some of those beings are us, or they are like us. They're beings that are metaphysically fallible, that have the power of deliberation and the power to end deliberation, which is the power of the will. And they can fail in their judgments. They can fail in their intellectual judgments. They can fail in their moral judgments. They can sin. Right. So Aquinas's theory of sin is. It's actually bound up with our metaphysical finitude that only God by nature is impeccable. Right. Everything else, no matter how awesome God makes it, is the sort of thing that can fail. This is just a sort of metaphysical constraint, Right? They're, they're, they're beings of potency and act. They're finite. We can only consider so many things at a time. We can choose to consider certain things when we're making or when we're about to make an important decision, and we can choose to ignore certain things. So Aquinas's theory of sin is, yes, it's due from ignorance, but it's a culpable ignorance because we chose not to consider what we could really have considered, the power to consider it. Right. So yes, ignorance plays a role in Aquinas's theory of sin, but it's a culpable ignorance because we had the power to consider it. Right? All right, so things can sin, and when they sin, bad things happen and the world can become seriously disordered. Right. But God is the sort of being we think, I think philosophically that wouldn't just kind of let that happen and step aside. Right, Right. In fact, I think the kind of original philosophical motivation for God is not just to share the good of existence. You know, if God's going to be, you know, generous, he won't just bring things into existence. He'll probably be super generous, which means he'll bring things not only into existence, but to share in the highest good, which is union with himself. Right, sure. So, right. And this is, this is very Christian, but I think it could be philosophically motivated as well, just from these principles of pure existence. And the good is self diffusive and stuff like that.

But there's like a problem, right? Like, how is God going to like unify with a rock? A rock isn't the kind of thing that can have that sort of personal friendship with anything because it's not a conscious being. So it seems like God, if he's going to kind of pull all creation into union with himself. I think this is a really cool insight in the philosophical tradition.

He's got to kind of create something that is a microcosm within the macrocosm. Right. Something that sort of concentrates in itself the entire spread of creation. And this is what the human person is. Right. We've got the lower material aspects in us. We also have the higher angelic, spiritual aspects of it. Right. We're composites of form and matter, of immaterial intellect and all these good physical parts. Right. So the idea then is that if God sort of pulls us into union with himself, he's sort of automatically bringing all of creation along for the ride.

[01:10:27] Remy: Fascinating.

[01:10:28] Patrick: Isn't that awesome, man? Isn't that sweet? I just. Man, I fell in love with that line. I'm like, that is, that is. That has to be true right now. It gets better, I think, because not only. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, it's.

[01:10:42] Remy: I just real quick. It's neat because it, it makes sense to then turn around and say that through his precious suffering and death that Christ redeems all creation. Because by redeeming us, it's sort of, it's spreading. It also explains why Hebrews would say, you know, when Adam fell, all creation fell because we are.

[01:11:06] Patrick: Yes, yeah, right. We're the microcosm in the macrocosm. Right, yeah. So, yeah. And you already anticipated was going to go is that once you have that in place and then the fact that things got screwy, man, it just sets up for the incarnation and atonement like that. Yeah, right. Well, like that just seems like that God became man so that man might share in part, you know, become God. Right, that's. And that's true. And bring us back to Himself.

[01:11:31] Remy: That's truly God. Then also, I mean, like you want to talk about God unifying with his creation and sharing with it his, his glory and majesty and being and all that he is, you really can't get any, you can't get any closer to that idea than the Incarnation, than God taking flesh into himself. Right. Like, it's so funny. We argue all the time on Twitter because it's a useless hellscape. And one of the things we argue about, one of the things we argue about are these simple phrases like, God has a mom.

God has a mom. And people, they freak out because they're like, oh, if we're talking about the Father or if we're talking about true divinity or whatever, no, that's ridiculous. And it's impossible. And it's like, well, guys, Jesus is God. Check. Step one, Jesus has a mom. Step two, you know, vis a vis.

God has a mom. You know, God.

[01:12:37] Patrick: Yeah, I'm with you. Yeah.

[01:12:38] Remy: You know, God was hungry. At some point in time, there's really, there's no, there's no better, truly. Unification, redemption, pulling into himself of this reality and sharing himself with this reality, then the incarnation is there. That's.

[01:12:58] Patrick: Yeah, yeah. So I think just from good philosophy, you can really, really anticipate something like that. And then once you just kind of have that on the scene historically, like, how can you resist it? Right. Yeah, I couldn't. I couldn't, not intellectually. Now, of course, there's the whole moral conversion aspect. Right.

You know, was, was very significant as well, but that's that. All right. And then why, why am I Catholic? Well, yeah, I searched around for a while, and I thought, I thought a lot about this, and, and I was veering Protestant for a while. In fact, a Lutheran. We went to a Lutheran church for a while, and then Evangelical.

I, I, But I hesitate to ever say that. Yeah. I hesitate to ever call myself Protestant because I just really wasn't. I was just kind of searching and thinking. Right. And I guess I would just say a lot of things again, I think there's good philosophical motion notions, and not that Protestantism can't pick up any of these, and certainly Lutherans be able to pick up more than other Protestants. But we're not just rational animals or rational social animals that depend on hierarchy, tradition, authority to get around in the world. We're physical beings. So sacraments make a lot of sense to me.

[01:14:12] Remy: Yeah.

[01:14:14] Patrick: Institution makes a lot of sense to me. Authority makes a lot of sense to me. The right. Authority for judicial purposes, not, not always epistemic purposes, but for judicial purposes, unity purposes, functional purposes. Right. And then there's the historical data. So I would just say there's a cumulative case without getting into any of the weeds, where I just thought that the Catholic paradigm was able to explain the best of all that stuff, the philosophical and historical data for me.

[01:14:42] Remy: Sure.

[01:14:42] Patrick: And that's why I became Catholic. That makes sense. Yep.

[01:14:45] Remy: Yeah. No, that. That makes a lot of sense.

[01:14:46] Patrick: Yeah. And. And look, man, I. I have tons of brilliant Protestant friends. Has had a great conversation with Gav in Ortland. I love those. These conversations. And just as I try to be as, you know, respectful to atheists and realize there's a lot of brilliant atheists out there, there's a lot of brilliant Protestants.

Love you guys. Right. I'm just glad that we're able to have these types of conversations together.

[01:15:06] Remy: Yeah. Big, big on the ecumenism over here. I always.

I always.

That I find there's. There's a lot more unity than there is discord, I think.

[01:15:24] Patrick: Yeah. You brought up the points about, like, justification and stuff before, and that's what I've found, man, when I was really just trying to figure it out for myself, you know, like, once you get out off of the online debates, you realize there just is a lot more harmony on things.

[01:15:36] Remy: Yeah.

[01:15:37] Patrick: Like, sometimes, like, the way we talk about things is very different. Right. But once you clear up that.

Not so far apart as I think a lot of people realize. Right.

[01:15:47] Remy: I sat down. I sat down with a Catholic priest one time on this show, which, you know, good on him. Very brave of him to do, I found. I've always wanted to, like, I really enjoy talking with. With different priests of different Christian traditions. And I find that the Catholics are the hardest ones to get on. And then I think part of that, a lot of that, I think, is humility. A lot of them, I don't think they realize maybe how highly educated they are. You guys educate the crap out of your priests. They're. I've not run across one. I've not run across one that I'm like, wow, this guy's an idiot. You know, like, they're always very smart, very intelligent, very well spoken, but I don't know that they necessarily. I think most priests probably just. I have my parish and I have my people, and that's, you know, good enough for me. Yeah.

[01:16:47] Patrick: And, you know, there's different levels of training, philosophical and historical and theological. Different priests get. And of course, like, priests, again, just have different interests. Right. For me, my interests are metaphysics. I don't really do Catholic Protestant. Like, that's just not my area. Well, I had to work. I had to work it for myself. But, like, that's not just that's just not what I do. Right. Interests are just philosophical largely. Right.

[01:17:10] Remy: A lot of them also, I think, worried that it'll end up being a gotcha like that, that it'll end up being some kind of gotcha conversation where I'm going to grill them on. On theology, you know, and so then they're hesitant to come on. But it's like, I don't. I actually don't want to do that at all. I just kind of want to chat and see. I want you to explain what you. I'll explain what I believe and we'll see where we meet in the middle. And I did have a priest that came on and was willing to do that with me. And we got to talking about the sacrament of the altar and the Eucharist and we started talking kind of like really delving into sort of finally parsing the theological language. And I said, well, you know, ultimately in Lutheran theology we're going to believe in a motive presence. We say he's physically present is what we would say. He's physically present in the sacrament. But we don't mean like fleshly physically present.

We're going to say ultimately we would refer to his mode of presence in the sacrament as sacramental. It's his sacramental mode of presence.

[01:18:12] Patrick: Yeah. The distinction is really fine. It's been a while since I looked into this, but the way I remember it being is that it's not just a real presence that the Catholics maintain, but a real absence too.

[01:18:22] Remy: Right.

[01:18:24] Patrick: We're talking about transubstantiation versus consubstantiation, stuff like that. So you want to talk like deep in the weeds of distinctions, but that is actually to your point that the things are actually a lot closer than I think we realize.

[01:18:34] Remy: Well, because.

[01:18:35] Patrick: And the differences are really fine grained. Right? Yeah.

[01:18:38] Remy: Even though y'all would say that the essence of the bread and wine is truly absent, and it is truly the essence is now truly the flesh and blood of Jesus. I don't think there's a Catholic out there that would maintain that when you eat the bread, you're ripping Jesus, Jesus limb from limb. That. You know what I mean? Like, it's not physical. It's not physical in that way that you're tearing Jesus apart with your teeth, you know, like no one, no one is saying that. And so it's funny to talk to somebody on the Catholic side and explain, like, we understand you don't believe that. We don't believe that. And it's like we actually are the real Distinction. Yeah. Is the. Is going to be. The true absence of bread and wine is probably going to be one of the bigger distinctions between the Lutheran and Catholic Eucharist.

I think also we just sort of buck at the idea of explaining it at all.

You know, Jesus said, this is my body.

[01:19:38] Patrick: Good. At some point, there's. There's just going to be some impenetrable mystery. Right. Which I think is a thing. Right.

[01:19:43] Remy: Well, because once again, circling. Circling all the way back, we're talking about what is, to us an impenetrable being, you know?

[01:19:51] Patrick: Yeah. Right. I would, you know, there'd be.

I would love to, because the guy that I think you would have more material to converse over because theology is not my area of specialization, but I think he's. He's like you two. He really enjoys ecumenical dialogue. Very friendly, not into gotcha stuff. As Eric Ybarra.

[01:20:10] Remy: Okay.

[01:20:11] Patrick: I would love to see a conversation between you two, and I'd be happy to make that connection to good friend of mine.

Brilliant mind. Just, just. It'd be. I think that would be a very. If you're looking for, like, that type of conversation with a Catholic who's into a lot of these. These types of, you know, areas of discussion, he'd be a good guy to connect with, for sure.

[01:20:32] Remy: Yeah. No, I would love that. I'm always down. I'm always down.

That's awesome.

So if I wanted to get into.

Not necessarily.

I feel like with stuff like this, people always kind of tend to drift towards apologetics and maybe, like, philosophically thinking about Christianity and theism in general sort of lends itself to that, but not necessarily from an apologetic lens. But if I just wanted to get into philosophy to deepen my own knowledge of, say, classical theism and how it ties to Christianity, where do you recommend I start?

[01:21:14] Patrick: Yeah, well, that's a. That's a great question. I always recommend this, like, if for anybody. Right. I think just at least some degree of philosophical education is just so useful.

Don't be intimidated, you know, by it. I mean, what is philosophy ultimately? I actually like Planica, one of my favorite pots and philosophers. Right. He says philosophy is just thinking hard about things. That's all it is. Right.

[01:21:35] Remy: Okay.

[01:21:36] Patrick: Doesn't that sound good? Right. Doesn't that sound good? We should want to think hard about things.

[01:21:39] Remy: Things.

[01:21:40] Patrick: Right. And he says it's best done slow, and that's that. Man, that's. That's definitely true. So there's lots. I mean, first off, I do recommend, you know, one of the benefits of My master's program especially, which is odd because like you didn't even get this in the philosophy courses I took as an undergrad. My undergrad was not philosophy, but I took a lot of undergrad courses in. It was time spent with just, just, just the classics, the original texts. So I would say just to give people a few to get started with that aren't like too crazy. Don't do Aristotle's physics. You'll need a huge bottle of Motrin for that. But his ethics, you know, start with his, his Nicomachean ethics. That's fairly accessible. It's such a classic. Do Plato's Dialogues for sure, maybe the Republic.

Another one that I think is a really good, important classic is Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy. He does more philosophy of God there. He's. It's really just a long extended response to the problem of evil.

Really, really good and important. Aquinas. Well, man, there's a summa that's quite a monster. But yeah, you could just kind of like pick through that a little bit here or there if you're into like the philosophical parts of it. Right.

But definitely, you know, Aristotle, Plato, Boethius would be like three. If you're just gonna, you know, do, do a few of the classics and the contemporary scene, there's a lot of good, there's a lot of good books. Right. One guy I really like because he's both a great philosopher and a great writer is Mortimer Adler.

And if you get his book how to Read a Book, it's actually a disguised book in like classical Aristotelian logic. But it'll just, it'll teach you how to engage with philosophical texts and how to like do those sort of mental chin ups. How to go from a state of understanding less to understanding more. When you don't have a mentor, it's just you and the book. So definitely get that and read that. And then at the end of that book he's got the great works of philosophy and you could just spend your lifetime going through the great works of philosophy using the principles he taught in the book. So that, that, that book is really good. He's also got a book called Aristotle for Everybody. And I'm broadly an Aristotelian. I think Aristotle has got a lot of things right. So if you're just looking like good introduction to Aristotle, maybe even while you're reading Aristotle, I think it is helpful to have some, some help there even just to help you get clear in terminology and stuff like that. Aristotle for everybody is really Good.

And then there's. Man, there's just so many. There's so many introductory books. I actually just picked up a new one recently, if people like the kind of metaphysics we're doing here, a book called Introduction to. I think it's just called Introduction to Mystic Metaphysics by Michael Gorman. I just. I've only read two chapters, but I'm really impressed because it's. It's a book that is definitely accessible, but he's going into. Into depth as well. So I think I'm. Even though I haven't read it, I think I'm. I'm already ready to endorse that book and then just be completely shameless. I'll say my own too.

[01:24:38] Remy: Yes.

[01:24:38] Patrick: Because even though I'm kind of like going into the deep philosophical weeds, I was inspired by Adler to, like, try and, like, provide a philosophical education as I was getting into the debate. Right. So my book has lots of sidebars where if there's, like, you know, some fancy philosophical term, I take the time to explain what that means, maybe give a little bit of the history. So I think people will actually genuinely learn a lot about what the discipline of philosophy is and methodology just by working through my book on the existence of God as well. So those would be a few off the top of my head to start with.

[01:25:11] Remy: It occurs to me. It occurs to me if you want to get into philosophical thinking just thinking about it, you need to a. Know how to think, right?

[01:25:25] Patrick: You.

[01:25:25] Remy: You need to learn how to, like, actually think and not just, I think a lot of people react and they think. That's thinking.

Yes.

So you need to know how to think. And I think the other thing that helps is probably you need to know how to speak. Like, you need. You need a vocabulary. You're gonna need. You're gonna need to know words. Because if you don't know words, you can't formulate the ideas. You have to have. You have to have the words to have the ideas.

[01:25:59] Patrick: That's why you get so many technical words, right? And then you'll wonder, well, why do we need these so many technical words? And you try to do without them, and then you realize, oh, I guess we did need those. Right? Yeah.

[01:26:08] Remy: Yeah. It's. It's funny in. In theology and in the study of theology, you wonder that a lot. You know, you wonder that a lot. Where it's like. Where it's like, why does everyone constantly refer to this thing in Latin? And so then, like, you don't refer to it in Latin, and then you realize that in English, it sounds just like this other thing that's completely not at all the same thing, you know, and you, like, you start to realize the confusion that happens with sort of the imprecision of language. You know, there's my favorite example in English, the imprecision that modern English can lend itself to is like the word heaven. You know, we're all going to go to heaven when we die. But in, in precise theological language, what you're thinking of when you think we die and go to heaven is actually the intermediary state. It's a temporary intermediary state before the resurrection. And the thing that you, you should actually be hoping for, the thing that's actually closer to what you're conceiving of as heaven is going to be the resurrection and the new earth, which is entirely different from where your spirit's going to be on the cloud with the harp or whatever you want to think of after you die.

But I feel like in order to think about things, you need the vocabulary to talk about them.

And, and a precise, you know, a precise vocabulary. You.

[01:27:39] Patrick: Yeah, absolutely. And that's why I would say, like, if, if you are going to read Aquinas, you know, get, yeah, just get like something like Aquinas A Beginner's Guide. There's another one, Aquinas A Beginner's Guide by Ed Faser, because he's going to help you get the vocabulary vocabulary down.

And it's important because not only is it a technical vocabulary, but he will just use terms in ways that are just very different than how we currently understand them. Right. So you want to make sure that you're just not, you know, importing your modern assumption or understanding into his text when he means something actually completely different. So I do recommend that you get a little bit of outside help or a guide if you're going to go to, you know, to the, to some of these classics.

[01:28:21] Remy: What, what do you think are some of the biggest, biggest benefits for Christians to study philosophy? Like, what are some of the biggest reasons you think a Christian should man?

[01:28:33] Patrick: Well, for me, it's just, it's just, it's, it's, it's purifying. Right, Purifying your, your understanding, hopefully, of the world, hopefully also about God. You know, we talked about not falling into anthropomorphisms about God. And, you know, thinking philosophically about God, I think will give you a much, I don't want to say richer understanding because it's. What we've been talking about is like you come to understand that God is so radically other and transcendent, but a greater hopefully. All right. Or opportunity for reverence, stuff like that.

I think philosophy, I mean, look, we're, we're, we're intellectual animals at the end of the day, we sort of thrive on this stuff. Doesn't mean that everybody is meant to be, you know, that, that ivory tower academic. But I think everybody stands to benefit from sharpening their intellect.

[01:29:28] Remy: Sure.

[01:29:29] Patrick: To various degrees. Absolutely. It helps. I mean, it helps in evangelism, man. We know that, right? Apologetics is a legitimate field. You always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in you and with gentleness and respect, right? So we know that Christianity is not just broadly assumed in our culture anymore, right? People are very skeptical, people are very critical.

So even when people just see that you have thought about it, right? Even before they have even seen what your arguments or reasons are, just the fact that they've seen that, oh, you've actually put some thought into this, they tend to. That, that gets them interested or impressed or curious in different ways. And then if you can back that up with some decent reasons, again, don't have to go like super in the weeds on everything, but if you could just maybe, you know, kind of get your, you know, you know, you know, master, like just a few things here or there, right, that you have on the ready, that can just be enormously useful in everyday conversation, evangelism, apologetics. So I think it's useful on that front.

Yeah. And I don't know, man, I, I always just, I just love it because I just, I feel like I'm just borrowing intelligence from people that are a lot smarter than myself too.

[01:30:45] Remy: You know, I get.

[01:30:47] Patrick: And it makes me, it makes me. It helps you with humility, for sure, which, you know, I always need, but also gratitude, right? You know, there's people there who've wrestled with these tough ideas and they can be of help to you. That's always really cool, Right? And it's reassuring in a sense, too, because you can't answer everything, that's for sure. But you can be pretty confident there's somebody out there who's, who's wrestled with it and probably has some good answers if you need some help, right? So, yeah, I guess those are some reasons I've just never been able not to do it, you know, so just, just, just always been into it, you know what I mean?

[01:31:27] Remy: I like to say that the church has been around for 2,000 years. You know, Christianity has been here for 2,000 years now.

[01:31:38] Patrick: Yeah.

[01:31:39] Remy: People smarter than me or people smarter. Like, if I'm talking to an atheist, people smarter than you have asked better questions to people smarter than me. You know what I mean? Like, this isn't. We've, it's been around a while. None of us are treading new ground here. I don't think anyone's come up with any novel, brand new objection to anything.

You know, we're so. Yeah, there is that. I get to borrow. I get to borrow from people smarter than me, you know, I get to lean on. There's a whole, there's a whole past, a whole group of people that have, that have done work and like, I just have to follow in the footsteps here, you know?

[01:32:24] Patrick: Yeah. Maybe you can push it forward a little bit. Inspired too, right? Like. Yeah, refine a little bit. Right, Absolutely.

[01:32:31] Remy: But it's not like, it's not like I'm, it's not like I'm the first person that's ever been faced with this, you know, like, there's. I find that to be very encouraging, you know?

[01:32:41] Patrick: Yeah, totally.

[01:32:42] Remy: People can do this. They've done it.

[01:32:44] Patrick: Yeah. They've been through that. Right. Like. Yeah. Right. And. Yeah. Is there anything ever totally new? I don't know. I've spent a lot of time, you know, in the, in the weeds of this stuff. And like, there's, you know, there's different formulations and refinements and stuff like that, but the kind of, the big stuff is largely the same, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah. Like, even atheism, modern materialism, like, you see, it's precursors and ancient atomism and all that stuff. Right. Like, even, even the broad philosophical schools have always kind of been there, you know.

[01:33:20] Remy: Yeah. I don't, I don't know that.

I don't know that there's a, A real.

There might be novel ways of thinking about certain things, but I don't think anyone's coming up with any brand new.

Stepping up with some kind of brand new novel thought altogether that no one has ever thought that I can defeat theism and prove atheism with this brand new way of thinking about God that no one's ever thought about God this way before. And I can prove, and I don't think that's happening. I think, you know, like you said, it's. People take things like the problem of evil and maybe we can approach this, we can refine this down and approach it a different way to come up with an objection or a solution, but no one's come there's not a new problem of evil, you know.

[01:34:16] Patrick: Yeah. And same thing with a lot of, even with a lot of the theistic stuff, you know, I've, I've got some takes that I think are novel, but I'm always, I'm always borrowing or synthesizing, you know, or just connecting, you know, dots that are already out there. And that's good because like, you don't, you don't, you shouldn't be like discouraged, like, oh, everything's already been said so nothing more news that's not true. Right. The things can be pushed forward and refined as well.

[01:34:39] Remy: Absolutely.

[01:34:40] Patrick: I guess what we're trying to say is that, you know, have confidence. Right. That these, the tough questions of this general form have always been around and brilliant people have been wrestling with them and there's, there are good answers out there, you know.

[01:34:51] Remy: Yeah. And I think it's, I think it's encouraging too that, you know, the questions are still, you know, that we're all still playing the same game. I guess I find that to be encouraging as well. And part of this, I guess, is from the theology side of it, the goal with good theology is in fact to not innovate and to not refine and to not be novel.

The goal of good theology is to take what the apostles taught, what Jesus taught the apostles and they taught the apostolic fathers and so on down the line, to take that teaching from them and pass it down to the next guy. Just, you know what I mean? We're not, I don't want to change it, I don't want to add to it, I don't want to take away from it, theologically speaking. I just want to hand on the gift that's been given down to me, you know, and again, it's just, I, I, I find it encouraging that there's, I am a hundred percent certain that there's never going to be some kind of great historical or scientific breakthrough that's going to completely upend Christianity or like, on your end, Christian philosophy. We're not going to discover something that all of a sudden calls into question everything.

[01:36:12] Patrick: I think that's, I think that's right. I mean, I can't close off the logical possibility of some things. Right. But yeah, I mean, I've spent a lot of time thinking about the so called conflict thesis. Right.

And I've largely come to conclude that there just isn't one. Right. It's just sort of bogus. Right. Greatly exaggerated and I guess I would say in a modest respect, the best of what contemporary science has to offer is more confirmatory of the existence of God rather than disconfirmatory. Right. Whether we're talking about physical fine tuning or what have you. Yeah.

[01:36:56] Remy: Here's a question for you. This is something that I think, and I'm wondering philosophically how you would approach this idea and what you think about it. And I understand this is probably going to be kind of off the cuff, but you're a smart guy. I think he can handle it. Let's try.

I think that there are hard limits that God puts on humanity.

And I mean that generally when I say that scientifically, But I also would say philosophically as well.

I think there are hard limits that there are things that we just simply will never be able to do, like beat death, death, anti aging, cloning, I think, traveling faster than the speed of light, I think. And these are scientific examples because this is the way I've thought of it.

But I think there are hard limits that God puts. You know, the Bible says that he tells the sea, thus far and no farther. And I think he does the same. But there's plenty of us that he wants for us to discover and explore and learn and see and grow into. But there are also, I think, hard limits where he says no farther than this.

[01:38:09] Patrick: Yeah, I mean, look, I think that's true with. With respect of the problem of evil. I think that there is, like, some threshold of awfulness that God would not allow, you know, the world to descend into. Obviously, I don't think we can say exactly where that is. But it's also important to understand that wherever that threshold is, it's compatible with us coming right up against it. So, like, epistemically, it might seem no different. Right. Like, you think, like.

[01:38:35] Remy: Right.

[01:38:36] Patrick: There's no way God would allow the world to be this bad. Where the answer is, actually, you're. You're almost right. Right. But we're right there. Right.

[01:38:44] Remy: Right.

[01:38:44] Patrick: Yeah.

[01:38:45] Remy: The. The truth is he wouldn't allow it to be a tiny bit.

[01:38:48] Patrick: He wouldn't. I'll be like, plus one, worse than that or something like that. So I think that's true. Right. I just don't know where to draw those lines. You know what I mean? Sure. And I think it's important to be humble about it now. I think that there are, you know, certain things you can be positive about. About what? I think you can have certain expectations of God. For example, Aquinas thinks that God isn't just going to annihilate the world out of existence. You know, five seconds from now Right. He thinks that that would just be against God's will for creation and God would be acting irrationally, which God you just not only wouldn't do, but just can't do. Right.

But like those are really broad, really broad expectations when it comes down to like making really hyper specific. Make predictions. Again, I think there are specific lines. I just don't think I have, I know I don't have access to them and I question whether anybody could. You know what I mean? Yeah, but I agree that they're there. I think, I think, I think, I think death is probably certainly one of them. Like I think that the Christian can, can say, yeah, I think I can predict that there's just, we're just not going to be beaten death anytime soon. Right. I'm with you on that. Right, Right.

[01:39:54] Remy: Well, well. And even to say, even to say that there are hard limits, to say human knowledge that they're. That there are hard limits, but to say that I don't think anyone can probe necessarily what that limit is, even that itself. Right. Would be another example of a hard limit that, you know, God says, look, there are just, there are things that are for me to know and for you to just not know.

That's.

[01:40:22] Patrick: Yeah.

[01:40:23] Remy: There, you know, whether it's just out of, out of some kind of love for us, maybe protection or something like that, or whether it's just a facet of his being versus a facet of ours.

[01:40:34] Patrick: Right. I think it's one of those two things. Right. I think if it's. It might just not be metaphysically the case that we could know certain things, at least in our mode of knowing, but it could also just be the case that it's better for us in, you know, this providence of salvation, not to let. Here's a good example. Right.

Many saints have thought that if God revealed to you all of your sins at once, if you knew how bad you really were, you would despair. Right. So he.

[01:41:02] Remy: Yeah, 100%.

[01:41:03] Patrick: So you don't know all of it all at once. Right. But gives it to you in a way that like, you can deal with it without like completely despairing. So that would be God putting a restriction in place. Why? Because of his loving providence. Right. So I think that that would be a good example of that. Right?

[01:41:17] Remy: Yeah, it's like when, when someone says, like, well, why doesn't God, why doesn't God remove all the evil from the world? And the theological answer to that is, well, he did that one time and it involves slowly drowning planet over the course of 45 days. You know what I mean? Like, God can certainly remove all the evil from existence if he wanted to, but it means your precious Gam Gam is going to die.

[01:41:41] Patrick: Yeah. You know what I mean? It also. So, like, you know, we certainly believe that God is at work at this right now. Right. Might not be on. On the timeline that everybody wants or in the way that everybody wants, but why should we expect that? We know the best way to deal with this. And I think we shouldn't. Right. I think here's an. You know, here's an analogy. Right.

I don't play chess. Not really. I kind of know the basic rules, but if I'm sitting down with a chess master and he's making all these moves, I probably don't see the reasons why he's making the moves that he is. But I have good reason to think that even though I don't see the reasons, he's got them and they're really good. Right.

[01:42:21] Remy: Yeah.

[01:42:22] Patrick: So a lot of things. I think that analogy is. Is pretty similar to how we should think about, you know, the order of Providence. I. I shouldn't. It's not that I just don't see the reason for God doing all the things that he does, but given the sort of distance between me and God, which is infinitely greater between me and a chess master, I shouldn't even expect to see the reasons. I should expect not to see what all those reasons are.

[01:42:46] Remy: Right.

[01:42:46] Patrick: Right. And again, this is. I think that maybe should just. It should be. It should give you hope, but also humility. When you see it like that, you know, it's.

[01:42:56] Remy: It's crazy because a lot of people today, going back to like, the chess master analogy, not only do they.

Do they not understand the reason the chess master is making the moves he's making, but them having never played chess before in their lives, but put it like, that's just.

[01:43:14] Patrick: Nobody would do it like that. Right? Yeah.

[01:43:17] Remy: Yeah.

[01:43:17] Patrick: Well.

[01:43:17] Remy: Or worse, like, accused the chess master of breaking the rules. You know what I mean? Like, you can't move that piece like that, you know? And it's like, dude, you don't even know.

You don't even know how to play the game, you know? Like.

Yeah. I don't know. It's the air. The. I think the only. The only thing in general that. That outpaces the stupid. The stupidity of humanity just sort of in general is our arrogance.

[01:43:48] Patrick: Sure.

[01:43:49] Remy: Like, man.

[01:43:51] Patrick: Yeah.

[01:43:52] Remy: Like, we are so quick to be like, To. To assume so much of ourselves. Right. It's difficult.

[01:44:03] Patrick: Yes. That's that is again, I think a great thing that philosophy can do is it can, I mean, if nothing else, when you're doing philosophy, you're, you know, up against a lot of other people who are really smart and thinking really hard about things. I think that can instill a lot of humility. Right. So I think that's another potential virtue of philosophy. Potential. You know, sometimes there's, there are people who get into this and it, it, I don't know, they, and they just become more clever without being, becoming more wise, as we mentioned at the beginning.

[01:44:33] Remy: Yeah, good way to round that back. That's so good.

Pat, thank you so much for hopping on for like two hours with me, man. It was a great time.

[01:44:43] Patrick: Yeah, this was, this was great, man. We got to explore a lot of territory. And like last time, I really enjoyed it, brother. Really did.

[01:44:49] Remy: What, what kind of things? What kind of things can I link for you? What do you want to tell people about real quick?

[01:44:53] Patrick: While we have most relevantly, my book that we discussed a fair bit here, the Best Argument for God, published by Sophia, I think that would probably be of most interest to people as we record this conversation. Sophia has it discounted from like 20 bucks to 5 bucks for the paperback, but I have no idea how long that's going to go on for most people. Just get it off of Amazon so people can check that out. Otherwise I have my podcast Philosophy for the People, so if you just search my name and Philosophy for the people on YouTube, that'll come up and I've got a substack as well, so we can put a link there in somewhere, I suppose.

[01:45:30] Remy: Excellent. Yeah, I'll link to all that. Make sure that people don't get hoodwinked by the other Pat Flynn, who also great dude and puts out good stuff.

[01:45:42] Patrick: I've been on his podcast. Right?

Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah. We finally decided to dissolve all the mystery of who the real Pat Flynn is so people can check that out if they want.

[01:45:55] Remy: In my mind, he will always be the false Pat Flynn.

[01:45:57] Patrick: Good, good. Yeah. Fake Pat Flynn. He's a great, he's a fun dude though. He's, he's, that's, that's the smart, passive income Pat Flynn, if people are curious. Not this Pat Flynn. Right. But, but still a good guy and worth checking out. Yeah. Uhhuh.

[01:46:10] Remy: Yeah, he, he, he's. Honestly, he's taught me a lot, just about finance and just how to think, like in a business way. Oh, and the stuff.

[01:46:22] Patrick: He's great. Yeah, he's really good for sure. So definitely recommend him. I just. It's like if you. You start asking, like, hold on, why is this guy talking about how to make passive income online? You might have a different Pat Flynn than this conversation.

[01:46:38] Remy: Still worth checking out, though.

[01:46:39] Patrick: Yeah.

[01:46:40] Remy: Awesome, Pat. Thank you so much, bud.

[01:46:42] Patrick: Yeah, cheer.

Welcome to Season 4, and Happy Reformation! We're back for the next 22 weeks with fresh, tasty episodes.

To launch Season 4, I'm joined by my very dear friend, The Reverend Doctor Donald Merigold R. W. Francis Stein, M.Div., D.Min., Ed.D., DDR, Ph.D.

Make sure to follow @TheDonStein on X!

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[00:00:00] Remy: This episode of Lutheran Answers is brought to you by our sponsor, Dial A Podcast. Dial A Podcast, proud sponsor of Lutheran Answers, provides a simple yet powerful solution to bring your church's sermons and Bible studies closer to those who might be a step away from the digital world. Getting started with a local telephone number is easy, allowing anyone to listen to your content with just a phone call at their convenience. It's an excellent way for congregations of all size to extend their reach. Get started with a 30 day risk free trial at dialapodcast.com and ensure no one misses out out on your church's messages.

Hello and welcome to Lutheran answers. Season 4, Episode 1 We are back and we are joined today. Blessed to be joined by, and I hope I'm getting this right. His publicist wanted to make sure I would. The Rev. Dr. Donald Marigold. R.W. francis Stein, M. Div. DMin, EdD, DDR, PhD or as I call him, my friend. Don.

Don. How you doing, sir?

[00:01:07] Don: You know, with it, I guess I'm doing okay. I get an interview like that, with that kind of introduction, boy, I feel like a million bucks. Too bad. I'm gonna be the latest interview of the season. You know, you're not starting out with a bang.

[00:01:23] Remy: No. Well, you don't want to. You wanna, you know, you wanna set expectations low.

[00:01:29] Don: And that's what I'm here for. I'm gonna set that bar about as low as it can possibly go so that the season only goes out. Your listeners are gonna be blessed and then.

[00:01:38] Remy: Yeah, exactly.

People, people will say hockey stick in quality, which is the goal.

[00:01:48] Don: Very good.

[00:01:49] Remy: Last time, last time you were on, we were supposed to talk about vicarage and we. I don't think we ever actually even got around to it.

[00:01:55] Don: Wow.

[00:01:57] Remy: But that's okay. You're not a vicar anymore, are you?

[00:02:00] Don: No, it's been about two and a half years since.

Since I've been ordained. So we're talking like a full three something years ago that I was last on here. It can't be that long.

[00:02:15] Remy: It might be.

[00:02:17] Don: Wow.

[00:02:18] Remy: Might be.

[00:02:19] Don: Man, we got old. My hair fell out. I'm bald now.

[00:02:23] Remy: Yeah, you look great though. It's such a good look.

It's a good look. I gotta get in better shape because I gotta do that, you know, I'm starting to get kind of thin.

[00:02:37] Don: It is a whole lot easier to maintain. You know, it was a really fun time when I decided, I'm done, the bald spot's too big.

I saw a picture of what I looked like when I was presiding at the altar, I was like, who's that guy? You know, what's the cue ball from? And realized I needed to shave this down. I went to the bathroom, started shaving it, getting it all cleared off and wiped it all out. Looked good, came out, and the toddler was sitting right there. My three year old Penny, she's four now.

[00:03:10] Remy: Instant tears.

[00:03:13] Don: Daddy, your head.

And I said, it's good. It's all clean. Do you want to see it? Do you want to touch it? And she says no. And she went running the other room and I could hear her talking to Emily and she's saying, mommy, Daddy's head's all gone. And she's right. My head has gone ever since. Yeah.

[00:03:39] Remy: It reminds me of the videos you see of people who have like their toddlers and they shave their beard for the first time and then like their toddler immediately starts CR this stranger in my home.

[00:03:49] Don: See, this is why we Lutherans grow beards. Because without it there's, there's just nothing left. There'd be, there'd be no point.

[00:03:55] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

What T. Take me through. Take me through the process of coming to terms with shaving your head. Honestly. Cuz it's something that I want to avoid, but also I know is unavoidable.

[00:04:13] Don: Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, you're familiar with the stages of grief, right?

Yeah, it's very similar. Right. You've got your denial first. You know, I'm not going bald. It's just a little spot. This will come back. Or it just looks that way. You know, the blonde hair. That's why. Clearly.

And then eventually you get a little angry and you wish that you could maybe just shave it down a little and you shave a little bit, then you shave a little more and you know, and then you're uneven on either side and you got to do something. I'm rambling now. This isn't even making coherent sense.

And yeah, eventually comes acceptance and you shave it one day and you never look back and it's good.

[00:05:00] Remy: Yeah, yeah. Feel the, the breeze, dude.

[00:05:05] Don: I feel like I have superpowers. I can feel like a 2 degree change in the temperature.

[00:05:13] Remy: That's great.

That's so good. That's like, I'm usually a pants guy. I'm usually wearing blue jeans at work and you know, pants.

When I, like, wear shorts. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. When I have, when I have to wear shorts, like if I'm. If I'm gonna be outside for a day, I'll wear shorts, you know, in the Summer, whatever. And it's always shocking, you know, like when I feel like all day long I'm like, is there something on my leg? But it's the opposite. There's nothing on my leg, you know?

[00:05:47] Don: Yeah.

[00:05:48] Remy: I imagine it's like that.

[00:05:50] Don: I'm a short shorts guy myself.

God's gifted me, of course, glorious pearly whites called my thighs. And, you know, that's what I get to walk around.

[00:06:01] Remy: Yeah.

[00:06:02] Don: Yeah.

[00:06:03] Remy: It would be a shame to hide them.

[00:06:06] Don: Absolutely.

[00:06:09] Remy: Don, how you said two and a half years since you've been ordained.

[00:06:13] Don: Yeah, it's been that long. That's wild.

That's just.

[00:06:17] Remy: How's two and a half years of ministry treated you?

[00:06:21] Don: It is more glorious than anything you could imagine. I love it.

The people here are something else.

They have a real heart for our community. They want to actually do things.

They don't want to just come to church on Sunday and say goodbye for six days. They want to be together, be a family. And I credit them with building that over the years. It's not something that you can just make happen overnight, and it's certainly not something that you can program into reality. It's a culture, and it's been built for many years, and I've got my predecessors to thank for that.

We sometimes don't realize that ministry is more than just a person. And ministry is a whole lot more than just one time period with a person. It's God's people in a place over a long period of time. And like, when you read, like, Bo Geertz is the hammer of God, and you see how all these different pastors over the years build this congregation into what it is, you start to gain an appreciation for it. And then when you see it in real life, that's when you really realize just what a small part a single pastor plays in the overall ministry of a church, let alone Christ's whole church. And it's a humbling experience and a freeing one, too, because I'm not perfect.

And that's a good thing, because God's people get a chance to step up, make things happen as they should.

Praise him for that. That he uses even imperfect idiots like me with bald heads and red glasses to. To be useful to his people.

Yeah, ministry is great. Plus, I get to, like, baptize babies.

[00:08:21] Remy: That's just all the time.

It's.

It's definitely.

See, it's so great.

I. It's one of my. It's one of my favorite things, partly because it's, like, the cutest thing to see. In the world. But it's so great to watch like the church grow in that way. Especially because, like, the kind of church I grew up in, watching the church grow was something completely different. It was invite your friends to the pizza party weekend or, you know, it was, it was stuff. It was. We need to put video games programming in. Like, let's build a cool loft area with a cafe and video games, you know?

[00:09:15] Don: Yeah. We don't have a need for that word, the sacrament.

Those things build and the people come together on their own.

[00:09:28] Remy: I almost think those things are more damaging than they are helpful. Right. Because you're, when you're not founding people's faith on the word of God, it's, it's. We're doing like a bait and switch. I don't really know how to. We're building their foundation on movie references and pizza and lock ins and, you know, video games and whatever, you know, cool song and dance that we do to get people in the door. But we're telling them that we're building their faith on Jesus, but we're not. We're building their faith on secular consumerism and, and sort of the things that the world finds attractive. And so then that faith, because it's not actually built on Jesus, fails them. And. But when it does, they blame Jesus.

[00:10:26] Don: Right?

[00:10:27] Remy: You know?

[00:10:28] Don: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I agree. This is why I like an honest outpouring of Christian love, like bubbling over into potlucks and fellowship time and all that good stuff. Yeah, that's still the church. That's the church being the church. It's not a bunch of people trying to like evangelize a church into being just from a social club, you know?

Yeah, I'm not being articulate.

[00:11:00] Remy: Yeah.

[00:11:02] Don: But yeah, I absolutely agree. I don't think you can program a church into existence.

[00:11:09] Remy: No, no, you can't. The, the seeker sensitive thing, I think is, is very much a lie.

When you inherit a church like yours with like a really great culture, is it difficult to continue, like fostering or growing that? Or is it like, is it worrisome? Are you like, worried about.

[00:11:37] Don: I think every pastor deals with imposter syndrome because. Right. Seminary prepares you as well as you can possibly be prepared. But ultimately you're getting, you know, your entry level competency. That's exactly what a seminary degree is. You're not, you're not an expert by any means. You're certainly not like a tried and true exegete or preacher. You're learning as you're going and God be praised for the, forgiving people that he puts in the pews.

Like, I. My midweek sermon this week was absolute trash. It didn't come out the way I had prepared it all week. But Lou there in the third pew on the left side, in his beautiful, forgiving nature, says, pastor, thank you.

Good sermon. I know it wasn't, but he kindly says it is. And so it gives me a chance to grow, too, and a chance to be able to come and serve them and meet them where they're needed. So to get to your question.

Yeah. To inherit something like this, it's a blessing. I don't think any pastor could ask for a better kind of place to land, to grow into the ministry. Yeah.

[00:12:58] Remy: Yeah. It's certainly.

I feel like there. You have a strong history of pastors that.

That put in the work and got this church to this.

This sort of, like, loving, relational community, you know, kind of place. This sort of Christian community sort of place. You.

You have other pastors that their. Their predecessors did the opposite. Right. That, you know, you've heard horror stories, you know, where it's like, they fostered instead of, like, loving community.

It was all politics and backbiting and, you know, distrust. And you have some guys that land in those situations, and it's, you know, it's no wonder that they burn out of it, you know?

[00:13:55] Don: Yeah. And every church has its horror stories, right? I mean, we use the good cliche. The church is not a place for saints. It's really a morgue for the dead. And we're only made saints by the grace of God.

And so sin is everywhere. And, yeah, there's bad things that happen throughout history. And I don't think it's necessarily because every pastor, I don't know, I have a hard time blaming a people or a pastor. There are some churches that, yeah, they're bad, and they chew people out and spit them out the other end. And there are pastors who are just not a good fit for a certain congregation. But if God calls a man to that ministry, then he's there for a reason. Sometimes maybe it even is to punish that congregation with his presence. Who knows? God gives us exactly what He. He, in his wisdom, knows we need.

[00:15:00] Remy: It certainly, certainly makes you consider how much you.

Excuse me. How much you actually believe in, like, the divine call. You know what I mean? Like, you hit a. You hit a tough spot. You had a tough spot in the ministry, and it's one of those, like, rubber meets the road. Like, you know, you gotta, like, you believe it or you don't. You know, not that there are guys who don't, but, I mean, maybe. I don't know.

[00:15:32] Don: Yeah. I mean, it's not just a job. You can't just walk away on it when the going gets tough. You gotta preach the law when the law is needed. You get to preach the gospel even when it's a.

A difficult time and, you know, people are craving it. That's a blessing. But, yeah, it's a divine thing. It's not just a job, Remy. I'm sorry. My brain is like all kinds of fog all over the place. I hope. I don't even know if any minute of this is usable yet.

[00:16:06] Remy: At this point in the interview, Don and I discussed rescheduling. We were both pretty tired. You can actually hear me yawning back in the beginning if you listen close. But ultimately we decided to press on and Don had such a wonderful idea. I've cut that little bit out for time, but we're going to pick back up with Don's brilliant idea and what led to a wonderful podcast episode.

[00:16:32] Don: Well, what if we just have some fun? Do you have topics that your future guests are going to be talking about?

Because then I can, like, get my word in just for fun. Fun.

[00:16:47] Remy: I do have two specific questions before we do that, because that's actually a great idea. I do have two specific questions that I wanted to ask you.

And it's kind of one question. It's like a two parter.

What was.

What was an idea about pastoral ministry that you had coming out of seminary that was immediately shattered where immediately you were like, oh, that was way off. And then what's another thing, another. The opposite way where you were like, that's exactly what I hoped it would be.

[00:17:29] Don: Man.

I don't know if there was anything that was completely shattered.

Not to, like, to tout my institution, but like the professors and the program and the whole curricula at St. Louis is really well formed and tried and true. I mean, the institution's been around for over 150 years. It knows what it's doing.

I don't think there was anything that was shattered. I think the biggest thing that I personally realized after being in the parish, that my professors probably did try to teach us and I just, you know, didn't make the connection, was just the limited amount of time that I have to actually do my sermon prep. Like, if I want to do all the other parts of ministry that I am invested in and wanting to do, I have to carve out that time for sermon planning and prep. Otherwise it's just not going to happen. And that's something that even on vicarage I didn't quite understand because on vicarage I was preaching every other week. I had two weeks to prepare a sermon. I had some nice, nice sermons on vicarage. But yeah, I don't think there was anything that completely like shattered my understanding of ministry.

If I had to say something, it would just be that you don't have that much time to do your sermon prep. And so for me now, sermon prep has kind of turned into this thing where I do my initial textual study on Mondays, look at a couple of commentaries that I think might fit, decide whether I like it or not, and kind of sculpt out a basic outline of that week. And then as I go and do my shut in visits or as I work on other things throughout the week, because I've got confirmation to plot out. I've got men's Bible study, women's Bible study, I've got adult Bible study prior to service, all those things to work out elders Bible study, that to actually sit down and write the sermon. There's not really time. So I'm listening to people as I'm in those studies, as I'm going house to house, and as I try little bits and pieces to see how they land and fit, I'm kind of composing the sermon in my head. And then on Thursday, because we've got a midweek service Thursday afternoon, I sit at the computer and actually type up an actual manuscript. Sometimes I even use it. That's, that's.

Yeah, it's. It's funny.

[00:20:24] Remy: Have you winged any yet?

[00:20:26] Don: I can't, no. No, I have never winged a sermon and God willing, I never will have to.

But I don't think my people realize just how much of the sermon writing process they are responsible for. And you know, they always, there's always somebody who says, you know, pastor that spoke right to me, or pastor that, that really helped me with my situation. And in, in my head I'm thinking that's because you're inspiring it. Thank you. But.

[00:20:56] Remy: Right. I wrote that for you.

[00:20:58] Don: I'm glad it's hitting, but you know, thank you. Worked hard. Yeah.

Yeah. So if there's one thing, there's, there's just not hours.

Yeah. If there's something that's better than I even imagined. In seminary baptisms, man, nothing beats a baptism.

Those are great. My first year here, we had an entire family that was being baptized. They came over from one of the E Free churches in the area. And that was a What? One of the evangelical free churches.

[00:21:43] Remy: Oh, okay.

[00:21:46] Don: They went through the. The parents went through my adult instruction, and the kids, you know, joined up for Sunday school and confirmation, and they all were baptized at one service. Five baptisms at once. It was cool.

[00:22:01] Remy: That's awesome.

[00:22:02] Don: Yeah.

[00:22:05] Remy: At once, too. You just dunk them all in one go.

[00:22:09] Don: I should say. One after another.

[00:22:13] Remy: Oh, oh, oh, yeah, that makes. That makes a lot more sense.

[00:22:17] Don: I only have two hands. Yeah.

[00:22:22] Remy: I guess you could do two at a time.

[00:22:24] Don: Yeah. This was also funny. So I have a practice that when I'm baptizing an infant, after they've been baptized, I take them up to the altar. And as other people have described it, I do the Lion King thing where I lift the infant up because, you know, St. Paul says we are living sacrifices to God. And so I bring the child up and I pray that God would continue to send his Holy Spirit to work in their heart to make true the promises that have been given in baptism and that this little one's life would be a blessed sacri. Living sacrifice to God. And then I bring them back down and I hand the child to the father so that he can then do his duty for the household and continue to train him up in the way he should go so that when he's old, he will not depart from it.

It's a good time. All of this to say, when I baptize this family, there were no infants involved. And so when we were walking through, you know, the process of what we're going to do, how the baptism itself works, some of the older kids asked.

You're not going to try to lift us up at the altar, are you?

[00:23:35] Remy: Yes.

[00:23:36] Don: No, I will not.

Yeah, it was fun.

[00:23:43] Remy: All right, so I am getting together questions. So I am going to ask you a couple of questions from upcoming episodes.

I am going to. Also, I have a whole treasure trove of theological questions that people email me.

[00:24:11] Don: A treasure trove.

[00:24:13] Remy: A treasure trove. Well, it's a trove.

[00:24:17] Don: Okay.

[00:24:18] Remy: It's a. It's a doozy. Trove. Let me tell you, I've got a whole. I got a whole load of theological doozies for you.

[00:24:26] Don: Sounds good.

[00:24:27] Remy: So we'll. We'll put you to the test here.

Hang on while I jot just a couple of notes.

[00:24:40] Don: Okay?

Are you excited for the packers game tonight?

[00:24:58] Remy: Remy, you know me. I am such a big baseball fan. I cannot wait. Are they playing the Chicago Bulls? You've been paying attention for the Stanley Cup.

[00:25:13] Don: You know, methinks the lady doth protest Too much. I think deep in your heart, you are such an avid sports fan that you probably right after church, you can't wait to get out the door. And if I were to ask Joe, I'm sure that he would probably tell me the truth.

[00:25:32] Remy: How much you want to bet on it?

[00:25:34] Don: Nothing. I'm not a betting man. Sinners?

[00:25:42] Remy: Yeah. No, I. I'm not a sports guy, but we do have a local baseball team, and my friend's mom is, like, super into baseball. And so me and him and his parents and my wife and we're always going to, like I say, always going to the games. We've been to like, three, just like. But I find it really interesting, huh?

[00:26:02] Don: Just like a Savannah Bananas team.

Have you heard of this event?

[00:26:06] Remy: Some.

No.

[00:26:09] Don: They're kind of like the Harlem Globetrotters of baseball. They do these most.

[00:26:13] Remy: Oh, no.

[00:26:14] Don: Things.

[00:26:15] Remy: No, it's a minor league. It's a minor league team off the Astros.

They're. They're actually pretty good.

[00:26:25] Don: Do they cheat just like the Astros do?

[00:26:30] Remy: I don't know. But every time we've gone, I've gotten free tacos from the little Mexican joint down the street because we got six runs.

[00:26:36] Don: Nice.

[00:26:38] Remy: So that's really all I care. I'm in it for the tacos. All right, so let me ask you. Talking about death.

[00:26:47] Don: Oh, my favorite topic. Great.

[00:26:50] Remy: Uh huh huh.

[00:26:57] Don: Memento mori. Remember it? It's coming. Yep.

[00:27:02] Remy: It's. It's. So how do you explain to people, how do you explain to, like, your congregants, the concept that you are a Christian now.

You are not living life for you, and you are not living life for the hell of it. You're living life for other people.

How do you get that across?

[00:27:25] Don: This is great.

One of the places that I like to start with this is Philippians, chapter one, right? Because you got St. Paul, who is literally in chains, stuck in prison, not knowing what's going to happen next. Is he going to live? Is he going to die?

And his congregation is worried about him, right? They're worried sick. They're sending people to prison to give him food. Because in those days, that's the only way that you get cared for in prison.

And he's sending back letters. And the letter that he sends back to the church in Philippi, he says, for me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. And he keeps talking about how, you know, it'd be really nice to just die and not have to worry about this, and wouldn't that be great? You just get to Be blessed and rest in Jesus.

Every day I wonder, Lord, will you take me now? This is good. I'll sing the song of Simeon right here. If this means you will take me to be at rest with your son.

But Paul goes on then. And Paul goes on. And I want to get the exact wording here because I think it's some of the most beautiful language in scripture when it reminds us of our purpose here.

So, let's see. Philippians, chapter one.

And here he is. For me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me. Yippee. More work yet which I shall choose, I cannot tell. I'm hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary. On your account.

Did you catch that?

The only reason, St. Paul, you people, you need me.

And it's the truth. It's the truth. We're not here for ourselves anymore. We've given up everything. I must decrease that he may increase. My life is forfeit. I am not my own. In fact, I have been bought at a price. You are not your own.

And that's the same for all of us. Jesus Christ has spilled his blood, purchased and won me from sin and death. Not with gold or silver, but with his precious death and burial and resurrection. All those things.

And to me, that's just the most beautiful thing ever. You're of such value that the whole world needs you. Like trying to explain that to somebody, it doesn't take much convincing. And once they realize, oh, yeah, I matter to other people.

Yeah, I don't. What's death? That's nothing. Nothing at all. And in fact, then we get to die every single day. Dying to our sin, rising with Christ.

Nothing better.

So, like, what was the question? How do you explain that to people? Man, you just live it. You just preach it. They'll catch on.

[00:30:42] Remy: Excellent.

What are the.

[00:30:47] Don: See, this was.

[00:30:48] Remy: What are the ministry needs?

[00:30:51] Don: Go ahead. Ministry needs. Where?

[00:30:53] Remy: What are the ministry needs of ministers? What are the pastoral needs of pastors?

[00:31:02] Don: The same as everybody else.

The same as everybody else.

We need pastors. And I'm grateful that we do have pastors to pastors, both in the formal institutional sense and in the informal, loving sense. And here's what I mean by that. Like, we've got a wonderful setup in the lcms where we have circuit visitors and brother pastors in our circuit. And we've even got this wonderful district. And I'm blessed to probably have the best district president in the entire lcms. And it'd be good if nobody caught that. You can edit that out, because I don't want him getting elected to any higher office. He has to stay here.

And it's good to have these pastors who care about one another, who, you know, in the middle of the day, text each other, hey, brother, love, you know, you're going through a tough time praying for you, and it's wonderful to be able to repay that, to share that with others, too.

And then in the informal sense, and I have to be explicitly clear here, I'm talking informally, small p Pastor, those who care for others.

The church is filled with people who love one another, and I am blessed to have the best pastor of them all in that small p. Pastoral sense in my wife. She lives in my house.

She's forgiven me more times than any pastor ever has.

So God be praised that he provides pastors to pastors, both literally and figuratively.

So ministry needs. We need pastors, people who care, people who love.

And every now and then, some time off.

[00:33:05] Remy: Yeah, yeah.

And I also heard you say that you support your wife, who is a female pastor, and that the LCMS should ordain women.

[00:33:20] Don: Is that exactly.

[00:33:21] Remy: I picked that up.

[00:33:22] Don: Yeah.

[00:33:23] Remy: I think it's a direct quote.

It's not going to stop me from taking that clip out of context and tweeting it a bunch.

[00:33:31] Don: I'm sure it will. I'm looking forward to my Twitter mentions blowing up. You know, the cool thing about Twitter is this. It's got this real cool feature called the block button, and then I don't see it.

[00:33:43] Remy: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, actually on the Lutheran Answers account, and I'm very proud of this. I don't block anyone. I now my block list is long. I do have a very long block list, but I don't block any actual people. I block bots when they pop up in my mentions. I really don't have a bot problem. Everybody has this bot problem. I don't.

The bots have died.

[00:34:08] Don: That's good. The last couple of months, the bots have been nice.

[00:34:13] Remy: So I have a ton of blocked bots, and then anytime I see an ad, I block that account running the ad.

[00:34:23] Don: You know, the big ads that I've had lately have been the Mormon ones.

[00:34:27] Remy: I don't know the Mormon ads.

[00:34:29] Don: Those are the worst and most obnoxious things ever.

And I don't know that there's a meaner group on Twitter than the Mormons. Like all The Mormons I've met in real life that I'm like friends with, they're like the nicest, sweetest people. But, but the people online, I don't, I don't know if they're even the same breed. That's, that's something else.

[00:34:51] Remy: The Mormons you've met in real life are not the nicest, sweetest people, though. They are, they are not at all. It's all a front man. Because Mormonism is such a works based religion, it is such a works focused religion that everybody you have to do, you have to be successful. Like, this is one of the things that they don't tell you when you're investigating the Mormon Church that you find out later. But one of the ways that you reach this sort of deification in Mormonism and, and draw close to Heavenly Father is through worldly success.

That is one of the ways that you, you, you climb their ladder of salvation is what they call it, is through worldly success. And so a lot of Mormons are in crippling debt. A lot of them are very nice outwardly.

[00:35:44] Don: Debt held by other Mormons too. And in Mormon institutions, that debt is specifically held by other Mormons in Mormon institutions, so that it's almost impossible to get out too. I mean, they'll own your house and if you ever leave their church, then you're up your, you're up the creepiest creek without a paddle.

[00:36:07] Remy: I know, I know missionaries, I know missionaries that have deconverted on their mission and the church just left them there. It's one of the reasons why they want you to be 18 before you go on your mission. Because if you deconvert, they'll just leave you wherever you are and they'll say, well, you're an adult, figure it out, get home.

[00:36:25] Don: And the other big part about those, those missions. Mormons don't do missions with the expectation that they're actually converting people. Not at all. It is a consolidation to make sure that they have completely indoctrinated and fused up and taken out any possibility of this person leaving the cult.

Yeah, absolutely. Wicked.

[00:36:49] Remy: Yeah. People, people have to hire attorneys to get off the rolls of the church. Yeah, like, that's crazy.

[00:36:58] Don: Have you checked to see if somebody has vicariously baptized you yet?

[00:37:03] Remy: No. Can you do that?

[00:37:05] Don: I, I'm pretty sure you can, actually. Let's, let's see.

Am I Mormon baptized?

I don't know if you can look it up online. I don't know if you ever could.

I know they keep those, those rolls though.

Oh, well, if you ever find out, let me know.

[00:37:37] Remy: Yeah, yeah.

[00:37:43] Don: They. They tried to posthumously vicariously baptize Martin Luther, among others. They tried Helen Keller, too, and Anne Frank and all kinds of others just like, why would you do that? How rude.

[00:37:59] Remy: You know, maybe this is a fruitless search because I don't think you can be vicariously baptized if you're still alive. I think now that we're talking about it, I think you do have to be dead, so. But it's. It's good to know I won't be resigned to outer darkness. Anyway, that's what they call hell.

Yeah. Wicked, wicked people. I'm gonna clip this up and tweet it, too. That'll be fun.

Is witchcraft real?

[00:38:33] Don: Why do you want to know?

[00:38:39] Remy: It's an upcoming podcast topic.

[00:38:41] Don: Yeah.

Yeah. I did an independent study in seminary with our good buddy, rural Lutheran, Ian Hines on the demonic. Oh, we should do a. No, we shouldn't. We shouldn't.

[00:38:59] Remy: How do you do. I was gonna say interruption. New question.

[00:39:03] Don: Thank you.

[00:39:05] Remy: How do you do an independent study with someone else?

[00:39:10] Don: You got to get it approved. What we wanted to do was get a class together, and we had several guys, but it wasn't quite enough to get the registrar to do something, and then that would require putting together a full syllabus and getting it approved through all those things. So we just decided to do it as an independent thing. And so everybody else dropped off and it was just Ian and I. But it ended up being great because we got to have, you know, Talk time with Dr. Ulawski, who might be the expert in all of the Protestant world on the Desert Fathers. He's even translated several of them and got to read a whole lot of pseudo macarius and all kinds of other guys.

Oh, yeah, it was a good time. But one of the things that we realized as we were seeing how the Desert Fathers interacted with the demonic was just how very similar they are to the Lutheran Fathers, and especially when they describe the personal interactions of the Christian with evil spirits.

You could take some Luther things side by side with pseudomacarius, and you'd be hard pressed to discern which one was which. They could have been interchangeable.

[00:40:30] Remy: Wow.

[00:40:32] Don: All of this stemming from your original question, Is witchcraft real?

Yeah, I mean, of course. But it doesn't look like what people imagine. It's not Hollywood theatrics. It's stupidity and knowledge that people shouldn't have.

And it leads to very dark places and very lonely places and fear.

The good thing is Christians don't Have to be afraid, though. Where the Holy Spirit resides, there's not room for another.

So. God be praised.

[00:41:07] Remy: Have you seen that movie, the Pope's Exorcist, with Russell Crowe?

[00:41:14] Don: You're asking me if I saw a movie?

[00:41:17] Remy: Oh, you're not a movie guy.

[00:41:19] Don: I am. Sorry. I mean, like, I have my series that I watch with Emily, and then I have the series that she watches that I'm not allowed to watch or be in the room for because I asked too many questions.

[00:41:29] Remy: Excellent.

[00:41:30] Don: Yeah, I don't. I don't watch too many.

I have my. My Christ in Film series that I do. So there's like 12 movies a year that I do watch.

[00:41:41] Remy: Wow. In the Pope's Exorcist, there's this really great scene at the beginning where the main priest guy, Russell Crowe, is investigating a case to determine whether or not it's actually demonic possession or if it's mental illness or whatever. And it's this little boy, and they've got him, like, strapped down to the bed or whatever because he's like, you know, harming others, harming yourself, whatever. And so Russell Crowe comes in. He's this. He's this old Italian priest, and he sets his chair next to the boy at the bed, and he sits down in it, and he just looks. And the boy's looking at him. And, you know, it's. He's got this demonic sort of visage on his face, and he has these. He's sort of like. I don't know, like, purring is maybe the right word. It's these sort of guttural throat noises he's making, looking at Russell Crowe, who is just sitting there, just comfortably sitting there. And finally the boy goes, I know your sins, priest.

And Russell Crowe goes, oh, really?

Name one.

And then just leans forward in his chair.

And the boy sits there and looks at him for a while longer and kind of growls. And Russell Crowe goes, oh, you can't name one, can you? Because they've all been absolved by the Lamb of God.

[00:43:06] Don: Yes.

That's awesome.

That's the way it should be. Are you not entertained? Yeah. That's great.

[00:43:17] Remy: It was awesome. It's probably one of the best scenes, I think, in one of those kinds of movies I've ever seen.

[00:43:24] Don: Good.

Yeah.

[00:43:27] Remy: How do we deal with things like hauntings?

[00:43:31] Don: What do you mean?

[00:43:34] Remy: Say someone comes to you and they're like, pastor, I think my house is haunted. What do you do?

[00:43:38] Don: Why do you think your house is haunted, Janet?

[00:43:43] Remy: Lights turn on in the middle of the night.

I got pulled out of my bed the other night. I was asleep, and something grabbed me by the arm and yanked me out of the bed. And I live alone. I don't think it was my cat that did it.

[00:43:56] Don: Have you checked your cat for steroid use?

[00:44:01] Remy: Yes.

[00:44:02] Don: This is why I don't have a house. I mean, they're. They're pretty much portals.

[00:44:09] Remy: I tell you what, my cats are just portals to vomit.

[00:44:15] Don: That's right.

[00:44:16] Remy: So a lot of hairballs and pea soup.

[00:44:28] Don: I am.

I'm not gonna go there. Never mind.

Cats are a creature.

God made that.

[00:44:37] Remy: God made.

[00:44:38] Don: Yep, yep.

Maybe it was after the fall, but he did make the.

[00:44:45] Remy: Maybe they were just different pre fall.

[00:44:50] Don: Yes, undoubtedly. Yeah. Okay, so somebody's really dealing with this kind of stuff. And not to make light of it, it's really scaring them. Right.

Whether it's real or whether it's in their mind, either way, you have a God who offers them comfort.

So you go and do what your God gives in order to provide comfort. You read his word, you pray.

That's what the church has done for two millennia.

God's word and prayer.

That's it. So you go, you bless the house, you bless them, you remind them they're forgiven, and that's that.

[00:45:38] Remy: Especially because.

Go ahead.

[00:45:43] Don: If it persists, then you do it again and you keep praying and you know, that's it.

God is bigger than the boogeyman, as Veggietales profoundly told us.

[00:45:57] Remy: Amen.

[00:45:58] Don: Yeah.

[00:45:59] Remy: Well, and it's. I think it's important, too, to remember that, especially with things like this, the devil's ultimate goal or a demon or whatever. Their ultimate goal isn't to scare you. It isn't to frighten you.

Their ultimate goal is to get you to not believe that Jesus did the thing for you that Jesus says he did for you. Right. That's the ultimate goal, is to destroy your faith. Christ's atonement in Christ's work in the gospel.

[00:46:30] Don: That's why you go for the comfort of God's Word. Yeah.

[00:46:34] Remy: Yep.

Amen.

Amen. Very good. Okay. I am going to now hit you with questions that people have emailed me.

I'm gonna hit you right in the face.

As a pastor.

Oh.

Oh, this is actually a good one. As a pastor, how do you deal with the idea that Gentile and Jewish Christians have separate promises and that only books of the New Testament are to apply to Gentiles, but that the rest of the Bible applies to Jews?

I'm sorry? That the only books of the New Testament that apply to Gentiles are Paul's letters, but the rest of the Bible applies to Jews.

[00:47:32] Don: Okay, so this person has probably come from a dispensational background of some sort or another, right? Yes, you can tell that by the question, because we can't accept that question as its phrase. There's a couple misunderstandings there, so let's address those first.

First of all, all scripture is God breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. Sorry, that's the niv, not the ESV version, but that's the one that's in my head from eighth grade.

We know that. So we're not Martianites. We're not chopping out the Old Testament and saying, yeah, this only applies to ancient Israel, not to us. No.

Now, I will nuance that by saying, yeah, there's parts of the, you know, Levitical law or the ceremonial law that do not apply to Christians today. We're still bound by the moral law which God has laid down, because God's law is the law of the universe. This is his desire and his will for creation. That's what the law is. It's the way that he made it to work. To break God's law is to sin for us. And it would be just as ridiculous if the sun decided, yeah, I'm gonna stop rotating and start doing loops. I don't even know how that would work, like, physically or atomically.

[00:49:01] Remy: That would be terrifying.

[00:49:02] Don: Yeah, it would. Or like, if the sun decided, I'm not gonna shine anymore, screw fusion. I'm gonna do fission. Boom, here's the fireworks. I don't know.

Sin is that strange and wrong. That's why God's law is always good and it doesn't change.

So wiping away this whole, forget the Old Testament thing, it all applies to us, every piece of it.

The other thing in that question that we need to apply then is, is there a different covenant for us today than there is for Israelites in the past?

And for that, no, we can go read the book of Hebrews and see that there have been Christians since Adam, all who have believed in the promise which was to come that was made in Genesis 3:15. That beautiful proto evangelium has continued all the way till now. All believers.

Abraham was accounted righteous because of faith in the promise, not because of his works, not because he was under some different covenant. It is the covenant that God has always had and which is fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ right there. We can't take that question as it is. So we would gently explain that, you know, we are. We still believe in all of the scriptures. We still are one with that promise grafted into that one promise.

And so the question doesn't really make sense anymore and hopefully we throw it away and stop looking at dispensational sites online.

[00:50:55] Remy: So still in the dispensational vein, there is. So there's not.

There's not this. All the Christians are going to be raptured and there's going to be a tribulation for the unbelievers. And then after that, all the Jews are going to be saved through the temple sacrifices again.

[00:51:25] Don: Was Jesus sacrifice not enough?

I don't know.

[00:51:36] Remy: It's so, you know, it's funny because I grew up in this and growing up like it all made perfect sense, but like, now deep into Lutheran theology, biblical theology, hat tip it, it's just. It doesn't make sense, does it? Like, it really doesn't make sense at all.

[00:51:57] Don: No, no.

I'm kind of at a loss. I would. I would have to sit and think for a while on how to even help someone to see that this is not the way it works.

Man, how do you explain to somebody that the scriptures are amillennialist?

Where do you even start?

[00:52:19] Remy: No, it's a tough one.

[00:52:20] Don: That's. That's one that I really just haven't had to deal with too much yet. Oh, man, Remy, you're pointing out a blind spot for me. Well, I guess I got to go read some.

[00:52:29] Remy: I think you're.

Please don't. Please don't. It's terrible. I think your initial question is actually a pretty good starting point for any kind of discussion. If someone comes to you with something like this, which is, is Jesus not enough?

You know, when of course, they're going to balk and they're going to say, oh, well, of course Jesus is enough.

[00:52:51] Don: Great. Then if God's grace is sufficient for you, as it was for St. Paul and for every other saint who has ever put their faith and trust in the promise that the Messiah would truly come, which goes all the way back to Adam, then let it be enough for you.

Why do we need to try to comprehend the incomprehensible mind of God and make sense of how the world's going to end? God simply doesn't reveal that to us. It's not important. It's not part of our salvation.

It's not even revealed to anyone but the Father.

[00:53:38] Remy: I've got so many good questions, Don.

[00:53:44] Don: Man, I hope half of this stuff is usable for You.

[00:53:49] Remy: It's. So far, it's all usable. I cannot wait to put your. You went to St. Louis, Remy.

[00:53:59] Don: Don't do that to me. Don't do that to my institution. They don't. They don't need that.

[00:54:04] Remy: What?

It's the best Concordia.

[00:54:08] Don: It is, but you're gonna, like, trim it, and I'm gonna have, like, angry letters.

Ordain women.

[00:54:15] Remy: No, I. No, I was just. I was just trying to remember, because I was gonna say, we're gonna put that St. Louis education through its paces here.

What is the main.

I'm going to put that St. Louis education through its. Through its paces here. And then, like, the answer to every question is just going to be like, well, we should ordain women.

[00:54:44] Don: We should not ordain women.

[00:54:48] Remy: No, no, we should not.

[00:54:50] Don: No, not.

[00:54:51] Remy: What's the main difference between Lutheran. Lutheran theology, Lutheranism, I should say, and Roman Catholicism?

[00:54:59] Don: Whoa, there's a question.

[00:55:03] Remy: Yeah, yeah, someone emailed that to me. That was the full question.

[00:55:07] Don: Read it again. I want to get the exact wording right.

[00:55:12] Remy: What is the main difference, the main difference between Roman Catholicism and Lutheranism?

[00:55:20] Don: Okay, then if it's just the main difference and not main differences or anything like that, then we're just going to do the quick and easy one. Justification by grace through faith in Christ alone. That's it.

The Semi Pelagianism of Rome eventually leads to either works, righteousness or a crisis of the conscience, intense suffering. And this is why Roman Catholics make such great converts to Lutheranism, because they're always rediscovering the gospel almost every single Sunday.

And one reason why I am so grateful to be Lutheran, because in the college days, I considered Roman Catholicism for a little bit.

Went through rcia, and, you know, I married a Catholic. So trying to decide how we're gonna raise our kids. That was a question for a little bit. Our future kids, we decided before we had them. But, yeah, sure, sure, I can show you the baptismal certificates and all of the times, but when it comes to the main difference, it's just got to be justification, the actual gospel. And, you know, there are Roman Catholics who are effectively Lutheran nowadays, and that's a good thing. We don't have to rely on the felicitous inconsistency or the happy accident for them to be saved.

Their practice and their enunciation of the gospel and their overall theology is drawing closer to us every day. And that's a good thing.

Is it there? 100%. No. And maybe it won't be this side of Eternity. But, you know, give it a couple more centuries of persecution, who knows? Maybe they'll come around to us.

[00:57:20] Remy: Do you think. Do you think we're drawing closer to Rome? Rome is drawing closer to us, or are we drawing closer to each other? Have we not moved at all?

[00:57:28] Don: No. I mean, you compare us to our Confessions. I don't think there's been any movement or departure from our beliefs in our practice. There are things to be desired in certain places around the globe. For instance, in America, we still have this aversion to every week, communion. Not at my congregation, but in others.

We struggle sometimes to. To live out our Lutheran Confessions.

But I don't think we have departed from our Confessions at all. I do think that Rome is moving away from the errors of Vatican I and trying to backtrack, you know, papal infallibility to a more synodical use.

Conciliatory, maybe. And then I do think that they have moved significantly with regard to justification. And I know we all poop on the joint declaration, as we should. It's an empty document that allows for a whole lot of wishy washiness.

But the fact that they were even willing to come to a table to try to make something even wishy washy is progress. And if you attend the average Catholic funeral, you'll hear the gospel. Even if it's clouded by the extra teachings, it's still there, lurking beneath it all, offering that true comfort to those who need it.

One of the best examples of this is the funeral of Antonin Scalia.

Have you ever heard that funeral sermon by his son, a Catholic priest?

[00:59:35] Remy: No.

[00:59:36] Don: He gives the most beautiful Lutheran sermon.

There's. He starts it off really great. He starts talking about how does this great rhetorical trick where he talks about how we're here because of one man who was very controversial, sometimes despised by those in authority. It goes on and on. And, you know, all the people in the audience are giggling because they think that this is about his father or something, something. And he says, and that man, of course, is Jesus Christ.

And then he goes on, amazing. Give the comfort that only the gospel can give. And reading the media responses to that funeral sermon was fantastic, because they did not understand a Catholic funeral. They didn't understand Christianity at all. They had no sense of the hope for eternal life that we Christians have. And so it was interesting to try to hear them make sense of it or try to.

But go ahead and give that one a listen sometime. So when it comes to the Catholic Church improving.

Yeah, I think Luther would even be pleased to see how far they've come in 500 years. And let's pray that it continues.

[01:00:56] Remy: Amen.

This is so good. I'm writing down all your answers so that I can put them on my website.

[01:01:05] Don: Bad idea.

[01:01:07] Remy: You are secretly Lutheran answers.

[01:01:11] Don: Nice.

[01:01:14] Remy: So David asks during communion, when the pastor speaks the words of. Of institution, is the pastor speaking as an agent of Christ with the authority of Christ with which we are to believe, as it were, Christ himself?

Or is it more that the pastor becomes more than a pastor, and we should accept that the words are coming from the mouth of Christ himself?

[01:01:48] Don: I don't understand the distinction.

[01:01:50] Remy: I guess that's.

Well, I think. I think probably.

What's that?

What's that? What is that fancy word?

[01:02:04] Don: Is he just asking if the sacerdotalism in Persona Christie.

[01:02:11] Remy: Yeah, well, so I think the idea is. The idea of the question is sort of, what does in Persona Christi mean? Does it mean that the pastor is just doing what Christ has command and we should accept it as though it's Christ himself? Or is the pastor somehow like a vessel for Jesus, which I know it still sounds like the same question.

[01:02:33] Don: No, I see the fine distinction that he's trying to make, but I don't think it's either or.

[01:02:41] Remy: Okay.

[01:02:42] Don: If we're functioning as vicars of Christ, then that's what we are. We are vicariously there serving God's people. I mean, this is why before the communion liturgy really begins, the first things out of the pastor's mouth is, what.

[01:02:59] Remy: In the name of the Father and the Son?

[01:03:01] Don: Well, after the invocations, I'm talking the service of the.

[01:03:05] Remy: Oh, okay.

[01:03:06] Don: The first words the pastor says at the service of the sacrament are, the Lord be with you. And then how do the people respond?

And also with you and with thy spirit. And also with you. The whole point is that they are giving the assent that, yeah, this guy is the called and ordained servant who's here standing in the place of Christ for us. We are approving what he is about to do in the congregation. We, the body of Christ, are submitting to Christ our head and letting this guy serve us in his stead and by his command.

So I don't know if that answers the question, but I don't know that we need to make that distinction. The pastor is fulfilling what Christ has commanded, and God's word is God's word. It does exactly what he says it does. Doesn't return to him empty. And here's what this word is doing. His word is making present the very body and Blood of Jesus Christ for you.

[01:04:13] Remy: I only laugh because I know it's a huge debate online. And also with you versus and with thy spirit.

The more I read, the more I learn, the more I discuss with my fellow seminarians, the more I think and with thy spirit is correct.

But also, if this makes sense, like, the less concerned I am with it overall. Does that make sense?

Like, I'm not going to go in and demand my. My church change everything overnight because we're. And also with you type of congregation. I'm not going to demand we change everything overnight, you know, but I do still loudly shout and with thy spirit.

[01:05:00] Don: Every church has people who do that. You know, it's meant to mean the same thing, but. And with thy spirit is more theologically accurate with your spirit. If you want to modernize it. I wish we would have kept it consistent in our hymnal.

We cycle through all five services at St. Andrew. We change them with the church season so you really get a feel for where the church is at. Which is kind of cool because each service has its own feel. You know, Setting two is minor key. It's a little more foreboding. Setting one, you know, is a little more happy and bright and ordinary time. Ish. And then you've got setting four, which is very scandinahuvian and sing songy and just works perfect for Christmas time and Advent.

And then, you know, tried and true setting three for all the major feasts, because that's what we know.

And so all of this to say as we're cycling through these different services, my people often forget which one they're doing. And so at their turn to say, you know, and with thy spirit. It's often this cacophony of and with also with thy spirit. You. You know, it's fun.

[01:06:25] Remy: Yeah, I.

I also find that switch back and forth a little.

A little annoying. I also, I don't know why, but I also don't like the updated verbiage on some of the, like the creeds or like the Lord's Prayer. There's.

I couldn't. I'm not an LCMS guy, so I couldn't tell you, but I've. I've been through a couple of LCMS services where whatever setting had like some modern modernized kind of. I wasn't a fan, but that's just curmudgeoniness.

[01:07:06] Don: Yeah. Well, you're welcome to come to our church. We're pretty traditional, pretty good old fashioned.

[01:07:13] Remy: Nice.

What state are you in?

[01:07:17] Don: We are three miles south of the greatest state in the Union Wisconsin.

[01:07:23] Remy: Okay.

Okay. Weird to call it the greatest state, but yeah, you know, I guess I'm.

[01:07:32] Don: Close enough that I can still go north and get real cheese, good cheese and cheese curds and, you know, good new Glarus beer, which is only sold in Wisconsin. They don't sell it in the heathen states like Illinois or. Where are you? North Carolina?

[01:07:47] Remy: Yeah, North Carolina. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a Louisiana version of that called the Boot that they only sell down in Louisiana.

[01:07:58] Don: I might have had that. I might have had that when I went down.

[01:08:03] Remy: I think it's good.

It's just like a good drinking beer.

[01:08:08] Don: It is.

[01:08:09] Remy: All right.

John 20:23 if you forgive the sins of anyone, they are forgiven them. If you retain the sins of anyone, they are retained.

Josh asks, what is this verse teaching? Is some type of confession to a priest necessary? Is private confession necessary for all sins or only specific, really bad ones like apostasy, adultery and murder?

[01:08:43] Don: With these words, Jesus is showing what the keys to the kingdom are capable of doing. Forgiving sin. This is something that he's demonstrated throughout all of his ministry on earth, where, you know, I'm thinking of the lame man who he made walk. And the people are angry because he does this work on the Sabbath. How dare he do this? And Jesus responds, what's more amazing to say to somebody, get up and walk, or that your sins are forgiven, but that you may believe. I'll also raise the guy and let him stand.

Forgiving sins is something only God can do, and he gives that power to his church through the keys.

So this guy is asking, what's this verse doing? It's giving the church the ability to forgive sins. That's incredible. It's amazing.

We are able to forgive one another, to confess and be absolved, to bring our repentance and our sin directly to God.

Do we need to confess to a pastor or priest?

No.

That's not what the pastor or priest is for. Not to be the not like a cruel gatekeeper and a master of forgiveness, only doling it out when he wants it.

Instead, he is to forgive the sins of the penitent and retain the sins of the impenitent. He gets to be the absolution man because he's the one who has been called and ordained to do that on behalf of the church, not because he's the only one who can forgive sins. All Christians can forgive sins.

When my 4 year old takes a piece of candy from the candy jar that she's not supposed to take and my wife forgives her after she says, I'm sorry, Mom, I won't eat it again.

Then that forgiveness that my wife gives is just as valid and certain as if Christ himself were saying it.

Whatever our vocation is as Christians, we have the ability to bring Christ there. That means we get to forgive sins.

So then what makes the pastoral office different when it forgives sins? Because this is the guy who's been called and ordained to do it for the people.

So if you have a sin that is truly burdening your heart that's really sticking with you, then go and talk to the pastor. See the guy who God has put in that place so that you can know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has forgiven your sins and that you are truly his own child.

Does that work?

[01:11:53] Remy: Amen.

[01:11:54] Don: All right, that works.

[01:11:56] Remy: That works.

[01:12:01] Don: This raspberry tart is really good.

[01:12:04] Remy: Is it?

[01:12:05] Don: Yeah.

[01:12:07] Remy: Hold it up to the camera so that I can.

[01:12:10] Don: It's beautiful.

Crisp and red. I gotta read this to you because this will just make it sound even more delectable.

Treat yourself to a rare delight. The voluminous raspberry bouquet will greet you long before your lips touch your glass. Serve this Wisconsin framboise very cold in a champagne flute. Whoops. Then hold your glass to alight and enjoy the jewel like sparkle of a very special ale. Oregon proudly shares their harvest of mouth watering berries which we ferment spontaneously in large oak vats. Then we employ Wisconsin farmed wheat and year old Hellertau hops to round out this extravaganza of flavor. Life's too short to to wait for dessert and joy.

That's good.

That sounds good.

[01:13:19] Remy: Okay, common critique from more orthodox lately than before, but also from Rome, which. Which used to do this pretty frequently.

Are our holy orders valid?

[01:13:37] Don: Yes.

And we don't need Rome or Constantinople to tell us whether they are or not. Anyways, AC Peapkorn had a great article about this. About how even from the Roman perspective, our orders are good and fine and valid, or ought to be.

And this is really interesting because everybody just kind of assumes that Lutheran orders are considered null and void. Because that's what Apostolic curiae said about the Anglican orders, right? They didn't have the proper form, matter or intent. Therefore it can't be a proper ordination.

Here's something though. Rome has never explicitly ruled on Lutheran orders in the way that they have on the Anglican orders. Like we can assume and infer that they wouldn't find our orders valid. Not that we care anyway, but they technically haven't ruled against ours. So maybe, maybe years down the line, Rome might even acknowledge our orders to be valid. In fact, this was something that nearly happened at Vatican ii.

It was on the table, they were thinking about it. And Peepkorn again had this. He was one of the Lutheran observers at Vatican II along with Yaroslav Pelikan. And oh, who's the third guy? Name escapes me.

Not as important as the other two.

And Peep Corn was there. And the Catholics really did consider for a little bit at least acknowledging Lutheran orders. But then they decided it would be too difficult because there were too many synods at the time.

And how could you possibly police it or tell which ones followed and which ones didn't? And the reason that Lutheran orders are a little more acceptable to people who have this view of the traditional order of apostolic succession, where you have to have the laying on of hands, is because we have never rejected the laying on of hands. We have always maintained it for our pastors.

And this goes from the Scandinavian countries where we even kept the historic episcopacy, and into the German countries where we rejected the episcopate in name, but we still practiced it essentially with superintendents and whatnot.

And the general practice for the Church of Rome is that they will have at least three bishops present when they consecrate a bishop to maintain clear succession and make sure that nobody can challenge it and say, oh, well, you know, one or two of those guys didn't have valid succession, so now nobody knows.

Instead they would have three. We Lutherans don't just have three bishops present. When we do the laying on of hands for ordination, we have all the surrounding pastors present for the laying on of hands. And something to understand about Lutheran orders is that a lot of people think that we don't have bishops, we just have the equivalent of priests. And that's not it at all. We no longer have just priests. We do as the New Testament has, where Presbuteroi and Episcopoi and and Poyomen, they're all the same. You know, pastor, bishop, priest, it's all the same thing for us. We flatten those three tiered layers where Rome says no, there's distinction between bishops and priests and deacons and everything else. And we say no, there's one shepherd, that's it, pastoral office. And so we don't have the equivalent of priests. We have the Roman equivalent of bishops in every church. Every Lutheran pastor is the local Lutheran bishop.

And so when we have our ordinations, we're not just ordaining we're essentially consecrating bishops. So when we do the laying on of hands, we don't just have three bishops present, we have, you know, 15 or you know, 20, however many pastors happen to be present for it. So we have maintained apostolic succession and we know that even through the actual process. But more than that, and far more important than the action of ordination, the right of it is the teaching that it affirms.

Does that make sense? The teaching that it affirms is more important than the rite itself.

And that's how we maintain true apostolic succession, which is nothing more than successing the apostolic teaching of the church from one generation to the next.

So if anybody wants to try to say that we have presbyter ordination. No, we don't.

We don't. And if somebody tries to say that we don't have valid orders, we do. And we don't care what anyone else thinks. Nana, nana, boo, boo.

[01:19:12] Remy: So hear me out on this. No, Rome has never directly addressed our orders, but they do accept our sacrament as valid.

[01:19:32] Don: We gotta qualify that. We got to qualify that they accept baptism as valid because it's a trinitarian baptism, just as we accept any trinitarian baptism as valid. Not Mormons, those aren't trinitarian, but they don't necessarily or across the board accept our sacrament of the altar as valid.

So some do, some come close to. It doesn't. The Pope, Pope Benedict had a wonderful brotherly letter before he was Pope. So this isn't an ex cathedra statement or anything like that.

He had a letter where he stated that the even a church. Let's see if I can get the right wording. Even a church that values the traditional apostolic succession need not deny the life giving presence in the Lord's Supper. At a Lutheran Lord's Supper. That's not the exact wording, but that's the essence of what he said. He didn't outright say that it is the sacrament proper, but he did say that there is something going on there, some sort of presence.

And it does have to be further qualified that, you know, he's talking with a friend and he's thinking out loud. He's not right. He's not stating the opinion of the Roman Church.

I think we're not too many centuries away from Rome acknowledging that any church that professes the real presence may indeed have it.

But.

[01:21:20] Remy: So if Rome ever did profess that, even if they never addressed orders, holy orders, they would, that would be a tacit affirmation of holy orders. Just based on Rome's own view of the office, indelible character, etc. Etc. If you're to say that our priests can do this thing that your priests do, then our priests must also be valid, because according to their own theology, our priests couldn't do the thing if they weren't valid priests.

[01:21:54] Don: This is where I'm hesitant to say something concrete, because let's be real, Rome's doctrine is far more malleable than ours.

They believe in a development of doctrine and Elizabeth elucidation of the Holy Spirit that makes doctrine clearer over time. And so they're able to kind of change and refine it. And I could see a number of ways that they could totally not change what their theology says in order to accommodate Lutheranism.

And Rome's done that kind of thing before, but ultimately they. They want to save face, and we aren't anywhere close to that. Now.

[01:22:42] Remy: Do you think.

Do you think Rome, on the development of doctrine, end of things, which do you think is more likely for Rome in the next 150, 200 years? That they accept Lutheranism and un excommunicate Luther, etc. Or that they start blessing gay weddings and. Or female priests?

[01:23:13] Don: Oh, man.

[01:23:14] Remy: Which way do you think the pendulum will swing for them?

[01:23:17] Don: Oh, man, that's rough. That's rough.

Well, if their conversations with the Lutheran World Federation continue, then I don't think Rome is going to be headed in a good spot. And that'll lead to a very, very great schism that will make the original great schism look like practice.

[01:23:44] Remy: This is something. I'm sorry to cut you off, but this is something that, like I talk to my sister a lot about is that I don't envy at all the position that Pope Francis is in right now, because anytime he makes any kind of a statement on one of these issues, he has to thread a very thin line. And people have often been sort of put off by how ambiguous his statements about, like, blessing gay marriages and things like this are. But he has to do that because he has two very large factions that want exactly opposite things. And if he commits too hard one way or the other, he's gonna create a schism. You know what I mean? So he has to be able to put out a statement on blessing gay marriage that the people who are against it can support and the people who are for it can also support. That's a very difficult needle to thread.

[01:24:44] Don: Yeah. And this is where it's important to look at the things that Pope Francis actually says. I know people like to Accuse him of being a liberation theologian who follows, you know, this guy, Gustavo Gutierrez. He's not.

He's a Roman Catholic, and a pretty standard Roman Catholic.

Does he say things in a pastoral way to try to soften it more than popes have in the past? Oh, yeah.

Does he kind of understand the politics of the times? No doubt he's very shrewd. He's a Jesuit. They have lots of tricks.

But he's a Christian.

He's a Roman Catholic. He's not ever going to say that gay marriage is acceptable. He can't.

[01:25:40] Remy: Right.

[01:25:44] Don: I don't know what we'll see with Rome. I don't think in our lifetime we will see anything like an accommodation for gay couples within the Roman Church. It's just not going to happen.

I know the Diocese of New York has done its weirdness with blessings that it would give to anybody and trying to kind of like turn that into a quasi marriage blessing. But again, outside of a certain Jesuit, that's not really what's happening there.

[01:26:20] Remy: Right.

[01:26:21] Don: I.

You're asking which one's more likely, that they. That they venerate Luther as a saint or that they promote gay marriage?

I think Luther gets canonized before that happens.

[01:26:37] Remy: Wow.

[01:26:39] Don: And I don't think that leads to any sort of acknowledgment of Lutheran orders nor intercommunion with Lutherans. I think it ends up just leading to confusion.

[01:26:52] Remy: Yeah. No. And. Well, and that makes sense. That makes sense. What with them being the church of the Antichrist and all that confusion would be the fruit of any work done.

[01:27:10] Don: And there's another option here that I think is more likely, which is that we maintain the status quo and nothing changes.

But there are good things happening, too.

I don't want this to be, you know, crapping on Rome because what used to be the pcpcu, the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity. I forget what they call it now.

It changed its name, but they're meeting with what they call Concordia Lutherans.

Those are Lutherans who actually profess the Book of Concord.

And, you know, God be praised. There's been some fruitful talks there.

One of the professors who I did my independent study with, Dr. Olawski, is in fact, one of the guys who's gone and been part of those. He's had an audience, private audience, with two different popes now.

[01:28:05] Remy: So, you know, they put a.

They put out a paper with the ilc. Right, right. Not too long ago.

[01:28:15] Don: Yes. And that one was a wonderful breakthrough. And there is an addendum that President Harrison of my church body added, that talks all about Lutheran orders because there was a question on whether Lutherans actually believed ordination to be necessary.

And while we don't believe that it is a dominical sacrament, we absolutely believe that it is not necessary within the church. And so we clarified there for them. And if someone is a nerd like us and wants to know what Lutherans teach about Lutheran orders, read President Harrison's response to that. It's really easy to find. You can just search ilc, pcpcu, what is it? Final something or other. And you'll.

[01:29:06] Remy: You can just look in the show notes. It'll be in the show notes.

[01:29:09] Don: Good. Yeah. Let Remy do the hard work for you.

[01:29:13] Remy: That's right. That's what I'm here for. Speaking of the hard work, keeping it sort of on a. I'm trying to keep these questions in order here as our conversation moves through them. Here's one for you. Okay. When Jesus said, this is my body, this is my blood. Blood, take, eat, take, drink. Okay. I admit a hundred percent that it was in some mysterious way his body and blood. That night at that, at that meal, at the Last Supper, because the man himself was saying and doing it. My question is, how do we know that now, 2,000 years later, it's not just a memorial? How do we know it's still his body and blood?

[01:29:58] Don: What were the words that Jesus said when he gave them his. His body and when he gave them his blood?

[01:30:05] Remy: Take, eat, take, drink, do this.

No, that's good.

[01:30:13] Don: His own words are pretty self explanatory.

[01:30:20] Remy: That's good. I usually go with Paul's discourse about the Eucharist where.

[01:30:27] Don: Corinthians.

[01:30:30] Remy: Where you're guilty concerning the very body and blood of the Lord. How can you be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord if it's not the body and blood of the Lord?

[01:30:37] Don: By the way, that is one of the verses that ended up convincing, now a teacher at the St. Louis Seminary to become Lutheran. He had been a Baptist, but as he started reading Greek, he realized you can't stay Baptist.

[01:30:52] Remy: Amazing.

[01:30:53] Don: Yeah.

[01:30:54] Remy: God bless. Now if only we could teach the other Baptists how to read Greek. I mean, read Greek.

[01:31:02] Don: You know what they call a Baptist who can read?

[01:31:06] Remy: What's that?

[01:31:07] Don: Presbyterian.

I'm sorry, that's a Methodist.

That's a Methodist. I'm sorry. No, no, it was really good. A Baptist who can read is a Methodist. You know what they call a Methodist who has money is a Presbyterian.

[01:31:23] Remy: Oh, gotcha.

No, that seems right. That seems Correct.

All right, let's see, man. Oh, okay. So last question here. This one's actually been asked twice in two different ways. Ways.

But I'm just going to ask it in a consolidated third way. It's a very simple question. Knock it out of the park. I'm certain you can, Don. Why are some people saved and not others?

[01:32:01] Don: That's above my pay grade.

You'll have to ask God.

Okay, so God, in his good and gracious will, desires for all to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth, period.

Jesus Christ, in his death, has conquered death for all. He has made atonement for all people of all times and all places.

And yet still some reject that gift.

That is entirely the fault of sinful human beings who reject the gift. That's not God predestining them.

That's God in his permissive will permitting them to reject him.

God is good. He's not the author of evil. He doesn't create things to destroy them.

That's not his nature.

He's good.

[01:33:09] Remy: So when the Calvinist tries to get around double predestination because it is wicked and evil, they'll say, oh, well, like R.C. sproul is famous for this. God chooses to save some and then he just passes over others. But that's just effectively double predestination. That's just choosing to save some and choosing to damn others is no different than choosing to save some and choosing not to save others. It's the same thing. It's like when. It's like when they do that trick with John 3:16, where they say that whosoever believes is actually better rendered all those who believe. And it's like, well, that's the same thing. That's. You're actually just saying the same thing with different words.

So it's like that where they're still. Even with this language of passing over, they're still affirming double predestination.

Is it maybe good to say that in the Lutheran view, God doesn't pass over anyone, that God truly works and wants and wills to save every single person, but that people are allowed to reject that salvation? So then it really is in no way on God. It's not that he passed over them or that he actively damned them. In fact, God actively did everything he could.

[01:34:29] Don: I mean, this is. This is full monarchism, right? We are the. God is completely responsible for our salvation, and the only ones responsible for our destruction are ourselves. That's it. Yeah.

[01:34:43] Remy: Yeah.

[01:34:45] Don: Yeah.

[01:34:46] Remy: Yep.

[01:34:49] Don: I need to get some new softball. Really washed out.

[01:34:54] Remy: No, it's all right. You. You don't live in one of those sunny beach states, so how could you have a nice tan?

[01:35:00] Don: Don't.

I do got a nice tan, though. Check this out, though. I've been out on the boat and fishing with. With guys and shooting the guns and. Oh, you can't really see it, man. Yeah, there. There, you can see it. See?

[01:35:13] Remy: Yeah.

Out on the boat in the ocean. Oh, no.

Is it like. Is it a corn boat? It's a corn boat that you, like, take through the corn lakes and rivers.

[01:35:26] Don: In God's country up here.

[01:35:28] Remy: Oh.

Oh, okay. Gotcha.

Don, thank you so much for agreeing to come back. Thanks for helping me kick off season four.

[01:35:42] Don: Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. I wish I could redo the first 15 minutes where it was just like, me babbling.

[01:35:51] Remy: I'll cut it. I'll cut it for. It'll be fine. No one will know.

[01:35:55] Don: Good, good. Remy, thanks for having me on. It's always a pleasure. Thank you. We should. We should do this more often, and I will be awake more.

[01:36:08] Remy: Excellent, excellent. Thank you for signing up to be my co host, and I love you so much.

[01:36:15] Don: Wait a minute, wait a minute. Wait a minute.

[01:36:18] Remy: Isn't that what you just said? That's what you just said, Donald. You just said it.

So no takesy backsies. I love you. God bless you. And we'll see around the Internet, huh?

[01:36:33] Don: Yeah, yeah. Maybe I might have to stay off of there after you splice some of my quotes. We'll see.

[01:36:40] Remy: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. We're getting good and choppy with this one.

[01:36:45] Don: All right. Well, wonderful. Remy, God bless you. With you. Thank you, brother.

Did you like this episode of the Lutheran Answers Members Only podcast Table Talk with Lisa Cooper? Part two drops next Monday, exclusively for Lutheran Answers Members!

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