Proselytize or Apostatize

Drew Sokol preached to hundreds at Redeemer Presbyterian Church before a faith crisis led him to resign. In this episode, he challenges Barnabas Piper with the idea that God's Spirit does not seem to be evident in the lives of followers of Jesus. Barnabas responds by suggesting that the American church is simply not open to the movement of God's Spirit. They go on to discuss conservative vs progressive Christianity and the future of the church. 

Thomas Newman decided to try out Christianity for a while as an unbeliever and chronicled his journey in a documentary-style podcast series called "Hiding in Plain Sight." Although he never converted to faith, Tom found a lot of value within the Jesus movement. We ask him questions about his experiences and David presses him with some evidence that Christianity might actually be literally true. 

 There is no guest this week! I give a sermon, David declines the opportunity to respond to the altar call, and we go on to talk about apologetics and politics. 

 David's pagan coworker, Brandon, joins us to talk about paganism, politics, polytheism, and some more topics that may start with 'p'. 

 We are joined by Virginia St Clare to talk about her belief that all of the Abrahamic religions are essentially the same. Our conversation meanders into topics such as absolute truth, canonization, and the resurrection. 

Jordan Karim joins us again to debate the merits of the Kalam Cosmological Argument for the existence of God. You are going to want to put your thinking cap on as Jordan and David nerd out about a lot of crazy physics & philosophy.

Jordan's sources: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1h1Z-p0LPx8CZTf4A2htVOeyhu5dsasr0jbOiQNq_-tE/edit?usp=sharing

Titus grew up in a very conservative Mennonite church. Obviously, our upbringing continues to influence our worldview no matter how old we get. In this episode, we invite popular blogger Asher Witmer onto the show to take a deep dive into some of the sticky issues that Mennonite young people often wrestle with. David jumps in with a question or two and gets a bit of an education this peculiar denomination. 

 In this episode, David and Titus catch up on a few current events and Titus talks about his trip to India.  

In this episode I am joined by Matthew Milioni from Followers of the Way, a network of house churches who emphasize the kingdom of God. Matthew shares about how he and his wife left a skinhead gang to become disciples of Jesus. We go on to discuss the early church, the proper role of Scripture, and the ransom theory of Jesus' atonement. My co-host David comes on at the end to discuss the interview.

 On the 46th anniversary of the landmark US ruling that made abortion legal, New York state signed into law a new abortion rights bill.

The most controversial part of the bill is the provision allowing abortions after 24 weeks in cases where there is an "absence of fetal viability, or the abortion is necessary to protect the patient's life or health".

My home state, Virginia, is currently considering a similar bill.

We thought it would be a good time to invite a pro-choice advocate onto the show. This conversation gets a bit feisty, as abortion debates often do, but at the end we parted ways as friends.