Timothy Brindle: New "Fault Lines" Album, Shai Linne, BLM, LGBTQ+, and Q&A from Listeners DMW#228
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This week Greg sat down with @timothybrindle1526 Timothy Brindle is a Pastor in the PCA, Lecturer at Westminster Theological Seminary, and hip hop artist since 2003. We discussed the drop of his new album (6/24/24) "Fault Lines: The Album", the influence Voddie Baucham's book had on it, as well as an inside look on how the album was written and recorded. They discussed his relationship with Wrath & Grace, and the most pressing issue facing the church today. Greg also asked Timothy submitted questions from the listeners about the PCA, and his relationship with Shai Linne. Timothy stuck around for a segment of "Fresh 10" and his answers might surprise you. Enjoy!
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- 00:03
- Hey, it's a live album drop episode, let's go check it out now in 2013 black lives matters established claiming black lives are systematically ravaged the hashtag and movement.
- 00:18
- Oh, there it is. Welcome back to another episode of dead man walking podcast guys. If you've been listening for a while, you're going, wait a minute. That's not the intro.
- 00:24
- Well, it's because it's a special intro. I say this every week. We got special guys on, but we got a special guy on, we got a new album drop episode and we wanted to talk about it.
- 00:32
- It's Timothy Brindle. But before we get to him, of course, we got to talk about our sponsors because they help us go to conferences, bring you guys content.
- 00:37
- They support the show. Look at, I ain't doing this to retire, right? I'm a real estate broker by trade, but it does help when we have guys that are reformed brothers in the
- 00:44
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- 00:51
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- 01:26
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- 01:32
- You can check them out at jacobsupply .com or call me at 734 -224 -0978 or Hey, as always click on the link below.
- 01:38
- We got to support our brothers building stuff in the kingdom. So with business out of the way, want to introduce this gentleman,
- 01:45
- Timothy Brindle is a pastor in the PCA. He is also a senior stewardship officer and a lecturer in Old Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary.
- 01:53
- We're going to get along great. Where he completed the master, his master of theology and master of divinity degrees.
- 01:59
- Timothy has been making Christ centered hip hop since 2003, which we're going to get into a little bit today. He recently released his 11th project called
- 02:07
- Fault Lines, the album based on Vodibachum's book. He's the author of the unfolding book and four part acoustic theology for kids series with Jonathan Gibson, Timothy and his wife.
- 02:18
- I want to make sure I say this right, Floriana. Is that what it is? Floriana, you are quite close brother.
- 02:25
- Sorry, Floriana live in Southeastern PA and have nine children, including one in heaven.
- 02:32
- It's Timothy Brindle. Welcome to the podcast, sir. Thanks for having me, brother Greg. Praise the
- 02:37
- Lord for us being dead men crucified with Christ, but now raised up to walk in newness of life.
- 02:44
- Let's go Ephesians two. I love it. Absolutely. So first of all, can you give a little more on your bio if you wish to for listeners who may not have heard of you.
- 02:52
- I'm sure they have, but we've got some listeners that might be new or might be new to you. So anything
- 02:57
- I missed in that bio that you'd like to add? Bro, that was a nice summary. Thank you for that.
- 03:03
- Yes. My main ministry and priority is my family, my wife and wonderful children.
- 03:09
- We have four boys, four girls. But then along with that, serving in the local church as a pastor at Olive Street Presbyterian church alongside of my close friend,
- 03:18
- John Orlando, excellent minister and man of God to serve with. And then, yes, also continue to work for and have ministry with Westminster Theological Seminary where I was just blessed to study
- 03:31
- God's word at brother Greg. Yeah. So I wanted to have you on and talk about the new album,
- 03:37
- Fault Lines, the album. The book is by Evodia, Evodia is awesome.
- 03:43
- Bought that a few years ago. I think it hit the nail on the head on what was going on in America. We talk about that kind of stuff here on the podcast quite often.
- 03:51
- And then when I saw this album coming out, I went, holy moly, this is going to be insane because I was
- 03:59
- I got turned on to you through, I think it was a David and Goliath or something like that, a song about that.
- 04:05
- And I'm sorry. Look at me. I'm 42 when I was in my 20s. I lived in Breathe Music. Now I've got a business to run, family to raise, right?
- 04:11
- I can't remember all that stuff. But I just remember years ago going, gosh,
- 04:17
- I wish some preachers preach from the pulpit on some of these reformed rappers do on their songs, because it was just, it's so rich, theologically rich.
- 04:29
- And I got to listen to the album over the last probably two days. I'm impressed with it.
- 04:34
- I mean, melodically, it sounds good, lyrically, it's always solid. But I want to talk to you about it. First of all, why this album and why now?
- 04:41
- Explain a little bit, because I feel like there's a theme to it. Greg, I was blessed to get to know
- 04:50
- Vody Bauckham over the last several years. It's funny, I first bumped into Vody in 2015 at the
- 04:56
- Gospel Coalition conference. This was before TGC canceled the good
- 05:02
- Reverend Doctor, unfortunately, but because of his truth speaking. And at TGC, I was like, wow, you're
- 05:09
- Vody Bauckham. Can I get a picture with you? And he said, wow, you're Timothy Brindle. Can I get a picture with you?
- 05:15
- And it so happened, Vody was already familiar with my music, him and his son, Trey. And we stayed in touch some, and then we did some conferences together first in 2017.
- 05:25
- It was especially in early 2021 when I was wrestling through things such as critical race theory and how to make sense of it.
- 05:37
- These are things that really were a challenge for my family and I and for our local church and for the community, especially the
- 05:46
- Christian hip hop community. And I just felt Vody's book, like you said, really hit the nail on the head.
- 05:54
- But Vody and I were invited to speak at a couple events together in early 2021 by Wrath and Grace.
- 06:01
- And Jay, Yohan Henao from Wrath and Grace, he asked me and Vody, hey guys, how about Tim puts
- 06:10
- Vody's book into an album? What do you guys think? Vody and I agreed.
- 06:15
- And it took three years to complete it. And, you know, on one level, you could say,
- 06:22
- Greg, that the three years, it was worth that amount of time to really sit on and really process and work through the intricacies and complexities, but then also how widely applied and critical race theory, critical theory, critical social justice is.
- 06:49
- And so to be able to spend a long time thinking on those things, writing on them, seeking to perfect the album as much as I can, humanly speaking as a sinner, and to be able to run it past Vody and do so with a great group of brothers,
- 07:04
- Wrath and Grace. Shout out to Aaron Warner, also known as Nobody Special, the producer of all the beats.
- 07:11
- Him and Brother Leo from Jesus Wannabes, who did a lot of the mixing and mastering. And even we did a heavy metal hip hop song on there, and he did some of the guitars on the
- 07:22
- BLM song that you just played at the beginning. It was just a joy to do it. And so, yeah, that's really how it came together was through my relationship with Wrath and Grace in doing,
- 07:34
- I guess, now four or five events with Vody in the last three or four years and being able to connect with him when he came to the
- 07:41
- States and really trying to bring the content of Fault Lines, which exposes the critical social justice movement and critical race theory, but trying to do so through music, through lyrics, and especially to,
- 07:56
- I would say, the Christian hip hop genre, which has really become, I think, affected by unbiblical thinking in many of these areas,
- 08:04
- Brother Greg. Yeah, I feel like it has. You know, you go back 10, 15 years and kind of that genre of Christian rap, or even more specifically, that Reformed Christian rap, had a very different feel to it than it is starting to emerge right now.
- 08:20
- So I think the album is much needed. I absolutely love all of the acronyms we have, you know, like titles like TRC, the
- 08:27
- Resistance of Christians, CRT, Christians Reject This. You know, we do sell a
- 08:32
- T -shirt on our shirt called, and it says, Teach CRT in School, Christian Reformed Theology.
- 08:38
- So we're tracking the same there where we like to toy with those because that's a serious issue, you know,
- 08:44
- BLM, Blatant Lies, Multiplied. So even the album titles have a theme.
- 08:49
- I've got to imagine you're saying it's taking you three years and you don't seem like, and your music definitely doesn't reflect this, like you just lay something down and you might not know too much about it.
- 09:00
- I feel like you dive into it, you study it, you look at it from every angle, and then you're creating a song out of that with lyrics.
- 09:08
- Is that kind of what happened on some of these subjects, too, to where you probably had a head knowledge of it and understood them, but you probably took a deep dive on some of these subjects?
- 09:17
- Yes, Greg. You know, Voti's book was huge. The Fault Lines album, in a few of the songs, it lays out
- 09:27
- Voti's instruction, his teaching from Fault Lines, the book, for instance, songs like BLM, Blatant Lies, Multiplied, basically go through,
- 09:41
- Voti has a section on the Black Lives Matter movement, unpack that. The song called
- 09:46
- False Narrative, comparing the deaths of George Floyd and Tony Timpa, Breonna Taylor and Sierra Meyer, Dylan Noble and Philando Castile.
- 09:58
- So some of those songs follow. It's really putting Voti's book in those particular chapters to lyrics.
- 10:06
- Same with the song CRT, the way Voti breaks down critical race theory. But then some of the other songs are taking principles, biblical principles that Voti teaches and exposing the critical social justice movement and sort of my take or contribution, as Voti puts it, the way that he described it is it's my contribution to the discussion, but sort of still in line with his book.
- 10:31
- And in that regard, zooming in on melanin, how the reality is there's one created human race in Adam.
- 10:39
- And we've all been given melanin by the Lord, brown pigment, skin color, but to various degrees.
- 10:46
- And all of this was embedded in Adam, in his DNA. And so there really aren't multiple races.
- 10:53
- So melanin gets into that as well as the true narrative, which is really sort of like the biblical theology of race or ethnicity, sort of how on the
- 11:02
- Unfolding album, I trace themes from the Old to the New Testament. True narrative does that.
- 11:07
- And then wanted to add a song on the LGBTQ movement.
- 11:14
- That's the song called SSA, as that acronym, same sex attracted Christian.
- 11:20
- But we reword it, the adjusted acronym, Satan's sexual atrocity.
- 11:27
- And that's because the enemy uses critical theory, which divides people up as oppressed or oppressor.
- 11:35
- And he not only does that with race, but attempts to with gender and sexual orientation. Often CRT and BLM does this too, uses the race as the
- 11:46
- Trojan horse to bring in the LGBTQ movement. So I wanted to address that in light of Vody's new book, which he just released
- 11:55
- June 1st, just in time for Pride Month. And it's called It's Not Like Being Black, How the
- 12:02
- LGBTQAI2 Plus Movement Hijacked the Civil Rights Movement.
- 12:08
- Yeah, they certainly did. And that is a whole other episode in and of itself. A question for you that I would like to see if maybe you can put your finger on it, because I'm still puzzled.
- 12:18
- I have some theories and I know ultimately what it is. But why do you think the
- 12:24
- Western Christian church has been bamboozled by things that are so blatantly true?
- 12:31
- Right. So you have these truths, these big truths. And I think this is why we fell into the COVID stuff. After a few months, most sensible people could see what it was.
- 12:39
- You know, the Black Lives Matter movement. I mean, you could tell what that was. And that you see people buying, you know, million dollar houses and misappropriating funds.
- 12:48
- And we knew what that movement was. You see the biological truths within the LGBTQ community. We have these truths that are right in front of our faces.
- 12:56
- Yet the Western Christian church and I would say the liberal, progressive and even coming into the mainstream now, evangelical church, falls for these lies and chases after these lies, even though the truth is in front of their eyes.
- 13:10
- And I'm saying a truth that is a that is a natural truth sometimes, you know, you don't even have to be a believer to understand the difference between a man and a woman.
- 13:21
- We've been given a common grace that allows us to discern that. So even they're claiming to be a believer, even an unbeliever cannot see this, but they wholly accept it.
- 13:30
- What do you think that move is and why that is? One thing that comes to mind,
- 13:35
- Greg. Satan. He even comes as an angel of light.
- 13:43
- Yeah, Satan has been a master craftsman at using half truths or hijacking movements where it's filled with lies, but there's enough truth or a change in language redefinitions.
- 14:04
- And so this goes back to how, you know, sort of classical
- 14:10
- Marxism with with Karl Marx had more of a focus on the economic class of the owners, the business owners and the employees as they oppressed for a suppressor.
- 14:24
- But then cultural Marxism with Gramsci and those in the Frankfurt School, they took the
- 14:31
- Marxist idea and they tried to apply it more to culture. And there was this concept of hegemony, those who have the power in its power of knowledge.
- 14:42
- And so one of the goals with cultural Marxism and, you know, as those from the Frankfurt School came to the
- 14:47
- States in the 1930s fleeing Nazi Germany, but they went into the academy and we just see that it's trickled down.
- 14:56
- It's taken time. You know, we think of schools, not only like Oxford and Cambridge, which at first were training ministers of the gospel.
- 15:08
- So likewise in America, Yale, Harvard, in Princeton and so on, these were institutions that used to train ministers in sound
- 15:19
- Christian reform theology. But the cultural Marxist got in and along with other liberalism, has
- 15:27
- God really said, as is the serpent's perpetual perennial question that he's been uttering through his children since Genesis three.
- 15:37
- Right. And then so these things have trickled down. The church has always struggled with worldliness. And so when
- 15:43
- Christians hear things like justice, oh, racial justice, that sounds really important.
- 15:50
- I don't want to be about racial injustice. And the enemy uses enough linguistics and he uses history.
- 15:59
- So the fact is, the United States of America does have a history of real racism.
- 16:05
- And of course, there's still real racism today on all fronts, from all peoples. So he can make use of those things to leverage them so that then people begin to interpret present events through the lenses of the past.
- 16:17
- And then instead of trying to understand justice biblically or racism biblically, it's using the world's redefinition.
- 16:26
- So with cultural Marxism, there was an attack on language and definitions to try to redefine concepts and knowledge and then make it experience based.
- 16:38
- My experiential knowledge is there's no such thing as objective truth in Christians, even though they don't,
- 16:45
- I think, consciously buy into it subconsciously. How I feel in my experiences and my emotions is how
- 16:52
- I begin to understand things. These are some of the ways I think that the church has bought into these lies,
- 16:57
- Brother Greg. Yeah, no, so true. And I think I agree with you, too, with probably one of the best tricks that Satan has ever pulled was to make you think he comes to you like a horror flick.
- 17:10
- You know, he's got the pitchfork and the horns. He is absolutely comes as an angel of light.
- 17:16
- He was made of music. He thought he was better than God. There's a guy named
- 17:21
- Bobby McFerrin, I believe, and he does a demonstration with a pentatonic scale with a group of strangers all around the world where he will jump on stage and he gives them the note and the people say it and then he jumps over and he gives them the second note.
- 17:35
- Just by giving them two notes, he can jump along the scale and create a whole song. And intuitively, people understand that scale without knowing why.
- 17:45
- They go in thirds up the scale, down the scale. He's singing a lead. He's jumping all around no matter where he goes.
- 17:51
- He can go all the way down, all the way up. And he says, you know, this is everywhere I go. It doesn't matter where I'm at, Europe, Africa, United States, down in South America.
- 17:58
- Everyone understands this. And it makes you think, wow, music is an extremely powerful thing.
- 18:04
- And, you know, if I was the angel of worship or music, maybe I would have a little pride and think, wow, yeah,
- 18:10
- I can induce people to do things. You know how powerful music is. You're an artist. It can sway people, convince them.
- 18:17
- It can bring them together. It can pull them apart. That's why I think music like yours is so important because I think ultimately, and I think you would agree, the arts and music especially is for the glory of God.
- 18:31
- He has given it to us to glorify him. So I want to talk about the process a little bit of making and recording the album.
- 18:38
- I don't want to get too much in the weeds in case there's not too many tech guys out there. You know, I don't want to start talking about two inch fat tape and Neve boards and all that.
- 18:46
- What, what was the process like for you? So you said it took three years. Do you start writing first? Do you lay some, some music down and then you get lyrics?
- 18:55
- Do you kind of do it all at the same time? Stuff like that. What's your process in writing an album?
- 19:02
- I'd love to talk about that, Greg. Um, what I usually do, Greg is, is find a beat first that I think goes with a particular theme.
- 19:13
- I maybe have a theme in mind for a song. Maybe a few rhyme schemes have already come to me or I've, I've thought on, um, or, or punch lines or concepts that I really want to break down, um, through a song.
- 19:28
- And then it's to find tracks that go with it. One of the blessings of wrath and grace is there's a producer for wrath and grace.
- 19:36
- Again, Aaron Warner, nobody special is producer name. This cat has an entire catalog or archive dozens and dozens and dozens of great beats.
- 19:48
- And so with him, the question isn't, um, can I get a beat or it's which one should
- 19:53
- I pick? And so it's finding one that goes with a particular theme. And then there were a few times with this album where I already had a beat that I wrote to and recorded to.
- 20:02
- And Aaron, as one who can just make beats so efficiently, he was like, you know what?
- 20:08
- I don't really feel, I'm not really feeling that beat anymore. Tim, check out this new beat I made, uh, while I was in the shower or while I was laying in my bed.
- 20:16
- Maybe not while he's in the shower. And wow, Aaron, man, this bro, this joint, this is even better than, than, than the prior one, which
- 20:24
- I loved. So that's sort of the way it occurred. Okay. Um, and so I, I, I kind of had the several songs that I wanted to write, um, as I read through Bodie's book a few times and found it so helpful.
- 20:37
- And as I also was preaching in my own church on thinking biblically about race, if you go to timothybrindleministries .com,
- 20:46
- you can find that three part series, thinking biblically about race and writing on some of these things for Westminster magazine.
- 20:52
- That article is also on my website. It then made me want to put these things into songs, um, for the sake of God's people.
- 21:01
- And even though my primary ministry is preaching, teaching and writing brother Greg, I still think, like you said, music is a powerful tool, powerful means that we can use.
- 21:12
- It was created by God for his glory and hip hop. So happens to be very word based, very word centered, very speech centered.
- 21:19
- So you can pack in a lot of content with hip hop. And so that's one of the blessings that can be used for discipleship, for instruction, for catechesis, catechism and so on.
- 21:30
- Yeah, no, absolutely. Does your, as a pastor, does your sermon prep kind of mirror album prep or no?
- 21:36
- Is it totally different? Not the content. I'm saying the process of what
- 21:41
- I'm going to be preaching on. I'm always interested in that when you find someone who's creatively inclined and also a pastor.
- 21:47
- I would say that my writing process for writing songs now, Greg, it follows my sermon prep planning.
- 21:56
- And so far as when I'm, you know, so the first thing I do when I prepare a sermon is I, I read it and translate it from the original
- 22:03
- Greek and Hebrew. This is what we're trained to do at Westminster. And as you do so tons of things jump out at you from the text, both in the grammar and syntax and the themes and the way that this word is used in this passage and so on, and the way that this writer uses this phrase, this passage from the old or new
- 22:19
- Testament and so on, and then finding the main point of the text, how it connects to Christ and his finished work, and then how that also applies to us in our practical life.
- 22:30
- You know, not only the indicative of what Christ has done, but the imperative, what he calls us now to do through our union with Christ.
- 22:37
- And so, so now when I write songs, I might not necessarily translate a whole passage, but if I am expounding a passage or a particular theme,
- 22:45
- I'll first lay out maybe the main point and then the few sub points. And so, you know, if you think of a three point sermon and how the main idea of the text is your main point of the text, and then you have your three sub points that you, you break down, it's very similar to writing a hip hop song where in the chorus, you're putting the main, the hook, it's your main idea, you know, the main point of your song, and then your three verses are basically your three, your three point sermon.
- 23:16
- Oh, I like that. No, that works out. That's good. So about this relationship with, uh, uh,
- 23:23
- Wrath and Grace, how did that come about? Uh, how did, how did you, how did you find those guys?
- 23:29
- Yeah. So Jay, uh, from Wrath and Grace, he's, he's had the
- 23:35
- Wrath and Grace company, uh, for over a decade and Wrath and Grace, uh, originally, you know, primarily a clothing company in a, in a, in a hip hop record label, um, making good
- 23:47
- Christ centered reform hip hop. Uh, but then also through, uh, Jay's love for the word and Jay's connection with other, uh, ministers of the gospel and, and, and theologians like Dr.
- 23:59
- Votie Baucom and Jay and Votie, very close friends. Jay actually, Wrath and Grace does the booking for Votie.
- 24:05
- Um, Jay, he reached out to me, man, it must've been in the early 2000 teens, probably 2011, 2012, to share how he was encouraged, uh, through our music, which was helpful for him in understanding reform theology and him getting plugged into the local church, being discipled by faithful, godly men.
- 24:24
- So just continue to stay in touch, did some collaborations and concerts. So I think probably, um, about a decade ago, began to collaborate with Jay and Wrath and Grace through certain concerts or, or, or song collaborations.
- 24:38
- And then it was in the, you know, I think by 2017, 2018 and 19, at least every year to, um, or at least every year doing a couple of conferences with Jay and Wrath and Grace.
- 24:49
- So that's sort of how we, uh, got connected and became closer friends. Awesome.
- 24:55
- Yeah. So, uh, the album is called, uh, fault lines, the album.
- 25:00
- We don't want to confuse it with the book fault lines, the album, but follows it closely and obviously we're going to link up everything below to where anything that if you guys are listening right now and you go,
- 25:09
- Oh, where's that? Or where do I find his ministry or get the album? It's all going to be linked up by the time you guys listen to this.
- 25:15
- Um, I'm streaming it on Apple and Spotify. Where else can people find it? It's also on iTunes where you could purchase it directly from wrathandgrace .com
- 25:23
- for $11 .99. Uh, have the, you know, the MP3 downloads and it has the lyric insert in there.
- 25:30
- So you can have all the lyrics as well. And there's a few other materials in there as well. Like the album credits and some other things, some things from Dr.
- 25:37
- Votie. Yeah. Is the, yeah. Is the purchase from the website still preferred?
- 25:42
- Because I've talked to some people and, and I don't know after they've reworked their kind of, uh, contracts with artists, the streaming doesn't really seem to support the artist.
- 25:53
- It's not really in their favor. Is it still that way? It's still that way, Greg, it's unfortunate.
- 25:59
- I remember in the early days with lamp mode, um, you know, my first several albums were released through lamp mode.
- 26:07
- It was a blessing, man. It was just CDs, you know, then MP3s came along, but still you, you usually had to buy that directly from, uh, the artists from, from the record label and it was so much more helpful financially for the record label and the artist.
- 26:24
- And so, yes, if you ask me, uh, how would it benefit wrath and grace and Timothy Brindle more financially?
- 26:32
- I'd say buy it straight from wrathandgrace .com wrath and grace also has an app, uh, that you can, you can download that app, uh, to your, uh, your iPhone, um, or your
- 26:42
- Android and, um, and, and get it and eventually be able to listen to it through there as well.
- 26:49
- Awesome. Cause that's really what we want to be doing here too, is, is not just supporting because it's, it's good music.
- 26:54
- It's godly music. It's glorifying God, but I'm really big on supporting other brothers that are doing things.
- 27:00
- Um, uh, we don't need to be throwing our money to the pagans and to the secular list. We need to be making sure we're supporting our brothers and sisters in the
- 27:09
- Lord that are actually doing and building things. So I just had that thought because I've done that, you know,
- 27:14
- I'm going to go, I've, I've streamed it for this interview to listen to it over that. Cause it just released a few days ago when we recorded this, but I definitely will go purchase it too, to make sure we support.
- 27:25
- And I would like to tell the listeners, go do the same thing, go to it. It'll be linked up below and go support it.
- 27:31
- All right. Just a couple more questions. Then I want to get into some Twitter questions that were sent into us. Uh, so with all the problems going on in, uh, the
- 27:39
- Western Christian church and in America in general, what do you think the biggest issues are that's facing the church?
- 27:45
- Not necessarily the country, but facing Western Christian church right now.
- 27:51
- Is it multiple issues? Is there one that's glaringly bigger than the rest? What are your thoughts on that as a pastor and as an artist?
- 27:59
- Greg, I think there are multiple issues, but they can be boiled down to one or two.
- 28:05
- I would say the main problem I think facing the church is the enemy deceiving
- 28:12
- Christians, uh, with false ideologies with unbiblical worldview.
- 28:18
- And there's a few places, uh, it's interesting in, in Corinthians, second Corinthians, uh, where, um,
- 28:27
- Paul says in second Corinthians 11 to, to the Corinthian church, I feel a divine jealousy for you since I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.
- 28:36
- But I'm afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.
- 28:46
- Well, what are some of the ways that the enemy, uh, seeks to deceive us like he did Eve? Well, remember with Eve, it was questioning
- 28:54
- God's revelation, questioning the sufficiency and the truthfulness of God's revelation has
- 29:00
- God really said. And one of the ways he does that is through ideologies, which are essentially arguments, lofty arguments raised against that are contradictory of the knowledge of God in Christ.
- 29:13
- So in the chapter before second Corinthians 10, Paul says, beginning with verse three, for though we walk in the flesh in these, these human bodies, we're not waging war according to the flesh that is even according to the sinful nature or who we were in Adam, because the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but they have divine power.
- 29:35
- It's the power of the spirit resurrection power in Christ through the word to destroy strongholds.
- 29:40
- We destroy arguments. Notice that these strongholds, their arguments, their teachings, we destroy arguments and every lofty opinion, an opinion, or, or a teaching that's, that's, that's boastful and lifted up against the
- 29:55
- Lord lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God to take every thought captive to obey
- 30:02
- Christ. And I think that with these ideologies we're talking about, such as critical theory, uh, that the enemy has crept in and that it's ultimately an attack on image of God, who we are as image of God.
- 30:18
- And so you see the attack when it comes to, uh, things that, uh, a man made or a satanic version of race, uh, and all the implications with that.
- 30:27
- But then there's the attack on sexuality and bro, it's ultimately an attack on the home.
- 30:33
- It's an attack on the family. And so here's where I would boil it down, Greg. I think the primary problem facing the church is the attack on biblical manhood and womanhood.
- 30:43
- Who we are as those made in God's image as male and female, although we're equally image of God, male and female created to glorify
- 30:51
- God, the way that a man glorifies God primarily is as a father and husband, the way that a woman glorifies
- 30:58
- God is primarily as, as a wife and a mother. And therefore there is a distinction in how we were designed, how we were created, who we are spiritually.
- 31:08
- And I think. This stuff connects to the ideologies, Greg, because the bottom line is, are we going to be men as you and I are men great to stand and fight against these things in truth and in love and in firmness, uh, are we going to allow these ideologies to ravage our churches and our families, our marriages and our children, or are we going to stand firm in Christ?
- 31:29
- So that that's how I would boil it down, bro. Yeah, no, great answer. Okay. Last question in this segment, we'll move on.
- 31:36
- How can music in general or in all genres, how, how can music, what does it need to have or not have to glorify
- 31:45
- God? So glad you asked that we've been talking about this in our family worship time with our kids is we now have four teens and, um, you know, uh, four teenagers, um, you don't have 14 yet or teens or teenagers is how should we think about music?
- 32:04
- How would you think about secular music and so on? And there's two, two things that I think make music glorifying to God in Psalm 33,
- 32:14
- David actually gives a command where he says, play skillfully to the
- 32:20
- Lord, Psalm 33, uh, verse three, sing to him a new song, play skillfully on the strings with loud shouts.
- 32:30
- So in order to glorify God, music should be done skillfully with excellence. So with artistic, uh, ability in an aesthetic excellence, right?
- 32:42
- The Lord desires it to be done in excellence as he is excellent and great.
- 32:47
- Now, as those creating God's image, Greg, the unbeliever can play skillfully.
- 32:54
- They can make music excellently. Right. But the other aspect comes next.
- 33:00
- Notice, uh, it says two verses later, he, the Lord loves righteousness and justice.
- 33:08
- So in order for music to glorify God, it not only has to be done skillfully or excellently, what we can call aesthetic beauty.
- 33:15
- It not only has to have beauty, it must have truth because righteousness and justice is living life in conformity to God's law, his truth.
- 33:27
- It's based on truth. The unbeliever can't ultimately do that, right? Maybe they can to an extent, but it's going to be limited because whatever is not done in faith is sin.
- 33:37
- As scripture says, and the natural man, first Corinthians two 14, he can't understand the things of God, their foolishness to him, but we have the mind of Christ, the
- 33:47
- Holy spirit person. And so for that reason, really only the Christian can truly glorify
- 33:54
- God in our music by doing it not only excellently, uh, in terms of beautiful aesthetic, it being well done, but then also based on the truth of his word, exalting and magnifying
- 34:06
- Christ as in accordance with the scriptures. Yeah, no, so true. I, so many songs come to mind too, to where, you know, the love of a woman, a horrible thing that happened in my life.
- 34:17
- And you sing, these are a shadow of the truth. They're biblical truths. God made man and woman and all those things.
- 34:23
- But an unbeliever truly can't understand those. And then in turn, like you said, with righteousness and justice, truly glorify
- 34:30
- God in those. So, um, yeah, right on, uh, let's shift gears here as we, uh, start to put bookends on this episode.
- 34:37
- I had some, uh, listeners, uh, tag me and say, Hey, if you're having Tim on, could you ask him a few questions?
- 34:43
- Now, if you don't have answers for these say, yeah, I don't know. I'm sure. Um, or if you don't even want to answer them, that's fine too.
- 34:50
- Um, but I said, I would ask them, uh, Noah wing on Twitter says, uh, where's he at, is the
- 34:56
- PCA a denomination with a clean outside of the cup and a filthy inside, or have there been drastic improvements since 2018 ish?
- 35:06
- So there's some, there's some, uh, stuff baked into that question. He's assuming some things, but, um, what do you think?
- 35:12
- What are your thoughts on that? Cause you're part of the PCA, correct? That's correct. I've been a part of the
- 35:17
- PCA since 2002. Uh, and been an ordained, uh, minister in the
- 35:23
- PCA since 2021. Uh, and I would say it's quite clear. The PCA is a mixed bag, like every denomination overall.
- 35:31
- I think, um, there's many encouraging things about the PCA. It's the largest reformed
- 35:38
- Presbyterian denomination in the world. Not to mention the United States with more churches. Many of these churches are faithful gospel preaching churches, uh, that hold to the inerrancy and the infallibility of scripture of a biblical understanding of the
- 35:51
- Lord Jesus Christ and of the triune God in the, in the, in the one way of salvation by faith alone in Christ alone, uh, to grace alone, to the glory of God alone because of scripture alone and so on.
- 36:01
- That being said, there are still challenges in the PCA. I think there's a soft wokeness that has come into the
- 36:08
- PCA in terms of, uh, things such as racial reconciliation. Now that might sound strange.
- 36:15
- Why is Timothy questioning racial reconciliation? Isn't racial reconciliation a good thing? Well, I would ask, first of all, are there multiple races that need to be reconciled?
- 36:24
- No, there's one race. And then racial reconciliation usually assumes a white versus black racism, uh, which is not necessarily, uh, the case.
- 36:35
- Um, we need to examine issues of racism on a case by case basis. And then not to mention me and my brother in Christ, we're already reconciled to the father and to one another.
- 36:46
- Racial reconciliation assumes that there's beef between me and my brown skin wife, which isn't, there isn't now sometimes there is beef, but it isn't because of, uh, of, of skin tone or things like race it's because of our, our sinfulness.
- 37:01
- So racial reconciliation and sort of the fallacy of ethnic diversity where really ethnic diversity oftentimes just wants colorism.
- 37:10
- It just wants, it just demands to have churches where there's people with different amounts of melanin.
- 37:17
- And if you don't have that in your church, you're, you're sinning or you're not as righteous when bro, when it comes to a biblical understanding of ethnicity or the word ethnos found in Revelation five, nine, and seven, nine, it's based on Daniel seven and Genesis 10, where nations are essentially things, uh, nation
- 37:34
- States like America, and there's multiple different colors of Americans, not to mention nations are comprised of tribal groups, tribal clans.
- 37:43
- There's no mention of skin color. They have different languages. They're in different lands. And so, by the way, bro,
- 37:49
- I'm already ethnically diverse. I'm an Irish, German, Scottish, English, Polish, American, bro.
- 37:55
- That's ethnically diverse. And I would say every American church in that regard with a biblical understanding of ethnicity, it's already diverse since Americans.
- 38:04
- Uh, by nature, uh, consist of people who are descendants from different tribal groups and nationalities and languages, and then great praise the
- 38:14
- Lord, if me and an Indian brother or someone from an African descent are worshiping together, the faithful preaching of the gospel and loving one another based on scripture, it'll bring that about organically.
- 38:25
- And it doesn't have to always have a, uh, uh, uh, uh, colorism to it.
- 38:32
- Some churches might have people with a variety of different skin complexion, some might not.
- 38:37
- At the end of the day, Christ is building his Jew Gentile church from every tribe, tongue, and nation. So I think those are some of the weaknesses in the
- 38:44
- PCA. We need to be tighter on that. And then also when it comes to women in leadership and what that looks like, uh, for again, men walking in their roles as those who lead and women as those who are led, who, who come alongside and help.
- 38:57
- So those are some of the challenges with the PCA, but we trust in the Lord to be at work, brother. Yeah, no, that's good.
- 39:05
- Uh, you know, it, it, it just hurts me so much too. When you see that, that believer that, uh, fully understands what
- 39:11
- Christ did on the cross, how there's reconciliation between brothers, uh, different cultures, um, we are one in Christ and then
- 39:18
- Satan really knows how to use the flesh, you know, to get in there and go, yeah, but aren't you a victim, but we'll look at that thing that happened in the past or is it, you know what
- 39:27
- I mean? And really starts to divide. And then we start to rank that over the redemptive work on the cross and the imputed righteousness and the reconciliation we have with our brothers, no matter what part of the globe they're from, that's one of that, that is one of the most glorious things, uh, that I look to every day, uh, when
- 39:46
- God saved me and get up and wake up grateful is the fact that look at, man, there's people in my church that I'm closer to than I am in my family because me and some of my family do not share, uh, the reconciliation of Christ, but I do with my brothers and sisters in my congregation and it can't be explained.
- 40:01
- And people who don't understand that or have an experience or Lord has not saved them, they will never understand that, but it, it hurts me so bad to see people fooled by that, that are professing
- 40:13
- Christians and go, well, I'm going to rank skin color, culture, experience, feelings, past hurts or above the reconciliation
- 40:21
- I find in Christ. Uh, so yeah, I'm tracking with you, brother. Um, question number two, and we only have a couple more.
- 40:28
- Uh, this is a fun one. I thought, but maybe not for you. Uh, if you could name only one favorite all time hip hop song by someone else other than you and, uh, your then name, your favorite song that you've ever written and put out.
- 40:41
- So do you have a favorite hip hop artist or song of someone else? And what is the favorite one that you've done? I'd say most of the songs by Haza Kim.
- 40:51
- Haza Kim is also featured on the, uh, Fault Lines album and Haza Kim and I were, were artists, uh,
- 40:58
- Haza Kim, two brothers, Michael and Tony Ray. Um, um, we were both on lamp mode recordings as well.
- 41:04
- Um, Haza Kim's album Theophany is probably my favorite album ever. And, uh, one of the last songs on Theophany is called
- 41:12
- Kadosh, the Hebrew word for holy. One of my favorite all time songs. And so that's, that's what
- 41:17
- I'd have to go with, um, right there, Greg. Do you have any for yourself or no? They're just, uh, just out there for people to listen to and make judgment calls themselves.
- 41:28
- Yeah, I can't quite, I would say, you know, on the new album, I really loved writing in, in listening to the song
- 41:35
- I wrote called Floriana story. Um, there's a song called Floriana story and Timothy story sharing our, uh, our life stories and how they intertwine.
- 41:44
- Um, Floriana story has become one of my favorites that the Lord helped me to write. Yeah. Love it.
- 41:51
- Uh, okay. Two more. Um, has, has Shilin sold out? Like Lecrae, KB, Jackie Hill, Perry, et cetera.
- 41:58
- I don't even know who Jack, Jackie Hill Perry is, or is he only slightly off in his new book? What are your thoughts on that?
- 42:04
- Or are we taking a pass on that one? I would just direct people to a video that I did with wrath and grace recently with my brother,
- 42:11
- Talib Smith, hosting it on a podcast and it's called a letter to my friend explained.
- 42:17
- And in that podcast with Talib Smith, I explained my song from the album, a letter to my friend addressing brother
- 42:24
- Shilin, and I get into some of those things on, uh, where, uh, my concerns are with shy.
- 42:30
- So I just direct listeners to that. And I think it'll answer their questions. And then finally, Keith Brown on Twitter says, are you going to be recording, uh, any future albums with wrath wrath and grace?
- 42:41
- Uh, what makes wrath and grace a good partner label? I think we kind of covered that at the top of the show though. Uh, but yeah, basically you think you ever have anything in the future with them or you just, you just kind of take it as it goes,
- 42:51
- I think I'll take it as it goes in so far as I was supposed to retire a couple albums ago.
- 42:57
- Uh, but if I do make any more albums, I think, um, it will definitely be with wrath and grace.
- 43:03
- I just love those brothers. And what makes them so great is their boldness, their stance for Christ. Uh, their love for the truth and their unashamed in this, uh, to, to proclaim the truth of Christ and his word, uh, even against what the cultural trends and norms are.
- 43:19
- Yeah. It's very, uh, proverbial for me to not plan more than maybe two or three years out, because if I do the
- 43:24
- Lord will go, ah, I have something else for you. Don't, don't start planning 10, 20 years out, you know, so that's good.
- 43:30
- All right, cool. Let's wrap this up here with the fresh 10 segment. This is where we do 10 fresh questions, uh, just to get to know you a little bit more.
- 43:36
- They're fun. They're light. Uh, you want to stick around for two more minutes and do it. I'm happy to Greg. Go for it, man.
- 43:42
- All right, let's go. Here we go. Can we kick that one more time? All right.
- 43:55
- It's the fresh 10 question segment with Timothy Brindle. Here we go. Question one, what city and state did you grow up in and how did that affect your childhood, if at all?
- 44:02
- I grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It affected me greatly in that I'm a,
- 44:07
- I'm a lifelong, uh, Pittsburgh pirates fan, which has taught me much about suffering and persevering through hardship.
- 44:14
- Uh, but it also was the place where I became, uh, immersed in Christian.
- 44:19
- Uh, or I should say secular hip hop as an unbeliever, uh, which God used providentially for the, once I became a
- 44:26
- Christian, so already be familiar with writing rhymes, ready, already being an artist so that I could then use it for Christ.
- 44:34
- I love it. And, uh, man, you guys got some rabid sports fans out there in Pittsburgh. Question number two, what's your favorite funny story or joke to tell people?
- 44:41
- Do you have a go -to joke or a little funny story or a quip or something, either when you meet new people or see someone or introducing yourself?
- 44:47
- Do you got to go to, or not at all? Yeah. I'd say one of my, uh, go -to jokes, people oftentimes see my family and they say,
- 44:56
- Timothy, you have such a beautiful family. They look just like your wife. Yeah.
- 45:03
- That's a good one. Partial, partial compliment and insult all wrapped into one, bro. I'd like that.
- 45:08
- That's okay. As long as, as long as they're not calling the kids ugly, huh? That's right. They're being honest though, because praise the
- 45:14
- Lord for my beautiful wife. And, uh, question number three, you're in the, you're in the, uh,
- 45:19
- Delorean, the flux capacitor is fluxing. Are you going back in time to visit the great, great, great, great grandfather? Are you going forward in the future to visit the great, great, great, great grandkids?
- 45:28
- Uh, I think I would have to go back in time and meet our father in the faith,
- 45:34
- Abraham, see how he responded to the Lord who told him to put the sign of the covenant on his eight day old child.
- 45:45
- Even before Isaac was able to believe, still put the sign of the covenant on him and to see
- 45:50
- Abraham's and also put it on Ishmael, who Abraham likely knew was an unbeliever, uh, to show
- 45:58
- God's faithfulness, uh, to Isaac and that the sign of circumcision was double meaning it not only pointed to blessing, but it pointed to curse, uh, in judgment for those who didn't persevere in faith.
- 46:09
- And it's likewise with baptism. So there you go. A little, uh, advertise for that.
- 46:14
- Yeah. So he didn't have to have a full profession of faith on them, be fully immersed. Is that what you're saying? Hmm. Interesting.
- 46:20
- Okay. Question number four.
- 46:26
- What's something people would be surprised to know about you? Something, if you told them a fact and they went, what that you did that, or you've been there, that's you.
- 46:36
- I would say one is, um, I don't really listen to much hip hop.
- 46:42
- Um, there's just not a whole lot of edifying hip hop, Christian or obviously secular, and then secondly,
- 46:49
- I used to be woke. And so on the, on the, uh, fault lines album, I talk about being awakened from wokeness.
- 46:56
- Wow. So good. Question five, top three bands or music albums that you have influenced your life the most.
- 47:03
- You kind of talked about one in the Twitter question. You got a couple more you could throw out. Yes. I would say the atonement album, my brother
- 47:11
- Shilin hands down. Um, that was good. The reformation by, uh, Christ centric and another mate, another amazing album.
- 47:21
- Um, and the mosaic by Zeta blacksmith. Awesome. All right. Question number six.
- 47:26
- What properties do you go after in monopoly? You a Baltic cheap guy. You go for boardwalk.
- 47:31
- You go somewhere in between. What are you doing when the family's playing monopoly? What is dad going after? Is he scooping up the reds?
- 47:38
- Yes. I'm, I'm, I'm one of the reds guys. I go for the middle. It's not as expensive, but then when you got motels on them, boom, you're wiping them out, bro.
- 47:46
- Wiping them out. Yeah. No mercy. All right. Question number seven. Uh, what do people misunderstand about you the most?
- 47:52
- Uh, I always tell people, people go, man, you seem probably like a jerk a lot. Cause you just say what's on your mind. I go, actually, I'm a pretty nice guy,
- 47:58
- I think. Uh, but that's a misunderstanding. Um, how about you? Something that they misunderstand about you?
- 48:05
- I'd say with this most recent project, um, a lot of the maybe more shallow understandings of, um, my album and the songs are that I'm saying racism does not exist or I'm making it out that there aren't, um, uh, ethnic sins, but that's not what
- 48:26
- I'm saying at all. I'm just saying, I'm not assuming systemic racism, not assuming structural racism, nor am
- 48:34
- I assuming, uh, that there's only certain people who can commit sins of partiality or, or bigotry, but that it's something that we all struggle with our ultimate, the ultimate answer is we talked about Greg is the gospel of the
- 48:46
- Lord Jesus Christ in union with Christ by faith in him. Amen. Yeah. And you, and what the kind of album you put out, uh, is bold as well too, because you will get hurt that hurled at you, uh, whether it's true or not.
- 48:59
- Um, if you could sit down with a cup of coffee with any historical figure outside of the Bible, who would it be?
- 49:05
- And why can't be in the Bible, historical figure dead or alive. It would be gear hardest boss.
- 49:11
- Gear hardest boss is known as the grandfather of biblical theology. We say at Westminster boss is boss.
- 49:18
- A boss was older new Testament professor for the founding faculty of Westminster seminary, uh, in his understanding of Christ and all of scripture has just been such a blessing to me in that, uh, boss is biblical theology or covenant.
- 49:32
- Theology is really what I lay out in the unfolding book in album. So man, if I could sit down and have coffee with boss or the founder of Westminster seminary and the
- 49:40
- Orthodox Presbyterian church, Jay Gresham, Machen, the way that Machen stood for truth as laid out in his book,
- 49:46
- Christian liberalism, and I have a song on the fault lines album called a line in the sand, and it goes through Machen's book,
- 49:54
- CNL, Christianity and liberalism. How's that apply today? Two more that we're done.
- 50:00
- What is the movie you've watched multiple times? You can just turn it on and watch it. I know almost every line in home alone, uh, for better or for worse.
- 50:09
- Uh, and then I would say saving private Ryan, which is now my son's favorite movie as well. Uh, I gotta tell you there was a, we, uh, my daughter was younger, uh, maybe eight or nine and her and her brother were doing something on the stairs.
- 50:22
- They were building this thing and they were going to slide down on a mattress or something, and I walked up to her and I walk around the corner.
- 50:28
- I go, that is so dangerous. And she, she taps it. She's like nine and she goes, don't worry. I worked all the kinks out.
- 50:34
- Uh, which is, I think that's, that's a home alone too. Now that I think about that, but still in the, in the genre. So, and I laughed so hard.
- 50:40
- I said, I gotta let you do it now. I mean, that was such a great line. She worked all the kinks out. All right. Last question here on fresh 10 with Timothy Brindle.
- 50:47
- What is a book outside of the Bible that everyone should read? We know we go to the word of God. We know we eat it. We know we dwell on it.
- 50:53
- We know we meditate on it outside of that. What's a book that everyone should just flip through at least once.
- 51:00
- I would say, um, the holiness of God by R .C. Sproul comes to mind.
- 51:06
- Yeah. Also biblical theology. Oh, there you go. Biblical theology, old and new testaments by Gearhart is
- 51:12
- Voss. And if they really, if they want to go deep, if they want to go deeper or what you, what else do you have on your shelf, bro?
- 51:19
- Reform dogmatics by Herman Bovink. Oh, so good. Yeah. All right. That was it. That was fresh 10 with Timothy Brindle.
- 51:37
- All right, Pastor Tim, take us out. Give us the final word and anything else you want the listeners to know about fault lines, the album out now.
- 51:45
- I would just point each of us to the living Christ in his word as sufficient for everything in this day and age.
- 51:53
- Let's hold fast to the Lord Jesus. Let's be faithful in the local church. And as husbands and fathers, men, let's lead our families and encourage them in the gospel.
- 52:06
- Couldn't have said it better. Thanks for being here, pastor. Appreciate it. Thank you, Greg. Blessings, bro. Blessings guys.
- 52:12
- Thank you so much for listening to another episode of dead men, walking podcasts, as always, you can find out more about us at dmwpodcast .com.
- 52:18
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- 52:24
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