Dead Men Walking Podcast with Jake Loop: Update on Ukraine, Biblical Suffering, and Eschatology

Dead Men Walking

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:11

Yeah, love it! Give it to me. Yeah! Every week baby.

00:20

Well this is a little bit different set up for those that are watching on YouTube. Absolutely. I'm going to always be looking like this when

00:27

I'm talking to the people. If you're not watching me. And I'll look this way. We moved the table around a little bit.

00:34

We have an in -guest studio tonight. But welcome back to another episode of Dead Men Walking Podcast. We're glad you are with us.

00:41

Thanks for supporting the show and commenting and reposting and visiting dmwpodcast .com

00:47

where you can get all your fun merch that supports the show. And I want to thank Brian Adams for his song Heaven.

00:53

That's random. Excellent. Okay, we'll go for that. But if you are watching on YouTube or watch,

00:59

I'm wearing one of our shirts here. That's a beautiful shirt. You like that? Teach CRT in school. Christian Reform Theology.

01:05

A little play on the hot button CRT issue. Yes, it is. Which we talked about last week actually with Tom McMillan at the

01:12

State Board of Education. Yeah, we did. That was a great show. That was really good. You know, it's always funny when I listen back and I'm like, this is actually pretty interesting.

01:19

We kind of said some things that were important. Right, exactly. It's kind of hard sometimes when you're in.

01:25

Yeah, you're like in it. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. To realize. To really listen. But before we get into it, this episode is brought to you by the, what is it brought to us by?

01:36

The Detroit Baptist Theological Seminary. Yep. Out of Detroit. They have a free event coming up on March 18th in Allen Park.

01:43

They have Dr. Joel Beek. He's from the what? Reformed?

01:48

Puritan. Theological. Right. Theological Seminary. I met him at G3. It was unbelievable.

01:55

He's such a historian. Very cool. Right now I think they have about 50 or 60 seats left.

02:02

We're partnering up with them. I know I'm going to be up there. I think you're going to try to make it depending on your work schedule and family stuff, right?

02:08

Yep. It's in Allen Park, Michigan. So for all our listeners that are in Michigan, Ohio, even Indiana, not that far of a drive for you to hear a wonderful historian, pastor, scholar, theologian,

02:19

Dr. Joel Beek. It's during the Rice Series. You can check it out at dbts .edu forward slash rice.

02:25

We're going to link that up on the podcast and YouTube and all the social media so you can click on that. It's free.

02:31

Yeah. You know, you want to hear him speak, Dr. Joel Beek at G3, you're going to pay a couple hundred bucks and you got to travel to Atlanta to go to the national conference or you can hook up with these guys and you can listen to them for a few hours.

02:42

I'm guessing. Lecture. Like I said last week, when you hear the word lecture, it's like, oh no, but no, this is good stuff.

02:49

This is the stuff. Well, the cool thing is it's like a, it's kind of half day. It's like an 8am to 1pm.

02:54

It's awesome. And that is a Friday, right? I believe Friday, March 18th. So check it out guys. And we, we are happy to partner with them.

03:02

But we do have Jake Loop in. How are you doing, sir? He's a pastor at North Monroe Street Church of God.

03:08

He's a local missionary. Welcome to the lion's den. Jake Loop, how are you, sir?

03:15

It's great to be here. We have 250 people in studio. Yes, we do.

03:20

Thanks for being here, everyone. Live studio audience. Jake, before we get into it, tell us a little bit about it yourself.

03:27

Well, born and raised in the area. Yeah. Southeast Michigan and been quite a few places.

03:35

Ran from the Lord for a long time. Story that we can all relate to, I'm sure. A lot of us. Many of us anyways.

03:41

Yeah. And he, you know, my wife and I are local missionaries here. The Lord brought us back to this area, our hometown, and basically laid it on our hearts to become missionaries to our hometown and to the local area here.

03:55

And so we've been pursuing that. And our emphasis mainly is intercessory work, prayer.

04:00

We do some pastoral and discipleship, things of that nature. But our main call is in intercessory and praying for the people of the area.

04:08

And we also have a house of prayer that we run and we operate. Right here in Monroe County, correct?

04:15

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Tell us a little bit about your family, because I know your wife, your kids, you got the cutest family ever. Yeah. We're very blessed, very fortunate.

04:23

We have two kids, Liberty and Finn. And Liberty's three, she'll be four in June.

04:29

And Finn is one, he'll be two in October. So they keep us on our heels and they're into everything and flying around.

04:35

And I'm sure you guys know, but it's so beautiful. Parenthood, man, it's just really opens your eyes to a lot of things that you were just completely oblivious to before you had kids.

04:45

Absolutely. You know, I always say when you have children, it's almost like another common grace of God to reflect

04:52

His glory back to you. You start to, well, first of all, they're little mirrors. So when they get a little older and they start doing things that you go, that's kind of annoying.

05:00

And you go, oh, that's me. I do that annoying thing. Maybe I should ship shape it up. But not only that, the unconditional love you feel for your children and that desire of I would do anything for them.

05:13

And I just want to see them taken care of and be close to God. That's how our Heavenly Father is to us.

05:19

And it's like, what a beautiful reflection in creation of God, giving us that revelation and that wisdom, even in something as what we take for granted as parenthood.

05:32

Yeah. And it's so beautiful. I heard someone say one time, as much as you love your children, God loves them infinitely more. Absolutely. You know, and that's like, we can't comprehend that, but that's a good thing to meditate on and to understand, especially when we're contending and believing and praying for our children for whatever it is and kind of taking a moment to be like,

05:50

Lord, you love my children more than I do, infinitely more than I do. So it's a blessing and it opens your eyes to characteristics and attributes of God that you may not have been fully aware of before you had kids.

06:04

Yeah, absolutely. So before we get into newsy news and into our subject tonight, excuse me,

06:10

Jason and I, we kind of have a common theme. We're a little crazy. We both own businesses and we do kind of side hustles and stuff like that.

06:17

And can I embarrass you and talk about your passion with shoes for a minute?

06:23

Just because, listen, now we're going to get into some serious stuff, but this guy knows those sneakers like nobody else.

06:31

I haven't heard this story yet. I keep hearing that you're the sneaker guy, but I don't know this. He knows it. And sneaker culture is so interesting to me, but I just,

06:38

I don't know anything about it. And I'm like, I can't learn another thing and get into another thing. My Puma high tops is about as far as I go.

06:45

I like them. But what is this sneaker obsession? And like, what do you like about it?

06:51

I mean, I'm just a sucker for like subcultures in general. I'm just, they're, they fascinate me.

06:57

But then every once in a while that subculture hits things that you really are passionate about and really interested in.

07:03

And so I just have always been a lover of shoes growing up and it was probably, I had an athletic background, basketball, so it could have been tied in there.

07:11

But, and then ultimately it just kind of evolved into a way to make some additional money for my family.

07:17

Yeah. So. So you collect, you resell, you do all that stuff or no? I don't collect. And, and, you know, for all the aspiring resellers out there, rule number one, don't buy in your own size.

07:28

Is that what it is? Why is that? Why can't you buy? Oh, cause you'll want to wear them. And then you won't sell them.

07:36

Yeah. So that's funny. So if I want some Jordans, I just got to come to you. Yeah. All right. You give me, give me a heads up and I can.

07:43

So my, my Walmart shoes aren't, aren't in this category. I can't sell them. Yeah.

07:48

They're probably not worth the whole lot on the secondary market, but. Right. You're flip -flops from Gap that were $2 .99.

07:56

Yeah. Yeah. Right. Exactly. That's, I'm that guy. I'm the frugal guy. I try to watch out for that.

08:01

I find, I just find the whole culture fascinating, especially since man, you go out there and even in the last five or eight years, there are just so many cool looking designs.

08:11

And then you got, obviously some are going to hold value better than others that are mainstay brands, but even some of these secondary brands just go,

08:18

Oh my gosh, man, they're getting so neat and intricate and one of a kind. I just don't understand the

08:24

Kanye West. Yeezy? The shape of them. It just looks so crazy, but people love those things for some reason.

08:32

The one they're super comfortable. Really? Okay. And yeah, and it's. Jake's a Yeezy man. Yeah. I know.

08:38

I've had a couple and you know, yeah, they're super comfortable, but also, you know, anytime, you know, the word is silhouette.

08:44

So anytime a new silhouette comes out, people are either like, yes, we want that or no, that's trash.

08:51

No, that's trash. Yeah, right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And so, and that one just, that one just took off. That's crazy. That one hit, huh?

08:56

Yeah. Yeah. I'll stick with my, my boots and you know, my, my, my slip -on shoes.

09:01

Yeah, there you go. Dude, I was a Vans guy for just so long because they're easy to slip on and I'm like, I gotta,

09:07

I gotta change. Exactly. I love my Converse. Right. The only thing I didn't like about that is just, you know, four and a half foot long shoelaces all the time.

09:16

I'm tucking them in, you know, it's, it feels like I'm putting on a knee boot. It's like, good Lord. I liked them though.

09:22

Right. Right. Yeah. But with the Converse, you gotta put a slip, a slip on in like a, a shoe.

09:28

You're walking on cardboard. You get, yeah, because it's like, yeah, yeah. That insole. I mean, cause like, you remember back in the day, that's what they wore when they played basketball.

09:37

I can't even fathom that. But I could not imagine. PF Flyers breaking and rolling ankles. Yeah, man. In the ABA. I couldn't imagine.

09:44

Yeah, man. But I, I love that you showed your age a little bit. You're like, hey man, you gotta get Dr. Schultz in there if you want to wear a shoe.

09:50

All right. Hey, I'm about to be 41 on Tuesday. So, uh, you know. No, it's true though.

09:58

It's true. Oh, I sneezed. I sneezed two days ago and cracked my back. I was like, what was that?

10:05

Oh, do you want to tell you what I took the other day for Tom? You know, I took Tom's and I won't talk about it.

10:12

Actually, uh, uh, forgot to bring up. I'm just going to say this on air. Okay. Let's just, let's just make sure this gets out there.

10:19

Jake and I went to elementary school together. Manor Bobcats. Manor Bobcats, baby. The Bash Brothers.

10:30

Yeah. Shout out to the Manor Bobcats. Oh, that's funny. Wow. You guys go back a ways then. No, I mean, we, we didn't really,

10:37

I mean, I don't think we really knew each other, but yeah. Yeah. But I think we rode the bus. I was a little bit older, right?

10:42

Yep. What grade was it? Like elementary. So you still had your beard then? Yeah, I totally had my beard.

10:48

Yeah, exactly. You know, I had the mustache and then I had the dirty beard. There you go. I started early.

10:56

Very cool. All right. Let's get into some newsy news. We only got one story for you tonight, let's do it.

11:02

News, the news, the news, the news, the news, the news, the news, the news, the news, the news, news.

11:10

We got some news. Yes, we do. And it's only going to be one story.

11:15

Like I said, we usually pull two or three for everyone, but obviously going on this week and when this airs in a few days from when we're recording, it'll probably still be going on, but it's obviously what's been on our hearts is

11:26

Ukraine. The, well, they're calling it a war. I mean, Putin is invading sovereign nations.

11:33

We've just seen all kinds of stuff coming out from that. Your boy, Elon Musk, got his

11:38

Starlink over there so they could actually get some internet and communicate. Gosh, man. Which that alone blows my mind.

11:46

There's a private citizen that owns one guy and he's like helping geopolitics.

11:52

I'm wondering if they don't sit him down and go, yeah, stop, stop getting in the middle of what you can do, you know, international affairs.

11:59

Right. Right. But, but it, I mean, it's awesome that he can, you know, kind of, I mean, sure, depending,

12:04

I mean, but it seems like, it seems like, and again, I'm not an Elon apologist. I always sound like this on this, on this episode, but man,

12:13

I do love it how he's like trying to actually do things for the world. And he's actually, I honestly came out and said like, he doesn't care about the money that he's making, you know, it's like, yeah, he's the richest man on earth.

12:25

But, but, you know, he's just like, I don't, I don't do this for that. I do this to help people, you know, and you see that.

12:31

So anyway. But yeah. So, I mean, we were, we're not going to get way deep into all of the particulars because I'm not smart enough or an intelligent enough to probably lay it out.

12:42

Me either. But you go back 20, 30 years and you see Putin's, you know, he's, he, heck he annexed

12:47

Crimea as late as 2014 under Obama. And he's, he's had his eye on it. And unfortunately,

12:53

I think he senses some weak leadership from other countries. And what we were talking about before air was, gosh, man, it's such a big missionary presence in the

13:03

Ukraine. Last week, our podcast broke the top 50 in Ukraine. So everyone listening in Ukraine, we appreciate you.

13:10

We love you. We're thinking of you. We're praying for you. But you have believers there. You have non -believers there.

13:16

You have missionaries there. You know, when Paul commands us, remember those that are in the mission field. Remember those that are in prison.

13:23

And war is not a fun thing. Actually, a friend of mine who hosts a lot of my domains for my businesses, he's in, is it

13:29

Belarus? Just North of Ukraine, right? I think that's Belarus. He's right on the border. So the night that the morning that they started bombing, he sent me video out of his apartment and you could see the smoke.

13:41

That's how close he is to that border. And he's doing some reporting for the Monroe News here in Monroe County, but he's sending me back these videos.

13:48

And I mean, he's right there and he goes, yeah, it's, it's a war zone. It's buildings are coming down and they're bombing things and they've taken, you know, over some areas.

13:59

And it's just, man, if nothing else, I wanted to talk about this a little bit just to let people that are in that country, if they happen to come across this podcast as believers,

14:08

I think we can all agree that we're praying for them. We're keeping them in our prayers. The believers and non -believers, both, you know, that was a big thing for me, even when the

14:20

Iraq war, Iraqi freedom and all that was going on as man war tears apart families. I really didn't like the fact of us going in and, you know, droning innocence when we thought that they made a phone call to someone, you know, this is getting into political stuff, but even the party that I, you know, belonged to the political party did not like the fact that I disagreed with some of that stuff just because you go, why does there have to be bloodshed and families torn apart and mothers and fathers killed?

14:46

And that's what's going to be happening here. So we really need to lift those guys up in prayer, I would say.

14:51

Absolutely. Yeah. Do we see an end to this? Do you think it's going to be a short thing? I know a lot of our, you know, we put up something about our pre -mill dispensation.

15:00

It's like, it's begun. It's the end of the world. I have a little bit different of an eschatology on that, but it's definitely something that's a huge shift in the world.

15:07

I mean, yeah, for sure. I mean, the, the, the thing that, you know, you start to think about is just like,

15:12

I, I don't know all the ins and outs of NATO and the treaties that have been signed, but like, this is a humanitarian type situation.

15:21

You know, these are, these are human lives. These are men, women, and children, like you're, like you're saying. And, you know, there, there have been a couple of videos that have been fake that have been put up that we've seen, but there have been some, some real heart wrenching videos that you see of children, you know, leaving their dads and families being torn apart.

15:40

And it's like, you know what, man, like these guys are standing up, you know, to tyranny, like for real, you know, like, like,

15:49

I know, I know the, the, the jab and the virus stuff is, is horrible, you know, but what

15:55

Putin is doing, I mean, this is like, this is next level. I mean, like to hear that there's people dying over there for a man to build his tower, you know, like this, this is just horrible.

16:08

So, but yeah, I think I, I just wanted to kind of throw that in there. Yeah. And what's frustrating about it is they've, they've had a long, long history of corruption in Ukraine.

16:18

They've been democratic since I think 94, 96. But even then they were buying votes and it was all just kind of on the face, right?

16:26

Oh, we have three branches of government, we have a constitution and the prime ministers and the presidents, they would, you know, be in cahoots and, and they just got in the last few years to a president and his name's slipping my mind to where it seemed a little more on the up and up and the people were behind him.

16:41

I mean, even Joe Biden offered to fly him out of there and he said, I need weapons. I don't need a plane ride out of my country.

16:47

I'm going to stand here and defend with my people. And I'm wondering if Putin saw that and said, oh man, they're, they're basically on the right track.

16:55

You know, Romans 13 talks about righteous governments. God instituted righteous governments. If you have a righteous government, it will produce good things, right?

17:05

And when you have a righteous government, it says the unjust is punished. And I think maybe that's what

17:11

Putin saw too and said, well, now's my time to move maybe with who's in office here. You've got a president there that's not putting up with his, you know, his bullying.

17:20

So I think it could become very serious. Have you been following it at all, Jake? Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's been an interesting story.

17:27

And you know, the, the first thing that was really eyeopening to me here in America and in the

17:32

West, it's like, there's been such a war over media and the news. And when, when this began to happen, my first thought was, okay, like I need to,

17:41

I want to find out what's happening. And then you're like, where do I, where, where can

17:46

I trust? Who can I trust? And now there's all of these narratives that are coming out, obviously Putin invading

17:51

Ukraine, but then now you have these competing, if you want to call them competing narratives coming out about Kalinsky, the president of Ukraine and how he's tied in with, you know, all of these, you know,

18:02

I won't go there, but your, your favorite conspiracy theorist people, how he's tied into all these.

18:07

So you have all these mainstream media pushing all of these narratives and you really have to, you know, dig and look and, you know, do your due diligence.

18:18

Otherwise you'll just be swept up into someone else's narrative, you know, and we, you know, we do sets at the house of prayer on Friday nights and that's, that's what we did.

18:29

We, we prayed for Ukraine and the believers there that, you know, God would move them and that they would have, you know, boldness and courage in the face of really, really staring down life and death, you know?

18:41

And it's just, I think it's a situation that we have very little paradigm or grid for, and we'll probably go into the talking about tonight, but we have very little grid or paradigm for in the

18:52

West. Yeah. If any at all. If we even truly understand it. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of crazy because the older I get and the more things you go through and then, you know, and you see the world go through these iterations and things, and then even with this whole disinformation and kind of propaganda stuff over the last three to five years,

19:12

I just go, as a believer, it feels like the great commission is even that much more true.

19:20

Shouldn't we just kind of put our head down, make disciples of nations, preach the gospel. Yeah. And it's like, does it really?

19:26

Cause I mean, I know a lot of believers that love to get into the end time stuff. They love to get into the conspiracy stuff and it goes, but does that change the great commission for me?

19:34

If it's a conspiracy or not, shouldn't I just be, my main goal is to preach the gospel and disciple nations, right?

19:40

And if that's, if that's our commission as believers, then yeah, we might have a, we might have a thinking of, we would like Ukraine to be free so we could go there and do that easier.

19:50

Sure. Right. But at the same time, the commission doesn't change if they're under a communist or a

19:57

Soviet or a, you know, any type of certain rule. That's why we have Christians being beheaded in China year after year after year.

20:05

It's an underground church because they've taken the commission to heart and they said, yeah, it doesn't really matter who's in power or what elites are deciding.

20:15

My job is to disciple nations and preach the gospel. So it's like, I don't know. I don't know if that's just getting older.

20:21

Sometimes it sounds like an excuse not to pay attention to the small details. I'm not saying that. I think that's important, right?

20:27

We should be wise as serpents and gentle as doves, but at the same time, man, it, all that doesn't matter.

20:36

You know, go, let's go read Ecclesiastes when he says it's all, it all doesn't matter. There's one, there's one

20:41

God, there's one gospel, there's one commission. And I think that's really what we should be aiming for in my opinion.

20:47

I don't know. Yeah, no, I agree with that. And I think it's important. If we don't know what the

20:53

Lord has called us to, you know, as, as an individual, there's obviously the general will, the general purpose of God for all believers, but also specifically what the

21:02

Lord is asking us and inviting us into. And we will just get swept up into, you know,

21:08

Lord knows what, and, and even, even referencing to your point, good things. You know what

21:13

I mean? Like we can get so busy doing good things that we actually never do the thing that the

21:20

Lord has asked us to do. And I think that that that's really can be an indictment on, you know,

21:25

I'm not trying to pick on the Western Church, but on the Western Church, we build all these things and we, you know, do these programs.

21:33

We do and do, and we do, and we do. And it's like, well, what really is important when it comes to the gospel?

21:39

What, what really has the Lord commanded us? What really does scripture command us to do? And specifically, what is your role?

21:47

What is your, you know, gifting your invitation from the Lord to do and to partake in what scripture invites us and commands us to do?

21:56

Yeah. I heard a preacher once say, and it stuck with me, this is probably 15 years. And he said, there's a lot of good things that aren't godly.

22:04

That's right. Meaning there's a lot of good things that aren't righteous and holy. He said it was the tree of good and evil, not the tree of holiness and evil.

22:10

Right? So there's a lot of things that you can fill your life up with that are good, but not necessarily righteous, holy, and godly.

22:17

And I think those are distractions. I would agree with you when you're talking about the Western Church. And once again, we don't want to pick on them.

22:24

Jason and I do that enough here on this podcast. We don't do it out of a place of hypocrisy or condescending, but it's like a wake up call.

22:30

Let's get to the real thing here. You know, when we say things like we want to see less pastors and more disciples, it's not because we hate pastors.

22:38

I want to see people discipling people. I want that friend that comes to your church 90 % of the way they're discipled, looking at your life, going, why are you different?

22:47

You know, have a basis of understanding. I don't bring people to church so my pastor can save them. I don't think that's the job of the pastor.

22:54

I'm kind of getting off on a tangent here and we've talked about this before, but I feel like that's kind of what the Western Christian Church does too.

23:00

We do some good things, you know, air quotes, good things, maybe, you know, feed the homeless, you know, help the poor.

23:07

Those are all things we should be doing as believers, right? Absolutely. But then we go, okay, and then put our two hours in a church and go back to living as, you know, almost as atheists, almost as no one in prayer.

23:18

You know, you're a house of prayer. You know, Martin Luther's famous quote was, I don't trust any Christian that doesn't pray four hours a day.

23:25

Now he had some issues too with being a little bit judging, right? Especially towards the end of his life, we won't get into that.

23:31

But he was making a point of, are we in really, are we in communication with God? Which, you know,

23:37

I love the fact that you said we're missionaries and we focus on intercessory prayer. Gosh, I think this world could be turned upside down if Christians, especially in the

23:46

Western church, Christians understood the power of actually being in prayer for extended periods of time.

23:53

Instead of that two minute prayer in the morning, God, I love you at night with your kids. And then you go about your day.

23:59

I mean, it'd be insane if I didn't talk to my wife for 23 and a half hours out of a 24 hour day, just ignored her, living in the house with her.

24:07

I talked to her twice for two minutes each, you know? Why we do that with God, I don't know, but I'm so thankful for you and having that focus on prayer.

24:18

I think it's very important. It is. And it's just, to your point, going back to almost the atheist statement, you know, there are many professing

24:26

Christians who are actually practical atheists. Yeah, I like that. You know what I mean? And what

24:32

I mean by that is their life gives, you know, no room or no reflection of the

24:40

Lord, even though you are a professing Christian. And even though, you know, like you said, you put your time in on Sunday or whatever it might look like.

24:47

But, you know, when we hold that in light of scripture, in light of what we read in the

24:53

Bible, in light of, you know, if we really want our hearts to be convicted, like you referenced earlier, in light of the church in the

25:00

Middle East, in light of the church, the underground church in China, you know, where I just heard a story not long ago where, you know, they have these, they have missionary training grounds in the underground church in China, and they buy them one -way tickets to the

25:14

Middle East. Because the expectation is you're going to go, you're going to preach the gospel, you're going to share the gospel, and it's probably going to cost you your life.

25:22

Wow. And on the way, when you're getting executed, you're going to share the gospel with your executioner. Yeah, I heard that.

25:28

It's crazy. You know, it convicts my heart, and it's like, you know, we just have a, everybody, you know,

25:35

I'm, like I said, we're not trying to pick on everybody, but we just need the church in America, not because I know the church in America, that's why

25:41

I'm talking about it, you know, I don't. Right, we don't know the church in Yemen, although well, right, right, right. You know, and it's like, we need to wake up, you know, and it's a lot of, there's a lot of variables, there's a lot of things as to why we are in the place that we're in, you know what

25:54

I mean, which is a lot of that goes to, you know, poor theology, you know, leaders that may not have the best intentions, share all of these things, personal discipline, you fill in the blanks, right, we could go off.

26:08

Even emphasis on the wrong things, maybe, not necessarily ungodly things, but the emphasis maybe on the wrong place.

26:14

Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right, so I know that, and to tie all that up, when we really commit to spending time before the

26:23

Lord in prayer, that's when the Lord reveals those things in our heart, right, you know, and begins to work and begins to purify our heart, you know, and so that's what the

26:32

Lord is after, those who have clean hands and a pure heart. Yeah, so what started this whole episode, let's get into it for a little bit.

26:37

I was sent a clip of you speaking at your church, and it just, the way you phrased it just really rung true with me, you were talking about suffering, and you said something to the effect, you were talking out of,

26:49

I believe, 1 Peter 4, and I tried to pull the audio on it, but the keyboard player, she was, that audio was loud, man, she was still going strong when you were talking, so I couldn't really grab that, and God bless her,

26:59

I'm a keyboard player too, when I'm in the middle of worship, I might play a little too loud too, but that's okay. But you said something to the effect of, you know, this is the only time we have, our time of suffering here on earth is really the only time we have to really glorify

27:13

God, when we get into glory, that time will be over. Maybe you can say it a little bit better, but can you talk about that, what you said in that clip a little bit, and then that'll give us that jumping off point into talking about suffering tonight.

27:26

Sure, yeah, I just, basically I just gave an exhortation, and like Greg said, out of 1

27:32

Peter. By the way, really quick, when you said exhortation, you had me, no one uses that word anymore properly, it's always,

27:39

I have a word from God, okay, that's fine, but an exhortation, I just love that word, it's an uplifting, it's a building, and what did you, okay,

27:46

I'm gonna give you props again here too, I'm not being judging to anyone else, but you said, I have an exhortation, and what's the first thing you did, you went right to the word of God.

27:52

Before you started saying what, you know, your opinion, it was like, here's the foundation, so anyone listening, if you got an exhortation out there, start with the word of God.

28:00

Don't start with your dog joke, you know, don't tell us about your dog. Right, exactly, but anyway,

28:06

I'm sorry, we were in a group there, I just had an interruption, I'll tell you that. Yeah, so, the whole premise of, in that moment, giving that exhortation was, if we're not prepared, you know, to face suffering, and suffering in, like we were talking before the show started, whatever that looks like, you know, it can look, it looks different for every person, but ultimately, if we're not prepared and understand the beauty of suffering that actually molds us into the image of Christ, then we will miss the opportunity, and like you referenced, that opportunity, this life is the only time that we have that opportunity, is to actually walk through the suffering and the hardship and the trial that life brings, that we would actually be molded into the image of Christ.

28:54

And because, like you said, once we die and we stand before the Lord, you know, that opportunity is gone, and I think sometimes, you know, we just, we're basically stuck in this prayer cycle of get me out of this, get me out of this, get me out of this, instead of asking the

29:09

Lord, what are you showing me, what are you teaching me, you know, how are you refining me, how are you pruning me in this, you know, whatever it is that we're going through, and, you know,

29:19

I grew up, you know, I know that this will get you guys going, I grew up hardline

29:26

Pentecostal, okay, hardline Pentecostal, religious hardline Pentecostal, and so, you know, there's a lot of, you know, just funky theologies there, a lot of emotionalism, and all of those things.

29:38

We got some on the Reform side too, don't worry. Yeah, yeah. It's all about biblical moderation. Paul Washer. Hey, how dare you?

29:47

We don't need to fight, yeah, people will come. 1 ,800 people just tuned out. I know, I'm just joking, everyone, jeez.

29:54

People will come for you in the comments. Sorry, go ahead, Jack. Yeah, so, but anyway, it's just working through some of that, you know,

30:03

I don't want to call it false theology, but just things like, to your point earlier, where maybe the emphasis was in the wrong place, where we're highlighting the wrong things, where we're spending our time, where we're spending our money, where we're placing our effort and our energy.

30:16

And so, I just think it's very important that we understand that the entire purpose of our life is to be molded into the image of Christ.

30:26

Correct. Period. Yeah. And so, and everything else is a byproduct. I heard a pastor say one time,

30:34

Christianity is beholding Jesus. When we read the Bible, it is to behold

30:40

Jesus. When we worship, it is to behold Jesus. When we preach, when we teach, it is to behold

30:46

Jesus and that others would behold Jesus. And so, when we do that, I think it puts us in the mind frame and in the proper heart posture of saying,

30:57

Jesus, even if this suffering, even if this hardship that I'm going through, if it molds me into your image, I'm in.

31:03

Yeah. Yeah. Amen. Yeah. For me, it's one of my favorite references when you have

31:10

Shadrach, Neshach, and Abednego. They say, my God will save me. My God can save me. But even if he doesn't.

31:16

I just love that caveat. Those words. Those words. Even if he doesn't. Why did they say that? They knew he would save.

31:22

They had 100 % faith. If you're a faith preacher, they had it.

31:30

He will. He can. But even if he doesn't, and that was the faith, it doesn't matter.

31:35

My life is in his hands, whatever type of suffering I go through. And Jason and I were talking about this before the show too.

31:43

That shows up in a lot of different ways. And I don't want to belittle some of that when we say, oh, there's people in prison and dying for the faith.

31:50

I get that. But also, like you were saying, there's financial hardship that's real.

31:56

There's emotional hardship that's real. There's physical hardships.

32:01

It's just not about physical healing and things like that. One of the biggest issues

32:07

I have with kind of the faith healers is just automatically assuming that God wants them healed right there at that moment, at that time.

32:14

When there could be all kinds of issues behind that. Now, we see Christ work through some stuff with people before he healed and after.

32:23

And it's kind of, you know, it's his will, not our will type thing. But there's all kinds of hardships that we go through, like you were saying,

32:29

Jason. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I mean, I remember a movie that I saw a few years ago called

32:35

Finger of God. I think it was the second one. And at the end, I saw this girl after all these people had been, you know, either healed or, you know, whatever may have happened there, placebo effect or whatever, but she was still in her wheelchair.

32:53

And she just, you know, she didn't understand why, like why that was happening to her.

32:59

In that moment is what was kind of coming through, you know, what she was saying.

33:04

And it was just, I'm just sitting there going, man, the things that the church, and again,

33:11

I'm not pointing the finger at everyone here, but certain sectors of the church have just given this false, you know, caveat of, hey, you're supposed to be healed.

33:26

You know, and it's like, it turns into a workspace. You know, what did I not do right?

33:32

Sure. What did I not do right to have a baby? You know, why can't I have a baby, God? What did

33:37

I do? You know, why can't I get out of this wheelchair? What did I do to you? You know, why am I broke?

33:43

Why can't I take care of my brother if he's in need, if he needs to go to Ukraine to help out? Why can't

33:49

I, you know, like, and there's a lot of I questions there, but it's like, you know, you get into that mode if you don't realize that, you know, if you're in that valley, it's okay.

34:01

You know, like. I'll read the Psalms, man. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, from David, I mean. Right. I mean, you could go all the way through this.

34:09

Every two minutes. Scriptures, but yeah, man. I mean, it's just one of those incredible,

34:14

I don't know, just things that happens in the church, and it just kind of saddens you too that maybe certain people haven't been shown, hey, when you're in that valley, praise him.

34:28

Try that. Like, try that in that suffering, you know? And if you do ask for grace to get out of it, guess what?

34:36

You might be back in it to learn the rest of that lesson, because I've been there, you know? Like, I'll get out of that valley, and all of a sudden,

34:43

I'm like, all right, everything's cool. And then all of a sudden, God's just like, hold on a second. There's a couple things you didn't realize, you know?

34:50

But anyway. What do you guys think about this? Let me ask you, because I've been following this for a long time. I feel like we might be trending that way more, more towards a more biblical truth of praising him and glorifying him in our suffering, which

35:04

I think is more biblical than God doesn't ever want you to suffer. He doesn't ever want you to be sick. He doesn't ever, right?

35:10

Just in like mainstream evangelicalism, just from like worship songs coming out, sermons that I'm seeing from people that I maybe formerly didn't really align with.

35:21

I feel like we're trending that way a little bit. Do you guys think that? I see the reformation happening. There's still going to be the crazies out there.

35:28

We're still Kenneth Copeland talking about tube demons in the airplane, and hey, you need to say, Creflo Dollar and those guys.

35:35

And I don't know where you stand on those, but we don't like it when you're bilking people in the name of God. And that's where at least

35:40

I stand on that. But I feel like overall, and I don't know what it is. I think

35:46

I do know what it is. I think anytime you have believers coming under persecution, that is a, like you were saying, that is a process of refinement.

35:55

Church has always survived under persecution. There's a little bit of me that goes, we see all this stuff. Oh, I can't do this. I can't do that.

36:01

They're coming down on Christians. And I go, this might be the greatest reformation and revival of the

36:06

Western Christian church we've seen in 200 years. If we just get a little persecution, if we just get a little non -privilege, because we've had it too good for too long.

36:16

And sometimes I think that puts us in a place of David counting his men, right? Like, go take a census.

36:22

I did that. Next thing, boom, he falls. And it's like, cause it's not about us. I mean, but do you feel like that?

36:27

I mean, I don't know. You're probably more connected to the being in, being a pastor and, you know, kind of in that, in that mainstream kind of evangelicalism and keeping tabs on all that.

36:36

Does it feel like we're kind of trending a little more towards that? Look at, yeah, we are to praise him in our suffering.

36:42

Yeah. You know, or no, am I just? No, no. Or is that just wishful thinking on my part?

36:48

I definitely think we're in judgment, but yeah, I mean. No, I agree wholeheartedly with what you're saying.

36:53

For a good thing. Yeah. And, you know, and to your point, you have to make a decision.

37:01

Ultimately, you know, if you walk with the Lord, if you're a professing Christian for long enough and you walk and you go through things and you see things in your community and your family and your church and your church family and all these things, ultimately, if you're honest with yourself, you have to ask yourself those questions.

37:16

You have to walk through that and you have to say, okay, we're at a moment here where things are difficult, whether it's personally, whether it's in your family, whether it's the nation or the nations at large, and you begin to ask these questions.

37:29

Is God still who he says he is? Is the word of God still true?

37:34

Am I going to believe that? Or, which you're also seeing this in mass to your point, am

37:39

I going to get offended and bitter because God didn't do or act or in a manner in which

37:45

I thought he should or did and I'm going to get mad at these people and these people and this leadership, et cetera, and I'm going to, kind of, drift away and really be led into delusion.

37:55

Because the scripture in Thessalonians, it says that because they loved not the truth.

38:02

There's a difference between people understanding and receiving truth and then using that truth, specifically scripture, to just beat people over the head with and pound people into submission and prove your arguments, right?

38:19

That's, you know, the Bible is true. But there's also a place where you can actually love the truth.

38:26

You have it in your heart. You have a love for the truth that's pure and it's holy unto the

38:31

Lord. And the scripture says because, which this right here will ruin a lot of people's theology, because they did not have a love for the truth,

38:41

God sent them, God sent them a strong delusion. You know, and so there's a point where we really have to, rubber meets the road, and what we read things in scripture, we read the

38:53

Bible and we're like, I don't like that. Yeah. My opinion is different than that. I don't agree with that.

38:58

And are you going to submit to God's word? Or are you going to bend that thing until it fits, you know, your lifestyle or your preference or your opinion?

39:08

And to finish up on your point, I think by the hand of God, he's saying, okay, we're no longer doing that.

39:16

Like, you're going to come into alignment with my word and you're going to hide it in your heart that you would not sin against me.

39:23

Or you're going to have a lot of hardship, a lot of problems. You're going to find a lot of offense, a lot of bitterness, all of these things that we've all encountered, that we've all seen, that we've all had to work through in our own heart.

39:33

Yeah. And so I think you're 100 % correct. And I think it's being done by the hand of the

39:40

Lord. That's the scariest verse in the Bible to me is Matthew 7, 23.

39:47

Depart from me, you work of iniquity. I never knew you. Yeah.

39:53

And to your point too, I heard a pastor say years ago, if you're using theology like a sledgehammer and not a scalpel, you don't understand theology at all.

40:02

And it really, it really pricked my heart because I was in my late 20s, closet kind of cage stage, like I'm going to tell everyone the truth and they need to know it because I love the truth.

40:15

And did you love the truth? Because you love the truth? Yeah. Or did you love the truth because you wanted to be right? You wanted to argue, you wanted to seem smarter, you wanted to have the last word.

40:24

And the Lord really had to remove that from me. I mean, I think we have to do everything in grace, like you were saying too. But you just made me think too, man.

40:32

It's like, I do not envy people in ministry if they call themselves a shepherd or a pastor or a minister, because the level of offense with the sheep, it's like, if you don't say the right thing or do the right thing, they're like,

40:44

I'm out of here. I'm leaving the church. And then they go talk about you. It's like, and this isn't going to, I don't want to start, you know, just dogging on people that are, that are doing that.

40:51

But it's like, golly, we're in a culture right now. Like you said, that is so ready for offense, you know?

40:59

And you said, that's like, just, you kind of just pick and choose what you want to read in the Bible to where Christ was like, he was the one that is, is the one man,

41:06

God that should, should never have had anything come against him. And he still didn't take offense.

41:12

How much more should we, within our sin, when someone offends us, forgive and we're commanded to.

41:19

And boy, man, that's another one too. I know it's kind of off the subject of suffering, but it's like, just ready to be offended at any time.

41:26

Christians and non -Christians, believers and non -believers. It's insane right now. Yeah. How it's like, boom, right?

41:32

Social media, man. That's part of it too. Right? You can say one little thing. I mean, it could be about a cheeseburger.

41:39

Somebody's just going to get after you. Are you serious? Five guys, five guys, really?

41:47

You're like the impossible whopper, you hippie. You know, I eat meat, you know, it never ends. But I think that goes back to what we were saying earlier in the episode too, about prayer.

41:55

If you spend any amount of time before an all -righteous, all -holy, sovereign

42:00

God who's fully just, fully loving, all those things, and you're spending time in his presence and prayer, it is really hard to come out of that and then be instantly offended because of who you were just in the presence of.

42:13

You know what I mean? And it's like, maybe that's the reflection of the culture too, of just, we are not in communion with Christ like we should be.

42:21

And then that offense is built up, which, you know, even goes into what

42:27

I'm looking at when you see a lot of feeling forward stuff, you know? If I feel a certain way, it's like, well,

42:33

Jeremiah tells us that our heart's deceitful among all things. Don't trust it. Don't look at it. Don't trust your feelings. It's the biggest sinner you have.

42:40

And yet everything is very, this is how I feel. And emotions are good. God created them, all that.

42:46

I want to put that precursor in there. We'll get hate mail going. You guys hate it when people cry or laugh.

42:51

No, I've experienced joy and sadness and anger and all those things. And the Lord has provided those emotions for us.

42:58

The object is to reflect that and bring glory to him and all those things. But it's just, yeah, the culture of offense and then suffering, it's like,

43:09

I feel like we're just so in far left field. And is it because we just have too much good?

43:15

I mean, we got it so good here in relation to other globally. Let's take every country and look at it.

43:21

Not just my state, my county, like against the backdrop of history and the globe.

43:26

We've got it pretty darn good still as Christians in America. Don't we? Yeah, absolutely. And does that skew our perception of what suffering is?

43:36

I feel like we got everything we want. Our suffering is like, I didn't get approved for that loan for that $50 ,000 car

43:44

I can't afford. God, what's going on? Yeah, that's an extreme example. But it's like, is that, you know what

43:49

I mean? Is that really suffering? Is it really suffering? It's like, I don't know, man. It's like, well, one other thing

43:57

I also wanted to touch on. I know it's, I know it's flying by. Yeah, I can't believe it's already been 44 minutes.

44:06

Something that I've been noticing more and more, and Greg and I were talking about this again earlier, and Jake, maybe you could kind of touch on it, but men in the church being afraid of those feelings that he just talked about.

44:22

Men being afraid to be like, you know, I'm not doing good. You know, men that are afraid or just push aside those things that are really going on in their marriage, in their life.

44:35

They're, you know, like their day -to -day, their secret sin, their offense, all that, their job, you know, maybe they're about to get fired or, you know, they don't know what's happening.

44:43

Measuring up. Yeah, or maybe something's going on with their kids or whatever it is, you know? And it's like,

44:48

I mean, I don't know. I just, I just really would love to see people have more community in that, like men coming together and, you know, being able to share those things and walk through those things rather than feeling like they need to go through that with a hard head and a hard heart, you know, because I mean, suffering, it's hard to walk through by yourself, you know, for one.

45:16

And we're not called to as believers either. Exactly, exactly. But I don't know, are there things that you've seen within the community with that?

45:24

Yeah, our church started, and I didn't start it.

45:30

I was there, but I didn't start it. But we had a, you know, just to answer your question about the desire and the need for that, both.

45:36

There is a need, and there actually are men that are like, we need this. And they started our men's ministry last night.

45:44

They kind of kicked it off again last night after a long pause. And there was like 65 guys there, you know what

45:51

I mean? And it's a testament to, one, I believe the pressure and, you know, the frustrations that men are feeling, but also on a spiritual side, you know, it's an ultimate strategy of the enemy, you know, from a multitude of fronts.

46:11

But ultimately, if you attack the husband, if you attack the father, then really the rest kind of disintegrates, you know.

46:19

And then from a spiritual perspective, and I know this is a testimony of my, you know, I was raised by my mom. So really rough relationship with my father.

46:27

We're since reconciled, but growing up, I didn't have that. And so, you know, like when I was born, when

46:32

I became born again, like Jesus, I was cool with, Holy Spirit, I was cool with. But when they began to talk about, and when

46:39

I began to read about the attributes and the nature of God the Father, I'm like, I can't relate to that.

46:44

I don't know what that is. I don't, you know what I mean? Like I have no paradigm or no grid for that.

46:51

And so, and I think that there are many, many men who are out there, even if you had a father in the home who was just absent or, you know, you fill in the blank, that ultimately, whether we're conscious of it or not, we project that.

47:05

Oh, we project that. We view God the Father through our earthly father, through the prism of how we related to our fathers.

47:12

Absolutely. Yeah. Most Christians do. Yeah. Which is really rough thing because God can't be compared to an earthly father, first of all, in that sense.

47:21

But it's like, so we'll take it like you were saying, we'll take it. My dad was stern. God's stern. He stands for, you know, law and order and justice and all.

47:29

He does. But if you, you know, or an overloving father, right? Oh, God's all love. And you go to these extremes by seeing

47:36

God the Father, who's all those attributes equally. And we kind of exaggerate one of those because our earthly father is that way.

47:44

I think that's a real issue. But to Jason's point, yeah, absolutely, man. I think

47:50

God made us man and woman unique, different. That's not popular to say now, you know, in this culture.

47:57

But it's like, I think men suffer a little differently than women and women suffer a little differently than men.

48:03

I think that's why it is good to have groups and ministries and things that are, that are, you know, focused on the different sexes.

48:13

Because I think there is an extra added cultural pressure, right? Like, dude, if you're a guy and you got a family and you're the head of your house and all this, you can't be, you're not supposed,

48:23

I say can't be, you're not supposed to be running around talking about, oh, I feel down. I feel depressed. I don't know if I can get through this.

48:29

And it's like, yeah, you are. That's what the Bible says. Go to one another in fellowship, right? Not only confess our sins, but talk about your troubles.

48:37

And how can we glorify God in this situation? How can I disciple you and you disciple me in iron sharpening iron?

48:44

And I think that's a big thing on suffering too, especially for men. Most of our listeners are probably men. I think last time

48:49

I checked. And so if you're listening right now, that's another thing to where it's like, you can't let the culture pressure you into acting a certain way.

48:57

That's outside of how biblical man is supposed to act. Yeah, that's right. Because sometimes I feel like we've said a lot of times, we sometimes allow the gospel to bow to the culture.

49:08

When in fact, it's the culture that's bows to the gospel. That's right. You know, and kind of like what you were saying earlier, where we kind of misinterpret or take parts of the

49:15

Bible. I like this. I don't like that. You know, it's the cherry picking, right? Deconstruction movement, you know.

49:22

But I think that's a big component of it too, of being, of suffering is also falling into the cultural trap of how you're supposed to respond to suffering.

49:32

And here's the reality. If we, if men in general, if we put all of our struggles and, you know, sin issues in the middle of the table, they would all be the same.

49:43

Really close. I mean, sure, there would be some, you know, details that are different or whatever, but it's like, it's just that hurdle, that first step of getting over, you know, being vulnerable enough to expose yourself to, you know, and that's the beauty and the importance of community and why we desperately need it.

50:00

Why scripture is like, you don't do this alone. You know, like if you think about God himself,

50:06

God himself exists, father, son, and spirit, you know. And it's like, he didn't have to do that.

50:12

He could have did it any way he wanted. And that's the call to community in us.

50:18

We're social creatures by design. Yeah. You know, and I'm an introvert by nature, but I know like when

50:23

I, sometimes I start to get, you know, a certain way, I'm like, okay, I need to get around people, have a conversation and like be edified and be encouraged, you know?

50:31

And so. You give my wife a good book in the house to herself. She may never come out.

50:36

And I'm like, why haven't we done anything in two hours? I'm extreme extrovert. She's extreme introvert.

50:42

And that's right. But noticing that, like I didn't mean to interrupt you, but like understanding your personality. And you know, my wife, we talk about this all the time because she's like, when you become a new creature in Christ, that's why we don't really take stock in those personality tests and things like that.

50:55

Like you are a new creature. He takes those personalities that he gave you, those gifts, those things. And we, and we do it onto the glory of God.

51:01

We, you know what I mean? We don't try not to go to those extremes anymore. The extreme introvert, the extreme extrovert, which

51:08

I don't know if I can say anything. I started a dang podcast where we talk for hours every week. Yeah. And it's funny because you're extrovert and I am more of an introvert.

51:16

A little more, but it works. I know, right? Somehow. Yeah. It's nice because when

51:21

Jason says something, everyone listens to introverts. I've noticed that. Like when my wife says something, everyone peeks.

51:27

Oh, okay. And it's usually wise. She's a very wise woman. But at the same time I go, oh gosh,

51:32

I wish people would listen to me when I talk. You're always talking. Like, why would we listen? You say 10 ,000 words a minute.

51:39

It's biblical. It's in Proverbs, right? Many words and sin is not absent. Oh, man.

51:45

Thanks for calling me out, Jake. But I think that's part of suffering too, is like understanding your weaknesses and things like that.

51:54

Like you said, if all men came together, we'd probably have a lot of the same stuff. But recognizing those deficiencies in our walk too,

52:04

I think can help eliminate some of that suffering. I think we haven't touched on this yet and we'll wrap it up here shortly. But like we don't talk about the pragmatic part of sometimes we cause our own sufferings because we're walking outside of the will of God.

52:17

We go, why did this happen in God's court? Well, here, I gave you a whole book that tells you why it happened right there.

52:23

You're not being attacked by the devil. You just make bad decisions. You just make, right. That's a good meme.

52:30

I think we put that meme up. Is it a meme? Okay. I put one up. It's sometimes that, right? Right, right. Sometimes I think people like to blame the devil.

52:37

Oh, the devil. It's like, well, no, you made a decision. You walked on ice and that's why you fell.

52:42

That's the consequence, right? So there's some of that too, when we're addressing that. And that's why

52:49

I said, like we said, the great commission at the very beginning, like discipleship is so important, man. Like, you know, the world calls it mentorship.

52:56

Christ said disciple first, then preach the gospel. It's crazy how he put that order on it. And I'm not saying that technically means one's more important than the other, but I find it a little funny that it's disciple, preach the gospel.

53:07

What does that mean? Wouldn't it be preach the gospel, then disciple? No, go out and disciple and teach and reflect who

53:15

I am. Like you were saying, right? Like behold me, man, if we just got to that point, the preaching the gospel part is the easy part then.

53:24

Well, he's already living the life. He's already reflecting Christ. And that's kind of how I've been with like proselytizing and things like that.

53:30

Like, I'm just not a big, shove it down your throat, kind of in your face. And look,

53:35

I love my street preachers. That's what we're doing. We had guys on that do the end abortion now and all that.

53:41

And they're on the corner and they do it graciously. But at the same time, it's like, I've had people come up to me and they say, you're a believer.

53:48

Yeah, well, give me your spiel. And it's like, well, no, my life is supposed to reflect my spiel, right?

53:53

And I've actually had people come up to me months later. Why do you do that? Or why don't you do that? Or why won't you go there?

53:59

And then it's like, oh, then the conversation's open. Let's sit down and talk. And now I can say, well, this is why, because I got a book that tells me how the world was created.

54:07

And we're a little bit off. And this brings me back into alignment with how, you know, and those big ideas can then be broken down into real life, pragmatic things.

54:17

And for me, it's been, I don't know. And the Lord saves in a million different ways. I'm not saying there's any one right way.

54:23

He said, preach the gospel, right? I don't know if that's on a street corner or having coffee with someone at Starbucks. My point is, is if you're speaking truth and you're speaking the truth of the word, it doesn't go void, right?

54:34

Yeah. And I think oftentimes we have a short sighted view of discipleship. And what

54:40

I mean by that is, if you look at the life of Jesus, how many people did Jesus disciple? You know, he wasn't running to and fro trying to gather crowds.

54:51

And, you know, and frankly, it's the opposite. If you really pay attention in scripture, almost every time in the gospel where it was like a great crowd came,

55:01

Jesus is like, all right, watch this teaching. Unless you eat my flesh. Right, he got real weird real quick.

55:07

And people are like, yeah, I'm out of here. Yeah. But what I mean by short sighted and discipleship is like, you know, okay, let's look at your kids.

55:15

If you think generationally, which is a whole other conference, I've been teaching on this a lot.

55:21

Are you post -mill? What do you mean by that? You're eschatology. And what do you mean by that?

55:27

Like pre -millennium, post -millennium. So here's - Pre -omnipotent. That's out of nowhere.

55:33

So you're saying generation to generation. So I like that. Yeah, so - Like generational is great.

55:39

And I don't - Like you won't hide in your closet. You're not hiding in your closet. You're not being like, oh -

55:44

Wait for Jesus to come? Yeah, Jesus is coming in any second. Post -rapture for sure. Yeah. Yeah, or post -tribulation for sure.

55:52

And, you know, when you get into that eschatology, it goes back to suffering. We can talk about that if you want. But if you're talking about why people have a hard time with suffering, if you have a pre -tribulation theology, it's probably going to contribute to, wait a minute, why am

56:11

I walking through all of this suffering? Why am I having a hard time with this? And it's like, that's because in your heart, you have not prepared.

56:21

And when I was in seminary, I went to a very conservative seminary that was pre -trib.

56:27

Yeah. And I'm like, I'm not pre -trib. Yeah. You know, and I would get, you know, and I'm like, they're like, well, you know, they would give me the spiel.

56:34

And I always had one question. I said, that's fine. Like, if you believe we still be brothers and sisters in the

56:41

Lord, that's fine. I said, but take that. If that's true for you, then that must be true for the body of Christ around the earth.

56:50

Yeah. So take that to the underground church in China, take that to the church in the

56:56

Middle East and say - Turkey, Yemen, all those places. Don't worry, the Lord's going to get you out of here. And you're like, well,

57:01

I just watched my family lose their heads. Yeah. So, you know, in - Plus what a disservice it does to all of our church fathers and martyrs up until that point.

57:10

Yeah, yeah. And like I said, that's a whole other conversation, but - You were talking about discipleship.

57:15

Yeah. Going back to - Where Jason got those crazy eyes for Postville. Yeah, he's a - Generational discipleship. Well, when he started talking about generational,

57:22

I'm like, cool. Right, right, right. Let's do this. So we're supposed to do some work while we're on the earth.

57:29

So the Great Commission makes it, you know, it's supposed to happen. No, no, absolutely. We can have an eschatology discussion.

57:37

I think of my children, right? And you're like, you know, I'm almost 40.

57:43

I'm in my late 30s. So it's like when I'm not going to see my great -grandkids grow up, you know, barring a miracle of the

57:50

Lord. So it's like discipleship -wise, what can

57:55

I impart to my children? How can I disciple my children that my posterity would actually walk in the ways of the

58:03

Lord? Yeah. You know, it's not this - When I'm gone. Yeah, yeah. When I'm dead and with the

58:08

Lord, you know, by God's grace, that my, you know, and that's a prayer that I pray often, that my posterity that I will never see, that I will never know, you know, on this side of glory, that they would serve and that they would know the

58:24

Lord. And so from a discipleship perspective, whether it's your own children or other people as well, and oftentimes we get caught in the numbers game, right?

58:32

You know what I mean? Especially when you're talking about the metrics and the quantitative things of church and Western church and American church, et cetera.

58:39

But it's like, you know, if you look at what's really humbling is when you look at the life of Christ, you know what

58:45

I mean? He had his disciples and yes, he ministered. He had great crowds. He had other people as well.

58:51

But if you look at the core of his ministry, he poured into these small group of guys and trusted that what

59:00

I impart to them through discipleship, through, you know, my life, through them observing me, through them walking with me, that it's actually enough that they will go and turn the world upside down.

59:10

And so it's like, if we took that mindset of like, okay, when that's your point, if it's that coffee, if it's that coworker, if it's your family member or whatever, like, and I know that the

59:20

Lord is prompting me to disciple this person. If I do it from the context of, it's actually not about,

59:25

I need to get this guy saved so that he can get to heaven, like, that's beautiful. But what impact is this guy or this woman going to have on their people, on their generations, on their kids, you know?

59:36

And so when we take a look at that, we kind of, it gives us a longer view as opposed to like, well, you know,

59:44

I'm only discipling two guys right now. Does that make, you know what I mean? You know, so I don't know if that makes sense.

59:50

Okay. You're declaring it here. It's crazy because I was, man, geez, we're just coming up with so many good subjects here.

01:00:00

I know we need to wrap it up, but, you know, even five or eight years, five or eight years ago, I was like, oh, eschatology and type stuff.

01:00:06

It doesn't matter. We just go out there, follow the commission, like preach the gospel. I'm not getting into all that. And then

01:00:12

I started to realize that sometimes when what you believe in your end times, you know, eschatology.

01:00:18

That's what's changed me. It can kind of change how you do the great commission, how you disciple, how you preach the gospel.

01:00:24

If I'm a, you know, if I'm one of those pre -mill kind of pre -rapture, like, hey man,

01:00:30

I'm just going to hold up and wait for God to take me out of here because I got the ticket. It's like, I don't know if that's the greatest.

01:00:35

Then again, we have guys like John McArthur, famously reformed. He's pre -mill, but it doesn't, he doesn't take that attitude with it.

01:00:42

Like, I'm going to keep preaching to the day I die and not close down my church in California. Right. I probably don't land on pre -mill.

01:00:49

I'd probably land somewhere else. But my point is, is those are secondary issues. It's like you were saying, like we can still call them brothers in Christ.

01:00:55

Hey, that's awesome. But at the same time, if it's affecting the way that you live day to day, that's where it gets a little sticky for me.

01:01:03

And I'm like, okay, that does. There is some importance to understanding when Christ will rule and reign, what he was talking about in Matthew 24, you know, all those types of things.

01:01:13

Because if I have a skewed version of that and just go, you know, anything, eschatology or anything that causes me to say,

01:01:20

I'm just going to stick my head in the sand until the Lord raptures me out of here. Yeah. Whatever that is.

01:01:25

Yeah. It's not, it's probably not good. It's probably not really biblical. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. And if you want a case study on that, all you have to do is look at the

01:01:34

Jesus people movement. Yeah. Yeah. Because, you know, you had these massive, massive amounts of people being saved and the prevalent theology that they were being taught was at any moment.

01:01:46

Yeah. Twinkling of an angel. At any moment, we're out of here. Yeah. So they - The Nakey Rapture is what

01:01:52

I call it. We all lose our clothes. Yeah. We're in the sky like, what the, what is going on?

01:01:58

This is weird. Yeah. We try to keep it light here with heavy subjects.

01:02:05

Jason does that very well. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. And so when you look at that, that study and it, you know, there's a great book, it's called

01:02:11

God's Forever Family. But if you look at, if you look at that theology that, because they, when they got born again, they were born again.

01:02:21

Yeah. They were like, what's the Bible say? We're doing it. Right. Yeah. And they're like, and then they begin to sit under these teachers that begin to teach, you know, this pre -tribulation, like the, you know, before all this stuff comes, the

01:02:34

Lord's going to, you know, zip us out of here. Yeah. And so this is when you begin to see the birthing of like communal living.

01:02:42

And, you know, like we're just going to live together and we're going to pray and we're going to try to get as many people saved as we can.

01:02:47

And we're going to prepare. Yeah. And then - Bring them into the commune and not really go outside of our four walls. Yeah. And we're out of here.

01:02:53

So it's just, you know, to your point, that's, you're exactly right. And how do you disciple generationally with that type of outlook?

01:03:00

Like you were saying, there's no next generation. And just a Postmill point, like the, there are some crazy

01:03:07

Postmill. Like, sure. There's like a couple of different views on the Postmill, like Bethel's Postmill, but that's not what we ascribe to here.

01:03:19

But you're digging deep enough to any doctrine or theology. You're going to find some extremes and there's going to be some people, you know, it's like, man, well, first I think it's,

01:03:30

I know this sounds so cheesy, but I keep saying it. Like the older I get, the more I'm like, the Bible is all about moderation.

01:03:36

Everything is moderation. There's really, I don't sound, we can preach a sermon that says Christ was extreme.

01:03:42

He was, but I'm saying the extremes of those doctrines. Usually I land kind of in a moderate place.

01:03:49

Yes. God is 100 % love and he's also 100 % justice, but he's both of those things.

01:03:55

I can't serve a God that just loves me to no end and doesn't hold me responsible. But I also don't serve a

01:04:01

God that drops a piano on my head every time I mess up. So like, where does that leave me? That leaves me with a biblical heavenly father that is both of those things all the time, 100 % in his fullness and attributes.

01:04:12

What does that look like? And that's where, you know, we have fun calling out those extremes because you just go, when you kind of get to that center of that balanced biblical view of who

01:04:21

God is, you go, gosh, we got these extremes everywhere. It's like politics or anything else where we're just accentuating one portion of who

01:04:30

God is or suffering or discipleship and it's like, you get way off real quick.

01:04:35

I don't know if this is new. I mean, I was regenerated probably four years ago and I grew up in the church and whatnot, but all of a sudden now it's like, well, it was a say the

01:04:44

Greek. And you're like, come on, man. Like, do you really speak Greek? Can you really speak

01:04:49

Greek to me right now? Like that it'll be somebody else that's like, yeah, well, he doesn't, you know, that's not what it means in the

01:04:56

Greek. And it's like, this guy teaches Greek. Like that one episode with Dr.

01:05:03

White, Dr. White was like, I don't need a strong concordance. I speak Greek. Yeah. And the guy was like, do you know what that means?

01:05:09

You should get you a strong concordance. Yeah. I don't think that means we shouldn't aspire to learn more about languages or deeper.

01:05:18

It's like, everybody's like the internet police, you know? And it's like, oh, well, I saw this.

01:05:24

I saw this thing. So all of a sudden I'm going to fight this point. And it's like, well, okay, man, that's not over.

01:05:30

I feel like the biggest thing right now is just being, we're so fast and it's so easy just to take a verse or two out of context.

01:05:37

Yeah. And there's no hermeneutic there. Yeah. There's no like verse chapter and heck it's a whole letter. We didn't have chapters, you know, 500 years, 700 years ago, whatever it was when that priest on the run started writing it down.

01:05:48

But it's like verse check. It's like, you have to go small and then go big verse, chapter, letter, you know, covenant.

01:05:56

Yeah. Whole redemption plan. Like if that fits, if all those fit into the, how you're interpreting that verse, then you're probably good.

01:06:03

Yeah. But it's like, boy, are we quick to take a verse and just use it? You know, I call them the

01:06:08

Google theologians. You know, they just go, oh yeah. Top 50 things about this subject. And then, oh yeah, that verse.

01:06:14

And it's like, dude, dude, let's get it in context, man. You know, now I think this is going to de -evolve into us complaining about everything we hate about the internet.

01:06:23

You do need a system. You need a systematic study though of, you know, systematic approach. Yeah. If we don't have that, then we can find, you know, all of us, we can find ourselves leaning one way or the other, you know.

01:06:34

And if we don't, to your initial point, if we don't embrace the tension and the paradox of scripture, we will drive ourselves crazy.

01:06:45

Yeah. And I mean, I've literally seen people go crazy trying to figure out like the

01:06:52

Bible. You know what I mean? Like, nope, this is the day and the hour and you take this and you put this and it's like, you know, you have to, like, yes, we study to show ourself approved and also embrace the mystery of God.

01:07:08

You know what I mean? It's the paradox. And it's not either or. It's yes, both, and more.

01:07:14

You know, it's like, you know, all of these, we could quote many of these scriptures. That's like, obey and honor your mother and father that your days may be long.

01:07:22

And then Jesus is like, unless you hate your mother and father. Yeah. And we're like, oh, you know, like if we don't understand, you know, the context, we don't understand what

01:07:30

Jesus is saying. Gouge out your eye, cut off your hand. Yeah. All of those things. Take it off.

01:07:38

All right. Let's put a bookend on this. Let's wrap it up. Jake, as you take us out here, why don't you tell everyone, you got anything you want to plug or any social media or anything where they can find you, the ministry, anything like that?

01:07:49

Let them know. We'll link it up in the, on the podcast and YouTube as well too. Cool. Yeah. So mineralhouseofprayer .com.

01:07:55

If you want to check out our house of prayer that we run right now, we're running like almost 15 hours a week, 15 hours of prayer a week.

01:08:03

And then my personal, my wife and I's personal kind of missionary page would be loopfamily .org.

01:08:10

Loop L -O -O -P, correct? That's right. Loopfamily .org. I like it. Jake, thanks so much for sitting in with us.

01:08:15

It was fun, man. Talking. I feel like we could have went another three hours. We could have turned this into a

01:08:20

Joe Rogan Christian podcast, but we'll have to have you back, man. Anytime you just want to talk about the word.

01:08:26

We're just looking to bring glory to God. I know Jason and I have the same heart, right? We want people to know the

01:08:32

Lord and to know him truly and to understand that everything we do, you know, if you're a

01:08:39

Westminster guy, right? The chief end of man is to glorify him, enjoy him forever. You know, and when we were talking about suffering tonight,

01:08:46

I'm going to repeat one of my favorite verses by Charles Spurgeon or quotes by Charles Spurgeon that says, the sovereignty of God is the soft pillow on which

01:08:53

I lay my head in times of adversity. And I think that's what we need to do as believers is understand that God is in control.

01:09:00

He's sovereign overall. We, you know, he loves us. Absolutely. But sometimes that loving is a

01:09:05

Jacob where your brother's throw you into a pit, sell you into slavery. Yeah, it can be. And then he looks at him. Yeah.

01:09:11

You know, Joseph, 25, what'd I say? Jacob. Sorry, Joseph. Yeah. Sorry. See, that's what happens when you talk too fast, start making mistakes.

01:09:19

But yeah. So guys, thanks so much for listening to another Deadman Walking Podcast episode. As always, go to dmwpodcast .com,

01:09:25

check out the merch, check, leave us a voicemail, leave us a text, give us some constructive criticism, some comments.

01:09:31

We like all that. And if you buy one of our funny, which we think funny t -shirts. Yeah, they are. Supports the show, helps us.

01:09:38

We appreciate it. Anything else, Jason, before we get out of here? No, no. Thank you guys. As always, guys, God bless. Be sure to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Deadman Walking Podcast for full video podcast episodes and clips, or email us at deadmenwalkingpodcast at gmail .com.