The State of Apologetics in the Church

The Purpose of the Panel Discussion on Apologetics

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Welcome to The Rap Report. I'm your host, Andrew Rapoport. And today what we're going to have for you is something special. We did a panel discussion on the state of apologetics. This was hosted by CARM .org, Christian Apologetics Research Ministry.

They hosted this. Many great speakers. Myself one of them, Tony Costa, Eddie DelCour, Eli Alala, and Matt Slick, all getting together, having a discussion on the topic of apologetics, the state of apologetics in the church.

You're going to want to listen to this. But before we get to that, I owe you an apology. Yes, I'm late in dropping this episode. In fact, I almost missed the entire week. I have been podcasting, I don't know, four or five years now, and I don't think I've ever missed a week with you guys.

I try really hard to make sure that I continue producing good content for you, the listening audience. So I hope that you're sharing it with other people so that they find this good content. But I had done a two-hour response recording to Joe Biden's speech that he did in Philadelphia, where basically he called more than half of America terrorists and declared war on Americans.

It really was, he said it was that those that are conservative are a clear and present danger. That's the language of warfare. And I did this whole response. I got done with it and said, it just wasn't good.

I didn't like the way it came out. It was too repetitive. It wasn't really clear. I was not happy with it. And I don't want you, my listening audience, to listen to garbage. And so I just scratched it and didn't have anything ready.

Well, we did this panel discussion. I asked Carm if I would be able to have the rights to, not the rights, but the right to play this to this audience. And they said yes. So this is very informative. You're going to learn a lot about apologetics.

I hope you find this very helpful. And we may be doing more of these in the future. So that's coming your way right now on The Wrap Report.

Introducing the CARM Panel and the Speakers

Welcome to The Wrap Report with your host, Andrew Rappaport, where we provide biblical interpretation and application. This is a ministry of Striving for Eternity and the Christian Podcast Community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.

All right. I guess we're on. I heard the thing recording in progress. Welcome to a panel discussion, Carm's first one. We're going to be having, hopefully, a really good discussion on the topic of what is a state of apologetics in the Christian church today.

It's a very important topic. It's really something that's been increasing a great deal in importance throughout the Christian church. I've been doing apologetics for a long time. We'll talk about that after we introduce everybody else.

What I'm going to do is have each one on the panel here introduce themselves, any books they've written, contact information they can provide, where we can get a hold of them, and stuff like that. Then we'll get into discussing the issue of apologetics in the Christian church.

Then we'll do that for about an hour. Then what we'll do afterwards is have a time of Q &A where people can then just put in their questions, and you can direct them to everybody or individuals. Then we can deal with it accordingly.

Hopefully, everything will go fine. We are losing a new technology. Please bear with us with any problems. I'd like to open up in prayer, and we'll get going. Lord Jesus, thank you for the ministry that you have given to each one of us by your grace.

You've called us. You've condescended to reach out, to reach down and touch us, and allow us to attempt to defend your faith and expand your faith and speak for you. We ask for that you would bless us and allow us to speak according to your word, according to your wisdom.

We ask for your mercy and for your grace, and a blessing upon each one here in the panel, as well as those who would listen. We ask for your blessing. Just seven times seven, we ask for your blessing, Lord.

In Jesus' name, amen. All right, so I'm assuming everybody can hear me. And since you all raised your heads after the prayer, that's good. What I'd like to do right now is have each one of you, if you don't mind, introduce yourselves.

And I want to start with my nemesis. Who would that be? It would be Andrew Rappaport. Andrew Rappaport, who I've known for years. We've done things together, preached together, taught together, evangelized together, and battled over paying for meals together.

And so that's quite a story. Hey, Andrew, thanks for coming on, man. Thanks for having me, Matt.

I mean, look, you did eventually, after nine years, buy me dinner, just for the record. It took nine years. You did do it in epic, epic fashion. Live, unapologetically live, you had dinner delivered to me.

It was epic.

Yeah, for some stupid reason, Andrew has, and I will admit it, been able to outsmart me repeatedly. No, no, no, no, get the term right. Outslicked you. Outslicked me and outsmarted me. Over the years, I've got a lot of stories you could talk about where I've gotten up a half hour early at a restaurant to go pay the bill, and he's already paid it.

Things like that, you know. He's a slimeball. So the thing is that I call him a jerk when he blesses me because that's the thing. But I did get him. All right.

So how can people get a hold of you? What ministry do you run? Yeah, so I'm at With Striving for Eternity Ministries. You can go to strivingforeternity .org, and we also have part of that is the Christian Podcast Community, christianpodcastcommunity .org, where you can hear Matt Slick live as one of the podcasts that are on there.

So we have over 50 podcasts on there. We're primarily a discipleship ministry, so we disciple through podcasting and disciple podcasters, but we come into churches and do seminars. But we have a very weird way of ministry because we actually target smaller churches that cannot afford to have people come in.

That's our target. We want the churches that are like 25 people, and they go, no, no one's ever going to come to our church. That's who we're looking to help out because those are churches everyone avoids.

We have an online school that Matt Slick convinced me I should try to do called the Striving for Eternity Academy. We teach how to interpret the Bible, systematic theology, things like that. My books would be what do we believe is a Christian systematic theology, and what do they believe is basically a systematic theology major, Western religions.

If you want to hear more, my podcast is called The Wrap Report. And Matt Slick and I started a podcast years ago, and he got too busy and dropped out, but called Apologetics Live. So if you like apologetics every Thursday night, anyone can come in asking any question, apologeticslive .com.

I want to get Matt to come on with the guy that I just recently had on. He says he is the top 1 of all Christians, and he could not cite a single verse from any Bible verses he was referring to. He also said that Christians can sleep with a prostitute in faith, and it would not be a sin.

So I would love to see Matt reacting with him. So I might try to get him to call the radio show or have Matt and him go on for a longer period because it'd be fun.

Yeah, that'd be interesting. Obviously, he doesn't have all his paws in the litter box. So, all right. So you get a hold of you at strivingforeternity .org. All right. And good stuff. Eddie, my man, how are you doing, buddy?

I'm doing good. Thank you very much. Doing very well. Hey, thanks for coming on. Really appreciate it. Could you introduce yourself, how people can get a hold of you? Sure.

My name is Edward Delcor, and we have a nonprofit organization, apologetic and Christian educational, called the Department of Christian Defense. They can get a hold of me through there. Also, my YouTube page is there as well.

And what I do, I am a professor of theology at actually two and a half seminaries. I say half because one is correspondence in London Greenwich School of Theology. But I enjoy what I do, and I'm delighted to be here today.

Thank you very much. How can they get a hold of you if they wanted to? I think they can hold me through the website, christiandefense .org. Christiandefense .org. That's probably the best way to get a hold of me, christiandefense .org.

It has a contact page, and it has, of course, a boatload of information. It also has our books that I've written. One of the last ones I did was I co-authored with several people, including my friend Anthony Rogers.

And it's a massive book on the Trinity. It says, Our God is Triune. Also, I have a definitive look at oneness theology. It's a polemic and a refutation to oneness theology. And it's a positive affirmation of the Trinity.

And we have a couple other books that we offer as well there. It's all on christiandefense .org.

Excellent. Yeah, I've been studying the Trinity more and more in depth, and I wrote a 500-word definition, so to speak, of the Trinity and taught it for five weeks. Really enjoyed it. Maybe we could have a discussion on the Trinity.

I think it's a very important topic. Yeah. The foundation. What it is and what it's not. Yes. And how it relates to oneness. Incidentally, I met David Bernard a couple of months ago and challenged him to a debate, politely.

It wasn't obstreperous. And he declined. And then he said he might be interested in a discussion. So he gave me his email address. I emailed him. And that was five, six weeks ago. I've heard nothing. So we'll see.

But nevertheless, David Bernard, for those who don't know, is one of the top oneness guys in the country. All right. Tony Costa. Hey, brother.

Thanks for being here, man. Could you introduce yourself? Yeah, my pleasure, Matt. Thanks. It's a great honor to be with you men. My name is Tony Costa. I'm from Toronto, Canada. So I'm the only Canadian on this panel.

And I'm professor of apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary. And I also teach as an instructor at the University of Toronto in the areas of gospel studies and archaeology of the Bible and the ancient Near East.

I've been involved in apologetics for over 30 years and debated Muslims, cultists, atheists, secularists, and so forth. Two of my books that are in print published, Early Christian Creeds and Hymns, that was just published early this year.

Early Christian Creeds and Hymns, What Early Christians Believed in Word and Song. And so this examines the creeds that are embedded in the New Testament text. So we're not necessarily talking about the historic creeds, although I do touch tangentially on that.

And the book also looks at the hymns that are embedded in the New Testament text. And I also have Worship and the Risen Jesus in the Pauline Letters, which is my published doctoral dissertation. And so I also do a number of—my YouTube channel is Toronto Apologetics, Tony Costa, Toronto Apologetics.

And I also do some online teaching. We were talking about the Trinity. I have a course coming up, October 1st, an all-day course, online course on the Trinity. And I'm teaching on cults at Toronto Baptist Seminary starting next Monday, and also teaching Biblical Greek as well.

So again, it's an honor to be with you, Matt. I know a number of you. I've had you on my YouTube channel, so I'm looking forward to tonight's discussion.

Oh, thank you. You got more degrees and qualifications than a thermometer. Well, my name's Matt Slick, and I don't have a doctorate, but I have a Master's of Divinity, and I've been doing apologetics since 1980.

I run CARM .org, C-A-R-M dot O-R-G. It's had 151 million visitors, been doing radio for 17 years, written a few books, and do debates. So there you go. And my wife says I'm an expert at being irritating and obnoxious.

Not just one category, but two. So I think I got that over you guys. All right. Now, OK, I want to get into some stuff. We're going to just have some good time talking. I want to ask really quickly, how long have you each been doing apologetics?

I've been doing it since 1980, roughly 42 years. How about Eddie? How long have you been doing it?

Developmentally, probably starting around the late, probably early 90s. Early 90s.

Hey, Andrew, how about you? Yeah, I'd probably be about the same. The earliest I could date that I started doing open-air evangelism was 92. So I probably started sometime shortly before that, just doing one-on-one.

So probably about 90, 91.

OK. And how about you, Tony?

Yeah, same date, 1990, 1991, around there. OK.

Yeah, I started in 80 and learned about Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses. And then a friend of mine and I developed a swap meet ministry. We'd go out, do that, go door-to-door, do stuff. So I consider that a start.

OK. And so, Tony, you already kind of gave us some of your areas of expertise, which I didn't know you could teach Biblical Greek. So that's great. Maybe I'll call you up sometime and ask you some questions when I get really stuck on some stuff.

So your areas of expertise would be Greek, history, archaeology. What else?

Yeah, Hebrew as well. I taught Hebrew. And, of course, if you know Hebrew, Aramaic is a sister tongue to Hebrew, which, as you know, some of the books in the Bible, the Book of Ezra, parts of Ezra, and huge parts of Daniel are written in Aramaic.

And you've got a few lines here and there in Jeremiah and in Genesis. But basically, my area is also systematic theology, hence my teaching on the Trinity. And so I do generally a wide swath of topics.

So general apologetics is usually my thing. I don't just deal with one particular area. Some folks specialize only on Islam, for example, or creation, evolution. So in my field of study, I've been able to teach on a wide spectrum of topics.

Okay.

Yeah, I do the same kind of a thing. General, but I really love systematics. I really enjoy that. And, Eddie, how about you? What would you say your areas of expertise are?

Probably somewhat, I don't like to be broadly brushed with just apologetics. But I think a point of fact, the main area would be on textual issues, but also in cultic evangelism. You know, I used to refer to Jehovah's Witnesses and Muslims and oneness as non-Christian cults.

But now I use the biblical definition that Paul uses in Ephesians 2 .12. They're atheistic religious groups. That's not oxymoronic because they have a devotion to their system of philosophy. But Paul says to the pre-converted Ephesians, who had lots of gods, that before you were converted, you were without hope, and he uses the term atheo, you're atheists.

So I think it's theologically proper to say atheistic evangelism, which covers everybody, right, all non-Christians, all non-Christian religions, and so on and so forth. So probably those two particular areas, textual issues, and also general apologetics and polemics, and then, of course, general theology.

That's interesting. I'm going to check that out.

All right. Andrew, what's your area of expertise?

I would probably say my area would be in hermeneutics because really, I mean, any debate that I end up doing, that's what it comes down to. How do you interpret the Bible? And so that's been my focus, you know, correcting Matt all the time.

It's just, you need to know good hermeneutics. Well, he introduced me as his nemesis, so I have to throw that back. But, you know, I do a lot in textual criticism, as you know, but I really think if there's two areas, if someone comes and says, I want to do apologetics, what are the two areas I should focus on to be able to do apologetics?

I would say it's probably hermeneutics and church history. Hermeneutics so you know how to interpret the Bible because once you have the right understanding of the interpretation, you then apply that throughout the Bible to do your systematic theology.

But church history to realize, you know, there's nothing new under the sun. I mean, Matt, this is an area you're an expert in, in the early century heresies. And, you know, just knowing this, it's like, this is, for folks that don't know, Matt and I would play a game sometimes when we'd be on the show and I would just name things and he would name which heresy it was from the first centuries.

But because that's really what it is. You find that there's nothing new under the sun. And so if you know how to handle the scriptures, you know the errors that have come before us, you can handle a lot of the apologetics that's going to come your way.

It's true. All right. So if you guys are, you know, everybody's watching, listening, well, no, what I did was I asked them their areas of expertise because apologetics is not simply one thing. It is a broad based thing.

I want people to understand what apologetics really is. Now, I run a Christian apologetics research ministry. So apologetics is studying everything. It really is studying everything. You could study logic.

You could study math. You can study evolution. You can study information theory. You can study presuppositionalism. You can study textual criticism. You can study airplanes. I mean, really, airplanes and the design and how it must be in place in physics.

What is the underlying principles? Everything relates to the created order of God. And we know we have certain interests because of our personalities. I want you to understand apologetics is not simply a narrow field thing.

It is a broad based thing. It takes a lot of us to be able to do stuff now and to cover it. So I have certain areas where I'm better at than others. And these gentlemen will have certain areas where they're better than others.

I think Tony's got them all covered apparently now. That's what it looks like. So good for him. All right. So now we can get into the discussions. OK, I'm going to start with a very simple thing. We're talking about the current state of apologetics in the Christian church.

So zero being pathetic, ten being fantastic. What are your subjective opinions on the state in the Christian church in America overall? So some churches are better than others overall. What would you say is the score that you would give the Christian churches in America today?

Zero being pathetic, ten being fantastic. Tony.

Well, I'm Canadian, so I don't know. I don't know if you want me to comment on America or Canada. Do Canada. But I can say that I could say that for Canada, it's pretty abysmal. I'd probably put it four, four, and that's being charitable.

It's most churches that I've been invited to speak at have next to nothing in terms of apologetics. But what I always encounter are parents telling me that their kids have have abandoned the faith. They they've gone off and married Muslims.

They've gone off and married people in the New Age movement and so forth. And the first thing I always ask is, did you ever have any classes, Sunday school classes or midweek classes on apologetics on how to defend your faith?

And most more often than not, the response is no. All we're told is Jesus loves me. This I know for the Bible tells me so. And so the major problem here, I feel, is that the pastors are going to be held to a high account by God almighty because they have been appointed as shepherds over the sheep.

And they're not doing a good job of protecting the sheep against the wolves and the predators. And so I would say that the state of apologetics in the Canadian church is abysmal. And it's very sad, to be quite honest with you.

I can count on maybe one hand churches that I know that take apologetics seriously.

All right, Tony, you give a higher number than I would have. I would have given a one and a half to two. Yeah, I'm very charitable. Yeah.

All right, Eddie, what would you say? It's interesting. If you start from the West Coast and go this way toward back east, the numbers start increasing. But out here in the West Coast, and keep in mind, I've probably been in thousands of churches.

And I've had thousands of discussions with pastors. And I can honestly say it's probably zero to one. Overall, there's a lot of great churches, though, that are solid and see the importance of apologetics.

But too many, they have no idea what it is. But the root cause is because they're not theological teaching churches. And if you're not theological teaching churches, apologetics is going to be the last thing you're going to deal with.

I remember I was doing a I don't know if you remember. Well, you might, Matt. You're like older, like me. But Ed Cole, remember? Someone know who Ed Cole is? Remember that guy? He used to speak to men at giant conferences, Ed Cole.

Anyways, I did this Ed Cole conference in the 90s. And the guy picked me up in the van, and he asked what I do. I said I teach apologetics. He says, you know what, that is really good because Christians are so misconstrued as mean people.

We have to learn to apologize. We have to learn to be nice to people. And that's really about the education that I find in far too many churches. They don't go beyond a junior high education in the Bible.

So when you want to bring up apologetics and I know many people who tried to have apologetic classes in their church, but they were immediately shut down because, you know, a lot of pastors, unfortunately, do not see the importance, the biblical necessity.

They do not see it as something that they should have in their church. So the congregation suffers because apologetics and good theology is being just completely it just evaporates. It's never there because the pastor himself is just not aware of the importance of it.

So I give it maybe a one, unfortunately. But I will say one last point. I found in my experience, speaking to a whole lot of diverse, different churches, once they're exposed to good theology and I've had this personal experience.

You can go to a, you know, a kind of goofy, charismatic kind of church or just a non-teaching church. You teach on something that's theologically related, you know, or apologetic. They never heard that before.

But there's always a group of people who are so their eyes light up. They've never heard it before, and they want more. So you do have people that if they get exposed to doctrine and apologetics, they want more.

They're very interested in it.

Yeah. I used to preach in ABC churches in Southern California, actually lots of churches. Did pulpit supply for a few years. I really liked it. One Sunday, I preached in three different churches. And I started teaching doctrine, inserting doctrine into sermons occasionally.

And to my utter surprise, they just loved it. They said, we've never heard this before. So there's a real need for it out there. All right, Andrew, what would you say?

You want to define ABC churches as someone who was a pastor?

I was going to, and I didn't. American born Chinese ABC.

Thank you. Yeah. So I was, you know, Tony said he said four, and that was being generous. I would say three if I'm going to be completely generous. Very simply because as we look at people that think they're in good, solid churches, and you're saying across the spectrum, what's the things that are being battled the most in churches right now?

Women preaching and homosexuality. I mean, those are so clear in scripture. So when we say, well, where's the state of apologetics? You know, the fact that these are the issues that are being addressed shows that how weak it is, that the culture is what's defining how to interpret the Bible for so many churches.

This is this is the major problem that we have. I actually put this on Facebook just this week. I said so many are suffering because they do not hear God from the pulpit for the shepherd. Either knows not the word or studies, not the word.

And that's the problem is, unfortunately, the reason apologetics is so weak in America is because the guys behind the pulpit don't know the word well enough to defend it.

You know. I so agree with you. I once did a seminar for some men, clergy, elders and some people in Palm Springs, Southern California. And it was really an interesting time because they wanted me to go to a hotel with them.

And we had these rooms and we're to teach for hours and hours a day. It was kind of it was different. Long story short, they didn't have any scripture memorized. I think they had the average was like 10 verses and had been Christians for many years.

Didn't we're not having devotions with their wives and their families, not teaching them. We're not studying the word of God, didn't know the basis of the Christian faith. And I was shocked at the ignorance that was there in a lot of places and a lot of people.

In my opinion, most elders are not qualified to be elders because they can't distinguish between truth and error. And I don't want to just not call pastors, but you're right. The fault is with the pastors.

They're the ones obligated. But sympathetically to the pastors, they've got to be counselors. They've got to be bookkeepers. They've got to be this. They've got to be that. And to study apologetics, we know you don't just do.

I've learned it took me five minutes. I figured out apologetics. It does not work like that. So it's a problem and there really is a problem. So I want to ask what we can do to fix the problem. But before we do that, I really want to go over a little bit more.

If you don't mind, why is apologetics needed? We kind of just cursory went over it. What are the real reasons? Why is it so important that we learn how to first Peter 315 to give an answer to everyone who would ask us to give a defense?

So Tony, why do you think it's so necessary for us to do that?

Yeah, well, because first of all, it is a divine command. As you pointed out, first Peter 315 and Jude 3, that we are to contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints. And so the Christian church has been in the business of answering questions from day one.

And when you quote John 316 to somebody, you're practicing apologetics. It is it is literally the defense of the Christian faith and giving reasons for why you believe what you believe. And so all evangelism really is part and parcel apologetics.

It's important because it it gives reasons to believe it reinforces the clarity of God's word. It reinforces the majesty of God, his sovereignty. It reinforces the truthfulness of Christ and his resurrection.

And we are told that we are to give an answer to everyone who asks of us about the hope that is in us. And so every good team, whether you're talking NHL or NFL, you need a good offense and you need a good defense.

If you don't have a good defense, you're you're you're not going to succeed. And so first and foremost, it is a divine command. It is incumbent on all Christians, not just the pastors, not just the missionaries.

It's not just the theologians. All Christians are called to give to give an answer for their faith. And I think that that really is, Matt, the missing link in the Christian witness. And and we've downplayed.

I mean, I think of people, even even people like Martin Lloyd Jones, who actually didn't think apologetics was overly important in the Christian witness. He just thought just preach the gospel. But that is part of apologetics.

So. So, again, it's a divine command and it reinforces our confidence in the Scriptures and in the sovereignty of our triune God.

Why Apologetics Is a Biblical Command

Amen, brother. Amen, brother. Hey, Eddie, you want to add anything to that?

Yeah. A couple of things. Apologetics guards the church. Remember Paul's last it really was his farewell letter to the pastors at Ephesus. And he says, I'm innocent of all man's blood in Acts 17. He talks or Acts 20.

He talks about this is the last time he's going to see them. I'm innocent of all man's blood because I teach preach the whole gospel. But then he gets to the end and he tells them to guard themselves, guard yourself and the flock.

So pastors need to guard themselves and the flock, which the Holy Spirit made them overseers to shepherd the church of God. The word shepherd, as we know, the linguistic meaning there would be one who guards.

That's the first lexical semantic there. One who guards the primary obligation of the pastor is to guard the flock. How do you guard the flock? By sound doctrine, by teaching apologetics how to defend the objection.

And first and foremost, you guard the flock by teaching them to give a positive affirmation to the gospel. That's how you guard the flock. But he says, don't you remember? He says, Savage Wolves will come in.

They won't spare the flock. They'll draw disciples among themselves. And he says, don't you remember? For three years, night and day, I warned you with tears. And, you know, you got to think to yourself, who out there, what pastors out there are weeping because of the false churches within or the false church, false teachers within the church?

Because he says, Paul says, even from your own number, these men will arise. Who's weeping out there because of false teachings in the church? Paul says, I warned you three days or three years, night and day with tears.

So the question is, did these Ephesus pastors listen to the apostle Paul? Well, you fast forward maybe 20 or 30 years or more, perhaps in Revelation chapter two, we find that Jesus commended the Ephesus pastors for staying true and finding apostles false and persevering for the name of Christ.

They were commended for that, commended for apologetics. Today, you're pretty much ridiculed if you try to introduce apologetics to the church. And also in one more point in First Timothy chapter three, when Paul affirms the infallibility and sufficiency of the scriptures, it's very interesting because after he affirms that scripture alone, scripture alone equips the man of God for every good work.

And he's not, I know we had a question about this. I do not believe he's speaking about a list of books when he says all scriptures, but rather he's speaking of the nature of scripture as God inspired, as God breathed out.

But he says in Second Timothy or First Timothy, after he gives this affirmation in chapter four, in chapter four, he says, I know when I leave, this is what's going to happen. In other words, if you don't, and he gives this commission to preach the word, right, in season, out of season, to rebuke, to correct, to encourage, because this is what's going to happen.

Men will not put up with sound doctrine, but to suit their own desires, they'll give doctrines that their itchy ears like to hear. They'll turn away from truth onto mythologies. So that's what happens when you don't, when you don't preach, when you don't practice apologetics, when you don't preach a solid understanding of doctrine, you have people that will just flock to anyone out there.

That's really interesting because the, the tenses in chapter four, when he says to preach the word in season, out of season, correct, rebuke, exhort, they're in the most urgent tenses in the Greek language.

They're various imperatives. Those, those verbs there to preach, to be ready, to correct, to rebuke, exhort. These tenses are, as Dan Wallace says, do it now verbs. They stress urgency more than any other commandment, various imperative here.

That's how important this is. That's how important it is to affirm, not only affirm sound doctrine, but using scripture alone. That's Paul's message. Scripture alone equips every, every man for every good work, but be able to defend the faith because if you don't, if you don't do these verbs, this is what's going to happen.

Amen. Well, we have a new face in here, Eli, and it looks like Andrew's got to apologize for everything he was saying about Eli here before he got in there. Cause he did show up. I know I'm just kidding.

Of course, Eli.

This isn't the retired, retired apologist group. Oh, I don't know, man. All you guys look old. Eddie looks like he's got some, some spry youth to him. Everyone else, man. I don't know what's going on.

I'm just kidding.

No, I'm the oldest. You're the youngest, I think. You're not kidding.

I got the baby face right now, so.

That's right. I'm 65. I'm up there.

And I bet that Eddie can still in a gym lift more than you. And I think if you and I got into a gym where we do jiu-jitsu, I'm sure that, well, you'd be on the mat unconscious, but you know, be careful.

I never stopped though. Since I was 18, I never stopped.

Well, I, you might not know this, but I am a black belt in Kung Fu movies. So I can look like I know how to.

That's out there with Matt's black belt in Run Fu.

Yeah, I have a black belt in Run Fu. Several black belts in Run Fu. That's right. Slick Jitsu, yeah. Yeah. And Glock Fu. And at any rate. So Eli, introduce yourself. You and I have known each other for a few years and we have interesting conversations.