The Platonic Ideal of Self-Centeredness - Kevin DeYoung - Finale

All right, we are back with part five, and this probably will be the last part, but we'll see.

I make no promises. Uh, of the Kevin DeYoung, Moscow mood, Moscow, somebody corrected me in the comments,

Moscow, Moscow mood, Moscow, Moscow. I mean, it's spelled like cow.

I don't know. I think it should be Moscow. So I'm just going to keep saying Moscow. Anyway, this is part five, and I know it's part five because of our friend

Bendel Wehry here. Bendel Wehry is the master memer, and I think he's done a good job here.

He says, on Twitter, he says, the rise and fall of A .D. Robles, and then you see the screenshot, like title screens of all four of my videos on Kevin DeYoung.

I start off, and I'm joyful, happy. I'm, you know, he moves on. I'm still joking around and laughing, and then

I've got mean face, and then I've got the very serious face, and this is the rise and fall of A .D.

Robles. Man, I did not intend it to go this way. You know, it just, this is just what happens when you read

Big Eva material. You know, you start off, and you're like, oh, this looks good. This, this seems promising, and then you read, and then you just get, you know, your countenances, it just changes as you continue to read.

This is a lesson in Big Eva. If you're going to read Big Eva materials, you got to prepare yourself for that, because it'll, it'll affect you deep down inside.

It's like Gollum, you know, Gollum. He's just got the ring there, and he's, and he's just saying, he turns into this beast.

Anyway, let's see if we can turn this around. Let's see if we can be happy again. I make no guarantees. I really don't know how this one's going to go, but we're going to continue and hopefully finish.

Here's where we left off. The Reverend Kevin Young says, So much of what

Wilson produces online strikes me as showmanship. It's like that famous quip from James Denny that it's impossible to make ourselves look clever while also proclaiming that Christ is mighty to save.

If, if Rick Warren did videos like No Quarter November, granted, they would have a much different vibe.

The same people that loves Wilson's gimmicks would almost certainly lampoon a hyped up, dressed up Rick Warren close up as a self -serving cringe.

At the same, at the time of this writing, you can purchase from Canon Press a limited edition No Quarter November flag for $60 and a

No Quarter November special reserve edition flamethrower for $19 .43. You know, this is so interesting.

Like, it's, it's, it's like, you know, this is showmanship, right? This is showmanship.

And, you know, it's, it's like that quip from James Kenny. It's impossible to make ourselves look clever while also proclaiming

Christ is mighty to save. Um, that sentence is ridiculous.

Ridiculous. Now I just quickly stopped the video and looked up what the definition of quip is.

You know, I went to public school, so who knows, but as far as I knew, quip, a quip is like a clever remark.

And so here we got, just got done saying, well, you can't say that Christ is mighty to save and be clever at the same time.

That's impossible. And look at this clever quip, look at this clever remark that sprues it.

It's a, it's a self -defeating thing. Like is, is, is, is a quip okay? Or is it not okay? Well, the facts are that showmanship, quips, vibes, things like that, they are all always okay.

So long as you're not doing it in a masculine way, if you're doing it the way gospel coalition does it, you know, gospel coalition has a vibe.

They have showmanship. It's just the effeminate kind. Gospel coalition showmanship is the effeminate kind.

That's the only kind that's allowed in Big Eva circles, either effeminate or emotionless.

Like you can be Spock or you can be like, like, like Galadriel. You know what

I mean? I'm watching the rings of power right now. You can be Galadriel or you can be, well,

I guess Galadriel is kind of masculine though. So maybe you can't even be her. You can't be Godriel. You gotta be, you gotta be, you know,

Reverend Lovejoy's wife, or you have to be like Spock. Those are the showmanships that are available.

And cleverness is never allowed. And clever quip, quip is what

I mean, a witty remark, a witty remark. Yeah, that's right. It's a quip.

It's clever. I mean, obviously this guy, James Denny, can't be proclaiming Christ is mighty to save.

I mean, this is a clever remark. It's just, this is just preposterous. I mean, again, this is just all about centering what he wants to use, center.

He wants you to be like him. Kevin DeYoung is the example. Unfortunately, that's not the case at all.

I mean, Jesus was clever. Jesus had clever remarks. Jesus had showmanship, obviously.

Like showmanship can be good or bad. Showmanship can be cringey or not cringey.

It's like, you know, yeah, he's right though. If Rick Warren did like a No Quarter November, it would be, it would probably be cringe, right?

Because it's not that the showmanship is automatically cringe. It's that depending on where you stand, you know, it's cringe.

Anyway, like Doug Wilson, I love P .G. Woodhouse, his witty use of the

English languages without equal. Woodhouse wrote like a trapeze artist engaged in verbal flips and death defying metaphors.

And somehow he always stuck the landing. I can see how Wilson takes his cues from Woodhouse, except that with Woodhouse, there was nothing at stake.

He was a humorous first and foremost. The point was to dazzle with his words while poking gentle fun at aristocratic

England. But Wilson wants us to believe that the stakes could not be higher. The barbarians have breached the castle wall.

The Western world is crumbling. We are engaged at war. The apocalypse is drying nigh. At the same time,

Wilson's online persona is almost always Woodhousian fun and games. So in one video where new St. Andrews, Wilson's college tries to make an important point about the wickedness of contemporary culture, the narrator interjects with a kind of mocking.

Hey, wokey McWoke face. It's not about it's not being the tone police to say this kind of insult is silly, unnecessary and ultimately undermines the seriousness of the issue they're trying to address.

Which is it? Are we in the trenches against the enemy or hosting our own late night talk show? It's both.

It's both because Jesus was funny and he said funny things and he mocked people and he said things that I guess a guy like Kevin DeYoung could say were unnecessary, silly.

I mean, Kevin DeYoung spirit was alive back then, you know, like like Jesus, did you know you offended them?

Did you know? It's both. The situations we find ourselves in in everyday life, take it out of no quarter

November for a second, take it to your own life. The situations you find yourself in in everyday life are serious.

There are life and death decisions that you make almost every single day. There are trajectories that you choose to take or not take.

There are decisions you make that have really big impacts on your family. And yet if you have no joy in your household, you are failing.

If you don't have laughter in your household, you are failing. If you're in a life and death situation and you're in a very serious situation, you know, you lost your job, you don't know where next month's rent is going to come from, you know, you don't know how you're going to put food on the table and things like that, you still are commanded to have joy.

You still should work to have fun with your kids. Obviously there's a time and place for everything.

There's a season for everything under the sun. We understand that. There's a time to cry. There's a time to weep.

There's a time to mourn. There's a time to laugh. There's a time to feast. There's a time to fast. There's all kinds of different times.

And so, you know, depending on the situation, there's certain things that are appropriate, but a freaking commercial for your university can strike a funny tone, even as the work of the university or college rather is very serious work.

The work that you do in a university like New St. Andrews is very serious work for the people that engage in it.

But for a commercial for the college, you can have a little fun. Like this is the thing, like almost all the examples that he uses here are just so preposterous.

Like his panties are in a bunch over nothing. These are commercials.

These are commercials. Commercials are often attempting to use humor to sell a serious message.

That's what commercials really do. That's what commercials, there's life insurance commercials that are very funny.

Life insurance is a serious matter. It's a serious matter, but you can sell it using comedy.

You know, besides, you know, he uses bad language.

I'll give him a pass for that one because that one could be more serious if his charge is correct. But he uses the two

No Quarter November commercials and then he uses the New St. Andrews commercials as examples of how this guy's crazy.

It's a grow up, Kevin, grow up. Why don't you put up, you know, you know, probably people would like you more.

You'd be more attractive to people if you just smiled a little bit more. How about that, Kevin? How about that?

Ironically, for all that Wilson says and writes about manhood, his online tone is often juvenile. Petty insults and childish put downs do not display the manly virtue of magnanimity, the loftiness of spirit that enables one to bear trouble calmly, to disdain meanness and to display a noble generosity.

Yeah, well, I mean, I mean, I just disagree. I just disagree. I mean, obviously, there's a there's a you know, if you're juvenile all the time and stuff like that, then fine.

But but it would be it's it's one of the most ungenerous readings that I've ever heard of to say, oh, yeah, all

Doug Wilson does is is juvenile. It's just not the case. It's just not the case at all.

You know, there is. A lot of seriousness in what Doug Wilson writes, but the thing is,

Kevin would prefer him to be very sad. Kevin would prefer him to be very sad about everything that that's that's the big evil way you need to be either emotionless or you need to be very troubled, deeply fearful, concerned like a woman like that's that those are your options.

You can either be Spock or you can be Reverend Lovejoy's wife. That's big Eva in a nutshell.

And that's not the case at all. That is not the case at all. All right.

The next section, I believe this is the last section. A more excellent way. I'm a fan of good satire.

John Witherspoon used it to great effect against the 18th century moderates in the Church of Scotland. Sarcasm can be a holy weapon in the

Lord's army, but sarcasm and satire by the minister are best used sparingly and against those whose hearts are set against the truth.

But Wilson makes fun of those who could be allies and loves to troll people who disagree with him. It's as if all the world is a meme war to be won.

And no publicity is bad publicity so long as people are paying attention to Wilson and can impress. I suppose

I've taken the bait by writing this essay. Yeah, I suppose so.

I suppose so. And I know you're trying to make yourself look better because the more excellent way that you speak of according to this article is essentially how you and your buddies do it, how

Big Eva has done it. And unfortunately, Big Eva has lost the plot in so many ways.

I mean, people were, you know, I don't want to go too deep into this, but people were looking into Kevin DeYoung's little church a little bit because of this article.

And Kevin DeYoung has a Pastrix ministry at his church, a Pastrix ministry. Don't believe me?

Go to his website and find out about the Shepherdess ministry. Shepherd, pastor are the same thing.

That's the same thing. The only reason he didn't call it the Pastrix ministry is because it'd be too obvious what he was up to.

The Shepherdess ministry. Yeah, they're not really pastors, but they're Shepherdess. You see, they're Shepherdess.

They're not pastors. They're Shepherdess. You've lost the plot,

Kevin. You've lost the plot. You've let winsomeness destroy your brain. Your brain has turned to mush in a lot of the key areas.

Now, that's not to say that your brain is useless in the key areas, because it is not. It is not.

But you've swallowed the camel and strained the gnat in some key areas.

You've lost the plot, and you've let winsomeness rule the day. Winsomeness decides what you talk about, how you talk about it, things like that.

And you think that your strategy is the only strategy. It's the holy strategy. You have a

Jesus that is incomplete. You don't point out the mockery. You don't point out the attitudes and the tones that are too masculine, you know, the ones that you put forward.

And I know this, too, because I used to consume Big Eva content all the time.

All the time. With the exception of Driscoll, I'll say this.

With the exception of Driscoll, the Jesus that I heard about was essentially

Spock. He was essentially Spock. The Jesus that I heard from the pulpits of Big Eva was essentially

Spock. And then sometimes he was even a little effeminate.

That's the Jesus that I was taught from Big Eva, with the exception of Driscoll. And that's an incomplete

Jesus. That's an incomplete Jesus. And so I'm not saying that you need to be someone you're not.

Obviously, Kevin DeYoung, you're not like Doug Wilson. I'm not telling you that you need to act like Doug Wilson.

By the way, neither is Doug. For all of this hand -wringing over, you know, everyone that he disagrees with, he's going to go and mock them and stuff like that.

Everyone has to be just like Doug. For all of that, you yourself quoted him as saying, not everybody has to do it this way.

And I gotta be honest. I say this too, and I've said this independently for years at this point.

Not everybody has to say things the way I say it. I was just on the phone with somebody, and he was talking to me about a problem at his church.

The church is giving to some ministry that's pretty liberal now and stuff like that. And he had told me at one point that he had shared a video from John Harris with his pastor about this.

And I told him, I said, hey, let me just be very transparent.

If I were you, I wouldn't share my content with your pastor. And here's why.

Because so many pastors are just instinctively trained over time to totally reject someone who does not speak the way that they speak.

I said, do what you want. I'm not telling you what to do. But if I were you, I'd be more strategic about this.

And I know this person I was talking to, he doesn't have my personality. We're not the same person.

We don't have the same tone or things like that. But we agree on a lot of things. And I said, find your own voice.

Speak to him the way it'll be effective to speak to him. And I've said this before too, to a group of men.

I said, if I was talking to my grandmother about some of these woke issues, I wouldn't say it the way

I say it on YouTube. It'd be the same message. The content would be the same. I'd have the same points, but I wouldn't use the same language with my grandmother that I would use with you guys.

And I think that's probably wisdom. You know what I mean? You talk to different people differently. And so Doug Wilson is, most of my friends understand this, that not everybody has to do it the way we do it.

Not everybody has to be like Eric Kahn. You know what I mean? I love Eric Kahn's style, but not everybody has to be like him.

I love John Harris's style, but not everybody has to be like him. It's just the way it is.

And so, Kevin, I don't understand why you think you, you are the exemplar of the more excellent way.

You have a good style for certain people, but let's just face it, Kevin, you have failed to keep the men.

You have failed to keep their attention and to have influence with regular men.

Obviously not in Toto, but in general, the facts bear this out. So maybe your way isn't as excellent as you think it is.

He continues, one of the sad realities is that Wilson could set a different mood, still full of Chester's Tony and mirth, but focused on better things and in a better way.

After Rich Rachel held Evans, the progressive Christian writer and scathing critic of Wilson, sadly passed away at only 37 years old.

Wilson wrote a moving article full of sympathy and grace. I thought you'd never seen that before, Kevin.

I thought you've never seen it before. I thought,

I thought, nevermind, nevermind. He showed genuine pastoral sensitivity without giving away an inch of theological ground.

Wilson knows how to strike that tone. Wise, gracious, resolute, and dare I say, winsome. Dare you say it?

I've said this many, Doug Wilson is the king of winsome, but not the fake kind, not the gay kind, the real kind.

I've said this many times. One can only conclude that he prefers to write in a different way.

Wilson could keep all the good stuff on classical Christian education, all the helpful material on family formation, all the counter -cultural advice on being old school men and women.

He could explain the Bible. He could highlight heroes from church history. He could blog about the great books. He could work to maximize what he shares in common with other conservative

Christian leaders and networks. Christians could be drawn to Wilson because he shows them more of Christ rather than more of Christendom.

That's one viable approach. But he would have to dial back, way back, the sarcasm.

He would have to, again, see, everyone has to be clone copies of Kevin DeYoung. Maybe they could be a little more edgy than me, but not too much.

He would have to decrease so that Christ can increase. I mean, what do you even say to this stuff?

I just, you lose the ability to form words to explain this.

It's a Bible verse, obviously, and he knows that, so you have to take it seriously. But the point of that Bible verse,

Kevin, reverend, I should say, was that the people were following John and then they were attracted to Jesus.

And they were like, John, should we follow this Jesus? I mean, you know, he's attracting a lot of people.

And he was talking about his followers, his numbers. And he was talking about people should follow

Christ. And so, Kevin, reverend, are you saying that those who follow

Doug Wilson and his blog, and they watch No Quarter November, and they read his blog and things like that, that they would see what they are doing as, you know, this is

Doug's thing, you know, I've got this Christ thing over here and I do this sometimes, and then I do the Doug thing. I'm a

Doug follower. Could I say the same thing about Gospel Coalition, who has much more influence, and I would argue much more negative influence on the church, and say, well,

I mean, obviously, Gospel Coalition needs to decrease. And Christ needs to, so he can increase.

So Christ, if Christ is going to increase, Gospel Coalition needs to decrease. Could I say the same thing back to you?

No, you guys would say that, you know, you're promoting following Christ. You're promoting, that's what

Doug's doing. It's just, what do you say to this stuff? He would have to press pause on perpetual pot stirring.

Why? Why? He would have to cultivate a depth of intellectual exploration that is more lasting and ultimately more helpful than the surface level spray into the controversy disorder.

Why? Why would he have to do that? You see, this is the thing, like he's talking about the viability of approach.

You know what? The reason you're writing this article, Kevin, is because Doug's approach is not only viable, but is kicking your teeth in and you are smart enough,

Kevin, to see the future. You are smart enough to have a little foresight and you see where this is going.

You've lost the men and you know that that is not going to lead to more influence for Kevin, DeYoung and buddies, but rather the

Moscow mood and all the theology that you find so troubling that you, I'm not going to get into it in this article, it's going to lead to an increase of that.

This is obviously a very viable and more importantly to Kevin and his buddies, a very effective approach.

And so you're not a dummy. That's why you're writing this article, because your teeth are getting kicked in and you're trying to stop the bleeding.

Good luck with that, Kevin. Good luck with that. Oh man.

He would have to refrain from keeping his pointing finger permanently extended in search of eyes to poke. He could try to be an evangelical statesman or lean into his role as a seasoned mentor to younger

Christians, especially men who don't need permission to be brothers as much as they need a godly role model to emulate and a spiritual father to correct their youthful excesses.

That's what he's doing, by the way. You might not like his style, but that is what he is doing.

And there's an army being, a figurative spiritual army being created. And you know what the results of this army are?

The what we're doing is that we're having big families. We're training them in the fear and admonition of the

Lord. They're being catechized. They're being taught about the world correctly. We're singing songs.

We're bringing singing back. You know what I mean? How many videos do you need to see of Doug Wilson, Moscow Mood, you know, loving people?

Men, I know what happens in your churches, Kevin. I understand. I've been to your churches, not your church specifically,

I'm talking about Big Eve in general, where you see everyone around you and they're singing and the men are either silent or just kind of singing under their breath.

And then I've seen, not even at church, just at the pub, just in the square, lots of men singing songs, glorifying the

Lord. You would think if you read this article, he was singing songs to Doug Wilson. No, we're singing songs, glorifying the

Lord, raising his name on high, unashamed, unembarrassed, loudly, proudly, boldly with a little bass in our voices.

Just songs just break out like in Lord of the Rings. You know what I mean? It's like sometimes you go to these events and you look up and you're like, when the dwarves get here?

We're now singing songs after dinner, like what's happening here? It's all coming back.

All the stuff you say he's not doing, all the stuff you say he's not doing, he's doing. He's doing it.

And here's the problem, Kevin. You have rejected fighting at all.

Well, that's not true. Fighting in a very polite, sort of courteous, sort of half -hearted kind of a manner.

And here's the reality. Actually, men need to be trained to fight more full -throatedly.

Men need to be trained to fight and have more backbone and have more balls, cojones.

You know what I'm talking about? Cojones. They need to be trained to use those for the

Lord. You don't have to cut them off, Kevin, before you go fight. You don't have to snip them off first and then go fight.

No, no. You actually can use them and you can use them effectively for the kingdom of God.

And you don't think that Doug Wilson is attempting to correct youthful excesses.

I can be generous and say, you just really haven't been looking. Open your eyes, Kevin. Or I could say, you're just lying.

I mean, it's just as simple as that. You're lying to yourself and you're lying to your readers.

And you should stop doing that, Kevin, because lying is a sin. He could use the eighth decade of his life to devote his considerable writing talents to persuading unbelievers to consider

Christianity, to passing on the Reformed faith, and to offering a deep, penetrating cultural analysis.

I believe he could do all of this if he wanted to. As if he's not doing any of this stuff. This is the other thing about it.

He's like, he could do this. Well, I mean, what that means is he's not doing that. He's doing all of those things,

Kevin. So I'm left with two options here. Either open your eyes, you're ignorant, you don't know what you're talking about, or you do know what you're talking about, and you are lying.

You're choosing to break the commandment. You are bearing false witness.

I have my opinion on this, Reverend. I have my opinion, but I don't see inside your soul.

Only you know what you're doing. Or he can pepper his writing with naughty words, play with blow torches, and make fun of Southern Baptists.

That's the other option. It'll be hard to take both approaches at the same time. I'm sure you do find it hard,

Kevin, but lots of people don't, and more don't, every single day.

You can do all of this stuff, and this is the reality. You know, I'm a father. I've got four kids, and you know,

I talk to my kids about the Lord. I catechize the kids into the

Reformed faith. I offer cultural analysis to my kids. Obviously, they're young, so from a young perspective,

I do all of that, and you know what, Kevin? I still play

Nerf Wars with my kids too. You know what I mean? I still have a real good time playing

Nerf War with my children, and when they're older, we might play with blow torches.

We might tell jokes. Even when we're older, Kevin, we might do it.

We might poke fun at each other. We might laugh at some of the stupidity that happens in the

PCA or the SBC or Big Eva in general. We can do that and hold together at the same time that these guys are on our team, but we can still make fun of the stupid things that they do because there's no shortage of that.

We can cultivate an attitude where we love each other but are still not taking each other too seriously.

You know, when people make fun of me, you know, pretty much almost every time

I laugh about it myself, and I take it very well. Clearly, Doug and the boys here at the

Moscow Mood, you know, you've attacked them pretty viciously. You've lied about them. You've bared false witness about them.

They've taken it pretty well. You can hold these things together,

Kevin, and when we're raising Christian men, we have to recognize that we've neglected a lot of masculinity for a long time.

It's not an accident that people all the time in my comments point out the fact that essentially what we get from Big Eva is that to be a

Christian man, you essentially have to act as much like a woman as possible without sinning.

Oftentimes, there is a lot of sinning involved in that. Basically, the ideal of a

Christian man is essentially, it's very effeminate. It's very womanly, but there's a disconnect.

You see, we're actually careful readers of the Bible, most of us, and what we see of the heroes, the male heroes in Scripture, we see the way that they act, and then the way

Big Eva and guys like you, Reverend De Young, say that we have to act. There's a huge chasm of disconnect between the heroes of the

Scripture, men of faith, men of God, zealous for the Lord, and the way that Kevin De Young not only acts himself, but insists is the only holy way to act.

There's a huge chasm of difference there. And I believe that Doug Wilson is trying to bridge that chasm, and you know what?

He might not do it perfectly, but I prefer his imperfect way of bridging that gap to your sissy way of pretending like that gap is not there.

I'm going to go with the Scripture on this one, Kevin. You are teaching an incomplete Christ.

You're teaching an incomplete masculinity. You're teaching an incomplete view of what it is to be a follower of the

Lord, zealous and on fire for his glory, and acting and operating in a world that does not acknowledge his kingship.

There's going to be controversies, there's going to be brawls, there's going to be fights, there's going to be political issues, there's going to be all kinds of things.

There's going to be idols to chop to the freaking ground, and we are going into this knowing that the gates of hell cannot stand against us, and so we're going to go into it like the heroes from the

Scripture. And guess what? All the hang ringing in the world, all the pearl clutching in the world is not going to stop that.

So good luck. Hats off to you, buddy. You keep doing what you're doing, and we're going to keep doing what we're doing.