Have You Googled Ordo Amoris Yet?

And welcome once again to the American Churchman podcast. I'm your host John Harris. And as always, we have my co -host

Matthew Pearson with us. Hey Matthew. Hey John, how you doing? Doing good, doing good.

It's a lot colder. We just actually talked about this, the temperature. That's what, you know, as you get older, that's what you talk about.

And my wife actually yesterday was like, why are you looking at the weather? And I'm like, I don't know, I'm aging. But it's warmer in Florida than it is in New York.

And I'm just so grateful I'm in New York and not where our other guest today, Seth Brickley, is in Wisconsin, where it's only 10 degrees.

Do you go ice fishing? I do, in fact. And we typically like to go when it's about 25 to 30 degrees.

If it's this cold, I'm not going to go out there. So, I mean, it's thick enough to like,

I hear stories, you drive out on the ice. I mean, are you at that level or is this just...

Yeah. Well, it's funny. I go with our friend Mark Brooks. He's a big ice fisherman. And we take his four -wheeler out and he's got a portable ice house that we take out.

And it's a good time. Yeah. Matthew, you have no clue what we're talking about, do you? If it's 25 to 30 degrees outside,

I am not outside. That's all I'll say. Yeah. But there are, if you guys have seen

Grumpy Old Men, there's like villages and fires going out and all kinds of stuff like that.

It's a good time. Yeah. If you have friends to be with. I went when I was younger. I probably went three times, maybe three or four times in my life.

And if you don't have friends, it kind of stinks, in my opinion. You just freeze out there on the lake.

But I went with friends once. We threw a football. We played Risk. I mean, it was fun, but it was hot dogs.

Anyway, this isn't about ice fishing. I mean, it could be. But we have a number of things to talk about.

One main one in particular, which is the Ordo Amoris. And I feel like we've talked about this before.

Last week, in fact, Matthew and I talked about this a little bit, but we have actually two articles at truescript .com.

And it's important for me to mention that truescript does sponsor this podcast. So if you like what you hear, go to truescript .com,

scroll down to the donate tab. We appreciate it. It's a 501c3. We put out great content.

We are hosting great conferences. Seth, actually last year, I mean, when we really didn't have any finances, he just opened up his church and said, let's do a conference here.

And we had a good time, but we have some bigger stuff coming. So I need to let everyone know about the next big thing for truescript.

There's going to be a few conferences, but the next one is in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania in April. You can go and check out

Christianityandthefounding .com for more information about that. And that's all I'll say since I've been plugging it every episode.

So with that, Matthew, I'm going to turn it over to you for our attribute of God this week. Yes, of course.

This week's attribute is, it's one of the big ones because it's one of the three transcendentals and we'll get into what that entails a bit later on, but we'll be going over God's goodness or God as being goodness itself.

So as we always do with these attributes, I'm going to start off by reading a verse. And so this one will be from Exodus chapter 34 verses five through six, which reads, and the

Lord descended in the cloud and stood there with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the

Lord passed by before him and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long suffering and abundant in goodness and truth.

So of course, notice that last part there, abundant in goodness and truth. We've already sort of discussed the attribute of God as truth.

So now we're going to be focusing in on God as goodness. Now, when we're speaking of goodness as being an attribute of God, we first must define what goodness is, like goodness itself is as a transcendental property.

So when I say transcendental property, what I mean is I'm speaking of the three transcendentals. If you're online or somewhat well -read in theology or philosophy, you've probably come across this before that there are these three big transcendentals out there, and those three being truth, goodness, and beauty.

And so obviously goodness is one of these. So goodness being a transcendental or transcendentals themselves, these are essentially, and then before I continue,

I always have to cite sources. So I am once again, Moeller maxing.

So this is great. You should get this. If you're a student of theology or you just like theology itself, this is very helpful.

Richard Moeller's dictionary of Latin and Greek theological terms, because I did not come up with this myself by any means.

So I will be largely taking from that for us to discuss goodness. So goodness as one of the three transcendentals, essentially these are, they're essentially universal predicates of being in general.

So they're universal predicates of being that's like what it is metaphysically.

So in the metaphysical sense, then goodness can be defined as a property as the property of actualization, completion, or perfection of the nature of a thing.

So what a thing is that in its fullness, when it reaches what it's supposed to be or do that means it is good.

So like to use, I guess, a more practical example, a stove that gets hot is good because it's fulfilling its end as a stove.

What is a stove made to do? It's made to heat up to get hot. So thus it is good. So that's why I say that goodness is essentially the property of actualization, completion, or perfection of the nature of a thing.

I hope that example kind of helps. So this being said, goodness thus belongs to God in an absolute sense and is identical with the divine essence as are various of the other, all the attributes of God, they're identical with the divine essence.

So God is good in himself and he is the absolute good who grounds all things and is the very standard of goodness, which all created things measure up to.

So the reason why that sort of thing is important is because when we say that something is good, we have something in mind by which we're measuring something can be kind of good, really good, very good.

Even God, he pronounces all these things good in the creation narrative. And then he says, this is very good.

So there's a certain measure by which we measure goodness. Now it's not as if there's like a scale and at the top is

God and at the bottom is Satan or something. It's not just that God is the top of the scale, but it is that God himself is a scale because he is goodness.

So goodness thus is an attribute of God. He is the very standard of goodness, which all created things are to measure up to.

And if the created thing is fulfilling its intended end, it is participating in God as goodness.

So in relation to creatures or created things, God is good in that he is the efficient cause who produces all finite or created goodness.

So all good things come from above. All good things stem from God. He is the standard or exemplary cause of all created good, according to which goodness is created and judged.

So not only this, but he is also the final cause or highest good being the ultimate end of all good things.

So all things insofar as they're working towards their purported end are being, are they're reflecting

God because they're doing as God has created them to do. Remember our example of the stove, a stove, which gets hot is good because it's doing what a stove is meant to do.

So God's goodness. Now, a lot of these properties can sometimes become abstract and just people will just be like, oh, this is just theological gobbledygook.

This is just Neoplatonic Aristotelian philosophical nonsense. So what is like the practical like behind this sort of thing?

Why do we talk about good in this sense in this relation to being and metaphysics and all that? Well, the reason why we do that is because we see

God manifests as goodness in our lives every day and ordinary things of nature, but also in extraordinary things of grace.

So God's goodness is manifest in his goodwill towards creatures. And this can be seen also through his other positive attributes or the affections of God's will.

You can see God's goodness in his grace, his mercy, his long suffering, his love and his patience with creatures.

So everything that happens to us for our own good, for our own end, it is a manifestation of God's goodness when you become good at a craft or when

God saves you from salvation. So these little things is being good at a craft versus being saved for salvation.

These are all manifestations of God's goodness, just in various ways. And that's why goodness as an attribute matters.

And so, as I always say, that would be the attribute of goodness wrapped up in a nutshell.

Pastor Seth Brickley, do you want to add to that? No, I think you pretty much covered it.

Yeah. I mean, it's one of those things you see in the first chapter of the Bible, right? Genesis one, where that the word good, the

Hebrew word for good, whatever that is, I can't remember right now, but it shows up over and over again.

And the Lord looks at his creation and he says, it's very good, right? So the standard is set right from the get go of Scripture, where God is that standard.

And we don't really know fully, right? Because we live in a fallen world. But at that time in history, before the fall, everything was precisely as it was supposed to be.

And of course, you turn to the end of the Bible and you see it restored, right? In the

New Jerusalem, where everything once again is precisely as it's supposed to be, right? But of course, in so many ways, we experience the goodness of God, like Matthew said, both in nature and in the spiritual side of things, through the grace that we experience through Jesus Christ, through his sanctifying work in our lives, through the joy of family, right?

To the joy of friendship, to watching a sunset, to ice fishing, right?

I mean, there's so many different things we can say, right? About the goodness of God that we can experience. And so, yeah, so, but thank you,

Matthew, for that. That was, you must be on the path to being a professor. That was impressive. No, I've thought about it before, but I want to be a pastor, but you know, maybe, maybe one day,

I'm not sure. So we'll see. Well, pastors, I tell you what, pastors need to know their stuff, because I think the pastorate has been watered down, where the way that you're communicating is,

I think, is pretty rare. So that's a good thing. Maybe it's not quite as rare in Presbyterian circles.

I don't know. Yeah, that could be it, too. More rare, but yeah, I was going to say, you know, when people, kids, especially growing up in the church, when they leave the church, you know, and obviously not all kids do, but the ones who rebel, oftentimes, it seems to come down to this attribute, saying, questioning it, saying

God's not really good, and therefore, I'm justified in my sin. Obviously, other attributes can also be questioned, but I think, for me, that's the one

I see questioned the most, and whenever there's a trial, that's the one that I know, often, my own heart wants to work through again and really confirm, you know,

God, and then, of course, you know, it's like the psalmist. It's when David, so often, was running away from people, and it seems like so many of the psalms are him starting out with this bad thing's happening.

God, are you still there? Are you still good? And then, by the end, saying, oh, yes, God's good. So, yeah, it's a blessed attribute, but without it,

I think you really don't have Christianity, and there are other religions that have deities that aren't necessarily good, but Christianity is not one of them.

Christianity posits a God who's always perfect. Yeah, praise

God. Yeah, and not only that, but he's not just, like I said earlier, he's not just the top

God of the totem who's like the good on the scale, but he is the scale, so that really just sets a standard.

It not only makes us think how we can be good through living lives of holiness, but it makes us, you know, sort of have awe and contemplation of God himself, and it's just something that's also really nice about this attribute is just that,

I said a whole lot, okay? I did, but people just, what I said can be understood just intuitively in the most simple way.

You just point to something. You say, good. You don't need to say what I said. You just intuitively know what something good is, and then you just say, but God, he is goodness itself, and that's just something beautiful,

I think, so it's nice. It also solves Euthyphro's dilemma where the question of, an atheist would still point this out and say, well, is

God good because he meets a standard that's external to himself of goodness, or is goodness the nature that it is?

Does goodness exist because it is reflective of a divine will of some kind? And the answer to the dilemma is that, is what

Matthew said, that God is goodness, that that's part of nature, so it's actually kind of a nonsensical question.

He's the standard of goodness. He doesn't exist outside the standard or judge an external standard, like he is the standard, so that's the only way it makes any sense.

Otherwise, I mean, you really don't have a standard of goodness without that. I don't see any possible turning.

Yeah, and evil is the absence of goodness, and Satan is fully evil because he woefully falls short of the standard in the worst possible way.

Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. All right. Well, let's talk a little bit about the Ordo Amoris.

There are two articles I would just point people to if they're interested at truthscript .com, and I should probably pull them up just so I know.

One of them is called, What in the World is the Ordo Amoris? And the other one, and that was by Nathan Rush, and the other one is by Richard Henry, and it said, have you

Googled, the title is, Have You Googled Ordo Amoris Yet?, which is also the title of this particular podcast, so I'll pull those up just so people can see what

I'm looking at here. We don't normally do, when there's new items, at least, when you have something that's trending, we don't do two articles.

We do one, usually. We did two on this, and I think there was others considering doing an article themselves because it was such a big deal, and maybe that's the first thing to say about this is, when

J .D. Vance told, I think it was Sean Hannity, that, and he didn't say Ordo Amoris, I don't think, to Sean Hannity.

He just explained the concept behind it, that there's this Christian principle that we favor those who are in closest proximity to us, and then when he was called to the carpet online by,

I think it was a liberal journalist, he said, just go Google Ordo Amoris, so it's kind of a surreal thing that the

Vice President of the United States knew what the Ordo Amoris was, the order of loves, and it is a

Christian principle, and that he was willing to go out there publicly and defend it and use it to justify

Trump's immigration policies. So I'll start there and just maybe bask in the amazing thing that this is.

I wasn't expecting us to get into Christian doctrine and justify the policies of Trump under that, but here we are, and I think it's a great thing.

So just any thoughts on that moment itself? Pastor Brickley, maybe?

Yeah, it's pretty remarkable. I mean, just, you know, Trump's, this is his 15th day in office, and to see all the policies he's put forth that, you know, not only agree with common sense, but actually agree with Scripture as well, right?

And so when Vance said this, I think a lot of us get shocked when he says something like this, because it's the political realm.

You don't usually hear stuff like this, but it's pretty remarkable what's happened under the Trump administration and all the policies he's pushed forth.

Yeah, but yeah, there's these two Latin words, right, that, you know, I'm not a Roman Catholic, so I don't really know Latin, you know, hardly at all.

But yeah, these two Latin words, right, order of love, and John, honestly, through your influence,

I really, it caused me to dive deeper into this, because you talked about this really before anybody

I knew talked about this, and I know you've talked about how the Christian church has really been lacking in this area of understanding this.

And I think it's showing how much the church has been lacking from the fact that a lot of people are outraged by this sentiment, right?

And, you know, and it's the woke crowd, you know, who's been outraged by it. But yeah, there's the biblical history of it, of course, we go, you go right,

Exodus 20, 12, honor your father and your mother that your days may be long in the land that the

Lord your God is giving you. So you see this, this preference of love, right, toward your parents.

And it goes the other way around, too, right, children to their parents, Ephesians 6, verses 1 through 4, children, obey your parents and the

Lord for this is right. And then verse 4 says, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the

Lord, right? So what Vance is communicating is this familial love that we're supposed to have, where we have this priority to our family, right?

And then of course, he extends it beyond that, right, to our nation before immigrants who are coming in.

Yeah, yeah. I think going the Bible route is good on this. And I just have to point out, though, before someone said

Ordo Amoris was the name of my band in college. And I have to say the podcast is not about your band in college.

I apologize if you were hoping for that, but I haven't seen it in my searching on the web for Ordo Amoris.

So anyway, and Kim, I should probably just address this real quick, too. Do I hear chickens or kids?

I hope it's not too loud. That's my daughter in the other room. So she's growling or something. I don't know.

No, it's okay. But the practice of Ordo Amoris, I love her. I'm just going to let her keep doing it. That's great.

Amen. So the Bible route, I think, is really important on this because, you know, let me give you a little story here.

This is a true story. This happened last year. I was sitting down with someone who

I was having a hard conversation with about loving people, right? And I'm sure you've had these conversations,

Seth, about with your own congregants and so forth about like, where's your priority? You have a family, you have people you're responsible for.

Well, this individual told me that he already had a church family and that that was more important to him than his natural family.

And I was a little blown away, but I brought up this term. I said, you know, this is not in keeping with Christianity.

We believe in the Ordo Amoris. And because I had been writing on it, there's a chapter on it. Although I didn't use the term,

I should have since JD Vance is mainstreaming it now. I thought the Latin would be too confusing, but apparently not.

So he wanted to justify it with scriptures. Like, well, tell me where in the

Bible. And I'm just like stunned almost because I'm like, this is throughout scripture. So you could go so many places.

And one of the things Nathan Rush does in the article on True Script is he points out from the very beginning,

Cain and Abel, you have this element already emerging.

You know, it was especially egregious for Cain to do what he did to violate

Noah. And who is Noah trying to help?

Essentially, it's his family first, right? He's supposed to be preaching and getting others to come, but it's his family who ends up coming on the boat with him.

And you ask for it throughout scripture. And there's so much about the nation of Israel, starting with Abraham, and he's the father of many nations, and it's his son.

It's this ancestral connection that's important that must be maintained. And this land must be maintained within these families and these tribes.

And you get to the New Testament, as you rightly pointed out, Seth, and you have the commands for parents to children and children to parents.

You have even Jesus on the cross. Jesus is often looked upon as this revolutionary figure by the left who decided that it was more important to look at spiritual siblings or spiritual, you know, other

Christians as your family instead of your natural family. And yet Jesus is up there on the cross, figuring out how to take care of his own mother.

These are just part and parcel to who we are as humans. And it's so represented in the

Bible all over the place. Paul's yearning for his natural kinship according to the flesh, his natural family in the

Jewish people is one of these examples. So anyway, I think this is very biblically rooted and it's on so many pages.

I mean, you just can't get away from it. It's in every book, practically of the Bible, you have these principles. So I was stunned when someone just thought this was philosophical and this isn't rooted in scripture.

There's nothing, there's no principle there. But I think that maybe what this comes down to, why someone would even ask that question is we've eroded this for so many years.

And this is one of the working thesis I have in one of my chapters is I think that through really a number of things in modernity, but Darwinian evolution being one of the main ones, we have separated love and duty.

And this was one of the objections I saw to this is that love and duty are two distinct things. And we've separated them so much that someone can violate their own duties in the name of love now.

I'm going to have an affair because I love this person and not my wife. Well, that's nonsensical.

To a pre -modern person, that's lust. But now we're actually calling that love.

We're framing that differently. And so I think that's a key thing.

You look at this, even in arranged marriages and stuff, there's an old courtship book.

And it even talked about sacrificing. I want to get the word right here. Sacrifice, love or duty ordains it.

And the sense there meaning that if you have a passion for someone, if you have a duty to marry someone else, and back then it was for the survival of your family and that kind of thing, you have to do what's right.

And I know this is crazy to modern people. We just think this is nuts because you should be able to choose freely.

And that choice is where you exercise your love. So I'm going to quit talking and just say that, maybe throw that out there.

Do you think that because we've separated love and duty so much, that's why what

J .D. Vance said is maybe so offensive? Maybe start with you, Matthew. Yeah, I definitely think that plays a role.

And I actually had a little Twitter thread on this the other day, because I started off with a pretty basic tweet.

I'll just read my first little tweet. I just said, Ordo Amoris is just common sense, and those who dispute it still live by the principles outlined by it.

A happy inconsistency, frankly. And then I sort of, John, I kind of said what you had basically said, where people have this separation of love and duty, where they think that love is confined to your feelings, to the affections essentially, which is ridiculous.

Because look, I'm an unmarried man, so I don't know what it's like to be married. But I can imagine there are times where you may not particularly, if you may be going back and forth or whatever, you may not particularly like your wife in that moment, or maybe any other family member, but you have a duty to love them.

And so there's that whole thing where it's like some people you don't really like, but you still love.

And that's grounded in duty. And the same thing happens even in our spiritual lives, where if you're ever in a season of spiritual depression, or something like that, you may not be feeling all the same things for God as you may have felt at one moment.

But you still ought to pray, you still ought to read your Bible, you still ought to go to church, because that is duty.

And then part of getting out of that rut is sort of asking God to cultivate your affections.

But yeah, it's quite ridiculous to separate duty from love, because love is a duty.

Because what is a duty is something that is due to someone, it's your duty. And that's a part of justice.

It is just to love those who you ought to love. It is just to honor your father and mother. It is just to love your wife.

These are topics of justice. You want to talk about, you know, a gospel -centered justice or whatever.

Well, Ordo Amoris, there you go. That's what I would say. And I mean, it's just, it's clear in Scripture as well.

Especially when you look at, I don't know, like the Apostle Paul, like it kind of like you were talking about,

John, it's not just like a philosophical, abstract philosophical notion. The Apostle Paul in First Timothy 5 .8

literally says, but if any provide not for his own, especially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith and is worse than an infidel.

I think some translations render it as a heretic, actually. King James says infidel. And then like Paul in Romans 9, where he talks, he's talking about his kinsmen, according to the flesh, the

Israelites. He said, for I could wish that myself were cursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen, according to the flesh.

And then Matthew Henry, like I know that everybody uses Matthew Henry, but it's for good reason because Matthew Henry is great.

I love his commentary on there because he says, I just haven't pulled up. He says, Paul was a

Hebrew of the Hebrews. We ought to be in a special manner concerned for the spiritual good of our relations, our brethren and kinsmen.

To them we lie under special engagements and we have more opportunity of doing good to them.

And concerning them and our usefulness to them, we must in a special manner give account.

So I think that a lot of this is just plainly obvious. Like, of course, like everyone will, in some sense, maybe affirm like, oh, there's an order of Morris of you and your immediate family, but they don't really want to extend it because they're, they may be scared.

I don't know if they may be scared of being called a racist or something like that, but it's like this, these things are not only natural to us.

Like we know it's true. It's thoroughly biblical. What the apostle

Paul says in both first Timothy and in Romans, I think it's crystal clear.

And that a lot of what drives people away from this is like you said, John, divorcing duty from love, but then also there's fear of being called the wrong thing.

So I think that's a lot of what's behind this sort of thing. Yes. Yeah. I think some people also,

I think I saw a comment that said something like, well, this is like outside of Christianity, it's platonic origins or something.

And I mean, I have a quote from a Libby who said that the true patriotism was founded upon the respect for family and love of the soil.

So, I mean, obviously some of these ideas do, this is something in natural revelation.

This is broader than just the Christian tradition because it's just like the gender binary, right?

Every society has - It's obvious. It's intuitive to everyone. Right. Do you have something there?

Yeah. Jesus ties the two together. He says, if you love me, you will do what

I command. Matthew mentioned marriage. I look back at my marriage.

So I've been married for a little over 10 years now. And I look back at the early days and there was a lot of feelings, right?

And some would say, well, you loved your wife more back then. But one thing we communicate to each other a lot is that through the adversity of life, through the duties of life, through the mundane times of life, we love each other more today than we did when we first met, when that romantic experience, as wonderful as it was, and it was wonderful.

But just the nitty gritty of life in the midst of that, that's where love is tested and it is duty.

And yes, I do have a strong affection for my wife, right? But I show that affection for her by doing it, right?

By fulfilling the responsibilities that the Lord has given a husband to fulfill.

You also, I mean, one of the things I thought about you, because I was like, oh, Seth's going to be on the podcast. We're talking about Ordo Amoris.

I don't know of anyone else who's literally written a song about their hometown. Yes. You're very much a localist as far as your affections.

You'll live and die in your hometown and you don't really have any interest in going anywhere else.

Yeah. Yeah. And I can share this with the music legend, John Harris here, who by the way, congrats on your new album.

Thanks. Thanks. I've already heard. It's really good. I want to listen to it. But yeah, so there is a sea shanty song called

Cornwall My Home. And so they would go out to see the crew mates would sing this song.

And I love the song. And I decided I want to rewrite this to my home, which is

Eureka. We're just north of St. Croix Falls in St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin. And so Eureka, my home.

And it's something we actually, every single year we have a harvest service because we do live in a, there's some farming in our community in November.

And during this harvest service, we sing some unique songs that we normally wouldn't sing on a

Sunday morning. And so I was able to sing this with Mark Brooks at our harvest service.

But, and I don't, some people, some would say, well, that's kind of out of place for church, but I, we're celebrating the area we live in.

You know, the place that God has placed us, right. And you know, Acts 17, he's put us in a specific location for a specific time.

And every area has their own beauty. You know, John, you in New York, Matthew, you in Florida, me in Wisconsin, every area has their own beauty and we should celebrate that.

Yeah. And it does. But on every area I found always, or the people who live in these areas always values the people around them.

And area, sometimes people can live in, and New York is notorious for this, but people can live in that area and not know their neighbors and not care to know their neighbors and just be individuals in the global market.

And, and, and that's fine in their minds. Maybe they don't know anything else. What I saw when

I went to your town is that there is a strong community sense and people do treat each other more like neighbors and they are proud to be from the same area and they want to make sure that it looks nice and it's that protected from threats.

And you know, you know, even churches. I mean, when we went to the conference, I was meeting people from all these different churches who just, it doesn't happen everywhere

I go. I mean, like they showed up and didn't think of anything of it. Like, like it wasn't a competition. So I'm not saying that it, you know, obviously every there's centers everywhere, right.

But to have an area that the people actually prefer one another and take loving their neighbor seriously is a wonderful thing to have.

And I think people used to know that more that used to be more common in our country.

And I think it's finished. And maybe that's another reason why people have a hard time when JD Vance says something like this, because maybe they don't know that in their own lives, or maybe that is to them the symbol of a bigoted past or something.

But when you see it in action, it's a beautiful thing, I think. Yeah. And sadly, the church in America has taken their cues from the world, right?

We see this over and over again, you know, and Isaiah 520 talks about, you know, darkness is light and light is darkness and sweet is bitter and bitter is sweet.

Everything's backwards, isn't it? It's just wild to see this. And I think this is a great example of a verse like that.

It's flipped. We should care more about the immigrant than we should about our own family. More about the immigrant than someone in our church family.

It's all backwards. Yeah. Yeah. Well, how many people saying that you should care for the immigrant are doing tangible things, really?

I mean, it's sacrificing of themselves versus getting government money, and they rely on that gravy train for their own ministry's livelihood or something.

Yeah, that's right. You talk about this, John. It's the idea of love. They're not actually doing anything.

Every beauty contest winner wants to, you know, world peace. World peace. World peace kind of thing.

But Nathie, did you have something? I have some quotes I'm going to read them if you don't. Nope. Go ahead.

Read those quotes. Let's do some quotes here. I wanted to get some reactions. So on the

Ordo Amoris here, philosopher Immanuel Kant said, inclinations are always burdensome to a rational being.

So in other words, passions and so forth that these are an irrational being. So you see this separation happening, that there's rational beings who make rational decisions unaffected by emotions.

And then in The Origin of Species, Darwin claimed that maternal love or maternal hatred is all the same to the inexorable principle of natural selection.

So these love, passion, all this, even maternal love.

So that's duty too, right? It mixed in with that. This is all just a biological impulse.

And if that's true, then why not homosexuality? Why not forming alternative family arrangements that aren't even real families or real marriages?

But let's call them that. Because it's all biology. It's all justified based upon your whim and your whim or your inclinations then determine what is right for you or what is.

And so I do see these two kind of opposite extremes where you could have someone who's very hooked in their emotions and into passion and so forth.

And sometimes this could be sinful. And then those who want to just rise above the fray and be calculated and rational with everything.

And I think what we see in scripture is the love that God has, it's duty.

Agape is duty, right? But there is feeling,

I think, behind it. So I think of the Pharisees, right? What did they love? This is a question

I haven't heard people ask a lot. I mean, what does scripture say? They were lovers of money, right?

What else did they love? They loved the chief seats at the synagogues and respectful greetings in the marketplaces. They didn't love

God though. And so they love themselves, right? That was really ultimately, that's what it came down to.

They love themselves. They were willing to sacrifice for themselves. And then when

Jesus gives the new commandment to love one another, uh, it's not obviously new in the sense of a sequence, but it's new in the sense of emphasis that there's a spiritual community that emerges the church, which is characterized by love.

And, and, and here's the final thing I'll say before getting either of your reactions. I, this is the thing that I think is extremely fascinating to note that if you look at Israel and the natural love that the

Israel people, Israeli people in the old Testament had for themselves, the preference they gave to one another.

Um, and then you look at the church and the love that the church is supposed to have for one another, you know, to do good to all people, but primarily first of the household of faith, they're very similar.

So like, you know, the Israelites were supposed to provide for the destitute members of their countrymen.

Same thing with the church. You're supposed to provide for the people who are destined to do with the church. Um, when you have a conflict, you're both the

Israeli and the Christian are supposed to seek mediation through the mechanism of the church.

Or, you know, in the case of the Israelis, you know, they were adjudicate, uh, their personal disagreements in a religious court.

Uh, they, you know, we're both supposed to prefer one another in very tangible ways. And for the

Israel Israelis, this included laws concerning slavery, worship land rights that favor their countrymen over others.

So all I want to say is that it seems to me when we talk about the spiritual community, it wouldn't make any sense unless we already had that natural order to draw from and appeal to.

That's what made sense. That's why when people knew, uh, they knew what the family of God looked like because they knew what it was to be in a family and to be in a nation.

And we got it backwards now because so many of these woke guys want to like say that the church just replaces or erodes or erases all of these tangible things.

When in reality, I think that's actually that like the example of what the church should be, we find in the nation of Israel.

So maybe Matthew, I would be curious maybe to get your thought first since, uh, your theological mind here, you know, did anything seem not kosher to you or does that seem to hold up?

Uh, no, that seemed, uh, yeah, that seemed pretty, pretty straightforward, pretty accurate.

I don't really have anything, uh, further to, uh, add onto that really. So, so yeah, pastor

Brickley, any, any thoughts on that? No, no, I think, yeah, it's, it's interesting, you know,

God is our father, you know, and, and it says, you know, Jesus is our brother, which is always kind of interesting to think, but you know,

Romans eight says that, right. He, um, very clearly. And yes, I think what,

I think the point you're making is, is, is a, is a solid one. Yeah. It's just, we are the family of God.

I mean, I say that to my church all the time. We are brothers and sisters in Christ, right? We, it's our church family and there is that deep bond that you have with those people in your church.

It's a very deep bond. Um, and, and it's true that there's, you know, there's people in the church who they have a family member and they're closer to the people in the church because you have that bond in Christ.

Right. And, but they spend more time with the people in their church. Um, so they have that deep bond, but, but the best case scenario is when we have this, you know, like I, like my brother, for example, he's a, he loves the

Lord and you know, he's a brother, he's a brother biologically and he's a brother spiritually.

And that's the best case scenario. Right. But I do see, yeah, there, there, it is this natural connection between, yeah, that we have this on the natural side and we have this on the spiritual side.

I think that's exactly right. So one of the things Nathan Rush pointed out in his article is that some people may object to this because they think that love should be spread around equally.

It's this equality principle. Yeah. So he makes the case that God actually loves certain people more than others, which that seems just bigoted, right?

Like why would God love, uh, Jesus or Jacob more than he saw? Or why would

Jesus lay down his life for his sheep specifically? Or, you know, or why would

Paul love his people? But this seems to be a running theme throughout scripture is there is a type of favoritism that shown to some and not others.

And I don't always know why that is. I don't, I don't know why sometimes God chose me to be born into a

Christian family where I heard the gospel at a young age and other people don't have that opportunity. And I know sometimes, you know,

I I'll tell myself, and maybe this is true that if they come to faith later, those are the circumstances, obviously

God ordained them and he, they needed those circumstances or God determined that they would go through those circumstances for his purposes.

But I, you know, I had it easy. Why, why is that? Why did I have it so easy being so close to truth?

Cause I could have been born anywhere. So, you know, I don't know if you have any pastoral, um, advice on this because people ask this all the time when they have near death experiences to like, why me?

But it really does come down to this question of like, is there a, is there a special love

God has for some and not others? Yeah. Yeah. No, I mean, there's no question that he does.

And I, and it does make people uncomfortable. Um, but like you said, he, he chose

Jacob, Jacob, not Esau. Um, he chose the nation of Israel, not, and not all the other nations.

Um, you know, and Ephesians one, right. He chose us, uh, in him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him.

Um, yeah. So you, you see this, this, uh, in the doctrine of election, right. It, it, it is so highly offensive.

And that's one thing I find very interesting. A lot of these, like the coalition, you know, they're, they're reformed and yet they are, you know, pro illegal immigrant, uh, you know, pro showing preference to them over our, you know, our, our family and church family.

I find that very interesting. I think that's a clear contradiction. Um, but yeah, the Bible does that. I mean, God's able to do that.

Right. I mean, just like Matthew said at the very beginning, he is the standard of goodness. Uh, you know,

Romans nine, Paul says, who are you old man to answer back to God? You know, he, he, he can, he can do it this way.

And he, and he does, and he does do that. Um, yeah. So, so I think it's even more offensive when we, when we think about how

God, how God does choose certain things. And, and when we look at the natural relation side of it, that's what baffles me because it doesn't seem like that should be offensive at all.

Of course, I'm going to love those in closer proximity to me, but the election one, you can see why someone would be like, huh?

You know? And that's why Paul anticipates that in Romans nine. Right. Right. Right. Right. Where he's like, who are you, you know, and then he says, who are you old man to answer back to God?

So some of this is just, it's just a mystery. And we just have to say, you know what? God is good, right?

He is the standard of all goodness. And we need to rest in that. And that's, and that's really the best

I can do as a pastor, you know, on some of those questions, you know, cause I was born into a Christian home, uh, just like you,

John and Matthew, were you born into a Christian home? Yes, I was. You were. Yeah.

So all of us were born into a Christian home. My dad, my dad was not born into a Christian home though. Uh, he was born into an unbelieving home and yet was saved out of that.

Uh, but, but he's never been like, you know, why, why did that, why did God do that to me? I mean, he's, he just accepted it.

This was God's will for his life. Um, but yes, it's, it's a heavy question. Yeah.

Yeah. And I mean, it's just one point, I suppose, in the whole discussion of Ordo Amoris, because, uh, it's just getting over that hump of like, oh, you're, you're, you, you should prefer some people over others.

And we all do this. We all prefer, uh, with our time and our investments of finances, we all prefer some people over others.

Uh, and a lot of that has to do with the people that are around us that we interact with. It's hard to really, um,

I mean, it really does take a federal or a national, a general government to do something like take your money and invest it with people you don't even know somewhere else.

Like you wouldn't naturally do that kind of thing. Right. Um, so maybe Seth, you already brought it up, but maybe we should get into the policy side of this just a little bit.

So the primary accusation is that this is bigoted. This is a racist in some way you're preferring in the case of JD Vance, you're preferring

Americans or American citizens over illegal migrants. I mean, that's the application that he was making there.

And somehow this is on somehow this is like out of step with what

Jesus taught. I mean, what you keep hearing, uh, from, from so many, so many, I actually had it queued up and I think

I lost it, but, uh, there was a number of social justice, uh, Christian types, uh, that were saying like Bill Vischer and, um, uh, you know, do you,

I don't know if Gavin Ortlund, uh, waited on it. Oh, I think he did. Someone did tell me.

Yeah. Did you hear he did? Uh, I didn't, but I, I know what he's going to say.

Well, no, see someone did say that he weighed in on it and he was troubled or something by it. And I'm like, what?

I don't understand this. This doesn't make any sense. Like I'm just rejoicing that this Christian, you wanted a

Christian government or an influence. I thought we wanted to influence in a Christian, even if you don't want to be Christian national, is that scary?

You want to influence here. We have it. So, um, but basically Christianity is opposing the

Ordo Amoris application of it. So maybe let's talk about that on a policy level.

So you have more responsibility to your border into your countrymen than you do to. Uh, what does that mean?

Does that mean you shut the border down? I mean, I don't, I don't think the Bible tells you specific policies for each age, but like, like in our age where we live now, how would you apply that?

I think that Trump administration is doing a pretty good job applying it or trying to, I don't know.

What do you think Matthew? Uh, yeah, no. Um, the Bible doesn't necessarily outline step -by -step like what to do in this situation.

Here's what you do here. Here's what you do here. Uh, generally there's an understanding that we as humans are created as rational beings.

So we have a reason, a mind that God has given us and equipped us to use. And so taking principles, you then apply it to differing circumstances.

And I think that given the state of our border crisis, given the state of American demographics, it makes perfect sense that part of applying an

Ordo Amoris and extending it to a national level, uh, for the American people and nation is, uh, understanding that, yeah, uh, you can, uh, you know, take care of, uh, these migrants, uh, in a way that is prioritizing the needs of the

American people. And part of that is because they're so badly, uh, they've been so badly mistreated and neglected for all these years.

It makes perfect sense to, to do that. It's really like sometimes, okay, like political philosophy, uh, just governmental jurisprudence in general, those can be complicated matters.

Things like this are not that complicated. You don't need to use the word Ordo Amoris. You don't need to understand like some of these like things like super in depth to understand that there are general principles, which we ought to be able to prudently apply to particular circumstances for the good of our people, because we love our people.

And because we have a duty to them, we are duty bound to our people and to love them in a particular way, just as the apostle

Paul was duty pound to, um, his own, uh, kinsmen, according to the flesh, why ought not we, uh, you know, have the same kind of reasoning and thinking and, and above all a civil magistrate, someone who is in power, a servant of God has a duty to the people who he is governing to the members of his

Commonwealth. And so it makes sense to prioritize them. Again, this is not that complicated.

This is basic common sense being applied in policy and yes, of course.

Uh, you know, if you see a migrant on the side of the road, who's hurt, you ought to help them. And like I said last week, you help them and you can still call ice because, uh, you know, you can like part of, uh, you know, like, like there is a sense in which, you know, every member of the human race in some sense of the other is a neighbor by virtue of our shared lineage to Adam.

Like, of course, uh, you know, if you come across somebody, yes, help them because they're your neighbor by virtue of proximity.

But that does not mean that does not entirely negate or, or to amorous and ordered loves and things like that.

Um, and, you know, I think it was back in like maybe August or September of 2023 where Jake Meador like was essentially saying that when

Augustine speaks about order of Morris, he's only talking about neighbors in the proximate sense and things like that.

And those who are close to you by virtue of proximity, but like, that's ridiculous. How was that geographic proximity?

Yeah. Yeah. But like, that's just, that's patently ridiculous because like, you know, like a mother who like, and then

I said this in 2023 and uh, then I actually, I saw Steven, we'll say something very similar the other day, but a mother whose daughter is off in college, like states away, she may be far away.

She may be far by hundreds of miles. That doesn't matter. That mom like still has a certain degree of love, which she extends to her daughter, which far surpasses the illegal migrant that may be in her neighborhood.

Like that is just basic common sense. And I have, I literally like, I would say, oh, you know, maybe he would disagree.

I'm not sure. I haven't read his whole corpus. I have zero doubt in my mind, take me to the bank, take all the money out of my account.

Augustine would agree. Like it is ridiculous to think otherwise. And like the fact that like, it just is, it's patently ridiculous really.

Um, there, because, and the reason why that's the case is because there's something that, that like brings a mother and a daughter together.

That is just, it's closer than location. She could be standing right next to somebody, but she is somehow still bound to her daughter in a particular way.

Now, again, it's easy to extend that on a national level for policy.

And it's, it's obvious. It doesn't take like, it doesn't take a huge IQ to think if you have an average

IQ, you get it just like that because you don't need to think through these big, big words, blah, blah, blah.

No, just go with your gut. You know, it's right. Yeah. Yeah. It's, I think it was

Joel Barry. I saw yesterday post something about, uh, these different, these different like elements of, um, that, that, well, he was defending the

Ordo Amoris, but he was saying that it's like this complicated matrix of all these different things. And I just remember thinking, I was looking at that.

I was like, well, yeah, sure. You have, you have your nationality. You have, you have obviously the different levels of that.

So you, there's you, your nuclear family, your broader family, your, but then there's also geographic location.

So there's your town, there's your County, there's your state, you know, and then there's also, um, you know, people who,

I don't know, culturally similar to you, people who are Christians, obviously now that you've added a religious element.

So there's all these different things and how do you figure out, it almost sounds like you got to sit there forever to figure out.

And who of us actually sits there and thinks about these things in detail on it?

I don't, I mean, I think he was right. Actually. I think Joel, Joel was right to say that there's all these things play a part, but it doesn't become an abstract math problem.

Like, um, if someone comes through the door tonight, I don't care if they're a professing believer in the

Lord Jesus Christ. If I don't know, if I don't see them, I don't know them and they're unwelcome. They're probably going to get hurt because I have children sleeping in the other room and a wife.

Right. My first duty is to them, not just because they're vulnerable, but because God has given them charge over me.

Um, I mean, there's a few of these elements working. I mean, they're, they're in geographical proximity as well.

Um, I go to a diverse church, right? So here's another example. Maybe you guys can think of some examples for yourself. Like I have friends of mine who are very different.

I would say culturally than myself that come from different parts of the world and so forth. And I think it does take some, uh, shared experience to, uh, to develop, uh, trust and sometimes friendship and these kinds of things.

So like the greater that distance culturally, sometimes, sometimes at least the more I think shared experience it takes because, because you have sometimes barriers you have to overcome.

You don't always understand each other, how each other communicates, all that kind of thing, different preferences.

Um, but you know, when you get to a point when you've had a lot of shared experience with someone, even if they're different than you, but you're sharing life, maybe they're, they work with you or whatever.

They become like family. Like this is a process of that, that can happen. You can have people you adopt into your family that aren't a natural relations and they become, that's what makes it actually so amazing is you treat them as a member of your family.

Uh, and that experience is what binds you to them and so forth. So, um, so anyway, like I, I think that like, obviously there's, there's room for all of these things, but this is such a clear cut case.

You're talking about people we don't have shared experience with who are different culturally, who are different, uh, religiously.

I mean, they, they, they're different. They speak a different language. That is the most fundamental thing. Now we should just like give them the money and the resources and the social security and everything else that my daughter's going to have to pay the debt on.

And like, no, that's not right. That's not wrong. That's right. And Donald Trump is, he's such an interesting guy.

I mean, you can, one thing you can tell about Trump is that he loves his family. Um, you know, his children love him.

I mean, they're, they're very close and you can tell he loves his country. All right. So, so if we, if we go back to 2015,

June of 2015, when he goes down that escalator and he announces he's running for president, uh, this was the issue he ran on.

It was immigration, immigration, immigration. I remember watching the first debate in August of 2015 and that's all he wanted to talk about.

They'd ask him a question. We gotta, we gotta put the wall on the border because, and he understands that, you know, this order of Morris, that these, these people, these immigrants coming across the border are taking preference over our own people.

And not only that they're bringing in drugs, there's gangs coming in, there's terrorists coming in, you know,

Trump is very much a, he's not coming at this from a place of Christian conviction. Of course it's just common sense.

He's, he sees it like we're saying here, it's just obvious that this is a crisis, you know, so, so to get kind of get back to your original question,

John, I think that policy, because it is a crisis and because the left has so wanted and said pretty much anybody come on in, come on in, we'll give you amnesty.

You can stay here as long as you want. You don't have to pursue citizenship, uh, because the left has done that.

And we know that they've done it for the wrong reasons, uh, for devious reasons, you know, Trump sees this and he says, we got to crack down on this in, and to make this a top priority, you know, in some nations, they don't have to do it and make it as big of an issue because it's not a huge issue for them.

But in our nation, it's, it's been a crisis. Let me show you a picture. I saw that I posted this on X today.

So either of you read Spanish or no, no, no. Uh, which is, um, so I did a

Google, this was last year. It was about a year ago. I was in Los Angeles. Uh, I was, this is actually an, I think a van eyes or Burbank and it's probably van eyes,

I think. And, uh, this is out right outside of LA. And I took a picture of it and I didn't know what it said.

Cause I don't know Spanish either, but I saw the social security card on this and there's a lot of illegal migrants.

Los Angeles is a sanctuary city. So I did a Google, uh, translate of it and, uh, let's see if I can pull that up.

Um, so this is what it actually says. Oh, that's no, that's in Spanish again.

All right. I'll just read it to you. So it says papers, Pepele's papers in cases, allegedly impossible lawyer, angel .com.

So it's got a social security card picture right there. And I'm telling you, I mean,

I, we've known in California, this has been happening for a long time, but they're, they're advertising. And I don't know how they're paid these lawyers and so forth, but this is on a major street telling people in Spanish, you don't have a social security card.

We'll get the stuff that's impossible. You might think it's impossible to get a social security card.

Our lawyers will get it for you. It's happening. Uh, and this is the kind of thing Donald Trump is, uh, opposed to and shutting down.

And it's the right move. It's not, you know, how would you feel if someone just started raiding your bank account in your home?

Like we would say no. So, so this is obviously it's not the same. This is a collective thing, but, um, it's the same principle at least.

And, uh, um, just wanted to show that because it still makes me upset. It was a year ago.

It still makes me upset. California, California for you. Yeah.

That's going on in other places to the same extent. A lot of questions coming in.

So let's, uh, get to them and, and stuff. Uh, what instrument do you play? I play guitar and harmonica. You guys play any instruments?

No, I, I say piano. Yeah. Piano. I played piano growing up.

Yeah. And learning guitar. I obviously picked up on the ukulele because that's just easy if you know guitar anyways, but I'm terrible with strumming though.

And I've still, I still to this day struggle with bar chords. So yeah, you gotta have a strong thumb for that.

Dr. Bob quoting Thomas. We didn't quote Thomas Aquinas, but that might get you labeled a Thomas. Yeah. All right.

Well, we didn't do it, so we're not going to be late. Uh, Anita Smith honor thy father and mother is different than loving thy father and mother because some parents are truly unlovable, but as a

Christian, we can honor that parent in the position they have as a parent. That's a good thing that you want. What do you think there,

Pastor Brickley? Yeah. In fact, I preached through the 10 commandments last summer and address that issue.

Um, like I, like I know a woman who, uh, her parents are very toxic, uh, and I mean, false teachers, you know, so how do you, how do you deal with a false teacher who's a parent, um, who's a cult leader?

Um, how do you honor, how do you fulfill that command and also follow the commands of scripture, what they say about how we deal with false teachers.

Right. Uh, so there's, yeah, these can be some really complicated questions.

I think there's some ways you might still be able to honor the parents, um, which that is, that is the clear command of scripture gives us without, um, you know, you're not going to have that strong affection, of course, for a false teacher.

Um, but again, we don't want to separate affection and duty. Right. So there is,

I don't know, there, there, there is something we need to honor and love. I mean, cause I think of honor, you're supposed to honor the King.

Yeah. It's paying homage. I don't know. You have to love, I mean, there's maybe there's duty there without, you don't necessarily have to have a, yeah.

We love our enemies, right? So love our enemies. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. So there, I still think it's a love, but it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's very much a duty kind of love, right.

Instead of you're not going to have that strong affection that you have for, for the people you, you really love.

So, um, but yeah, those are complicated questions to answer because there's some, you know, not everybody has a great relationship with their parents, not every father and mother are easy to love.

Um, but we still need to find a way to honor them to the best of our ability.

Yeah. I mean, I think it's desiring the best for that person, right? That's in a nutshell, love and in various forms, whether it's, uh, arrows or romantic, or if it's a fellow or something like that, it's wanting the best for that other person, whatever that connection is in seeking it.

So I think you can do that for a parent who is even evil in a sense.

Like you can want the best for them. The best is that they repent, right? Yeah. Pray for them. Yeah. Yeah. If anything, let me, uh, go a step further as Christians.

We aren't just supposed to love our neighbors before our families. We're supposed to love our enemies before ourselves and our families before.

I don't like the last part of that before ourselves. I think he's joking. Uh, Oh, this is a quote.

Jesus taught this and also embodied this by laying his life down for his enemies. Uh, it literally says, he says,

I have called you friends or a slave does not know what his master is doing. And he said,

I laid my life down for my, my sheep. So I don't, I don't know about that. I mean, like the thing about the redemption, right.

Is that Christ takes enemies and turns them into friends, correct? Like that's the, the amazing part.

He doesn't, they don't, they're not continuing to be enemies that hate him. He like that. That's a requirement, uh, or I should say a, a feature of redemption.

So yep. Yeah. Big difference. Big difference there. Israeli is the modern term.

The biblical term is Israelite. Yeah, he's right. I felt weird saying it, but I kept going with it because consistency, uh, how do the woke critics of the order of Morris choose which immigrants to help?

They can't help everyone with limited resources. Just print more money. I don't know what you're talking about. Yeah. By the way, that's

Matthew Boris. Shout out to him. He came to our conference last May. Hi Matt. Yeah.

So, so can we go back to his question again? Matthews. Uh, yeah, I've got to find it again. Yeah. Is that, no, that's not, hold on.

I think that was, I lost it. That was it. You just had it. I think you just had it up. I did.

Was that it right there? Yeah. There we go. Oh no, it's this one. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. He's right. I mean, we don't really need to say much about that. Yeah. It's just kind of, and they probably don't even put any thought into it.

They just say it's a virtue signal for the most part and to counter signal, uh, president Trump.

So yeah, it's the idea of love. Yeah. This will be the third podcast I talk about this, so I'm not going to talk about it.

Should we support ice raids for churches? If there's probable cause that's exactly what

I was going to say. And probable cause is a rainbow flag right outside. Yeah.

Uh, yeah. I, I know for a fact there are churches I'm sure in my area, but obviously in the country that, uh, would more be more than happy to, uh, hide illegal migrants and so forth.

Um, Vanna Moller says, I don't like the idea of the government institutions raiding a church. It was done during COVID. We should deal with those that Harbor criminals, but there can be a time and place imminent threat.

You know, my understanding is that this was something that was already in place that the

Biden administration changed. And maybe I'm wrong on this, but I'm, that's what I read. At least that the Biden administration said there's these, uh, safe zones or sensitive areas and churches were just one of them where ice couldn't go.

I couldn't, couldn't do anything. And so the Trump is just reverting it back to what it was before Biden. That's my understanding at least.

Um, so, um, all right. Well, okay. Here's one.

Uh, Owen strands said, if you are truly born again, and this is Tom rush, this is Tom rush, our board member.

You are far closer in Christ to a born again. No, he didn't. This is a joke. You are bored again.

I saw him say it. Oh my goodness. You are far closer in Christ for boarding and foreigner whose language you don't speak.

Then you are to your dear doting cooking, uh, cookie baking grandmother who you are genuinely you love, but does not know

Jesus. The first is your true family. The second sadly is not. So he's saying that, um, if there is a born again foreigner who speaks a different language, uh, that you are closer in,

I guess in Christ, well in Christ. So you're closer in Christ to them, even though they don't know.

I'm not even sure what this supposed to like. Well, notice the end there where he says like, the first is your true family.

The second is not, it's a, it's a direct negation of natural relations entirely.

Uh, and that's like the, cause of course in a qualified sense, you can go, okay. Yes. Like in regard to spiritual unity and true spiritual family, sure.

A born again, a immigrant may be like that related to me in that sense, but that does not negate natural duties or the true natural affection that real family is real family.

Like that's just true. That's why Paul still had his natural affection for his kinsmen, according to the flesh, despite the fact that they crucified the very

Lord who came to save them. Like it's, you know, this is like one of the most atrocious acts that they could have done and the

Jewish leaders turning them over to the Romans and then the crowd shouting crucify him.

And yet, even after all of that, he still loves them. He still says he's willing to be cut off from Christ for their sake.

And guess what? The people that he's talking about, they're not born again. They're not believers.

They rejected the, their very own Messiah who came bearing like there's their same flesh, their same lineage.

And yet what is Paul still do? He still loves them. So it's like, huh, it's almost like those sorts of relations are true relations in some sense of the other.

Again, this is not like just a philosophical notion that this kind of thing that Owen Strand puts forth, it's just biblically absurd.

It's ridiculous. I don't understand. The scary thing to me is if you grow up in a family that believes this, if you're not a

Christian, like I, so I have two brothers. One of them does not know the

Lord in a personal way and he respects religion and so forth, respects Christianity. But I mean, this happens in Christian families at times because as we, we believe you cannot become a true

Christian, a true believer in Christ because of your family's faith or your parents' faith. It has to be something that God does in your own heart.

Right? So if that, if you don't become a true believer, then like, I don't know what you do if you're in, if you're

Owen Strand's kid, like, are you just not part of the family? I don't get it. Um, I don't want to be, but yeah.

Yeah. It's, it's one of those things where our spiritual family, obviously the people we, we don't know who are our brothers and sisters in Christ, that we will be with them in heaven one day.

We'll be praising Christ together forever and ever. And that's a beautiful thing. But the opportunity for us to love is our grandmother who makes those cookies, right?

This is the person, this is the person we're supposed to spend our time, um, showing the love of Christ to where we don't, we don't have that opportunity to this person across the world.

Right. So, so yeah, so we, we should not neglect, uh, the closeness of our, of our, of our family.

And, and there is that deep bond that's there, even if they're not believers. I mean, we know we, we, I'm sure we all have family members who, um, we don't know the

Lord and I love them dearly and that's, we should apologize for that. Um, you know,

I saw, you know, I saw some of them on my vacation recently. I, I love these people. Um, you know, and I, I, I lay my life down for them.

Um, but yeah, we, we, we can't mix up these categories though.

And that's what, and that's what Owen Strand is doing. Yeah. It's odd. Um, but, uh, we've been going actually,

I'm losing, I lost track of time. We've been going over an hour or so. Um, I have my own, my own daughter who's going to go to bed here.

So I need to go honor, honor the Lord of Morris here. And, um, but, uh, no,

I, I appreciate it. Uh, both of you guys. So, uh, I want you, Seth, uh, please plug. Um, I don't know if you're, are you on X or where, where, where can people follow your work or.

Yeah. Yeah. I, I am on Facebook. I'm not on X though. I decided not to do that.

So, uh, I mean, my, my sermons are on our church website, um, which is

EurekaBapChurch .com. Um, I do regularly write for, for this wonderful organization called

TrueScript. Um, and in fact, I have an article that was just, uh, published like a week ago called about common sense, which actually very much relates to this too.

Yeah. Um, and, uh, you know, and one other thing too, I'll, I'll, I'll make a shout out here once a month.

Um, I'm on a podcast with Jeff Cleaver, pastor Jeff Cleaver, and, uh, we do a podcast, uh, tearing down the high places and we, we, we talk about, you know, what's relevant within the church and yeah.

So that's a really good time that we have. And there is a conference the first weekend of May that John, you will be speaking at.

Right. Yeah. Do we have a title for it yet? Is it, it's the truth, but that's like a, uh, a, a stand in.

Cause I think we're easy. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Wasn't it like slaying the giants or something like that?

Yeah. I don't know. I didn't think we had a final, uh, yeah, but so that conference is in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, the first weekend of May.

And I I'm speaking there as well. And, um, I'm going to talk about what a remnant shepherd looks like.

Cause I, that's something we really need to hear. So at johnharrispodcast .com and the speaking section, there is,

I did put Jeff's email. So if people want more information, they can email Jeff. So I don't know if there's any like, a signup sheet or anything like that yet.

But, uh, but if people have questions and they live in the area, then they can go there. Yeah. So that'll be a rich time.

Yeah. So, so Matthew, if you want to come up to New Jersey, of course you're probably gonna go to a different conference before then.

Right. I actually was in a New Jersey a few months ago and I'll be up there again this month, actually.

Oh, wonderful. Any special reason, Matthew? Oh, just, uh, my, my girlfriend's family are there.

So, you know, it's fun to, to hang with all of them and all that. So yeah. Oh, wonderful. Very cool.

All right. We're going to end the podcast here, but God bless. Thanks for everyone who participated.

I know there's more questions coming and we just ran out of time though. So I hope that you can hang on to those and maybe next week on the