WWUTT 2490 Q&A Jelly Roll's Speech, Mark Driscoll's Visions, Beware False Teachers

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Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll, are these guys Christians? Mark Driscoll, how is it that he keeps getting platformed?

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And what can we do to be aware of and stay away from false teachers? The answers to these questions when we understand the text.

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This is when we understand the text, a daily Bible commentary that we may be equipped for every good work in Jesus Christ our

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Lord. Please tell others about our ministry at www .utt .com.

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Here once again is Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky, who was not along with me this week. She was actually very congested this week, so did not have a voice to do the show.

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Your prayers for her would be appreciated. Let me begin by reading from Psalm 34, starting in verse 11.

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Come, O children, listen to me. I will teach you the fear of the

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Lord. What man is there who desires life and loves many days that he may see good?

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Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit.

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Turn away from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it.

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The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous and his ears toward their cry.

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The face of the Lord is against those who do evil to cut off the memory of them from the earth.

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When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles.

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The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

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Welcome to the Friday edition, the end of the week edition, the weekend edition, the whenever I have the chance to record this and upload it edition of when we understand the text, when we take questions from the listeners and you can send a question to when we understand the text at gmail .com

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or go to our website, www .utt .com. Click on that voicemail tab and you can record a voicemail to us through your phone or through your computer.

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It gives you like 90 seconds to either ask your question, leave your comment, give us a compliment. We would love to hear from you and we'll play it on the program.

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I've got two questions that I'm responding to today and they both have to do with very popular figures.

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The first one has to do with Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll, whose song Hard Fought Hallelujah just won the

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Dove Award for song of the year. The next question has to do with Mark Driscoll.

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This guy is in the news again, trending on social media, however you want to say that he's been added to a conference, another one in which like everybody has just forgotten all the stuff that Mark Driscoll did over a decade ago.

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Do you realize it was this month, 11 years ago that Mark Driscoll resigned from Mars Hill Church?

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Nobody was forcing him to do that. He just did it because he did not want to have to go through the disciplinary process they were about to put him under because of his abusive behavior.

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We'll recap all of that because apparently it needs to be recapped. Nobody seems to remember all the stuff that Mark Driscoll did.

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Some people do, of course. But yeah, these people that keep platforming the guy or going to his church, which is still growing his church trinity, which is just up the road from me in Phoenix.

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And yeah, people just have very short memories when it comes to all the stuff that Mark Driscoll has done.

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Let's begin with the Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll thing. So this is from Maddie, Dear Pastor Gabe, I have really enjoyed the song

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Hard Fought Hallelujah by Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll. Recently, a friend sent me a comment by you saying that Jelly Roll is not a

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Christian and he's in an open marriage with his wife, which I guess that means they allow each other to sleep with other people.

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Well, that stunned me. So I looked it up and it turns out that Jelly Roll's wife, Bunny XO, is that her real name, has called this a rumor and they're not in an open marriage.

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Were you aware of this? If you have something else, I'd like to see it. Well, she sent me a link to an article from PennLive .com,

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P -E -N -N live .com. I don't even know what that is, but when I click on it, it's behind a paywall.

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I apparently have to pay five bucks even for a day pass to read this article, which I'm not going to do.

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So I found the same story on Yahoo and that actually came with a video clip.

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So I'll play that here in just a moment. But first, let me kind of tell you who these individuals are. You may have heard this song,

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Hard Fought Hallelujah, especially if you listen to K -Love. They really like to play it there. This is among the popular praise and worship music that's really circulating around Christian music right now.

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Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll have had what is perhaps the most popular Christian song this year with that particular tune,

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Hard Fought Hallelujah. By the way, it's co -written by Steven Furtick. Brandon Lake is out of the

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New Apostolic Reformation. And when I say out of it, I don't mean that he's left it behind. He's still a part of it.

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He's just not as closely aligned with it as he was before. His beliefs are still the same. It's not like he's turned from that and actually become a

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Christian. But he was first published, I believe, through Bethel Music.

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That was where his first album came from. Did a lot of praise and worship with Bethel Music. Still does.

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We'll partner with them and do things, Hillsong, Elevation Worship, obviously with Elevation that comes out of Steven Furtick's church and with Furtick being a co -writer on that song.

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Brandon Lake and Steven Furtick have done co -writing things together. I've mentioned Brandon Lake on this program before.

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It was earlier this year. I can't remember which month now, but you might remember the story from earlier this year where Brandon Lake was talking about how the song

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Holy, Holy, Holy just goes over everybody's head. The classic hymn. The hymn that's in your hymn book at church,

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Holy, Holy, Holy. It's too deep. It's too difficult for us to grasp, and so we shouldn't sing that song because some unbeliever that comes into the church won't understand what we're talking about, and it will just be beyond their comprehension.

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But who is church for? Ultimately, church is the Christians who are praising

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God. It is for God. We are lifting up praise to God. Unbelievers are going to come in, but we're not catering the church to unbelievers.

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If any unbeliever does come in, we need to share the gospel with them. Tell them to turn from their sin to the Lord Jesus Christ, but we do not shape the church worship service for unbelievers.

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This has been going on for decades now, this seeker -sensitive mindset of programming your church service, as a matter of speaking, because these people that will go after this seeker -sensitive way of doing church are putting together a program.

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They're planning this out as, church needs to be done this way because we want to be able to appeal to those seekers when

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Romans 3 tells us, no one seeks for God, and yet we believe there's this imaginary seeker guy out there that's looking for something, and so when he comes into our church, we need to speak language in the right kind of way that will minister to him, when that's not the point of church.

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Church is for Christians to praise God. That's not where our evangelism is done.

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Evangelism is primarily done out in the world, when we go beyond the church walls and we are sharing the gospel with other people.

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So Brandon Lake still has that seeker -sensitive thing going on, obviously associated with the new apostolic reformation.

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He believes heretical things about the Trinity, about the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, even individually, the individual persons of the

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Trinity. And then you have Jelly Roll. Brandon Lake is doing this song with a guy named

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Jelly Roll, who, by the way, I had no idea who this was, had never heard of Jelly Roll before this song,

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Hard Fought Hallelujah. Apparently, the guy is a country music star of some kind, but I did not know who this was before he was pulled into doing this song with Brandon Lake.

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Jelly Roll is not a Christian. Brandon Lake is a heretic in the things that he believes about God are not biblical.

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Jelly Roll is just not even a Christian at all. And yet, he is regularly performing with Brandon Lake.

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This wasn't like they did a song and they did a few performances, and then it came about that Jelly Roll's lifestyle really wasn't

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Christian, and so then Brandon Lake decided, well, I can't associate myself with Jelly Roll anymore. No, nothing has changed.

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They still perform together all the time, despite the fact that Jelly Roll has been in an open marriage, meaning that it's basically mutually agreed upon adultery.

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Jelly Roll commits adultery. His wife, whose name is, I guess, Bunny XO. I don't know what that's...

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I'm sure that's a stage name of some kind. I don't know what her real name is. Jelly Roll.

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I mean, that's not his real name either. I've seen his real name. I just don't remember what it is off the top of my head.

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But anyway, these two are in an open marriage. It's a mutually agreed upon adultery.

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He can sleep around with other women. She can commit adultery with other men.

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And so anyway, as Maddie had pointed out, she did some investigating on this and came to discover that that was just a rumor.

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And Bunny XO set the record straight regarding this particular rumor, and I'll play the clip from her in a moment.

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But first of all, here's Jelly Roll. This is after they received the

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Dove Award for Song of the Year. Was this this week, earlier this week or last week or sometime? I can't remember when this was.

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But anyway, here is Jelly Roll, and this is his acceptance speech, receiving a

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Dove Award for Song of the Year. Y 'all forgive me. I'm one.

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I'm not sure how much I even belong speaking up here right now, but just and I'm nervous.

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I ain't been this nervous since I went to criminal court, y 'all. This is a real thing for me. I mean, I'm sweaty palm, but I was listening to him and I was thinking about Matthew when

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When he talks about the least, when he said, uh, when I was hungry, you fed me. When I was thirsty, you gave me water.

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When I was in jail, you came and visited me. And I realized that I'm standing here because people took time with the least and I don't really know what that means.

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Is he referring to himself as the least? I was the least of these. As I've talked about many, many times regarding that passage in Matthew chapter 25, when

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Jesus is referring to the least of these, he's talking about our fellow believers, our fellow Christians, the least of our fellow

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Christians. He's not talking about every person who has been in prison and you went and visited them or who was hungry and you gave them food to eat.

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He's not, he's not talking about all of the poor or marginalized in a society, which in Jelly Roll's case, he's not even poor.

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He's a multimillionaire. But continuing on, I want to, I want to give this message as clear as I can right now.

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The world is hearing about Jesus like they haven't in decades right now. There is a revival happening in the

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United States of America where you can't go on a corner and not hear about Jesus right now.

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And while we are hearing about Jesus, I encourage you to put faith on your feet and feed on your faith and walk out of this building and go do for the least.

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They've heard of Jesus. Now show them Jesus. Go feed the poor. Go visit the ones in jail.

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Go show them who Jesus was. They were done talking. It's time to show. I thank you for the double warrants.

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I think this thing is great. I think it gives alternative programming for kids at home watching this. My son's watching this.

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I think this is awesome. He gets to watch an award show like this. I thank God that I could see the forest for the trees.

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God bless them. But what Jesus is he talking about? What does he know about Jesus?

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He's just paying lip service to Jesus. Jelly Roll doesn't really know him. He and his wife both claim to be

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Christians and will talk about Jesus like you hear about Jesus all the time in country music songs.

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I mean, you're always hearing about Jesus, but they live lifestyles that don't look like Christians whatsoever.

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You know, the double awards that were recently Forrest Frank, I think he won war. He won artist of the year.

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And Forrest Frank did not attend the double awards. And Frank has decided he's not going to attend award shows for him.

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The award is being able to serve Christ, being able to speak his name and sing to his glory and that people would even be one to Christ.

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That for him is reward enough. He doesn't want to be doing award shows and receiving awards for these these things that he does for Jesus.

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I'm kind of on the fence about that. I can understand the benefit of receiving an award. I mean, my dad,

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I went and attended an award ceremony with my dad five years ago when he was awarded the

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Legacy Award for 50 plus years in Christian radio. And it was a great honor for my dad. I thought that was a that was a pretty big deal.

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But anyway, Forrest Frank has just decided he's not going to attend award shows, which is fine. It's great for him.

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But Jelly Roll called him out, publicly called him out on that because he would not go to the

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Dove Awards. I probably wouldn't attend the Dove Awards. I have attended the Dove Awards a couple of times.

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I probably wouldn't do it again, though. But anyway, Jelly Roll publicly calls out Forrest Frank and says the following.

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You won't receive a trophy for something from Jesus for Jesus, but you will take the profits from something from Jesus for Jesus.

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Maybe I'm missing something here. LOL. Well, Jelly Roll does the same thing.

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It's an incredibly hypocritical statement. The very thing you're accusing Forrest Frank of is what you do.

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You're taking the profits from proclaiming Christ. It's OK to get paid for the job that you do.

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A worker is worthy of his wages. A Christian can even make a lot of money and making a lot of money for making

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Christian music or art or some kind. There's nothing wrong with that either. It's more a matter of what they do with the money than it is that they actually make the money.

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But making a lot of money, there's nothing wrong with that. But the very thing that Jelly Roll is calling

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Forrest Frank out on is the thing that Jelly Roll is doing. He is profiting off of Jesus.

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But in Jelly Roll's case, I don't know about Forrest Frank, though, honestly. I don't follow the guy.

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But with regard to Jelly Roll, you know, when I heard of that, when I heard this song,

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Brandon Lake, Jelly Roll, and I look these guys up, I mean, it didn't take me more than a couple of minutes to figure out, oh,

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OK, Brandon Lake is with Bethel Church, which is a heretical church.

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And Jelly Roll is not even a Christian at all. Again, the guy being in an open marriage, which is just mutually agreed upon adultery.

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Now, like Maddie said, that somebody had said to her that this was just a rumor and Bunny XO had disproved it.

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So I went to this article on Yahoo to to read what she was talking about.

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Now, hang on. I got to I got to put it back up here because I took it down Yahoo posted there and it says

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Jelly Roll's wife, Bunny XO, officially addresses the open marriage rumors. Living life in the public eye comes with its issues and two of the biggest burdens is being under constant speculation.

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This is especially true when it comes to a celebrity's romantic life. Artist Jelly Roll and his wife,

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Bunny XO, married since 2016, have always been open books about their relationship together.

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The pair met at one of his concerts in Las Vegas when Bunny learned Jelly Roll was traveling back to Vegas.

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She offered for him to stay at her place and they haven't been apart since. And it's kind of an admission of fornicating.

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And that's how they ended up together. It's a white trash love story. Jelly Roll once told the hosts of the

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King and the Sting and the Wing Clips podcast. The King and the

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Sting and the Wing Clips podcast. OK, there you go. Noting that he was living in a van at the time when I hugged her,

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I could just feel the genuineness of her. I could tell it wasn't an act. The rest was history.

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Together the two overcame a ton of hardships. Jelly Roll is often credited his wife for his success as she financially and emotionally supported him as he got his career off the ground.

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Now the pair are enjoying success in their own lanes and together. But with success comes scrutiny.

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And recently Bunny took to her podcast to clear the air around some questions about the openness of their marriage.

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OK, so now here's the clip. Now, before playing this clip, I have listened to her podcast.

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It's called the Dumb Blonde podcast, I believe it is. Even beyond this clip, it is it is a filthy podcast.

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Like you can't listen to it, the F words are so rampant, it is

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R rated, and there's probably even worse content than what I heard and I did not want to hear anymore.

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This is Jelly Roll's wife and the two of them call themselves Christians, and you're going to hear her say that in this particular clip, there's language in this clip.

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I have muted it so you won't hear the bad words. Don't worry, but you'll figure it out.

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I mean, you'll you'll know what it is that she's saying, even though I've bleeped all of this out and tried to to clear it up a little bit.

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But again, these people that are being presented to us as Christians and these Christian songs that are being pushed out and even receiving

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Dove Awards for Song of the Year, they're not believers. And even the stuff that they say and the stuff that they put out is really, really terrible.

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And I'll expound on that even in a moment. But here's here's Bunny XO addressing the rumor that her and Jelly Roll are in an open marriage.

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Also, can we talk about the clip that I made? OK, oh, no, you guys got a very good job.

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Hey, mom, can we talk about the clip that every page?

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First of all, love all the clip pages who are clipping the podcast. Love that. Go keep doing it. But you guys are clipping clips from like six years ago.

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One of them, finally, there was a clip that went around that said, if I want to sleep with other men, I can.

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And people have just ran with this clip for years. And I know that I've addressed me and my husband's situation.

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I don't understand what part of we are not in an open relationship that people cannot comprehend.

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The only thing that we don't do, though, is try to control the other person.

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If I want to go sleep with another man, he's not going to be like, no, your minds, you know, you can't do that to people.

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OK, so it's still it's still an open marriage. They just don't call it an open marriage.

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We just don't stop the other person. We don't tell them, no, you can't go do that. But but they can.

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And then that's still apparently agreed upon in the marriage. So maybe there's a little bit more resistance to it than we would have been led to believe before.

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But but that's still an open marriage. It's still they're seeing other people and sleeping around with other people committing adultery.

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It goes for like if there was another woman, but this is all in the past. Like we've completely stopped all of those shenanigans because you can't trust anybody in the world.

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Back in the day, that was OK. Now, hear that. So she said that that was who we were before.

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But we've stopped all those shenanigans. There's no repentance. This never gets called evil.

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In fact, she's whitewashing it by saying, no, no, no, it wasn't an open marriage. It's just we weren't controlling each other is what it was.

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But we've since closed the marriage sort of. I mean, you'll you'll hear from what she says here.

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It's not really that way. But but we've since closed the marriage because you can't trust people in the world, not because they learn that it was evil and we're actually not honoring

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God. And and our marriage needs to be more reflective of Christ, the way that Christ loves the church, as said in Ephesians chapter five.

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It's not that understanding. It's that we just couldn't trust people in the world anymore. And so that's why we've changed the nature of our marriage, how we looked at our relationship.

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We don't want to tell each other what we can and can't do. We have free will. That's a huge difference between having an open relationship.

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Because also we're healing together and learning to be together. Yeah. And that's just what was good in the beginning for you guys.

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He had never been in a real relationship. Granted, he had a couple of 10 year relationships, but he had cheated on every one of them.

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I had been cheated on and I was in sex work. How am I going to be in sex work, having sugar daddies telling my husband, no, you can't sleep with other people like you guys just don't see the bigger picture.

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And there ain't on everybody. So she was doing sex work. While they were married to each other.

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So you can't tell me not to go sleep with other I mean, she's admitting it was an open marriage, this is just an extremely bizarre response, but you can anyway, like I said before about how the podcast is just really filthy.

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You can probably understand why now like, oh, isn't jelly a Christian? Yes, we are both Christians. We love

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Jesus. And that's why we have changed the uniform of our relationship. It was never open for us to have to close it.

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I think that's where people don't understand, because we were six years ago, we were just learning how to talk to the Internet. Everybody, their mom runs with that clip.

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But I'm so happy because one clip finally posted the whole clip. Yeah. And people, of course, are only going to hear what they want to hear.

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But the majority of the time they clip that if I want to go sleep with other people. And it's so funny to me because we have brought in more women into our relationship than I'm just going to stop.

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I don't think I need to go any further. Yeah, you hear her say, no, we love

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Jesus. And then and then she's talking so flippantly. About how promiscuous they were and doesn't really sound like much has changed, except that, you know, we've just kind of tightened up the restrictions a little bit because you can't trust people in the world.

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We've stopped all those shenanigans, she says. And we both love Jesus, but but doesn't really explain what that means or what that's even grounded in.

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We love Jesus. So what? Like, what does your marriage then look like now?

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What does your marriage look like that is honoring of God? Do you understand that the way that you were living before?

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Was evil that God has promised that he will judge. Colossians, chapter three, verse five, put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and covetousness, which is idolatry.

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On account of these, the wrath of God is coming. And don't forget, first Corinthians, chapter six, verse nine, where it is said that sexual immorality, the sexually immoral will not inherit the kingdom of God.

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The judgment of God is coming against this stuff. She doesn't seem to have any awareness of that.

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So we love Jesus. So what? Who is Jesus to you? Jelly Roll said it,

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Brandon Lake says it in his songs, but who is this Jesus that you're singing about? Who are you talking about?

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Now, when I was trying to figure out Bunny XO's real name, I was trying to look it up and I couldn't find it.

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But I I found this People magazine article that was from just last month.

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This is dated September 17. So it's not even been a full month. She has announced

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Bunny XO has announced a new memoir entitled Stripped Down, unfiltered and unapologetic.

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And she says, here's the quote at the beginning of the article, although I've left that lifestyle behind,

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I've stripped down one last time and bared my soul for the world to see.

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Now, you might be thinking to yourself, OK, well, she's just being euphemistic. No, because when

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I scrolled down on the cover of the book, she's naked. And I deeply regretted even scrolling down.

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So a book entitled Stripped Down, and she really is that way to say

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I've left this lifestyle behind. No, she hasn't. And it's the same with her description of their marriage.

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It's not an open marriage. And then what she describes is an open marriage. I've left this lifestyle behind.

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And then what she presents is exactly that lifestyle. These people are not Christians.

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And yet this is what is being pushed out there as Christian, man, I can still remember when

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I was working in Christian radio and the news came out that Amy Grant was getting a divorce.

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Amy Grant and Gary Chapman, her first husband, were divorcing. And then the discussion became among so many different Christian music programmers, do we still keep playing her music or not?

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Same sort of thing happened when Sandy Patti was caught in adultery. Michael English was caught in adultery.

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This is what was going around among the Christian music programmers at Christian radio stations all over the country.

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Most Christian radio stations were yanking their stuff. So you weren't hearing Sandy Patti, Michael English and Amy Grant on the air anymore.

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And Amy Grant had pretty much gone secular by that point anyway. So it wasn't like she was making music for Christian radio anymore regardless.

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But these were the discussions that I was having 20 years ago. How long ago was this?

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Over 20 or 30 years ago, I guess it was. And so these were the kinds of things, the kinds of decisions that were being made in Christian radio because an artist got caught in adultery and got a divorce and their songs were getting yanked off the air.

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There was there was even a Christian artist, I can see her face, but I cannot remember her name.

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She was on America's Got Talent and she performed, did well,

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I suppose. I don't think they won anything, but but she was asked in her performance on the show where like what her history was and everything.

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And she talked about how she was in Christian music, but then she got pregnant out of wedlock. And so she lost her recording contract and all of her music got yanked off of Christian radio.

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And the hosts of America's Got Talent were just appalled by that. They were like, oh, man, I can't believe somebody would treat you that way.

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We have standards or we used to used to have standards in Christian radio. That if a person wasn't living like a

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Christian, then they weren't going to get their songs played on Christian radio. That appears to be a thing of the past now.

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Because now for a man that is in an adulterous marriage, give him a

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Dove Award for Song of the Year and who is not going to look into this guy and find out the kind of life that he lives and that's going to appear

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OK to people as long as you give lip service to Jesus. Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll's song,

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Hard Fought Hallelujah, is not a hard fought hallelujah.

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It's not a hallelujah to God at all. It's just Jelly Roll finding another platform to make more money.

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In the meantime, he continues to live this wicked lifestyle that is not reflective.

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Of a person who fears God and wants to honor Christ at all. So I hope that's helpful for you,

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Maddie, and you can pass on that information. Did you say that that was to a friend? A friend told you a friend sent you a comment by me saying that Jelly Roll is not a

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Christian and he's in an open marriage with his wife. Well, anyway, so I hope that I had answered that with you well enough and God bless you.

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I appreciate you listening and asking the question as well. There are some better songs out there.

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There's better things for you to listen to that are even more God honoring than Brandon Lake and Jelly Roll.

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We don't need these guys, you know, the heretical Christian musicians.

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We don't have to have them. There are better musicians out there and those who truly love

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God and actually live Christian lifestyles and have some better Orthodox beliefs regarding their

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Christian faith. I don't know why we keep turning to the same people, but it's like Bethel Church, Hillsong and Elevation are still the top three.

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They are the big three in Christian music. When you go look through the most sung songs in Christian music right now or in churches right now, so this is according to the

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CCLI charts, which tracks all of this stuff. What songs are being sung in churches across America?

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And I think pretty much around the world as well. The top three are still Bethel Music, Elevation and Hillsong.

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Those are still the top three. They're heretical churches, but they know how to market.

30:28

Bethel Church has even outright said, and we've talked about this on this program many other times, Bethel Church has said that they win people with the music.

30:36

So they draw people into the teaching at Bethel Church. Elevation draws people into the teaching at Elevation.

30:45

They do this through their music. They've admitted that that's what they do. And there's a lot of money behind that music to make sure it's put out there.

30:54

And it's the stuff that you hear whenever you hear Christian music. Because there's money to promote it, but we don't have to listen to these guys.

31:04

There's better stuff out there and the big conferences and stuff like that. Stop calling on these guys to lead the worship at your conferences.

31:13

I was very disappointed that it was these same people that were leading worship at Charlie Kirk's memorial as well, as if there's no one else out there that we can call upon.

31:23

Speaking of this, on that note, you don't need Mark Driscoll either to lead your movement.

31:30

And I don't know why people keep going back to Mark Driscoll, but it happens over and over and over again.

31:37

The disgraced former pastor of Mars Hill Church, who, as I said earlier in the program, resigned 11 years ago from Mars Hill, has since reinvented himself, founded a new church in the

31:50

Phoenix area. It's called Trinity. I've even known people that go there. I've known people that like it there.

31:56

But Mark Driscoll just seems to I'll tell you what Becky said. OK, so Becky is not on the program here, but this is the way she described

32:04

Mark Driscoll when we were talking about it. Mark Driscoll is the Brett Favre of pastors.

32:11

He's really talented. He's really good, but he is full of drama and he never seems to go away.

32:19

So this guy just keeps coming back. And whenever he comes back, it's a whole lot of drama.

32:24

A guy that's totally full of himself, because that is Mark Driscoll in a nutshell. And so and so here he is once again.

32:32

He's been platformed in this clear truth conference that's coming up that includes some other speakers as well.

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Originally, Votie Bauckham was supposed to be the speaker, but he just died. And so to replace

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Votie Bauckham, they put in Mark Driscoll. Now, the ironic thing about this, about this particular conference, is that clear truth media was started to be an alternative to the

32:59

Gospel Coalition and Acts 29. Now, I think it's even called Real Clear Churches or something like that.

33:07

They've changed the name because the whole leadership structure has changed. But anyway, they wanted to be an alternative, something that was that was more solid than the

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Gospel Coalition and Acts 29. And who do they bring in as a speaker? One of the co -founders of the

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Gospel Coalition and Acts 29. Seems to me like history is repeating itself.

33:32

You know, if you really want to sabotage your movement, bring Mark Driscoll into it, because he sure knows how to do that.

33:40

Anyway, I got this question from Jace. I'm already talking about this. And Jace is really the one who sets this up, asking this question.

33:46

Pastor Gabe, I appreciate you keeping up on issues that I don't have the time to keep up on. I wanted to ask you about Mark Driscoll.

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I believe I heard you say once that you're amazed how short everyone's attention span is concerning Driscoll.

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What did you mean by this? What are the main reasons you would say he's disqualified for ministry?

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Well, I believe the statement I even said the statement at the beginning of this program. I said it again. But I believe the statement, as you heard, it would have been that everybody's memory is short concerning Mark Driscoll, because all of this happened over a decade ago with Driscoll publicly disgraced and disqualified as a pastor.

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But he keeps coming back and he's never apologized for the things that he's done. As a matter of fact, he's he's since totally cast the blame on the elders that were putting him under discipline.

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So he's never apologized for anything. He he has no contrition, demonstrates no contrition at all, has never admitted that he was abusive and overbearing.

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Well, just to talk about some of the offenses that was really the main thing is that Driscoll was being charged with being an abusive pastor.

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There were what was the number? Hang on. I got to look this up. So there were 21 former

35:08

Mars Hill pastors who were bringing charges against Mark Driscoll for being abusive.

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And those charges included, number one, Pastor Mark exhibits a lack of self -control by his speech and by verbally assaulting others.

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Number two, we believe that the way Pastor Mark has created a culture of fear instead of a culture of candor and safety, people are often afraid to ask questions or challenge certain ideas.

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And then number three, Pastor Mark is verbally abusive to people who challenge him, disagree with him or question him.

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Now, this is from a news story that was published in August of 2014. As I mentioned,

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Driscoll resigned in October. There was the AX 29 network, which, as I mentioned,

35:56

Driscoll helped to found the the the pastors that were among the AX 29 network.

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They removed Mark Driscoll from AX 29. And because of his abusive behavior and that he was disqualified as a minister, they even said that he was disqualified.

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And that was the reason why he was being removed from AX 29. Well, the elders at Mars Hill wanted to do an investigation of it.

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But in the meantime, they were telling Driscoll that that he was going to step back for a little bit and he was going to resume preaching in January.

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And so Driscoll was accepting of that. But then suddenly out of the blue, he just resigned.

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At first, he was willing to submit to the discipline of the eldership, acknowledging the charges that were brought against him about abusive behavior and things like that.

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But then he just resigned. He ran away from it and would not listen to correction.

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As Proverbs 12 one says, the one who rejects correction is stupid. And here was

36:55

Driscoll rejecting correction, even though he acknowledged those charges. And you'll still hear interviews with him every once in a while or comments that will be made by him about that season, in which if you listen to the comment carefully, you will recognize that he will admit that there were legitimate charges that were brought against him.

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But he always deflects the blame. It always ends up being cast against someone else.

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Let me play you a clip here. This is from 2022. It's from a little over three years ago.

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Driscoll was preaching in his church in Phoenix about when he was removed at Mars Hill.

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And he said in being removed from Mars Hill that God had showed him a trap was set for him and that he needed to be released from from this burden of being put under discipline in Mars Hill.

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So he left. His claim is he left because God told him to. So listen to this again.

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This is from a sermon that he preached at his church just three years ago. Lots of conflict and controversy.

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So, OK, investigate everything. I know I'm not disqualified. I know who I am. I can't wait to stand before Jesus. It's gonna be a great day for me.

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Not that I'm perfect, but I I know who I am and I know who he is. And we were asked to return and I'll share something with you.

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I've never shared. I don't know if it's a good idea or not. I'll ask Grace. She just she did this.

38:28

OK, so so I was in one end of the house.

38:36

Grace was in the other. God spoke to us both, said you're released. You need to resign immediately. OK, now, before going further, he has actually said this before.

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So the statement of like, I'm going to share something with you that I've never shared before, he actually has. And I'll play that for you.

38:55

There's there is a detail that he includes here that he did not include the first time that he shared this.

39:01

So maybe that's what he's referring to. But he's not actually saying anything here that he hasn't said before.

39:07

He said of the clip that I'm going to play for you, he said 10 years ago the same thing that he's he's saying here.

39:15

So anyway, continuing on. And God told me a trap is set. He didn't tell Grace that. So she came in.

39:21

She's like, God just spoke to me. I was like, God just spoke to me. And I said, what did you hear?

39:26

She said, we're released. I said, I heard we're released. That trap was set. So so we walked away, didn't defend ourselves, took 18 months, didn't do social media, didn't do public ministry, just wanted to heal up and be with my family and get them into safety in a very dangerous season of our life.

39:42

Now, that's actually not true. So he said we took 18 months away from social media and everything else.

39:48

No, he was doing like a tour of interviews and all this kind of stuff that was going on at that time.

39:56

Days after he resigned from Mars Hill days. He was speaking at a conference.

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At Robert Morris's church in Dallas, Texas. Robert Morris, the guy who was who was just booked a few weeks ago, wasn't it?

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The sentence was handed down on Robert Morris because he had sexually abused a teenage girl years ago, and now he's going to prison for six months.

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He needs to be put away for life. Really deserves the death penalty for what it is that he did.

40:31

But anyway, I mean, you know, this is Robert Morris, the pedophile who Mark Driscoll went to his church just days after he resigned from Mars Hill and spoke at his conference.

40:43

And then months after that, so about eight months after his resignation, he did an interview with Brian Houston, who was then at the time the pastor of Hillsong Church, Brian Houston, who is likewise been exposed for all different kinds of sexual abuse that was going on at his church.

41:02

That church has been exposed. I don't know that any charges were brought against Houston specifically, other than he just didn't do anything about the stuff that was going on in his church.

41:12

But anyway, you know, all this to say Driscoll Driscoll did not take 18 months away from social media and all this stuff.

41:19

He was still out there. He's always been out there always doing things. There's never been a break.

41:26

We've never not had Driscoll. This guy is is a self -absorbed narcissist.

41:33

He just cannot help himself. And so he went around to all of these new apostolic reformation, charismatic guys to reinvent himself, ends up coming back into the spotlight, ripping on Calvinism.

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You know, he was even known as a Calvinist when he was at Mars Hill. But now he says it's for guys with daddy issues and all this stuff.

41:53

So anyway, yeah, finds a new way to rebrand himself. But it's always been this this kooky, charismatic.

42:00

And so, again, right here, he's saying that Jesus had told him that he did not have to submit to discipline because they were setting a trap for him, is what he said.

42:12

What was that trap? Well, let's continue on. So during that time, I met with some of my critics and enemies, one on one or small group, people that had been friends, people who claim to be

42:24

Christians, some who were pastors, some who still are pastors. And I asked him,

42:30

I said, I said, God told me a trap was set. So I asked him,

42:35

I said, do you know what that might be? And these people that we had known said, yeah, the nuclear option was we were going to accuse you of adultery.

42:48

This was at Panera, multiple meetings at Panera. At Panera, this this was at Panera, we were meeting at Panera, and we came up with this idea that we're going to accuse

43:02

Mark Driscoll of adultery. Now, notice that when he said that there was kind of a buzz in the crowd.

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They're all like, oh, wow, this is his church, his church in Phoenix that he's telling this to.

43:17

You guys discussed accusing me of adultery. You know, that's not true. I've been faithful to my wife my whole life.

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I adore my wife. I love my wife and she loves me. We've been faithful to each other. We've been open our whole marriage about any struggles we have had, because we know that every married couple has some hardship to go through.

43:36

And we have never been dishonest, but we have never done that. We've never done anything remotely like that.

43:42

Now, let me point out something else. So he hears from God.

43:50

Right. He hears from God. That you're released from Mars Hill.

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They were setting a trap for you. And he's saying that his wife heard the same thing.

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So they're both hearing from God that a trap is set for you. And so you're released from your responsibilities to Mars Hill.

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He goes to former elders and asks them, were you setting a trap for me?

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And they said, yes. And openly, honestly admit we were going to accuse you of adultery, even though you were not guilty of adultery, like they willingly offered that just said, oh, yeah, right.

44:29

Well, you caught us, I guess. So now we're I'm going to admit it. Yep, you're right. We were going to trap you and we were going to accuse you of adultery.

44:38

And incidentally, this is not the only time that he has done this. He's done this before, where, like, he he thinks that God has given him a vision of something and he calls somebody out on it and they go, oh, yeah, you got me.

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Somehow he has this magical ability to just elicit a confession out of somebody just by saying, hey,

44:56

God showed me this. Oh, yeah. Well, if God showed it to you, you're right. It's true. You got me. And he's done this before, like I said.

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So anyway, continuing on. I said, yeah, that's why we kept it as the nuclear option. I was like, to get me what they said to get you out of the pulpit.

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They said, because we knew that if we accused you of adultery and enough of us signed the open letter, that ultimately there would be such a media firestorm that you would have to exit ministry, exit preaching

45:27

God's word for probably a year while a full investigation was done. During that time, we could take over and lead and be in charge.

45:36

And then we figured one of two things would happen. Either you would come back, but we would be in charge or you would never come back.

45:44

And you'd be done forever. And the whole time he's telling this story, the backdrop behind him says a study in Nehemiah.

45:52

So somehow this story fits with the Bible lessons that he's been doing in the book of Nehemiah.

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Multiple people told me that to my face on separate occasions and days. Yeah. So he doesn't just have one elder who's admitted this.

46:09

Multiple people have told him this. Therefore, multiple elders, multiple elders, he had said to, were you setting me this trap?

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You were setting this trap for me. And they all admitted, yeah, we were is the nuclear option. We were going to accuse you of adultery, even though you weren't guilty of it.

46:25

I want you to be if I'm going to be your pastor and I love you, I promise you this. I'll always tell you the truth.

46:31

And I want you to love and honor and respect Christian leaders and pastors. Okay. He's he's lying.

46:38

He is lying here. This is a whole story is a lie.

46:44

It's not true. And he's throwing the elders of Mars Hill under the bus elders.

46:52

Since he did this, there are elders that have come out and have said it's a complete lie. Never, ever happened.

46:59

The elders did not have this nuclear option in which we were going to falsely accuse

47:05

Mark Driscoll of adultery. The charges had already been given to him, and he was willingly accepting them.

47:11

He was admitting that he had been abusive and that he was going to submit to that authority.

47:16

By the way, the very fact that he's telling this story right here is an admission.

47:23

That he was guilty of the charges that were being brought against him. It's a very implied in admission, but it is an admission because he's deflecting here to don't pay attention to the stuff that they were accusing me of.

47:41

Look at how evil they were. Look how evil they were. They were going to accuse me of adultery.

47:46

So you see how smart it was for me to not submit to their call to discipline me.

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To get out of there instead, because God had revealed to me a trap was set, and this is what they were going to do.

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This is gaslighting. Driscoll knows how to tell a story.

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He knows how to lie through his teeth. This is an incredibly dishonest man.

48:13

This clip alone is enough to disqualify him for good.

48:20

Should not be in the position of a pastor anymore. Should not be invited to anybody's conference to speak.

48:27

This man is a liar. He is a narcissist, full of himself, abuser, documented, documented through and through documented for over a decade that this man has been an abuser, and he still seems to keep getting platformed and doing his thing.

48:46

And it's baffling to me that we just can't seem to remember all the stuff that he's done.

48:52

Let me keep playing this here because there's something else that he says here. That's pretty wild.

48:57

Here we go. Don't assume the worst, assume the best, and don't believe everything you hear and don't contribute to the gossip that just takes lies and gives them life.

49:09

So what he's telling his congregation here is what he's doing.

49:16

He says to them, I'll always be honest with you. I'll always tell you the truth right after he tells this lie of a story.

49:24

And then he says to them, don't always believe the gossip. This is gossip. He's making accusations of men that can't stand there and defend themselves.

49:36

He's throwing all of the Mars Hill elders under the bus and saying, look what they were going to do to me.

49:42

And it's a complete lie just to make himself look amazing. Amazing.

49:49

I remember John MacArthur saying one time, beware those preachers who are always the heroes of all their own stories or.

49:59

Even the victims of all their own stories. Beware those pastors, they're always the heroes or they're always the victims right here.

50:09

You've got Mark Driscoll playing both roles. I'm the hero and I'm the victim. I wasn't guilty of anything.

50:14

Hey, I'm looking forward to standing before Jesus one day. I know what I got going on. It was these elders that were going to do this to me.

50:22

Look what they were going to do so that he looks really, really good in front of his congregation. And this is just one story.

50:31

I could play you many other stories. From Driscoll of where he he will talk about.

50:39

God told me this. God revealed this to me. God said this. He is a prophet in his own mind.

50:45

And I don't know if the guy is a if he's a charlatan in the sense that he knows

50:51

God did not actually speak to him. Or if he's one of these persons that he just thinks that the thoughts that pop into his head must be

50:59

God's thoughts must be God saying this to me. But anyway, like I said to you before, this story that he's telling here, though, he says

51:07

I've never told this before. This is not the only time that he has said this. Let me go to the

51:13

Brian Houston interview that he did in June of 2015. So this was 10 years ago.

51:20

And again, you know, it contradicts Driscoll's claim for 18 months. We were just laying low.

51:26

We weren't doing anything. No, he was doing an interview with one of the biggest pastors on the planet and having this broadcast on his channel.

51:34

So here's what Driscoll says in this interview with Brian Houston about the stuff that was going on at Mars Hill and why he had resigned eight months before.

51:44

Here we go. You detailed a fair bit about mistakes you had made and offenses that you had caused.

51:54

And did you feel like that was received by people? I never got to say goodbye to the church and the people.

52:01

And so what went public was a it was actually the resignation letter that went to the legal governing board that was in authority over me.

52:09

And so I, I know under the circumstances that there wasn't a way to do that, that would have been clean or easy.

52:21

I don't have any criticism of the board. I think for the people, it meant there wasn't closure.

52:28

And I didn't we didn't get to say anything. And so and we didn't expect to resign.

52:35

I met with the board. There was a whole list of things that were charged by current and former leaders.

52:44

And there was an internal governance struggle and threats of legal action. And it got very complicated.

52:52

And again, he's not admitting to doing anything wrong here. So even though there was a point when he said he was going to submit to the discipline, he never admits wrongdoing.

53:02

He's never been repentant about any of this, about about any of the responsibilities that he had that led to this whole fiasco.

53:12

He never takes ownership for any of that. It's always somebody else. A lot of it was anonymous through the internet.

53:18

So you don't know who is saying or doing what now. Now, that's another funny comment, because one of the things that Driscoll was charged with in his abusive behavior is that he would create these anonymous accounts and then would go after people that he didn't like on the

53:38

Internet through these anonymous accounts. So here he's blaming these anonymous accounts were blaming me and stuff.

53:44

That was his playbook. That's what he did. And so I invited the board to do a full examination, interview anybody, anything, and we would submit to whatever verdict that they determined.

53:57

That went, I think, about eight weeks. We met Friday and Saturday, October 10th and 11th. I remember because the 11th was my birthday.

54:04

And so Grace and I were present with the board and they said, we see in your history of leadership, less in more recent years, but particularly in the past, pride, anger and domineering leadership style.

54:18

I think that would be the three exact words they used. We don't see anything disqualifying.

54:24

These are areas we want you to grow. We want you to return to leadership of the church soon.

54:30

They wanted to do some cleanup internally. We want you back on January 4th in the pulpit, give you time to heal, things to cool down and for some changes to be made.

54:41

We agreed to that. I sent in a go forward plan and then we went home to have birthday cake with the kids.

54:49

I think it was on Monday night. I was in the bedroom. Grace was in the living room. And so we told the board and told the kids, you know, come back and resume preaching and try and love and serve and fix what was a struggling church.

55:04

And God had provided a way for us to do that as volunteers. And so our plan was to come back as volunteers.

55:11

And then he's still making himself out to be the hero here. Look at how good we were going to be.

55:17

I wasn't even going to come back on top. I was just going to come back as a volunteer. On that Monday night,

55:24

I was in the bedroom. Grace was in the living room and he spoke to me and he spoke to her in a supernatural way that neither of us anticipated or expected.

55:35

And so Grace walked in and she said, I feel like the Lord just spoke to me and said what we're supposed to do.

55:40

And I was like, I feel like the Lord just spoke to me and said what we're supposed to do. It's not what we wanted. It's not what we had agreed to.

55:46

And it's not what we had planned for. And so I asked her, well, what did the Lord say to you?

55:52

Because I didn't want to influence her. And she said, we're released from Mars Hill.

55:59

Yeah, we can take him out.

56:07

So, well, she said, well, what did he say to you? And I said, well, the Lord revealed to me that, you know, a trap has been set.

56:15

There's no way for us to return to leadership. And I didn't know what that meant or what was going on at the time.

56:23

So there you have it again. God revealing to us, we were released.

56:28

The word released from Mars Hill and a trap had been set for us.

56:34

Now, as this clip goes on, he doesn't explain that that trap was the nuclear option, like he talked about with his church three years ago.

56:41

But this is what he has been saying since he left Mars Hill. God revealed to him this word released.

56:47

And this is what these charismatic false prophets do. They have this word from the

56:52

Lord, like literally a word from the Lord. Beth Moore will say, I have a word for you today.

56:58

And God revealed that word to me was nets. And then her whole teaching will have something to do with nets.

57:05

I'm not even just making that up. She did a whole series on nets. One time,

57:10

Cindy Jacobs, the new apostolic reformation, false prophetess will say, God has revealed a word for me this year.

57:17

And that word is breakthrough. That's the that is the word for 2025 or something.

57:23

She does this at the beginning of every year. And so here, Driscoll and his wife, Grace, are saying

57:29

God revealed to us this word released. And we were able to escape from all that discipline we were going to have to undergo.

57:41

My friends, when whatever pops into your brain, you can just attribute to being the

57:47

Lord saying to you something you can get out of anything. You can do whatever you want. God revealed it to me.

57:54

So therefore, it must be God. This is Mark Driscoll putting himself above God's word would not submit to discipline.

58:03

Proverbs 12, one says, whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid and claiming that God has revealed things to him.

58:12

He did not actually reveal. God is not going to reveal to you that you should not submit to a disciplinary committee.

58:18

And then 18 months later, you can just turn right around and start a whole other church.

58:23

Just start all over again. Start your church. You're still a qualified minister. This is completely contrary to the word of God.

58:30

This is Driscoll putting his word above God's word where God's word says in first Timothy 519, do not admit a charge against an elder, except on the evidence of two or three witnesses.

58:41

There were dozens and dozens of witnesses, if not more against Driscoll's abusive leadership style.

58:49

And then verse 20, as for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels.

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I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging, doing nothing from partiality.

59:08

And Driscoll ran away from all of that. He was not going to submit to what God's word said. He was going to submit to what he thought

59:15

God was saying to him in his mind. He is a false prophet. He is disqualified from ministry.

59:23

Roman 16, 17 says, I appeal to you brothers to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught.

59:34

Avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites and by smooth talk and flattery, they deceive the hearts of the naive.

59:52

That's Mark Driscoll. And my friends, I take no pleasure in highlighting these things, either from Jelly Roll or Mark Driscoll.

01:00:02

It grieves me. It grieves me that these are the men who have these prominent positions of leadership among Christians and Christians clamor for what they're saying and what they're doing.

01:00:16

Do not be deceived. You must be holy.

01:00:22

And these men are not going to lead you to holiness and Christ likeness.

01:00:28

They are just using you to fill up their own appetites. Don't be led astray by them.

01:00:37

I hope that you attend a good church with a faithful man of God who is preaching every

01:00:43

Sunday, faithful men of God, as it should be with a plurality of eldership, that you may imitate their faith.

01:00:52

Hebrews 13, 7, remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God, consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.

01:01:01

Verse 17, obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls as those who will have to give an account.

01:01:10

Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.

01:01:17

Now, guys like Jelly Roll, Mark Driscoll, they're going to have to give an account before God, and I hope they would repent before they have to give an account before God.

01:01:25

When the chief shepherd appears, as Peter talks about in 1 Peter 5, you will receive the unfading crown of glory for those who were faithful and in submission to the word of God.

01:01:38

1 Peter 5, 5, likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders, clothe yourselves, all of you with humility toward one another, for God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

01:01:54

My friends, as always, I appreciate you listening and thank you for sharing this program with somebody else.

01:01:59

Once again, if you would like to submit a question or if you even have any comments about anything that I've said here, send it to whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com

01:02:08

or go to wwutt .com and click on the voicemail tab and record a voicemail either through your phone or through your computer.

01:02:17

Becky gives you her love. I look forward to being on here again with you next week. We continue our study in Luke.

01:02:24

We're up to the Lord's Table section in the Gospel of Luke. That's going to be Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

01:02:30

And then on Thursday, we're still in Jeremiah. Friday, another Q &A, God willing. I love you all.