#43 UNDERSTANDING DIVINE HIDDENNESS + Dr. Josh Waltman

Biblically Speaking

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Hello, hello! Welcome to Biblically Speaking. My name is Cassian Bellino, and I'm your host. In this podcast, we talk about the

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Bible in simple terms with experts, PhDs, and scholarly theologians to make understanding

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God easier. These conversations have transformed my relationship with Christ and understanding of religion.

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Now, I'm sharing these recorded conversations with you. On this podcast, we talk about the facts, the history, and the translations to make the

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Bible make sense so we can get to know God, our Creator, better. Hello, hello!

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Welcome to Biblically Speaking. My name is Cassian Bellino, and I'm your host. Today, I am welcoming you from 2025.

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It's the second of the year, and I'm so excited to start this year fresh with a topic that you might not even know you're wondering about.

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Okay, we're going to talk about divine hiddenness. Where is God? If He wants us to know Him so badly, why don't

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I see Him? Why isn't He in front of me? I think that this is a discussion topic that maybe a lot of atheists, if you're considering this, the agnostics, this is going to be the episode you want to tune in for because today,

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I have Dr. Josh Waltman. You're back after a discussion with The Unseen Realm. Oh my gosh, that discussion was so wonderful.

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Today, we're going to talk about divine hiddenness. You said this is your bread and butter. You're passionate about this, and here

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I am like, well, I don't even... You're right. Where is God? I can't wait to hear your explanation.

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Welcome back to the show. I'm so glad you're here. So good to be back with you, Cassie, and I'm just thrilled to see you and have this conversation and just excited to talk about this.

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So thanks for having me on. Absolutely. So divine hiddenness, is this something that you taught or how did you...

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Before we get into it, how did you get into it? Yeah, so for me, this is...

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Obviously, it is a very, very deep topic in theology and philosophy, and it's something that we could sort of wax poetic on for a long time,

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I think, but it started for me at a very personal level. And I guess we'll just kind of jump in here on the personal level.

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Let's do it. When I became a Christian, when I was in high school and had an experience that caused me to start really questioning the meaning of life, and that sounds like a big topic, and of course, it is.

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And that ultimately led me to seeking the Lord in scripture. And I really believe

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I had an encounter with the Holy Spirit as I read scripture and was convinced of the truthfulness of it.

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And so no one really led, quote unquote, led me to the Lord. It was reading scripture and responding to it.

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And I couldn't understand why did I have that encounter? And it was so convincing to me.

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I consider myself a fairly skeptical person, or at least I did then. And yet it didn't seem to resonate with others that I was sharing my testimony with, and they didn't seem to have the same experiences.

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And so that led to a bunch of questions for me, like, who is this God that spoke to me the way that He did and revealed

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Himself the way that He did in my bedroom over the course of about three or four months when I was 17?

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And that He didn't seem to do this for others. And so for me,

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I actually went off to college. A lot of people go to college to get a degree and get a job. But for me, I had this like burning question.

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I just wanted to understand who this God was. And so I went to school to try to find answers. And it led me on a journey of about 15 years, to be honest with you, trying to find an answer to this.

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And as a matter of fact, my Ph .D. in large measure was to go and try to find a satisfactory answer to this question.

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Again, not really for a job, but for my own edification. It bugged me.

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Over time, the issues there, we're going to unpack this a little bit, but the issues there really threatened by virtue of sort of doubt that came with them.

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It seemed to threaten my faith. And so it was important to me just like on the base existential level to try to figure out what's going on with this concern.

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Where is God? What's He doing? Why is He revealing Himself in certain ways to some and not others?

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And is He really good if He's doing that for some and not others and so forth? That is amazing.

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My follow -up question is obviously going to be, well, how? Because I completely agree with you. Before you respond to that, I have had somebody say many times, why do you believe in God?

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And I'm like, whoa, I mean, where do I begin? Because you want to go into like, well, in my personal experience,

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He's revealed Himself to me not just in that one time. I feel like He delivered a vision to me. I think for most on -fire

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Christians, you have that experience of like, well, I had a vision and God spoke to me in a dream. But also on the minute day -to -day,

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God saved my life a thousand times today already. Where do I begin? But you're right.

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I think it's really tough to say, well, of course you're going to believe in God because He revealed Himself to me. And that person's like, well,

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He didn't reveal Himself to me. So why would I believe that? Did He like show up in front of you?

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Well, I think that actually is kind of touching on the nerve of some of this. It's like for me, I didn't hear an audible voice.

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I would use the language of communion. I really believe that the Holy Spirit was speaking to me through Scripture.

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And, you know, as I read Scripture, I really felt the Lord was applying this in a very personal and profound way.

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And so in theology, we talk about this in terms of religious experience, the phenomenon of religious experience.

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And that sort of is different for different people. It's like, you know, some people will go to a church service and say, hey,

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I really felt like the Spirit was moving today. And others will be like, well, that was the driest sermon I've ever heard.

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It's almost like the Lord is moving in different ways, in a personalized way in many respects.

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And so for me, it was an audible voice, but it was a sense. And I just can't get around the religious language here, and I'm sorry for it.

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But there was a sense of calling, a calling. And it wasn't divorced from my reason or my intellect.

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I was evaluating what was being sold to me in Scripture, we might say, what

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Scripture was saying. But it was through the lens of, okay, where can meaning be found in life?

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So for me, when I was 17, you know, trying to think about, do I want to play college football? Do I want to go and try to be a doctor?

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Do I want to go try to make a bunch of money and make a name for myself and things like that? And for me, the answer to all of those questions led to something pretty vacuous.

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It's like, what is that? If I'm just an animal, a primate, why does that mean anything in the scheme of things?

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I won't even be remembered in a generation from now. But how can life have any meaning at all?

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And so God was working through those lines of thinking. And as I read

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Scripture, it seemed to be affirming a lot of this. And also my life seemed to line up with the way that Scripture was sort of interpreting what

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I was walking through. And in addition to all of that, I really, again,

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I can't get around the religious language. I felt a sense of calling that the

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Holy Spirit is speaking to me and saying, this is true. The gospel is true. Come and follow me.

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You know, Jesus is saying, come and follow me and taste and see that he's good. And so I think a lot of times when we deal with issues related to like the evidence for Christianity, what a lot of people want to do is to just sort of intellectualize it and say, well, it's all about being neutral and objective.

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And like, let's put our emotions and experience to the side. I'm not one to say that that can happen.

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I actually think that we always bring our emotions and our affections and our experiences to the table.

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And it's part of a whole package of how we evaluate evidence and things like that. Absolutely.

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And so, yeah, I think God is the God of truth, both intellectual truth and intellectual evidence and emotional and experiential evidence.

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All of this comes together to help us to know him. And I think that's what God was doing for me in my bedroom during that season.

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That's beautiful. And it's so well said. I mean, I have two questions. One being,

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I can relate to you because I feel like God was putting a calling on me to start this podcast.

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I wanted it. I wanted to find it. And then out of nowhere, when I moved to Hawaii two years ago, this was five years after the initial nudge, it was like everything was lining up for me to pursue this.

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And then once I said, yes, everything fell together. But that kind of begs the question of, does God only reveal himself to us when we're seeking him?

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Because I have had a few friends where they're like, I used to be a Christian, now I'm not. And then out of nowhere,

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I was like, God, if you're there, let yourself be known. And then he did that thing that he always does that makes me know, because we all have that unique thing.

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I don't think we all experience, we're unique people. My friend, he was saying God would always talk to me with blinking lights.

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And I know that makes no sense, but for him it did. And he prayed a prayer randomly and he was like,

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God, let yourself be known. And he's like, and then it happened. So I feel like, did it take him to postulate?

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Yeah. Well, I mean, it's a lot there. I mean, I certainly think that before we become

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Christians, certainly it's the case, at least I'm with Paul in the book of Romans.

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He says, no man seeks after God, no, not one. And so we're not in a posture, I don't think, of earnestly sort of wanting to follow

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Jesus with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. I think the spirit has to do some work in our lives to get us to the point where we're able to submit fully to him.

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So if the condition is that God will only work in the lives of people that are fully submitted to him, then none of us qualify for that.

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You know what I mean? None of us are there. But the flip side of that,

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I think it's true that God wants this sort of dynamic relationship with us. It's probably been said on your podcast many times, he doesn't want a robotic relationship where he's doing all the work.

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He's wanting to do the work to change our hearts, but he wants us to choose to respond in submission and obedience and affection for him.

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And I think so much of the human experience and condition and everything that we walk through even as Christians and non -Christians alike is about choice.

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And so, yeah, I do think that when we choose to submit ourselves to the

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Lord, I do think he does something special. There's a sense of blessing associated with responding and obedience in our choice that we wouldn't necessarily have received had we not responded in that way.

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So it's a little bit of a both end. God in his sovereignty is working in the hearts and lives of people, even when they don't necessarily choose to follow him.

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And also, those that are following him as his people, in as much as they're submitting to the

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Spirit and the work of the Spirit and Scripture and so forth, we receive blessing as God reveals even more.

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We understand even more as we continue to submit. I love the both end.

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I love that even within his divine hiddenness, which we're about to jump in, this is a nice little intro, but even those turned away from him, he can turn their shoulder.

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And even those actively facing him, he will bless them for facing them. So that's wonderful that all are included, but thank you for explaining that.

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Jumping in, why is God so hidden? Oh man, this is such...

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Okay, let me maybe kind of give a preface here. Anybody that's maybe dealing with this question or maybe you've got a listener that's not a believer and it's like, this is the issue that's the hang up.

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Everybody always wants the quick social media meme answer to this. And like I said, it took me 10 to 15 years to find something fully satisfactory.

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Yeah, wrap this up in 30 seconds, please. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What I'll say is if you want to have a satisfactory answer,

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I do think it's out there. I actually wrote a book on this. And so if anybody wants to connect with me,

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I'm happy to maybe have further conversations about it. But I think that God is...

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First of all, maybe let's deal with it this way. Some people that I know, Christians would say, well, God's not hidden.

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He sent Jesus. God's not hidden. I talk to him all the time. Well, yes, he did.

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And yes, he has revealed himself, but God didn't show up in physical bodily form in my bedroom to tell me to follow him.

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And I don't walk around as a Christian and have this audible voice inside my head that I can just talk to Jesus like I'm talking to you.

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And to be honest with you, the Christian life is full of plenty of valleys and plenty of times where I just genuinely,

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I'm going to be completely honest with you. I just genuinely do not feel the presence of God.

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There are times when that feeling... And if you're a believer and you're listening to this, you may or may not know what

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I'm talking about. Sometimes you just feel God is with you. There are plenty of times that's not the norm where I'm still choosing to follow

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Jesus, even though I don't necessarily have that feeling. So all of that to say, God's presence isn't fully manifest in all of our lives at every moment of our lives.

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And I think it's a bunch of reasons for that. Let me mention the first one. Before you get into it,

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I just want to echo because I think that I love your vulnerability. I think it gives us permission to admit that one of the things that I struggle with most is like, oh yeah,

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I'm pursuing this podcast because God told me to. It's like, well, I think he does, but it's not like God wrote me a note confirming it.

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I'm trying to be obedient and then seeing what happens after. That would be insanity. That's like, well, I did it because God texted me last.

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I don't know, but I'm trying my best to be obedient. And I think that's really well put.

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Now, back to the show. Well, yeah, let me just always kind of make this point here.

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The Psalter, the 150 Psalms, they can be categorized into many different categories,

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Psalms of Thanksgiving and Psalms of Praise, which is what we often hear in church and things like that. But the most common type of Psalm is called a

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Psalm of Lament, where the Psalmist is sort of crying out to God for some needs.

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And in that category, we actually see Psalms where Psalmists like in Psalm 44, Psalm 10, or 22, or 13,

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Psalm 45. It's a variety of these where the Psalmist is saying, God, you're asleep. Where are you?

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Wake up. Or why do you turn your face from me? Why does it seem like you're so aloof and distant and so far away?

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And I think, you know, the fact that those appear in Scripture and the Psalms are sort of capturing the life of a follower of God.

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I think it's actually, it's pretty encouraging to me that others who are writing those books are recognizing this phenomenon.

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And so, yeah, I think calling out to God and recognizing that that's a really common experience.

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Now, of course, you know, the atheist is going to look at those experiences and see evidence for atheism, you know, or potentially say that the

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Christian is sort of jaded or misinterpreting experience in a wrong way, in an erroneous way.

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And I want to be just very, I don't know, I just,

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I understand where those folks are coming from. Like I said, I've dealt with doubt on this for many years prior to this.

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I feel very affirmed in this issue for myself currently. You don't feel like you're being delusional?

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No, no. But also I want to say, like, I understand where someone is coming from, if they're saying, hey, like, maybe you're just misinterpreting this whole thing, you know.

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But, you know, at the same time, I think we have every reason to think that God, it's like a common experience for people to say, yeah,

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I just don't always feel the presence of God in my life. So, yeah, we can talk about some of unpacking some of the reasons and the answers for this.

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But yeah, I just want to recognize that it is a real experience for people. I wanted to have this conversation because my first, leading question is, if the

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Hebrews left Egypt following a pillar of fire and having a tabernacle with a cloud coming down on it, why don't

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I get that? What happened? And it's like, was that just like the mystical fairy land of the

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Bible that we no longer live in because we have skyscrapers and telephones? Is there a place that does?

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But I appreciate you kind of recognizing, like, even the people in the Bible wrote songs about the lament of not experiencing

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God. And even, like, regardless, you experienced God in your room.

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I experienced God. Like, it's not something that has never happened since then. Yeah. And we can even have these profound experiences.

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You mentioned Israel. You know, Moses goes into the tabernacle and comes out with his face glowing because of the presence of God that he experienced.

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And, you know, the people saw the parting of the sea and they saw manna come from heaven and they saw truly miraculous displays of God's presence.

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And yet they turn right around and create a false idol. It's just, you know, how much more so does that principle show itself in our lives even today?

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You know, how much revelation is enough to really deal with this?

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And I think that's what Jesus is accomplishing, right? It's one of the reasons that he chooses to reveal himself the way that he does is because he's trying to deal with the spiritual sort of root of the problem.

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And that's part of the answer here. That's one of the facets of an answer from my perspective is that if God were to show up in an overt sort of magisterial way in my office right now, you know, and say,

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I'm God, bow before me. If that were to happen, I think it's possible that I would start to even doubt that.

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Did I imagine it? Was it an illusion? Was this an alien? You know, what's going on there?

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I think, of course, of course, God could make it such that I'm convinced by that. That's true.

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I think you can make the case that that's slightly coercive. It's doing away with some of my choice if he overwhelms my choice and takes it away from me.

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But at the same time, I think God is wanting to reveal himself in a way where I am responding sort of on a spiritual level.

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You know, I'm connecting with him spiritually and submitting on a spiritual level.

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And so he's connecting through the Holy Spirit and convicting me of sin, which if he were to display himself as the parting of the sea or something like that, that doesn't necessarily deal with the sin issue.

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And so that's why we had to have a new covenant. The new covenant deals with the sin issue.

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And so he's he's getting to the root of the issue by convicting us of our sin and having us come to know

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Jesus and to be regenerated, to have to be new creatures in Christ so that we can respond with soft hearts and not hearts of stone like the people of God in the

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Old Testament. Instead of bringing overt manifestations of God's manifest presence in that way, he's actually doing something more profound and fundamentally changing us from the inside out.

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So am I interpreting that we kind of overlook the bigger issue, which is addressing sin because we put too much pressure on the belief issue, which like the people didn't really struggle with.

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They didn't struggle with like, well, is God real or not? It's am I sinning or not? Like, how convicted do I feel about my sin and breaking away from my prior beliefs and prior systems and honoring now a unified

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God? Yeah. You know, part of the failure of the people under the old covenant, it's not that the covenant, it's not that the law was bad.

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You know, the law was obviously good. It came from God. And the covenant was good because it came from God. But when

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I say Old Testament, I just mean old covenant, right? The old covenant, the issue was that the people didn't ultimately really want to keep it.

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It was a heart issue. And so we see those descriptions, you know, in the Old Testament, the promise for the new covenant, the

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New Testament was that God was going to take a heart of stone and turn it into a heart of flesh, meaning it was going to it was going to respond affectionately to God.

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And God is going to write the law of God on people's hearts so that they now want to choose to follow

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God because they love him. Right. So the issue with the old covenant was not

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God's displays of revelation or even the covenants put in place. It was the people's hearts not wanting to respond in obedience and love.

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And so that's what the New Testament fixes. It actually, God goes beyond just establishing the covenant like he did under the old, but he actually goes into the covenanter, the person, and makes them new so that they can now love

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Jesus with heart, soul, mind, and strength in the most profound way. Whoa. Oh, my gosh.

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Wow. That makes me like see Jesus. I mean, not like a new life, but like the love that we feel for Jesus, the love that we're called, the love that we do feel when we really give our life to Christ.

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It's like, that was the point. Now you want it. Whoa. Okay. We've gotten so off track, but I still want to get us back in.

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Well, actually, I don't think we've gone off track at all. I actually think that that's part of why God is revealing himself the way that he is.

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He's trying to bring about that end, right? That's his agenda. Rather than appearing in front of us, he's trying to bring it back to a heart that yearns for him versus a heart that's like validated because we were gratified with his presence.

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Right. And to be clear, under the new covenant, there will come a day when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess.

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And we will recognize truly a physical lamb on the throne of God in heaven.

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There will come a day when we see that, the full sort of representation of God's presence.

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Okay. But in the sort of timeline here, God is revealing himself to change us under this new covenant so that when that day comes, we're in right standing with him.

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So he's resolving the problems under the old covenant in the new covenant so that we know his presence fully in this covenant.

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So I actually think that that's part of why he's hiding himself the way that he is because he's trying to get at the spiritual concerns, the spiritual issues that are keeping us from responding with affection and love and obedience and so forth.

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Um, so you're saying like, maybe God, like we go to God. That's to say I'm playing up the conversation of like,

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Hey God, wish you were present. I never see you. I miss you. God's saying like, exactly.

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That's the point. That's exactly what I want. I want you to be in this headspace. Yeah. You know, um,

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I have a friend who recently, a very, very, very good friend. He, he actually was a student for a season here with me and he was working on some issues, some research on divine hiddenness with me and his brother passed away in an accident unexpectedly one day.

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And so his family, he was very tight with his brother and his family. They were walking through a season of intense grief, him and him and especially, right.

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And, uh, what he said as he was walking through that grief was it just feels like the pain, like it feels like God, like I'm living in a world where I say that Jesus is

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King and he's in control of everything. And yet I'm, I'm experiencing this incredible amount of pain and suffering and loss.

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You know, I'm dealing with this on an emotional level, but what's happening though, is that in that grief, he tells me,

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I have this profound thought that this isn't how it's supposed to be and that we're supposed to be connected to Jesus, to the

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Lord, to the God, the creator God, which we're supposed to be connected in a way that isn't severed by death and that this isn't how it's supposed to be.

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And he said in that moment, as he had that realization, he realized that with hiddenness,

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God is trying to communicate. Yeah, this isn't how it's supposed to be. You're supposed to be walking with me.

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There was a garden. You walked with me in the garden. Sin introduced death and brokenness into this world.

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And because of that sin, now I'm working to restore it, but it's a process.

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And so hiddenness and distance and suffering in that, the feelings of disconnect and all of it in his experience actually taught him something about the heart of God in wanting to bring back into restoration that which was broken.

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Man, my instant gratification was talking way too loudly at the start of this conversation because you're right.

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It's a process. We have to endure this to appreciate the presence and the connection with them.

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Hey guys, Cass here. Are you feeling like your faith life is on buffering mode, waiting for that next level, but stuck in spiritual dial up?

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Biblically heard. Yes, I think that's right. You know, sin has a lot of effects.

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It has the effect, of course, of creating a rift between us. Not to be too crass, but we've stuck up our middle finger to God and said,

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I want to do it my way. 100%. We've broken his law, so we're lawbreakers.

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What theologians have always said about this is that because we're sinners, the presence of God, he's holy, and his presence is actually pretty dangerous for sinners.

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You think about Moses. Moses has this encounter with God. He says, I'll do what you ask.

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Just let me see you. Now, to put this into context, this is the guy that goes and communicates with God and comes out with a glowing face.

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And yet that wasn't enough. I just want to see you more is what he says. And so Moses says, just let me see you.

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And God says, well, if you see me fully, you're going to die. So I'll just let you see sort of the aftermath of my glory.

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Hide behind that rock and you'll see me pass by kind of thing. So it seems like the full presence of God for a sinner is actually pretty dangerous for us, especially apart from Christ.

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And so in Jesus, we're given new access. But if God were to show up in his full presence here,

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I think that's the same thing as him saying, I'm going to judge you for those that don't know

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Jesus. And so it's actually from a theological perspective, it's his kindness that keeps him from fully manifesting on the earth in those kinds of ways.

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He gives us time to respond, I think is the way I would put it. This might be a little off track, but you said something that struck a nerve with me.

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Are you saying that God could judge us based on how other people don't know him?

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So if we come to God and say, I'm a devout Christian. I love you, Jesus. I'm all in. It's Jesus coming to us and saying, well, if you love me so much, why are there people here that don't know me?

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Well, I think ultimately we're accountable for our choices.

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I don't want to say that we're accountable for the choices of others. But certainly

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I do think that part of being accountable for our choices includes possibly being apathetic about those who don't know

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Jesus and not having any concern for their salvation. I think it is incumbent upon us as followers of Jesus to be concerned about the things that Jesus is concerned about.

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And so what is Jesus concerned about? Well, he's very concerned about seeing his people return to him and the lost sheep come back into the fold.

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And he's very, very concerned about seeing people that he loves come to know him through his gospel.

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And so, yeah, I think if we're apathetic to those things, yeah, I think we are accountable before the

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Lord. Not to say that we lose salvation. I'm not saying that at all, but I do think God is giving us opportunity in our lives here on earth to make choices that please him.

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Yeah. It was something I wanted to just kind of get a response from because it made me think a little bit, but yeah, sorry to get you on that sidetrack.

32:00

I was going into this conversation like, okay, well, if God wanted me to know him, where is he? And I think you've kind of showed like, well,

32:07

God wants you to know him. That's why he's putting you through this, like, I want to say cleansing process, like this reprioritization process of like knowing what it's like to not have him.

32:17

So you crave him, so you know him and kind of recognize like God doesn't play by our rules.

32:23

Like, well, God, if you want me to see you, you would be present versus God's like, you don't want to see me. You'll die.

32:29

Like you don't know what you're asking for here. Kind of like, that's it. It's a human desire for a

32:35

God -sized solution that you don't even know what you just asked for. Great, great way to explain that.

32:42

Thank you. Excellent. You, thank you. Well, here's the thing, you know, let's, let's deal with this a little bit from maybe if you have a listener who is like, well, yeah, okay, fine.

32:54

But that's, you know, couldn't God maybe overcome all of that? Like, why doesn't he, maybe he doesn't show himself fully, but couldn't he show me more than he does?

33:03

You know, why doesn't he show me more evidence if he does in fact exist or something like that?

33:08

Right. So I'd like to address that a little bit. I think, you know, the, the argument from atheism is that if God is all loving and all powerful, why doesn't he make himself more known?

33:22

Why doesn't he provide more evidence to people that are open to believing in God? Like the people that are like, there's a

33:30

God out there. I just don't know what. Yeah. Or the people that say, look, I, I want there to be a God, you know,

33:36

I, I wish that there was a God, but I just don't see enough evidence to make me think that there is one.

33:43

You know, and people, I actually have known some that have said, look, I, I'm an atheist or at least an agnostic.

33:50

And, you know, I, I have cried out and said, you know, God, if you're there, make yourself known and I'll follow you, you know but I just, to be intellectually honest,

34:01

I cannot say that I believe in God because I just am not convinced that he's there. So that's, that's kind of the argument from atheism is that if we have people like that, then

34:11

God is kind of like a derelict parent. You know, he's kind of like a, a father that's walked out on his, on his children because that's, that's the argument.

34:24

And I, I, I resonate with it because let me paint it this way.

34:30

There's a famous philosopher by the name of J .L. Schellenberg, who's agnostic atheist that, that has this great analogy.

34:40

He says, look, imagine you've got this child out alone in a forest and the child is wandering through the forest, you know, and recognizing he's in trouble, that he has a need.

34:55

And he just, he wants to find his parents and he's crying out, hey, are you there?

35:01

I need you, dad, you know, where are you? And, and there's a parent, let's say, out there that's able to, to see the child.

35:10

The child doesn't see him. The parent sees the child and has the ability to come and rescue the child and be there for the child and, and has not only the ability, but loves the child.

35:22

Well, there's no explanation according to this atheist Schellenberg, there's no explanation for why that parent wouldn't go and make himself more known to that child who's crying out.

35:34

And so he says it is with people who are open to believing about God, God's existence, and yet have not received enough evidence.

35:44

You know, God has the resources, he's all powerful. And he, he says, the Bible tells us that he's all loving.

35:51

So if he's all loving and all powerful, why doesn't he make himself more known to people that are crying out for him?

35:57

And so that's kind of the argument from, from atheists on this, right? So my, my take on that is

36:05

I actually, I actually don't think that there are those kinds of kinds of people that are perfectly sort of neutral about all of this and wanting there to be a

36:16

God. And they may, they may very well say that they are trying to evaluate the evidence objectively, but I don't think that anyone evaluates that evidence objectively apart from,

36:29

I'm going to, I'm going to use an expression here, sort of a spiritual bias or spiritual disposition, posture.

36:38

You know, we all look at intellectual arguments for the existence of God and I'm an apologist.

36:45

And so I've seen this play itself out for a long time. You know, you may have a listener that says,

36:52

Hey Cassie, and you believe in God because you have a bias to believe that God exists. But certainly an atheist has a bias to believe that God doesn't exist.

37:03

And so we all, we all come to the arguments and the evidence and our experiences with biases and things.

37:10

I don't think that objectivity is fully possible. That's a good point. I feel like the people that I speak to, and we were kind of discussing this prior to the call, like I, you know, the people that are telling me,

37:21

I believe in fairy tale. I, I kind of have two people in my head that I'm imagining that this podcast is perfect for, and I hope that they're listening is, and I have a lot of this in Hawaii, shout out to all my yogis, but people that are like, uh,

37:35

I've got mother nature, I've got the universe and I've got God. And you know, one of them will respond and I'll know that that's them.

37:43

Or you've got somebody that's like, there's nothing out there, but I'm open to be convinced otherwise.

37:49

Are you saying that both of those people already have a bias to not be seeking God? And that's what holds them back that they're not actually neutral and open to it or else they'd be pursuing

37:59

God. Yeah. I honestly think that Romans one, Paul is making this point explicitly that, you know, we've suppressed the knowledge of God and in pursuit of other deities in pursuit of self and pursuit of other idols and things like that.

38:15

Yeah. I do think, and again, it goes back to human choice all the way back to the garden itself.

38:20

You know, um, Adam and Eve walked with they chose to sin. And then funny enough, they hide themselves from God because of sin.

38:30

God says, where are you? They were hiding in the bushes because they were ashamed as a result of their choices.

38:37

So, um, it seems like sin has the effect of, of causing us to, to sort of, you know, uh, recoil from God and things like that.

38:46

Um, I do think there are plenty of people that I, that I suspect are, that are paying lip service to saying that they believe are open to believing that God exists, but I'm not so sure that their openness is as open as they think that they, that it is here.

39:03

Let me give a couple of examples to this. Um, someone who says, yeah, I'll believe in God. Just show me the evidence.

39:10

My, my question to them is, all right, if I show you the evidence, are you willing to submit your whole life to your creator?

39:20

Are you willing to turn from your sin? And are you willing to recognize the supernatural reality of a, of a creator

39:28

God who made everything? If, if he actually exists, are you willing to be morally transformed?

39:34

That is to turn your back on sin and follow whatever he says in worship.

39:41

Um, like, because in order to truly be open, if God exists, then he has a right to call us to worship and submission.

39:49

Um, and so if you're not willing to respond in that way, then that would seem to reveal a bias that you don't necessarily want

39:57

God to exist, because that means that you're going to have to change something about who, how you are fundamentally living.

40:03

Right. It's two pieces of the brain. It's not just, do you agree with me? It's now, are you going to change? Right. And so all of that, all of that baggage, right.

40:12

All of that baggage is what we bring to the table when we evaluate intellectual evidence, um, arguments for the existence of God and so forth.

40:24

Um, you know, Romans back to Romans one, um, the attributes of God have been plainly seen.

40:30

God has made himself known through nature. He has made himself known through scripture.

40:36

Um, those, those, those pieces of evidence are available. And so we would say, all right, why isn't that convincing?

40:43

Well, the, the atheist says, well, I'm not convinced by that. You know, that that's not enough. Um, yeah, but why?

40:51

Um, and so my contention here is, and I know we'd have to unpack this a lot more, but just by way of summary, my contention is none of us are neutral, uh, when it comes to evaluating that evidence, we always have a spiritual disposition, um, by which we're evaluating and it changes our position or disposition, excuse me, changes how we're evaluating the plausibility of those arguments.

41:18

Intellectuality of your initial reaction that God is doing this because he loves us and he wants to transform us with the new covenant.

41:25

They can't even be open to that because they have this bias. So it's almost like very phase.

41:31

Yeah, exactly. Right. So like if I'm alone in my bedroom at night and I'm reading scripture and praying, and I have this sense of calling a religious encounter and things like that, that, that requires me to be open to a supernatural perspective of the world.

41:48

Like I can't just believe in hard matter. I have to believe that there's a spirit that's speaking to my spirit and revealing himself to me.

41:56

But if from the get go, I'm in, you know, sort of a naturalist or a materialist, and I've just said, none of that exists at all.

42:05

Show me the hard evidence. Well, there's no amount of hard evidence that's going to convince you because you've thrown away, you know, so much of the evidence that's available to you spiritually speaking.

42:17

Um, and that, that bias is coloring how you're evaluating the evidence that is available.

42:23

So, um, and I know that that's not a particularly politically correct position.

42:28

I know everybody kind of wants to think of themselves as, you know, sort of an objective and neutral, you know,

42:34

I can, I can determine what's true. You know, I can use my human finite mind and I mean,

42:40

I can sit right here and reason through the existence of God in a perfect way. Well, I'm sorry, but you know, that that's just not true.

42:48

You know, it makes me think, um, like about people that are spiritual and they are keen to these experiences.

42:55

They are leaning into an openness to experience God, but they're not under the

43:00

Christian umbrella. Like this is just a thought like Native Americans and that different type of spirituality.

43:06

Would you say that they are closer to experiencing God than maybe like a modern

43:12

Western evangelist, you know, Anglo -Saxon type of community?

43:18

Man, that's an interesting question. Um, I do think that, I do think that they're, they are operating with some different, some different presuppositions and, um, they are,

43:35

I guess, I guess at least they're open to a supernatural worldview. They've already accepted that. There's a, in evangelism circles, there's, there's a scale that people often talk about, like, you know, the sort of different steps on the road to someone coming to follow

43:51

Jesus. Um, and you go, you move from outright full -blown hostile atheism to agnosticism to maybe there's something out there to, you know, and you kind of progress like this.

44:03

I think I would look at people that have a supernatural worldview and other religions as being further on that scale.

44:09

Yes. Um, but I also, you know, as we talked about last time,

44:14

I, I, I think that part of being open to a supernatural worldview is recognizing that there are those that want to deceive in the spiritual realm as well.

44:25

Um, and, and the, the biblical account tells us about that, you know, um, there are fallen angels, demonic spirits and so forth.

44:33

And so that's a part of the equation here too, is that, um, all of this human choice from the very beginning in the garden, uh, has also entailed intervention from others that are trying to lead us astray.

44:48

Such a good thing that even, yeah, just because you're spiritual and I want to say woo, woo. Cause that just, you know, you know, that doesn't mean it's like, well, you're open to experiencing

45:00

God. Cause I think a lot of new age people are with genuine intent, trying to experience God. They open themselves up to these experiences that are like, well, if God had revealed himself to me,

45:09

I would obviously lean in. That's where I'm trying to go. I'm trying to, you know, reach my highest but you're right. That is so many introductions to the unseen realm that negatively affect the spirit.

45:18

And like, I pray for my friends that are, uh, I had a, I had experience with a friend and she's like, I'm going to a breathing circle.

45:24

And I'm like, well, I'm just, I'll pray for you. And she's like, oh, you're judging me. I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa.

45:30

I would never judge you. You're going to do whatever you want, but I am worried about you. Cause like, what is going on?

45:36

What spirits are there? Are you releasing something? Is somebody like you're opening yourself up with no prayer of protection.

45:42

So at the end of the day, like you're going to do whatever you think is making you closer to God, a better person, more healed, whatever.

45:49

But if you're not like putting on the armor of God, you're right. You're absolutely, you know, open to weaknesses from the enemy, whether you acknowledge him as the enemy or not.

45:58

I think that he's still there. That's right. And, and, you know, the minute that you bring spiritual warfare into a conversation like this, the atheist is like, whoa, hold on a second.

46:10

Hold on. That's, that's your, that's your Christianity. That's your religion. You know, I don't believe in any of that. That's way off the deep end.

46:16

And honestly, when that happens, my response is yeah, but aren't you kind of proving my point here that, you know, you're sort of hostile to the possibility that there's a supernatural reality.

46:33

And, you know, you've got this sort of recoil to it and you're saying, oh, that's crazy.

46:39

You know, but the truth of the matter is the vast majority of people that have ever existed on planet earth have held something closer to what

46:49

I'm describing in terms of my worldview than those that have held to an atheistic materialism.

46:56

And it doesn't mean that what I believe is true, but it does mean that it's at least not crazy for me to think that, you know,

47:04

I've got a leg to stand on here and that we shouldn't just throw it out from the get go. Right. At any rate, yeah.

47:13

It's interesting, right? Like people that are involved in other religions, I think

47:19

I would look at other arguments to try to prove the truthfulness of Christianity with them than I would with, you know, an atheist.

47:29

You know, the atheist is going to say part of why they discount the experience that I had and that you had with Christ as evidence is because it's, you know, the

47:40

Muslim has an experience and a testimony. The Buddhist has an experience and a testimony. You have an experience and a testimony, and they all contradict one another.

47:49

So this can't be viable evidence because they have different truth claims that contradict one another.

47:56

Well, that may be true that there is contradictions, but the fact that religious experience is so common across the board doesn't mean that you get sort of a trump card to throw it all out.

48:12

It could just be that there is some experiences that are deceptive from deceiving spirits and some that are from the

48:19

Lord. So it's just so simply said,

48:26

I think that like while you're talking, I think we go into this conversation. It's like either God is real and he's going to reveal himself or he doesn't reveal himself and he's not real.

48:34

And it's like the issue is you. Are you open to even experiencing this? And then once you experience it, is it from the enemy or from God?

48:43

It's closing the door on a spiritual experience before you even experience God. And I think that, yeah, it's so easy to stay in the world view of like, well, he's either real because he showed himself or he's not real because I've never experienced him.

48:59

Well, how are you opening yourself up to this experience? Are you just completely discounting the entire unseen realm, both good and bad?

49:08

Right. Exactly. From the get go, without even looking at any of the arguments, right? You're just closing yourself off because of your bias.

49:18

And that's basically showing that you're not open to begin with and you're not neutral.

49:25

Is there like, since you're like, you know this, this is your zone of genius. Is there like a modern equivalent of like, well, like working out, like, can we relate this to working out in any way of like, well, you don't even know the effects of working out because you've never stepped in a gym.

49:38

So who are you to say working out works or not? Like I'm trying to really put this in simple, simple terms right now to kind of make it easier to grasp.

49:46

Because I think like at the end of the day, like my next question is what's the solution to people that are keeping that door closed?

49:51

So is there a modern equivalent? I don't know if this is exactly what you're asking for, but I do think,

49:58

I mean, working out may very well be a good illustration. But, but I, you know,

50:04

I think it begs a lot of questions about how do we know anything? You know, how do we know anything to be true? Yeah.

50:12

And do we just, do we just assume things? And, and I think before we can throw out religious experience as a way of knowing or the

50:23

Bible or, you know, praying or any of the spiritual disciplines, before we throw out any of that as evidence,

50:32

I think we need to have the conversation about how do we know anything? And so for me, you know,

50:38

I, I, I tend to help people try to think through that a little bit. I know

50:44

Christians maybe sometimes, or at least lay, lay Christians are a little notoriously gullible and just, you know, they don't necessarily think through this very well.

50:54

And atheists kind of tend to exploit that, I think, because they tend to think through it a little bit more than your average Christian.

51:00

And I appreciate that atheists care enough to, to go and explore those kinds of concerns.

51:06

I think that's, that's a valuable thing. And I think, I think Christians should ask those kinds of questions, but for me, determining whether or not something is true, it involves, you know, does it, does it correspond with reality?

51:21

Is it, you know, Jesus is Lord, God exists? Does that, is that comport with what

51:27

I'm seeing in the world? Is the worldview that's being proposed to me in scripture, is it consistent?

51:34

You know, is there a consistency there or is there inconsistencies in scripture and in the Christian worldview?

51:40

But if it's perfectly consistent and it explains the world as it really is, and I'm having a religious experience that is personalized and tailored to me to help me understand these things, like those are pretty, pretty good lines of evidence, you know, like buckets, if you will, for testing, whether or not something is true.

52:00

And that's generally just as a broad sort of outline. That's what I usually try to help people to walk through when they ask me those kinds of questions.

52:10

Got it. So is the solution for people to just start reading the Bible? Like if they go from not, like the door is closed, they are not open to the spiritual realm.

52:19

And they're like, okay, I realize now that the door is closed, but I still have like, still God is hidden to me.

52:25

So how do I kind of take that next step? Is it to just go straight to the

52:31

Bible? Like, what would you recommend to these people? Like in a very realistic sense? Cause of course, like the

52:36

Christian answer is, you know, pick up the Bible. But even that is like, like, that's what held me up.

52:42

You know, I would open the box. I'm like, yeah, I want to experience God. And I'd still be like, what the heck is going on? Like, I don't know.

52:48

I would argue that that's maybe not the best suggestion. So what would you suggest? Yeah. Wow. I think it'd been,

52:54

I think honestly, it would depend on the person. I don't want to give a one size fits all because I think different people have different needs.

53:00

I think for the atheist, for someone who does not know Jesus, they really need to, they need to explore the truth of the gospel because they need the gospel.

53:14

That's the center of everything. And I would encourage someone that's looking at that possibly to go at the, look at the resurrection because if the resurrection occurred, then that gives credibility to the rest of the gospel message and so on and so forth.

53:27

Right. That opens the door to the supernatural and everything else. So I think arguments for the resurrection is a good route to go for the atheist, but it just kind of depends on what the intellectual hangup is, you know, and maybe talk to a

53:43

Christian apologist or a pastor even about those kinds of concerns. If there's a genuine, my plea for those folks maybe that are listening is if this is possible, right, if this is possible, then you kind of owe it to yourself to explore it in an honest and open way because it could actually be the key to your entire life in the current, the present and in life to come.

54:10

So why not explore it? You know, why not try to figure out if this is true? Because if it's true, it has major ramifications for you.

54:17

But for the Christian that's walking through this, I think it just depends on what's going on.

54:26

You know, I'm in my late thirties now. I've been around the block for a little while, not as much as some, but more than others.

54:37

And I kind of know the drill to a degree. I know that a lot of people get into the grind of life as Christians, as believers.

54:47

And they, you know, they kind of get into the routine. They go to church on Sundays. Maybe they read their

54:52

Bible occasionally. You know, they're trying to live the Christian life. Maybe they have kids or, you know, they're just, they're doing what they can do.

54:59

They're working a job. And as a pastor, I've had people come to me and say, Hey, Josh, is this, is this all that there is?

55:08

You know, is this it? And I feel that.

55:13

I feel that in my bones. That's a legit question. And what

55:19

I usually, when I start to probe there, it is actually an issue with God's hiddenness.

55:26

Like I don't sense God working, but I'm trying to be faithful. I don't necessarily feel God's presence, but I'm willing to listen.

55:34

And so what I encourage those folks to do in that situation is to pursue a communion with God, you know, not just to read the

55:46

Bible as a checklist, not just to go through the motions and the actions, but to really truly desire to know him and to please him with your affections, to love him in all those ways.

56:00

And if you do that, and you're not necessarily looking for a pillar of fire, as you said earlier, you'll find that God shows up in spiritual ways throughout your day.

56:12

You know, you, you sense, you know what, today I, today I helped my kid try to learn to be more obedient at the supper table before I got on the interview with you.

56:23

He's a little kid and it was very frustrating for me, to be honest with you.

56:28

And I just felt like God was saying, yep, Josh, that's, that's you. Like, you don't listen to me.

56:35

I get frustrated with you too. And yet I still love you. And I'm, I'm, I'm patiently helping you to learn what it is

56:43

I want you to learn. But those kinds of moments will come, but God asked us, you know, to be able to listen in that way for the deeper communion and following God.

56:56

And so I think, you know, if you've got a believer that's walking through that kind of concern, I would,

57:02

I would want to walk with them in a pastoral way, as I just described. For the atheist, I would encourage them to look at the resurrection of Jesus.

57:10

For the, for the person that's walking through a terrible tragedy in life and they just feel like God is distant.

57:17

I would want to talk with them about what I mentioned earlier about, you know, this isn't the way it's supposed to be.

57:23

And we're longing for something more and God is present, but sin is the issue. And, you know, we're, we're looking towards eternity.

57:30

Like all of these things, all of these things are sort of based on the individual need of the person.

57:37

Does that make sense? It does make sense. Yeah. I, it is tough though. I mean, for even the person trying to just connect with God, it's like, what does that mean to love him?

57:48

What does that like? I can't hug him. I can't kiss him. Like I can't buy him flowers. Like, what do you mean love this invisible

57:54

God? And I like, I feel like going through that sanctification process in the last year, it's like, well, like putting his desires before mine.

58:03

And that comes from kind of like knowing his desires and being like, well, God would want me to do this. And then kind of like having that response, that change in behavior, that openness to a new outcome that isn't based on your desires, but God's.

58:15

And for me, that was like, okay, logistically, what does it look like to love God? And you're right.

58:20

Once you do like, that's why we believe in God. Cause we did that. And then we saw the fruits of his love and it's like, and then you stay in it cause you love it.

58:27

But to initially experience that it is going to, you know, vary on the person, but once it starts happening, you kind of,

58:34

I don't want to say get addicted because like taking up my cross every day, man, you know, but still, yeah.

58:40

Yeah. Jesus says, if you love me, then keep my commandments. Yeah. And so it's not, you know, keeping the law of God is a matter of loving him.

58:53

Yeah. It's not a matter of keeping a law like we do for the law of the United States, you know, it's, it's keeping the law because that's how

59:01

I show him that I love him. And I, and I think that's part of what the new covenant does.

59:08

He gives us a heart of flesh. He helps us to, to no longer be slaves to sin, but the slaves of righteousness.

59:16

You know, I care deeply about making him proud of me in that way, you know, and, and, and that's, that's a work of what, that's what he does.

59:25

You know, he changed me. I didn't do it, but still it's, it's a work, it's a work that in my sanctification,

59:32

I'm choosing back to choice, you know, when Adam and Eve messed up the new covenant helps to correct.

59:38

And in fact, does correct over time progressively. And so, yeah, that restoration of relationship, it comes back to my choice to be submitted in obedience.

59:48

And yeah. Yeah. I think, I think you're right. I think it's hard.

59:54

It is very difficult. I think that there are times where God doesn't want us to be addicted to the feeling of God.

01:00:03

God, God wants us to be, to choose to love him, even when we don't feel like doing that.

01:00:13

And, you know, look just real quick, I know we've kind of got in the episode here in a few, but it's just like a marriage.

01:00:20

I always go back to my personal relationships as examples. There are days, there are days

01:00:27

I don't want to get up in the middle of the night to go take care of my one -year -old who's cutting teeth.

01:00:33

Or there are days when I just don't want to get up in the morning to go do what I have to do to provide for my family.

01:00:39

But I have to choose to, as you mentioned before, take up your cross and follow him.

01:00:45

But I have to choose to die to self in service to those that I love.

01:00:51

Okay. That's, that's the nature of relationships. And so God is wanting a relationship with, like, that's what we say, that's kind of a

01:00:59

Christian cliche, but that's what we mean. We're choosing, even when we don't feel like God is near, we are choosing not to rely on the feeling, but to submit ourselves in obedience.

01:01:14

And then God blesses us. But even the blessing isn't the point. The point is we love him and he's worthy.

01:01:25

And so, yeah, I think, I think all of those things are part of what God's doing by staying hidden or, you know, we, he seems distant at times.

01:01:34

I think that's part of, he's teaching us these kinds of things so that we would choose to submit in obedience.

01:01:41

Man, this episode did not go the way I thought it would. That's okay. No, because I think that that's the point is

01:01:49

I struggled with this expectation of like, okay, so what is the recipe that I need to follow to get

01:01:54

God to show up in my room tonight in my dreams? And then I can know what he wants for my life. But you have flipped it on its head of like, it really comes down to free will.

01:02:03

It really comes down to choosing to be open to him and choosing to overcome our own biases and choosing to be obedient and understanding that we're choosing a

01:02:12

God that operates outside of our own routine, that he is putting on our hearts. That is a phasal process of what it used to be to what it's becoming to yearn for him, to choose him.

01:02:23

Even when we don't have the response, we still choose him. That's the whole point is like, are we still choosing him without him in front of us?

01:02:29

And he wants that kind of love that chooses him despite the lack of gratification. So not the answer

01:02:36

I wanted, but still, I'm glad that you explained it because sometimes we just need a wake up call.

01:02:44

And I have really gone through it of like, well, I don't get

01:02:49

God because of this. It's like, yeah, that's kind of the point. It's like, that's what you want. It's like a human thing, and we are a fallen culture.

01:02:56

So of course, you're not going to get what you want sometimes. But I think that you have beautifully laid out the joy of pursuing him and also the risk of not pursuing him.

01:03:08

I don't like this argument of like, well, I believe God and I'll either go to heaven or there's nothing and I just die. I don't really like that.

01:03:14

But what is at stake? What is at stake for you to not open yourself to God and pursue him?

01:03:21

I don't like that either. You're going to experience this joy and love you can't fathom.

01:03:30

And I like to say this because it's my easiest way to convert people. I don't even know if it works.

01:03:35

This is my easiest way to plant a seed as people would always say to me like, well, how do you know? I don't believe in God because there's just not enough proof or not enough evidence or too much hurt in my life, whatever it is.

01:03:45

I'm like, well, I believe in him. So why don't you just give him a chance, throw him a prayer and just open yourself up and then see what he does.

01:03:55

And I believe and I know that he's going to do something beyond any form of fathomability.

01:04:01

He's going to blow your mind. So I just want them at least to be open to it. And I think you've done a great job, really painting the picture of the beauty that comes with that choice.

01:04:10

Yeah, thanks. I do think that the come and see line of discussion is a good one.

01:04:17

If you want to know what Jesus is like or if he's there and cares for you, come and see.

01:04:24

I think that there are answers to intellectual questions and doubt. I'm an apologist.

01:04:30

I'm a theologian. I live in that world. But there are plenty of people that are pursuing answers and not

01:04:36

Jesus. And I'd rather you pursue Jesus. So, yeah,

01:04:41

I think the intellectual comes with the spiritual and the emotional.

01:04:47

It's all caught up together. And again, I don't want to give the impression that there aren't intellectually satisfying answers.

01:04:55

There are. That's the pursuit of truth. And some people are wired to need that more than others,

01:05:00

I think. But but we still recognize that we have to have the kind of disposition before God if we really want to understand that the way that he's revealing himself.

01:05:14

So, yeah, thanks for thanks for bringing that up. Absolutely. Well, you have a book on this, so why don't you go ahead and plug because people are probably dying to read it now.

01:05:22

So how do they find it? How do they find you? How do they find your classes? Yeah, so as far as the book goes,

01:05:28

Why Does God Seem So Hidden? Again, my name is Josh Waltman. And so that's all the standard stuff, Amazon, Barnes &

01:05:34

Noble, all that fun stuff. It is an academic book. And so if you liked the stuff that we were talking about just now, but you want to go into more depth and really get into the arguments, the philosophical arguments, that would be a great resource for you.

01:05:49

But, you know, if if you're interested in maybe school, you know, and actually coming and studying some of this,

01:05:55

I teach at Liberty Theological Seminary and Liberty University School of Divinity.

01:06:01

And so come and see us. And we have these conversations all day, every day. It's what we love to do.

01:06:06

So I really appreciate you letting me be here with you. Of course. Shout out to Liberty University. You guys are just gold there.

01:06:12

Just I love talking with all of you guys. So thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and answering my questions, even if we did get off topic.

01:06:20

But you're always welcome back. I'll find another excuse to bring you back. I think I'm going to bother you right after we hang up about the next topic.