What's Behind the IF Gathering?

Conversations That Matter

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Welcome once again to the Conversations That Matter podcast. I'm your host, John Harris. We have a special opportunity today to explore something that I don't ever,

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I don't think I ever have actually gotten into in any kind of detail, and that is women's ministry, women's ministry.

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One of the things that I've noticed over the past, well, three years, four years since the social justice movement really got going full steam in evangelical circles, and there were lament sessions, and there were talks about reparations and all the rest, is that oftentimes when a church went, quote unquote, woke, it was because something happened in the women's ministries or a women's

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Bible study at that particular church. So one of the popular books was Be the Bridge. And I don't know how many times

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I heard this story repeat itself, but I did, that the women's Bible study got a hold of Be the

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Bridge, and they started doing that in their small group. And that created a situation where women were coming to the pastor and saying, why can't you speak about this from the pulpit?

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And the pastor wanted to please them and ended up pulling the whole congregation in a not so great direction.

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And of course, men are perfectly capable of bringing in bad doctrine. And there's no question about it, but there does seem to be a hook in women's ministries that is somewhat different, that operates in a different way and is something that I'm probably just not as knowledgeable about because I'm not a woman,

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I'm not going to these conferences, a lot of that material doesn't appeal to me as a guy, so I'm ignorant.

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And so I think it's important to understand though, what's happening in women's ministries or some of the threats that can come in through them.

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And that's why I am pleased to be joined by Melissa Lex this morning. Melissa Lex is a homeschool mom.

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She is an administrator for LEARN, which is a homeschool co -op in Southern New Jersey out of Faith OPC.

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And you can go to her website, ttew .org, ttew .org, and you will find all sorts of information, profiles of different teachers in women's ministries and conferences and so forth.

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So Melissa, thank you so much for being willing to talk to me about this and help listeners understand some of the challenges out there.

02:40

Yeah, no, thank you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity, sharing my information so that I can help women learn discernment.

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Yeah, definitely. Tell me why you decided to start focusing on women's ministries specifically, because if you start a podcast, you can go in all kinds of different directions, but you're narrow in the sense that you just, you don't want to talk about what

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J .D. Greer's doing. You want to talk about what's Beth Moore doing? What are some of these other figures

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I actually haven't heard of we'll get into? Well, it is sort of a long story, but I'll make it as short as I can.

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I just noticed in my own life, after being heavily involved, growing up Christian, just being heavily involved in women's ministry, that I just felt like my,

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I wasn't growing, but I grew up in a very kind of seeker sensitive church and had a kind of incident in my church where I really started questioning how biblical it was.

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And from there, just kind of developed a more biblical view, went more reformed in my theology.

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And then I started to see other women having those same type of problems, same type of questions.

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And I started to realize that, well, it's prevalent in women's ministry.

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So yeah, that's kind of what I, how I got the podcast started was just, first I started on Marco Polo, just shooting, answering questions and dealing with women's ministry

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Bible studies as we were going through it. We, you know, we used online, especially during COVID and we're messaging each other that way and I thought, well,

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I'm answering the same questions over and over, so maybe if I just put it on an audio file and found

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Anchor and that's how that started, it just kind of grew into this separate thing completely on its own, so yeah.

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Well, you know, women's ministry, like I said, it's not something that I'm as knowledgeable about, but it seems when

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I've seen advertisements for women's Bible studies or conferences, even at my own church, I'm thinking more years ago, but they were, the message, the attraction was much different than for a men's retreat or something where, and maybe you can put your finger on this better than I'm trying to put my finger on it, but women's ministry seem to, they seem to have a message oftentimes of, if you do this course or if you come to our conference, we're going to get you to this kind of next level of satisfaction with your life,

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I suppose. Not that men can't be appealed to on a basis of a message like that, but I think men's ministries, they're not, they're not usually not appealing to you being satisfied with your life.

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It's more, it's not, I don't want to say it's not as focused on you because they can be,

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I'm actually having a hard time finding the words myself for what the difference is, but there's a, men tend to be,

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I suppose, more externally goal oriented, so we're going to learn this, you know, you've come and you will learn this, which will help you with this task, but it's not necessarily even about you and your life or your marriage, whereas women's ministries is more, and maybe this is a difference between home and women being more focused on the home and men being more focused on the outside world.

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And, but you know, there's, there's not, I don't see as many apologetics resources for women and stuff.

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It's not very deep theology generally for women. It tends to be, it seems kind of self -healthy and cheap or shallow psychological stuff.

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Am I tracking right? Do you know what I'm trying to express to you? What, how would you express that? What's the difference?

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Well, I would kind of call it a emotional, there's an emotional underlying motivation behind it.

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We, we thrive off of relationships and, and yeah, we're not exactly necessarily goal oriented, but it's always kind of a, how it makes us feel.

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There's a lot of books on, for women, like conquering restlessness.

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Jan the Allen has some kind of book about being restless and certain feelings.

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Con, one of her books also is getting out of your head. Yeah. So they're very like emotionally centered, trying to always make you feel like, how do

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I say this, satisfied in what you're doing. And I think that's because there's a kind of disillusionment among women.

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Because we don't know our roles. We don't know biblically how to be a biblical woman.

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And so we're not satisfied, constantly being told in women's ministry, specifically to find your calling, find your purpose.

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And it's never really focused on the home. The home is just a second, secondary thing.

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And that's really your feminism entering into women's ministry. It's, it's the same type of mentality, just at a lesser level than the world pushes feminism.

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But yeah, I would definitely agree with, there's not discernment there because it's not about discernment and not necessarily about truth.

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It's more about the feels and emotions. That's an excellent description.

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And I, so, so one of the things you said, it's, it's, they don't see their role as much in these materials, especially as it pertains to the home.

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And I think what, what I see in the few things I have seen from advertisements for women's conferences and ministries is that often it's, it's what you said.

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It is, you're in the home, you're kind of stuck with these kids or this husband or this life that you didn't maybe plan on.

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And that the rest of the world is telling you isn't really satisfying. And maybe you don't feel quite satisfied and you'd rather.

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But it's saying in that situation that you find yourself in, have some self -focus and some self -care.

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And and here's the things that you can do in the situation. And many women find themselves in to try to achieve some level of satisfaction, but yeah, they're not finding it in the role.

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And, and, you know, men, we have the same problems. I mean, it's not like we don't, but we're, we're wired differently,

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I suppose. And and so it doesn't come across the same way. We don't have all the self -help stuff as much.

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And, you know, one of the things I was thinking before having you on was that, you know, women's ministry is kind of a new thing, isn't it?

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I mean, this isn't, this doesn't have a long history of specialized ministries, conferences, books, exclusively focused on women.

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Yeah. Lifeway has been a big push behind that.

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Lifeway with their books. It, it, after COVID you had an even more boom.

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And so say, for example, the IF gathering started back in 2014.

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But it really boomed because COVID hit and every churches were closed because now women's ministry has become a total entity on its own, really.

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Lifeway has helped with that through the books and the conferences and stuff like that.

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But IF gathering itself is probably the leader in women's ministry.

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One of the biggest ministries, parachurch ministries, in regards to that.

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And that's because they do online conferences. And so because of that, it's not where it used to be.

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Women's ministry was kind of centered specifically individual churches.

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And maybe you'd hear a conference like Beth Moore might show up to where I'm at in Philly.

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And so the church would hear about it and go to the conference and then go back and do a Bible study or one of her books or something like that.

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Now you have it where individual women themselves can go online, can sign up to be a host, excuse me, a host at IF, for IF, and it's called an

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IF Local. And she can invite people to her home and do a

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Bible study and it can incorporate all denominations and even unbelievers. And so,

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I mean, the idea is brilliant, but it's dangerous. Do they work with the church or is this just totally outside the church?

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No, it can be completely, they can. So like a church can say, so when

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I was involved in women's ministry, I was involved on the board. Usually, you know, you consult the elders and be like, hey, we want to do this.

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And they just kind of be like, OK, yeah, they might check it out a little bit and give the

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OK. And then from there we set up the conference and it can be held at a church.

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This, right, you don't have to be at a church to do an IF Local. They don't necessarily check that.

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I can go in and pay for the viewing and like I said, invite as many women as I want.

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It's become a completely separate entity now. Well, tell me a little bit about IF for the viewers.

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I've never heard of it before. I think you told me about it and it's a big conference. And I guess it's because it's women's ministry that I haven't heard of it.

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But it's very influential. And I would imagine gaining influence. What's the concern that you have about this?

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What theological things are? Oh, there are several, several theological issues

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I kind of have with IF. One of my issues, I think the biggest, biggest issue

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I have is it's very social gospel light. Besides the,

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OK, so when you separate women's ministry from women's roles, you are going to try and push women into discipleship.

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There's a lot of under the guise of discipleship. There's a lot of encouragement to pursue discipleship apart from the home.

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So it's it's not really about discipling your kids, being a helpmate to your husband.

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It is about, you know, participating in social work. And they don't clearly say that.

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But her ministry involves such or invites such other ministries as Be the

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Bridge. Let's see. I'm trying to think of some of the others. She just has invited several other people to speak that are quite popular.

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Here's another example is Dr. Curt Thompson, who's kind of not very well known, but he has his own ministry, too, which is more psychologically.

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He's a psychiatrist, so it's psychologically based. And so women come into this ministry and they're selling their books and they're selling their ministry and women sign up for it after hearing the speakers.

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So you have people coming in to speak and women fall for it because they just they don't have discernment.

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Yeah, that's probably one of the biggest issues that I that I see is just the other ministries that are not biblical, that teach false.

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They do teach falsely and women fall for it. So who are the big names then?

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You know, I've obviously heard of Beth Moore, right? But you have a number of other names on your website, and I know we probably can't talk about all of them, but like, you know, top three or four big names in women's ministries that are pushing the needle in the wrong direction, that pose a threat to the

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Church of Jesus Christ. And then and why do they pose a threat? What kind of teachings are they bringing in that women are being subverted by?

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Yeah, well, Jenny Allen, I would say it's one of the bigger ones just because of her ministry.

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So if ministry not only has the conference, that's just the push to get that's just where the door is opened.

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Then they go to the athletes and then they can actually learn how to lead, be a woman in leadership and host other

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Bible studies on their own. So Jenny Allen, I would say right now is one of the bigger ones. And where her theology is wrong is she in my from my study of her

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Bible studies, she incorporates other philosophies such as positive psychology into her books and stuff like that.

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I have nothing against psychology and man's observation, but I do have a problem with bringing it into a

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Bible study and using it as a lens to look at scripture.

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I think that's just not where we start. We start with scripture first and then we can look at psychology or the studies of the brain and stuff like that.

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Scripture should be our starting point. And I think that's where I disagree with her a lot. She does it with a lot of her studies.

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She's got another study coming or it's not coming out. It is already out called Arise and that is on social, social gospel, social justice as well.

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So another person that I would say is more they're not they're not as social gospel, but they're more they undermine scripture by teaching and preaching to men and have a more feminist.

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They act in more feminist ways. I don't know how to how to say this, because one of the things is when

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I look at a woman and the way I kind of discern it is if she's going to undermine scripture by her actions, by preaching and teaching over men.

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So another one that's pretty popular, Sadie Robinson, she twists scripture.

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She doesn't know how to handle scripture. She starts out with talking about if instances and from that then brings in scripture.

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Another one is Bianca Olthoff, who is an associate is also a pastor of her own church with her husband.

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Who else that I would say are really more we see

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Beth Moore. I think a lot of people in our camp actually know, know the problems with Beth Moore.

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But Beth Moore is so big and that's why I think she is very influential. I remember years ago

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I was in college ministry and we had a advisor for our group because you had to have an advisor on campus who and he he suggested to me the

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Beth Moore Bible studies. And I was like, wasn't that for that's for women, right? And he's like, no,

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I mean, I do it. And I think that's why Beth Moore is as known as she is, is there were a lot of men who were involved in her material, even if it was aimed at women.

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And she just reached a level of stardom that I don't know if any of the others have. But, you know, the preaching to men thing has become,

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I think, the red line in a way with women's ministry for for at least the more conservative minded, theologically conservative minded men, they because I haven't ever heard anyone say women's you shouldn't have women's ministry, like women shouldn't have people who speak to the challenges in their life that have also experienced them and help them get through it.

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And I'm like, that's I've never heard that critique. What I have heard, though, is that, well, they can't speak to a mixed audience, though.

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That's that's in violation of several passages that say women should not have authority biblically over a man, ecclesiastical authority in the setting of the church.

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And this is where the needle is being pushed, it seems to me. Like, yeah, even, you know, there's a fine line, it seems like with even

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Sadie Robertson, who I believe I think she spoke at Liberty University, if I'm not mistaken. So it's Jenny Allen.

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She really. OK, well, it makes me feel good about. So so so they they've spoken to these large audiences and they are mixed audiences.

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And you may think college, they're college kids, but there there's adults in there now. There's there and we should be treating college age people as adults.

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But but there is a precedent that gets set when in these large settings like that, that it's perfectly permissible.

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And then when you have a pastor who's more biblical and someone who's affected by the gathering or they went to Liberty or they, you know, wherever they saw this, they come in and they say, pastor, can't we have this material here?

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Can't we invite this speaker? And the pastor puts his foot down and says, well, not not to a mixed audience, not or not having the kind of conference that you saw.

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It creates division. And women think, well, what are you, a sexist or you don't? Yeah.

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And and so this is what I'm seeing, at least. And the women are oftentimes the drivers in moving churches from those core convictions through subtle changes like that, just because that's a it seems small, but it's a challenge to the authority of God's word, not to men, but to men too, but the authority of God's word and what he has to say.

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So so you didn't mention, I thought it was interesting, you didn't mention Joyce Meyer. She's one of the big ones, I thought, is she, do you focus on her at all?

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No, I just kind of think she's obvious. She's obvious. Is that what it is? OK, so, but that's because, well, honestly,

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I kind of put her in the more word of faith kind of camp and I'll get to that that type of theology eventually,

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I hope to. But Joyce Meyer, for me, yeah, she is a big one, speaks to men all the time and even has a video in which they've asked her that question.

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And she's just like, well, God called me, you know, that type of mentality. So but at this point, we're just kind of where my pie, because it's still kind of new.

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It's two years old. I've just kind of been led more towards if gathering. And from there, the more seeker sensitive social gospel has been more out of it.

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Like, I don't know that I can see any social gospel from Joyce Meyer yet.

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And that's just because I haven't done a whole lot of study, not saying that she doesn't somehow preach that or teach that women don't preach.

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But let me read for you. This is on the If Gathering website then. So we won't go to the really out there ones like Joyce Meyer.

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But If Gathering is very, as you said, subversive because it does appeal to women who attend more conservative churches.

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And it says discipleship is what we're about. This is what they're what they're what we're about section, our vision.

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And it says we believe discipleship is the way Jesus said the world will change.

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Now, already, well, Mike, I haven't even gotten a sentence in. Yeah, I mean, discipleship is important, but the world as it's a means to an end now, it's not it's not an end in and of itself to to make disciples.

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Now it's a means to changing the world, right? Life on life, coffee dates in living rooms, in local churches, guys are already tuned out studying

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God's word together, making disciples who make disciples. The reason we gather is because we actually want to live out what we say.

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We believe we want to come together as a generation to live out what he has called us to do. We gather because we need each other.

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We quit because we need to understand who God is. And we unleash you to your places because you are the most effective way to spread the message and hope of Jesus Christ.

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One more sentence. There will be a day when we are together in heaven and we're looking back at the work we did together.

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And if gathering is about this dream and what could make the most of the time we have to build the kingdom of God.

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So there's like I'd say 80 percent of that at least is sounds great. And but there's there's certain words, though, that jump out to me, obviously changing the world.

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So using discipleship as a means to this end really bothers me. And then it's it's like the word dream kind of jumps out to me.

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This unleash, we unleash you to your places where there's

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I don't know what it is about some of these terms, but they I don't see them in guys ministries or mixed ministries.

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But but in women's ministries, there's like this like we're going to empower you, like right, like we're going to empower you and then unleash you.

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Like you're going to get your charge from coming to our thing. Like if you need your boost, this is where you come to get your boost.

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Is it teaching reliance on their ministry as instead of a reliance on the word of God?

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Is that the subtlety here that I'm picking up on? Yes. And I think you hit a lot of what seeker sensitive churches and because it's more about your purpose now, it's not about obedience to God, as God called us, you know, in the

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Great Commission to go and make disciples and teach them to obey all that God has commanded.

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Now it's go and make disciples. And especially among women, it's about making women leaders.

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It's that is a huge, huge thing. The word leader for women, as if I really do kind of take offense to it a little bit because it's a secret, sneaky undermining of our role in the home and the importance of women and training up their children and being the helpmate to their husband and the ministry in the home as the focus where that's what the

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Bible describes our calling is. They push their call, the calling to discipleship and not that women can't evangelize and can't disciple other women.

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It's not the Titus 2 discipleship. It's a it's a more of an evangelizing to bring women into the church, but without evangelizing.

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One of the things I did notice about women's ministry when I was in it is the idea of evangelizing was giving my testimony.

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So it wasn't giving the gospel, the actual proclamation of a finished work in Christ, a historical event for my sins.

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It was what is God doing in my life right now? How is God changing my life right now and making me better?

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Right. So it's about works and and how he's called me to this great, you know, work service to the homeless or in Jenny Allen's, you know, the sphere there and called me to the work of discipling other women.

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So, yeah, there's just it's it's very, very sneaky and all that.

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And one of the things that she says on that website also just flat out was that discipleship is

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God's means by which he changes the world. And there's a slight truth to that.

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Right. But our goal is not changing the world. And then that's where all the social gospel really comes in.

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And that's why you see a lot of what her connections are with people like Be the Bridge, Latasha Morrison.

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And you have Matt Chandler who comes in and David Platt who comes in and Eugene Cho.

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I never pronounce his name right. But so more social gospel oriented speakers.

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Right. So that's really where the problem lies. It's it's it's not a blatant in your face.

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We're going to just ignore Titus, too. But it's never talked about. Well, it's never the focus.

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The word generation also sticks out to me in that it says that we want to come together as a generation to live out what he has called us to do.

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And I if you go to I think it's their beliefs, you see that word come out again.

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Generation. I'm looking for it. Maybe it's not beliefs, but that's kind of a buzzword. You don't hear that as much in men or mixed ministries.

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I don't know what that exactly entails, but my suspicion is maybe there's a that that becomes the corporate body that you have an allegiance to, an identity and a calling to reach.

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So it's your generation. And this is this seems like it's in the context. It's about women, the women of a generation, but not the family, not your local church.

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Right. So so there's it's a separation you from those things that actually will fulfill you more that God has ordained for you to be integrated into.

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And now you're attaching yourself to do something so much bigger, so much more important, so much more fulfilling that you would be able to reach a generation and empower yourself to unleash yourself.

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You're right. You're almost your superhero language. It's you can be a superhero in a sense.

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And it does seem glamorous. I kind of get it like I kind of see why women would want that, especially if your life consists of mommy.

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Why is the sky blue? You know, you know that it's like I just want to be empowered and unleashed.

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Right. So so how do you I'm curious, personal question here. But so you probably feel the appeal to this.

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So and you know what I'm talking about with the ordinary patterns of life and maybe how that can can sometimes be somewhat boring and so forth.

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How do you combat maybe in your own head this temptation? Oh, scripture.

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I can't help it. Scripture, that's probably one of the biggest things that I would say having right theology really changes your view about what

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God has called women to do. So if you have a right theology, especially that God is sovereign, that he that it's a salvation is his work and that what he has called women to in ministry of the home, that it really is to use their language, world changing, then and not just world changing, eternal, that the work of the home is an eternal work.

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It changes everything. When it's when you start to hear the world telling you or such a ministry like this, telling you that you need to go out there and and do your good works, then, yeah, you feel like you won't ever match up one because you are you are replacing one work for another, the work of serving your home and stuff like that and going out and serving the world.

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And not only that, you're not focused on your relationship with your husband.

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You're not focused on your relationship with your kids. You're not really focused on taking care of the home and making it a place of hosting for other people, ministry from the home, stuff like that.

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So how do I personally scripture if I am in the word and I and I am reminding that because this was a big issue for me, homeschooling,

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I've homeschooled. It was never my intention, but I started homeschooling and you do feel, again, to use their words, restless and and discouraged and just hidden.

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You feel like you're the person behind all of it while everybody gets to go and do their great stuff for the world.

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And here it is. You're at home just doing the minuscule, teaching your kids and stuff like that.

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But getting into the word and especially sovereignty of God and just realizing that God has called you to that, that's what draws me back to the heart of my children and to my husband and and wanting to be submissive.

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And then I start to see what God is doing through my submission and through my service to my kids and through homeschooling and and and your faith builds.

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You don't get that if you're focused elsewhere. It's more self -centered. Well, if you're dependent on the gathering or some spiritual high for your charge, that is a great business model because then it creates dissatisfaction until the next time.

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And then you you'll think, I'll get my buzz now. And so that's I mean, it's brilliant. I suppose it's making money and I suppose it's exerting influence because of that.

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But but it would lead to just more dissatisfaction based on what you're telling me. It did for me, at least.

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I mean, I wasn't involved with the gathering, but even women, not that I'm saying women shouldn't be involved in church ministry and women's ministry themselves.

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It just has to be placed in the right view. The moment I start, which

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I did, it was about my purpose and getting other women evangelizing to them.

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Not that that's bad. We don't want to ignore that. But I was dissatisfied in the home.

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And so my dissatisfaction in the home leads me to act in certain ways that are not loving towards my home and towards my husband.

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When you get into some of these materials, when they talk about purpose, is that something that's so unique and tailored to you that it's like it's a mission to find it and everyone's got a sort of a different one, as opposed to focusing on the more broad categories that God has given to women in general, right?

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That you are just focusing on that. That's why you say you're rooted in scripture. You see your role. You see what God has called you to do.

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But in these situations, like the If Gathering, is the impression you get that your purpose is this really unique thing that,

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I mean, you got to go on a journey to find that. It's like the rainbow. It just always kind of escapes you and you think you have it.

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Yeah, it's like, I don't know if you've ever, I'm sure you've read The Purpose Driven Life. It's really that.

35:37

That's the driving teaching underneath it, especially for women.

35:44

And here's one of the things. So I had my very first episode for my podcast. I listed,

35:49

I think, five things that I saw wrong with women's ministry, where it was going wrong. And that one was, the first one was feminism and the roles are equal.

36:02

So you are equal in roles and which then equals to your worth.

36:11

But underlying that, to justify that, because the Bible doesn't teach that.

36:16

The Bible says that there are different roles. You have to ignore that. And so women are either going to twist scripture or to justify the work outside of the home, the ministry outside of the home.

36:31

And to do that, they have to receive special revelation. Now, it's not like they're speaking to God or God is speaking to them in an audible voice, but it's a feeling or you say, oh,

36:43

I'm really, really talented in this. I'm a great speaker. You know, God has obviously gifted me with speaking talent.

36:51

So I'm going to go use that to preach. I mean, that's a lot of the arguments that you hear. So it is kind of some sort of special revelation, whether that's through a feeling, an inclination or visibly seeing my talents, stuff like that.

37:06

So, yeah. Yeah. So that's good. What do you say to someone who is single, though, because I'm wondering if some of the developments in women's ministry is the result of a rising tide of single

37:21

Christian women. And I don't have stats in front of me. I just know from personal observation that the complaint that you can't find a good guy for women who even want to get married.

37:33

I think there's a rising tide of Christian single men as well. But specifically women who what do they have?

37:41

They have their careers. I mean, this is dissatisfying, too, because you're not designed necessarily to those maternal instincts aren't really going to be exercised.

37:54

And so what do you say? Because my heart goes out to some of these and I know some very well -meaning, wonderful Christian women who want to submit to scripture.

38:01

And I can see a message like this being appealing. Like, you know, you're dissatisfied. You haven't found the man you want and you don't have a home and kids.

38:09

But, hey, you can come and get your buzz here and find your purpose.

38:15

You know, what do you say for them to find their, I don't know, ministry? Well, yeah, yeah, definitely.

38:25

And I think one of the really the things about IfGathering is you mentioned about the generation and the talk of generations.

38:34

They really hit college campuses because of the online ability.

38:40

They have a lot of locals on college campuses. So, yeah, you're right.

38:46

It does appeal. And I have, I would encourage a single woman in this way that their service at this point, you know, being away from the home, say they're in college now, their service is to their church, to serve in the walls that are called to women in the church institution.

39:11

I have another, in my first podcast, I differentiate between church institution and the church

39:16

Catholic. So you can serve your church in the roles and the ways, administration, secretarial work, cleaning, service to the older women, to widows, all of it.

39:33

So you can serve in that regards. But your ultimate end where you should be looking at and planning for the future is that God may call you to have a family and may call you to have children.

39:50

So like Titus 2 states, the older women are to be training the younger generation.

39:59

And that's what you don't have in churches, especially seeker sensitive churches. And you have young adults, which we were heavily involved in the young adult group, me and my husband.

40:11

And it's a mixed group. And it's always about your purpose. It's always about what you're going to do out in the world and stuff like that.

40:19

But you need to have something for those single women, especially I think churches need to start in their teens for women, the older women who are have been married for a certain amount of time to be training them to love husbands and love children, be pure, kind, working at home, submissive to husbands.

40:39

All of that so that they can come into marriage with a more biblical view.

40:46

I think that would be very helpful to have. And not only that, I would think what's needed, too, is for men to be training the younger men, instead of all these teen youth groups on games and finding their purpose and dealing with culture, which

41:07

I think is important. We do a disservice when we don't train them up for marriage and family life.

41:15

And I think that's why we have a homeschooling is starting to become a boom, because I think people are starting to see that.

41:25

Yeah, the Bible tells us to train our children and not give them over to Caesar. But it's taken so long because and has led us down this path.

41:35

And it's obviously affected our culture in so many ways, handing our kids over to the government.

41:41

And because of that, that's where we're at. But people are starting to see it and start to go back to scripture, both husbands and wives and fathers and mothers going and training their kids.

41:53

But if we prepared them for that, I don't think we would be so much in this situation, at least not in the church.

42:01

Yeah, no, I agree with you. If people want to go, if people are listening in now and want to know where to find out more about this, ttew .org,

42:11

you have several teachers that we haven't even gotten to, which is fine.

42:18

But I think this has been good to just shine a little bit of a spotlight on an area that I don't focus on a whole lot.

42:25

And I assume it's going to, women's ministries, is it growing? I would assume it's growing.

42:31

Yes. Apart from the church, it's growing apart. OK, so just an example. Jenny Allens, this last year, the 2023

42:40

If Gathering Conference had 3600

42:46

If Locals. That's individual spots that you can have two to 20 people in a home that can include churches, that includes college campuses.

42:59

So 3600 If Locals covering all 50 states and I think 36 countries.

43:08

Right. Then they're coming up on their 10 year anniversary. She is basically one of the biggest stadiums in Dallas.

43:19

And I can't remember the name. It was basically sold out. It was sold out the weekend of If Gathering.

43:25

So which seated something like 45 ,000 people in the stadium.

43:31

That's not going to include all the If Locals that will be developed over the year.

43:38

OK, so we're talking huge. Yes. Yeah, that that is a lot bigger than I thought.

43:45

Man, there's so many things I could ask you about. And I'm looking at your website right now. There's so many other names.

43:51

And I know you said you have more you're going to add. Thank you for doing this. Thank you for being a discerning voice in this realm where, you know, so many men,

44:00

I think, are just they're ignorant. I, I would just encourage you to go to the website

44:05

TTEW .org. And I mean, are there ways that they can support you when they when they go there or I don't know anything else?

44:13

They can pray for me. They can email me if they have any questions, especially in regards to certain biblical women's biblical teaching.

44:22

I don't have any way of support just yet. I'm getting there.

44:29

So right now I'm just asking for prayers. I would love to have monetary support eventually because it is a lot of work.

44:37

It's I spent a lot of time researching all of this and I'd like to continue.

44:43

Yeah. Yeah. I know more than most how much research that can take. Yeah, it would be, you know, and not to put another thing on your plate plate, but it would be awesome if there was like a book, right?

44:53

A comprehensive book of yours, but then it would probably go out of you'd have a number of new women ministry leaders coming in and it wouldn't you'd have to update it every year or something.

45:04

But but having the podcast is great. It's a library of information, thoroughly equipped podcast. You can find it at TTEW .org

45:12

and there's a number of episodes there about the IF gathering and profiles on various women's ministry teachers and so forth.

45:19

And so, no, very helpful stuff. And so I'm hoping I'll put the link in the info section for people who are listening and want to check it out.