THE HERE I STAND THEOLOGY PODCAST Interview w/ The Dead Men Walking Podcast

Welcome to the Here I Stand Theology podcast, where we are a podcast dedicated to appointed and spirited debate biblical doctrine, amongst other stuff. And so tonight, we are going to be talking probably a little bit of everything with the guys you may be asking, or if you're one of our few subscribers and followers, you may know who we've got on the podcast tonight.

We have the actual dead men walking of the dead men walking podcast. We are super excited about these guys being with us tonight. So without any further ado, let's bring these guys in. Hello, guys.

How's it going, Claude?

I like that one good. By the way, we had a studio audience. They are just a little bit delayed. So these are the guys from dead men walking.

I think I just got a little scared.

Was that from the Tennessee Republican Party Convention?

What was that? I'm not sure that. I think that might have been Oprah Winfrey in the front row, clapping for you.

Wow.

And I almost fell backwards in my chair right there.

Did I have the sound a little louder? Was that OK?

I think it's great.

Yeah. All right. I'm trying to juggle here tonight. So, guys, we want to thank you for being with us again. As I mentioned, we are super excited to have you here. We've got quite a bit. We'll talk about tonight quite a bit.

We'll go through. But before we go any further, let me make an apology. I apologize for the Chris Huffman positive review debacle. I know it wasn't Chris Huffman. It was Chris Huff.

Yeah, we're going to the podcast.

I'll be honest with you all. I think I was I was about half asleep when I when I was watching that. But I did love it. I didn't want to forget it in the morning to make a positive review. So I want to say something good to you all about that.

Chris loved it.

All right.

So let's just realize something really quick to hold on. Hold on. I got to turn this around.

Oh, go ahead. Oh, yes.

At the hats on these hats.

Yeah, those are super nice hats. Hold on. Let me bring you off full screen here.

I caught. I do need to tell you something. When did you when you created your podcast? You said in this year, January this year.

Yes, sir.

So if anyone listens to our podcast, they know that I'm a county commissioner. I want to show you what my logo is when I ran in 2016.

OK. All right.

Don't you see this now? Now, this was 2016.

Holy cow. We're close there.

But more so, you know, I was first.

All right. You were first.

Then I ripped off. Here I stand the podcast for my campaign.

Well, it's it's I should that should be bowing to you on that. Hopefully there was no copyright infringement there.

No, not at all. You go get your free images and you use them.

I know you're.

In. Oh, guys, of the hats. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Thank you much. All right. So let's let's start with just a couple of fun questions here. So first question to all of our male viewers that may or may not be watching tonight or tomorrow when the podcast or when the episode premieres.

The first question is very important. And it's this. Why would a man shave his face down to the skin?

You know, what's really funny about that question? The other day, I almost just shaved it to a mustache.

Oh, my. I know.

I was about it because it's been so hot. And like, I mean, you know, usually the beard's fine. I mean, I don't really worry about it too much. But but yeah, I mean, the other day, my the air conditioning went out in the house and, you know, I didn't didn't have all of my necessities.

And I was like, what am I just out of mustache? But yeah, no, that would be horrible. I would have I would have allowed you guys to go ahead and make fun of me.

I would deserve it.

I usually find the guys that do that are usually liberal progressives and they're in the middle of transitioning.

Well, that's how I started.

I will be I will be honest with you. It's it's that's probably what appeared the last time that I shaved. I appeared to be a liberal transgressing or a liberal progressive transitioning because I literally I think I literally cried the last time I shaved my beard.

Yeah, I guess we love your listeners that don't have beards.

Yeah, right. Yeah.

As we say in Tennessee, bless their hearts.

The women that don't have beards, our sisters, our sisters.

All right. So the next question, hard hitting, pressing. Yeah, we ask this anytime we have a guest on the podcast. So the question is this, guys, if you all had to arm wrestle, who would win?

Oh, oh, I think I'm going to give that to Jason.

I don't know, man. I have. I'll be honest. I was working at Ford Motor Company before about eight months ago. I started trading stocks full time. And since then, I am not usually doing as much manual labor.

You should see Greg's yard out here, man. He cuts his grass. He digs holes. He's like got all this different landscape going on. I mean, he's always out in the yard. So you know what? I'll I'll give it to Greg this time.

No, no. But when I was at Ford, I was pretty tough. Yeah.

You still have some of that Ford toughness. All my all my powers in my lips, you know, a lot of eye and try and let's go on.

Well, if it wasn't for the antlers, you all could you all could just arm wrestle there. You'd be the first group to ever officially live arm wrestle on the here. I stand the other podcast pay-per-view thousand dollars.

All right. That's it. That could be an episode.

It would get us down to fight, laugh, feast to, you know,.

The guys that free the states. They actually said after the podcast that they I think they arm wrestled James Silberman and Sam.

Oh, man. Wow. Yeah,.

That would have been worth watching.

To keep peace among brothers, as as we should. Biblically, we'll say it's going to be a draw. Yeah. OK, there we go.

That's not manly. That's not manly. Somebody's got to win. There's winners and losers.

Yeah, right, right, right.

No participation trophies.

Quad. I love this guy.

All right, guys. So for real, let's if y 'all would tell us, Jason, we'll start with you. If you would tell us just a little bit about yourself, your hobbies, what you enjoy about y 'all getting started on the podcast.

Yeah, yeah. So Jason Hamlin. I'm from the southeastern side of Michigan. Yeah, I was in a band before I had come on this podcast before I started working at Ford. I mean, I had traveled the entire world.

I was. I was in Europe a couple of times in Japan, all over the states. I mean, I was living in a van down by the river sometimes.

Yeah, right.

But yeah, I yeah, I mean, think things I like to do, I guess looking at stocks for me, my job. No, right. It's like I never knew how much I loved math, but I love math. But yeah, I mean, but but on a serious note, I absolutely love theology.

And I mean, studying scripture. I know, right? I'm like, wait a second, I just said it like theology.

He's making the laugh noises on you.

So, yeah, so I mean, I love theology. I love talking theology. I love trying to, you know, figure out God's God's word and what biblically what it actually says, because I did dive into the NAR. I was regenerated probably three and a half, four years ago.

And praise the Lord.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I went to church my whole life. You know, same story as most heard every every sermon and ran away. You know, like I said, got in a band, toured. And yeah, I ended up finding Apologia Studios was the first reformed teaching that I had really dove into.

And it was between Durbin. And then he started having guests on. I mean, from Gary DeMar to Andrew Sandlin. And then I started hearing about Douglas Wilson and Toby Sumter. And it just went on and on.

And then Greg was like, you should you should come down. I'm going to have a podcast. I was like, I don't know, man. I'm not really good on the microphone. I can't stand talking whatsoever. I get really nervous.

And I still go through that. I mean, we've done a year and a half. I'm still like, oh, you know. And yeah. But anyway, I came down, had a seven or eight hour conversation with Greg about theology, and it was just like, what is going on right now?

You know, that's like the most awesome thing that could ever happen. And, you know, within the next week or two, he was like, what do you think about jumping on and being co-host? I was like, I don't want to do it whatsoever, but yeah, sure, let's do it.

And from there, yeah, I mean, we just started started talking to as many different theologians, scholars, people that are way smarter than than myself. I know that both of us are. Yeah, I mean, sometimes some of those conversations, you're just like, oh, man, I'm not even supposed to be in the same room.

But it gets really nerve wracking and scary, you know, to be talking to certain brothers, you know, but what we stand on the shoulders of giants, man. And I was thankful for these men of God that have just just you know, learned as much as they could and just to be teaching us, even when we are interviewing them and being so humble about it.

And it's just awesome. So but anyway, sorry, I kind of went on a little bit there. But yeah, that's kind of that's kind of me.

That's what we're wanting. That's what we're wanting. Appreciate it. Go, Greg. How about you?

Oh, thanks, Claude. Yeah, so let's see. Married 16 years this November to my beautiful wife, Samantha. We have three children, Penelope, Coralie and Oliver. They are eleven, nine and seven. Yeah, grew up in a kind of a little bit more legalistic Bill Gothard type church when I was younger.

Then we transferred to a church that was kind of the other side of the pendulum, which was a little more kind of NAR, like you were saying, Jason, centric, very gifts and healing and prophecy with a capital P and all that.

And then when I was like 17, graduated, I was homeschooled up until 10th grade. So my last two years went to public school, couldn't believe how people treated their teachers and the disrespect and all that stuff that went on in public school.

And I just kind of went wild. I was just like, I want to do my own thing. I was in a band for a little bit for a couple of years. We toured regionally and really look back on that period of my life to where, you know, I was in I didn't care if I died or lived.

I was running from God. I knew I shouldn't, you know, be doing what I'm doing because I still had the conviction of the, you know, the moral code that God sears into our conscious, even though I didn't profess him.

And in one instant in 2004, the Lord took everything from me. He took my band, my house, my car, my license, my job, my girlfriend at the time, which is now my wife, and pretty much put me in a place to where all I could do is say, well, I think at least I still have Jesus.

And I tell people and I've said it many times in the podcast, I said the sinner's prayer at seven and I got saved at twenty four because it was it was at that moment that I understood who I was in relationship to who God was.

So got back into the word, just had this two year period of just purification of just study. And, you know, kind of picked up where I left off with kind of the charismatic movement. I started really reading the Bible, reflecting on questions that I'd always asked growing up that I'd never gotten good answers to, you know, that are now memes on the Internet.

You know, I remember asking. I remember asking my my youth pastor when I was 13. I said, why do people go to hell? And he said, they don't believe in Jesus. And I said, well, doesn't the Bible say belief is a sin?

And he said, yeah. And I said, well, didn't Jesus die for all sins? And he said, yeah. And I said, well, then why isn't everyone in heaven? And he just looked at me and he went, oh, that's a good one.

And turned around and walked away. And I didn't know that I was wrestling with that 13 years old. You know, I didn't know there was a theological name for that. We're talking about atonement and what Christ actually did and limited or unlimited atonement, all those things.

So I started reading the reading the Bible and then got a hold of a Dave Hunt newsletter. It was called Berean Call back in the day. And he was not reformed, but he would. And I really liked how he kind of pieced apart the Bible.

But even with that, I found some issues and I go, well, they kind of contradicting himself here about six months in. He says, hey, go get this book that I wrote with this guy named James White. It's called Debating Calvinism.

And so I buy it and I'm like, oh, Dave Hunt is going to wipe the floor with this James White guy, whoever this dude is, you know, bomb halfway through the book. I'm like, Dave, you're getting killed here.

Who is this guy? And that put me on. And then I started to realize all these fathers of the faith that I grew up with in church that they would mention to me, the Jonathan Edwards, the John Bunyan, the the the study guide in the concordance that I was reading, Matthew Henry, the Charles Spurgeon, all these guys were reformed.

And I'm like, wait a minute. Why didn't anyone ever tell me this? I just heard Calvinists were these like weirdos that really kind of didn't even believe anything. And I should stay away from them. I mean, that was kind of what was told to me.

So I go from the Bible to R .C. Sproul, from the Bible to James White, from the Bible to Apologia, from the Bible to John Knox, from the Bible to Spurgeon, from the Bible to Jonathan Edwards, from the Bible to John Newton and Amazing Grace and his autobiography and how he became reformed and back and forth.

And then I realized, oh, my gosh, reformed theology is just believing what the Bible says and letting the text stand on its own and not putting a tradition or a doctrine over what the Bible says. So about two years into that coming to the Lord, I realized, oh, my gosh, I think I'm reformed.

But I had been so ingrained with people telling me, oh, Calvinists just believe you're all robots and, you know, that whole argument. It took me a good six or seven years to wrestle with it and come out of the proverbial Calvinist closet.

Like I didn't even come out and tell people like, you know, this is what I believe. I'd go, no, I believe in the sovereignty of God and I'm wrestling with these things. And probably when I was 30, so a good six years and I just turned 40 this year.

That's what I was like. Nope, this this is what it is. And I and I hit my cage stage running, boy.

I had six years of death and resurrection.

And then everyone needed to know about it, you know. And Jonathan Edwards, don't make me let you listen to in the hand of an angry guy, you know what I mean?

Like, that's it.

And then I realized and then I and believe it or not, which he straight up far from when I first started listening to him, Matt Chandler said something in a sermon, geez, 10 years ago, and he just said, you know, if you use theology like a hammer and not a scalpel, you don't understand theology or God at all.

And it just really hit me and it went, OK, it's not about winning a debate or winning an argument. It's about knowing God. That's what theology means. Right. And that's why Jay and I love doing this podcast.

And I would assume this is why you love doing this podcast is trying to outsmart anyone or win a debate or say you're wrong and I'm right. Maybe in some things we are. But for me, anyway, I can only speak to myself.

I just want to know God more. I want to know him more closely. I want to read his word. I want to understand who he is. And that's what it's the study of. So during covid in 2020, they shut me down for a few weeks up here in Michigan.

We started a podcast. Jay came on second episode. Yeah. And we've been going strong ever since. Once a week, we have shorts on Saturdays. We're a little five minute explanation on some things. We've tried Clubhouse where people jump on live.

I know we got some new segments coming out with book reviews. So we're just chugging along, man, and having a good time.

Yeah. Amen. Yeah, exactly.

That's awesome. So so in your early episodes, I noticed you were like on the couch, on the couch and in a chair. Was that there in the same room?

Yeah, it is. It is.

And we realized as soon as we got three guys in here, two of them had to sit.

On a love seat and it was goodbye.

Yeah, right. Yeah.

And it was very I mean, like we were trying different angles. We added another chair like like I had a friend that brought a chair over and, you know, I was sitting in that and then you only see my side profile.

You just see the back of his head and that and I'm like, man,.

My left side looks a lot better than my right side. And it's like, oh, man, what's going on, man? And then then Greg found this table and painted it up and added the sweet horns and, you know, sorry. Sorry.

Yes, sir. I'm not a hunter. You know, I live in Michigan, but I don't know.

And I bought my property.

I hunt for verses in the Bible, boys.

Right. That's right.

I hunt for sinners.

Yeah. Yeah.

I hope for our minions. Good lord. Sorry. Oh, sorry.

Yeah, I don't get them.

Get them to say, man, you ought to say out.

I say I hunt for heresy.

All right. I think I've been called that over the years. And I'll talk to that a little bit when we get later on in our questions. But but so that is I mean, that is awesome. I mean, it's it's it's such a blessing in really, truly.

It's refreshing to to sit here and to be laughing with reformed folk.

Right. Right.

Because it seemed like most reformed folk think you got to. You know, you got to be stiff. You got to be rigid. You can't enjoy life.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's what I mean. Are part of our show that we've noticed that people like the most is whenever we do cut up, laugh. And then even the newsy news section, we have a section where we where we talk about current events or something that's happened in the world.

And there's a funny newsy news song. Now we have a new song for a book review, which is suggestions. And I mean, it's we try to have a good time, but also be as serious as possible when we are handling the word of God.

But yeah, I totally agree with what you're saying, though. I mean, every every podcast that I kind of go through, it seems like one in ten will like say a little joke. And you're just like, what? What?

What? Because like right when they start the show, it's like, all right, we're getting into first John today and we're, you know, it's like, OK, that's good. But I'm fine with it.

But, you know, yeah, but anyway, which I have found reform guys to be some of the having some of the best senses of humor.

Yeah, yeah. Very mean.

You look at the dry stuff is really funny. Moments by which we're going to have next couple of weeks, which we were just featured on. Yeah, I mean, I don't know if you're familiar with him, but I mean, he just clips together all of the jokes and kind of the inside stuff from the reform guys.

And I go, I would watch this as a stand up set. These are great.

They are hilarious. I love the last one. Do you get number 17?

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. The Dr. White Thug Lifes are really fun.

Top Guests on the Podcast

So, guys, of of of all of y 'all, I've had some big time guests on your show. So in your opinion, who are the top three?

I knew you were going to ask.

Let me let me frame that and say this.

I ain't first. I can't be first on it.

Don't don't worry about the big time guests, because they're probably not watching this show anyway. So you're not going to hurt their feelings.

Man, I'm going to make them.

Yeah, yeah. Right, right.

We could go one for one. Well, what if I said one, you said one?

OK, can they be the same or?

Yeah, they can be the same. Because there's there's a couple that we just kind of have to remember. Agree on. Yeah, yeah. I mean, for me, I'll just be completely honest. Doug Wilson, I mean, has just like blessed my family's life.

I mean, my life. I mean, so many lives. But but may I tell you what? To to have a conversation with him was was a lot of fun and really, really cool to have Doug Wilson on. So I'll go with him.

So I'm going to say one that might be a little controversial right now because he has been in the news recently and some of the reformed guys have soured on him because of like Bethel worship and stuff like that.

But I liked not necessarily my favorite, but definitely in the top three was Dr. Sam Storms, because I thought he did such a just a passionate defense of amillennialism. Yeah. To where he was. He was just so passionate about it.

You go, yeah, this guy isn't coming off this. We can't flip him to premill. He's definitely, you know, post post. Yeah, we'll never flip him to premill. And it was just it was explained in a in a nice way.

And go back and listen to that. So that was over a year ago, but it was only a little 30 minute interview. But yeah, he packed so much into that just to talk about straight theology, define terms, why he believes where he finds it.

I just from that aspect, I thought it was a good episode.

Yeah. Yeah.

Have you all seen the an evening of eschatology? Yeah. They're at the roundtable.

Two and a half hour.

Yeah. It's awesome. It's awesome.

We just need to complete that. Get Piper on and then that premill guy.

Let's see. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jeremy, I can't remember. Yeah, I can't.

We're joking.

We love you, Jeremy.

Whatever you want.

Whatever.

Oh, so I guess I want to mention the two and a half hour or two and a half hour videos. I love that stuff. So you're all you're all wives and family. Do they like say, would you please turn that off? Because my wife does.

I mean, she's a preacher's wife, but she's still she can't handle.

Oh, yeah. My wife will be like, yeah, you're watching another debate.

The same thing.

Yeah. Over and over. Yeah. I'm just like, I'll just put the headphones in, babe.

Don't worry about it.

Daddy's got to watch some apology.

Exactly. Yeah, man.

So who's your number two?

Yeah. Number two. Number two. I'll go with. I love, love Glenn Sunshine. I mean, that guy. Yeah, man. History scholar. I mean, the guy I love talking to him. And yeah, just extremely smart. One of those guys that you're just like, just just talk, just talk.

And I'll just listen. You know, it's like I don't I can't ask you a question. But yeah, but anyway, yeah, Glenn Sunshine and his his podcast.

Oh, man. So I guess he just gets three other like doctors and really smart dudes together. And they just talk about the craziest stuff. Sometimes they like link it up to like Lord of the Rings. And you're like, how is he relating limited atonement to Lord?

I know.

Hey, C .R. Wiley, Mark Price, is that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd love to have them on. We need we need to figure that out.

So, Greg, you're number two.

Yeah, two. Let's see. Oh, gosh, I mean, I'm a big fan of Tom Askew, so I loved when Tom Askew came out a few months ago. And we threw down the gauntlet and said, why don't you talk about, you know, female pastors and what the biblical ramifications are of that?

And he's like, yeah, I don't know you guys, but I'll come on there. Talk about it. I was like, love it. I love it when guys don't shy away from those hard subjects. You know, yeah, it just came on and gave us time.

And, you know, we got a couple laughs out of him, which was good. I like taking someone like Tom, who's so stoic and then getting him to chuckle at our stupidness.

So that was a good one, I thought.

There was something in the newsy news that he did. Did he respond to it or what was it he did during the newsy news?

Yeah, we said, you can comment if you want. I said, can I comment on that song?

It was a lot of fun.

All right, Jason, number three.

I know I know my three, but I think you're going to say, oh, no, I.

Man, I'm having a really rough time. If you already have yours, go ahead. Go ahead. Yes, please.

This is a weird one that you got on that. I didn't even know existed. OK, and it was one of my favorite going to say no. You know, I think Jason goes, I got this guy.

You're going to love him.

I've seen him on YouTube. Yeah, he's a Christian. Now he's not reformed. OK. But would you we made a little joke about that, too, is a great guest. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. He was like making 50 grand a month as a new age dude.

Yep. Had number one website, got radically saved by Christ. Now he preaches against, you know, the one Christ consciousness and all this stuff. And we got like UFOs and like government, you know, shadow governments and like reform stuff and all kinds of cool.

So it was like a two hour episode. And he was so gracious.

Yeah. And we could have kept going with. I mean, like, it was so awesome. But yeah, yeah.

I know he is. He is super intellectual.

Yeah. Extremely. Man, he's so smart.

But he explains it so well. You know, even a dumb guy like me is like, oh, I can understand that.

Yeah, yeah.

My my third, I would would piggyback off of the new age topic. Oh, yeah. Doreen Virtue was a lot of fun to have on because she was living in that as well for years and years and years. And her testimony is just amazing.

I mean, you know, from her, you know, going to church and pretty much saying that that she was a Christian, but then also going to all these new age conferences, saying that she was channeling angels to write books and best selling books.

Yeah, best. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I mean, her story and we got into yoga. We got into, you know, a bunch of different topics, which which that's the thing that I really love about the people that we have had on these conversations.

We try to pull in things that the church might be doing in some instances where, you know, they might think it's innocent. They might think, oh, yeah, well, you know, I'm hearing from an angel or I'm seeing an angel or I'm doing this.

I'm doing that. I'm praying to an angel. It's like, well, wait a second. Yeah, don't don't don't do any of that, you know. And here's a person that actually like went through a lot of these things. And she's, you know, teaching against it, like like really, you know.

But but yeah, I loved having Doreen Virtue on. She just got her Masters of Divinity. Was it? Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, I mean, praise God for for her and her testimony.

Who was the guy that she listened to on the radio that she said? Was it Steve Lawson or was it Craig Ferguson or not?

Craig Ferguson? I can't sing. Claire Ferguson. Claire. Yeah. Yeah.

It was one of those guys. It was a reformed guy. And she said, yeah, I was listening to the radio. He's just preaching Christ crucified and the sovereignty of God. And I was like, wow, I'm wrong. Right.

Yeah.

Just amazing. Yeah.

Love reform.

Good question. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Well, thank you all for answering that. I, I was I was kind of thinking not to ask it because it might be putting folks on the spot, but still. Yeah, that's what we're here for. We're here just to have a good conversation, right?

To be honest, that's right.

That's right. Well, that's that's part of it.

Female pastors. No.

So you mentioned the pre-meal pastors conference. Did one of you come out of an IFB church at some point? Did I read that on the side or was that somebody else?

I was very growing up. I was in a legalistic fundamental Baptist. Yeah, I mean, you know, this it was my family on the Hamlin side. We we came up from the holler of Harlan, Kentucky. And yeah, man, we were in the middle of Appalachia, middle of nowhere.

And yeah, I mean, it was it. It was just folks, folks from the country that that's how they were raised. That's how they were taught. You know, and I do believe that grandma and grandpa thought they were doing the right thing, you know, teaching the right thing and teaching us scripture.