This is War - Time to Start Acting Like It

Wanted to share a quick comment that I saw somebody make about my podcast. And it was a really nice comment. It, you know, really, very much encouraged, sort of me and, and sort of what I do. But I thought it was an interesting comment.

I wanted to kind of talk about it a little bit. Because I think there's probably a lot of you out there that feel this way. And I'm one of them. I'm one of you. So if you feel this way, I want you to know that I feel this way, too.

Here's what this comment says. He says, I find myself ashamed of being shocked at what he's saying, because he's right. And I know he's right. But it's so unpopular, which probably speaks to our ma slash my need for men like him.

He inspires me for sure. Now I feel a little embarrassed to read this because I know who I really am. I know about my sin before God. I know that, you know, you might think that that that that, you know, I'm courageous or whatever it is.

But I often don't feel that way. And so, you know, thanks for the nice comments. They really do mean a lot to me. But they slightly embarrass me. But I wanted to talk about this because, because I want you to know if you are like this guy, and you feel like this, like you're like, you're almost like ashamed, because you're shocked at what I'm saying.

And you know, you know, it's right, but you wouldn't say it that way. I want you to understand something. I feel the same way that you do. Because I say these things in a certain way, I'm trying to be as straightforward as possible.

And when I think about things, like, for example, my whole situation about how people who vote and support Democrats should be church disciplined. As I'm saying these words, I'm thinking to myself, but that sounds really harsh.

You know, that sounds overboard. You know what I mean? But I can't see another way around it. Logically, if we would, if we would church discipline, neo Nazis, if we would church discipline, people who are open racist, why would we not church discipline people who support abortion, it's way worse than racism.

And, and so I can't think of a logical way around this. And so I have to say it that way. But I want you to know that, that I, I feel I don't know if it's a shame is the right word, but but embarrassed because I, I feel like it's too forceful.

Why He Speaks So Directly

And the reason I feel that way is because I have been indoctrinated into this really sissified version of, of Christianity, where, you know, you don't, you beat around the bush, I've been trained to beat around the bush, I've been trained to be vague, I've been trained to have ultimate nuance in every area, and to be very soft spoken.

And that's just not the reality. That's not the reality of manhood in the in the in the church. And, and, and look, not everybody has to say things as straightforward as I do. And sometimes people would say things even more straightforward than I do it.

And so, hey, you know, I'm not like, I'm not like the standard here, isn't it? I'm not saying that at all. Because here's the thing that we have different people for different purposes, right? And so you have to be relentlessly biblical, and you have to hold on to biblical principles.

But maybe you don't have to tell people to shut up, like I told Dr. Russell Moore to shut up about his completely virtue signaling nonsense article this this week. You know, like, until you get ready to take a biblical stand, Dr. Russell Moore, where where where people who did a little kids get executed when they're found out until you're gonna will be willing to take a completely biblical stand, stop virtue signaling.

Now, you might say it even more harshly than that. But the reality is not everybody has to say it that way. But you have to hold on to biblical principles relentlessly, you have to. That's the only way.

And the reality is, so so so if you feel shocked at what I'm saying, I want you to understand, I feel shocked to be saying them. You know what I mean? But But I'm trying to be very careful to be straightforward and relentlessly biblical.

And so if I need to shock your system a little bit, that's what I'm going to do. Look, there's different people for different purposes. One of my favorite ways to demonstrate this is I named my son Ezra, right?

I love Ezra, Ezra, the scribe. He is awesome. He's a student of the law. He's he loves the Lord. He was he was someone who was a bit of a of a renegade among his people, because the people were going off the deep end.

And Ezra was like, No, no, we have to remember God. And man, that's why I named my son that because I want him to be someone that is relentless in that way. But Ezra was also not as aggressive as another contemporary of his Ezra and Nehemiah.

I love those two books, because they're operating at the same time, you know, these two people were active at the same time, during the same period of Israel's history, but they're very different. And the Bible presents them both as faithful men.

See Ezra, what Ezra would do is Ezra was very pious, you know, Ezra would pray, Ezra would, would, would would sit and meditate on the Word of God. He was study, he was studious, and all these things.

And Ezra would go to God with everything. And Ezra would, when he had an issue, he sometimes he wouldn't approach it directly. One time he had to go through a place of land, and he felt embarrassed to ask the king to give him protection because because he had told the king how great God was.

And so he felt embarrassed to say, well, you know, if God's so great, why do I need your protection? Right? So he kind of like, you know, he was relentlessly biblical, he was relentlessly dedicated to God, but he was very pious in a certain way.

Nehemiah wasn't like that, exactly. Nehemiah was also an aggressive sort of relentlessly biblical, relentlessly dedicated to God person, but you would as what Nehemiah, he, he would go straight to the source.

Because during during the same kind of situation, they need a protection to go through this land. He went straight to the king, you know, Ezra's over there praying, and that's great, because we need people to be doing that.

But in the meantime, God is answering Ezra's prayer through Nehemiah, who goes right to the king. He says, Hey, king, here's what I need from you. And the king granted it. So we've got Ezra's and we've got Nehemiah's.

And you know what, my nature, my nature is naturally more like Ezra. That's why I named my son Ezra. You know what I mean? I'm more like that. I'm more like the kind of guy who wants to be on the sidelines, you know, praying behind the scenes, you know, not really involved in that kind of thing.

But I, I honestly feel like I have an opportunity to be a Nehemiah, because we've got people in the past, the Bible presents these people as heroes. And Nehemiah sees the people profaning the Sabbath, and he rebukes them to their face.

He sees people treading the wine, the wine press on the Sabbath, he sees people intermarrying with pagans. He sees people intermarrying with pagans. And you know what he does? He doesn't he doesn't use soft words like, well, you know, that's not God's best for your life.

No, that's, you know, that's not quite what God had in mind. No, he beats some of them and pulls their hair out. And that's a hero of biblical faith. He's not like Ezra. He's not like Ezra. Here's what it says in Nehemiah.

In those days, I also saw some of the Jews who had married women of Ashtad, Ammon and Moab and half of the children spoke the language of language of Ashtad. And they could not speak the language of Judah, but only the language of each people.

And I confronted them, and I cursed them. And I beat some of them and pulled out their hair. And I made them take an oath in the name of God, saying you shall not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons or for yourself.

See, Nehemiah was aggressive. Nehemiah was it was a person who didn't pull punches, literally, I'm not going to beat people, you know, I'm not going to do that. But the reality is that we need Nehemiah's to we don't need a church full of Ezra's and no Nehemiah's.

Christ's Confrontations With Religious Hypocrisy

Look, our example is is is is Christ. And you know what? Christ had different ways that he dealt with different people. And the people he saved his most aggressive words for the people he put together chords and started whipping people for with the people that were using religious sounding stuff to put forth their own agendas to put their own interests first.

And you know what? The social justice movement is exactly like that. They are pharisaical to the core. They've got their standards of piety and holiness, and they've got nothing to do with the scripture and they're holding you accountable to it.

And they want your money just like the money changers and they want to take advantage of all of this biblical sounding flowery language in order to take from you. They've got power lust, they want sex, they want sexuality to change and all these kinds of things.

And they want your money. Jamar Tisby wants six, seven figures up in this mug. And so you know what? I'm not gonna pull punches with him. I'm not gonna pull punches. I'm not gonna be like Ezra. Look, we need Ezra's.

I'm not saying you can't be an Ezra. We need some Nehemiah's too. Anyway, I hope this is helpful. God bless.