In this episode David LeBlanc interviews Jeramiah, he notes that his questions of faith began with questioning the Jehovah's Witness teachings, particularly in relation to the New Testament. His early objections were based on inconsistencies he found within the text and the interpretations provided by the Jehovah's Witnesses. This led him to explore other religious traditions, and eventually, he found himself involved with a Christian woman who introduced him to charismatic meetings within the Assemblies of God.
Jeramiah then recounts his experience before attending Bible college. They discuss the manipulation tactics used in churches, exposing the human side behind the spiritual façade. The conversation explores the speaker's decision to attend Bible college, influenced by a pastor who encouraged them to pursue ministry. Jeramiah contrasts this supportive conversation with the conflicted discussions with his father. Jeramiah expressed frustration with the theological focus and lack of critical examination in their Bible college courses.
This podcast delves into the speaker's journey, touching on topics such as conflict, personal struggles, and exposure to critical scholarship in Old Testament survey classes. It's fascinating to explore how personal experiences and encounters with different religious perspectives can shape one's spiritual journey.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:09):
Hello welcome to the Pulling theThreads podcast.
This is another two parter and this interview David LeBlanc is
interviewing me. This one went kind of long so I
decided to cut it into two. Hopefully you enjoy the first
part, learning about my story with some new details you may
not have heard before. And make sure you tune in next
week for the second part. Also, make sure you like and
(00:29):
subscribe and follow on YouTube,follow us on Spotify and join
the Facebook group as well as join the discussion at Jesus the
Jew within judaism.com. And I hope to see you on the
next podcast. And yeah, so today we're going
to do a different type podcast. Instead of me interviewing
somebody today, David is going to interview me.
(00:51):
And yeah, so why don't you go ahead and start?
Well, hi. Hi Jeremiah, this is I'm Dave
LeBlanc, and I've had my own podcast that I've kind of
deactivated. I used to do a lot of interviews
myself, so. So you asked me to do this for
you, which I'm happy to do. It was striking to me is just as
(01:12):
a form of introduction. You've introduced me a couple of
times to your audience, but you and I have very many
similarities to our background. Not completely parallel, but
there's a lot of parallels, especially as we go further on
our journey. I guess you know most of your
(01:32):
audience that's not new to your program will be familiar with
where you're at. But for the sake of just setting
a groundwork here, before we delve into your story, how would
you describe your? Yourself spiritually today.
Like where where would you find yourself camping your your, your
wagon at right now? Where would I camp my wagon?
(01:59):
I mean I identify as Jewish. I went through conversion.
So I mean situationally that's, you know practice the holidays,
practice Kosher Shabbat, all that kind of stuff.
I'm definitely more of a philosophical person.
And so I would say that I'm grounded historically and
(02:23):
factually and like the way things are.
If you would ask me about religion in general, I would say
that I'm agnostic about most denominational organized
religions. I, you know, believe in God.
A higher power that I feel is help me throughout my life, or
(02:45):
at least help me make better decisions that I would make of
my own. And you know, if we get into my
story, we can talk, talk about why I feel that that's something
that's still important to me. But it kind of all goes back to
the the it's it's kind of the thought about the divine spark
(03:09):
and everybody, the Nets would say Elohim, that there's this
divine spark in in everything and the Klippo, the things that
kind of cover things up. I I don't think that, you know,
for me and my family, Judaism isthe religion that I practice and
that morally, philosophically, ethically aligns with my
(03:30):
personal value system and I guess always has.
But when it comes to like the denominations, the structures,
the people, I believe all of that's fallible.
It's human. So I mean, I I don't subscribe
to the view that there's only one way and there's no other
(03:51):
way. For me, this is what works.
And and you know, within Judaism, you know, we say the
righteous of all, you know, people have a place in the world
to come. But I guess to start it off,
that's kind of where I'm I wouldsituate myself.
That's that's fair, yeah. And for for disclosure, for the
audience, for those who don't know, I share with you a journey
(04:17):
out of Christianity and into Judaism.
I also formally converted with my wife through the Conservative
movement, as you did. And the reason I bring this up
is because those who are seeking, there's many different
types of people that would subscribe or watch videos such
as you and I have produced. That deal with more scholarly
(04:40):
kind of an intellectual approachto the concepts of religion or
or various different traditions that would be certainly outside
the purview of what you know. When many people think about
observing Jews, they think of the Black Hat crowd with.
You know, the ultra Orthodox, you know, praying at the Western
(05:01):
Wall kind of thing, you know, intheir little communities in the
cities of America and and and elsewhere.
So you obviously, like myself, have been fascinated over the
years, especially recently with the philosophies and the variety
of thought within the Jewish world that is available.
(05:22):
But you're not so much attracted.
Maybe that's the wrong word, butyou don't really gravitate
towards the more extreme versions of Jewish Orthodoxy,
which I find is very interestingto me because not to make it
about me, but like you, I had a very.
(05:44):
I had a variety of background experiences and religion that
one of the things I wanted to avoid as I as I matured was
getting into more extremism after coming out of extremism,
you know, so now that we've established where you're at
currently, you have a fascinating background that you
shared some bullet points with me prior to this interview and I
(06:07):
wanted to start right at the beginning, which I think is a
really interesting place to begin.
For people to understand how you've arrived, where you're at.
Now. You shared with me that you were
raised in a home of Jehovah's Witnesses from the time you were
very young, and that you didn't take long before you started
(06:29):
questioning various aspects of that as you matured and and get
towards puberty. You had a very inquisitive mind.
And that by the time you were 18, you were openly asking
questions about everything. And you also mentioned that
there was some tension in your family with your dad, which I
also experienced, which I think was a big impact on why I was
(06:49):
also searching. So I I wondered if you could
speak to those early years what your home life was like and how
your home life affected the way you viewed your family's
religious devotion and and how that affected you as you grew
into maturity. All right.
Well, I would say to start it off that my home life drove me
(07:15):
to God to to to wanting to believe in a higher benevolent
power that cared about my plight.
So you know, growing up in a home where emotional and
physical violence is normalized,your views a bit skewed from
(07:39):
what people who grow up in a safe home would be.
You know, I I, I experienced physical, emotional and sexual
abuse for my father. And it it was something that
took me many years to deal with.And my father isn't the one that
converted to Jehovah's Witnesses.
(07:59):
My mother converted to Jehovah'sWitness when I was four.
And I'll kind of get into my dad's background in a little
bit, maybe all the stuff going on, the ingredients played into
the soup that made me, of course, because they're my
parents. But my mom had a sudden infant
death at, I think it was like 3 1/2 months, a stillborn child.
(08:24):
And then she just kind of handled the idea of having
another child. So she had an abortion ridden
with guilt. The Jehovah's Witnesses come
knocking on the door and provideher something that was appealing
to a broken soul at that time. So my mom became a Jehovah's
Witness and she was pretty devout about it, threw
(08:46):
everything all in it. It, you know, when you don't
have to take responsibility for yourself for your problems and
somebody tells you what to do, it's a it's an easy way to go
when you're going through hard times.
So I feel like they take advantage of people that way.
So in in you know my my background on my mom's side is a
little bit mixed. My grandfather was a Irish
(09:09):
Catholic so before she converted, I think they went to
some Irish Catholic stuff when she was a kid.
There is some nominal, like Jewish ancestry that goes back
to Spain and Sephardic, but, well, lockically.
I wasn't Jewish. That's why I chose to convert.
(09:29):
But there's some ancestry there.But the the big thing is my
parents raised me. My mom, my mom decided she was
kind of left in charge of it. So she made me and my sister go
to the Jehovah's Witness thing. My father was German, of German
descent, and his family was Catholic.
(09:49):
He went to parochial schools. He was sent to Sunday school.
He would go in the front door and out the back door, but he
was not an adherent to Catholicism.
When I was growing up, he got into the Celestine prophecy or
something like that. It was some metaphysical book
(10:13):
about seeing the auras, auras onpeople.
You have a blue or green aura kind of stuff you talk about.
He studied some Jehovah's Witness stuff and then he
studied with a Native American witch doctor and had me a little
concerned for a while there because right around the time of
(10:33):
the Hail Bop comment, he was talking about some of that stuff
and he may had a conversation with me and this this plays into
like the mental health issues. Later he had a conversation with
me about if you commit suicide, make a point with it and this is
in like you know there's a spaceship behind this comment
(10:57):
and you know I guess that they were going to commit suicide to
go up this spaceship in the sky.When the that group committed
suicide, I was kind of in desperation, trying to find
reach out to my father to make sure he was still alive, Come to
find out he was. It was just associated with
(11:17):
people who had strange beliefs and espoused some of them.
But I never adhered to his way of life.
One of the defining moments for me, and this would have been
later on. This is because I'm jumping
around. It wouldn't be formative.
It's more when I was my parents went through divorce between my
(11:39):
junior high and high school. It would have been around junior
high, maybe eighth grade. Actually, no.
It was the summer, summer schoolbefore 8th grade high school.
So it was right between junior high and high school.
I, my parents were living separate and I was given the
(12:02):
involuntary choice of being withmy father, involuntary as they
didn't have a choice. But so I come home from school
and he goes, you know, tell me something about your day.
What did you like? And so, like this science
teacher was told me like some really cool stuff and I was just
like kind of going off like that, that that this is so cool,
blah blah blah, blah. And then all of a sudden he just
(12:25):
got really, he won. He became dogmatic, basically
telling me it was crazy. And I was like, well, he's a
tenured professor. He studied this.
This is his specialty. I'm going to go with science on
this one because he was espousing just some fringe
(12:48):
theory that wasn't grounded or rooted in any kind of science or
history or facts or anything. And so anyways, he comes around,
comes around the table, chases me down the hallway, punches me
in the throat, we end up on the ground.
He's got me pinned to the floor and he goes, why did we do this?
And I'm like, you punched me. I don't know.
(13:10):
That was how my father was, though.
So, so it went from having a conversation to he he just
became very volatile, yeah. And you were just trying to
share information answering his question.
Yeah. And I don't, you know, neither
one of us want to be labor on this aspect, but just I'm just
trying to understand. So it's, it sounds to me like it
(13:30):
escalated extremely quickly in avery confusing way.
But it seems like it was not so confusing in that there was a
repeated pattern of this and he and he literally got violent
when you. When you started proclaiming
things that he was threatened byideas that he was threatened by,
Yeah. And that was kind of how he was.
He talked about in his childhoodhow he was bullied and he had
(13:53):
physical violence happens to him.
That's why I was pinned to the ground.
He starts to tell me this story about how of all places to get a
lesson like this one when he I think he was around 18 or
something. Must have been around the time I
was born. Couple of his friends got him
(14:13):
drunk. That's why I'm on my back being
pinned to the floor and they ended up stealing his car and
leaving him without a car. So the next day he goes and he
finds each one of them, he beatsthem up and then he gets his car
back. Quite an interesting place to
tell me a story like that. So it was it was it was a
(14:37):
challenging environment. You know it's took me many years
of therapy, counseling, support groups get to the point where I
I've worked through it And you know as a father, I feel like
I've done a great job with my children navigating the
difficulty. So it's not like something I and
I've got to interesting place inmy life that I am thankful that
(15:02):
I am stronger and more aware andI'm stronger than I would be if
I hadn't had those experience. I would not wish those
experiences on anybody. But I am thankful for the
strength that I have, that otherpeople don't have the same
strength. So to go.
(15:23):
Up for one second because I justwant to emphasize something here
that you're you're touching on it and I know that you know we
we never want to, we never want to spend time talking about our
own attributes. So I want to do that for you
here for a second because you know here you are, you have this
blog and this podcast and you'retrying to pursue an intellectual
(15:45):
conversation about origins, pulling the Thread podcast.
And you've expressed to me privately and also publicly that
your your motivation in this is to really provide a platform
that can help people that are similar to you and I that really
have genuine questions that are not.
You know, just not, we're not trolls trying to just tear
(16:05):
people's faith structures down. We're we're literally trying to
give people an opportunity to explore these ideas, just as you
have. And I I just want to say that
I'm not a psychologist, but to be able to live a functional
life as an adult, hold a job, raise children, go through
(16:27):
relationship stress and still have the mental strength.
To be able to explore these ideas, and at depths like you
do, I think it's a great, it's agreat, I don't want to say
testimony, but it's a great example of the human spirit and
how you really can't hold us down if we don't let ourselves
(16:50):
be held down no matter what we've been through.
But we should always be empathetic to where people are
coming from because we just don't know what they've been
through. You know, people are carrying
around a lot of pain, right? And and so if you haven't been
through pain, it's hard to be empathetic with others pain.
And so I've always sensed that from you in the in the time that
you and I have interacted that you, you are a very empathetic
(17:13):
person and you've always maintained a great sense of
humor which I think is a great sign of mental health is having
a sense of humor about yourself and about your life and and so
this is fascinating. So so you went through this.
Really. Dysfunctional relationship with
your dad. I should ask you, I'm.
(17:34):
I'm sure that some of your audience might want to know, is
your dad still alive? Yeah, my father's still alive.
And it's a he's alive. I haven't talked to him in many
years because unfortunately he chooses to still be like that.
(17:56):
And I don't want my children to ever see me interact with my
father in a way that would teachthem that that kind of behavior
is normal or OK. Even if I handle it right.
I don't want to see that kind. I don't want them to see that
kind of father son interaction because.
Even in his adult life. I'm sorry.
(18:17):
I'm sorry. Go ahead.
Even in my adult life, he still chooses to get in my face and
become try to get physically violent and and stuff like that.
Yes. You can't afford that when we're
on your children, you know. No, I I won't.
But you're. I'll ask your mom.
Where is your mom at today? My mom and sister is still very
(18:39):
committed to the Jehovah's Witness religion.
So because of that, we've went through periods of I've been
disassociated. I got this fellowship from the
Jehovah's Witness because of allthings I was training in martial
arts to be able to protect myself.
So I didn't have to be afraid ofmy father in case he did
(19:00):
something violent to me that wasn't, you know, and I felt
like telling me I couldn't trainin martial arts to defend myself
against a violent attack. Just wasn't something I could
hold on to. So, but in my childhood, and as
(19:21):
challenging as it was, what gaveme peace and centered me was I
would go for walks and I would talk to God and I would pray and
I just pour out my soul. You know somewhere in there I
experience freedom acceptance and then crying out for help
(19:48):
that you know but the the the conflict with my dad I was
talking about we're we were literally arguing about
something my science teacher told me and it was like the he
was into all these fringe theories and I was very much
into like grounded facts and evidence and stuff like that.
And I think like you kind of made a comment earlier and and
all these kind of events that happened like early, early on.
(20:10):
I didn't just accept or adopt like my mom's.
Joe was witness thing by the time I was 8.
Which means she had only been doing it for about four years,
because I was four when she started.
I was already asking how to go to heaven.
And one of the elders was like, you got to know the truth and
(20:33):
become one of the 144,000. And all this is convoluted.
They're stringing scriptures together and I'm just like
scratching my head like, okay, That's a bit much.
It's a lot. And I remember I walked away
from that and I was walking to the front of like their, what
are the the Kingdom Halls, what they call it?
(20:55):
And I was walking to the front. And I was like, I was, I started
to do a prayer that was like theway they would.
And then I checked myself. I was like, Lord, teach me the
truth. I don't know, teach me your
truth. I want to know the truth.
And so at that early age that that that Colonel was embedded
(21:16):
in me like I want to know the truth.
And so the way that you know, authentic between inauthentic
when you're dealing with money, they have, you look at real like
legit money and you study it, you get comfort with it, the
smell and everything so that when you're given a fake, you
know the difference between realand fake.
And so I feel like for me, I read the New World Translation
(21:41):
cover to cover once I the the New Testament presented so many
challenges for me. And then I started again and I
read the snok again and I just at that point I was just like
there was too much that I had issues with the New Testament
and I started going to the elders and challenging them on
(22:02):
their view that, you know, Jesuswasn't God and different things.
I'm like the text, it doesn't make sense.
This isn't lining up. And then you know one of the
what they ended this way. Let me finish with this ended
this way and and and my my supposition was different than
what they said. But they're like, you know,
(22:23):
understanding that I don't agree.
They're like, well, you know, there are some things that you
just have to take on faith and I'm kind of making a mental note
to myself though yeah, you're crazy.
And I don't subscribe to that was kind of my what I took on
faith. When he said that I I didn't.
(22:43):
I didn't take things at faith. I was like, no, we need to have
proof and evidence for this stuff.
So what were you going to say? Yeah, I apologize for jumping on
you. I wanted to ask you when you
started having problems with theNew Testament that you you threw
in the comment that you always appreciated the Tanak.
(23:04):
Of course, the Tanak is a phraseyou learned much later.
Were you having a problem with the New Testament at that young
age because it, because you're reading of the New Testament was
difficult to square with Jehovah's Witnesses doctrine?
Or were you having a problem with the New Testament because
of, or in addition to, your reading of the Old Testament of
(23:26):
The Tonight? Yes.
OK, so one, my first objections to the New Testament were almost
at Matthew. It didn't line up with it
tonight. And then secondly, the arguments
I started having with the elderswas about their interpretation
of the New Testament. So my first thing was like, this
(23:49):
doesn't line up. Salvation is this way and it's
not what is this new salvation, but it's not supported in.
It's not what is this, it's it'sa little bit convoluted, but to
some degree I kind of did take some of it on faith for a long
time. I learned the question, but and
(24:10):
then the other one was I really took them to task with their
interpretation of the New Testament because I started to
look into what I call the purplepeople leaders, their diaglot.
Their purple diaglot. It was a old it has the Hebrew
English translation with the transliteration under it, and
then their English translation on the side.
(24:31):
So I had started like, I was like, all right, if anything is
true one, it should. If you test it against itself,
it should be proven true among itself, right?
So my first thing is I'm hearingthese things about Jehovah's
Witness, that maybe it's a cult,maybe there's this and that.
And so I'm like, well, let me test the thing against itself
and see if it actually holds weight.
(24:53):
So I started to look at the the Greek text, the translation, and
then I look at their trans, their translation and their
transliteration isn't the same as the the the transliteration
under where it goes Greek to to transliteration English.
They're adding words and I'm like, well, wait a second, so
(25:13):
the actual Greek text does not support what you're saying.
And so at that time, it supported more of a traditional
Christian view. At that time when I left
Jehovah's Witnesses, which was about when I was 18, then I did
take a path into Christianity because at that time, based on
the text I was looking at, that would have made more sense for
(25:34):
me to explore and test it, you know, against itself kind of
thing. But so I mean, to answer your
question, it was a bit of, it didn't match the Tanak, which
the Joe's witness is called the Hebrew scriptures and they
called the New Testament the Greek Scriptures, which it's a
little nicer to have that term than Old and New Testament every
time you say it. So my brain was, my brain wasn't
(25:57):
completely embedded with the OldTestament, New Testament.
They just say Hebrew scriptures and Greek scriptures, which so
that dichotomy, you know it thatworks.
I mean, one's a Hebrew text, one's a Greek text, so.
Yeah, but yeah, right. But so yeah, but your initial
(26:17):
objections were that you weren'table to corroborate the claims.
Upon their own testimony. So it wasn't like you were
taking other religions or other sex claims and working it
against them. You you were just having issues
with their own explanations about their own tradition
because there was an incongruityin the text itself to what they
(26:38):
were telling you. You.
You weren't adding it up, so that made you open to exploring
some other traditions. And then you mentioned to me
that at some point after becoming an adult.
You ended up meeting a Christianwoman who sounds like you had
some type of relationship with and she invited you to
charismatic meeting. So explain that a little bit and
(27:01):
how you ended up getting exposedto the Assemblies of God.
Well, so I was living with a woman.
It's quite interesting story there, but I'm not going to get
too much into that one. Oh, no, I don't.
I'm just saying this is your next transition.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it was it was a really
(27:21):
interesting there was a lot of moving pieces on that one.
I I won't get too into it because it could get off into
the weeds. But yeah relationships have kind
of influenced some of my choicesto keep I guess the people
happy. But and I was open like I had I
had I had been kicked out of theJehovah's Witnesses.
(27:43):
I'm. I went to the library and I was
reading on Judaism and Buddhism and yeah, you know, even at that
time I remember thinking that Judaism was one of the oldest
religions and you know, it was one that stuck out to me.
But I was looking at all of them, really.
And like, I had a torn rotator cuff.
(28:04):
What was I doing that I got a torn rotator cuff?
I think I was doing martial artsat the time.
Well, I I was, I don't recall what I did.
Anyway, she invited me to this crusade at the Oceanside here
Amphitheater. I think it was the Door
Christian Fellowship. They're a really strong
(28:26):
evangelical charismatic, you know, Pentecostal healing laying
on the hands. You know, the they had a big,
big crusade down at the pure amphitheater there.
And you know, but I I went by earlier and you know they they
kind of put this incense in the air.
So it kind of has a certain smell in the air and stuff like
(28:47):
that. I just remember the the smell of
the incense that they had kind of burned in the place to make
it have a certain odor before, like I noticed it before.
But I I think it was meant to add to the ambiance of the
experience. You know, we had the worship.
So it was really intense with the alter calls and stuff and
(29:08):
kind of feel like if you don't go down, you gotta go cuz
everybody else is going the onlything left at you in the fight.
History Have you actually read my book or you just scanned it?
I'm not sure if you actually read it yet.
I skimmed through it. Yeah, but I thought so.
Well, the only I'm not putting it in the spot, I'm just The
only reason I ask is because I had a whole chapter in my book
(29:32):
about when I first got born again.
That I I was, I befriended a guyI met at a business meeting and
he was part of a Southern Baptist church.
And so I used to go with him andI had been raised Roman
Catholic. So I had never really
experienced this Baptist style of service.
And I found that you know, the choir singing was interesting.
(29:54):
It was a lot more entertaining than you know, than the than the
Roman thing where you you kneel and you sit up and you sit and
you stand and you kneel and. But I was fascinated by the
preaching. But then, as you just mentioned,
now this is now this is in a Southern Baptist environment.
This is not the charismatic, which is, you know, slightly
more over the top or or a lot more over the top than what this
(30:16):
was. But they had kneelers at the
front of the church and at the end of every service.
And this was true of all Baptistenvironments that I had been in
throughout my life. There would always be a slow
melodic piano song at the end. Where the the pastor would kind
of continue with his little homily and they would start to
invite people forward who wantedto either accept Jesus or or or
(30:38):
pray and of course mostly it waspeople just praying about things
and and it's funny you made me laugh when you said that because
as as a new believer who really was committed to wanting to
really press in. You know I I had this attitude
and I mentioned this in my book that I was in it to win it, man.
Like like if you're going to do an alter call.
I'm going to go forward. I don't care if I have to make
(31:00):
up a reason. I'll think about something to
pray about as I'm walking forward.
But I want to be counted as one of those who was serious every
single week. So there was never a time I
didn't go forward. And I think that probably was
true of a lot of people that, you know, you come to this new
faith and you want everyone to say, hey, you can count on me,
I'm here, I'm here, you know, kind of thing.
I wonder if that was some of what some of what you
(31:21):
experienced when you get exposedto that.
I mean, there was, there was a lot of peer pressure to run to
the altar. And like the way they're
preaching about all these sins and stuff is to like trigger
this thought that God watches. He's going to tell tell them
exactly my sin, I got to run andyou.
(31:41):
Have to come clean, you know. So I mean it's just like they're
just, but it's like word solid. They're just throwing out random
potential sins so somebody feelsguilty.
And it cover everything. Yeah, right.
Yeah. So to to answer your question
like how I got into the Assemblies of God, you know, so
I went to that that crusade there.
And I, I don't want to say gave my heart to Jesus because I
(32:07):
don't know, like I was Joe's witness.
I already believed he existed like I don't, you know, like,
but that was the terminology born again, gave your life to
him, whatever. And I started going to a small
home Bible study for a while, and then we ended up going to an
Assemblies of God, me and the woman I was dating at the time.
(32:29):
And it was one of those ones that came back from the
Pensacola revival. So there was.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. There was a lot of really
intense revival related stuff. The.
Holiness Movement. The Brownsville, Yeah, yeah.
Speaking in tongues, laying on his hands.
Apologizing for taking behaviors, Yeah, yeah, very
intense. You know the the IT was like
(32:49):
they did basically Hillsong style worship and you know the
preaching, the altar calls. We had various evangelists and
prophets come through and it washeavily into like the prophetic
movement and just like all that revival stuff.
(33:12):
How old was a lot of emotionalism?
How old were you at this time? So between 18 and 21 because I.
Went OK. I was still when I was 21.
Right. So you're still, you're still
involved in martial arts and it just a little less so at that
time. Oh yeah.
Yeah, I was, yeah, I was up until, yeah, 97, yeah.
(33:34):
But you didn't have, you didn't have any children at this time
and and no. But just for context, I think
this is really important to takenote of for those who aren't
really tracking here. Or or maybe a kind of Maybe this
is obvious, but. So you had been disfellowshipped
by Jehovah's Witnesses, younger than that.
So you already had this dysfunctional relationship with
(33:57):
your dad and your mom, not her personally, but her fellowship,
this fellowship to you. And so you really were kind of
sent adrift spiritually, kind ofon your own.
And so you mentioned earlier. About the Jehovah's Witnesses,
(34:17):
how they seem to kind of prey onpeople who are in crisis.
But wouldn't you say that that'salso the case with these
evangelistic outreach type, you know, secret friendly type
environments where where people are kind of broken, they're kind
of like going through hard times.
There may be lacking relationship stability, they're
lacking home stability and this becomes like a warm blanket of
(34:40):
sorts that would you say that that's accurate?
Very much so. Praying on human weakness to
gain tithing supporters, prayingon people.
You know, I was, you know, cut off from my family in a I I felt
(35:02):
so the woman I was in an abusiverelationship where I was
experiencing like being. I got punched.
I got attacked with car keys. I wasn't doing this back, but
from a cycle of abuse, I moved to a cycle of abuse.
So I was in an emotionally awake, emotionally weak space
(35:24):
myself. OK, yeah, right, right.
Yeah. So.
So even this woman was she had issues, Yes.
When you have a broken family environment, you sometimes fall
in with people who the feeling of the familial feeling for
people who've been through trauma and sometimes broken and
you attract people like that. So I had yet to have learned how
(35:47):
to make better choices with my life.
And so yes, I was in a very dysfunctional relationship and
the fallacy act growing up thinking I could love somebody
when they're like that with it'snot going to help a person.
You've got to, you know, walk away from people when they're
like that. But that was something I had to
learn later in life. So anyways, yes, I was in an
(36:10):
emotionally weak space. Their methods preyed upon my
weakness. And then all of this excitement
gave me something to focus on other than the pain and trauma
in my life. So this excitement, I mean, this
was interesting stuff. I mean now, mind you, they're
(36:31):
talking about people being raised from the dead and being
people being healed and real, actual miracles.
You know, I did a mission trip down to Baja California and you
know, nobody's getting out of wheelchairs.
The blind aren't seeing, you know, there's no actual that.
There was a episode where peopleI know of mental health crisis
(36:55):
had manifested demons. I think it was a mental health
breakdown, but it was treated like a demon, which I think was
actually probably worse for thatperson.
Yeah, sure, Absolutely. And and part of it was directed
at me and I was like, yeah, I'm not even part of that situation.
So it people are saying there's a demon here.
(37:16):
There's a demon there. This is a demon, that's a demon.
You're like, really? That's just a human that's been
through trauma. They they need emotional
support. They need to learn how to.
Manage So are you are you sayingthat you were thinking that then
or this is back in reflection? Looking back on it, I didn't
know what it was at the time. What I know.
(37:38):
When they threw the aspiration to me, there wasn't a demon
involved and I had I actually did nothing.
It was I'm like literally observing what's happening and
then well the demon came in through you and I'm why, by the
way I was just sitting here likenot actually even.
(38:00):
I mean, it was somebody who had a grudge against me and felt
like I was a corrupting influence, yet I was not
actually doing anything. So like if you don't do
something they like, oh, it demon made you do it.
Which I think goes to a the dichotomy of the Christian view
of good and evil, God and Satan.You know, the devil made me do
(38:22):
it. No.
I'm curious. Yeah.
So I I want to, I want to reallyhone in on what you're talking
about real briefly without, without taking anything away
from your overall story here, because I think in in reading
your blogs and listening to you,I think this is really germane
to a lot of the things that you really try to hit on.
(38:45):
So you talked about your Jehovah's Witness experience
where you you looked at the faith wanting to believe but
having logical. Inconsistencies in your mind
with things that you were being told to believe versus what you
were reading and seeing and hearing and believing in actual
reality. And so now you're in this
(39:07):
environment where, again, we've already established you've been
cast adrift, you don't have a strong support system behind
you, and now you're in this highly emotionally charged.
Kind of electric atmosphere where where there's almost an
expectation of, you know, it's almost like being at Mount Zion,
everybody's expecting like miracles any moment and and
(39:30):
they're almost projecting it upon the audience even when it's
not there. Not almost they are.
And so was there, Was there likebefore you got involved in
missionary work and also the stuff.
I'm wondering if there was this period during this time where?
Where you just had this really uneasy feeling that things
weren't sitting well with you, even though you were
(39:52):
participating in it. Or were you kind of along for
the ride and kind of dawned on that you that this was not right
later? So I've always been very
Pollyanna. There's the old Disney movie
Pollyanna. She was very happy, go lucky and
everything naive to a degree. Always believed the best, very
(40:14):
positive. Despite all the stuff that
happened to me, you know, essentially relationships that
are burning buildings behind me,still a very positive view of
the world. So there were things that did
bother me and get my attention that I'm just kind of like, what
is that? But I didn't stop at that time
and go, let's just throw the baby out with the bathwater and
(40:36):
find a new thing. It was I I was exploring it and
like all things to the depth that I can always go all in on
things, honestly. You know, one of the
philosophies that probably is defines me and the way that I
process things comes from Jeep and dope.
(40:57):
The martial art that Bruce Lee invented that was formative in,
in my experience and it's, you know, to research your own own
experience to to honestly express yourself.
And so, you know, they they because it's a scientific
fighting art. The the idea of science was
something that always kind of it, it always came back to me.
(41:20):
So like, you know, that kind of was a was a grounding for me.
But in that early experience, there were things that were, you
know, flags on the field that I just kind of was like, okay.
Well, that's interesting. But then I was full in with it.
I was working at the church. I got to see behind the scenes.
(41:41):
And then I went to Bible collegebecause, you know, this
experience I had as a child where when I was alone, I was
able to pray and center and thenmake good decisions for my life.
And I felt like I connected withDivine.
I wanted to replicate this in, Iguess, a religious setting
(42:02):
because that's what the way I felt I needed to do that.
So the kind of we go back to thequestion early, I would define
myself more as spiritual and religious now, but I felt like I
had to find God in a religious setting.
And I was passionate about it because I was able to work
(42:25):
through things in it in my soul,get to a place where the trauma
didn't hold me back. And so I want to get to a place
where I can make this meaningfulto others or where I can make
this meaningful in my life. And and I'm, I'm being led to
believe it's the environment around me where I think it might
(42:48):
have been the choices that I made versus the environment.
But at the time, I felt like theenvironment around me was
feeding this. They're praying for healing, you
know, miracles. It was very exciting but I saw
way in in the things I saw like behind the scenes at the church
seeing very human process intentional means I'm at the
(43:10):
manipulation. We had a an evangelist come
through who taught how to manipulate a crowd to get him to
heal. Like literally like spilled the
tea and. That was very common, The
Assemblies of God. They had people that would go
around training churches and howto handle those types of events.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and literally explain the
(43:33):
whole process and kind of like manipulating and the like trying
to get people to fall out and I'm like like damn.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
I was like. It's not what vision.
That's not the altruistic ideal.Yeah.
So I was just like, wow, like, OK, so And that that kind of
pulled back the curtain for me alittle bit.
(43:53):
And that was right before I wentto Bible college.
You know, I I, I had seen the humanity, the, the things that
were attributed to the Spirit during the sermon was stuff that
I watched the pastor struggle with and asked me for the
message to speak that week. And I'm like, yeah, God's not
(44:13):
talking to me right now, bro. But, you know, it was a very
human process. But we're attributing all this
stuff to the divine. There's, you know, all these
methods to manipulate people. And so I've already got this
with the Joe's witnesses, like let's go with something
foundational and compared to these other things.
(44:34):
And I'm already starting to see the, the, the ingredients of the
soup. So I went to Bible college, and
while I'm there, I kind of I I became more studious.
You know, like where? Did you go to Bible college?
Where did you go to Bible College?
(44:56):
Southwestern Assemblies of God? University.
OK, yeah. Studying church planning and
pastoral ministries. So, so let me ask you a
question, because I know how Assemblies of God work, so I'm
just kind of leading you here. But so at some point, correct me
if I'm wrong, someone saw your eagerness and your zeal and
(45:17):
pulled you aside. Someone that you had some
respect for, some measure of respect and encourage you to go
down this path like we think that you would be.
Blessed God would use you if youwent, right?
Yes. So my pastor definitely had
this. I had volunteered at the the,
the church. I was basically a janitor at the
(45:38):
church and building sets for plays and stuff.
And. But yeah, he, he pulled me in
his office and he started talking to me about the calling.
You know, he feel the calling God calling you and they could
be a candidate. And, you know, there's just
assemblies that got college herein California, but it's too
liberal. I don't think you should do it.
(45:59):
You should go to this one I wentto in Texas.
It's in Waxahachie, TX walks of Woody.
What's a walks of Woody, You know, And so he encouraged me to
go to the, the Bible college he went to.
So, yeah, I mean that was that. That was probably what led me to
(46:21):
to make that decision, especially where I went.
But you weren't. You didn't really have a career
at that point. You were just working odd jobs
whatever. And you and you serving at the
church. So you didn't have a career that
you had to give up to go do this.
But how did you And if you did correct me but how did you feel
like this is what I'm really after here.
(46:42):
How did the pastor pulling you aside and talking to you about
your calling? How did that?
Inside your heart and your mind and like like how did that make
you feel and and and how would you attribute your response to
that conversation? Well, let me juxtapose that with
the conversations I was having my dad.
(47:03):
So at the time I was going to Maricosa College and I was the
goal of studying physical therapy and because I was doing
martial arts and I was training Olympic Taekwondo and I wanted
to compete in Olympic Taekwondo and then come back and be a
sports trainer. But that that yeah.
(47:25):
And so while I'm going to schoolthere my father who at the time
is the divorce decree had to help pay for college, didn't
want me to go and he was very conflict oriented.
So I started to with it was thisperiod of time I started to
withdraw from college because his abusive behavior.
(47:47):
My grades were starting to suffer cuz he was just calling
and harassing me and I was having a hard time.
With him, right? Well, juxtaposed that I wasn't
living with him, but juxtaposed that I wasn't.
I was living with my mom, cuz I chose to live with my mom.
Okay, you mentioned earlier thatyou were forced to live with
your dad. That's why I asked.
Well, I was there. Was forced to be with him for a
(48:08):
night and then you know, but I wasn't living with my father.
I when the divorce happened, I chose to live with my mom
because it was a safer place. But but to answer your question
so that the conversations I'm having with my father about my
future is very conflict oriented, he doesn't want to pay
for college. And then come along, an adult
(48:29):
male who's having a positive conversation with me about what
do you think God wants me to do?And I have to say that, I mean,
it felt good to have an adult male have a nonconflict oriented
conversation with me about my future.
Now I was at a place that I had a future that I was working on,
(48:54):
but I decided to go with the calling of God based on the
conflict with my father meeting a break from everything and then
this conversation he's having with me.
So yeah, it was very human thing.
Yeah, that's that's why it's that's why I pressed that issue
(49:17):
is because I often wonder and ofcourse you and I can only
speculate on this We're not you know researchers in this, in
this way where we're doing scientific, you know.
Double-blind studies on this type of stuff.
But I suspect that a great many people that go into fulltime
(49:38):
ministry in in some of these laycapacities and some of these
charismatic and evangelical environments that are less
formalized in terms of their educational requirements.
You know, like you talk about anAssemblies of God college.
It reminds me of also the Calvary Chapel.
So Calvary Chapel has a College in Southern Southern California.
Calvary Chapel. They'll ordain you and give you
(49:59):
an education, and they'll give you a nominal survey of various
courses. But it's all from an evangelical
apologist perspective. You're not actually getting
academic learning like you say at Yale or Harvard or something
like that. You're getting, you're getting
an apologist version of how you should understand the history of
your faith, Right. And that was very annoying.
(50:21):
That was very annoying. When talk about that, I went in
Bible college. I was, I was annoyed by the
statement of faith because like my New Testament survey class,
they give you this book and it'sthe theology with a bunch of
verses and then you got to studyand it's like, what am I
(50:41):
studying? Like you're you know I I
remember we we did a hermeneutics class and we're
talking about I mean half of thethe the courses are ice Jesus.
Then we have a hermeneutics class that's talking about
looking at the passage within its context and its culture and
you know who are you know the the this The Who what where why
(51:04):
and how and all that of a passage.
And I'm like yeah that that's what we should do.
And then I go over to my, you know, Galatians class and it's
like hopping through the verses and you're like, to be honest,
I, you know, in this martial artwe do what we're doing,
bilateral coordination. When you're using your right and
(51:26):
left hemisphere, sometimes, you know, it crashes in the middle.
Like you can kind of fill your neural load.
I felt like I was filling a neural overload and I'm like
okay, I'm not even sure within the context that verse means
what you're saying in your statement of faith.
So a lot of my frustration with the Southwestern and some of
(51:48):
these are God Bible calls began really like I'm studying a
statement of faith, not the Bible itself.
And I and I started to have conflict when my when my
professors about the text of Scripture versus forcing this
theological conundrum and down somebody's throat.
(52:09):
And I remember one of my classesthat it was kind of like near
the end of my tenure at Southwestern and it was the the
Old Testament survey class. You know they they they get into
the document hypothesis and you know amazing thing is they're
getting all textual critical on the on the Old Testament.
This is not something they do with the New Testament which is
(52:29):
an amazing thing because you're like very critical of this but
no critical at all. There's nothing critical of the
New Testament and all and you'rejust like there's a little comp.
This this is not, you know, it'scontradictory and I've never
even the document or. Hypothesis with you?
Yeah, yeah. That was part of that Old
(52:50):
Testament. Survey class.
Yeah. Huh.
Yeah, they probably thought theywere.
Enormously progressive for doingthat?
I guess so, but yeah, it was oneof the topics in there.
Yeah, I distinctly. Remember it?
That was your first exposure to that.
What's that? Was that your first exposure to
the critical? Scholarship approach?
(53:10):
Yeah. But I mean, I think I had
already been doing it myself, incidentally, you know, looking
at things within the attack.
Hello welcome to the Pulling theThreads podcast.
This is another two parter and this interview David LeBlanc is
interviewing me. This one went kind of long so I
decided to cut it into two. Hopefully you enjoy the first
part, learning about my story with some new details you may
not have heard before. And make sure you tune in next
week for the second part. Also, make sure you like and
(00:29):
subscribe and follow on YouTube,follow us on Spotify and join
the Facebook group as well as join the discussion at Jesus the
Jew within judaism.com. And I hope to see you on the
next podcast. And yeah, so today we're going
to do a different type podcast. Instead of me interviewing
somebody today, David is going to interview me.
(00:51):
And yeah, so why don't you go ahead and start?
Well, hi. Hi Jeremiah, this is I'm Dave
LeBlanc, and I've had my own podcast that I've kind of
deactivated. I used to do a lot of interviews
myself, so. So you asked me to do this for
you, which I'm happy to do. It was striking to me is just as
(01:12):
a form of introduction. You've introduced me a couple of
times to your audience, but you and I have very many
similarities to our background. Not completely parallel, but
there's a lot of parallels, especially as we go further on
our journey. I guess you know most of your
(01:32):
audience that's not new to your program will be familiar with
where you're at. But for the sake of just setting
a groundwork here, before we delve into your story, how would
you describe your? Yourself spiritually today.
Like where where would you find yourself camping your your, your
wagon at right now? Where would I camp my wagon?
(01:59):
I mean I identify as Jewish. I went through conversion.
So I mean situationally that's, you know practice the holidays,
practice Kosher Shabbat, all that kind of stuff.
I'm definitely more of a philosophical person.
And so I would say that I'm grounded historically and
(02:23):
factually and like the way things are.
If you would ask me about religion in general, I would say
that I'm agnostic about most denominational organized
religions. I, you know, believe in God.
A higher power that I feel is help me throughout my life, or
(02:45):
at least help me make better decisions that I would make of
my own. And you know, if we get into my
story, we can talk, talk about why I feel that that's something
that's still important to me. But it kind of all goes back to
the the it's it's kind of the thought about the divine spark
(03:09):
and everybody, the Nets would say Elohim, that there's this
divine spark in in everything and the Klippo, the things that
kind of cover things up. I I don't think that, you know,
for me and my family, Judaism isthe religion that I practice and
that morally, philosophically, ethically aligns with my
(03:30):
personal value system and I guess always has.
But when it comes to like the denominations, the structures,
the people, I believe all of that's fallible.
It's human. So I mean, I I don't subscribe
to the view that there's only one way and there's no other
(03:51):
way. For me, this is what works.
And and you know, within Judaism, you know, we say the
righteous of all, you know, people have a place in the world
to come. But I guess to start it off,
that's kind of where I'm I wouldsituate myself.
That's that's fair, yeah. And for for disclosure, for the
audience, for those who don't know, I share with you a journey
(04:17):
out of Christianity and into Judaism.
I also formally converted with my wife through the Conservative
movement, as you did. And the reason I bring this up
is because those who are seeking, there's many different
types of people that would subscribe or watch videos such
as you and I have produced. That deal with more scholarly
(04:40):
kind of an intellectual approachto the concepts of religion or
or various different traditions that would be certainly outside
the purview of what you know. When many people think about
observing Jews, they think of the Black Hat crowd with.
You know, the ultra Orthodox, you know, praying at the Western
(05:01):
Wall kind of thing, you know, intheir little communities in the
cities of America and and and elsewhere.
So you obviously, like myself, have been fascinated over the
years, especially recently with the philosophies and the variety
of thought within the Jewish world that is available.
(05:22):
But you're not so much attracted.
Maybe that's the wrong word, butyou don't really gravitate
towards the more extreme versions of Jewish Orthodoxy,
which I find is very interestingto me because not to make it
about me, but like you, I had a very.
(05:44):
I had a variety of background experiences and religion that
one of the things I wanted to avoid as I as I matured was
getting into more extremism after coming out of extremism,
you know, so now that we've established where you're at
currently, you have a fascinating background that you
shared some bullet points with me prior to this interview and I
(06:07):
wanted to start right at the beginning, which I think is a
really interesting place to begin.
For people to understand how you've arrived, where you're at.
Now. You shared with me that you were
raised in a home of Jehovah's Witnesses from the time you were
very young, and that you didn't take long before you started
(06:29):
questioning various aspects of that as you matured and and get
towards puberty. You had a very inquisitive mind.
And that by the time you were 18, you were openly asking
questions about everything. And you also mentioned that
there was some tension in your family with your dad, which I
also experienced, which I think was a big impact on why I was
(06:49):
also searching. So I I wondered if you could
speak to those early years what your home life was like and how
your home life affected the way you viewed your family's
religious devotion and and how that affected you as you grew
into maturity. All right.
Well, I would say to start it off that my home life drove me
(07:15):
to God to to to wanting to believe in a higher benevolent
power that cared about my plight.
So you know, growing up in a home where emotional and
physical violence is normalized,your views a bit skewed from
(07:39):
what people who grow up in a safe home would be.
You know, I I, I experienced physical, emotional and sexual
abuse for my father. And it it was something that
took me many years to deal with.And my father isn't the one that
converted to Jehovah's Witnesses.
(07:59):
My mother converted to Jehovah'sWitness when I was four.
And I'll kind of get into my dad's background in a little
bit, maybe all the stuff going on, the ingredients played into
the soup that made me, of course, because they're my
parents. But my mom had a sudden infant
death at, I think it was like 3 1/2 months, a stillborn child.
(08:24):
And then she just kind of handled the idea of having
another child. So she had an abortion ridden
with guilt. The Jehovah's Witnesses come
knocking on the door and provideher something that was appealing
to a broken soul at that time. So my mom became a Jehovah's
Witness and she was pretty devout about it, threw
(08:46):
everything all in it. It, you know, when you don't
have to take responsibility for yourself for your problems and
somebody tells you what to do, it's a it's an easy way to go
when you're going through hard times.
So I feel like they take advantage of people that way.
So in in you know my my background on my mom's side is a
little bit mixed. My grandfather was a Irish
(09:09):
Catholic so before she converted, I think they went to
some Irish Catholic stuff when she was a kid.
There is some nominal, like Jewish ancestry that goes back
to Spain and Sephardic, but, well, lockically.
I wasn't Jewish. That's why I chose to convert.
(09:29):
But there's some ancestry there.But the the big thing is my
parents raised me. My mom, my mom decided she was
kind of left in charge of it. So she made me and my sister go
to the Jehovah's Witness thing. My father was German, of German
descent, and his family was Catholic.
(09:49):
He went to parochial schools. He was sent to Sunday school.
He would go in the front door and out the back door, but he
was not an adherent to Catholicism.
When I was growing up, he got into the Celestine prophecy or
something like that. It was some metaphysical book
(10:13):
about seeing the auras, auras onpeople.
You have a blue or green aura kind of stuff you talk about.
He studied some Jehovah's Witness stuff and then he
studied with a Native American witch doctor and had me a little
concerned for a while there because right around the time of
(10:33):
the Hail Bop comment, he was talking about some of that stuff
and he may had a conversation with me and this this plays into
like the mental health issues. Later he had a conversation with
me about if you commit suicide, make a point with it and this is
in like you know there's a spaceship behind this comment
(10:57):
and you know I guess that they were going to commit suicide to
go up this spaceship in the sky.When the that group committed
suicide, I was kind of in desperation, trying to find
reach out to my father to make sure he was still alive, Come to
find out he was. It was just associated with
(11:17):
people who had strange beliefs and espoused some of them.
But I never adhered to his way of life.
One of the defining moments for me, and this would have been
later on. This is because I'm jumping
around. It wouldn't be formative.
It's more when I was my parents went through divorce between my
(11:39):
junior high and high school. It would have been around junior
high, maybe eighth grade. Actually, no.
It was the summer, summer schoolbefore 8th grade high school.
So it was right between junior high and high school.
I, my parents were living separate and I was given the
(12:02):
involuntary choice of being withmy father, involuntary as they
didn't have a choice. But so I come home from school
and he goes, you know, tell me something about your day.
What did you like? And so, like this science
teacher was told me like some really cool stuff and I was just
like kind of going off like that, that that this is so cool,
blah blah blah, blah. And then all of a sudden he just
(12:25):
got really, he won. He became dogmatic, basically
telling me it was crazy. And I was like, well, he's a
tenured professor. He studied this.
This is his specialty. I'm going to go with science on
this one because he was espousing just some fringe
(12:48):
theory that wasn't grounded or rooted in any kind of science or
history or facts or anything. And so anyways, he comes around,
comes around the table, chases me down the hallway, punches me
in the throat, we end up on the ground.
He's got me pinned to the floor and he goes, why did we do this?
And I'm like, you punched me. I don't know.
(13:10):
That was how my father was, though.
So, so it went from having a conversation to he he just
became very volatile, yeah. And you were just trying to
share information answering his question.
Yeah. And I don't, you know, neither
one of us want to be labor on this aspect, but just I'm just
trying to understand. So it's, it sounds to me like it
(13:30):
escalated extremely quickly in avery confusing way.
But it seems like it was not so confusing in that there was a
repeated pattern of this and he and he literally got violent
when you. When you started proclaiming
things that he was threatened byideas that he was threatened by,
Yeah. And that was kind of how he was.
He talked about in his childhoodhow he was bullied and he had
(13:53):
physical violence happens to him.
That's why I was pinned to the ground.
He starts to tell me this story about how of all places to get a
lesson like this one when he I think he was around 18 or
something. Must have been around the time I
was born. Couple of his friends got him
(14:13):
drunk. That's why I'm on my back being
pinned to the floor and they ended up stealing his car and
leaving him without a car. So the next day he goes and he
finds each one of them, he beatsthem up and then he gets his car
back. Quite an interesting place to
tell me a story like that. So it was it was it was a
(14:37):
challenging environment. You know it's took me many years
of therapy, counseling, support groups get to the point where I
I've worked through it And you know as a father, I feel like
I've done a great job with my children navigating the
difficulty. So it's not like something I and
I've got to interesting place inmy life that I am thankful that
(15:02):
I am stronger and more aware andI'm stronger than I would be if
I hadn't had those experience. I would not wish those
experiences on anybody. But I am thankful for the
strength that I have, that otherpeople don't have the same
strength. So to go.
(15:23):
Up for one second because I justwant to emphasize something here
that you're you're touching on it and I know that you know we
we never want to, we never want to spend time talking about our
own attributes. So I want to do that for you
here for a second because you know here you are, you have this
blog and this podcast and you'retrying to pursue an intellectual
(15:45):
conversation about origins, pulling the Thread podcast.
And you've expressed to me privately and also publicly that
your your motivation in this is to really provide a platform
that can help people that are similar to you and I that really
have genuine questions that are not.
You know, just not, we're not trolls trying to just tear
(16:05):
people's faith structures down. We're we're literally trying to
give people an opportunity to explore these ideas, just as you
have. And I I just want to say that
I'm not a psychologist, but to be able to live a functional
life as an adult, hold a job, raise children, go through
(16:27):
relationship stress and still have the mental strength.
To be able to explore these ideas, and at depths like you
do, I think it's a great, it's agreat, I don't want to say
testimony, but it's a great example of the human spirit and
how you really can't hold us down if we don't let ourselves
(16:50):
be held down no matter what we've been through.
But we should always be empathetic to where people are
coming from because we just don't know what they've been
through. You know, people are carrying
around a lot of pain, right? And and so if you haven't been
through pain, it's hard to be empathetic with others pain.
And so I've always sensed that from you in the in the time that
you and I have interacted that you, you are a very empathetic
(17:13):
person and you've always maintained a great sense of
humor which I think is a great sign of mental health is having
a sense of humor about yourself and about your life and and so
this is fascinating. So so you went through this.
Really. Dysfunctional relationship with
your dad. I should ask you, I'm.
(17:34):
I'm sure that some of your audience might want to know, is
your dad still alive? Yeah, my father's still alive.
And it's a he's alive. I haven't talked to him in many
years because unfortunately he chooses to still be like that.
(17:56):
And I don't want my children to ever see me interact with my
father in a way that would teachthem that that kind of behavior
is normal or OK. Even if I handle it right.
I don't want to see that kind. I don't want them to see that
kind of father son interaction because.
Even in his adult life. I'm sorry.
(18:17):
I'm sorry. Go ahead.
Even in my adult life, he still chooses to get in my face and
become try to get physically violent and and stuff like that.
Yes. You can't afford that when we're
on your children, you know. No, I I won't.
But you're. I'll ask your mom.
Where is your mom at today? My mom and sister is still very
(18:39):
committed to the Jehovah's Witness religion.
So because of that, we've went through periods of I've been
disassociated. I got this fellowship from the
Jehovah's Witness because of allthings I was training in martial
arts to be able to protect myself.
So I didn't have to be afraid ofmy father in case he did
(19:00):
something violent to me that wasn't, you know, and I felt
like telling me I couldn't trainin martial arts to defend myself
against a violent attack. Just wasn't something I could
hold on to. So, but in my childhood, and as
(19:21):
challenging as it was, what gaveme peace and centered me was I
would go for walks and I would talk to God and I would pray and
I just pour out my soul. You know somewhere in there I
experience freedom acceptance and then crying out for help
(19:48):
that you know but the the the conflict with my dad I was
talking about we're we were literally arguing about
something my science teacher told me and it was like the he
was into all these fringe theories and I was very much
into like grounded facts and evidence and stuff like that.
And I think like you kind of made a comment earlier and and
all these kind of events that happened like early, early on.
(20:10):
I didn't just accept or adopt like my mom's.
Joe was witness thing by the time I was 8.
Which means she had only been doing it for about four years,
because I was four when she started.
I was already asking how to go to heaven.
And one of the elders was like, you got to know the truth and
(20:33):
become one of the 144,000. And all this is convoluted.
They're stringing scriptures together and I'm just like
scratching my head like, okay, That's a bit much.
It's a lot. And I remember I walked away
from that and I was walking to the front of like their, what
are the the Kingdom Halls, what they call it?
(20:55):
And I was walking to the front. And I was like, I was, I started
to do a prayer that was like theway they would.
And then I checked myself. I was like, Lord, teach me the
truth. I don't know, teach me your
truth. I want to know the truth.
And so at that early age that that that Colonel was embedded
(21:16):
in me like I want to know the truth.
And so the way that you know, authentic between inauthentic
when you're dealing with money, they have, you look at real like
legit money and you study it, you get comfort with it, the
smell and everything so that when you're given a fake, you
know the difference between realand fake.
And so I feel like for me, I read the New World Translation
(21:41):
cover to cover once I the the New Testament presented so many
challenges for me. And then I started again and I
read the snok again and I just at that point I was just like
there was too much that I had issues with the New Testament
and I started going to the elders and challenging them on
(22:02):
their view that, you know, Jesuswasn't God and different things.
I'm like the text, it doesn't make sense.
This isn't lining up. And then you know one of the
what they ended this way. Let me finish with this ended
this way and and and my my supposition was different than
what they said. But they're like, you know,
(22:23):
understanding that I don't agree.
They're like, well, you know, there are some things that you
just have to take on faith and I'm kind of making a mental note
to myself though yeah, you're crazy.
And I don't subscribe to that was kind of my what I took on
faith. When he said that I I didn't.
(22:43):
I didn't take things at faith. I was like, no, we need to have
proof and evidence for this stuff.
So what were you going to say? Yeah, I apologize for jumping on
you. I wanted to ask you when you
started having problems with theNew Testament that you you threw
in the comment that you always appreciated the Tanak.
(23:04):
Of course, the Tanak is a phraseyou learned much later.
Were you having a problem with the New Testament at that young
age because it, because you're reading of the New Testament was
difficult to square with Jehovah's Witnesses doctrine?
Or were you having a problem with the New Testament because
of, or in addition to, your reading of the Old Testament of
(23:26):
The Tonight? Yes.
OK, so one, my first objections to the New Testament were almost
at Matthew. It didn't line up with it
tonight. And then secondly, the arguments
I started having with the elderswas about their interpretation
of the New Testament. So my first thing was like, this
(23:49):
doesn't line up. Salvation is this way and it's
not what is this new salvation, but it's not supported in.
It's not what is this, it's it'sa little bit convoluted, but to
some degree I kind of did take some of it on faith for a long
time. I learned the question, but and
(24:10):
then the other one was I really took them to task with their
interpretation of the New Testament because I started to
look into what I call the purplepeople leaders, their diaglot.
Their purple diaglot. It was a old it has the Hebrew
English translation with the transliteration under it, and
then their English translation on the side.
(24:31):
So I had started like, I was like, all right, if anything is
true one, it should. If you test it against itself,
it should be proven true among itself, right?
So my first thing is I'm hearingthese things about Jehovah's
Witness, that maybe it's a cult,maybe there's this and that.
And so I'm like, well, let me test the thing against itself
and see if it actually holds weight.
(24:53):
So I started to look at the the Greek text, the translation, and
then I look at their trans, their translation and their
transliteration isn't the same as the the the transliteration
under where it goes Greek to to transliteration English.
They're adding words and I'm like, well, wait a second, so
(25:13):
the actual Greek text does not support what you're saying.
And so at that time, it supported more of a traditional
Christian view. At that time when I left
Jehovah's Witnesses, which was about when I was 18, then I did
take a path into Christianity because at that time, based on
the text I was looking at, that would have made more sense for
(25:34):
me to explore and test it, you know, against itself kind of
thing. But so I mean, to answer your
question, it was a bit of, it didn't match the Tanak, which
the Joe's witness is called the Hebrew scriptures and they
called the New Testament the Greek Scriptures, which it's a
little nicer to have that term than Old and New Testament every
time you say it. So my brain was, my brain wasn't
(25:57):
completely embedded with the OldTestament, New Testament.
They just say Hebrew scriptures and Greek scriptures, which so
that dichotomy, you know it thatworks.
I mean, one's a Hebrew text, one's a Greek text, so.
Yeah, but yeah, right. But so yeah, but your initial
(26:17):
objections were that you weren'table to corroborate the claims.
Upon their own testimony. So it wasn't like you were
taking other religions or other sex claims and working it
against them. You you were just having issues
with their own explanations about their own tradition
because there was an incongruityin the text itself to what they
(26:38):
were telling you. You.
You weren't adding it up, so that made you open to exploring
some other traditions. And then you mentioned to me
that at some point after becoming an adult.
You ended up meeting a Christianwoman who sounds like you had
some type of relationship with and she invited you to
charismatic meeting. So explain that a little bit and
(27:01):
how you ended up getting exposedto the Assemblies of God.
Well, so I was living with a woman.
It's quite interesting story there, but I'm not going to get
too much into that one. Oh, no, I don't.
I'm just saying this is your next transition.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it was it was a really
(27:21):
interesting there was a lot of moving pieces on that one.
I I won't get too into it because it could get off into
the weeds. But yeah relationships have kind
of influenced some of my choicesto keep I guess the people
happy. But and I was open like I had I
had I had been kicked out of theJehovah's Witnesses.
(27:43):
I'm. I went to the library and I was
reading on Judaism and Buddhism and yeah, you know, even at that
time I remember thinking that Judaism was one of the oldest
religions and you know, it was one that stuck out to me.
But I was looking at all of them, really.
And like, I had a torn rotator cuff.
(28:04):
What was I doing that I got a torn rotator cuff?
I think I was doing martial artsat the time.
Well, I I was, I don't recall what I did.
Anyway, she invited me to this crusade at the Oceanside here
Amphitheater. I think it was the Door
Christian Fellowship. They're a really strong
(28:26):
evangelical charismatic, you know, Pentecostal healing laying
on the hands. You know, the they had a big,
big crusade down at the pure amphitheater there.
And you know, but I I went by earlier and you know they they
kind of put this incense in the air.
So it kind of has a certain smell in the air and stuff like
(28:47):
that. I just remember the the smell of
the incense that they had kind of burned in the place to make
it have a certain odor before, like I noticed it before.
But I I think it was meant to add to the ambiance of the
experience. You know, we had the worship.
So it was really intense with the alter calls and stuff and
(29:08):
kind of feel like if you don't go down, you gotta go cuz
everybody else is going the onlything left at you in the fight.
History Have you actually read my book or you just scanned it?
I'm not sure if you actually read it yet.
I skimmed through it. Yeah, but I thought so.
Well, the only I'm not putting it in the spot, I'm just The
only reason I ask is because I had a whole chapter in my book
(29:32):
about when I first got born again.
That I I was, I befriended a guyI met at a business meeting and
he was part of a Southern Baptist church.
And so I used to go with him andI had been raised Roman
Catholic. So I had never really
experienced this Baptist style of service.
And I found that you know, the choir singing was interesting.
(29:54):
It was a lot more entertaining than you know, than the than the
Roman thing where you you kneel and you sit up and you sit and
you stand and you kneel and. But I was fascinated by the
preaching. But then, as you just mentioned,
now this is now this is in a Southern Baptist environment.
This is not the charismatic, which is, you know, slightly
more over the top or or a lot more over the top than what this
(30:16):
was. But they had kneelers at the
front of the church and at the end of every service.
And this was true of all Baptistenvironments that I had been in
throughout my life. There would always be a slow
melodic piano song at the end. Where the the pastor would kind
of continue with his little homily and they would start to
invite people forward who wantedto either accept Jesus or or or
(30:38):
pray and of course mostly it waspeople just praying about things
and and it's funny you made me laugh when you said that because
as as a new believer who really was committed to wanting to
really press in. You know I I had this attitude
and I mentioned this in my book that I was in it to win it, man.
Like like if you're going to do an alter call.
I'm going to go forward. I don't care if I have to make
(31:00):
up a reason. I'll think about something to
pray about as I'm walking forward.
But I want to be counted as one of those who was serious every
single week. So there was never a time I
didn't go forward. And I think that probably was
true of a lot of people that, you know, you come to this new
faith and you want everyone to say, hey, you can count on me,
I'm here, I'm here, you know, kind of thing.
I wonder if that was some of what some of what you
(31:21):
experienced when you get exposedto that.
I mean, there was, there was a lot of peer pressure to run to
the altar. And like the way they're
preaching about all these sins and stuff is to like trigger
this thought that God watches. He's going to tell tell them
exactly my sin, I got to run andyou.
(31:41):
Have to come clean, you know. So I mean it's just like they're
just, but it's like word solid. They're just throwing out random
potential sins so somebody feelsguilty.
And it cover everything. Yeah, right.
Yeah. So to to answer your question
like how I got into the Assemblies of God, you know, so
I went to that that crusade there.
And I, I don't want to say gave my heart to Jesus because I
(32:07):
don't know, like I was Joe's witness.
I already believed he existed like I don't, you know, like,
but that was the terminology born again, gave your life to
him, whatever. And I started going to a small
home Bible study for a while, and then we ended up going to an
Assemblies of God, me and the woman I was dating at the time.
(32:29):
And it was one of those ones that came back from the
Pensacola revival. So there was.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. There was a lot of really
intense revival related stuff. The.
Holiness Movement. The Brownsville, Yeah, yeah.
Speaking in tongues, laying on his hands.
Apologizing for taking behaviors, Yeah, yeah, very
intense. You know the the IT was like
(32:49):
they did basically Hillsong style worship and you know the
preaching, the altar calls. We had various evangelists and
prophets come through and it washeavily into like the prophetic
movement and just like all that revival stuff.
(33:12):
How old was a lot of emotionalism?
How old were you at this time? So between 18 and 21 because I.
Went OK. I was still when I was 21.
Right. So you're still, you're still
involved in martial arts and it just a little less so at that
time. Oh yeah.
Yeah, I was, yeah, I was up until, yeah, 97, yeah.
(33:34):
But you didn't have, you didn't have any children at this time
and and no. But just for context, I think
this is really important to takenote of for those who aren't
really tracking here. Or or maybe a kind of Maybe this
is obvious, but. So you had been disfellowshipped
by Jehovah's Witnesses, younger than that.
So you already had this dysfunctional relationship with
(33:57):
your dad and your mom, not her personally, but her fellowship,
this fellowship to you. And so you really were kind of
sent adrift spiritually, kind ofon your own.
And so you mentioned earlier. About the Jehovah's Witnesses,
(34:17):
how they seem to kind of prey onpeople who are in crisis.
But wouldn't you say that that'salso the case with these
evangelistic outreach type, you know, secret friendly type
environments where where people are kind of broken, they're kind
of like going through hard times.
There may be lacking relationship stability, they're
lacking home stability and this becomes like a warm blanket of
(34:40):
sorts that would you say that that's accurate?
Very much so. Praying on human weakness to
gain tithing supporters, prayingon people.
You know, I was, you know, cut off from my family in a I I felt
(35:02):
so the woman I was in an abusiverelationship where I was
experiencing like being. I got punched.
I got attacked with car keys. I wasn't doing this back, but
from a cycle of abuse, I moved to a cycle of abuse.
So I was in an emotionally awake, emotionally weak space
(35:24):
myself. OK, yeah, right, right.
Yeah. So.
So even this woman was she had issues, Yes.
When you have a broken family environment, you sometimes fall
in with people who the feeling of the familial feeling for
people who've been through trauma and sometimes broken and
you attract people like that. So I had yet to have learned how
(35:47):
to make better choices with my life.
And so yes, I was in a very dysfunctional relationship and
the fallacy act growing up thinking I could love somebody
when they're like that with it'snot going to help a person.
You've got to, you know, walk away from people when they're
like that. But that was something I had to
learn later in life. So anyways, yes, I was in an
(36:10):
emotionally weak space. Their methods preyed upon my
weakness. And then all of this excitement
gave me something to focus on other than the pain and trauma
in my life. So this excitement, I mean, this
was interesting stuff. I mean now, mind you, they're
(36:31):
talking about people being raised from the dead and being
people being healed and real, actual miracles.
You know, I did a mission trip down to Baja California and you
know, nobody's getting out of wheelchairs.
The blind aren't seeing, you know, there's no actual that.
There was a episode where peopleI know of mental health crisis
(36:55):
had manifested demons. I think it was a mental health
breakdown, but it was treated like a demon, which I think was
actually probably worse for thatperson.
Yeah, sure, Absolutely. And and part of it was directed
at me and I was like, yeah, I'm not even part of that situation.
So it people are saying there's a demon here.
(37:16):
There's a demon there. This is a demon, that's a demon.
You're like, really? That's just a human that's been
through trauma. They they need emotional
support. They need to learn how to.
Manage So are you are you sayingthat you were thinking that then
or this is back in reflection? Looking back on it, I didn't
know what it was at the time. What I know.
(37:38):
When they threw the aspiration to me, there wasn't a demon
involved and I had I actually did nothing.
It was I'm like literally observing what's happening and
then well the demon came in through you and I'm why, by the
way I was just sitting here likenot actually even.
(38:00):
I mean, it was somebody who had a grudge against me and felt
like I was a corrupting influence, yet I was not
actually doing anything. So like if you don't do
something they like, oh, it demon made you do it.
Which I think goes to a the dichotomy of the Christian view
of good and evil, God and Satan.You know, the devil made me do
(38:22):
it. No.
I'm curious. Yeah.
So I I want to, I want to reallyhone in on what you're talking
about real briefly without, without taking anything away
from your overall story here, because I think in in reading
your blogs and listening to you,I think this is really germane
to a lot of the things that you really try to hit on.
(38:45):
So you talked about your Jehovah's Witness experience
where you you looked at the faith wanting to believe but
having logical. Inconsistencies in your mind
with things that you were being told to believe versus what you
were reading and seeing and hearing and believing in actual
reality. And so now you're in this
(39:07):
environment where, again, we've already established you've been
cast adrift, you don't have a strong support system behind
you, and now you're in this highly emotionally charged.
Kind of electric atmosphere where where there's almost an
expectation of, you know, it's almost like being at Mount Zion,
everybody's expecting like miracles any moment and and
(39:30):
they're almost projecting it upon the audience even when it's
not there. Not almost they are.
And so was there, Was there likebefore you got involved in
missionary work and also the stuff.
I'm wondering if there was this period during this time where?
Where you just had this really uneasy feeling that things
weren't sitting well with you, even though you were
(39:52):
participating in it. Or were you kind of along for
the ride and kind of dawned on that you that this was not right
later? So I've always been very
Pollyanna. There's the old Disney movie
Pollyanna. She was very happy, go lucky and
everything naive to a degree. Always believed the best, very
(40:14):
positive. Despite all the stuff that
happened to me, you know, essentially relationships that
are burning buildings behind me,still a very positive view of
the world. So there were things that did
bother me and get my attention that I'm just kind of like, what
is that? But I didn't stop at that time
and go, let's just throw the baby out with the bathwater and
(40:36):
find a new thing. It was I I was exploring it and
like all things to the depth that I can always go all in on
things, honestly. You know, one of the
philosophies that probably is defines me and the way that I
process things comes from Jeep and dope.
(40:57):
The martial art that Bruce Lee invented that was formative in,
in my experience and it's, you know, to research your own own
experience to to honestly express yourself.
And so, you know, they they because it's a scientific
fighting art. The the idea of science was
something that always kind of it, it always came back to me.
(41:20):
So like, you know, that kind of was a was a grounding for me.
But in that early experience, there were things that were, you
know, flags on the field that I just kind of was like, okay.
Well, that's interesting. But then I was full in with it.
I was working at the church. I got to see behind the scenes.
(41:41):
And then I went to Bible collegebecause, you know, this
experience I had as a child where when I was alone, I was
able to pray and center and thenmake good decisions for my life.
And I felt like I connected withDivine.
I wanted to replicate this in, Iguess, a religious setting
(42:02):
because that's what the way I felt I needed to do that.
So the kind of we go back to thequestion early, I would define
myself more as spiritual and religious now, but I felt like I
had to find God in a religious setting.
And I was passionate about it because I was able to work
(42:25):
through things in it in my soul,get to a place where the trauma
didn't hold me back. And so I want to get to a place
where I can make this meaningfulto others or where I can make
this meaningful in my life. And and I'm, I'm being led to
believe it's the environment around me where I think it might
(42:48):
have been the choices that I made versus the environment.
But at the time, I felt like theenvironment around me was
feeding this. They're praying for healing, you
know, miracles. It was very exciting but I saw
way in in the things I saw like behind the scenes at the church
seeing very human process intentional means I'm at the
(43:10):
manipulation. We had a an evangelist come
through who taught how to manipulate a crowd to get him to
heal. Like literally like spilled the
tea and. That was very common, The
Assemblies of God. They had people that would go
around training churches and howto handle those types of events.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and literally explain the
(43:33):
whole process and kind of like manipulating and the like trying
to get people to fall out and I'm like like damn.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
I was like. It's not what vision.
That's not the altruistic ideal.Yeah.
So I was just like, wow, like, OK, so And that that kind of
pulled back the curtain for me alittle bit.
(43:53):
And that was right before I wentto Bible college.
You know, I I, I had seen the humanity, the, the things that
were attributed to the Spirit during the sermon was stuff that
I watched the pastor struggle with and asked me for the
message to speak that week. And I'm like, yeah, God's not
(44:13):
talking to me right now, bro. But, you know, it was a very
human process. But we're attributing all this
stuff to the divine. There's, you know, all these
methods to manipulate people. And so I've already got this
with the Joe's witnesses, like let's go with something
foundational and compared to these other things.
(44:34):
And I'm already starting to see the, the, the ingredients of the
soup. So I went to Bible college, and
while I'm there, I kind of I I became more studious.
You know, like where? Did you go to Bible college?
Where did you go to Bible College?
(44:56):
Southwestern Assemblies of God? University.
OK, yeah. Studying church planning and
pastoral ministries. So, so let me ask you a
question, because I know how Assemblies of God work, so I'm
just kind of leading you here. But so at some point, correct me
if I'm wrong, someone saw your eagerness and your zeal and
(45:17):
pulled you aside. Someone that you had some
respect for, some measure of respect and encourage you to go
down this path like we think that you would be.
Blessed God would use you if youwent, right?
Yes. So my pastor definitely had
this. I had volunteered at the the,
the church. I was basically a janitor at the
(45:38):
church and building sets for plays and stuff.
And. But yeah, he, he pulled me in
his office and he started talking to me about the calling.
You know, he feel the calling God calling you and they could
be a candidate. And, you know, there's just
assemblies that got college herein California, but it's too
liberal. I don't think you should do it.
(45:59):
You should go to this one I wentto in Texas.
It's in Waxahachie, TX walks of Woody.
What's a walks of Woody, You know, And so he encouraged me to
go to the, the Bible college he went to.
So, yeah, I mean that was that. That was probably what led me to
(46:21):
to make that decision, especially where I went.
But you weren't. You didn't really have a career
at that point. You were just working odd jobs
whatever. And you and you serving at the
church. So you didn't have a career that
you had to give up to go do this.
But how did you And if you did correct me but how did you feel
like this is what I'm really after here.
(46:42):
How did the pastor pulling you aside and talking to you about
your calling? How did that?
Inside your heart and your mind and like like how did that make
you feel and and and how would you attribute your response to
that conversation? Well, let me juxtapose that with
the conversations I was having my dad.
(47:03):
So at the time I was going to Maricosa College and I was the
goal of studying physical therapy and because I was doing
martial arts and I was training Olympic Taekwondo and I wanted
to compete in Olympic Taekwondo and then come back and be a
sports trainer. But that that yeah.
(47:25):
And so while I'm going to schoolthere my father who at the time
is the divorce decree had to help pay for college, didn't
want me to go and he was very conflict oriented.
So I started to with it was thisperiod of time I started to
withdraw from college because his abusive behavior.
(47:47):
My grades were starting to suffer cuz he was just calling
and harassing me and I was having a hard time.
With him, right? Well, juxtaposed that I wasn't
living with him, but juxtaposed that I wasn't.
I was living with my mom, cuz I chose to live with my mom.
Okay, you mentioned earlier thatyou were forced to live with
your dad. That's why I asked.
Well, I was there. Was forced to be with him for a
(48:08):
night and then you know, but I wasn't living with my father.
I when the divorce happened, I chose to live with my mom
because it was a safer place. But but to answer your question
so that the conversations I'm having with my father about my
future is very conflict oriented, he doesn't want to pay
for college. And then come along, an adult
(48:29):
male who's having a positive conversation with me about what
do you think God wants me to do?And I have to say that, I mean,
it felt good to have an adult male have a nonconflict oriented
conversation with me about my future.
Now I was at a place that I had a future that I was working on,
(48:54):
but I decided to go with the calling of God based on the
conflict with my father meeting a break from everything and then
this conversation he's having with me.
So yeah, it was very human thing.
Yeah, that's that's why it's that's why I pressed that issue
(49:17):
is because I often wonder and ofcourse you and I can only
speculate on this We're not you know researchers in this, in
this way where we're doing scientific, you know.
Double-blind studies on this type of stuff.
But I suspect that a great many people that go into fulltime
(49:38):
ministry in in some of these laycapacities and some of these
charismatic and evangelical environments that are less
formalized in terms of their educational requirements.
You know, like you talk about anAssemblies of God college.
It reminds me of also the Calvary Chapel.
So Calvary Chapel has a College in Southern Southern California.
Calvary Chapel. They'll ordain you and give you
(49:59):
an education, and they'll give you a nominal survey of various
courses. But it's all from an evangelical
apologist perspective. You're not actually getting
academic learning like you say at Yale or Harvard or something
like that. You're getting, you're getting
an apologist version of how you should understand the history of
your faith, Right. And that was very annoying.
(50:21):
That was very annoying. When talk about that, I went in
Bible college. I was, I was annoyed by the
statement of faith because like my New Testament survey class,
they give you this book and it'sthe theology with a bunch of
verses and then you got to studyand it's like, what am I
(50:41):
studying? Like you're you know I I
remember we we did a hermeneutics class and we're
talking about I mean half of thethe the courses are ice Jesus.
Then we have a hermeneutics class that's talking about
looking at the passage within its context and its culture and
you know who are you know the the this The Who what where why
(51:04):
and how and all that of a passage.
And I'm like yeah that that's what we should do.
And then I go over to my, you know, Galatians class and it's
like hopping through the verses and you're like, to be honest,
I, you know, in this martial artwe do what we're doing,
bilateral coordination. When you're using your right and
(51:26):
left hemisphere, sometimes, you know, it crashes in the middle.
Like you can kind of fill your neural load.
I felt like I was filling a neural overload and I'm like
okay, I'm not even sure within the context that verse means
what you're saying in your statement of faith.
So a lot of my frustration with the Southwestern and some of
(51:48):
these are God Bible calls began really like I'm studying a
statement of faith, not the Bible itself.
And I and I started to have conflict when my when my
professors about the text of Scripture versus forcing this
theological conundrum and down somebody's throat.
(52:09):
And I remember one of my classesthat it was kind of like near
the end of my tenure at Southwestern and it was the the
Old Testament survey class. You know they they they get into
the document hypothesis and you know amazing thing is they're
getting all textual critical on the on the Old Testament.
This is not something they do with the New Testament which is
(52:29):
an amazing thing because you're like very critical of this but
no critical at all. There's nothing critical of the
New Testament and all and you'rejust like there's a little comp.
This this is not, you know, it'scontradictory and I've never
even the document or. Hypothesis with you?
Yeah, yeah. That was part of that Old
(52:50):
Testament. Survey class.
Yeah. Huh.
Yeah, they probably thought theywere.
Enormously progressive for doingthat?
I guess so, but yeah, it was oneof the topics in there.
Yeah, I distinctly. Remember it?
That was your first exposure to that.
What's that? Was that your first exposure to
the critical? Scholarship approach?
(53:10):
Yeah. But I mean, I think I had
already been doing it myself, incidentally, you know, looking
at things within the attack.
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