Episode 2 - Is Atheism Dead?

The age-old debate between faith and science takes a surprising turn as overwhelming evidence points to the death of atheism as a logical worldview. Join Elisa and Angelique as they explore compelling scientific data supporting the existence of God – from the mathematically impossible precision of our fine-tuned universe to archaeological discoveries affirming biblical accounts.

We're witnessing an unprecedented spiritual awakening across culture. Russell Brand proclaims he's "high on the Holy Spirit" instead of substances. Joe Rogan and Tucker Carlson openly explore faith. College campuses experience spontaneous worship gatherings. Even nightclubs in Miami witness crowds lifting hands in prayer. What's driving this radical shift, and why now?

The evidence for Christ's resurrection receives special attention, examining the testimony of over 500 witnesses and the fascinating scientific analysis of the Shroud of Turin. We also share personal testimonies of divine encounters that transformed our lives, demonstrating that God remains active and present today.

For skeptics, we offer a simple invitation: approach with genuine curiosity rather than fixed opposition. Ask hard questions. Examine the evidence honestly. For believers, we encourage bold authenticity – someone needs to hear your story. As science increasingly confirms what scripture declared thousands of years ago, the intellectual foundation for atheism crumbles, leaving us with the most important question of all: "If God exists, who is He, and what does that mean for our lives?"

Visit https://www.thedoubledosepodcast.com/subscribe to join our email list to receive a curated collection of resources to dive deeper into the evidence discussed today.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hey friends, welcome to what we're calling the first
official episode of the DoubleDose podcast, where real life
and important conversationscollide with spiritual truth.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
I'm Elisa and I'm Angelique, and today we're
diving straight into the big,bold question is atheism dead?
And that is a big, boldquestion.

Speaker 1 (00:27):
But I think before we tackle that one, we should kind
of share right out the gate whywe chose this topic.
When you think about all theother topics that we could have
selected, we are diving rightinto the deep end right, yes, we
are.
You know, before we can askanyone to trust God, you know,
with their struggles, with theireveryday life, with their

(00:48):
relationships, I feel like weneed to help people come to
understand that he's real right,that there is a creator, that
he wants to have a relationshipwith us and it's not just some
abstract concept that youunderstand in your heart, but
for our intellectuals out there.
Intellectually, you canunderstand that as well.
Yeah, I think it's twofold.

Speaker 2 (01:10):
There's two questions we could start this podcast
with Is God real or is atheismdead?
And I think the question of isGod dead?
That question's been aroundreally front and center stage
since the 60s, has been aroundreally front and center stage
since the 60s, where science wasreally trying to promote the
idea that science has excelledto the point where it eliminated

(01:31):
the question is God real, isGod alive, is God dead?
And so the fact is, is theybelieved in 1966 that they had
enough scientific evidence toprove the non-existence of God
to wipe out faith as we wouldknow it, when, in actuality,
what we can see very clearly nowhindsight can be our best

(01:54):
friend is that the next severaldecades, doors would be flying
open in the scientific community, actually disproving the notion
that there is no God.
So the more that we learnscientifically, it just keeps
pointing mathematically to.
The answer is well, god is verymuch alive.

(02:17):
The question starts to becomewho is God?
And I think you know.
So if you can answer thequestion, can you truly be an
atheist?
Today we're going to get intothat meaty question, but once
you get past the evidence thatpoints to a creator, you know
we're coming from theperspective that our creator is
Jesus Christ, it's the God ofthe Bible, and we're not going

(02:39):
to solve why we believe all thattoday, why we believe all that
today, but we will be bringingwisdom and information and
knowledge from that worldview, abiblical worldview.
So yeah, it's a big, meatyquestion.
We're certainly not going toget into all the tentacles today
, but we can absolutely start toset the table to answer the

(03:01):
question if God is real, whichwe know he is, why do we start
to believe what we believe?

Speaker 1 (03:07):
Yeah, so this has to be the first episode, right?
Because it's the compass foreverything, it's the foundation
and the root, and let's alsoshare with them, before we
really dive into all the details.
We made the special decision torelease our first episode on
Pentecost Sunday.
Yeah, share with them why wedecided to do that.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Well, if we look at the book of Acts, we know that
after Jesus resurrected.
So we're really in this divineseason right now in the year we
have Easter Sunday, resurrectionSunday.
So Jesus died on Good Friday,he rose on the third day, and
then we're in a waiting period.
Like all the early discipleswho walked with Jesus, they were
waiting and they were in thisperiod of devastation, not truly

(03:49):
understanding that theresurrected Christ is alive.
And so, once they realized thatit was well, how did the first
church start?
It was the on-pouring of theHoly Spirit, and that happened
on Pentecost Sunday.
And so it just so happens that,as we've been hard at work
plowing the ground getting readyfor this podcast, it's
perfectly teed up to launch ourvery first episode on Pentecost

(04:10):
Sunday.
So we launch in faith, knowingthat the Holy Spirit's on it and
he's going to do immeasurablymore than we can ask, think or
imagine, and just anoint thelisteners as they hear the words
that God has put in our heartsand our mouths to share to the
world.
We're just believing thatthere's going to be big fruit
that comes from Pentecost Sunday.
Amen, amen, so beautifully said, amen.

Speaker 1 (04:33):
Okay, so back to the big question at hand is atheism
dead?
You know, I imagine, like mostthings, that could certainly be
debated, but unless you've beenliving under a rock, right what
can't be debated is thatsomething's really happening,
you know, something, not justculturally but spiritually, and
it's really sweeping.
Sweeping the world, not justhere locally.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
Yeah, I mean there's miracles happening every which
way to Sunday.
I mean, we're going to talk alittle bit about Sean Ryan in
today's show, but he's beenhaving, you know, having
testimonies of near-deathexperiences, people meeting
Christ, which is not a foreignconcept.
I mean, I've actuallypersonally had those types of
experiences in my life.
I'll share a little bit aboutthat today.

(05:15):
But there are truly miracles.
People who have been dogmaticabout being anti-religion, so
just anti-anything that has todo with religion, god is
literally divinely awakeningsouls across the world.

Speaker 1 (05:32):
Even atheists, famous atheists, right.

Speaker 2 (05:34):
Famous atheists who have been steeped in science.
They've dedicated their entirelives to disproving God and they
are coming to conclusions that,yeah, there is a God, and
they've had to humble themselvesand accept the data for what
the data explains it to be.

Speaker 1 (05:51):
You're familiar with Lee Strobel's work right, oh,
yes, yeah, share a little bitabout Lee.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
Well, look at Mr Lee.
So we have his book on the showtoday.
But Lee Strobel, he's afascinating person.
He actually started as thelegal editor for the Chicago
Tribune and he was a dogmaticatheist, and his wife there was
a movie actually fashioned, casefor Christ, and it's based off

(06:17):
of this book and he still does alot of great work.
But the notion is is that hiswife came to realize the truth
of Jesus Christ and itinfuriated him, it stirred his
heart in such a negative waythat he set out from a
legalistic perspective, meaninghe went through law school, he's
a legal editor, he looks atevidence as a career path of

(06:39):
choice and he was going to lookat all the evidence around
Christ and disprove that Christwas who he says.
He was going to look at all theevidence around Christ and
disprove that Christ was who hesays he was.
That's incredible.
Well, at the end of it, he hadto look at the evidence too.
That was so overwhelming andcome to the conclusion that
there is Christ.
And I think this is what peopleare coming to realize Once we,

(07:02):
if we, can take off our biases,meaning, what do I have to be
right on?
Why do I need to be right inthe fact that there is no God.
Why is that so important to me?
And if I could just flip mythinking just a little bit and
say what if?
And say curiosity because afixed mindset?

(07:22):
If I believe dogmaticallyagainst something, I'm in a
fixed mindset and it limits ourability to grow as human beings.
Right, absolutely.
But if we can turn on curiosityjust for the sake of curiosity's
sake and have the courage andthe bravery to start to look at
what the science is saying, theevidence is saying about the

(07:43):
life of Christ, it's mindboggling what we actually have
to confront as human beings.
And we're going to talk aboutanother book in a little bit.
But that book actually sets thepremise to say there is so much
information now, so much data.
It's not even information.
It's hard factual data that ifwe're willing to look at the

(08:04):
data in curiosity, we canactually get to a conclusion
that it's not even information.
It's hard factual data that ifwe're willing to look at the
data in curiosity, we canactually get to a conclusion
that it's intellectuallydishonest to hold a position of
an anti-God world belief.

Speaker 1 (08:15):
Oh yeah.
Well, we're going to talk in alittle bit about why some of the
people are resisting God.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
Yes, exactly, but you mentioned Sean Ryan.

Speaker 1 (08:23):
We talked a little bit about Lee Strobel.
Did you happen to see therecent Sean Ryan podcast with
Lee Strobel and John Burke?

Speaker 2 (08:29):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
It was amazing.
Incredible I mean if you satthrough his good, solid three
hours, it was worth every minute.
I don't know how anybody whocould sit through that take that
all in and ever questionwhether there was God or Jesus.
Christ is our Lord and Savior.

Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, I mean just a couple of data points.
I'm a data geek Software she'sa coder people.
Yeah, coder Software engineerby trade.
I'm a data geek and I actuallylove data engineering.
It's like one of my side littlepassions, but I love data and
one of the things that they talkabout in that interview is the
authenticity of the evidencethat we have for the Gospels of

(09:09):
Christ.
So if you think about thingssustaining over a couple
thousand years, writtenmanuscripts that were a couple
thousand years old and actuallybeing preserved and able to be
read in modern day society, it'sa miracle that those things

(09:31):
exist to begin with, thatthey're able to be preserved
through natural disasters,earthquakes, fires that have
taken place, wars that have beenunderway across civilization.
That these documents can stillexist today is next to a miracle
.
But this is the reality andthey talk about it in that
podcast and I encourage everyonewho wants to get deeper into

(09:54):
just some of the ancientevidence that has come forth on,
specifically, sean and Lee andthere's one other gentleman that
escapes my name right now whowas on that show, john Burke.
John Burke, thank you.
The three of them discuss thereason for the resurrection.
Why would you believe thatChrist actually resurrected.

(10:14):
So it's a slim view of.
Is atheism dead Meaning?
If we believe in a biblicalworldview and Christ is the
answer, right, what would haveto be true is that Christ had to
resurrect.
Not too many people, like veryfew people, argue the life of

(10:35):
Jesus Christ.
Not too many people argue someof the miracles that he actually
facilitated.
But where the skepticism fallsis did he resurrect?
Because if he resurrected, gameover, and so that podcast show
with Sean Ryan hits what's theauthenticity of the resurrection
?
And so there's this one point24,000 manuscripts of the

(10:59):
Gospels exist today, 24,000.
Us today, 24,000.
So we're not believing off ofone document that like.
There's this other book by AndyStanley called the Starting
Point, okay, and he actuallypositions it to the
authenticities of just thegospels.
And it's like this If mygrandmother gave me her journal

(11:23):
and it's the record of her life,okay, and I take that journal
and I record it, so I have acopy, because I don't have a
computer and I can't just printa thousand copies, right, I have
to handwrite it.
It would be like us doing, youknow, getting to today the copy
of the copy, of the copy, of thecopy of the copy through the
generations and it landing inyour lap, you could start to

(11:46):
question is your version todaythe same authenticity of what
the grandmother started with2,000 years ago?
But this is the deal we havethe manuscripts within the first
decade of Christ's death.
That is a first account of whatactually took place.
That's incredible and theclosest thing in history next to

(12:08):
that.
So if you say, well, what otherlives have been documented?
It's Caesar, and there was onlylike 94-something documents
that they could pull forward,and those were all copies of
copies, of copies, of copies ofcopies.
So there's nothing in the worldthat has been preserved to the
perfection of the scriptures ofthe Bible, and that in itself,

(12:31):
you have to say why is that andhow could it be?
Is there something supernaturalgoing on that has preserved the
authenticity of this writtenword?
It's just something I ponderall the time.
I am awestruck by your wisdom.

Speaker 1 (12:47):
Oh no, you are so studied, Share with our friends.
I mean, you are decades studiedinto the history of the Bible
and God's Word and I want to sayyou spend hours a day.
Well, I'm on it every day, buthours a day I unfortunately
cannot claim.

Speaker 2 (13:07):
Well, you're very sweet and you're very kind, and
I do have a huge devotion tostudying the word of God.
It's a multi-decade journey forme, started in my early
twenties.
I know I still look like I'm inmy twenties yes, you do, but no
, I just love it.
But it's really.
I meditate on the scriptures,but I'm not one who can just

(13:28):
take the Bible, read it at facevalue.
I want to understand thecontext, the cultural dynamics
that's happening back in thatday and don't you encourage
everyone to do that?
Yes, 100%, because the more weunderstand about history and the
context in which thesescriptures are written, and even
the natural language in whichit was written, because some

(13:49):
things can, um, scripture is not.
There's no contradictions in it.
But what I've learned over theyears is the infinite emphasis,
the, the weightiness of onepassage.
You can lose so much of thedeeper meaning if you don't
understand the context.
It's like it's an illumination,it's like putting a spotlight

(14:13):
on the scriptures.
When you truly take the time toget into the Greek of the New
Testament Aramaic there'sscriptures in Aramaic as well
hebrew, the natural language ofthe jewish community when you,
when you really understand theroots of, uh, the, the language

(14:34):
that the bible's written in, andthen the historical context,
the cultural dynamics of thetime, things just become alive.
And then, if you look at whathas to be true, just keep asking
what, what, what, why, why, why, where, where, where, like all
the W questions, and you'regoing to unearth so much.
So to answer your questions,yes, I spend a lot of time in

(14:55):
the word of God and I do read,anywhere from 30 to 50 books a
year.
I'm a, I love to read, study,it's just part of who I am, and
you retain it.

Speaker 1 (15:04):
You retain it, yes, wow.
Well as do you, my friend?
Okay well, you hit on so manythings.
We're kind of squirrelingaround a little bit here, right.
Bring it back.
Before we dive into the scienceand evidence, I want to keep
talking about kind of what we'reseeing culturally, right, yes,

(15:26):
and even in pop culture, if youwill.
So we hit on Sean Ryan Um,we're, we're seeing lots of even
these huge influencers, which Ifind incredible, like Joe Rogan
, like Tucker Carlson, like LexFridman, who who, frankly,
historically used to not onlyavoid talking about God, but in
some cases they even mocked Godand were witnessing.
You know, each one of themreally lean into, with genuine

(15:47):
curiosity, biblical truth.
Some of them are recentlysharing their you know
testimonies of coming to faithand even, in some cases, how
they're truly experiencing God.
And you know I think youmentioned it when we kick things
off, I mean, once youexperience him, how can you not

(16:08):
share that?

Speaker 2 (16:10):
Yeah, it goes from head knowledge of him to heart
knowledge of him, and God isreally getting into the hearts
and minds of people.
And I do think it's hard todescribe, because you can be.
There's a period in my lifewhere I really questioned faith,
and I'm not going to get intoall of that today, but you have

(16:31):
your dark night and you're like,well, I was told to believe
these things, but you know what?
The faith that I have is moreof a byproduct of my
grandparents.
I shared in my testimony thatmy grandparents, my father's
parents, actually introduced meto faith.
And so when I started and thisis anybody's testimony you can

(16:52):
typically have the faith of theone that introduced you to God
unless you have a head-oncollision with God yourself.
Yeah Right.
And so there's, there's amoment in time where you're
blind, and God says that in John6, 44, that the Father draws
those to himself.
So you can't come to the Father, father, god, unless God is

(17:16):
drawing you unto himself.
And when I read that scripture,that was game changer for me,
because I started to have thisfaith that was independent of my
grandparents and those aroundme, but I realized that the
genesis of my faith wasn't fromme.
It was something that Godplanted in my heart, but it
couldn't be awakened until theFather drew me unto himself at a

(17:40):
Joe Rogan or a Russell Brand or, fill in the blank, of all the
people who have stood firmagainst Christianity,
specifically over the years.
And all of a sudden we woulduse the word awakening.
They may be asleep to faith andall of a sudden they're waking
up and they're saying whoa?
I have to look at the evidencea little bit closer now.
It's because God allows peopleto be blind until they can see,

(18:05):
and when they see, like we'reseeing, people come to faith.
God is removing the blindersand he's drawing them unto
himself.
I love that.
And, elisa, I just want to setthe stage here that you and I
know that our job is not todebate or to convince someone to
believe in the God of the Bible.
That's not our job, that'sGod's job.

(18:27):
We are here to be stewards ofour testimony and our life
experiences and the knowledgeand the wisdom that we pick up
along the way.
That's it God's in the businessof the heart transformation and
there's freedom in that.
I used to feel like I had tocarry the weight of everyone's
salvation on my own shouldersand just knowing that I can
never change someone's heart,god's in that business.

(18:51):
That's freedom.
And to your point just to kindof bring it right back to your
point is that what we're seeingacross the land and all these
influencers who are coming tofaith and it's not just
influencers, it's collegecampuses right Ashbury, ashbury.
And it's not just influencers,it's college campuses right
Ashbury, ashbury.
Talk about.

Speaker 1 (19:08):
Ashbury just for a minute, 2023.
I mean just this raw hunger forGod.
It was a very small group ofcollege students no hype, no
celebrity pastors, right.
They just came together toworship and praise God and very
quickly it spread like wildfire,turned into this multi-week I

(19:28):
believe, literally revival youcould call it that drew more
than 50,000 people.
I mean, it was so big.
You know it's big when even CNNor the Times can't ignore it.
Of course fox news picked it up, but that's not that shocking,

(19:48):
yeah, that's so good.

Speaker 2 (19:49):
And then how about wasn't there just 5 000 or so
people baptized in the like?
Did you hear about that?
Yes, absolutely yeah.
So we got uh worship breakingout on multiple campuses.
We have uh baptisms happeningin cal, california, and there
was just another one withRussell Brand and Sean I can't
say his last name, I don't evenwant to try the worship leader,

(20:14):
yeah, sean, his last name startswith an F and I'm not going to
butcher it on this episode.
No, but the point is, isrevival's breaking out across
the land, the globe?
Yeah, and it's not the people'sdoing, it's because God is
moving.
It's kind of like PentecostSunday.

Speaker 1 (20:30):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (20:31):
You get it, I like it , I get it on, bring it full
circle.

Speaker 1 (20:33):
There you go Athletes praying on the field, yes,
coaches praying openly.
And again it's not being mockedlike it used to.
And you know, again it's notbeing mocked like it used to
it's actually genuinely beingcelebrated, so that's really
incredible.
And then faith is rising inmusic too.
I mean, we've got, you know,our country music artists.
My guy Jason Aldean Well, letme be clear, he's your guy,

(21:00):
brittany, I'm just a big fan,you know, cole Swindell, jordan
Davis, I'm just a big fan, youknow, cole Swindell, jordan
Davis.
I mean, these folks are notjust singing about faith, but
they're actually pointing peopleto God live during their
concerts.
In some cases, you know, again,worship is breaking out and I
mean, how about Jelly Roll?
I was just go ahead, yes,please no go ahead.

(21:23):
I'm going to look something upactually.

Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yeah, you look it up.
But Jelly Roll Speaking ofmusic, oh my gosh, I love Jelly
Roll.
I loved him even before he cameout with Hard Fought, hard
Fought, hallelujah, excuse me,yeah, with Brandon Lake, but his
Save Me, like just his heartand his passion in his music and

(21:47):
what I love about him.
Sometimes we human beings canwait sin Meaning.
Oh, if I tell a lie, that's notas bad of a sin as if I go and
get drunk.
Wait, wait.
We wait sin.

Speaker 1 (22:02):
That's good.

Speaker 2 (22:03):
God looks at sin and says sin is sin.
Now the consequences of sin canbe a little bit different.
Wait, wait, we wait.
Sin.
God looks at sin and says sinis sin.
Now the consequences of sin canbe a little bit different,
meaning that if I tell a whitelie or a little lie, maybe I'm
not going to get caught andthere's no consequence that time
.
And maybe if I consume too muchalcohol and decide to get
behind the wheel of a car notsmart and something happens
where you're going to have someconsequences that come with that

(22:25):
.
But the point is so many peoplecan look at Jelly Roll and say,
wow, look at his life and throwstones at him.
But how redemptive is God.
And I look at his testimony andI just celebrate.
And it's not because, oh, hewas the bottom of the barrel.
No, because he was a little boy.

(22:46):
At one point in time he got offthe beaten track onto not a
straight path, and then Godredeemed him straight back and
now he's so humble to give gloryto God.
Yeah, it's beautiful.
He doesn't have to do that, ofcourse not.
I mean, he's got world fame now.
He could be filled with pride.

Speaker 1 (23:04):
In fact, he probably lost people by doing it Exactly.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
So he's standing, so he's gained the world and he's
willing to lose the world toyour point, because of his
conviction for Jesus Christ.
I just think it's absolutelybeautiful.
I do too.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
Did you find what?

Speaker 2 (23:18):
you were looking for, I did.

Speaker 1 (23:26):
So you had your babies, you had three babies by
23, right?
Is that how that?
Yeah, yes, good memory.
So, um, you probably didn'tspend a lot of time in
nightclubs or are familiar withthis kind of no, but so jimmy
levy, who I love.
He, he is doing faith-basednightclub type music and you're
even literally seeing worshipbreaking out in, in, like miami
nightclubs and festivals.
So so so check this out, let'ssee, try to hit that high octave

(23:59):
.
Is that the right word?
Oct Octone I don't even know.

Speaker 2 (24:10):
Can you picture everybody doing this in the
nightclub.
It's so good.

Speaker 1 (24:16):
I mean, God goes into the darkest of places.
He's showing up everywhere.
So you can't deny thatsomething big is happening, Amen
, Amen.
And I feel like even people areleaning into the hope and the
peace and the joy, even beforethey're making that connection
to him.
You know 100%, like somethingis drawing them, even if they

(24:36):
haven't connected those dotsjust yet.

Speaker 2 (24:39):
Yeah, and what do you think that is?
What do you think that is?

Speaker 1 (24:43):
Well, it's kind of leads us into the reasons why
people are turning back to God.
I mean, life is noisier thanever here.
We have so much at ourfingertips, yet we're more
disconnected than ever.
We're going to actually digdeep into some of this in an
upcoming episode too, about thelies that the world has sold us

(25:03):
with all these temporarypleasures that just aren't
creating lasting joy.

Speaker 2 (25:10):
Yeah, Well, you know, I mean, and so many people have
talked about this, but it'sjust worth just taking a moment
to really hone in on this, ifyou just think about humanity
and what we've gone throughsince even COVID.
Okay, so we're living in an age, a digital age, where we have
news 24 by seven.
We're completely connected, 24by seven, we're connected to

(25:34):
devices that actually rewire ourbrain.
Okay, so we're on technology,and I'm a technologist, and you
know there's always the benefitsof technology and the more we
learn and discover.
And then there's alwaysdownsides, and the screen is not
good for the human brain.
It's overstimulated, it'scausing major anxiety,

(25:57):
depressional issues, the listgoes on and on and on.
And then we also live in asociety where we want instant
gratification, we don't like towait, and so what happens is we
get more and more and more andmore and more, and we really
even you know poverty levels inour country, in America.
We are such a blessed nationthat poverty here doesn't look

(26:20):
anything like it looks like in athird world country, and so
even poverty is wealth to othernations.
And we have everything,literally everything we could
possibly have that this worldoffers, and yet we're empty.
Because the truth is this thewealth of the world will never
give us wealth in our heart.

(26:41):
That's right.
And people are finding thisemptiness.
And when you hit the pit andthe pit is when you realize that
you don't have hope and youdon't have light, because we're
surrounded by darkness 24 byseven, right and you don't have
real human connection.
That's it.
You have to turn to something.

Speaker 1 (27:03):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (27:04):
And so typically, you know you're going to start to
find it in people and you'regoing to maybe try out different
relationships.
You could fill the void.
That way People could beturning to substances.
Yeah, maybe because thesubstance gives them temporary
relief.
But you can try all the worldlythings, the worldly answers,
but then you still end up inthat same pit asking yourself is

(27:27):
there more?
Where am I getting hope?
That's it, and where am Igetting light?

Speaker 1 (27:30):
Yeah, did you see that?
Russell Brand said I used to behigh on sex.
You know drugs, alcohol, andnow I'm high on the Holy Spirit.
Did you see that I was likethat's good.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
I like it though.
That's good, that's good stuff.

Speaker 1 (27:44):
Oh goodness, I'm also a big fan of Jordan Peterson
and he said you know, the onething and you were hitting on
this that we can all count on inthis life is struggles.
Right, we're going to haveanxiety and hard times, so, to
your point, we absolutely need abetter strategy than temporary
band-aids to be able to navigateall of that.

Speaker 2 (28:03):
And right there, amen , yeah.
And so when we start to seewhat that looks like, you know
you wake up at 2 o'clock in themorning or you have a restless
night's sleep and you reallyhave no one to turn to, but
there's always someone who'slistening.
Yeah, oh yeah, you know.
The Bible's very clear that Godis omnipresent, he is
omniscient, he knows all, heknows what's in your heart

(28:27):
before you even profess it.
But what I love about God isthat he's all about relationship
, and he says he makes a coupleof promises that we can stand
firm on.
When you seek me with yourwhole heart, when you call upon
my name, I am waiting here, Iwill be found by you and I will
teach you Meaning that there's alot that we can't answer about

(28:54):
God.
No human being on the planet, Idon't care how schooled and
educated you are, howintellectual you are, you as an
individual will never be able toanswer all the mysteries of the
Lord.

Speaker 1 (29:08):
Beautifully said.

Speaker 2 (29:09):
Solomon, who was historically noted as the wisest
human to ever live, still fellshort on answers.
Okay, and so you're not goingto have all the wisdom.
I'm not going to have all thewisdom, but this is the deal At
2 o'clock in the morning, whenwe're in our pit and we can't
sleep, or 7 o'clock at night,and maybe we want to pick up

(29:29):
that drink and we're just goingto wash our worries away again
for the day, god says this callon me, I will answer, and this
is the supernatural thing thathappens.
Somehow.
There is this divineintervention that you can't see,
but as a human being, he'sgiven us senses that we can
sense and we can feel, and heshows up in this miraculous way

(29:52):
he does the peace washes overyou, and the more we build a
relationship with him, he wantsthe relationship, which means
trust me, read my word, get in,understand who I am, because the
more you learn about me, themore you're going to realize you
can trust me, and the more thatwe trust him and know him, the
more peace we have and we startto that void in our heart that

(30:15):
can't be filled with worldlypleasures, as Russell Brand so
eloquently said.
I wish I could speak like him.
I just he's like a poet.
Anywho, squirrel, I thinkyou're pretty close.
No funny trail Back on, back on.
But the point is is like Godfills that void, and it can be a
little cliche if you've beenaround the language for a while.

(30:36):
Yeah, trust in the Lord, he'llfill that void in your heart.
Let's not be too familiar withthese truths, because these
truths actually set us free ifwe dig into them.

Speaker 1 (30:48):
Yeah, agreed.
And he doesn't promise an easylife.
You have to keep remindingpeople that everything in your
life will get better when youbuild a relationship with a
living God, and you certainlywill feel fulfilled and
purposeful.
But he doesn't necessarily sayit's going to be easy.
It's not going to be easy.
So all the more reason to leanin Matter of fact, he promises

(31:10):
it won't be easy.

Speaker 2 (31:11):
True, Good point.
And he says take joy in thesuffering.
And why is there suffering?
Well, he didn't create thesuffering.
Let's be clear on that.
That's right.
Humanity actually chose a pathaway from the Lord and there is
a true enemy of our soul whocreates the suffering.
But through that suffering, Godsays he will take the ashes and
turn it into beauty.
And he absolutely does.

(31:32):
And oftentimes the human heartcan be very prideful.
I mean, I know I'm prideful andsometimes I can look at another
human being and something thatthey're walking through, and I
don't even understand thegravity of my judgment against
them.
In my hidden heart, in myhidden mind, I can look at them

(31:53):
and smile and be like, oh God,I'm so glad that's you and not
me.
How did they get themselvesinto that?
And you can, you can, I can.

Speaker 1 (32:00):
First, person here can be judging without realizing
.

Speaker 2 (32:04):
And then, all of a sudden, someone I deeply care
about is walking through theexact same thing and my blind
eyes can now see.
My empathy increases.
And in my suffering with myloved one, god teaches me truth.
So he has to humble the humanheart for us to truly understand

(32:24):
his language, and his languageis love.
We think we love.
Well, on this, we think we gotit.
No, he is love and we have totalk about his love with justice
, and those two things coexisttogether.
But he is love, and we don'tknow what unconditional love is.

(32:49):
So true, but when we startwalking it out with him and he
teaches us through our suffering, we can get a taste of it.
And it's really a taste.

Speaker 1 (32:57):
Yeah, you know so speaking of a taste and the
living God.
We kind of danced around alittle bit earlier some of the
science and the evidence.

Speaker 2 (33:09):
But let's break that down just a little bit more.

Speaker 1 (33:11):
Yeah, you want to get nerdy, yeah I love getting
nerdy, aren't we already Okay?

Speaker 2 (33:15):
I know I am Okay, so obviously I told you I'm a book
nerd.
I love data, I like all thethings.
One of my favorite authors isEric Metaxas, and he wrote this
wonderful book called Is AtheismDead?
And we're praying Well, we'regoing to pray that Lee is going
to be on this show with us.
We're going to pray that Ericis going to be on this show with

(33:36):
us.
Love it.
But this book, if you want togeek out, we could literally
spend eight hours talking aboutthis book.
It's like a couple hundredpages and it's dense.
I mean, he's got so muchinformation in here.

(33:57):
But there's a couple thingsthat I just want to kind of
point out from this book.
He goes through the notions ofthe fine-tuned theory.
Okay, yep, do I have yourinterest?
I do you do.
Okay, the fine-tuned theory.
I do want to know you do wantto know right.
It used to be that we would, youknow, say, oh, if the sun was
off by one degree, theneverything blows up or freezes,

(34:19):
right.
The fact is that it's like tothe trillionth power you can't
even measure.
For us to have Earth on life.
What needs to be true?
So just for one planet to hostlife, that of a simple organism,

(34:40):
not even the complexities of ahuman body with we can
communicate, we can sense, feel,taste all the goodness, just to
have life.
There's all in this book, ahundred million different things
that would have to.
If it's off just a slight degree, the whole theory just plummets
and you're not going to havelife.

(35:02):
And so the degree in whicheverything from the water on the
planet to the greenery that wesee for them to eat like, for
those plants to even have life,to the warmth of the sun and the
way it spins.
And then you look at space andthe galaxies, and everything is

(35:24):
so fine tuned, and that'sscience.
Science, yes, and we can'tbreak it down because we'd be
here all day.
But everything is so fine tuned, everything's just off a slight
degree the whole idea of lifedisappears, that's right.
Whole idea of life disappears,and you can just look at the

(35:45):
fine-tuned theory alone andstart to conclude, as many
scientists who were dogmaticatheists have concluded, that
wow, there is a designer behindthis notion of planet Earth,
that yes, there's's a big bangtheory, but for all the results

(36:10):
of the big bang to lay out inperfect order through all the
different specimens that liveand exist, to the human body and
how we communicate, there is nopossible way that there's not a
divine designer.
Divine meaning supernaturalcreator that we don't fully

(36:32):
understand None of us do but wecan be sure that the point of
not believing in a designer, acreator, being an atheist, is no
longer a plausible theory.
It's just not plausible, and soit's incredible to me.
What do you think about it?
So it points to a coder slashcreator right.

Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yes, and my girl, angelique, knows code.

Speaker 2 (37:00):
Well, yeah, even the DNA, like I could talk about our
DNA all the time, but thecharacteristics, even the DNA,
like, yeah, I could talk aboutour DNA all the time, but the
characteristics, we literallyhave, um, the name of the Lord
embedded in our DNA structure.
So when we start to understandthis is what I love about this
when we start to trulyunderstand the science behind
what's been created, it pointsto that there is a creator.

(37:23):
That is not by half it standsfor here.
But then when we look at howthings are created because
science, science, all science isdoing is giving us a language
to that of which is createdwe're really not creating
anything.
We're taking things, puttingthem together, maybe something
new forms, but we're notactually creating something from
nothing.
And the notion of life issomething came from literally

(37:47):
nothing.
That's right.
But when we look at the codestructures of the human body and
the DNA Yahweh's name there's abook out there called the God
Code Yahweh's name, which Yahwehis the God of the Old Testament
in the Bible.
His name is literally in theDNA code structures of humanity
and he says that you are made inmy image.
So why do I call that out?

(38:09):
Because if you look at theBible.
Why do we believe in the Bible?
Because the more we understandabout science proves the
accuracy of what was recorded inancient scriptures.
It's literally just givingrevelation, illumination to the
scriptures, to the fact that Godsays I literally made you in my

(38:33):
image and my name is on yourDNA.
That's incredible.
I don't know.
I could just sit in that and beblown away in mind all day long
.

Speaker 1 (38:47):
Well, and what do you think about the concept that
there must be a supreme morallawgiver as well?
You know how, even though youknow there's obviously extremely
varying degrees of morals,right that we all live by at the
end of the day, no matter whoyou are, you still, in your
heart and your conscious, knowright from wrong?

Speaker 2 (39:11):
Yes, a hundred percent.
And at the end of the wrestlingwith that one, yeah, and what
part are you wrestling with justmore specifically?

Speaker 1 (39:19):
Just just how to make sense of, of, of all of that.
Some people would argue thatyou learn that right from your
parents or in school, or oh yeah, I got modeling other people,
but I think it's so much deeperthan that.

Speaker 2 (39:34):
Oh yeah, like we are the by-product of what's in our
heart good or bad and you reallyyou can be taught into.
Again, this goes to a head anda heart thing.
You can be taught a lot ofthings.
You can be.
You can be taught good, you canbe taught bad.
And then what's actually in thehuman heart is what flows out

(39:55):
of a human being.
So why do certain people do badthings?
It's because of the conditionof their heart.
Why are certain people doinggood things?
It's the condition of theirheart.
What is good, what is bad?

Speaker 1 (40:05):
Love that.

Speaker 2 (40:06):
Right?
Well, good, by the definitionof God, is things that bears
good fruit of love to thosearound you.
Anything that deconstructs,that's destruction against a
human person, is bad.
It's evil in the sight of theLord.
You want to know a fun fact?
Yeah, I love this.
Okay Fun fact.
We want to know a fun fact.

(40:28):
Yeah, I love this, okay funfact.
Wealth, wealth.
We think about wealth and wethink about it's a good thing,
right?
Well, some people out therethink that wealth, wealth, is
evil, but wealth is actually ofmoney's evil, the love of money.

Speaker 1 (40:39):
It's big very good.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
But so in the hebrew language, which again is the
language that the Old Testamentis written in, there is every
word that you read you read inHebrew right to left.
So when we read our language weread left to right.
In Hebrew you actually readright to left.
And so if I read a word, so ifI read the word wealth, the

(41:06):
anonym to that word is actuallyin the same word but it goes
left to right.
Did you follow that?
You tracking with me?
so far Okay.
So what do you think the anonymembedded in the Hebrew word
wealth is?
Tell me.
Well, one would maybe thinkwhat?
What comes to mind?
What's the opposite of wealth?
Poor, right, poverty, sure,whatever would maybe think what,

(41:26):
what?
comes to mind.
What's the opposite of wealth?
Poor, right, poverty, sure,whatever it's actually, the
opposite of wealth is evil.
So this is god's language.
God says that this, the hebrewlanguage, is his native tongue.
It's like his.
So why would God say that theopposite of wealth is evil?

(41:47):
Because those who use wealthwrongly for power, for gain, it
goes against humanity, it's theantithesis of love.
But wealth for the good ofhumanity produces love, produces
bounty, generosity.
What flows out of a generousheart is good things.

(42:09):
And so I just to your point.
Full circle here is like themoral compass, the moral law,
like we know a lot innately.
God put a lot of things in us.
We're created in his image andhe's given us this thing called
free will.
That's right.
And why did he give us freewill?
Because he loves us.
He wants to freely choose tolove each other and to freely

(42:33):
choose to love him.
It's like one of the greatestgifts he's given us so good.

Speaker 1 (42:38):
Free will.
We're going to get into thatone in the next episode too.
We are yes, we are God'ssovereignty and our personal
responsibility.
Now we are God's sovereigntyand our personal responsibility,
amen.
Now, we talked a little bitabout the resurrection earlier,
but I'm not sure if we touchedon the fact that 500 witnesses,

(42:59):
more than 500 people, witnessedthe resurrection you were
sharing earlier how.
That's one of the biggestpieces that people question Not
did he die, but did he?
Did he resurrect?

Speaker 2 (43:11):
Yes, as I take a drink of water.
Thank you, yeah, it's a hugequestion, because now it's like
just to kind of pull back alittle bit.
We've had this conversationabout is atheism dead?
So, scientifically?
We have just walked into acouple concepts that people can

(43:31):
go deeper on and if you want toreally get into the deep end
again, is atheism dead?
You know a good read.
Yes, it is Lots of scientificnuggets in there.
And then we've also what can wewitness with our eyes today?
And we see this unusualactivity spinning up everywhere
of people coming to Christ.
So something's going on.

(43:51):
You've got to be curious aboutwhat is that?
And then so we start to say,well, we have a biblical
worldview.
And so you start to get intowell, why do we believe in
Christianity?
And you would have to believein the resurrection of Christ.
And so we've established yes,atheism dead.
Yes, god is moving, becausethere's a spur across the land.

(44:13):
And why is Jesus?
The answer Because no one hasactually resurrected and been
here Now.
Have people been resuscitated?
Different, it's different.
Have we had near-deathexperiences?
And people gave testimony?
No one has claimed to be theMessiah of the Old Testament.

(44:37):
No one has fulfilled all theprophecies of the Old Testament.
No one has lived out themiraculous life documented by
other historians outside theBible.
Okay, so the credibility of thelife of Jesus Christ.
And then you get to thisresurrection.
There's so many data pointsthat point to the resurrection.

(44:58):
We have nine different, andthis is in the Sean Ryan
interview, as well with LeeStrobel and our friend John
Burke.
I can never remember.

Speaker 1 (45:06):
I'm sorry John.
Sorry John.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
This is in the Sean Ryan interview as well with Lee
Strobel and our friend JohnBurke.
I can never remember.
I'm sorry John, sorry John, butthey give an incredible account
of why you should believe inthe resurrection of Christ.
But there's also this otherincredible thing it's the Shroud
of Turin, which is the deathcloth of Jesus Christ.
Amazing, right, yes.
So you have the History Channelwho did a full documentary on

(45:28):
this thing, and then that was acouple years ago, like maybe 15
or so years ago, and now youhave even more scientific
evidence coming off this cloththat's pointing to the
resurrection of Christ.
So if you haven't watched thatdocumentary on the death cloth
of Christ, I encourage you to doso, because what it's going to

(45:50):
show you is this really wildthing that happened.
Do you know what it is?
No, I don't think so.
It's when you take a picture ofthe Shroud of Turin, it becomes
an x-ray.
It's not like a picture of thecloth itself, it's an exposure

(46:11):
of an x-ray that's on the clothand they used NASA equipment to
study.
It's all in the documentary.
It's absolutely fascinating andI'm going to butcher it because
I haven't watched it in a longtime.
But the point is this theybelieve.
Well, they know scientifically.
They know that the only way youcan have this phenomenon and

(46:35):
it's a phenomenon, becausethere's nothing else that we can
point to that has an X-ray on adeveloped photograph.
Do you understand what I'msaying?
Yes, if you watch thedocumentary, it'll come to life
for you.
It's wild, but there had tohave been a burst of light that

(46:56):
was so radical, a burst of lightthat transposed whatever was in
the fabric.
It transposed it onto thefabric like an x-ray machine.
It's an x-ray, okay, and so youget that.
And then they studied the bloodon the cloth itself.

(47:16):
It's just crazy choked up.
I know it makes me teary-eyedyeah, it literally proves the
biblical account of thecrucifixion of Christ, the
flogging that he had, the puretorture, the spear that went up
into his lung, and how heactually drowned on the cross in

(47:39):
his own blood because his lungsfilled up with his own blood,
the blood that covered our sins.
But the account in the torturethat he went through was
literally captured in this clothby the marks of the blood.
The marks of the blood and thisis the other fascinating fact

(48:04):
is that if they removed the bodyfrom the cloth, there would
have been a removal pattern ofthe blood, meaning the blood off
his body would have smeared indifferent facets.
But there was none of that.
It was in perfect order as theywrapped his dead body.

(48:27):
The way that the blood absorbedinto the cloth was that of a
burial.
There is zero evidence in thatcloth that he was physically
removed from the cloth accordingto the blood pattern, which is
fascinating.
I mean, come on, like hello,sit with that for a minute.

(48:51):
So there's zero scientificevidence.
It actually proves the opposite.
It says a body did not actuallyget removed from this cloth.
Okay, so sit in that.
And then you take this notion ofthis burst of light that
transposed an x-ray onto thefabric itself.
It's a miracle.
And then you start to say, okay, well, people, back in the day

(49:17):
you had all the accounts,firsthand witnesses that you
talked about over 500, and someof those witnesses were the ones
that actually put him on thecross.
Think about this they were soldout that this guy had to get
tortured and flogged and hung tothe most torturous death that
we know of.
You can't get worse than dyingon the cross, right?

(49:39):
And those same people that puthim on the cross gave testimony
that his body disappeared.
Yeah, like that in itself, likewhy would that be?
And many of these people werehorribly beaten, imprisoned,
some were killed.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
Yes, and you don't allow that to happen to yourself
for a lie, for something thatyou know is a lie, 100%, I mean.
Think about, if anything, you'dthink that they would lie and
say it didn't happen just tosave themselves, like the fleshy
part of you would do that.
I think if you and I sawsomeone resurrected from the

(50:16):
dead, that would be soundeniable You'd probably be
willing to die for that too,cause how could you?

Speaker 2 (50:23):
Yeah, it's.
You're literally leaning intosuch a good point, elisa, it's.
What are you willing to die for?
Yeah, and you're asking this ofan entire community of people.
Go back to Pentecost Sunday.
Over 3,000 people came to knowChrist in one single day.
That literally was the genesisof the Christian church.
Those people signed up to diein that culture the day that

(50:47):
they said yes to Christ.
Why would 3,000 people do that?
Why, because they walked withChrist.
They saw Christ.
They all did.
The people that were in thebook of Acts that Peter was
addressing that day.
They literally were a part ofthe crowds that followed Jesus
all over the landscape.
They saw him raise the dead,they saw him heal the sick,

(51:10):
catch 5,000 fish and turn twoloaves of bread to feed the
5,000.
No, how many?
I totally messed that up.
What is it?
Help me?
Two loaves of bread and fivefish, or whatever the story is
you fed?
5,000.
I just totally lost it, but youknow what?

Speaker 1 (51:26):
I'm talking about.
I know, now that you said anumber, I have your number in my
head, I know.

Speaker 2 (51:29):
I just, I totally messed it up, but you get it.
He fed the 5,000 is my pointwith nothing Right.
And these people, they watchedall those miracles and when they
gave, when Peter and thedisciples gave testimony of the
resurrected Christ, they allsigned up to be killed.
Because they were killingChristians, they were throwing

(51:49):
them in gladiator arenas.
It was just massacre back then.
And why would people do that?
Because they knew that therisen Christ was king and that
he was worthy of belief andfollowing.
It's absolutely incredible, itreally is.
And then you know,double-clicking on that, who

(52:11):
were the first people that sawthe resurrected Christ?
It was, you know.
The Bible gives testimony ofMary Magdalene.
Well, she, let's just talkabout that for a second.
Who was she?
Who was this crazy?
Who is this woman who saw theresurrected Jesus Christ, you

(52:32):
know?
And her first reaction by theway, was oh my gosh, oh my gosh.
What did they do with my Jesus?
What did they do to him?
He's gone, only his death clothremains.
So, in the tomb, jesus' body isgone, but his death cloth is
perfectly there, just as itwould be.

(52:53):
And she's speaking, notrealizing.
The person with her is JesusChrist, the resurrected king,
and she's crying out.
And then Jesus opened her eyesand her ears so she could see
and realized that Jesus beatdeath.
Now that is critically importantbecause women were not
first-class citizens back in theday.

(53:14):
Matter of fact, if 3,000 peoplewere going to put their faith
on the testimony of a woman,they would be all the outcasts
of society, like discredited,like nobody's business.
But the fact is God issovereign.
He allowed a woman to be thefirst one to see himself

(53:36):
resurrected and she was the onewho went and proclaimed it to
the disciples.
And then Christ showed up tothem as well.
But that in itself, god is sointentional.
So if you understand thecontext going back to how we
started, if you understand thecontext of the culture of the
day, what you would have tobelieve like this would not be

(53:58):
how I would do it right.
If I'm God and men are morerespected, I would pick the most
respectable person in thecommunity and give them the
eyewitness account.
So it's more credible.
That's right.
But God, god's ways are not ourways.
He went to the lowliest personin the community because he's
going to build his church on therock of truth and it started

(54:24):
with that woman.
It's absolutely powerful.

Speaker 1 (54:27):
So I mean we, like you said earlier, could spend an
unbelievable amount of time onthe science and the evidence.
But we hit the broadbrushstrokes.
But why do you think thatpeople, with everything they,
still resist?

Speaker 2 (54:42):
in some cases.
Well, I mean, there's a lot ofreasons.
I want to flip it back to you,though.
Why do you think people resist?

Speaker 1 (54:50):
I read a quote once that said that people don't
reject the Bible because itcontradicts itself.
They reject the Bible becauseit contradicts them, and so I
feel like it's this.
I mean, there's lots of reasons, right, but it's like he holds
up a mirror, you know, to thingsthat we need to see in
ourselves, that sometimes wedon't want to see, and when you

(55:14):
face it, you have to dosomething about it right.
And I think sometimes peopleprefer spiritual blindness so
they can just keep living likethey're living.

Speaker 2 (55:24):
I say this with ultimate compassion, because I
once couldn't see and now I see.
But ignorance is bliss, right,right, and that's what you're
saying.
It's like you don't know whatyou know until you know it.
And then once you know, youactually have to do something
about it.
And I also think that there isa lot of hurt and pain in this

(55:48):
world that is done in the nameof God, right, and so people
reject the notion that if thishorrible sinner who has killed a
child can be forgiven by Godand go to heaven.
So I'm just using an example.

(56:09):
There's a lot of evil people, alot of evil.
There's a lot of evil in thisworld that reap destruction on
humanity, and if you take thelife of a child, you know it
doesn't get much worse than that.
How can that person find Jesus,be forgiven and go to heaven?
But me, I just sit in my homeand mind my own business, but

(56:31):
I'm going to go to hell.
Yeah, I don't buy that religion.
That's good, and just that.
I don't have time for that.
I don't have time for that.
That's just stupidity, andthat's a hard stance that people
take, because you can'trationalize what, you can't
explain yeah, okay, and so youjust say no and you get into a

(56:55):
fixed mindset really fast, andso I think the encouragement is
forget about why does good andevil exist?
For a minute, that's to methat's a secondary question.
The first question, and whywe're starting with this
question, is if God is real,which we know he is, then who is
this God?
And it's literally the mostimportant question we can be
asking ourselves, because theconsequences are incredibly high

(57:19):
if we don't get the answer.

Speaker 1 (57:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (57:21):
Right, yeah, yeah, and so there's a lot of reasons
to resist God.

Speaker 1 (57:27):
We can make up a thousand excuses, yeah, giving
up control and surrender all ofit.

Speaker 2 (57:33):
All the things, but it doesn't mean it's the right
and final answer.
That's right, right, amen,that's right.
So what do you have to gain?

Speaker 1 (57:41):
Oh my gosh, Everything, everything right,
salvation being number one.
But I mean, even if we putsalvation aside for a minute, if
you just start by livingaccording to his teachings, how
can you argue that everything inyour life wouldn't change for
the good?

Speaker 2 (58:01):
And again back to the suffering question.
It doesn't mean that we'regoing to have a life without
suffering.
It doesn't mean that bad thingsdon't happen to good people in
air quotes.
But the notion is this that thefruit of life with God.
How much harder is it to gothrough the suffering if you

(58:23):
don't have hope in God?
Yeah, there is no hope, thereis no point.
And I get back to this questionof well, what's the point of it
all?
What's the point of it all?

Speaker 1 (58:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (58:34):
And you know, you have this.
Clearly we have a divinecreator and he took great care
in his design.
I mean again a couple hundredpages on the intricacies of his
divine design.
Okay, if he took such greatcare to ensure perfection and

(58:57):
creation and such great care increating us, and he is the
essence of love, the absence ofhim in our lives equates to
meaningless life.

Speaker 1 (59:11):
Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 2 (59:12):
It's all.
What did Solomon say?
It's all like what is it?
The wind, the wind.
You know it all is under thesun.
The wind, yeah, you know whatI'm trying to say.
Save me lifeline friend, thosewho change like the wind.
No, but Solomon did saysomething.

(59:35):
It's an ecclesiast, yeah, it'san ecclesiast.
Nothing's new under the sun andeverything's fleeting.
It's like the wind.
It's all fleeting.
Right, that's what he said.
Okay, thank you, jesus, forgiving me the word.
We'll look it up later.
But the point is, if you takeGod out of the equation, then

(59:56):
literally it's all for nothing.
If you put God into theequation, it's all for
everything, agreed Everything.
So you literally have nothingto lose.
Life without God is the lifewe're living, and the
destination is what?
But a life with God.

(01:00:16):
You have everything to gain,and those around you.

Speaker 1 (01:00:20):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And I want to be very carefulabout saying putting salvation
aside before our fellowbelievers throw holy water on us
, because I don't mean tominimize that for a second.
But I just think when you're,you know, when you want to help
people, come to know the gospel.

(01:00:41):
You know who don't know ittoday.
Sometimes they just need aplace to start, and leaning into
his teachings can be a reallygood place to start.

Speaker 2 (01:00:51):
Well, that's what saves us, right?
So we're not going to day oneunless the Holy Spirit descends
upon a person and justcaptivates their heart
immediately, which happens Like.
We have people who have givengreat testimony, people who are
coming from walks in the Muslimfaith and all of a sudden they
have a head-on collision, likeon the road to Damascus, like

(01:01:13):
Paul did, and they meet Jesus.
Okay, that happens.
Those stories, though, in myexperience, are far and far.
You know there are fewer outthere.
But to your point, what happenswhen we peel open the word of
God and we look at it?
The word of God is living andbreathing.
It divides bone and marrow, itcuts through our soul and our

(01:01:38):
spirit.
That's what it says in Hebrews.
And so we can know that when weopen it, we're going to the
great surgeon and that greatsurgeon is going to do a work on
our heart.
I love that and that leads tothe salvation, because he saves
us through the process, hesanctifies us and changes us as
we go through his living,breathing word.
And so many people, millionsand millions of people have

(01:02:00):
given testimony to that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:01):
Yeah, speaking of salvation, did I share with you
the clip that I saw online thatjust, I mean, it really stuck
with me just from a visualperspective, um, where it was a
pastor and it's escaping me whoit was, but he said imagine that
that you die and you die at thesame time along with some other
people that you care about andyou both are, are kind of in

(01:02:25):
this in between space, right,and all of a sudden you start to
go this way and they start togo this way and you're looking
in each other's eyes and theysay to you, why didn't you tell
me?
oh yeah, I mean, does that?
Does that make your eyes fillup?
Oh yeah, it does.
Some people get reallyuncomfortable with that's

(01:02:48):
personal, it's private, that'sgood, I'm not gonna.
You shouldn't talk aboutreligion, don't get pushy.
It's the, that's good.
You shouldn't talk aboutreligion, don't get pushy.

Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
It's the greatest gift we can do is share the
testimony that we have.

Speaker 1 (01:02:59):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2 (01:03:00):
Well, when?

Speaker 1 (01:03:00):
did God get real for you.

Speaker 2 (01:03:02):
Oh gosh, so many things, you know.
What I think I want to share isjust a very short prelude into
a deeper testimony that we'llget into later, but when we talk
about the resurrection ofChrist, I have a child, austin,
who's 29 years old, wholiterally has multiple accounts

(01:03:22):
of having near-death or deathexperiences, and he's come back
to tell us about various things.
And there was this one event,though and I have many events
and the one that reallyresonates as we talk about the
evidence for the proof of theresurrection of Christ and why

(01:03:42):
he's our answer Austin.
In 2011, he went through anopen-heart surgery and he did
fine, but within 24 hourspost-op, he was in cardiac
arrest, and we were in the roomwith him and they started
resuscitation procedures, youknow, shocking him, multiple IVs

(01:04:04):
, pumping medicines into him, etcetera, and I'll never forget
it, because obviously, a motherdoesn't forget something like
that.
But as the minutes were goingby, one of the nurses tapped me
and said Ma'am, you can go andlay your hands on his shoulders
and you can pray over him whilewe're working on him.

(01:04:24):
And so you can imagine, we'reliterally in the cardiac ICU
unit right here in Charlotte,north Carolina, at Sanger Heart
Clinic.
We have an entire medical teamtrying to resuscitate my son and
I lay my hands on him and Istart praying and next thing,

(01:04:45):
you know, his heart starts andAustin's here.
This was in 2011.
He's still here.
The crazy thing about it is acouple days go by.
It's a long story.
They had to put him in inducedcoma.
They had to go back into heartsurgery, do another one on him.
Risks were high, stakes werehigh, but anyway, there was this
period of time where he wascoming to and I was having

(01:05:09):
conversations with him, sayingvery slow conversations, as you
can imagine.
Austin, do you remember anything?
No, and then he would fallasleep and then the next
sentence would pick up when hewould wake back up.
So, very long drawn out.
But he started to tell me Mom,I had a dream.
I remember a dream, and hestarted to recount what had

(01:05:32):
happened in the room when theyresuscitated him and it was a
dream and literally went throughthe details beyond details.
Won't get into all of it here,but what it told me is this is
that when he recounted thisdream to me, austin was hovering
over his body, looking at hisbody.

(01:05:53):
He understood what washappening, that he was in bad
shape and that his life wasdeclining and that people were
trying to save him.
And he saw his mother go andlay hands on him and pray and he

(01:06:16):
said in that moment, when Ilaid my hands on him, he
realized he was dying and hecried out to God and said God,
save me.
The next thing, you know, he'sin his body.
And God was with him and saidAustin, I'm saving you today.
And that was the end of hisdream.
And so when we think aboutthat's a very dramatic story,
it's an incredible story andit's a dramatic one, sure, and I

(01:06:38):
have smaller ones, bigger ones,whatever, but the power of God
in my life is beyond real, yeah,and I think the more I lean in
and say show me who you are.
It can come with some suffering, some tragedy.
Absolutely, show me who you are.
It can come with some suffering, some tragedy, and then the
miracle comes and you get to seemore of his power, more of his

(01:06:58):
glory.
That's it, and it comes with abigger responsibility.
The responsibility is to sharethe testimony.
Yeah, but that's one moment inmy life where I can say God was
incredibly real to me, where Ididn't need science to tell me.
I didn't need other people'sexperiences to tell me that in
my own eyewitness account of hismighty hand, I saw it with my

(01:07:20):
own eyes.
Yeah, amazing.
How about you?

Speaker 1 (01:07:23):
It was.
It was through my marriage, um,where I spent quite a bit of
time trying to save and fix andfill up somebody else, until I
realized that I needed to doexactly that for myself.
Um, and God was just.
He was there, um, through allof that storm, speaking using

(01:07:44):
other people, Uh.
And then there was just areally poignant moment when I
asked him a very simple prayerin the very next morning.
There it was like two sips ofcoffee in where he wanted to
make sure I knew it was straightfrom him.
I mean just incredibly powerful.
And then there were so manyother signs after that where I

(01:08:05):
knew that he was leading me,Like either things were going to
break wide open in our marriageand bring us closer together or
god was going to lead meexactly to where he wanted me to
be.

Speaker 2 (01:08:21):
It's so powerful, it's so powerful, yeah you know
what's really cool about thattoo?
Uh, journaling.
You know we talked a lot aboutreading the word of god,
journaling when we ask godquestions.
Keep those questions at theforefront, because when we get
the answers, when we realize,when we realize the speed in
which God will answer and we canwrite the journal entry to what
we're learning, we can start tocorrelate.

(01:08:43):
Holy cow, I asked this question.
Next thing, you know, bam, I'mgetting the answer.
I may not like the answer.

Speaker 1 (01:08:50):
I may not like what I'm seeing.
It's incredible.

Speaker 2 (01:08:53):
But that is a miracle , yes, and that God being able
to communicate so precisely withus is just as big as a miracle
is what I witnessed with my son,yes, and you're going to miss
it if you don't lean into arelationship with him Like you
got to be in tune.
Tune the radio in.
Tune the frequency in yes.

Speaker 1 (01:09:11):
So personal stories matter, the science and the
evidence matters, but I don'twant to leave here today without
talking a little bit about howthe Bible actually laid out what
science is catching up to.
Yeah, isn't that?

Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
amazing too.
It's so good.

Speaker 1 (01:09:29):
It's so good.

Speaker 2 (01:09:30):
People think it's the other way around, right.
People think science isdisproving God or disproving the
Bible.
Science is actually proving theBible, the scriptures and have
a couple here that I actuallywant to read and connect the
dots on and so Isaiah 40, verse22, says God sits enthroned
above the circle of the earth.
So that thing was written acouple thousand years ago.

(01:09:54):
Hello, the circle of the earth,the circle of the earth long
before we realized that theearth was round, everyone was
saying it was flat and I knowthere's people out there who
still believe it's flat.

Speaker 1 (01:10:06):
Really.

Speaker 2 (01:10:07):
Yes, there are.
There are, but that's okay.
I'm just saying that God saidthat it's round and by golly.
I think the science is showingthat that's right.
Also, it says that in Job 26, 7, that the earth is hung on

(01:10:27):
nothing.
So what does that mean?
Could you imagine, like acouple thousand years ago, job
getting this word from the Lordthat God hung the earth on
nothing?
What does that mean?
And now we have imagery whereearth is just kind of floating
out there in space, like that isincredible, I know.

Speaker 1 (01:10:45):
You kind of hit on this one earlier with regard to
DNA.
But Psalm 139 says we were knittogether in our mother's womb,
so thousands of years ago thatsounded kind of poetic, but we
know today that every cell, theDNA, all of it, all of it.

Speaker 2 (01:11:06):
Yeah, how about this one In Romans 120.
For since the creation of theworld, god's invisible qualities
, his eternal power and divinenature have been clearly seen
being understood from what hasbeen made.
So people are without excuse.
So that is just a declarationthat God is going to make known

(01:11:30):
what he created.
He's going to give us languagefor how it's done and the
components that make it up.
And the warning is this thatpeople are left without excuse,
and so this notion going back to, it's easy for me just to not
believe.
There's a warning that you'regoing to be held accountable,

(01:11:54):
that God is giving so muchevidence that it's overwhelming
that we don't have an excuseanymore.
So that makes me pause in myheart.

Speaker 1 (01:12:02):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think every new discoveryjust echoes what we already see
in the Bible.
I mean, we could keep going andgoing with, word after word.
You know, long before therewere telescopes and test tubes,
right, the Bible was alreadylaying out what science was
going to tell us many yearslater.

Speaker 2 (01:12:22):
Amen.
And you know, I think, thequestion that we got to just
keep asking ourselves.
So if you're a skeptic outthere, you know people are
listening.
They just don't know what tobelieve.
That's okay.
God actually challenges us.
To challenge him.
He says call to me, ask me yourhard questions and I will begin
to teach you.
But it's that notion of let'snot be afraid to be honest with

(01:12:46):
God, to say I don't believe.
Show me, I love that.
Oh, that's a powerful prayer.
It's a powerful prayer becausewhat's going to happen is he's
going to just blow your mind.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:12:58):
Yeah, yeah so we've been going for a while.
I mean, let's kind of wrap thisall up to your point about what
this means for everybody.
I mean, I think to your point,if you're a skeptic, lean in,
yep, explore.
Yeah, do like Lee Strobel.

Speaker 2 (01:13:16):
That's right, or Russell Brand?
There you go.
Stop being high on all thethings that you said and get
high on the Holy.

Speaker 1 (01:13:23):
Spirit, that's right.
That's right, that's right.
And if you're a believer, liveit out loud, right?
Yeah, I mean, be bold.
Someone needs to hear yourtestimony.

Speaker 2 (01:13:31):
Yeah, Be I mean, be bold.
Someone needs to hear yourtestimony.
Yeah, be authentic, you are God.
I go back to your testimonythat you gave about the
helicopter.
Yeah Right, oh yeah.
And if people don't know whatI'm talking about, that's going
to have them go listen to yourtestimony.
The parable of the flood, theparable of the flood.
Go listen to the testimony.
But to your point, if you're abeliever, be the helicopter for

(01:13:54):
someone.
I love that Be the lifeline.
Like give your testimonybecause someone's waiting to
hear it.
They need to hear it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:01):
I love that.
I know People reallyunderestimate how much impact we
have on others and everythingwe do say share.

Speaker 2 (01:14:09):
Yep.
And so I think that if there'sanything that anyone heard today
that kind of stirred somethingup in the heart I mean there's
things you said today thatstirred my heart.
So that's a prompting that I'mgoing to go dig deeper in it and
I would encourage everyone todo that.
What has God stirred in yourheart today that it's easy to
shut the door and walk away andjust ignore that little

(01:14:30):
prompting?
But if you got a prompting inyour spirit, that's how God
draws us to him.
It's that intuition, it's aguttural feel.
We got head knowledge, we gotheart knowledge and we got gut
knowledge.
We got the three brains thesedays in science right.
So if something hit your gut,be brave, be bold, start

(01:14:52):
exploring.
Don't choose to beintellectually dishonest.
Choose to start gettingintellectually honest and start
digging into the hard questions.

Speaker 1 (01:15:00):
That's good and we shared a lot of resources on
this podcast.
Today I'll have to go back andmake a list so we can share it
with our listeners, make it easyfor them to go and dig in and
watch some of the other showsand pick up some of these books.

Speaker 2 (01:15:15):
Yeah, we're going to do that too, aren't we?
So if you go to our website,thedoubledosepodcastcom right,
and you sign up for our emaillist, we're going to send you a
curated list of inspiration foryou to do just that Go deeper
into the various things that wetalked about today.
We're going to make it easy foryou.
Yeah, we're going to give youwhat we believe are trusted,

(01:15:37):
authentic and truth resourcesfor you to start to explore, and
if you have any questions, wewant to hear from you.
Drop us comments on Instagram,send us direct messages If you
have a question you would likeus to go deeper into on a future
episode.
We want to hear that too.
Right, it's great, absolutely.
So send us a message.
We want to hear from you and wereally want to be a voice that

(01:15:59):
can start to help you unpackthese hard questions.
Where can people find us?

Speaker (01:16:06):
TheDoubleDosePodcastcom .
They can find us on Instagramas that as well.
It's always the Double DosePodcast Facebook.
Let's see when else are we.

Speaker 2 (01:16:16):
There might be a couple other there might be,
yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:16:18):
Double Dose.
Sorry, we're brand new.
We're sorting this out, it'sall good.

Speaker 2 (01:16:23):
But just know that we are Elisa and Angelique.

Speaker 1 (01:16:29):
And we're so glad you were here to hang with us today
.

Speaker 2 (01:16:31):
Yes, and next week is another Another great episode.
Yeah, Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:16:37):
God's grace and our grind.

Speaker 2 (01:16:39):
Okay Well, let's pray us out, okay.
Yeah, heavenly Father, we justlove and thank you for this time
that you've given us today.
We thank you that you'vealready prepared the hearts of
the listeners, that you aredrawing each and every person
unto yourself, that this is notfor us and for our fruit, but

(01:17:01):
it's for you, lord.
We do this in obedience to you.
So, lord, I just thank you thatyou are just blessing the ears
of the listeners and that youare taking your word far and
wide.
We love you.
In the name of Jesus.
We pray Amen, amen.