Becoming One: The Ancient Path Through the Modern Church Maze in the Age of Noise and Neon.

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello and welcome to the map, guys.
One thing I want to say beforeI dig in here is, if you've been
listening to this podcast,there's actually a way for you
to influence the kind of contentthat we're putting out.
If you like it, great.
But if you say, hey, I'd liketo hear you guys talk about this
topic.
On the website the podcastwebsite there's actually a place

(00:23):
where you can send textmessages and comment on what you
want to hear on it, and so ifyou see like a social media post
on Instagram or Facebook orwherever about the podcast, you
can actually say, hey, love this, would like you guys to talk
about this and this and this andstart a dialogue.

(00:44):
So I give you permission, feelfree.
So there's something deeplyhuman about trying to make sense
of where we came from and wherewe're going and, whether we
realize it or not, our questionsabout faith and identity and
church and even technology arereally questions about what it
means to be human and what itmeans to be made in the image of

(01:07):
God.
And in this conversation I'mjoined again by my great friend,
tam Church Ward, and togetherwe're exploring the landscape of
faith, not from a place ofcertainty, but from a place of
honest inquiry.
We're also looking at thetension between ancient
tradition and modern expression,at strengths and blind spots of

(01:30):
the protestant imagination, andat the beauty and the
theological weight of orthodoxy,where salvation isn't merely
just an event, but it's atransformation, a a becoming.
And so we touch on thestructure of church, house
churches, the Orthodox Church,megachurches and everything in
between, and we ask what happenswhen nepotism shapes leadership

(01:55):
and when structure ends upreplacing the Holy Spirit, and
when intimacy collapses intoinsularity.
We wrestle with a question thatechoes throughout history what
is the church meant to be?
What is the church meant to bedoing in this generation?
And this isn't aboutecclesiology, it's also about
ontology.

(02:15):
We talk about theosis, the ideathat we're called not simply to
obey God but to actually becomeone with him.
And in a world that'sfascinated with AI and
transhumanism and the promise ofengineered transcendence, a
Tower of Babel 2.0, going to thestars, whatever it is, that
question how close can man cometo God takes on a new kind of

(02:40):
urgency.
And so this conversation is notmerely for spectators, it's for
those willing to think deeplyand question a bit boldly and
walk humbly in the pursuit oftruth.
So if you found yourself caughtbetween liturgy and the live
stream, between tradition andinnovation, between ancient and
the artificial, this one is foryou.

(03:02):
Let's in, welcome to the map.
We're live, we're back.
Hello, it's uh, hold on, it'sthe whimsical and magical

(03:26):
powerful.
Another adjective church ward.

Speaker 2 (03:30):
Whimsical.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
I say you're whimsical because you're an
identical twin which twinsalways freak me out Identical
twins Because it's like youliterally, genetically, are the
same person, but you're acompletely different person.
It's just a weird concept oflike.

Speaker 2 (03:53):
I don't know if that's completely true.
I apparently that's what I grewup thinking that monozygotic or
identical twins were the exactsame dna, like gene pool.
But apparently there are.
There are differences in ourDNA yeah, I mean like, yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
So I guess, like genetic testing has not caught
up to to if, for example, youguys, uh, hypothetically, were
sleeping with the same woman, wewouldn't know whose baby that
actually was.
But, to your point, epigeneticshas told us that hypothetically
.
But epigenetics, have you everseen twins that marry twins?
I find that odd.
Identical twins that identicaltwins that marry identical twins

(04:31):
it's like I I've seen that okay, well, anyways, uh, it'll just
be weird man, because I would.
You know you're not so.
You know in the tencommandments you shouldn't covet
after your neighbor's wife.
But your brother married theexact person you married, in a
sense like optic fromaesthetically, I mean me and my

(04:51):
brother.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
We didn't um, we didn't marry the same woman, but
they're both called jess.
They're both the same height,they both have brown hair.
They both look similar.
They could be sisters like it isreally interesting, um and we
and one time we were out and uhand I accidentally slipped my
hand into one of into her handand, um, turned around we both

(05:15):
looked at each other in absolutedisgust.
You know, it's like I can'tbelieve that almost love passed
through the hand.
It was a rejected either sideanyway.
Um, so that does happen.
There's real, real life, realtimes.
It is whimsical and it is weirdand it is freaky, and being one
is even worse.

Speaker 1 (05:30):
Yeah, well to your point, though.
Twins, uh, they did do a studywith epigenetics and they were
like they're twins and one wouldpresent with uh diabetes and
the other one wouldn't.
One would present with anautoimmune disease, and they
couldn't figure it out for thelongest time.
But what they figured out islike, even if you have like a
similar genetic makeup,environmentally things can

(05:52):
contribute to like switchingcertain genes on.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
Right, yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
And yeah, and so yeah , your thresholds might be
similar but a little bitdifferent.

Speaker 2 (06:02):
So yeah, but we also have incredibly different
interests and my brother grew updoing geography, um, like
geology, particularly maths,physics, I did philosophy,
ethics, history, english, andhis degree is in um,
environmental geoscience,followed by a master's degree in

(06:22):
soil, soil remediation, whichis looking at the pollution in
levels in soil, which to melooks more like shooting myself
in the face.
But then I did my first degreeis history and philosophy, then
my second degree is my master'sis psychoanalytics, with social
care.
I've got a postgraduate diplomain systemic therapy, or
systemic thought, rather, I'mdoing a PhD in the theology of

(06:44):
culture.
So we are genetically very,very similar, but we, our
trajectories, have been entirelydifferent.
He's a very rich banker, I am aimpoverished religious aspirer
not impoverished, not at all.

Speaker 1 (06:59):
all my books what did you study, tim?
Well, I studied about peopleand god.
What did your brother study,dirt?

Speaker 2 (07:07):
stuff, random material stuff, you know.
Anyway, it's fun yeah wellthanks.
Actually is really interestingbecause I studied everything to
do with the breath of god and hesaid everything to do with the
dust that was made from.
So if you think about the dustand the breath we, as the same
or nearly the same person weactually have got, we've, we've

(07:29):
walked a journey of prioritizingthe study of different elements
of mankind.

Speaker 1 (07:34):
It's powerful yeah, do you feel like you and your
brother would just tag team ated talk at some point, or?

Speaker 2 (07:41):
ted.
He's boring, he's just, he'sjust, he's just.
No, he's not boring, he's, he'sjust, he's just a banker.
You know, like he's, I like himjust just, a banker jokes.

Speaker 1 (07:54):
If he is this, I'm joking, not joking well, thanks
for for hopping back on, but weuh people were were super pumped
on the last kind ofconversation we had.
So I wanted to kind of justclose the loop on some things
that we were talking about interms of like structure with

(08:15):
church and like all that stuff.
So we'll kind of close that loopand then there's some things
that you want to talk about morein the vein of thought with
orthodoxy, and we can kind ofhop on that.
But the one thing I just wantto start off I'll I'll start off
and then throw the baton to youis that you know, in any kind
of model of how we're going tochoose to meet together, this is
going to be a game of oftrade-offs, and nobody's really

(08:37):
cornered the market on that.
And any direction that you'regoing to push in, it's just
going to be a game of tradeoffsof, like, what you're going to
give up to gain something, andthat's not a failure.
That's just the reality of howthings are structured.
You can't optimize foreverything.
When Paul said be all things toall people, he didn't mean that
you could be everything foreverybody, and so the whole we

(08:57):
do church differently thing isnot something actually to brag
about, like everybody's beentrying to do that forever.

Speaker 2 (09:09):
Unless you're Orthodox.
They kind of maintain the sametheology since the 8th century.
I'll talk about that at somepoint later.
Actually, it's really importantbecause they, they, they see
the um, the dogma of thedoctrine and liturgy of the
church as the safe haven thatkeeps everyone together.
And you can embrace differencein the base, on the basis that
they um are in the liturgy inthe church, in the doctrine, in
the dogma, and so, instead of itbeing an individual person

(09:30):
going after the individual thingthat God has said that they are
called to do, and thereforeit's hard to embrace difference,
because if you embracedifference you have to almost
dilute the call of yourindividual persona.
That doesn't exist in theOrthodox Church, because you can
only ever do something in thecontext of the Orthodox Church.

(09:51):
So it's just fascinating howthat all works out.

Speaker 1 (09:54):
Yeah, I think that, even like you know any kind of
like great schism or protestingCatholics that emerged like leg
as we move down the line, ifthey're saying, oh, we're doing
things differently, the bigquestion is, what does your
difference actually do?
What fruit is it producing?
What's the substance of that?
Albert Einstein said thatsometimes progression is like

(10:21):
somebody.
Progressivism is kind of likesomebody riding a bicycle
without a chain, like the thingsare in motion but you're not
actually going going forward.
And so if you see like thingskind of reductionary well, I
don't say reductionary becauseit's kind of where things
started but if you look at likehouse, church movements, like a
lot of people in in those kindof movements or structures are

(10:41):
like very anti-establishment,anti-institution and they're
like this is the way and youknow there's a lot of intimacy
and they bring smith, theclassic smith wigglesworth
prophecy to bear in there, whichis, after the traditional
church has died, there will be amove of god, um, in in the
houses, or whatever, and then,after that has died, there'll be

(11:02):
the true revival to come, orwhatever the specific wording is
.

Speaker 2 (11:05):
It is interesting that lots of different people,
who have lots of different viewsabout how church should run,
use and utilize the sameprophetic word to justify the
thing that they are doing damn.

Speaker 1 (11:19):
Yeah well people, people are worshiping like the I
think sometimes the the modeland and having a wrong kind of
value system towards the modelitself.
And at the end of the day, it'sjust a vehicle to carry people
and to carry the gospel as amessage into the world.
And so if you have a housechurch movement, you'll get
intimacy.

(11:39):
Kids can run around so you'renot shushing them and having to
segregate by age.

Speaker 2 (11:46):
Anyone can get a flag and they can wave it in your
face.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
Yeah, but obviously the trade-off is that sometimes
there can be theologicalinbreeding or incest, because
there's no cross-pollination,there's no outside input and
cultish kind of mentalities canarise out of that.
People are just recycling thesame ideas.

Speaker 2 (12:06):
Very few people that come into church who are not
christians.
You, you sheep steal for yourgrowth.

Speaker 1 (12:11):
That's generally what happens in the context of house
churches yeah, yeah and and uh,it becomes very insular in
terms of like, yeah to yourpoint, it's just like very like
inward, inward focus there.
And if we go on the other, in aspectrum of like yeah to your
point, it's just like very likeinward, inward focus there.
And if we go on the other endof the spectrum of like what's
going to emerge in the States of, like mega churches, they're

(12:32):
these big slick machines,they'll be, do big shows, they
get big numbers, like obviouslythey're.
They're reaching more people,like I think I gave the example
of my Haitian friend who back inthe day this is back in like
early 2000s he was like sayingJoel Osteen, I don't know
anything about how he managesmoney or anything like that, but
he gives an invitation forpeople to know Jesus.
Every single message and that'skind of God's responsibility of

(12:53):
where they take it from there.
And if people are genuinelyseeking God, god says you'll
genuinely find me.
And the promise of Jesus was ifyou ask God for a bread or egg
or you ask your father for abread or egg, he's not going to
give you a stone or serpents.
How much more will yourheavenly father give you good
things when you ask the HolySpirit.
And so, basically, god'sability to get you something
good and right if you'reactually seeking it, is bigger
than the devil's ability totrick you or give you something

(13:15):
wrong or for you to like mess itup and like just be stupid
completely.
And so that was his take oflike okay, if you're presenting
people with an invitation to arelationship with Jesus, but
like we know that behind thecurtain there's this massive
infrastructure that you have tomaintain the building, the staff
and then all the fundraisingthat goes with that, and at some
point the energy really shiftsto maintaining that as a kind of

(13:38):
business.
And then, if it's built arounda personality, once that
personality dies there's notreally a passing baton.
Sometimes you'll see a passingof a baton Ironically it's
within the family.

Speaker 2 (13:52):
You'll see somebody with.
So it's like dies or falls.
There's two options in thatmode.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
Scandal yeah.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
Yeah, exactly.
So you die and you hand it toyour kid kid and it's successful
.
But you can't hand it on toanyone else, or you have a fall
and then it was like, oh, markdriscoll, where's he gone, you
know, like.
And then he goes and does thisother thing, using the same
model.
It's incredibly successfulagain, and it's like actually
there's something, there'ssomething there to to take
account of, really.
And what also says is that eachone of these church expressions,

(14:25):
from house church through toorthodoxy, through to
catholicism, through to theexpression of the ecclesia, the
ecclesia, actually what, what wehave to be aware of, is not
just how, um, how good or badthey are, but you have to
analyze them as tools and asvehicles for the gospel, which

(14:48):
is what you're saying.
And if you and if you cananalyze them not on the basis of
your preference or if you cananalyze them not on the basis of
their excess in certain arenas,then what you can do is you can
actually begin an analysis ofthe success measure of how much
they bring the gospel, asopposed to how much you like or

(15:08):
dislike them.
I think that's a reallyimportant thing.

Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, I think it, just being objective about that
it can be a vehicle to movethings.
And I I to be honest, I don'tknow like cause I can argue both
ways.
You see, house churches inChina have thrived and really
driven the movement and growthof the church there.
But then in South Korea, themegachurch model in cities

(15:36):
because the cities are socondensed and that they're open
to Christianity that model haskind of driven growth there.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
And they're not persecuted.
That they're not persecuted isthe reality, so actually the
house.
Church movement is easy to keepon the ground than like some 2
000 person church and I thinkthat there's there's the
cultural dynamic there as well.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
Yeah, sorry yeah, I think like this is like a, like
a side thing that I always I Ithink it's.
I'd love to give your feedbackon this.
But if somebody let's say likemy is like a side thing that I
always I think it's, I'd love togive your feedback on this.
But if somebody let's say, likemy dad was a pastor or like

(16:18):
somebody my parent is in somekind of like leadership role
within an assembly, that childto go out and be part of another
community of people, maybe evenin a different stream, just to
kind of test themselves andtheir ideas and their
preconceived notions and whatthey've been taught through the
lens of somebody else.

(16:39):
Approaching my reasoning behindthat is, within Germany, when I
lived there, they have anapprenticeship model and
specifically with carpenters,you'll be driving down the road
and you'll see these guyswearing these like black leather
, like almost bell-bottom silky,like satin looking bell-bottom
pants and then a black likelittle vest on with a white

(17:01):
shirt with like the kind offrills on it, and it's a kind of
costume that carpenters wear.
But there's a rule that whenthey, when they finish the
apprenticeship, they have to goout from a certain radius of the
village that they were in.
They can't do business withanybody from the villages that
they ran like a certainkilometer radius and they can't
ask for.
They have to.
I think it's for a year or so,but they have to live off of

(17:24):
their work.
So maybe that's like hey, Ineed a place to stay, okay, you
work for me for X amount of time.
Hey, I need food and you ofcourse get money to or God chose
to put Jesus under the care ofa carpenter was that you have to

(17:49):
stand behind your work.
If you make a real crappy chairand you try to sit on the chair
, the chair is going to break.
The table is wobbly.
You have to stand behind thework that you're doing in terms
of the aesthetic but also thefunctionality of it.
You can't fake it until youmake it, but also the
functionality of it.
You can't fake it till you makeit.

(18:09):
And so I always appreciated thatkind of tradition that they had
there within their culture.
And so I think with peoplebecause there's a stink of
nepotism that if my dad was like, let's say, I was in a church
and my dad's a senior pastor,it's a big church and he's up
there at the mic, he's like I'mpassing on my mantle to my son.
It's like the family businessit's.
It's it feels gross and I'm nottrying to like, throw shade or

(18:32):
diminish anybody for that, butI'm just saying that's.
What rises up initially in meis like this is nepotism, this
is gross, like, and have youever been part of any other uh
congregation where you're notthe pastor's kid or whatever,
where people can just openlyconfront you or like poke holes
and like stuff that you'resaying or whatever?
I'd love to hear your, yourthoughts on that yeah, I think

(18:53):
you're right.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
I think I think nepotism works really well in
business.
I just think so.
So one of the big things aboutnepotism uh, if you don't know
what that necessarily means, itis the handing over of the reins
of something or other that youare in control of to a son or
daughter technically, but mainlya son is that what happens is
is that your kid gets theculture so much better than

(19:17):
anybody else because they livewith it.
So if you, if you've runsomething for a long time, then
your child will be the bestperson that you could think of
to hand over to, because theyunderstand the thing that you've
built and they'll continuebuilding it in the way that you
think it should be built, whichmeans this it means that there's
a, that there's not going to bea decline, there's going to be

(19:37):
a continuation, because you'lldo things exactly the same.
The negative of nepotism is thatif that child that is raised
can't do it and I mean there'sthis really interesting story
around Bethel, of course is thatEric Johnson felt that he
couldn't stay there, so he leftand did his thing.
So where next?
And it's like what happens whenthat desire to hand over to the

(20:02):
sun doesn't work.
But also one of the big thingsabout leaving your dad's house
is that you've got to learn tobe polite.
In your dad's house you canlike say what you want, you can
go to the fridge when you want,you can try and figure out um
like what, what you can get awaywith or whatever it is, and you
have the relationship with yourdad to be able to do that.

(20:22):
But as soon as you leave,here's and here's, here's the
key thing that you know that the, the, a son, um, isn't able to
leave.
His father's provision is thatthey can't finish anything.
So they they start somethingand finish that.
They can't finish it.
They start something and stopit half a through and go home.

(20:42):
I know people that do this.
So I've got, I know, a guywhose kids cannot finish
anything.
They leave and they come back.
They leave and they come backand they don't finish anything.
They do this part of a degreeor this half of this course or
this half of this or whatever,and they cannot survive outside
of their father's house.
Not only that, normally they'remajorly attached to their

(21:02):
mother, which which is a majorissue in marriage, but we can
talk about that at a differentpoint, but I think, in the
context of the church especially, I think that you have to
experience different streams inorder that you can understand
the value of them, as opposed towhat most people do, which is
stay where they're comfortableand believe that this is God's

(21:26):
given and ordained church.
So, whatever we say, whateveranybody says I don't care what
anybody says whether you thinkit's a cult or not a cult,
whether it's as big as Hillsongor as small as a house church,
most people don't think in thementality of the kingdom of the
church.
Most people think in terms ofthe locality of the church, and
so what they think is thischurch is what god has put here.

(21:47):
That's why every church has aprophecy that it's a resource
church.
Every church has a prophecythat it's a it's going to be a
host of nations.
Every church has a prophecythat it's going to be the center
of revival for their local area.
And we have this reallyinteresting narrative of church
that comes from the idea that wedon't want to embrace the other

(22:09):
spheres or understandings ofwhat the church is.
And if you look that backaround to the kid thing, as in
the nepotism thing, I'm like thereason why you need to
experience the other streams isto experience the dysfunction of
the thing that you're in, orunderstand the dysfunction of
the thing you're in, becausethen, and only then, can you
grow and improve it, as opposedto maintain it.
That's what I would say, but Imean, I've said a lot.

(22:31):
You can come back.

Speaker 1 (22:33):
Yeah, it's always funny, like the prophetic words
of always like doing big stuff.
What if we get a word?
It's like Tim, if you'reradically obedient, you're going
to change the world.
You'll never see it, you'llnever feel it, you'll never be
able to measure it and nobody'sgoing to remember your name.
That's your word.

(22:53):
Awesome, thanks.
Not saying that over you.
I say like if somebody likeit's always like you're going to
make impact, we're going totransform the city.
Everything's going to bedifferent because of you guys,
and it's just like what it'slike.
You're gonna lay the foundationin the in the road work.
Uh, people are gonna hate you.
They're gonna give deaththreats.
One of you, or two of you,might get your house burnt down.

(23:15):
You're not really actuallygonna see the fruit because
you're planting seeds and, as weknow, like trees need a little
time to grow.
But if you're obedient, coolstuff's going to happen.
Are you down?
Screw it.

Speaker 2 (23:29):
And that's why no one wants those words right,
Because everyone wants theimmediate gratification of
seeing the numbers.

Speaker 1 (23:35):
then Dude, there's a video I saw.
This kid goes to sit down inthe chair.
It's like the man of God'sgoing to give a word and he's
like, yes, you're the one who.
I see that you're looking for awife or something.
And he's like, yes, yeah.
And then he's like, yes, theLord is calling you to a life of

(23:57):
celibacy.
And the kid tries to jump upout of the chair and other
people are pushing him down intothe chair just to take it.
But it's like, yeah, we really,we really want to reverse
engineer something that's goingto like fit within the scope of
our life.
And I really struggle, like myparents really challenged me

(24:18):
because they they've giventhemselves away, uh, so much
into the in the things thatthey're serving into.
I mean, you had conversationsaround this, but when your
physical health starts to becompromised and a lot of things
start to get compromised,there's this text where Jesus
said I guess there's kind of atheme that people talk about

(24:40):
living in wholeness and makingsure that you're whole and
healed, and there's ahyper-focus on that.
But there's this other side ofliving your life as a living
sacrifice and there's thesetexts where you know jesus says
it you have to love me more thanyour mom and more than your dad
, more than your sister and yourbrother like basically bury
their own dead, bro, that'scrazy passage yeah, well, and so

(25:03):
uh, like the, the sacrificesthey made, the cost of their own
, you know, own health andrelationships and things like
that like there.
There is like a respect, uh toit, but it's not, definitely not
attractive, definitely not whatpeople would want for their
life and for me it's a reallylike.

Speaker 2 (25:23):
It's another example of the polemic right.
It's another example of whereyou have to have one or the
other so.
So if we take examples of bigchurches, machine churches, it
requires your life to run thatmachine.
If you don't want to give yourlife, you're not willing to
sacrifice enough, even if youget sick.
So, for example, I've hadfeedback from someone where I've

(25:47):
been sick for like six monthsreally trying to like do what I
need to do to keep this machinerunning, and he, the comment he
gave me was this well done, youpushed through the last six
months, well done.
And I was like, yeah, kind ofactually kind of well done for
for pushing through, but youdidn't see the impact on my
family, the fact that I camehome and I couldn't talk to

(26:09):
anyone.
You didn't see the impact on,um, the rest of my life.
I don't have any friends, likeI don't, I was too sick to go
out, I like whatever, blah, blah, blah.
And I think this is reallyinteresting and and hopefully
I'm not speaking from her, I'mnot trying to do that but
there's this interesting polemicwhere it's like either you have
to be completely and utterlylost in the glory and everything
is really easy.

(26:29):
Or you have to be so freakingdead that that is what Jesus
wants you to do, and I'm like no, you have to live a life of
individual understanding of whatthat means, given the season
that you're in, and you alsohave to do that in relationship
with people.
And so if you want to be partof a church that is a machine
and be involved in that machine,you will die and be a body in

(26:52):
that machine.
It just is what it is, that'swhat you're, that's what you're
committing to, and for somepeople yeah, maybe that's their
call it's like you know what?
I'll give my whole life to this, and so so they, they share
everything on social media orthey're the ones at every single
meeting or whatever it is, andactually their kids come to
everything or whatever.
Like I'm not saying it's goodor bad, I'm saying like that's
the decision.

(27:12):
But if you don't want to do that, you find yourself erring
towards like a smaller house,community church, which is like
hey, we'll meet around yourhouse, like once a week we'll
have dinner together, we'll alltext each other like across the
week, we'll do that with the 10of us over and over again, and
that can be church, and thereality is both are church.
It's just how you create thestory of the church, the
ecclesia, which is community,and the machine, because I mean,

(27:35):
antioch would have been prettyepic to run, so would Ephesus,
so there had to be structures inplace there.
But it's how you build thosetogether, without the polemic
saying with one you get smalland with one you get big,
because for some people theirsuccess is measured on smallness
and intimacy and other peoplethey're measured on bigness and
numbers, and actually both areright.
But how do you celebrate theother in the context of the

(27:58):
church to become the, the, the,the greatest expression that you
can possibly be, without peoplegetting lazy or people getting
sick because it seems to be oneor the other?

Speaker 1 (28:09):
You know.
You know, one of the laziestthings that I don't like is
unspoken prayer request.
Just keep it to yourself.
Then Like either like if you'regoing to ask me to approach the
creator of everything thatexists as your brother.
So we're going to, we're goingto, you know, I'm going to come

(28:31):
up to the throne of God with youand be like hey, we're asking
you, I'm petitioning for you tohelp my friend, tim here out, my
brother, but I don't know whatyou're asking for.
Hell, no, hell, no, I don'tknow what you're asking for.
You might be saying, hey, thepastor's wife is a witch and he
needs to divorce her so I canmarry him.
I'm not going to go up to you,sally, and pray for that.

(28:53):
I need to know what are wepraying for.
Or just say just pray for me asthe Lord gives you, you know,
as he leads you, fair enough,but don't say prayer request
unspoken.
You already spoke it.
Now, we don't know.
It's weird, it's shady.

Speaker 2 (29:14):
And it is spoken technically, because you are
speaking some sort of likedeception into the air, as you
say, bro, it just breedsspeculation.

Speaker 1 (29:22):
It's like God bless her heart.
I wonder what's going on.
Is she?
Is her marriage okay?
Is her finances okay?
Is her health okay?
We don't know.
We're spiraling now, mary, yeah, just tell us what you want us
to pray for if it helps.

Speaker 2 (29:38):
Anyway, like, I just don't spiral, I just like push
people over.
That's, that's my, that's theholy spirit jam.
If, like, if I don't know whatto do, I'm just not going to
push you and make it seem likeit's good.

Speaker 1 (29:46):
Well, I'm just talking for a sec, if you like,
I grabbed like this small, like40 person country church in the
middle of nowhere.
So in someone in the church,like they like does anybody have
a prayer request?
And it's just like man, what'sgoing on there?
I'm just joking, but seriously.

(30:08):
So yeah, it's all valid pointsand so like I mean kind of to
wrap up and like this will bethe segue into talking more
about orthodoxy, because I knowthat's kind of the meat of the
conversation we're going to haveIs you have these like two
streams of the Catholic Churchand orthodoxy and there's a lot
of things that like kind of gettrampled over as like people

(30:30):
have just fractured out of thatof like the liturgy can be
really beautiful.
There's a long memory with thatliturgy, like there's something
valuable of like a song, likeyou sing a song some of these
songs have been around for likehundreds of years and like
you're fostering that traditionwithin your family.
Again, if we look at the churchlike a family, like I'm

(30:51):
standing on the shoulders ofgiants that came before me the
space that's made for sacramentsand the meanings that's
attached to sacraments, versuslike picking and choosing what
sacrament is going to be purelysymbolic, but this is like
something really spiritual, butlike making the space for that
and like getting people up tospeed, building things.
That last there's something tobe said about that.

(31:14):
Uh, of like we talked about,this movement's going to live
and die with this guy who has agifting or is charismatic or
whatever, and it's boom, it's,it's like a freaking vapor in
the wind, but having somethingthat stands the test of time,
there's something to be saidabout that.
I would say that I and I'm nottrying to like rub you in the

(31:35):
wrong way I have, like friendswho are Catholic and some
friends who are Orthodox.
I lean more towards the Orthodoxside for a few reasons.
One is what we said earlier.
They're trying to genuinelymaintain something they didn't
build into their theology, a wayto just like, with no
parameters, like change thingsas a Catholic church is, and the

(31:57):
sentiment I get a lot of timesfrom Catholics is like
Protestant people a lot of timeswould be like it's all about
like the Bible and they go likesola scriptura's all about like
the bible and they go like solascriptura things.
And the catholics are well, youcan't do that, but even if you
did, we're the only people whocould interpret the scriptures.
You can't even interpret themand we gave you the scriptures
and I'm, like you guys fracturedfrom the orthodox church, like

(32:20):
you guys like had a specificdisagreement on, like you
departed from the thing thatthey're still maintaining and
you build in a theology inyourself that lets you change,
but then you criticizeProtestants for fracturing and I
just find that it's a littlebit hypocritical and that's why
I'm not trying to like isolateanybody, I'm just saying in a
broad-stroking statement, and sothere's this implicit message

(32:43):
that the Holy Spirit isn'treally speaking to me as an
individual believer if it'soutside that hierarchy, and I
find that just to be idiotic, tobe completely frank, and that
can come off.
It basically just comes off notlike confidence, but it comes
off as control and a lot ofother weird feelings with it.

(33:03):
Because I can totally embracethe beautiful parts of what
we're talking about, but youhave to acknowledge again what
we're saying.
These are just vehicles, likepeople we all know, like the
Sunday school thing.
The church isn't the building,the church isn't the steeple.
Open up the doors, here's thepeople.
Like it's the church, it'speople.

(33:26):
And so I adore the beauty when Igo into these churches.
Now it can look kind of.
I remember I was younger Ithought this is gaudy, this is
like awful.
But now, after living in Europeand seeing cathedrals, being in
the Middle East and seeingcathedrals, the attention to
detail, the beauty of thearchitecture, the beauty on the
inside, and then I come toAmerica.

(33:50):
No offense America, but we donot.
We have a beautiful country interms of landscapes, but our
cities suck.
Our architecture sucks.
This modern, brutalistarchitecture sucks the quality
of the materials we use and thenthe aesthetic of it sucks.
And I don't I mean that in themost endearing way, because when
I go into still when I go intothese cathedrals and these

(34:11):
cities that were made to belived in and people would
literally like just throw moneyand time and labor to make it as
beautiful as possible, theattention to detail, um it, it's
, it's fantastic and it's like Idon't know and it's last.
And that's the other thing thatit lasts.
It's not some like abstractdigital thing that we put in.

(34:34):
It's gonna last because it'sdigital and I feel, feel like
what's happened?
The spirit of America, I'll sayit like this what's unique about
America is that we're a bunchof criminals and rebels, that
the people who are over here,who are wealthy, like well-to-do
, they're the rebels and theneverybody else are indentured

(34:55):
servants that got sold and theneverybody else who came after
were basically like, okay, wecould stay here or we could get
on this boat powered by the windand go over this other land
mass that they call the newworld and they give us land if
we find land that nobody has.
There's a ton of land there andit's created this spirit that I
love that.
I'm american, I'm from here, Ilove that.

(35:15):
But like what our media kind ofinjects into us, like through
Disney and and all that is this,this mad dash chase of novelty
and self-expression, and likethere'll be this, this some kind
of plot.
There's a little village boy,his name's Tim, and he just
doesn't understand why we alwayshave to do this tradition.
But he, he, tim, can build aflying machine that nobody else

(35:37):
thought of, and tim's ideas aregoing to completely that one
person will completely transformthe entire village, and the
reality is it just never happens, very rarely would you have
like one idea that's going tolike do that.
And it's like fostering thisthing of like, almost like
marxism, where you're the herofor being a rebel.
You're a hero from bucking theinstitution or what's like

(35:57):
ancient.
It just feels oppressivebecause it's been there forever
and you're like the newest thingever.
And the reality is like God hasseen the entire scope of
humanity.
He's seen every person thatexists ever, and I mean this in
the nicest possible way.
I'm saying it to myself, buteverybody listening.
You're not that special.
You are special in the sensethat Jesus said the love that

(36:18):
the Father had for me before thefoundations of the earth he has
for you and you're going tofeel it in your hearts when you
read through John.
Jesus said that.
So what does that mean?
It means that when God only hadone son, the love that the
creator of the universe had, allof that love that he could
point towards one son, hepointed at Jesus, and Jesus
wants you to be a participant inthat.
But that's as true foreverybody who's existed ever as

(36:40):
it is for you.
So you're not that special andyour ideas are not that
impressive to God in the grandscheme of life.
And so when we try to be thisnon-conformist prophet that
comes to upend the tables andwe're Jesus in the temple and
we're going to flip tables andwhip people with a whip.
It's just like we're probablynot that person in the story.

(37:01):
We all think that we're Davidfighting Goliath, but reality in
the story of David, we're allprobably Mephibosheth.
We're the crippled.
Somebody dropped us down thestairs and we've been begging
and then, because of who ourfather is, we have a seat at the
table, and I mean that in thenicest endearing way, because
there are some people who areinnovators and you're brilliant,
keep inventing, but you're notbuilding a new foundation, and

(37:27):
so global models workdifferently.
Tim Churchward, razzle-dazzleus with your thoughts.

Speaker 2 (37:36):
Yeah, dude, we went from orthodoxy to globalization,
which is pretty powerful.
I am just on the america thingum, one of the things that I
love about america is that is,paul mammering says, um, that
you can get off a plane in newyork and think you can do
anything.
Um, the only flip side is thatyou, that you can't, and so
there's there's this reallyinteresting story.

(37:57):
There isn't there, which, whichis where anything is possible
as long as you orientateyourself towards the thing that
makes it possible, which, ofcourse, is God.
And so I mean I was talking toPaul about this but the thing
with Donald Trump and Elon Muskbeing in the White House,
whatever your political pointsof view are, they are mavericks.
We have mavericks running themost powerful nation in the

(38:21):
world and, whatever you thinkabout that maverick nature of
who they are, um is a veryinteresting time.
Politics is no longer politics.
Um, the, the most ironic thingto know.
This might be controversial,but the most ironic thing to me
about the republic is that it'screated a monarch.
But the most, the mostfascinating thing to me about
the, the, the, the, the setup ofthe republican uh, sorry, the

(38:44):
republican but of the republicof america, was that we did not
want a monarch representing godto us, except now you have got
one.
His name is donald trump, andit's very interesting, anyway,
blah, blah, um.
So, and he acts like a kingdefinitely acts like a king,
don't?
He has a kingdom and he putslevies on people who who he

(39:04):
thinks are his enemies, andanyway, blah, blah, so.
So I think there's this reallyinteresting narrative.
If we, in terms of america, Ithink, if we, if we just go back
just quick, can I start fromthe beginning of orthodoxy, is
that right?
So yes, so yeah, we're gonna.
We're gonna go like, um, like,I'm just gonna.
People don't understand the, the, the nature of the church.
There was one church up until451, um, ad, um.

(39:26):
That church was the orthodoxchurch, um, they were followers
of the way.
What happened is is that therewas a council of chalcedonia in
four is it gonna be reallyboring for some people, but it's
really important?
Council of chalcedonia in 451,and what happened is is that you
now have the, the, thechalcedonian orthodox, and then
the non-chalcedony, or theanti-chalcedonian orthodox, um,
and they're like the syrian um,the syrians and the syrian

(39:48):
orthodox church, or the copticegyptian coptic church, for
example.
Those are those guys, then youhave so, but they're quite
fringe, they don't really existout of in community with anybody
else, it's just themselves.
Orthodoxy continues to grow.
It spreads all the way through,particularly to Eastern Europe,
all the way into Rome, ofcourse, all the way through to

(40:08):
Britain.
But what happens is that in1054, I think that's the number
1054, there is the Great Schism.
And that happens over thisdogmatic.
Is it schism, great schism?
And that happens over thisdogmatic is it?
schism or schism.
I say schism because I'mEnglish.

Speaker 1 (40:26):
I'm right, but I think that there's you invented
the language, we just perfectedit, tim that's right.

Speaker 2 (40:34):
You've ruined it, bro .
We forgive you and we will seeyou in heaven, but we will not
high five.
But when we talk about thegreat schism, or schism I say
schism um, we need to understandthat it's over this concept,
concept of the filioque, whichis, which is this um really
quite um specific thing, whichis does the holy spirit proceed

(40:56):
from the father or does the holyspirit proceed from the Father
and the Son?
And the Catholic Church thatsplits believes that the Holy
Spirit proceeds from the Fatherand the Son.
The Orthodox think that'sheresy, by the way, and they
believe that the Holy Spiritonly comes from the Father.

Speaker 1 (41:12):
So, to elaborate on that point, the reason why they
view it as a heresy is becauseit automatically paints the Holy
Spirit in a picture ofinequality in terms of like his
personhood, that he'ssubordinate to the other two.
It creates a weird hierarchyversus the Trinity being one
entity.
Anyways, continue.

Speaker 2 (41:32):
Correct.
Yeah, and the idea that theHoly Spirit can proceed from the
sun is as in the Son almostgives birth, almost.
In that sense the Holy Spiritis just not right, but the
Father as the creator.
That is his dominantcharacteristic and so therefore
makes it so.
That's what they thought, butthen obviously in 1517.

Speaker 1 (41:54):
We could do an entire podcast just on that.

Speaker 2 (41:58):
Yeah, just on that idea but go ahead, go, oh no.
So I think it's.
I did.
I'm plucking the numbers outthe air just in my head, but I
think it's 15, 17.
Martin luther pins his 95theses to the door of wickenberg
castle 92 feces 90, 95 thesesit's your it.
Sorry the way you guys pronouncethe TH sound continue sorry, my

(42:20):
bad, I'm just messing with youby the way, nepotism is one of
the issues on his 95 theses, togo back to that point.
But also, protestantism is bornin England.
It's born slightly differently,because Henry VIII doesn't like
his wives and wants to killthem or divorce them, so he
basically creates his own church.
You've got another divide there, which is why you have the

(42:41):
Anglican Communion outside ofthe General Protestant Communion
.
Then you have Luther, you haveCalvin, you have Zwingli.
Then out of those guys, by theway, luther is a massive
anti-Semite.
Calvin orders people fromSwitzerland to go and kill the
Catholics in France.
So we've got these veryinteresting people who are in
charge of this movement, butbrilliant minds.
But then we also have this veryinteresting narrative there

(43:06):
where, because it'sProtestantism, there is a
protestation against many, manyversions of itself, which is why
you then have Baptists orMethodists or Lutheran or
whatever it might be, andthey're cultural reflectivities
of, or cultural reflectionsrather of the places where they
grow up.
But there's lots of divorce,there's lots of Protestant

(43:30):
protesting against thehierarchies that be to the point
where basically the mostsuccessful forces in churches
have been house churches,because they have gone from
completely um subjects to thetraditional established church
to being subject to no oneexcept themselves, and not just
um, not just um scripture.
So so there, but also um holyspirit speaking to me, and I

(43:55):
will guide these people as theself-elected or democratically
elected, sometimes leader whichwe know that the, the, the
churches, are not democracies,they're theocracies.
God puts people there anyway.
So we have this big, longhistory and what I'd say is that
, um, there's, there's a veryinteresting story for me in this
, which is where I actually seepentecostalism, charismatic

(44:20):
pentecostalism, as the naturalheir to original orthodoxy.
Um, that's what I view it as,in fact, my phd is going to be
about this, particularly in thearena of worship.
Um, and so I think thatpentecostalism is actually re?
Um refinding liturgy, just in avery modern way, and what's
really interesting to me is thatis that, as you think about how

(44:44):
orthodoxy runs, the liturgicalnature of the church, the divine
liturgy that takes three hoursyou're not allowed to sit down
in orthodox churches, there areonly, there's no pews.
You have to stand for threehours in those services and you
have to go on the journey.
You go to church two or threetimes a week.
You have to celebrate thefeasts.
You're absolutely in the church.
What the orthodox church wouldsay is that charismatics sorry,

(45:08):
catholics, protestants of everydenomination are not the true
church.
They're not real.
So the only way that you couldbe saved is in the orthodox
church, which holds to the trueteachings of christ that has
been handed down from theapostles and through the early

(45:28):
church fathers into themid-church fathers and to us now
.
And so we have this reallyinteresting thing where
orthodoxy is preserving the theit perceives to be the reality
of all of the teachings ofChrist, and outside of that you
cannot be saved.
So they wouldn't believe we'resaved.
For example, most orthodoxpeople wouldn't believe we're
saved.

Speaker 1 (45:49):
Until we go through confirmation and take First
Communion within the what'stheir protocol?
That's a Catholic protocol.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
Yeah.
So what they say is you're acatechumen.
So, if you want to, it's calleda catechumen, where you get
catechized by the church, by theOrthodox Church, and what that
means is which, by the way, isabsolutely wonderful, it's a
wonderful, they teach you very,very deeply.
It's not like hey, come give it.
So if you just imagine this,our church backgrounds are come

(46:19):
to the front of church.
Give your life to jesus.
You're fine, you're incongratulations.
Crack on with your life, forthe participation trophy
straight absolutely.
You could go to a four-weekcourse.
They'll tell you the differencebetween the chapter verses uh,
verses of the bible and you willbe fine.
And whereas the orthodox churchare like that isn't salvation,
orthodox Church are like that isnot being saved.

(46:41):
Salvation is a process, not amoment.
So they would say salvation andsanctification are part of the
same journey, because they wouldbelieve that salvation,
sanctification, perfection andbecoming one with God are all
part of the same journey.
So you have to start thatjourney off by being catechized
into, not your experience of god, although that is a major part

(47:05):
of orthodoxy it is into theteachings of the church, because
in the teachings of the churchis the logos incarnate, the word
incarnate which will changeyour life and save you.
And so what they believe isthat then, after a while, you go
through a process of Christaformation and then you go
through baptism.
In the Orthodox Church theybaptize you three times.

(47:27):
They go one, father, two Son,three, holy Spirit, because the
Trinity is equal and they'revery clear about that.
The Orthodox church spent thefirst 700, 800 years of its
existence fighting for thetrinity, and so in the orthodox
church it's very clear thetrinity is, is the most is.

(47:47):
The is the central doctrine ofhow you worship after the
baptism.
It is the beginning of yourjourney of perfection.
It's the beginning of yourjourney into theosis, which is
becoming one with god, becomingas god.
So athanasius.
So athanasius said god becameman so men could become gods.

(48:10):
So it's a very importanttheology of theosis that you
actually become with god, you,you, you, you.
You become one with him onewith him, yeah, one with him.
Yeah, you don't become godhimself, you can't participate
in his essence because he'stranscended, but you can
participate in his energies, hisactivities, and that's how we
become divine.
Um, so so they would believethat we have divinity in us.

(48:32):
So everything that we create,everything is a cultic
expression of who we are ashuman beings, has divinity in it
.
The purpose of christianity isnot to stand against something.
It is to reorientate somethingback to its original foundation
in christ and in god.
So protestantism is the exactopposite of this.

(48:54):
We stand against this and thisand this and this, and this is
why orthodoxy says unless it isvery, very clearly demonic,
which they obviously believe in,we are not interested in
standing against culture.
We are interested inreorientating culture.
So, for example, let's taketransgenderism or even

(49:14):
transhumanism.
So the idea that we want tobecome more like God is divine.
It's a divine and innate desirewithin every single human being
that we want to become like God, what they are.
So, from orthodox perspective,what they are seeing in the

(49:35):
transhumanism, the creation ofAI, this understanding that we
are creating a new form ofintelligence, the robotic
consciousness, is the poorlydirected desire to become one
with God and create andco-create with him.

(49:55):
Why?
Because that's what Adam didwhen he named the animals.
When Adam named the animals, hewas given the task by God to
co-create with God by callingthe telos the purpose out of the
animals.
So it's really important weunderstand this.
So, instead of standing againstsomething the Orthodox Church

(50:17):
will say, it is the church's jobin the teachings of christ,
because this is what christ did.
He didn't stand against anyone,he reorientated them.
He said you have heard it andsaid I tell you.
He said he takes what is trueabout the law, what is true
about the jewish culture, andredirect it towards the truth of
who the father is.

(50:37):
And so we have thisre-expression of the idyllic
ideal, because there isperfection in walking with god.
And so I've said a lot thereand come back.
I'd like to hear some of yourthoughts on it.
But when we think about thechurch, we have to understand
that the american, britishversion of church is so, um,
very esoteric.

(50:58):
Very few people across theworld believe that it is a
correct version of church.
Now, what?
In terms of its expression,especially in terms of its
salvation?
And I'd say that actuallythere's something very important
for us to understand there thatwe think because we live in
this world of the same streams,the same charismatic, the same
Pentecostal stuff.

(51:19):
We see this really interestingnarrative where we have the
truth, the Orthodox and theCatholics and actually the
Anglicans, but also, more thanthat, the various Eastern
understandings.
The way of Eastern thinkingdoes not believe that in any way
.
It's also one of the reasons,just so you know, protestantism
is one of the reasons whysecularism is such a massive
deal, because protestantism, atits foundation, um, made the and

(51:45):
the enlightenment humanism, andthen um the rise of the, of the
scientific revolution in theenlightenment.
It made the the thing that weworshipped, the deconstruction
of ideas to prove or disprovethem, and Protestantism did this
as well, and so it opened thegateway to secularism.
And now we are seeing fewer,fewer, fewer people in church

(52:09):
because we opened the door tothis is the Orthodox belief, and
I mean, I think there's sometruth in it to the door not just
to questioning but to rejectionand deconstruction.
And so I think there'ssomething very important to
acknowledge that we are in theposition where we are in in the
west because of the process ofreformation.
It wasn't all bad, but it is a,it is an.

(52:30):
It is a unconsidered outworkingof the process of reformation.
And so we find ourselves wherewe are, because in the orthodox
church you like Church, thedecline in numbers in the
Orthodoxy aren't because peopleare disbelieving or
deconstructing the OrthodoxChurch.
It's because the OrthodoxChurch is too rigid or whatever

(52:51):
it might be.
So they're leaving to findother expressions, but they're
not leaving God, as in the West,they're just leaving the church
.
It's very, very different.
Anyway, I've said a lot there.
Michael.
You carry on, tell me what youthink, anything that you pick
out of there which is like ohwow, I didn't think of that.

Speaker 1 (53:07):
Yeah, I mean you unpack a lot, I guess like I
mean, I have conversations withindividual people, so it's kind
of anecdotal, but uh, I guesslike hearing, because when I was
in in germany I had to go a lotof these uh conferences where
there was orthodox priests thereand catholics and like nuns and
um, we like are coming in.

(53:28):
It was always like a strangeatmosphere because we were
coming in as like leaders, uh,from different streams and um,
like, for example, the catholicswere like, hey, we need, we
need help like running events orwe need help like like they
would have like a like a freechurch, bring their we call.

(53:48):
They don't call themselvesprotestants, because the
connotation is like you'reprotesting something, there's
like, no, we're just free, butbut anyways, free church like
worship band would come and likeworship, like for the catholics
at the catholic event for likefor them.
And then we had we hosted likean event where they would uh, I
just laughed at it the entiretime because there's this big

(54:09):
archbishop that came.
It was a big deal like they.
They had this big like beer,like oktoberfest kind of tent
and this guy came and uh was abig deal for them, like an
archbishop in the catholicchurch.
He gave his like little preach.
And then the guy who I wasworking with like gave his like
little preach and then, uh, hewas the guy who I knew was like

(54:30):
talking about unity and then Iguess, like after the thing,
like backstage, the arch, thebishop, like grabbed him by the
arm, was like kind of likethrottling him a little bit
about what he said, because hetalked about unity and the
Catholics then served theEucharist.
Well then there's all thesepriests who go out like little
minions to give everybody theEucharist but they said, if

(54:51):
you're not Catholic, we need youto cross your arms across your
body, like this.
So we know you're not Catholicand we're not going to serve you
, but we'll pray a blessing foryou.
So it's like this whole talkabout unity but then we can't
even like uh, partake of of the,the body of jesus, together,
and so, anyways, there wasalways, and maybe it's just like

(55:13):
the roots of catholicism withinwestern europe versus like the
orthodox church has likestronger roots on the eastern
side of Europe.
I didn't get this.
I'm not trying to offendanybody, I just didn't get the
feeling of arrogance from theOrthodox Church.
So it's interesting for me likeI got it from the Catholic
Church and that's just like theindividuals who I dealt with.
Those are like I could go offon a lot of different scenarios.

(55:33):
There is a weird like biastowards like looking like we're
I don't know looking down orlike like patronization.
I didn't get that from theorthodox.
What I got from the orthodox iswe don't have time for your
like little games.
It's like we're just trying tofind god and like one guy was
telling me, um, the holy spiritstarted ministering to him out

(55:57):
of like some psalm and so hejust felt like, hey, I won't
move past this.
And so for years he was juststudying the psalm For years and
he would just like refuse,because the word of God is
eternal.
And so for him he's like wejust want to consume and consume
and consume, and we want thenew thing and we worship
knowledge and the consumption.

(56:18):
He's like what if I would juststay here with God?
And do I think that therewouldn't be anything to learn
after two or three years?
Do I think that?
And so like it's just a verydifferent mindset or a way to
like embrace, and the Westernmindset is very much about

(56:40):
consumption and regurgitation,but not really like what will
god do to me and teach me if I'mhere?
And I think it was um richmullins once said he's like the
guy who wrote the awesome godsong.
He said I am not what I believe, I am what I believe is doing
to me, and I feel like that's avery like orthodox thing, kind
of to say uh is and and you're,you're, you're when you like.

(57:00):
Talked about theosis.
I mean this is a lot of theseideas have been very central to
my journey.
It's just I didn't have someorthodox person like over top of
me like guiding me through.
It's just like uh, I would readthrough, like uh.
Authors like Brendan Manningand there's some other people
who they talked a lot aboutmysticism, which was always this
kind of.
When I think about mysticism, Ithink about like the mummy, the

(57:22):
movie the mummy of BrendanFraser and like something like
magical or whimsical ishappening Just really quickly on
that point.
The Orthodox are definitelymystics and mystics and I think
that's why Pentecostalism is theinheritance of Orthodoxy,
because I think we're allmystics.
That's what we're called to.
What I found is initially beingintroduced some of the stuff
that Bill talks about of the wayhe's unbelievably Orthodox in

(57:46):
some of the things he doesinitially, I got introduced to
some of the things he wasteaching back in 2008 and I just
never heard anybody.
Some of the things he wasteaching was back in 2008.
I just never heard anybody talkabout the gospels like this.
So I like was.
And then as you get intoanybody, like anybody who's a
teacher, a pastor, author,whatever they open the door for
you.
So, like I got into Lewis, butLewis actually opened the door

(58:07):
to me for Tolkien.
Or if I start listening toJordan Peterson, he opens the
door for me to Carl Jung.
So these people open doors.
And so as I go down the rabbithole, uh, where I got hyper
fixated on was in john 15, 16,17, where there's a really
peculiar kind of theology thatjesus is giving to the disciples
before he goes to the cross.

(58:28):
Paul, uh, builds off of thattheology.
It's always fascinating for me.
I know people personally whohate Paul.
They think that Paul hijackedChristianity as a movement and
that his theology is bunk.
He was a self-hating Jew.
Some people even believe thatPaul intentionally hijacked it.
Basically, he's like oh, if Ican't stop this movement, I'm

(58:50):
going to get into it andmanipulate people.
If I can't stop this movement,I'm going to get into it and
manipulate people.
They have really fascinatingtheories where they just don't
want to accept that what Paulwas saying about our identity,
theosis, what you're talkingabout, wasn't a Paul idea.
If you believe that, then you'dhave to reject what Jesus is
saying when he said I and theFather are one, as I and the

(59:11):
Father are one.
When you see me, you see theFather because I'm in him and
he's in me.
And as the Father and I are one, you're going to become one
with us.
When he talks about when I belifted up, I'm going to draw all
men to Myself.
When he talks about wanting toreconcile creation as well to
God, reconciliation means tobreak separation and to restore
the form of relationship.
So there's this Protestantswould accept okay, I'm a servant

(59:34):
of Christ, I'm the bride ofChrist, I'm a friend of Christ,
maybe, and I'm a son of God,daughter of God, something like
that.
But what Jesus is pointing tohere is what you're saying is a
oneness with God, where you'reactually sucked into it, like
Protestants would say somethinglike I accepted Jesus into my
heart, which Orthodox peoplewould freak out.
They're like what does thateven mean?

(59:54):
But it's like Jesus saying theTrinity, not just Jesus, but the
Trinity is going to suck youinto themself and so I'm going
to absorb you into myself.
And so, like, when you readthrough that, that's what was
being laid out.
And so for me it created acrisis, because I was always in,

(01:00:14):
uh, performance andrelationship maintenance mode
and a lot of it had to do withmy relationship, my parents,
fundamentalism and a lot of this.
But it's like keep this, keepthis, keep this.
Okay, we're, I'm good with god.
Oh, I messed up, I messed up,pray a little bit and then get
back on this level and it's likeI was trying to maintain
something that, uh, basically,if I, if, if I could never, if I

(01:00:38):
was never good enough to savemyself, I could never be good
enough to maintain it in theessence of like, uh, the way
that I was trying to to get toit, but, um, but, and also there
was no understanding of graceor no understanding of identity.
It's kind of peculiar to me thatyou said that the orthodox
people just think if you're notbasically confirmed within the

(01:00:58):
Orthodox Church, that you're notactually saved.
And I say that just because, ifI look through the progression
of the corpus of the Bible, thatthere's like this faith that
Abraham and them are maintainingbefore we get the law of Moses.
When we get the law of Moses,it gets transmuted.
It gets built upon, buttransmuted into something

(01:01:21):
different.
And then we see the Sadducees,the Pharisees, and there was
another group of religiousleaders at the time I can't
remember the name, but me andJohnny were talking about it
where he said they didn'tbelieve in animal sacrifices,
and that's where John theBaptist comes out of.
They saw the peculiarity of theanimal sacrifice, but they were
baptizing people and Jesus wasin that school of thought.

(01:01:42):
So you see these emergingschools of thought there, and if
you just glossed over you wouldsee that Jesus is embracing
what was there but building uponit in essence of like.
Paul would say like you know,if I make an agreement with you,
a contract, but you die, thenmy obligations to the contract

(01:02:02):
is fulfilled.
The contract isn't.
It's fulfilled, and so you moveon.
And so it's peculiar to me thatthe Orthodox takes the
standpoint of like if you're notunder this umbrella, god
couldn't possibly move there.
When we see God moving underdifferent umbrellas, I could
argue both ways.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
No, so just to speak to that.
I mean I don't necessarilyagree with that.
What I'm saying is that theOrthodox believe you cannot
continue on a pathway ofsalvation unless you're in the
church.
So let me ask you this, let meask you this so salvation is not
a momentary experience whereyou receive Jesus, so it's a
very different version of it.

(01:02:45):
Salvation is your journey asfar as you can get to theotic
expression of oneness with God.
It's all one thing.

Speaker 1 (01:02:54):
Well, this is the way I and, like, you're schooling
me a little bit, because some ofthis stuff this is the first
time I heard some of this stuffbut, like, from my understanding
, it's like when scripture saysthe blood of Jesus cleanses us
from all iniquities, it's inperfect tense.
It means it was happening, itis happening, it's always going
to happen, it's happening 24-7.
It's a perfect tense thing.
And so when I look at the scopeof scripture, for example, it

(01:03:22):
says the lamb who is crucifiedbefore the foundations of the
earth.
What does that mean?
It means that this happenedoutside of time, space and
matter.
God brought time, space andmatter into existence and then,
in time and history, we canpoint to a place where God was
incarnate.
He died on a cross andresurrected from the dead to
show us, to demonstrate to us,but it's always been happening
to us.
So, in that sense, when someonesays I got saved back in 1934,

(01:03:43):
it's like that's when I becameaware of what has already been
happened.
That's when I was able toaccept that I've been accepted
and so, yes, I'm as married asI'll ever be.
I can't get any more marriedthan what I am, but that dynamic
is changing.
As we like, go through lifeexperiences together and I am
perpetually becoming somebodydifferent.

(01:04:04):
I'm always me, but I'mperpetually becoming somebody
different.
So this, this union that we getsucked into, uh, for me it's
kind of like Dad's like oh, youwant to do life with me, I do.

Speaker 2 (01:04:17):
And that's why Adam and Eve are the great examples
of marriage.
Sorry.

Speaker 1 (01:04:22):
But I guess my question to you is because the
Catholics would just say youcan't accept Christ and not his
church, you can't separate it.
And what's implied or inferredby that is you have to come
under the submission of anotherperson who is in this
institution, who is going totell you what to think.

(01:04:44):
And I think that's where therub is.
It's like we would say anybodywho's following Jesus, who's
like seeking Jesus as Lord,would be a believer.
They're saying like theCatholics would at least make
the concession Tim, you could besaved, but you're probably

(01:05:08):
going to go into purgatory.
Some of them would say thatYou'll go into purgatory
probably, uh, maybe not, I don'tknow like it just depends on
the catholic talk to, but justto outright say oh sorry, I'm
just thinking out loud yeah, so,so, so, let me, can I start
from the beginning?

Speaker 2 (01:05:24):
so so, let's just go so so adam and eve um, they're
created.
Oh man, I don't know where togo with this.
Uh, there's so much stuff here,because the other thing about
the Orthodox Church is thatsymbolism is a major part of
their understanding of theology.

(01:05:45):
So Adam and Eve.

Speaker 1 (01:05:47):
let's start here.
God says to them Do you know anOrthodox person who we could
bring on here?
Yeah, sure, if they'd be opento it.
I'd love to bring somebody onwho's like, because I just feel
like if I was an Orthodox person, I was listening to us talk
about this.
I'm like, oh my God, these guys, you know, like I said, some of

(01:06:08):
this stuff it's first time forme.

Speaker 2 (01:06:11):
And I think the real issue is the definition of
salvation, of salvation beforeus, but.
But yeah, in terms of thatstuff.
But I think, um, I mean, if youwant to listen to, if you want
to listen to this podcast,there's a there's a podcast
called the orthodox ethos.
You'll find a lot of this.
I've listened to a lot of that.
So, first off, on there, I mean, you're right, probably it's
like some guy who's beenorthodoxy all his life.
Um, because I'm coming at itfrom an academic perspective,

(01:06:31):
because I'm studying for my PhD,as opposed to an experience
that lived part of it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:36):
There's like several Instagram accounts I follow,
like Orthodox dudes, and it'salways like kind of critical
stuff that they're saying, butthey have like all the good
insights.
But that's basically what hesaid.
He said a lot of people willcome like hey, I want to learn
about the service, but we'recoming like give us data, give
us theology help me, help me so,and that's what's massively

(01:06:58):
different.

Speaker 2 (01:06:58):
Because, because, because we would approach
orthodox church and say how canyou help us understand you?
And they're like no, no, we,you, you have to come and
experience.
So, for the orthodox theologyis not an academic pursuit, it's
an experience.
You cannot be a theologianunless you've experienced god,
and which is powerful.
Let me just, let me say thisjust on the theosis bit.

(01:07:18):
Is that right?
yeah, yeah, sorry I keepinterrupting you, I'm just
excited yeah, yeah, straight,and and I and I think and hear
me like I might come back to youin two weeks time ago, oh man,
you know, I read something elseand actually, like max was the
confessor, I misunderstood whathe he said, and if we do that,
I'll come back to you.
But I think one of the bigthings around the theotic nature

(01:07:39):
of human beings is number oneyou have to understand that
we're created as man gods, rightso Adam is created from dust
and, by the way, adam meansmankind, not man, human man, it
means mankind, so male andfemale exist within him, so not
within him, within adam, rightso?

(01:07:59):
So when god creates humankind,he creates humankind from dust
and glory, from dust and breath,and so we are not created the
same as just because the animalsare created simply from matter,
but we are created from matterand divinity.
So we are God-men, we'reman-gods in that sense, like if

(01:08:22):
you're a Protestant, listen tothis like your alarm bells are
freaking, buzzing so hard rightnow, and I completely get that.
But in essence, we are man-gods, like we are called to
participate.
I didn't know you guys wereMormons.
Yeah, that's right, andactually what's really
interesting is that the Mormonshave a heretical teaching on
this aspect of theology, whichis why I mean I could talk about

(01:08:45):
that if you want to.
No, no no.
Another rabbit trail for anothertime.

Speaker 1 (01:08:49):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2 (01:08:50):
But basically that's why adam, as as representative
of all humankind, male andfemale, um, not yet disunited,
but together um, he, he actuallyspeaks the names of the animals
we said this earlier on andwhat he does is that he speaks
out the telos, the purpose ofthose animals, and he co-creates
with god.
In other words, god trusts himnot to create ex nihilo, as god

(01:09:13):
did, but to create from withincreation, the purpose of
creation.
So, so, that's really important.
I mean there, yeah, I won't saythat, um, that's really
important to understand.
So then, there's no, there's nohelper, um, which is, which is,
I mean, it's, it's fantastic.
So, um, so the there's nohelper found suitable, there's

(01:09:34):
no partner found suitable foradam among all the animals.
So god takes him, god takeswoman from his rib right and
she's called eve and she'scalled etzer, um, something like
called gade or something likethat.
It's two words, etzer, and thenanother hebrew word, and that
literally translates as the onewho helps in meeting you in
opposition, right?

(01:09:56):
So the idea is that she is thecreation that points out all the
places where the human mancan't see.
So she brings to consciousnesssomething that has not yet been
conscious in adam.

(01:10:16):
Okay, that doesn't matter toomuch.
But then what happens is is thatthey are told you cannot eat
from the tree of logic and evil.
We could do any tree in thegarden, but not to the logic and
evil.
Now what's really interestingabout that is is that the
serpent comes and says did godreally say that?
Blah, blah.
And and what's interesting isis that is that eve says yes,
otherwise we might die.

(01:10:37):
And the serpent says this isthe great lie of the devil,
which you perpetuate in ourculture over and over again.
You will surely not die, um,but if you eat this fruit,
you'll become like god.
Now the protestant way ofthinking about that is and you
have heard this before is thatthat's the first lie.
It's the first lie that webelieve that we were not like
God because we were like Godalready.
But actually that might be true.

(01:10:59):
But there's also something abit deeper here, which is that
number one the devil is castingaspersions on God's character,
not just on our identity.
In other words, god is apatriarch, he's controlling you,
he's manipulating you, he isthe oppressor, the
anti-institutionalism, all thisfeminist talk about patriarchy
all stems from this moment.

(01:11:20):
And what's really interestingis that what the devil actually
tempts Eve with is not the liethat she's not really like God,
it is that she can shortcut howshe can become more like God by
eating from the tree of old goodand evil.
So here's the original purposeof humankind that we were meant

(01:11:43):
to walk in the cool of thegarden with the father to become
like him.
He wanted to teach us his ways,teach us his thoughts, subsume
us into himself.
But the human will desired notto go on the journey of
transformation but to getimmediate gratification for the

(01:12:04):
transformation from a human intothe divine.
And so what happened is is thatEve rightly perceived that the
fruit looked good to eat andhaving eaten it, her eyes were
open, she knew she was naked,she gave it to her husband, etc.
Etc.
And then they hid from God.
So what's important to knowhere is that Eve's desire to
become more like God was divine.

(01:12:25):
It was not put there by thedevil, it was divine.
So what the devil did was thathe convinced her that the way to
become more like God was toshort-circuit the relationship
that they could have had withhim walking in the corner of the
garden and instead willthemselves, as Nietzsche would
say, to power.
This is why Nietzsche is such aphenomenal prophet mind,

(01:12:48):
although he's very dark andnihilistic.
The will to power is exactlywhat's happening here, the will
to become like God, and ofcourse we know that's what
Lucifer wanted.
He failed to usurp God and as aresult of that, he now wants
humanity to usurp God for him,on his behalf and destroy
humankind.
So we think about theosis, thisunderstanding that we become one

(01:13:10):
with God.
The idea is that we become onewith God through God's rule and
law and relationship with him,not through what we can create
ourselves to become more likehim in our own will.
And so theosis is thisfoundational story of what we

(01:13:32):
are created to do and be, whichis become one with God.
So when we think aboutsalvation, we think about it in
terms of becoming one with God.
We are saved into that process.
We think, in terms ofProtestant mind, that we're
saved into heaven.
That's not orthodox mindsetwhatsoever, at least in my

(01:13:57):
understanding of orthodoxmindset whatsoever, at least in
my understanding straight.
It's actually that you're savedinto being heaven on earth and
becoming as heaven did, which iswhy jesus said be perfect as my
father is perfect.
It's why 1 peter 4, he sayspartake in the divine, be
partakers in the in the divinenature, because actually our
purpose is forever to bridge thegap between heaven and earth.

(01:14:18):
But we couldn't do it.
So who did it?
Jesus christ, the incarnateword logos, who died on the
cross.
That represented the joining ofheaven and earth and the
joining of man and man, or, ifyou would like, man and woman
back into the full creation ofwho God called us to be.
So the theosis is now made.

(01:14:38):
Becoming one with God is nowmade possible by the incarnate
Christ, by the incarnate Logos,who died, took on all sin, who
went to the depths and then isresurrected and ascends to glory
.
So outside of Jesus, you cannotfulfill your purpose of
becoming one with God, who wentto the depths and then is

(01:14:59):
resurrected and ascends to glory.
So outside of Jesus, you cannotfulfill your purpose of
becoming one with God.
But not only that you can'tfulfill your purpose of becoming
one with God unless you also gothrough sacramental procession
and sacramental transformation.
Because, for the Orthodox,baptism is not symbolic, the
Eucharist is not symbolic, theeucharist is not symbolic.
Baptism is your gateway yes, Imean, I'm here gateway into the

(01:15:20):
reality of salvation, and notonly that.
Um, the eucharist and the not.
There's the eucharist, thetransubstantive eucharist, the
eucharist that becomes the bodyand blood of Christ is what you
need to engage in heaven, onearth and continue your
participation with the divine,and that is how you encounter

(01:15:42):
theosis, that's how you engagein theosis.
It's a very, very powerfultheology, very, very different
to Protestantism, veryattractive to someone like me
who is a bit more mystic thanthey are rational, although
obviously I'm trying to processmysticism through a rational
mind and put language to it.
But I think there's somethingfor me there that's foundational

(01:16:02):
, because actually, in theProtestant world, we are told
that our, that what, what ourpurpose is is.
Our purpose is to bring peopleto know Jesus and to extend, of
course.
But our real purpose is tobring people to know Jesus and
to extend, of course, but ourreal purpose is to reflect Jesus
so perfectly that anybody thatcomes to us will meet him,

(01:16:23):
anybody that comes to us willencounter him and actually
creating disciples through that,by taking them through the
journey of baptism, theEucharist, marriage and in the
church.
It's very, very interesting.
It's very fascinating, and sofor me, I'm trying to
re-navigate the entirety of mytheology.
Just studying for three monthsof a PhD.

(01:16:44):
It's crazy.
But in answer to that question,I mean I don't know if that
answers the question, I don'tknow if that gives you any sort
of understanding of that, butthat, at least at this point in
my mind, is my understanding ofwhere we're up to.
And I think the other thing isis that within the context of
that creation story, we find thenarrative, and I mean the

(01:17:05):
details, are insane.
So when Adam is first created,he is told that you can eat of
every tree and plant bearingfruit that has seeds in it.
But to the animals, you eat theplants of the field.
Why is that important?
Because we are the ones thatcan ingest life and recreate
life as heaven, recreate thelife of heaven where we go,

(01:17:28):
recreate it, recreate how Godwants to create it, recreate how
god wants to create.
But then the curse or the curse,the consequence of sin, is that
now adam doesn't adam, god saysyou will eat of the green
plants.
So all of a sudden, outside ofgod and this becoming one with
him by walking with him in thegarden, we now no longer, until

(01:17:48):
christ, are able to participatein consistently making life
heaven on earth.
Without, without him, we can'tdo it, which is why we now we
eat the same food as the animals, and it's very, it's.
For me it's fascinating.
It's just, the symbols are very, very deep.
Sorry, I've said a lot.
Yeah you, what went off in yourhead?

Speaker 1 (01:18:08):
well, I, I well, I was just thinking about you were
talking about, like bridgingthe gap, bringing heaven and
earth whatever, which is whatBill Johnson bangs on about.

Speaker 2 (01:18:18):
It's what Pentecostals are banging on
about.
The whole point aboutPentecostal worship is that you
ascend the hill of the Lord, youmeet with God in your death, in
the death of self, in theworship of the King of Kings,
and you come back down themountain and you're released in
the heavenly realms to go andchange the world.
It's come back down themountain and you're released in

(01:18:39):
the heavenly realms to go andchange the world.
That's.

Speaker 1 (01:18:40):
it's the same principle in the pentecostal
worship saying I believe thatthe pentecostal worship is the
reformation in modernity of theorthodox eucharist, but we can
talk about that a different timeyeah, well, I think the the
expression sometimes gets hyperfixated, hyper fixated on itself
, like it gets too, and likeeven Bill said, like the more
Christianity interest in itself,the more relevant it becomes.
And I think it's about a hyper,a hyper focus on certain
expressions.
But, um, uh, no, I was justgoing to say like and I have to

(01:19:03):
wrap up here, I have a meeting Ihave to jump into, but I have
like friends who are, who areJewish, and I always like kind
of stroke their egos a littlebit, like, yeah, you guys are
God's chosen people.
You were chosen to bring heavento earth.
That was your whole deal.
You had to bring heaven toearth.
And they're like, yeah, and Iwas like thanks for giving us
Jesus, so they brought heaven toearth.

(01:19:26):
But to your point, then he'slike as the father sent me, I
now send you, and so I was adispensator Of.
You know, we see that theheaven was rendered open, the
holy of holies, with the curtainwas split from the top to
bottom.
There was a dispensation.
I'm not, I'm not adispensationalist, I'm just
saying there was a dispensation,a pouring out of of another

(01:19:48):
dimension and an invasion.
There's an invasion of anotherdimension that's layered on top
of our dimension and it peersstraight through, and so Jesus
is a bridge to your point oflike.
There's a plane of existenceheaven, there's a plane of
existence hell.
There's a plane of existenceearth, and we're spiritual
beings that can bilocate intoplaces and Jesus is opening up

(01:20:10):
our awareness of that, ourpathway to do that, and then we
just become little dispensatorsof that as we walk around and
reflections of that, which iswhat the guys in AI are trying
to do.

Speaker 2 (01:20:24):
They're trying to open the door, they're trying to
rip the door and bring inalternative life, to bring in an
alternative intelligence.

Speaker 1 (01:20:36):
Yeah, Tower of Babel 2.0, dude.

Speaker 2 (01:20:38):
Straight 100%.
And it's the desire to becomeGod without God.
It's the desire to usher in anew existence of intelligence
and consciousness without God,and it's the replacement.

Speaker 1 (01:20:52):
Can you imagine?
The second coming of Jesus hasto happen and he has to come
back as a warrior to help usfight synthetic robots like
Terminators that would be a bitepic.
Well, dude, it makes sense like,and he has to like, bring a
whole army of hosts.
Like he just rips a dimensionalportal, cause, like there I do

(01:21:12):
have to wrap up here, but like,whenever Jesus is meeting with
and moses, there's like thistheory about it that when moses
was seeing god face to face, orlike the burning bush, whatever
he actually like it was jesusstanding there talking to him.
Uh, there, and same elijah islike, because jesus is timeless,
like, yes, he was incarnate,but he just basically ripped a
dimensional portal, was talkingto him.
So in the second coming, itsays uh, behold, he comes right

(01:21:36):
in the clouds, shining like thesun.
Uh, at the trumbull's call, andevery eye will see him, even
those who pierce them.
And so it's like thissimultaneous exposure to this
event that transcends time,space and matter that the people
can you imagine?
You're like, you're crucified,you're the guy with the spear,
like poking his side, but all ofa sudden the heaven just ripped
, like, with heaven got rippedup with a crucifixion, right,

(01:21:58):
imagine like, boom, he's not onthe cross, he's up in the sky
and like everybody's likewitnessing it simultaneously.
He's never existed, ever.
And then he's like and thenwhat's also not talked about is
jesus.
There were saints that gotresurrected from the dead during
the resurrection of jesus Likewe just passed Easter, but there
are people who resurrected fromthe dead with him walking
around Jerusalem.
But just imagine that that waslike a foretaste.

(01:22:18):
He resurrects all these peoplefrom the dead and he's like now
we've got to go fight AI robots,guys, because they Anyways.
This has gone like way offtrack.
I think, like Orthodox peopleare probably upset with us, but
we love you guys.
Like to hear more.

Speaker 2 (01:22:33):
Please don't throw stones at us If we've got
anything wrong, like tell us,like we 100% From our
understanding.
Like I'm just trying to figureit out.

Speaker 1 (01:22:42):
I just lost them, dude, any like kind of small
shred of credibility or interestthat they had as soon as I
talked about Jesus fighting aholy crusade, war against AI
robots, that like they're like.
We're done with these guys.
They're cooked.
Thanks for having me.
I appreciate it.
Yeah, dude, we'll do anotherone, because we have to like
kind of close this loop in athought, but let's try to find

(01:23:05):
somebody.
Let's do transhumanism next timeand let's try to find an
orthodox person as a third wheel.
Let's try to do it alright.
Love you, buddy, love you, bye.
And let's try to find anOrthodox person as a third wheel
.
Let's try to do it All right.
Love you, buddy.
Love you, bud, bye.
May you remember the truth isnot always loud, but it is also

(01:23:26):
weighty.
May you walk with the courageto examine what you inherited
and the humility to see whatstill holds eternal value, and
may your faith not only survivethe complexity of this world,
but be deepened because of it.

(01:23:47):
If this conversation gave yousomething to think about,
something to carry into yourweek, then I'd ask you to do one
small thing Share it, send itto a friend or someone who's
wrestling with the samequestions, or someone who you
think is going to be provoked byit.
And another thing I'd ask issubscribe to the podcast

(01:24:08):
wherever you're listeningwhether that's on Spotify or
Apple, apple or wherever andleave a review, if you can.
Why?
Because this trains thealgorithm on who to show this to
, and so it gets in front ofpeople who are like you and who
are like me and, most of all,stay with us.
There is more to come and we arejust getting started.
I'm going to start multipleseries with with people I have

(01:24:31):
johnny gunta and tim church.
We're going to start anotherseries where we're going to
unpack themes throughout.
Like I said in the beginning ofthe podcast, give us some
feedback, let us know, push backon some of the things that
we're saying.
It gives us more content tocreate and kind of wrestle with
ideas that are relevant to you,the listener.

(01:24:51):
Until next time, walk wisely,stay honest and don't stop
asking great questions.
Love you, guys, peace.

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