August 13, 2025 • 46 mins
Join Pastor Joe, Tom, and Roseanne as they share conversation about the challenges of peer pressure, generational trends, and standing firm in your faith. In this hilarious and heartfelt episode, the team takes a nostalgic trip through 90s fashion (hello, rat tails and leg warmers!) while unpacking some serious wisdom about resisting societal expectations.
Key Takeaways:
- Faith takes courage, especially when it's not popular
- Wisdom means standing with God, not public opinion
- The church should be a support system that helps people resist group think
Memorable Quotes:
- "Don't be shy. Reach out. Don't wait for someone to reach in." - Roseanne
- "Having the courage to be disliked" - Tom Helmich
- "God's will is what is best for us" - Roseanne
Perfect for anyone who's ever felt pressured to conform or wants to understand how to stay true to their beliefs in a challenging world. Laugh, reflect, and get inspired!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pastor Joe Liles (00:00):
Joe, welcome to the TNC podcast, recorded in
(00:07):
studio, also known as theWorship Center at TNC, the
neighborhood church. We arecoming to you on a Wednesday,
mid of the week, and just so youknow what happens in middle of
the week today, for example, onsite, we have, Rotary coming in
for the first time, which isreally wonderful. So that's
really awesome. We have the kidsliterally talking to us in the
(00:28):
hallway, and very loud noises.
Some people call it screaming,sometimes screaming. We had a
kid knocking on the door asecond ago. We got coffee
brewing. I mean, it's just agood solid church morning.
There's bacon in the house.
There's already have acontractor coming in hot to fix
something that's going on. Solike, this is a solid church day
in the life of the neighborhood,which is Roseanne. Have you had
(00:48):
anything happened this morningalready that, since you've been
here in the hour?
Roseann Bowlin (00:54):
No, okay, that's that's a win, not anything the
ordinary.
Pastor Joe Liles (00:59):
That's a win.
That's great. Okay, so withthat, let's jump into the
podcast and do a littleintroduction on our host. My
name is Joe Liles. I am thepastor here at the neighborhood
church. And neighborhood churchstarted all the way back in 2012
and we have two staff memberswith us, starting on my left,
Director of Operations,Roseanne. Thanks, Roseanne,
that's great to see you today.
It's absolutely wonderfuljumping in. And we have a
(01:21):
segment, if you don't know,coming up later in the podcast.
Do you have your segment ready?
I do have notes. Okay, that'sgood. It's called Rose hands.
No, you have to sing it. I dohave to sing it. When table was
on the podcast, right? Man, wesing it together. You harmonize.
We hit some harmonies at somepoint, depth in there. And let's
just put it this way, I'm notthe harmony person. Table is
definitely the person who couldhit harmonies. I'm just a
(01:42):
standard melody guy like that.
That's it, right? So
Roseann Bowlin (01:46):
that means, so, yeah,
Tom Helmich (01:48):
I know what it means. I just can't do,
Pastor Joe Liles (01:50):
yeah, right, yeah. So if you don't know
Roseanne, knows Roseanne joinsus on Sunday, uh, staff member
during the week, but is here onSunday, just sitting as a church
member. So you give takeawaysfor your message, right? You
just sit and write notes duringthe message and say, Hey,
sitting out here, this is what Iheard. And sometimes it's Hey,
Pastor Joe, I heard some greatthings. Other times, a couple
weeks is hey, yeah, didn't haveany takeaways from that message.
(02:13):
So, and that's okay, that'sokay. It hit my heart, though.
But with that, we have a lot offun with that segment, because I
think it's a great identity ofpeople and how they hear the
message on a Sunday to my rightpastor of care and education,
the one, the only,
Tom Helmich (02:30):
formerly known as freckles. Ah,
Pastor Joe Liles (02:32):
Tom's, yeah, freckles. Where does freckles
come
Tom Helmich (02:35):
from? Oh, the kids.
The kids early on. Freckles,back on Airport Boulevard, yeah,
in city, when you guilted me,2014 volunteering. I don't guilt
anybody volunteering. Yeah,probably 24 called by the Holy
Spirit. 24 Yeah. Was rightbefore. It was about a year
before we chartered. Okay, so2013 so yeah, probably 2013
Pastor Joe Liles (02:52):
Yeah. So Dang, that's, that's beautiful
freckles. You got that name thenand then
Tom Helmich (02:56):
they quit calling me freckles because it was not
adult enough for them, which iskind of heartbreaking. It
Pastor Joe Liles (03:03):
is heartbreaking you get like those
wonderful I mistakenly sometimesintroduce Jess, my wife, who was
here in many different roles,but started off in kid city, and
she started off as Miss Jess orMrs. Nemo. Also right, because
she, one day, wore a Nemocostume to one of our popcorn
theologies. And so she got thenickname Mrs. Nemo, but I call
her Miss Jess. Took it down. Iwas like, Hey, this is Miss
(03:26):
Jess, oh, man, she does not likeit. She's like, a picture that
was, that was my role, like, 10years ago. And I'm like, Oh, I'm
so sorry. Another
Tom Helmich (03:34):
like, what came across my my Facebook memories
the other day. Oh, great. Apicture of you in skin tight,
pink, like cut off sweat shortsand a T shirt and your hair
spiked up and died, pink andlike glitter on your
Pastor Joe Liles (03:46):
skin. Do you want to know what failed
experiment that was? Do youremember it was epic? It got
your attention. This is whereJess got her name. So she was
Nemo, right? She dressed up asNemo, and I dressed up as a sea
and enemy. And here was here wassaying it It's hard enough here
was, here is how this wassupposed to work out and how it
didn't work out. So mind you,we're at the storefront. Okay?
(04:07):
I'm getting the back room. We'vegot trunk or treat set up. Trunk
or treats. Awesome, right?
Something we do every year, it'scoming up again this year. It's
grown substantially since wefirst started today. But so I
always dress up for it and dosomething I've done Angry Birds
and set up like a whole catapultsystem. I did a field goal
thing. I mean, we've done manswing a bat against a bat, you
know, like, I mean, just tons ofcrazy stuff, right? So I was
(04:29):
dressed up. Always have a lot offun with it. Well, this year, I
decided that Jess would be Nemoand I would be a scene enemy,
which she makes her home in,right? So it's super fun. We'd
walk around together. Be fun. SoI just said that so you could
hug her. Yeah, pretty much.
Yeah, anytime I can touch chessis fantastic, right? So, Oh,
give me a hug. And so with I hadthis idea that if I wore tight
(04:50):
pink pants, painted my hairpink, right, and a pink shirt,
and then got pink balloons, likethe long balloons you make, like
dog animals
Tom Helmich (04:59):
out of I think I was. One of the ones that got
tasked in the back of trying toblow them all up. Yeah,
Pastor Joe Liles (05:03):
correct, yeah.
So I got 100 of them right, 100of them, and my goal was to wrap
them around my body and havethem stick out around my face,
right? So I would basically havea belt around me, and they would
all stick up around my face. Andthen you could see my face
through the CN enemy. But then Iwas like a cn enemy creature.
The problem is, 100 balloons isnot enough. You would think that
would be way more than enoughthat you need popped a couple of
(05:25):
them, 100 was not enough. Idon't think we were able to blow
all them up by the time now westarted,
Tom Helmich (05:30):
because we didn't have time to we got behind on
something with the parking lot.
Pastor Joe Liles (05:34):
Oh, something was going on, yeah. And so I
ended up spraying myself, havingthe pink tights, and then, like,
20 balloons. Just walked aroundthese, these balloons, which did
not work, because I wasbasically everything pink, and
then some long pink balloons.
And by the time mine came up,the balloons were gone. They
were gone. And then kids kept ongrabbing them because they were
excited to see him. So basicallythey deleted until I had like,
(05:56):
three or four balloons. By thenight, I just looked like and
then they called me Bubble Yum,which I did not appreciate.
Like, what are you? And they'relike, Are you a piece of gum? I
was like, No, well now I am. Sothat was the see, an enemy to
bubbly. I'm year is what thatturned out to be failed. I that
was a fail. That one, I couldn'trecover. Also,
Tom Helmich (06:19):
the others have hit pretty good, though they pretty
good. That one was rough, butyeah,
Pastor Joe Liles (06:23):
Jack Frost hit really well. Calvin helped with
the staff on that one. I've doneMiss Mr. Not fantastic, Mr.
Incredible. Yeah, right, thatworked out well with Jess one
year. Did his first year thechurch, first year ever. I went
out and did a cardboard boatrace. Take that in for a second
cardboard boat race, and Idressed up as a enlarged zombie.
(06:44):
And, yeah, so, like, pillowcase,Saran wrapped around me, like,
open shirt, like, right? Thatone was a little too scary. That
doesn't work. So learned on thatone. So great. We'll have a
podcast about trunk or treatlater on, and we could talk
about all the adventures, whichis super exciting, but Tom, I
did not preach this week. Youwere up preaching this week,
(07:05):
sharing really an incredible wayof dear younger me, kind of
getting into this high schoolversion of ourselves. And what
do we need to hear is wisdom forkids going back to school. And
so if you can jump us in, into awonderful way, but before we do
that, we have to sing ourjingle, which, Tom. Can I say
out loud Yesterday, you weretrying to remember the phone
number, yeah. And you wouldn'tgive it to me. I made him sing
(07:28):
the jingle. He's
Tom Helmich (07:30):
and I got it right.
You got it got it right. You gotit right. 50 chance it could
have
Pastor Joe Liles (07:34):
been wrong, yeah. But no, you nailed it. As
soon as we got I had to sing thetone, but as soon as I sang the
tone, it's like the tone, thenit came down. Great. Yeah. So
all right, this is the jinglealso. Phone number, if you want
to call Roseanne. Roseanne, canyou just give us how you would
answer the phone if they callthis number?
Roseann Bowlin (07:48):
Thank you for calling the neighborhood church.
How can I help you today? Myname is Roseanne. This
Pastor Joe Liles (07:53):
is not just a neighborhood church phone. It's
make a friend phone like if youwant a friend, sounds like it,
yeah, if you need a friendtoday, call Roseanne. This is
need a friend line. Okay, that'swonderful. All right, here's how
it goes. 479-367-2285,
Unknown (08:10):
neighborhood, church.
Nice. Great.
Pastor Joe Liles (08:12):
Okay, we're in. That is the phone number.
Give a call to Roseanne. Tom,can you walk us through your
message on part two of dearyounger me, yeah. I figure
first, just to kind of
Tom Helmich (08:20):
break the ice a little bit, we talk a little bit
and talk a little bit about someof the dumb trends we fell
victim to because of peerpressure. Young yes, this was a
beautiful moment. I alreadyconfessed to my rat tail and
parachute pants and tight rolljeans.
Pastor Joe Liles (08:32):
So I've only seen you with this haircut,
which is, if I can just, kindof, I just want to frame it for
people, militaristic in style.
Right shaved sides, all at thetop, low on the top, a
Tom Helmich (08:42):
lot longer than it used to be this. Seriously, this
is my, like, long hair. Wow.
Haircut.
Pastor Joe Liles (08:46):
Okay, so this, I've known you the whole time.
I've known you. So when you saidrat tail, I took this same image
of shaved sides, very I mean,what I would say, half inch on
top, quarter inch on top. Alittle bit three quarter inch.
Okay, right, right on top. Sopretty much a buzz cut, right
with a little bit longer top,and then just a giant rat tail
on the bottom of this. Is thatwhat it was? Can you? Oh,
Tom Helmich (09:06):
no, this was total, like, I think I was trying to go
for like Mel Gibson and lethalweapon. Oh, but he couldn't pull
it off. But I did have the wavebangs that came out over one eye
and the rat tail. Of course, mydad is in the military, so I got
the option to either get adecent haircut. Oh, I eat this
or wear a pink ribbon in my hairto school, and I'm like, gotcha,
(09:27):
Mom, I need a ride to thebarber. Yeah, yeah. And then
once you go to this kind ofhaircut, it's hard to go back.
Yeah, it's so easy because,like, if I go more than, like,
three weeks without cutting myhair, I sweat all the time. Oh,
interesting. Like, it's just,like, my head's hot. It's just
not comfortable. Yeah, I doleave it a little longer than I
used to, because I'm not worriedabout the stuff I was worried
about before. I haven't had toput on a gas mask in two years,
(09:48):
so I leave a little bit on theside. I just take the guard off,
yeah, and just run it right downto the skin Grace a little bit
on top, because it was justvery, you know, very easy
maintenance. You know, I used.
Hour of soap for everything,including my hair. And it was
fine, but now it's like, Okay, Ican't have a little bit more
relaxed. So this is my longhair. Kind of hippie look nice,
leaving about a quarter inchsides and half to three quarter
(10:09):
on top. And yeah, as long as Ikeep it around there, I'm good.
You
Roseann Bowlin (10:13):
don't do love public servant hippie.
Tom Helmich (10:16):
Yeah, exactly.
Still kind of a gas maskfriendly haircut. But no, I had
that longer hair that the bangsthat covered would cover one
Pastor Joe Liles (10:22):
eye. Before you said wavy bangs. I just want
to put that out there.
Tom Helmich (10:26):
No, because I got wavy. I got calyx on all four
corners of the tile ahead, nice.
Okay, and so it was kind of likea cross between bangs. And like,
my wife had this, like, almostlook like, if you look on the
the oh, what's that? Juice comesin a gallon jug of like,
cranberry juice, and it's gotthis, like, wave on the Ocean
Spray. Well done. That's kind oflike what her bangs were with
Aqua net, like I was back then.
(10:48):
It's kind of a cross betweenthat and a swirly,
Pastor Joe Liles (10:52):
okay, like a little like swirly stick a
Tom Helmich (10:55):
kid's head in the toilet. Back in the day, I used
to happen to people
Roseann Bowlin (10:57):
Tom, I'm sort of picturing a mullet. Was it?
Tom Helmich (11:01):
The only thing I've seen a mullet is like, if you
imagine a mullet and you cuteverything off, but leave about
that much in the very middle, inthe back, yeah, a pinky size,
like a pinky size. How long wasit? By three to three inches.
Another went down to the collar.
I'm sure. Were you not Ithought, because I saw somebody
else do it, I thought, I'll
Pastor Joe Liles (11:18):
try again.
Yeah, not a good look. Not agood look. You know, what I love
is people don't know that youwere a police officer for 20
years, 25 years, 2525 years.
When you say that this was mygas mask haircut, without that
qualification, I love it sostrange. Like, yeah, gas mask
haircut. I see most cops havekind of pretty similar haircut.
Oh, absolutely. First time youtry to put a gas mask on, like,
with your hair, oh no. Neveragain. No, with football
(11:41):
helmets. Like, Oh, yeah. All theyears I played football, I'm
like, first thing I did at theseason start, like,
Tom Helmich (11:46):
with a gas mask to, you know, you put it on, and the
hood comes over the back, andthen these straps you wrench
back, yeah, and it just, it'sthis rubber so it sticks your
hair sticks to it, and it justwinds it up into it. Oh, no,
that's gross. And, yeah, so it'sjust,
Pastor Joe Liles (11:59):
so we had the rat tail trend. Were there a
couple other trends that youthought were not popular back in
the day?
Tom Helmich (12:05):
Yeah, I never got into the, like, the dinner plate
size, belt buckle, oh yeah,there's a lot of that, uh huh.
And then that's when I started,first seeing kind of like, goth
coming out. Oh yeah, you know,started becoming a thing, which
I didn't really get into becauseit depends on what your friend
group is. I guess that's true,yep. And so there's probably
there's probably a whole gaggleof us with rat tails and long
(12:26):
hair. It's great, you know, jeanjackets. And
Pastor Joe Liles (12:28):
now, what year was high school? So give me a
high school year for you
Tom Helmich (12:31):
see, 92 to 95
Pastor Joe Liles (12:35):
okay, 92 to 95 okay, let's, let's. Roseanne,
how about your high school? Whatwere trends in your high school,
like, oh, decade
Unknown (12:43):
earlier. Okay, that's good, yeah. So leg
Pastor Joe Liles (12:46):
warmers, leg warmers. Oh, yeah. Oh. Like, the
big, like, like, the yoga, like,
Tom Helmich (12:53):
videos, yeah, like a like, Jazzercise, yeah,
Jazzercise, leg warmers, yeah,okay,
Roseann Bowlin (12:58):
yeah. And they weren't called Skinny jeans. I
was trying to remember what wecalled our jeggings. No, no, no,
no. That's 12 years later.
That's relatively new, but itwas the jeans that were tapered
to the ankle. I mean, they weretight, yeah, but they were the
complete opposite of bellbottoms from the 70s, correct?
Yes, yeah. So those and legwarmers, big hair. But I I had
(13:20):
big hair anyway, because my hairis real thick,
Tom Helmich (13:27):
I figure there's, there's a time, like between
yours and mine where, like thewrist, the sweat bands on the
wrists and the headbands, sweatbands started to become a big
thing, like right between their
Unknown (13:40):
MTV, oh yeah, oh yeah.
Video, cube, music on it.
Roseann Bowlin (13:46):
Real videos. I mean, we would
Pastor Joe Liles (13:48):
sit for hours.
Seriously, wow. You
Unknown (13:51):
know, I
Roseann Bowlin (13:52):
had in a dark TV. Tom, you are a
Pastor Joe Liles (13:54):
person I no longer understand. You're about
to go off this topic, and I donot see you.
Tom Helmich (13:58):
DVD when they first came out, it's so dumb, like
we'd buy DVDs of music videosthat had been on MTV, yeah. And
all it was on it was, like, onesong, a video, music video from
MTV of white snake performing,like one song, and that was it.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:14):
And I'm like, what? How many times did you
watch it? No, how many times didyou watch
Tom Helmich (14:18):
it? Only a few. And that kind of got boring, you
know, because I've seen it once.
I'm like, okay, the music'sgood. I just kind of listened to
it in the background, yeah. AndWhite Snake honestly wasn't that
good for that long, yeah? But itwas different. And after a
while, I'm like, it kind of wentout, like, firehouse. Just kind
of like, yeah, gone,
Pastor Joe Liles (14:32):
yeah. It's great. What else you got?
Roseanne, what are some othertrends coming
Roseann Bowlin (14:37):
back from? Power suits for women, big shoulder
pads.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:41):
Oh, power suits. Yes, okay, I get that
yeah, because
Roseann Bowlin (14:44):
that was when Oprah Winfrey and all these
women were coming into power andso, yeah, power colors,
Pastor Joe Liles (14:55):
nice, yeah. I remember that. Yeah. I remember
the guy side, which was like,power ties. Like you could have
a power tie, right? I was nevera Thai person, but yeah, that's
my only relationship to powerclothing. Yeah,
Roseann Bowlin (15:10):
I think that's about it. Okay, yeah, those the
tapered jeans, is what I
Pastor Joe Liles (15:17):
Yeah. So I'm gonna fast forward a little bit
and bring back bell bottoms, butthey were known as baggy jeans.
So not just the bell bottoms. Wetook the bell and brought it all
the way to the waist when wecalled them baggy jeans.
Remember Jean COEs, unlike theskater jeans, oh, skater jeans
100% right, where you couldn'tfind
Roseann Bowlin (15:34):
your feet, you wore two sizes too big. So that
Pastor Joe Liles (15:38):
was also a trend, where they would hang off
Tom Helmich (15:40):
of your body. And this, these were kind of like,
imagine the legs of, like a 48inch waist pant on a 28 inch
pant,
Roseann Bowlin (15:48):
yeah, I remember seeing it,
Pastor Joe Liles (15:50):
yeah, skater shoes, right? Huge, right, fans
and all that kind of stuff. Butnot this, oh yeah, they come
back around, huge. So, I mean, Iwent through jinko face in a
really big way. And then I thinkthat was a huge trend. We had
the slap bracelet trend. Soyou're talking a little I
remember that, like slapbracelets were huge, and I was
coming up, and then, man, justother trends coming back in. I
(16:12):
wasn't, I wasn't the cool personcoming in to the school. So I
wasn't, I wasn't in all thetrends, right? But I do
remember, like Abercrombie andFitch, which still still rocking
today. I mean, Kaylee was therethis weekend shopping for news
clothes. But like that brand ofAbercrombie was 100% the 90s.
Like, if you had Abercrombieclothes, like you were another
(16:33):
level. I could only afford to goto Ross. So, like, I got
whatever the department storesent to Ross after they were
done with it, which was usuallyif I found a pair of Ginko jeans
during when I was picking thoseup. But I always felt like, as
an athlete, when I was coming upthrough school, that if I wore
Ginko jeans, I became lesser in
Unknown (16:51):
society, different value of that,
Pastor Joe Liles (16:55):
yeah, like there was nothing I could run
from, nothing I could runtowards. Like it is just kind of
shuffle. It's a shuffle. It's ashuffle. And I used to draw. I
used to draw all the time, and Iwould draw all my characters in
Jin goes right, because I couldjust draw the little tips of the
toes in a little circle becauseall the jeans were covering it.
And so it was super easy todraw. But yeah, that was our big
trend from back in the
Tom Helmich (17:16):
mess some brands I've not heard in a while. So
the jinkos and the vans, and thevans would come back in and tell
you the fans are back Skywalker,it's almost like, like that
culture that now are adults andhave jobs, ya know. And I
remember some of the brands thatI don't hear about anymore, like
everything was, was the bigthing was, guest jeans, oh yeah,
yeah, DoorDash, DoorDash. Andthen Swatch watches, oh
Pastor Joe Liles (17:38):
yeah, yeah.
Everything, everything haschanged now in a huge kind of
cycles back around. So, youknow, it has, you know what is
remained true for all of ourgenerations, for every single
one of us and the nextgeneration, Stanley Cups. Every
one of our generations had aStanley Cup. You know, it
Tom Helmich (17:53):
feels like, like was working class. Yeah. Now, I
wonder, somebody's kids carryingthem like you're not talking
about this, is there actuallyanything in there? Are they just
carrying it?
Pastor Joe Liles (18:03):
Oh, that's a good question. Yeah, no, yeah,
whatever Stanley did, well done.
Oh, yeah, when they've taken thegreen cup that everyone knew
that had your coffee hammertexture, oh, the hammer tech,
everything, right, and then madeit just everything that it is
today that every kid needs aStanley, and not just a Stanley
that's affordable. They need the$45
Tom Helmich (18:24):
now. It's a Bougie expense. It's a Bougie expensive
Stanley. And, you know, like the1015, $20 one from back in the
80s that, I mean, we've stillgot two of them on our on our
show, just as well as they didthen
Pastor Joe Liles (18:34):
they do, yeah, double wall, insulated, yeah.
And the kids don't even know.
You know what the sad part isthe kids don't know. I mean,
that's, I think the importantpart about a little bit about
the deer younger me series too,is that kids don't know that
Stanley's word these greenhammer texture cups that people
brought to the work in class.
Yes, they don't know. And yousee, like, I go out to vintage
markets now, and there'sStanley's are out there. Yeah,
Tom Helmich (18:55):
it just shows how marketing works. I mean, they
see that, and there's a longingto fit in with the crowd, yeah?
And so they, they feel like tofit in, they need to conform to
that kind of thing. And, youknow, the advertisers they, I
mean, they put a lot of moneyinto the psychology how to do
it, to get people to want to bedrawn into that, yeah, to
associate, you know, positivethings with that, yeah. And then
(19:16):
sometimes you look at itafterwards, you're like, Ah, I
feel victim to that. Was Ithinking, we have four Stanley's
in the house. I have $120
Pastor Joe Liles (19:22):
with this. $20 worth of Stanley's sitting in
our kitchen right now. I almostbought a Stanley side of the
fridge holder for our Stanleysfight. I am two
Tom Helmich (19:30):
Stanleys in the house for a total investment is
about $40 yeah, from the 80s and90s. My
Roseann Bowlin (19:35):
bonus granddaughter got a Stanley for
her birthday, and she screamed.
She was so excited. It's
Pastor Joe Liles (19:42):
a status symbol. Now, you know what else
is the status symbol? Jesus andbeing a Christian. Tom. How was
your message on Sunday? How'dyou like that transition?
Tom Helmich (19:50):
Well, so I think to get into that, we need to read
Proverbs 29 Yeah, let's do it.
That's great. And I figure withRoseanne, sultry voice, we have
her read chapter 29 verses, 25And 26 it'll just be, you know,
relaxing to listen
Pastor Joe Liles (20:03):
to. Yeah, I like that. Suck it in. All
right, let us. Let us getprepared. Roseanne, I'm excited
for this, because this is thesame votes that people are going
to make a friend with on thephone. So I just want to take it
in for a second. Okay?
Roseann Bowlin (20:12):
Proverbs, 2925 and 26 the fear of others lays a
snare, but one who trusts in theLord is secure. Many seek the
favor of a ruler, but it is fromthe Lord that one gets justice.
Tom Helmich (20:29):
Awesome. So justice, that word justice, can
also mean judgment. Ooh, yeah,so it's judgment. So it's like,
who's going to judge you? Theseare the rulers of the earth, or
is it going to be our God inheaven
Pastor Joe Liles (20:41):
does, is that the same? Sorry, I'm just gonna
is that the same that happens inthe Greek New Testament when
they talk about judgment andthen seeking justice? Right? Are
those two words synonymous inGreek? Also, I don't know the
Greek because I take judgmentand justice differently, but
it's interesting, they could bethe same word here in the Hebrew
Tom Helmich (21:02):
because I think a lot of stuff is different in the
modern, you know, with in, youknow, modern popular language.
And that's why we always have tohave new additions, you know,
new translations of the Bible.
But when you start, I mean, if Istart thinking about justice
apart from judgment, like, Idon't want, like, I don't want
like justice in the modernsense, from God, like I don't
want what I deserve. I want whatGod has decided to give me
(21:23):
through Jesus instead, becausewhat I deserve is not the better
half of that. Right. When wetalk about justice, it's usually
us wanting somebody else tosuffer something because of some
perceived wrong against us. Likewe want justice we want, almost
like revenge, yep. But in thiscase, justice, you know, is, is
this is, this is judgment. Andas followers of Jesus, we are
judged as righteous, even thoughwe're not, we get to kind of get
(21:45):
that free pass. And so I have tolook at that in the Greek.
That's, that's, that's a goodpoint, yeah, I would think it, I
would expect it to be, yeah, butI've been surprised before,
Pastor Joe Liles (21:55):
yeah, exactly.
Yeah. That's great. So take usthrough your message a little
bit like, what was, why did thisverse hit you in your message,
right? In order to share somewisdom that you would give to
your younger
Tom Helmich (22:05):
self? So when we've talked before about about awe,
being an you know, fear of God,being in awe, really meaning in
awe of God. And then, so then Iread in this, in Proverbs, it
says, you know, fear of others.
And I'm like, Okay, it's likebeing in awe of others is kind
of where I went, but it's adifferent word that's where.
That's where the Greek word offear in the New Testament, fear
of God actually means, kind ofbeing in awe of God, and
(22:26):
sometimes in the Old Testament.
But this particular Hebrew wordfor fear literally means
trembling, oh, wow, liketrembling before others being in
it's in a fearful sense, I'mbeing in fear of other human
beings, scared, scared. Yeah,right. You kind of look at it
was like scared of judgment ofother people, like peer
pressure. That's where I kind of
Roseann Bowlin (22:45):
equate that to peer pressure. That's the way I
looked at it, yeah, yeah. And itwas
Tom Helmich (22:50):
interesting. And I didn't make this a point,
because I don't really knowexactly where it goes, but just
to throw a little oddity outthere, yeah, when it says fear
of others, what they translateas others is actually Adam,
which is where you get the nameAdam, yeah, which means, but not
man as a male, as in, likehumanity, yeah. God created
Adam, the human being. So fearof Adam of humans is a snare, a
(23:16):
trap.
Roseann Bowlin (23:17):
But then so it's seeking their approval,
Tom Helmich (23:20):
their approval or or being in fear of their of
their judgment of you, right?
Like fearing the judgment ofother people, I see that. But
then, when it gets to but thethe very last verse, when it
says one gets justice from God,yeah, it actually has the Hebrew
word ish, okay, which means man,it's like woman or female is
(23:41):
Isha, and man is each okay. Sofear of other humans, you know,
is a trap. But men get judgmentfrom God, almost like, it's like
the gospel the right or theProverbs writer is thinking that
maybe men struggle with this alittle bit more than like, oh,
they think this is like, a thingthat causes there's an issue for
(24:01):
men more, yeah, because itspecifically says ish, and we
know what women are judged by,everybody's judged by God, but
almost, like, and I can see thisa little bit, like, in like,
male culture, like, yeah, menbehave in society a little
different, like, you know, we'remore worried about respect and
how we're viewed as being in aposition of power and stuff like
that, yeah. Like, maybe evenback to ego, ego kind of thing,
maybe even three or 4000 yearsago, like, dudes were like that
(24:24):
then too, maybe, yeah, you know,or it's just a style of writing
that doesn't mean that. And Ihave no idea I'm not a, like, a
Hebrew scholar, yep, I justthought that was, that was
interesting. Like, the writerthis is a little bit more
worried about men than women.
Like, maybe they're better atthis.
Pastor Joe Liles (24:39):
And I wouldn't say that women are outside of
that judgment from other women,right? If it right, if it were
to be that same type ofrelationship, right? But yeah, I
definitely feel that as a man,right, like judgment from other
men, judgment from enormous thepeer pressure, right? And not
maybe even consciously, butsubconsciously, like we're just
always in a state ofcompetition.
Tom Helmich (24:58):
We're always trying to sort each other. Yeah,
Roseann Bowlin (25:01):
you shake another man's hand? Do you
squeeze hard
Tom Helmich (25:05):
everything I've got, she
Pastor Joe Liles (25:06):
had so much discovery that you just seen her
face,
Tom Helmich (25:12):
like a respect thing, like, you know, you don't
want to shake a dead respect.
You know, it's like having afirm handshake is something
about that. Have you ever come
Pastor Joe Liles (25:18):
unprepared into a handshake when someone
went real hard on it and youdidn't expect it? Yeah? Expect
Tom Helmich (25:23):
it, mostly, was when I was younger, and I was
kind of timid about it, yeah,you know. But you know, the
thing
Pastor Joe Liles (25:27):
I can't get over with, and this is such an
ego thing that I do, and Icannot get over it, because it's
just ingrained in me now. Soshaking hands, fine, like, shake
hands, great. I'll sometimes dothe double hand just to kind of,
like, where he's you just slapthe other side of the hand too.
That's fine, you know, justremoving barriers, right,
whatever that can be. But ifsomeone ever comes up to hit me
on the side or pat me on theside, I always flex my arm
(25:47):
right. Like, whatever that.
Yeah. So like, if they go to,like, tap my side of my arm,
right, I can't not, like, flex.
And I don't know if it's like, aresponse, like, Ah, you're gonna
hit me. Played football, butlike, every time they do it, and
so someone, like, every timethey do it, and so someone like,
real nice will just come to tapme, and I'm like, oh, and I
tense up, and I'm like, what ishappening? So, yeah, that's just
my crazy and I
Tom Helmich (26:07):
wonder if this is why, when you get to younger
adults, if you look at the crosssection population across the
church, within certain agestrata, like it's almost all
women in church, yeah, and menkind of outside like they come
back in eventually, right? Butwomen are more likely to be
involved in church when they'resingle than than a man is, yeah,
(26:29):
and when doing rounds throughnursing homes and stuff, a bunch
of women in there, women livelonger, right? So more likely to
see that, but you'll see themgrouped up together and talking
to doing stuff, and all the menwere like, by themselves in
their own room, just sittingthere, staring at the wall.
Yeah. Staring at the wall. Oh,interesting. It's like, maybe
because they're and I don't, Idon't fully understand all the
psychology of that, but like,there's something there that
(26:49):
maybe as guys, we need to workon a little bit. Well, I
Pastor Joe Liles (26:51):
mean, it could be a psychology there, or could
be a response to all of thejudgment coming through all of
your life, right, where we can'tbe in spaces that might provide
judgment,
Tom Helmich (27:00):
aka church, no longer in a position to be able
to be at a perceived need ofbeing like we. We want to value
ourselves based on power we canprovide, like, strength, you
know, strength and authority.
And if, and if that's takenaway, then sometimes guys get,
you know, they get shattered,yeah, you know, then all sudden
they're, they don't feel likethey have a community group,
yeah, you know. And guys cravecommunity, but we resist it like
nobody wants to be even whenwe're inside
Pastor Joe Liles (27:23):
of it, we're resisting, yeah, we don't want
with anyone, embrace it, even ifwe haven't been around us. Yeah,
Roseann Bowlin (27:27):
I think there's a certain vulnerability to
coming to church alone. Yeah,same one. And I think, Well, I
think that men and women aredifferent. Male and female are
different. We're wireddifferently, and I think
females, women seek community,and males are the protectors of
(27:50):
the community. But if they're,if they don't perceive that they
have a community, then I thinkthat they it's they show a
vulnerability by seekingcommunity, if that makes sense,
Tom Helmich (28:04):
yeah? Like pretending like they don't need
anything from anybody, right?
Yeah, we had
Pastor Joe Liles (28:08):
an interesting moment happened. I was with a
group of men, and part of ourtime is a circle of trust, where
we share and and one of our guysshared that, you know, he was a
young buck, right? So, early,early 20s, right? And we had a
group of men that ranged fromlate 20s all the way to early
50s, right? Mid 50s. And therewas about, you know, 1012, of
(28:28):
us. And I call him a young buck,right? Because it's just your
young but, right? And so thisone,
Roseann Bowlin (28:35):
he's half your age. Oh, gosh, she said it out
Pastor Joe Liles (28:39):
loud, you know what not used to get it, yeah?
Tom, no, it still hurts. Stillhurts. Roseanne, so, but no, he
shared something vulnerableabout just not wanting to be
there. And, you know, like,things were tough, right?
Different things like this, and,you know, he didn't want to wake
up, and he couldn't get to thecommitment, right? And
everything else like that. And,and the guys kind of went
around. They're like, we'llcommit. You know, they pulled
like, the David Goggins of like,well, you just got to invest.
(29:01):
You just got to go for it. Andthat's a young reality, you
know, that's not like what we'reat and everything else like
that. And, and I stopped thegroup afterwards, and I said,
Hold on. I said, Is this howrespond to phone? And I stopped
the whole group, and I was like,Is this how we respond to
vulnerability? And I was like,we just had a person share like,
they struggle with commitment,and it's hard for them to get
out here. And, and I said, everyone of you questioned coming out
here this morning. I was like,no doubt that every one of us
(29:23):
woke up and went like, and I waslike, and yet we had someone
finally share that this is howthey react. We didn't come out
here and propose that we'restrong, you know, and that we
made it out here, and this isjust our commitment. And I was
like, No, every one of usstruggled to commit to this. And
I said, and we had a young buckteaching us how to share it, and
we all jumped on him. And I waslike, that's not
Tom Helmich (29:40):
the real all looking for a position, always
jockeying for position of power,like trying to set themselves up
in the pack and in the lift onFriday morning group. It comes
up a lot that men crave that. Imean, look at, like, a lot of
men, and like, in male sports,you know, there's the idea the
team, yeah. And I, you know, Ididn't realize that I'd found
that until I missed. It when I Iretired from the SWAT team of
(30:02):
having that kind of small tribe,yeah, when I have that group,
that working group, a lot ofguys are primarily all men and
firefighters. You know, you gotyour firehouse. It's a group,
like a tribe, a pack of peoplethat work together. It's that's
cross section starting to changea little bit. But men crave
that, yeah? And need to havethat. And it's kind of hard, the
way it is in society, and peoplelook for it, and sometimes they
find it. Ideally, they find itin the church. Yeah, and
(30:26):
everybody can the women find itin the church. But that's why
it's so important to have thesegroups, like the the small
groups, like the lift and thetable for the women and the life
groups and stuff like that, sothat people can can find their
subset of the tribe. Because thechurch gets to the point where
at one point, the neighborhoodchurch was that large group all
by itself, just that that groupand but it gets to a certain
size when it doesn't, can'treally do that anymore. And so
(30:48):
sustainable. It's notsustainable. You got to have
community and
Roseann Bowlin (30:51):
know each other, break off into packs that way
you can have you can you canfeel that support
Tom Helmich (30:55):
from one another, and get to the point where you
can trust being vulnerable withsomebody and telling them what
you're actually thinking withouttrying to think about you. About
how they're going to hear it andhow they're going to judge you
because of what they're saying.
Yeah, and that comes down tothat fear of man, right?
Everybody, when they have tohave an issue of vulnerability
or a problem or something thatthey're going to think like, how
is this going to be received?
(31:16):
What are they going to thinkabout it? How's it going to make
me look and getting past that isdifficult. If you get to the
point where you're only worriedabout God judging us and knowing
that God's gonna judge us andthat we know the promise we have
in that so we can go out boldlyin our relationships with other
people. But just because you'rea Christian doesn't mean you're
automatically gonna be thiscomplete different human being
and be completely bold andeverything. It's something we
(31:37):
have to fight all the time,because having that in the back
of our head makes us sometimeschoose things that we don't
agree with in ourselves andcause us dissonance in our own
minds about choices we makebecause we're trying to please
other people and their judgmentof us rather than what we think
is right. And that's a difficultthing, and it's harder for the
younger people.
Roseann Bowlin (31:57):
You just made the point of this entire um,
reading was that I would ratherbe judged by God on what I do,
but but rather than humans outthere, but when someone is on a
(32:19):
path that is not the way theyshould go, and it's obvious, but
it's not popular, but it's apopular way to go. Maybe I
should say then they needcorrection, because we know that
they are a child of God, we needto correct them in a way, in a
(32:40):
loving way, that is of God.
Pastor Joe Liles (32:45):
Yeah. Well, it's interesting thing. I think
about judgment with God too. Um,judgment with God is something
that I don't fear, because it'sharder for me to submit to God.
Like, judgment is something thatyou know, if you think about
being judged by a judge in acourtroom, right, like you're
standing before, like there's, apoint when you have to give over
control of that judgment, right,and you have no more say in what
(33:06):
that judgment is. Right, I findit harder to submit, and I have
more fear to submitting to God,right, and putting myself in
that place in the kingdom onearth that knows that I'm
underneath, humbly before God'spower, and that I'm still
struggling to find my place inthere right before I ever get to
judgment. Like, if I get tojudgment, great, at least I've
(33:28):
arrived before God. Like we'reworking hard, but like to
submit, though, and understandthat God's will and God's power
is what gives growth to thischurch and what gives growth to
people in their relationshipwith God. And it's not just the
work of the church. It's notjust the work of a pastor or a
Director of Operations, allright? Or when we meet with
people like it's everythingtogether. I think that
submission to God is a huge partof what is being brought up in
(33:51):
this and that was my point inweek one, was that you know your
final place is, you know yoursubmission to God, right? Helps
you understand your place in thekingdom, right? And your place
in the kingdom is before God,right, like below God, and we
have to submit to that. That's avery important
Tom Helmich (34:07):
part. I think the thing that makes it hard is
society fights directly againstit, not thinking necessarily
intentionally. But if we look atproximity of consequences, like
we know, being judged by God,submitting to God, is after the
end of this life and the nextlife to come, but what happens
at work or at school today andtomorrow is the product of peer
(34:30):
approval or disapproval, and soit brings some very real
consequences, and that'ssomething that as a society, I
think that we can do better. Weneed to do better in our own
cultures, even in the churchesand our peer groups about how we
respond to people doing things alittle different, because we
ourselves wind up inadvertently,you know, turning away from
people because they dosomething. You know, this a
(34:50):
little different because we fearjudgment from the crowd, and
then that perpetuates this, thiswhole idea of society trying to
turn people the way societywants them to. Go, you know
whether it be right, andremember what it is, and you'll
be gender, identity, sexuality.
It can be faith. It can be whatdenomination. It can be, what
you believe about thisparticular thing or that, or
just the way you want to dressor talk. But if society
(35:12):
disapproves, people are afraidof aligning with that person or
accepting them, because theyincur that judgment also. And so
now it kind of turns into thispack mentality, or where people
are afraid to just be them, bethemselves. And it actually was
going to change the reading forthe second point, because I
think this will make more sense.
It's the reading from John 12,and it's verses 42 and 43 says
(35:36):
that Nevertheless, many, even ofthe authorities, the Jewish
authorities believed in him,meaning in Jesus, but because of
the Pharisees, they did notconfess it. For they for the
fear that they would be put outof the synagogue. For they loved
human glory more than the glorythat comes from God. You know,
they they believed in Jesus, butthey were afraid to say it,
because they're afraid they'regoing to be kicked out of their
(35:58):
peer group, yeah, and so much ofthat people see, I mean, that's
what, what allows bullying andall kinds of things to happen
because they see something thatthey don't agree with, or
something they do agree with,and they're afraid to publicly
agree with it, because they'reafraid of not aligning with
public opinion. Yeah. And then,all of a sudden, the thing
that's most influential inpeople's lives is this, this
(36:21):
thing of called public opinion,that that changes all the time?
Yeah, you know, we see that inevery generation, and that winds
up having more influence onpeople than their faith. And I
think it's because of theproximity of consequences, and
if they don't have a strongfaith, a meaningful faith, and a
faith group, a tie to, like asmall group or a large group, or
a group of people in church tokeep them steady in that then
(36:44):
the most influential part oftheir life is, is peer pressure.
And so I think as a church,we've got to step up to make
those church groups and thosethose faith support groups, to
be the most dominant influencein people's lives, so they can
resist peer pressure.
Pastor Joe Liles (36:58):
Yeah, yep,
Roseann Bowlin (36:59):
the resist the flow of pressure from the
masses, because they all, youknow, that group think. They all
tend to think the same way, andthey group together because they
align their thought process whenit may be not what God intends
(37:22):
for us.
Tom Helmich (37:23):
There's a title of a book, and I like the title. I
have no idea if the books anygood. So I'm not saying go read
it, because not read it yet. Ihave no idea. But the title is
perfect, okay? It says, havingthe courage to be disliked. Have
the courage, you know, thecourage to be many great things
about the book. Yeah, I've neverread it, but that's the thing,
is, like, we're so, you know,we, we prefer in here glory,
(37:46):
right? Is this, this thing,meaning that that's in this
inherent worth or approval we,we're more afraid of approval or
disapproval of humanity than weare of God, and partly because,
like, well, there's grace andGod, right? Because we know
God's going to reach back out tous again every day, right? But
forgiveness isn't permission,right? But there's still
something has allowed society tobe have more influence over over
(38:08):
us than our than our faith. AndI think it's the Church's
position to try to counteractthat. It's still not easy, and
many churches still, you know,fall into trying to lead people
into the into the wrong thing,but getting in our own mind,
because, to me, a sign ofmaturity is when you get to the
point where you can be around acrowd of your peers that you
(38:29):
value your friends and feelcomfortable disagreeing right,
saying that, no, I don't agreewith that, and and get in a
position where you stand forsomething that they disagree
with, and having the trust tostill be, feel loved and and
ultimately, having thatknowledge of knowing that I'm
standing up for, I think Godwants me to stand up for, and I
(38:49):
don't care what the massesthink. Yeah, and to me, that's
like, to me, that's, that's asign of spiritual maturity and
maturity in someone's faith,that they're willing to go
against popular opinion to standup for something
Roseann Bowlin (39:03):
well, and we were talking before the podcast
about that saying, gotta standfor something, or you'll fall
for anything. You'll fall foranything, but sometimes you got
to stand alone, and that's not acomfortable place to be. But if
that's where God needs you tobe, that's where God needs you
to be,
Tom Helmich (39:22):
yeah, that's how, I mean, this is a little bit,
maybe a little bit dark, butlike looking back to 911 you
know? I mean, I was working as apolice officer that morning,
when the hijackings happened.
Out of all of those hijackings,there was one plane that
something was different, the onethat was trying to second one
heading from the Pentagon, yeah,because in a group like that,
one person who's perceived as athreat, everybody's looking at
themselves as an individual andfor their own and, you know, and
(39:46):
their own fear. And in thatinstance, they stepped out of
that and crashed the planesomewhere else. Yeah,
Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania,wound up not killing a bunch of
other people. It's the samething in a classroom where one
one kid is. Has a dominantpersonality, and he starts
bullying people. It just takesone person to step out outside
of the social norm and to standup for that, and other people
(40:07):
start doing it, and then nowthat person doesn't have any
power over them anymore. Thebully doesn't have any power
anymore. It's just we turn intothis flock of sheep, yeah,
instead of the sheep dog. And itjust takes that courage and that
confidence in our faith to standup and say, No, that's not
right. And, you know, I don'tcare if you disapprove,
Pastor Joe Liles (40:26):
aka, is saying that group thing can also be a
positive reinforcement, right?
If everyone leans into the samereality together,
Tom Helmich (40:34):
between group think and consensus like that. To me,
that's the the whole point ofthe the ecclesia, the church,
yeah, the gathered body is thechurch. Gathers together
everybody, united in faith, canbe a strong force to help pull
other people, other people in,whereas group think the title
just sounds like people thinkingtogether as a group. But
typically, like in the industryof like, of leadership, it's
(40:57):
always a negative, because it'smeaning the whole group takes on
whatever one person thinks,yeah, kind of, kind of
mindlessly, but you can, that'sthe purpose of the church,
right? We can come together infaith and draw other people in
and stand up for other peoplethat feel like they can't on
their own, and give them a peergroup to make them feel like
they can stand up againstsociety and be who, who they
(41:17):
really are, and and oppose thatthat group think
Roseann Bowlin (41:21):
a little bit and lean into those biblical truths.
Pastor Joe Liles (41:25):
Roseanne speaking of biblical truths,
it's time for your segment.
Roseanne notes. What was yourtakeaway from Tom's message as
you sat in the congregation, oneof the ecclesia right gathered
body, what were some of thenotes you took away from his
message?
Roseann Bowlin (41:42):
Don't be shy.
Reach out to don't wait forsomeone to reach in. Oh, man,
that
Pastor Joe Liles (41:51):
preaches all day. Yeah, better than what
Unknown (41:53):
I did. That's good.
Roseann Bowlin (41:56):
Be a living witness of God's truth. Choose
to please God rather thanpeople. Faith takes courage,
even when it's not popular.
Wisdom is standing in God ratherthan public opinion. God's will
is what is best for us.
Pastor Joe Liles (42:16):
That's nice.
That's really nice. Can you readthe God's wisdom one? Again, I
think it was the second to lastone. Yeah. To
Roseann Bowlin (42:25):
last one be a living witness of God's truth.
Choose to please God rather thanpeople. Is that the one next
one? Oh, the
Tom Helmich (42:33):
wisdom is, yes, there's one before that,
actually,
Roseann Bowlin (42:40):
Okay, I gotta find it again. I was really
writing these for me because,oh, faith takes courage, even
when it's not popular. Wisdom isstanding in God rather than
public opinion.
Tom Helmich (43:00):
Yeah, business, you know, standing in awe of God
rather than awe of humanapproval. Yeah,
Pastor Joe Liles (43:05):
I think that is wisdom. I mean, that's,
that's the tension that we liveinto daily, right, as we really
look at and that's why I wentback to that, or is it because
that's wisdom. It's notknowledge, right? It's, it's an
identity that, when we have anidentity in Christ, that's our
first identity, right? It is notwhen we lean back into what the
role thinks of us, or theposition that we have, or the
role that we have, or how thingsgo or the work that we've done.
(43:27):
It's our identity in Christ, andwhat does that mean to us at the
end of the day in personalrelationship with God, it's
Roseann Bowlin (43:32):
leaning into that Triune God and knowing that
he's with us daily. I thinkyou're
Tom Helmich (43:36):
gonna see extreme examples of that, and people
like Martin Luther with the hereI stand. We see that with
Dietrich Bonhoeffer and I'll bestanding up against the Nazis.
We can see that and theReverend, Dr Martin Luther King,
Jr, you know, we can see thatall kinds of people in society
that have, because of theirfaith, been inspired to to and
in Word, little stronger thaninspired, but like really driven
(44:01):
to stand up and say no based ontheir faith, no matter what
society tries
Roseann Bowlin (44:05):
to throw 10 bloom kind of Absolutely, yeah.
Pastor Joe Liles (44:09):
So this was great, wonderful message, second
part of dear younger me. So thisis a series where we're doing
wisdom all throughout the monthof August. We go up a generation
now. Now we're going to youngadult, young adults, maybe young
family, right? We get into thatrange, right there. You know
that good 20s range, that partwhere you would continue to tell
(44:30):
us that the boys are not fullyformed yet. 26 brains, not all
their brains, not all there yet.
The boys not plugged in yet. Soand then coming out of college,
right? So you get this kind ofentry into the workforce and
like, what would we tell ouryounger selves? And honestly, a
place where we see a lot ofyoung adults come back to the
church once they have family,right? So this is kind of an
(44:50):
absent into a comeback moment.
Tom Helmich (44:53):
I see it all the time with young dads. Oh,
they're like,
Pastor Joe Liles (44:57):
I gotta raise my child. Feel the weight of it.
Yeah. So they gotta raise this.
And so we're gonna be bringingup some of the studies about the
generations and where they're atand what we see from the youth
coming back in and differentthings like that. And then also,
how do we reach young adults? Ithink the church is notorious
for skipping a generation,right? We have great ministry up
through college, most sometimesmainly High School, and then we
skip until they have kids again,and then we go back into
(45:19):
children's ministry, right? Andwe had this gap years where
there's a there's a lostgeneration in there that the
church is not formed well around
Tom Helmich (45:27):
as men, primarily the boys of that generation.
That's true, very true, morethan the girls. And I think for
me, that's part of the reasonwhy I think there's such a
strong value in infant baptism,those young adults when they
start having families, yeah,because the infants being
baptized, but the parents aretaking an oath before God to do
certain things, to raise them infaith, and raise them in faith
in life, and they're makingthese commitments to the church
(45:48):
as a communal aspect that Ithink is absent in some other
denominations that don't doinfant baptism. And we, we kind
of lose out on that a little bitwithout it. Yep. Well, it's a
Pastor Joe Liles (45:58):
beautiful moment. So if you're interested
in a little bit more wisdom aswe're coming out of this. And
you remember younger self thatneeded that wisdom. If you know
someone who is a younger self,or if this is you, if this is
you, yeah, that's better. Ifyou're listening to this podcast
right now and
Tom Helmich (46:12):
you're like, ooh, for next week, might be some
epic cheat codes, yeah, do lifebetter?
Pastor Joe Liles (46:16):
There you go.
I like it. I like it. And allguys, people said, Amen, amen.
You you.
Joe, welcome to the TNC podcast, recorded in
(00:07):
studio, also known as theWorship Center at TNC, the
neighborhood church. We arecoming to you on a Wednesday,
mid of the week, and just so youknow what happens in middle of
the week today, for example, onsite, we have, Rotary coming in
for the first time, which isreally wonderful. So that's
really awesome. We have the kidsliterally talking to us in the
(00:28):
hallway, and very loud noises.
Some people call it screaming,sometimes screaming. We had a
kid knocking on the door asecond ago. We got coffee
brewing. I mean, it's just agood solid church morning.
There's bacon in the house.
There's already have acontractor coming in hot to fix
something that's going on. Solike, this is a solid church day
in the life of the neighborhood,which is Roseanne. Have you had
(00:48):
anything happened this morningalready that, since you've been
here in the hour?
Roseann Bowlin (00:54):
No, okay, that's that's a win, not anything the
ordinary.
Pastor Joe Liles (00:59):
That's a win.
That's great. Okay, so withthat, let's jump into the
podcast and do a littleintroduction on our host. My
name is Joe Liles. I am thepastor here at the neighborhood
church. And neighborhood churchstarted all the way back in 2012
and we have two staff memberswith us, starting on my left,
Director of Operations,Roseanne. Thanks, Roseanne,
that's great to see you today.
It's absolutely wonderfuljumping in. And we have a
(01:21):
segment, if you don't know,coming up later in the podcast.
Do you have your segment ready?
I do have notes. Okay, that'sgood. It's called Rose hands.
No, you have to sing it. I dohave to sing it. When table was
on the podcast, right? Man, wesing it together. You harmonize.
We hit some harmonies at somepoint, depth in there. And let's
just put it this way, I'm notthe harmony person. Table is
definitely the person who couldhit harmonies. I'm just a
(01:42):
standard melody guy like that.
That's it, right? So
Roseann Bowlin (01:46):
that means, so, yeah,
Tom Helmich (01:48):
I know what it means. I just can't do,
Pastor Joe Liles (01:50):
yeah, right, yeah. So if you don't know
Roseanne, knows Roseanne joinsus on Sunday, uh, staff member
during the week, but is here onSunday, just sitting as a church
member. So you give takeawaysfor your message, right? You
just sit and write notes duringthe message and say, Hey,
sitting out here, this is what Iheard. And sometimes it's Hey,
Pastor Joe, I heard some greatthings. Other times, a couple
weeks is hey, yeah, didn't haveany takeaways from that message.
(02:13):
So, and that's okay, that'sokay. It hit my heart, though.
But with that, we have a lot offun with that segment, because I
think it's a great identity ofpeople and how they hear the
message on a Sunday to my rightpastor of care and education,
the one, the only,
Tom Helmich (02:30):
formerly known as freckles. Ah,
Pastor Joe Liles (02:32):
Tom's, yeah, freckles. Where does freckles
come
Tom Helmich (02:35):
from? Oh, the kids.
The kids early on. Freckles,back on Airport Boulevard, yeah,
in city, when you guilted me,2014 volunteering. I don't guilt
anybody volunteering. Yeah,probably 24 called by the Holy
Spirit. 24 Yeah. Was rightbefore. It was about a year
before we chartered. Okay, so2013 so yeah, probably 2013
Pastor Joe Liles (02:52):
Yeah. So Dang, that's, that's beautiful
freckles. You got that name thenand then
Tom Helmich (02:56):
they quit calling me freckles because it was not
adult enough for them, which iskind of heartbreaking. It
Pastor Joe Liles (03:03):
is heartbreaking you get like those
wonderful I mistakenly sometimesintroduce Jess, my wife, who was
here in many different roles,but started off in kid city, and
she started off as Miss Jess orMrs. Nemo. Also right, because
she, one day, wore a Nemocostume to one of our popcorn
theologies. And so she got thenickname Mrs. Nemo, but I call
her Miss Jess. Took it down. Iwas like, Hey, this is Miss
(03:26):
Jess, oh, man, she does not likeit. She's like, a picture that
was, that was my role, like, 10years ago. And I'm like, Oh, I'm
so sorry. Another
Tom Helmich (03:34):
like, what came across my my Facebook memories
the other day. Oh, great. Apicture of you in skin tight,
pink, like cut off sweat shortsand a T shirt and your hair
spiked up and died, pink andlike glitter on your
Pastor Joe Liles (03:46):
skin. Do you want to know what failed
experiment that was? Do youremember it was epic? It got
your attention. This is whereJess got her name. So she was
Nemo, right? She dressed up asNemo, and I dressed up as a sea
and enemy. And here was here wassaying it It's hard enough here
was, here is how this wassupposed to work out and how it
didn't work out. So mind you,we're at the storefront. Okay?
(04:07):
I'm getting the back room. We'vegot trunk or treat set up. Trunk
or treats. Awesome, right?
Something we do every year, it'scoming up again this year. It's
grown substantially since wefirst started today. But so I
always dress up for it and dosomething I've done Angry Birds
and set up like a whole catapultsystem. I did a field goal
thing. I mean, we've done manswing a bat against a bat, you
know, like, I mean, just tons ofcrazy stuff, right? So I was
(04:29):
dressed up. Always have a lot offun with it. Well, this year, I
decided that Jess would be Nemoand I would be a scene enemy,
which she makes her home in,right? So it's super fun. We'd
walk around together. Be fun. SoI just said that so you could
hug her. Yeah, pretty much.
Yeah, anytime I can touch chessis fantastic, right? So, Oh,
give me a hug. And so with I hadthis idea that if I wore tight
(04:50):
pink pants, painted my hairpink, right, and a pink shirt,
and then got pink balloons, likethe long balloons you make, like
dog animals
Tom Helmich (04:59):
out of I think I was. One of the ones that got
tasked in the back of trying toblow them all up. Yeah,
Pastor Joe Liles (05:03):
correct, yeah.
So I got 100 of them right, 100of them, and my goal was to wrap
them around my body and havethem stick out around my face,
right? So I would basically havea belt around me, and they would
all stick up around my face. Andthen you could see my face
through the CN enemy. But then Iwas like a cn enemy creature.
The problem is, 100 balloons isnot enough. You would think that
would be way more than enoughthat you need popped a couple of
(05:25):
them, 100 was not enough. Idon't think we were able to blow
all them up by the time now westarted,
Tom Helmich (05:30):
because we didn't have time to we got behind on
something with the parking lot.
Pastor Joe Liles (05:34):
Oh, something was going on, yeah. And so I
ended up spraying myself, havingthe pink tights, and then, like,
20 balloons. Just walked aroundthese, these balloons, which did
not work, because I wasbasically everything pink, and
then some long pink balloons.
And by the time mine came up,the balloons were gone. They
were gone. And then kids kept ongrabbing them because they were
excited to see him. So basicallythey deleted until I had like,
(05:56):
three or four balloons. By thenight, I just looked like and
then they called me Bubble Yum,which I did not appreciate.
Like, what are you? And they'relike, Are you a piece of gum? I
was like, No, well now I am. Sothat was the see, an enemy to
bubbly. I'm year is what thatturned out to be failed. I that
was a fail. That one, I couldn'trecover. Also,
Tom Helmich (06:19):
the others have hit pretty good, though they pretty
good. That one was rough, butyeah,
Pastor Joe Liles (06:23):
Jack Frost hit really well. Calvin helped with
the staff on that one. I've doneMiss Mr. Not fantastic, Mr.
Incredible. Yeah, right, thatworked out well with Jess one
year. Did his first year thechurch, first year ever. I went
out and did a cardboard boatrace. Take that in for a second
cardboard boat race, and Idressed up as a enlarged zombie.
(06:44):
And, yeah, so, like, pillowcase,Saran wrapped around me, like,
open shirt, like, right? Thatone was a little too scary. That
doesn't work. So learned on thatone. So great. We'll have a
podcast about trunk or treatlater on, and we could talk
about all the adventures, whichis super exciting, but Tom, I
did not preach this week. Youwere up preaching this week,
(07:05):
sharing really an incredible wayof dear younger me, kind of
getting into this high schoolversion of ourselves. And what
do we need to hear is wisdom forkids going back to school. And
so if you can jump us in, into awonderful way, but before we do
that, we have to sing ourjingle, which, Tom. Can I say
out loud Yesterday, you weretrying to remember the phone
number, yeah. And you wouldn'tgive it to me. I made him sing
(07:28):
the jingle. He's
Tom Helmich (07:30):
and I got it right.
You got it got it right. You gotit right. 50 chance it could
have
Pastor Joe Liles (07:34):
been wrong, yeah. But no, you nailed it. As
soon as we got I had to sing thetone, but as soon as I sang the
tone, it's like the tone, thenit came down. Great. Yeah. So
all right, this is the jinglealso. Phone number, if you want
to call Roseanne. Roseanne, canyou just give us how you would
answer the phone if they callthis number?
Roseann Bowlin (07:48):
Thank you for calling the neighborhood church.
How can I help you today? Myname is Roseanne. This
Pastor Joe Liles (07:53):
is not just a neighborhood church phone. It's
make a friend phone like if youwant a friend, sounds like it,
yeah, if you need a friendtoday, call Roseanne. This is
need a friend line. Okay, that'swonderful. All right, here's how
it goes. 479-367-2285,
Unknown (08:10):
neighborhood, church.
Nice. Great.
Pastor Joe Liles (08:12):
Okay, we're in. That is the phone number.
Give a call to Roseanne. Tom,can you walk us through your
message on part two of dearyounger me, yeah. I figure
first, just to kind of
Tom Helmich (08:20):
break the ice a little bit, we talk a little bit
and talk a little bit about someof the dumb trends we fell
victim to because of peerpressure. Young yes, this was a
beautiful moment. I alreadyconfessed to my rat tail and
parachute pants and tight rolljeans.
Pastor Joe Liles (08:32):
So I've only seen you with this haircut,
which is, if I can just, kindof, I just want to frame it for
people, militaristic in style.
Right shaved sides, all at thetop, low on the top, a
Tom Helmich (08:42):
lot longer than it used to be this. Seriously, this
is my, like, long hair. Wow.
Haircut.
Pastor Joe Liles (08:46):
Okay, so this, I've known you the whole time.
I've known you. So when you saidrat tail, I took this same image
of shaved sides, very I mean,what I would say, half inch on
top, quarter inch on top. Alittle bit three quarter inch.
Okay, right, right on top. Sopretty much a buzz cut, right
with a little bit longer top,and then just a giant rat tail
on the bottom of this. Is thatwhat it was? Can you? Oh,
Tom Helmich (09:06):
no, this was total, like, I think I was trying to go
for like Mel Gibson and lethalweapon. Oh, but he couldn't pull
it off. But I did have the wavebangs that came out over one eye
and the rat tail. Of course, mydad is in the military, so I got
the option to either get adecent haircut. Oh, I eat this
or wear a pink ribbon in my hairto school, and I'm like, gotcha,
(09:27):
Mom, I need a ride to thebarber. Yeah, yeah. And then
once you go to this kind ofhaircut, it's hard to go back.
Yeah, it's so easy because,like, if I go more than, like,
three weeks without cutting myhair, I sweat all the time. Oh,
interesting. Like, it's just,like, my head's hot. It's just
not comfortable. Yeah, I doleave it a little longer than I
used to, because I'm not worriedabout the stuff I was worried
about before. I haven't had toput on a gas mask in two years,
(09:48):
so I leave a little bit on theside. I just take the guard off,
yeah, and just run it right downto the skin Grace a little bit
on top, because it was justvery, you know, very easy
maintenance. You know, I used.
Hour of soap for everything,including my hair. And it was
fine, but now it's like, Okay, Ican't have a little bit more
relaxed. So this is my longhair. Kind of hippie look nice,
leaving about a quarter inchsides and half to three quarter
(10:09):
on top. And yeah, as long as Ikeep it around there, I'm good.
You
Roseann Bowlin (10:13):
don't do love public servant hippie.
Tom Helmich (10:16):
Yeah, exactly.
Still kind of a gas maskfriendly haircut. But no, I had
that longer hair that the bangsthat covered would cover one
Pastor Joe Liles (10:22):
eye. Before you said wavy bangs. I just want
to put that out there.
Tom Helmich (10:26):
No, because I got wavy. I got calyx on all four
corners of the tile ahead, nice.
Okay, and so it was kind of likea cross between bangs. And like,
my wife had this, like, almostlook like, if you look on the
the oh, what's that? Juice comesin a gallon jug of like,
cranberry juice, and it's gotthis, like, wave on the Ocean
Spray. Well done. That's kind oflike what her bangs were with
Aqua net, like I was back then.
(10:48):
It's kind of a cross betweenthat and a swirly,
Pastor Joe Liles (10:52):
okay, like a little like swirly stick a
Tom Helmich (10:55):
kid's head in the toilet. Back in the day, I used
to happen to people
Roseann Bowlin (10:57):
Tom, I'm sort of picturing a mullet. Was it?
Tom Helmich (11:01):
The only thing I've seen a mullet is like, if you
imagine a mullet and you cuteverything off, but leave about
that much in the very middle, inthe back, yeah, a pinky size,
like a pinky size. How long wasit? By three to three inches.
Another went down to the collar.
I'm sure. Were you not Ithought, because I saw somebody
else do it, I thought, I'll
Pastor Joe Liles (11:18):
try again.
Yeah, not a good look. Not agood look. You know, what I love
is people don't know that youwere a police officer for 20
years, 25 years, 2525 years.
When you say that this was mygas mask haircut, without that
qualification, I love it sostrange. Like, yeah, gas mask
haircut. I see most cops havekind of pretty similar haircut.
Oh, absolutely. First time youtry to put a gas mask on, like,
with your hair, oh no. Neveragain. No, with football
(11:41):
helmets. Like, Oh, yeah. All theyears I played football, I'm
like, first thing I did at theseason start, like,
Tom Helmich (11:46):
with a gas mask to, you know, you put it on, and the
hood comes over the back, andthen these straps you wrench
back, yeah, and it just, it'sthis rubber so it sticks your
hair sticks to it, and it justwinds it up into it. Oh, no,
that's gross. And, yeah, so it'sjust,
Pastor Joe Liles (11:59):
so we had the rat tail trend. Were there a
couple other trends that youthought were not popular back in
the day?
Tom Helmich (12:05):
Yeah, I never got into the, like, the dinner plate
size, belt buckle, oh yeah,there's a lot of that, uh huh.
And then that's when I started,first seeing kind of like, goth
coming out. Oh yeah, you know,started becoming a thing, which
I didn't really get into becauseit depends on what your friend
group is. I guess that's true,yep. And so there's probably
there's probably a whole gaggleof us with rat tails and long
(12:26):
hair. It's great, you know, jeanjackets. And
Pastor Joe Liles (12:28):
now, what year was high school? So give me a
high school year for you
Tom Helmich (12:31):
see, 92 to 95
Pastor Joe Liles (12:35):
okay, 92 to 95 okay, let's, let's. Roseanne,
how about your high school? Whatwere trends in your high school,
like, oh, decade
Unknown (12:43):
earlier. Okay, that's good, yeah. So leg
Pastor Joe Liles (12:46):
warmers, leg warmers. Oh, yeah. Oh. Like, the
big, like, like, the yoga, like,
Tom Helmich (12:53):
videos, yeah, like a like, Jazzercise, yeah,
Jazzercise, leg warmers, yeah,okay,
Roseann Bowlin (12:58):
yeah. And they weren't called Skinny jeans. I
was trying to remember what wecalled our jeggings. No, no, no,
no. That's 12 years later.
That's relatively new, but itwas the jeans that were tapered
to the ankle. I mean, they weretight, yeah, but they were the
complete opposite of bellbottoms from the 70s, correct?
Yes, yeah. So those and legwarmers, big hair. But I I had
(13:20):
big hair anyway, because my hairis real thick,
Tom Helmich (13:27):
I figure there's, there's a time, like between
yours and mine where, like thewrist, the sweat bands on the
wrists and the headbands, sweatbands started to become a big
thing, like right between their
Unknown (13:40):
MTV, oh yeah, oh yeah.
Video, cube, music on it.
Roseann Bowlin (13:46):
Real videos. I mean, we would
Pastor Joe Liles (13:48):
sit for hours.
Seriously, wow. You
Unknown (13:51):
know, I
Roseann Bowlin (13:52):
had in a dark TV. Tom, you are a
Pastor Joe Liles (13:54):
person I no longer understand. You're about
to go off this topic, and I donot see you.
Tom Helmich (13:58):
DVD when they first came out, it's so dumb, like
we'd buy DVDs of music videosthat had been on MTV, yeah. And
all it was on it was, like, onesong, a video, music video from
MTV of white snake performing,like one song, and that was it.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:14):
And I'm like, what? How many times did you
watch it? No, how many times didyou watch
Tom Helmich (14:18):
it? Only a few. And that kind of got boring, you
know, because I've seen it once.
I'm like, okay, the music'sgood. I just kind of listened to
it in the background, yeah. AndWhite Snake honestly wasn't that
good for that long, yeah? But itwas different. And after a
while, I'm like, it kind of wentout, like, firehouse. Just kind
of like, yeah, gone,
Pastor Joe Liles (14:32):
yeah. It's great. What else you got?
Roseanne, what are some othertrends coming
Roseann Bowlin (14:37):
back from? Power suits for women, big shoulder
pads.
Pastor Joe Liles (14:41):
Oh, power suits. Yes, okay, I get that
yeah, because
Roseann Bowlin (14:44):
that was when Oprah Winfrey and all these
women were coming into power andso, yeah, power colors,
Pastor Joe Liles (14:55):
nice, yeah. I remember that. Yeah. I remember
the guy side, which was like,power ties. Like you could have
a power tie, right? I was nevera Thai person, but yeah, that's
my only relationship to powerclothing. Yeah,
Roseann Bowlin (15:10):
I think that's about it. Okay, yeah, those the
tapered jeans, is what I
Pastor Joe Liles (15:17):
Yeah. So I'm gonna fast forward a little bit
and bring back bell bottoms, butthey were known as baggy jeans.
So not just the bell bottoms. Wetook the bell and brought it all
the way to the waist when wecalled them baggy jeans.
Remember Jean COEs, unlike theskater jeans, oh, skater jeans
100% right, where you couldn'tfind
Roseann Bowlin (15:34):
your feet, you wore two sizes too big. So that
Pastor Joe Liles (15:38):
was also a trend, where they would hang off
Tom Helmich (15:40):
of your body. And this, these were kind of like,
imagine the legs of, like a 48inch waist pant on a 28 inch
pant,
Roseann Bowlin (15:48):
yeah, I remember seeing it,
Pastor Joe Liles (15:50):
yeah, skater shoes, right? Huge, right, fans
and all that kind of stuff. Butnot this, oh yeah, they come
back around, huge. So, I mean, Iwent through jinko face in a
really big way. And then I thinkthat was a huge trend. We had
the slap bracelet trend. Soyou're talking a little I
remember that, like slapbracelets were huge, and I was
coming up, and then, man, justother trends coming back in. I
(16:12):
wasn't, I wasn't the cool personcoming in to the school. So I
wasn't, I wasn't in all thetrends, right? But I do
remember, like Abercrombie andFitch, which still still rocking
today. I mean, Kaylee was therethis weekend shopping for news
clothes. But like that brand ofAbercrombie was 100% the 90s.
Like, if you had Abercrombieclothes, like you were another
(16:33):
level. I could only afford to goto Ross. So, like, I got
whatever the department storesent to Ross after they were
done with it, which was usuallyif I found a pair of Ginko jeans
during when I was picking thoseup. But I always felt like, as
an athlete, when I was coming upthrough school, that if I wore
Ginko jeans, I became lesser in
Unknown (16:51):
society, different value of that,
Pastor Joe Liles (16:55):
yeah, like there was nothing I could run
from, nothing I could runtowards. Like it is just kind of
shuffle. It's a shuffle. It's ashuffle. And I used to draw. I
used to draw all the time, and Iwould draw all my characters in
Jin goes right, because I couldjust draw the little tips of the
toes in a little circle becauseall the jeans were covering it.
And so it was super easy todraw. But yeah, that was our big
trend from back in the
Tom Helmich (17:16):
mess some brands I've not heard in a while. So
the jinkos and the vans, and thevans would come back in and tell
you the fans are back Skywalker,it's almost like, like that
culture that now are adults andhave jobs, ya know. And I
remember some of the brands thatI don't hear about anymore, like
everything was, was the bigthing was, guest jeans, oh yeah,
yeah, DoorDash, DoorDash. Andthen Swatch watches, oh
Pastor Joe Liles (17:38):
yeah, yeah.
Everything, everything haschanged now in a huge kind of
cycles back around. So, youknow, it has, you know what is
remained true for all of ourgenerations, for every single
one of us and the nextgeneration, Stanley Cups. Every
one of our generations had aStanley Cup. You know, it
Tom Helmich (17:53):
feels like, like was working class. Yeah. Now, I
wonder, somebody's kids carryingthem like you're not talking
about this, is there actuallyanything in there? Are they just
carrying it?
Pastor Joe Liles (18:03):
Oh, that's a good question. Yeah, no, yeah,
whatever Stanley did, well done.
Oh, yeah, when they've taken thegreen cup that everyone knew
that had your coffee hammertexture, oh, the hammer tech,
everything, right, and then madeit just everything that it is
today that every kid needs aStanley, and not just a Stanley
that's affordable. They need the$45
Tom Helmich (18:24):
now. It's a Bougie expense. It's a Bougie expensive
Stanley. And, you know, like the1015, $20 one from back in the
80s that, I mean, we've stillgot two of them on our on our
show, just as well as they didthen
Pastor Joe Liles (18:34):
they do, yeah, double wall, insulated, yeah.
And the kids don't even know.
You know what the sad part isthe kids don't know. I mean,
that's, I think the importantpart about a little bit about
the deer younger me series too,is that kids don't know that
Stanley's word these greenhammer texture cups that people
brought to the work in class.
Yes, they don't know. And yousee, like, I go out to vintage
markets now, and there'sStanley's are out there. Yeah,
Tom Helmich (18:55):
it just shows how marketing works. I mean, they
see that, and there's a longingto fit in with the crowd, yeah?
And so they, they feel like tofit in, they need to conform to
that kind of thing. And, youknow, the advertisers they, I
mean, they put a lot of moneyinto the psychology how to do
it, to get people to want to bedrawn into that, yeah, to
associate, you know, positivethings with that, yeah. And then
(19:16):
sometimes you look at itafterwards, you're like, Ah, I
feel victim to that. Was Ithinking, we have four Stanley's
in the house. I have $120
Pastor Joe Liles (19:22):
with this. $20 worth of Stanley's sitting in
our kitchen right now. I almostbought a Stanley side of the
fridge holder for our Stanleysfight. I am two
Tom Helmich (19:30):
Stanleys in the house for a total investment is
about $40 yeah, from the 80s and90s. My
Roseann Bowlin (19:35):
bonus granddaughter got a Stanley for
her birthday, and she screamed.
She was so excited. It's
Pastor Joe Liles (19:42):
a status symbol. Now, you know what else
is the status symbol? Jesus andbeing a Christian. Tom. How was
your message on Sunday? How'dyou like that transition?
Tom Helmich (19:50):
Well, so I think to get into that, we need to read
Proverbs 29 Yeah, let's do it.
That's great. And I figure withRoseanne, sultry voice, we have
her read chapter 29 verses, 25And 26 it'll just be, you know,
relaxing to listen
Pastor Joe Liles (20:03):
to. Yeah, I like that. Suck it in. All
right, let us. Let us getprepared. Roseanne, I'm excited
for this, because this is thesame votes that people are going
to make a friend with on thephone. So I just want to take it
in for a second. Okay?
Roseann Bowlin (20:12):
Proverbs, 2925 and 26 the fear of others lays a
snare, but one who trusts in theLord is secure. Many seek the
favor of a ruler, but it is fromthe Lord that one gets justice.
Tom Helmich (20:29):
Awesome. So justice, that word justice, can
also mean judgment. Ooh, yeah,so it's judgment. So it's like,
who's going to judge you? Theseare the rulers of the earth, or
is it going to be our God inheaven
Pastor Joe Liles (20:41):
does, is that the same? Sorry, I'm just gonna
is that the same that happens inthe Greek New Testament when
they talk about judgment andthen seeking justice? Right? Are
those two words synonymous inGreek? Also, I don't know the
Greek because I take judgmentand justice differently, but
it's interesting, they could bethe same word here in the Hebrew
Tom Helmich (21:02):
because I think a lot of stuff is different in the
modern, you know, with in, youknow, modern popular language.
And that's why we always have tohave new additions, you know,
new translations of the Bible.
But when you start, I mean, if Istart thinking about justice
apart from judgment, like, Idon't want, like, I don't want
like justice in the modernsense, from God, like I don't
want what I deserve. I want whatGod has decided to give me
(21:23):
through Jesus instead, becausewhat I deserve is not the better
half of that. Right. When wetalk about justice, it's usually
us wanting somebody else tosuffer something because of some
perceived wrong against us. Likewe want justice we want, almost
like revenge, yep. But in thiscase, justice, you know, is, is
this is, this is judgment. Andas followers of Jesus, we are
judged as righteous, even thoughwe're not, we get to kind of get
(21:45):
that free pass. And so I have tolook at that in the Greek.
That's, that's, that's a goodpoint, yeah, I would think it, I
would expect it to be, yeah, butI've been surprised before,
Pastor Joe Liles (21:55):
yeah, exactly.
Yeah. That's great. So take usthrough your message a little
bit like, what was, why did thisverse hit you in your message,
right? In order to share somewisdom that you would give to
your younger
Tom Helmich (22:05):
self? So when we've talked before about about awe,
being an you know, fear of God,being in awe, really meaning in
awe of God. And then, so then Iread in this, in Proverbs, it
says, you know, fear of others.
And I'm like, Okay, it's likebeing in awe of others is kind
of where I went, but it's adifferent word that's where.
That's where the Greek word offear in the New Testament, fear
of God actually means, kind ofbeing in awe of God, and
(22:26):
sometimes in the Old Testament.
But this particular Hebrew wordfor fear literally means
trembling, oh, wow, liketrembling before others being in
it's in a fearful sense, I'mbeing in fear of other human
beings, scared, scared. Yeah,right. You kind of look at it
was like scared of judgment ofother people, like peer
pressure. That's where I kind of
Roseann Bowlin (22:45):
equate that to peer pressure. That's the way I
looked at it, yeah, yeah. And itwas
Tom Helmich (22:50):
interesting. And I didn't make this a point,
because I don't really knowexactly where it goes, but just
to throw a little oddity outthere, yeah, when it says fear
of others, what they translateas others is actually Adam,
which is where you get the nameAdam, yeah, which means, but not
man as a male, as in, likehumanity, yeah. God created
Adam, the human being. So fearof Adam of humans is a snare, a
(23:16):
trap.
Roseann Bowlin (23:17):
But then so it's seeking their approval,
Tom Helmich (23:20):
their approval or or being in fear of their of
their judgment of you, right?
Like fearing the judgment ofother people, I see that. But
then, when it gets to but thethe very last verse, when it
says one gets justice from God,yeah, it actually has the Hebrew
word ish, okay, which means man,it's like woman or female is
(23:41):
Isha, and man is each okay. Sofear of other humans, you know,
is a trap. But men get judgmentfrom God, almost like, it's like
the gospel the right or theProverbs writer is thinking that
maybe men struggle with this alittle bit more than like, oh,
they think this is like, a thingthat causes there's an issue for
(24:01):
men more, yeah, because itspecifically says ish, and we
know what women are judged by,everybody's judged by God, but
almost, like, and I can see thisa little bit, like, in like,
male culture, like, yeah, menbehave in society a little
different, like, you know, we'remore worried about respect and
how we're viewed as being in aposition of power and stuff like
that, yeah. Like, maybe evenback to ego, ego kind of thing,
maybe even three or 4000 yearsago, like, dudes were like that
(24:24):
then too, maybe, yeah, you know,or it's just a style of writing
that doesn't mean that. And Ihave no idea I'm not a, like, a
Hebrew scholar, yep, I justthought that was, that was
interesting. Like, the writerthis is a little bit more
worried about men than women.
Like, maybe they're better atthis.
Pastor Joe Liles (24:39):
And I wouldn't say that women are outside of
that judgment from other women,right? If it right, if it were
to be that same type ofrelationship, right? But yeah, I
definitely feel that as a man,right, like judgment from other
men, judgment from enormous thepeer pressure, right? And not
maybe even consciously, butsubconsciously, like we're just
always in a state ofcompetition.
Tom Helmich (24:58):
We're always trying to sort each other. Yeah,
Roseann Bowlin (25:01):
you shake another man's hand? Do you
squeeze hard
Tom Helmich (25:05):
everything I've got, she
Pastor Joe Liles (25:06):
had so much discovery that you just seen her
face,
Tom Helmich (25:12):
like a respect thing, like, you know, you don't
want to shake a dead respect.
You know, it's like having afirm handshake is something
about that. Have you ever come
Pastor Joe Liles (25:18):
unprepared into a handshake when someone
went real hard on it and youdidn't expect it? Yeah? Expect
Tom Helmich (25:23):
it, mostly, was when I was younger, and I was
kind of timid about it, yeah,you know. But you know, the
thing
Pastor Joe Liles (25:27):
I can't get over with, and this is such an
ego thing that I do, and Icannot get over it, because it's
just ingrained in me now. Soshaking hands, fine, like, shake
hands, great. I'll sometimes dothe double hand just to kind of,
like, where he's you just slapthe other side of the hand too.
That's fine, you know, justremoving barriers, right,
whatever that can be. But ifsomeone ever comes up to hit me
on the side or pat me on theside, I always flex my arm
(25:47):
right. Like, whatever that.
Yeah. So like, if they go to,like, tap my side of my arm,
right, I can't not, like, flex.
And I don't know if it's like, aresponse, like, Ah, you're gonna
hit me. Played football, butlike, every time they do it, and
so someone, like, every timethey do it, and so someone like,
real nice will just come to tapme, and I'm like, oh, and I
tense up, and I'm like, what ishappening? So, yeah, that's just
my crazy and I
Tom Helmich (26:07):
wonder if this is why, when you get to younger
adults, if you look at the crosssection population across the
church, within certain agestrata, like it's almost all
women in church, yeah, and menkind of outside like they come
back in eventually, right? Butwomen are more likely to be
involved in church when they'resingle than than a man is, yeah,
(26:29):
and when doing rounds throughnursing homes and stuff, a bunch
of women in there, women livelonger, right? So more likely to
see that, but you'll see themgrouped up together and talking
to doing stuff, and all the menwere like, by themselves in
their own room, just sittingthere, staring at the wall.
Yeah. Staring at the wall. Oh,interesting. It's like, maybe
because they're and I don't, Idon't fully understand all the
psychology of that, but like,there's something there that
(26:49):
maybe as guys, we need to workon a little bit. Well, I
Pastor Joe Liles (26:51):
mean, it could be a psychology there, or could
be a response to all of thejudgment coming through all of
your life, right, where we can'tbe in spaces that might provide
judgment,
Tom Helmich (27:00):
aka church, no longer in a position to be able
to be at a perceived need ofbeing like we. We want to value
ourselves based on power we canprovide, like, strength, you
know, strength and authority.
And if, and if that's takenaway, then sometimes guys get,
you know, they get shattered,yeah, you know, then all sudden
they're, they don't feel likethey have a community group,
yeah, you know. And guys cravecommunity, but we resist it like
nobody wants to be even whenwe're inside
Pastor Joe Liles (27:23):
of it, we're resisting, yeah, we don't want
with anyone, embrace it, even ifwe haven't been around us. Yeah,
Roseann Bowlin (27:27):
I think there's a certain vulnerability to
coming to church alone. Yeah,same one. And I think, Well, I
think that men and women aredifferent. Male and female are
different. We're wireddifferently, and I think
females, women seek community,and males are the protectors of
(27:50):
the community. But if they're,if they don't perceive that they
have a community, then I thinkthat they it's they show a
vulnerability by seekingcommunity, if that makes sense,
Tom Helmich (28:04):
yeah? Like pretending like they don't need
anything from anybody, right?
Yeah, we had
Pastor Joe Liles (28:08):
an interesting moment happened. I was with a
group of men, and part of ourtime is a circle of trust, where
we share and and one of our guysshared that, you know, he was a
young buck, right? So, early,early 20s, right? And we had a
group of men that ranged fromlate 20s all the way to early
50s, right? Mid 50s. And therewas about, you know, 1012, of
(28:28):
us. And I call him a young buck,right? Because it's just your
young but, right? And so thisone,
Roseann Bowlin (28:35):
he's half your age. Oh, gosh, she said it out
Pastor Joe Liles (28:39):
loud, you know what not used to get it, yeah?
Tom, no, it still hurts. Stillhurts. Roseanne, so, but no, he
shared something vulnerableabout just not wanting to be
there. And, you know, like,things were tough, right?
Different things like this, and,you know, he didn't want to wake
up, and he couldn't get to thecommitment, right? And
everything else like that. And,and the guys kind of went
around. They're like, we'llcommit. You know, they pulled
like, the David Goggins of like,well, you just got to invest.
(29:01):
You just got to go for it. Andthat's a young reality, you
know, that's not like what we'reat and everything else like
that. And, and I stopped thegroup afterwards, and I said,
Hold on. I said, Is this howrespond to phone? And I stopped
the whole group, and I was like,Is this how we respond to
vulnerability? And I was like,we just had a person share like,
they struggle with commitment,and it's hard for them to get
out here. And, and I said, everyone of you questioned coming out
here this morning. I was like,no doubt that every one of us
(29:23):
woke up and went like, and I waslike, and yet we had someone
finally share that this is howthey react. We didn't come out
here and propose that we'restrong, you know, and that we
made it out here, and this isjust our commitment. And I was
like, No, every one of usstruggled to commit to this. And
I said, and we had a young buckteaching us how to share it, and
we all jumped on him. And I waslike, that's not
Tom Helmich (29:40):
the real all looking for a position, always
jockeying for position of power,like trying to set themselves up
in the pack and in the lift onFriday morning group. It comes
up a lot that men crave that. Imean, look at, like, a lot of
men, and like, in male sports,you know, there's the idea the
team, yeah. And I, you know, Ididn't realize that I'd found
that until I missed. It when I Iretired from the SWAT team of
(30:02):
having that kind of small tribe,yeah, when I have that group,
that working group, a lot ofguys are primarily all men and
firefighters. You know, you gotyour firehouse. It's a group,
like a tribe, a pack of peoplethat work together. It's that's
cross section starting to changea little bit. But men crave
that, yeah? And need to havethat. And it's kind of hard, the
way it is in society, and peoplelook for it, and sometimes they
find it. Ideally, they find itin the church. Yeah, and
(30:26):
everybody can the women find itin the church. But that's why
it's so important to have thesegroups, like the the small
groups, like the lift and thetable for the women and the life
groups and stuff like that, sothat people can can find their
subset of the tribe. Because thechurch gets to the point where
at one point, the neighborhoodchurch was that large group all
by itself, just that that groupand but it gets to a certain
size when it doesn't, can'treally do that anymore. And so
(30:48):
sustainable. It's notsustainable. You got to have
community and
Roseann Bowlin (30:51):
know each other, break off into packs that way
you can have you can you canfeel that support
Tom Helmich (30:55):
from one another, and get to the point where you
can trust being vulnerable withsomebody and telling them what
you're actually thinking withouttrying to think about you. About
how they're going to hear it andhow they're going to judge you
because of what they're saying.
Yeah, and that comes down tothat fear of man, right?
Everybody, when they have tohave an issue of vulnerability
or a problem or something thatthey're going to think like, how
is this going to be received?
(31:16):
What are they going to thinkabout it? How's it going to make
me look and getting past that isdifficult. If you get to the
point where you're only worriedabout God judging us and knowing
that God's gonna judge us andthat we know the promise we have
in that so we can go out boldlyin our relationships with other
people. But just because you'rea Christian doesn't mean you're
automatically gonna be thiscomplete different human being
and be completely bold andeverything. It's something we
(31:37):
have to fight all the time,because having that in the back
of our head makes us sometimeschoose things that we don't
agree with in ourselves andcause us dissonance in our own
minds about choices we makebecause we're trying to please
other people and their judgmentof us rather than what we think
is right. And that's a difficultthing, and it's harder for the
younger people.
Roseann Bowlin (31:57):
You just made the point of this entire um,
reading was that I would ratherbe judged by God on what I do,
but but rather than humans outthere, but when someone is on a
(32:19):
path that is not the way theyshould go, and it's obvious, but
it's not popular, but it's apopular way to go. Maybe I
should say then they needcorrection, because we know that
they are a child of God, we needto correct them in a way, in a
(32:40):
loving way, that is of God.
Pastor Joe Liles (32:45):
Yeah. Well, it's interesting thing. I think
about judgment with God too. Um,judgment with God is something
that I don't fear, because it'sharder for me to submit to God.
Like, judgment is something thatyou know, if you think about
being judged by a judge in acourtroom, right, like you're
standing before, like there's, apoint when you have to give over
control of that judgment, right,and you have no more say in what
(33:06):
that judgment is. Right, I findit harder to submit, and I have
more fear to submitting to God,right, and putting myself in
that place in the kingdom onearth that knows that I'm
underneath, humbly before God'spower, and that I'm still
struggling to find my place inthere right before I ever get to
judgment. Like, if I get tojudgment, great, at least I've
(33:28):
arrived before God. Like we'reworking hard, but like to
submit, though, and understandthat God's will and God's power
is what gives growth to thischurch and what gives growth to
people in their relationshipwith God. And it's not just the
work of the church. It's notjust the work of a pastor or a
Director of Operations, allright? Or when we meet with
people like it's everythingtogether. I think that
submission to God is a huge partof what is being brought up in
(33:51):
this and that was my point inweek one, was that you know your
final place is, you know yoursubmission to God, right? Helps
you understand your place in thekingdom, right? And your place
in the kingdom is before God,right, like below God, and we
have to submit to that. That's avery important
Tom Helmich (34:07):
part. I think the thing that makes it hard is
society fights directly againstit, not thinking necessarily
intentionally. But if we look atproximity of consequences, like
we know, being judged by God,submitting to God, is after the
end of this life and the nextlife to come, but what happens
at work or at school today andtomorrow is the product of peer
(34:30):
approval or disapproval, and soit brings some very real
consequences, and that'ssomething that as a society, I
think that we can do better. Weneed to do better in our own
cultures, even in the churchesand our peer groups about how we
respond to people doing things alittle different, because we
ourselves wind up inadvertently,you know, turning away from
people because they dosomething. You know, this a
(34:50):
little different because we fearjudgment from the crowd, and
then that perpetuates this, thiswhole idea of society trying to
turn people the way societywants them to. Go, you know
whether it be right, andremember what it is, and you'll
be gender, identity, sexuality.
It can be faith. It can be whatdenomination. It can be, what
you believe about thisparticular thing or that, or
just the way you want to dressor talk. But if society
(35:12):
disapproves, people are afraidof aligning with that person or
accepting them, because theyincur that judgment also. And so
now it kind of turns into thispack mentality, or where people
are afraid to just be them, bethemselves. And it actually was
going to change the reading forthe second point, because I
think this will make more sense.
It's the reading from John 12,and it's verses 42 and 43 says
(35:36):
that Nevertheless, many, even ofthe authorities, the Jewish
authorities believed in him,meaning in Jesus, but because of
the Pharisees, they did notconfess it. For they for the
fear that they would be put outof the synagogue. For they loved
human glory more than the glorythat comes from God. You know,
they they believed in Jesus, butthey were afraid to say it,
because they're afraid they'regoing to be kicked out of their
(35:58):
peer group, yeah, and so much ofthat people see, I mean, that's
what, what allows bullying andall kinds of things to happen
because they see something thatthey don't agree with, or
something they do agree with,and they're afraid to publicly
agree with it, because they'reafraid of not aligning with
public opinion. Yeah. And then,all of a sudden, the thing
that's most influential inpeople's lives is this, this
(36:21):
thing of called public opinion,that that changes all the time?
Yeah, you know, we see that inevery generation, and that winds
up having more influence onpeople than their faith. And I
think it's because of theproximity of consequences, and
if they don't have a strongfaith, a meaningful faith, and a
faith group, a tie to, like asmall group or a large group, or
a group of people in church tokeep them steady in that then
(36:44):
the most influential part oftheir life is, is peer pressure.
And so I think as a church,we've got to step up to make
those church groups and thosethose faith support groups, to
be the most dominant influencein people's lives, so they can
resist peer pressure.
Pastor Joe Liles (36:58):
Yeah, yep,
Roseann Bowlin (36:59):
the resist the flow of pressure from the
masses, because they all, youknow, that group think. They all
tend to think the same way, andthey group together because they
align their thought process whenit may be not what God intends
(37:22):
for us.
Tom Helmich (37:23):
There's a title of a book, and I like the title. I
have no idea if the books anygood. So I'm not saying go read
it, because not read it yet. Ihave no idea. But the title is
perfect, okay? It says, havingthe courage to be disliked. Have
the courage, you know, thecourage to be many great things
about the book. Yeah, I've neverread it, but that's the thing,
is, like, we're so, you know,we, we prefer in here glory,
(37:46):
right? Is this, this thing,meaning that that's in this
inherent worth or approval we,we're more afraid of approval or
disapproval of humanity than weare of God, and partly because,
like, well, there's grace andGod, right? Because we know
God's going to reach back out tous again every day, right? But
forgiveness isn't permission,right? But there's still
something has allowed society tobe have more influence over over
(38:08):
us than our than our faith. AndI think it's the Church's
position to try to counteractthat. It's still not easy, and
many churches still, you know,fall into trying to lead people
into the into the wrong thing,but getting in our own mind,
because, to me, a sign ofmaturity is when you get to the
point where you can be around acrowd of your peers that you
(38:29):
value your friends and feelcomfortable disagreeing right,
saying that, no, I don't agreewith that, and and get in a
position where you stand forsomething that they disagree
with, and having the trust tostill be, feel loved and and
ultimately, having thatknowledge of knowing that I'm
standing up for, I think Godwants me to stand up for, and I
(38:49):
don't care what the massesthink. Yeah, and to me, that's
like, to me, that's, that's asign of spiritual maturity and
maturity in someone's faith,that they're willing to go
against popular opinion to standup for something
Roseann Bowlin (39:03):
well, and we were talking before the podcast
about that saying, gotta standfor something, or you'll fall
for anything. You'll fall foranything, but sometimes you got
to stand alone, and that's not acomfortable place to be. But if
that's where God needs you tobe, that's where God needs you
to be,
Tom Helmich (39:22):
yeah, that's how, I mean, this is a little bit,
maybe a little bit dark, butlike looking back to 911 you
know? I mean, I was working as apolice officer that morning,
when the hijackings happened.
Out of all of those hijackings,there was one plane that
something was different, the onethat was trying to second one
heading from the Pentagon, yeah,because in a group like that,
one person who's perceived as athreat, everybody's looking at
themselves as an individual andfor their own and, you know, and
(39:46):
their own fear. And in thatinstance, they stepped out of
that and crashed the planesomewhere else. Yeah,
Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania,wound up not killing a bunch of
other people. It's the samething in a classroom where one
one kid is. Has a dominantpersonality, and he starts
bullying people. It just takesone person to step out outside
of the social norm and to standup for that, and other people
(40:07):
start doing it, and then nowthat person doesn't have any
power over them anymore. Thebully doesn't have any power
anymore. It's just we turn intothis flock of sheep, yeah,
instead of the sheep dog. And itjust takes that courage and that
confidence in our faith to standup and say, No, that's not
right. And, you know, I don'tcare if you disapprove,
Pastor Joe Liles (40:26):
aka, is saying that group thing can also be a
positive reinforcement, right?
If everyone leans into the samereality together,
Tom Helmich (40:34):
between group think and consensus like that. To me,
that's the the whole point ofthe the ecclesia, the church,
yeah, the gathered body is thechurch. Gathers together
everybody, united in faith, canbe a strong force to help pull
other people, other people in,whereas group think the title
just sounds like people thinkingtogether as a group. But
typically, like in the industryof like, of leadership, it's
(40:57):
always a negative, because it'smeaning the whole group takes on
whatever one person thinks,yeah, kind of, kind of
mindlessly, but you can, that'sthe purpose of the church,
right? We can come together infaith and draw other people in
and stand up for other peoplethat feel like they can't on
their own, and give them a peergroup to make them feel like
they can stand up againstsociety and be who, who they
(41:17):
really are, and and oppose thatthat group think
Roseann Bowlin (41:21):
a little bit and lean into those biblical truths.
Pastor Joe Liles (41:25):
Roseanne speaking of biblical truths,
it's time for your segment.
Roseanne notes. What was yourtakeaway from Tom's message as
you sat in the congregation, oneof the ecclesia right gathered
body, what were some of thenotes you took away from his
message?
Roseann Bowlin (41:42):
Don't be shy.
Reach out to don't wait forsomeone to reach in. Oh, man,
that
Pastor Joe Liles (41:51):
preaches all day. Yeah, better than what
Unknown (41:53):
I did. That's good.
Roseann Bowlin (41:56):
Be a living witness of God's truth. Choose
to please God rather thanpeople. Faith takes courage,
even when it's not popular.
Wisdom is standing in God ratherthan public opinion. God's will
is what is best for us.
Pastor Joe Liles (42:16):
That's nice.
That's really nice. Can you readthe God's wisdom one? Again, I
think it was the second to lastone. Yeah. To
Roseann Bowlin (42:25):
last one be a living witness of God's truth.
Choose to please God rather thanpeople. Is that the one next
one? Oh, the
Tom Helmich (42:33):
wisdom is, yes, there's one before that,
actually,
Roseann Bowlin (42:40):
Okay, I gotta find it again. I was really
writing these for me because,oh, faith takes courage, even
when it's not popular. Wisdom isstanding in God rather than
public opinion.
Tom Helmich (43:00):
Yeah, business, you know, standing in awe of God
rather than awe of humanapproval. Yeah,
Pastor Joe Liles (43:05):
I think that is wisdom. I mean, that's,
that's the tension that we liveinto daily, right, as we really
look at and that's why I wentback to that, or is it because
that's wisdom. It's notknowledge, right? It's, it's an
identity that, when we have anidentity in Christ, that's our
first identity, right? It is notwhen we lean back into what the
role thinks of us, or theposition that we have, or the
role that we have, or how thingsgo or the work that we've done.
(43:27):
It's our identity in Christ, andwhat does that mean to us at the
end of the day in personalrelationship with God, it's
Roseann Bowlin (43:32):
leaning into that Triune God and knowing that
he's with us daily. I thinkyou're
Tom Helmich (43:36):
gonna see extreme examples of that, and people
like Martin Luther with the hereI stand. We see that with
Dietrich Bonhoeffer and I'll bestanding up against the Nazis.
We can see that and theReverend, Dr Martin Luther King,
Jr, you know, we can see thatall kinds of people in society
that have, because of theirfaith, been inspired to to and
in Word, little stronger thaninspired, but like really driven
(44:01):
to stand up and say no based ontheir faith, no matter what
society tries
Roseann Bowlin (44:05):
to throw 10 bloom kind of Absolutely, yeah.
Pastor Joe Liles (44:09):
So this was great, wonderful message, second
part of dear younger me. So thisis a series where we're doing
wisdom all throughout the monthof August. We go up a generation
now. Now we're going to youngadult, young adults, maybe young
family, right? We get into thatrange, right there. You know
that good 20s range, that partwhere you would continue to tell
(44:30):
us that the boys are not fullyformed yet. 26 brains, not all
their brains, not all there yet.
The boys not plugged in yet. Soand then coming out of college,
right? So you get this kind ofentry into the workforce and
like, what would we tell ouryounger selves? And honestly, a
place where we see a lot ofyoung adults come back to the
church once they have family,right? So this is kind of an
(44:50):
absent into a comeback moment.
Tom Helmich (44:53):
I see it all the time with young dads. Oh,
they're like,
Pastor Joe Liles (44:57):
I gotta raise my child. Feel the weight of it.
Yeah. So they gotta raise this.
And so we're gonna be bringingup some of the studies about the
generations and where they're atand what we see from the youth
coming back in and differentthings like that. And then also,
how do we reach young adults? Ithink the church is notorious
for skipping a generation,right? We have great ministry up
through college, most sometimesmainly High School, and then we
skip until they have kids again,and then we go back into
(45:19):
children's ministry, right? Andwe had this gap years where
there's a there's a lostgeneration in there that the
church is not formed well around
Tom Helmich (45:27):
as men, primarily the boys of that generation.
That's true, very true, morethan the girls. And I think for
me, that's part of the reasonwhy I think there's such a
strong value in infant baptism,those young adults when they
start having families, yeah,because the infants being
baptized, but the parents aretaking an oath before God to do
certain things, to raise them infaith, and raise them in faith
in life, and they're makingthese commitments to the church
(45:48):
as a communal aspect that Ithink is absent in some other
denominations that don't doinfant baptism. And we, we kind
of lose out on that a little bitwithout it. Yep. Well, it's a
Pastor Joe Liles (45:58):
beautiful moment. So if you're interested
in a little bit more wisdom aswe're coming out of this. And
you remember younger self thatneeded that wisdom. If you know
someone who is a younger self,or if this is you, if this is
you, yeah, that's better. Ifyou're listening to this podcast
right now and
Tom Helmich (46:12):
you're like, ooh, for next week, might be some
epic cheat codes, yeah, do lifebetter?
Pastor Joe Liles (46:16):
There you go.
I like it. I like it. And allguys, people said, Amen, amen.
You you.
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