Daughter Now An Atheist | Hour 2

Daughter Now An Atheist

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand. Shannon,
Welcome to the Jesus Christ Show.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
Happy birthday.

Speaker 1 (00:10):
Well, thank you, Merry Christmas to you. How can I
help you?

Speaker 3 (00:12):
Thank you so much.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
I have an eighteen year old daughter and she was
raised I'm Catholic and I'm divorced, kind of an oxymoon.
But so while with me, she's always gone to Catholic
math and on her weekends with her dad she goes
to Chapel so Bold, you know, Christian upbringing, but not fanatical.
And about two years ago she decided that it's all

(00:35):
a bench of crap and that she is an atheist.
And I don't know how to how to talk to
her about it, how to bring her back into the fold,
so to speak, without turning her away even more. She's
talking about it being very similar to a cult. You know,
she doesn't have any faith whatsoever. I mean, she's a

(00:58):
scene of believing kind of person.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
Well, no, she's not. No one is. People say they are,
but they're not. You can't live that way. She'd never
be in love, she'd never experience all kinds of things.
She wouldn't understand what wind was and what all kinds
of physical phenomenon that take place that people don't really
see or understand. You don't see how all kinds of
things are done. So people say that, and she's eighteen

(01:21):
years old, she's wrestling. Well, you know what, it's really
not your job, thankfully. Your job is to give your
children the best tools you can so that they can
go out and use those tools anyway they see fit.
And so you've done that, And the best thing you
can do, Shannon is to live a life that is

(01:44):
a wonderful example that she can look to you for
things and allow her to come and ask you questions
and be ready, be poised to give an answer, as
you can know that just because you don't have an answer,
don't make them up. I know people that will sit
there and they'll make up something because they don't. Yeah, say,
if I don't have the answer, doesn't mean there's not
an answer. She could ask you a trigonometry question that

(02:06):
you don't know either. It doesn't mean trigonometry doesn't exist.

Speaker 4 (02:09):
So I would answers.

Speaker 1 (02:11):
Well, see that, people, but just know she's at a
growing point. Is she in college?

Speaker 3 (02:16):
Yes, just started college. Her twin sister and her twin sister,
you know, I mean, she's she's this didn't come about
so I feel like I've failed her someway.

Speaker 1 (02:29):
Absolutely not. As a matter of fact. You gave her
a brain to let her think.

Speaker 5 (02:33):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (02:33):
In Scripture it says test all things, hold fast to
that which is true. You gave her the freedom and
the tools to do that. That is a God given.
It's funny how God sees fit to make creatures with
free will, and then every Christian wants to run around
taking the free will away from everyone. That doesn't make
sense now does it?

Speaker 2 (02:51):
So will and everything else?

Speaker 1 (02:56):
When it comes to God, it's on your turn.

Speaker 3 (02:58):
There's no there's no free will the well.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
You know why people get as parents tend to get
nervous about this for different reasons.

Speaker 2 (03:05):
And I need to not see her in heaven Sunday.

Speaker 5 (03:09):
That's my biggest thing, of course.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
And that's a scary notion. However, she is searching, honestly,
and you don't know what she believes. Kids, even at
eighteen years of age, can say all kinds of things
for shock value. It's not surprising to you or anybody
else that she entered into college and now feels the
freedom to not believe in God. She is breaking away

(03:31):
and getting her own roots and her own wings and
deciding as to who she is. And some of that's
going to rub you the wrong way, and some of
it you're going to be proud of and excited about.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
But really, this was a Democrat at the same time.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
I don't know which was worth well.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
I'd say there are some Wow, you're you're a Catholic
and not a Democrat.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
Huh. Correct.

Speaker 4 (03:57):
I know it's an anomaly, but wow, yes two years
ago and said I believe I'm an atheist and by
the way, I'm going to register Democrat at eighteen. And
I told her I wish she was a.

Speaker 3 (04:10):
Pull answer instead, and I just went downhill from there.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Oh boy, don't don't first, don't freak out that. And
it's not it's not strange for someone wanted to become
a liberal or a Democrat or an atheist when they
enter college. So take a deep breath.

Speaker 6 (04:28):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (04:28):
And being a Democrat is not being the anti christ. Uh,
it is uh. And I'm going to say something and
I don't want people to swerve off the road. Okay,
just relax, Okay, ready, there are Democrats that are Christians.
Done dun dumb. It has nothing to do with your
spiritual beliefs. You can be a Democrat, you can be

(04:50):
a Republican. You just can't be part of the Green Party.
That's true.

Speaker 3 (04:56):
I guess it was just a double whammy of the
two together.

Speaker 1 (04:58):
Well that's as a parent, how powerful would it have
been if you said, oh, well, I'm glad that you're
searching and if that's where you land, I hope that
I've given you the tools.

Speaker 3 (05:10):
And I don't know if I'm right in telling her
to keep you know, I'm okay with it, because I'm
not okay with it.

Speaker 2 (05:16):
Well, I tell her, I am.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
You tell her that because this is really what you heard.
If you're honest with yourself, what you eat it. It
wasn't about what her beliefs were. What you heard is
I'm moving far away from who you are and who
you brought me out as. And that means I'm changing
and being different. And that's a scary thought. But as
a parent, you've you've gone through many things yourself, Shannon,
you didn't. You didn't pop out and say okay, well

(05:39):
I'm i'm this and I'm that I'm this because my
parents are. You found your way as well.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
I never lost Christ.

Speaker 1 (05:45):
Though, well some people do, when some people don't, and
some people it's not about losing. Uh. Some people will say,
you know, when a child says and when you don't
give them their toy and they look at you and go,
I don't love you. Yeah, And then the parent, do
you really think for one second when your children said
that that they really didn't love you.

Speaker 5 (06:02):
No, No, they wanted to correctly.

Speaker 1 (06:06):
She wanted to show you that she is her own person,
and that she's off to college and that she's going
to be learning things and studying things and becoming her
own person. And you should be very proud of that.

Speaker 2 (06:18):
So there's nothing more I should be doing.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
I'm afraid to do anything that might push her further away.

Speaker 1 (06:24):
Well you know what does that? Try and pull her
towards you? Okay, there's an old there's an old saying
that if you want to kill someone and make it
look like suicide, take them to a cliff and pull
them towards you. They'll jump off. It's just human nature
to the pull, push and pull principle, to reject, especially
children as they're growing into adulthood, away from their parents

(06:47):
and so that's exactly what's happening. And it's like anything else.
You trust that if they they smell the wafting and
wonderful aroma of a good meal, they'll come to eat.
If you try and force it down the throat, they'll vomit.
So so just be who you are, don't change, don't
there's not some holy headlock you're gonna get her in.

(07:09):
There's not some well if I do this or stand
on one foot, or if I if I tell her
how I'm listening to this new Christian rap band that
all the kids dig and it's really groovy, and try
to appeal to them or something. Just don't be yourself,
be mom, love God, and let God h you know, uh,
be the guide and the director of your life. And

(07:30):
she'll notice it. And then and if she brings something
up and says, you know, this is why I don't
believe you are more than capable of saying you know
and asking questions and saying, well, that's interesting, but why
would you think this or that? Just it's going to
be emotional if you get into conversations or arguments with them. Yeah,

(07:54):
as children, they just they're gonna expect you to do
the unexpected, love them through through the decision that they
make to the best of your ability. Be there for
guidance when they ask for it. And that's the key,
and it being there for them when they ask for it. James, patient, James,

(08:17):
thank you for joining us. Welcome to the Jesus Christ Show.
How can I help you?

Speaker 5 (08:21):
Happy birthday?

Speaker 1 (08:22):
We thank you.

Speaker 6 (08:23):
Not a problem. Throughout the New Testament, I kept finding
the mind of Christ through the letters of Paul, and
the mind was capitalized capital M. And then in the
Old Testament, I apologize for not having the address. I
saw the mind of the universe and that mind was
also capitalized in the scriptures. I need more elaboration on

(08:46):
how to get into the mindset of the mind of Christ.
I know it's love, and I know it's forgiveness, practice,
anything's over and over. Am I missing anything? I'm not
looking too much into it. Can you help me out
with that?

Speaker 1 (09:02):
Sure? And I love the question, James. I love the
way you think and the fact that you're seeing as
this big thing. But I want to kind of narrow
it down a little bit and put it in the
harmony of scripture as we talked about earlier, and the
importance of that. So we'll look at I want to
go through some verses that talk about that. So the

(09:23):
first one you mentioned, Paul, we'll look at first Corinthians
two sixteen. Of course, this is a letter to the
Church of corinth and really there is a lot of
problems in the church then two thousand years ago that
are still being wrestled with today. Absolutely, and it's kind
of interesting to see that you have Paul writing and

(09:45):
complaining about certain things that are going on in the
church then that are still going on and unfortunately probably
will be going on two thousand years from now. But
this concept is talked about here first Corinthians two sixteen,
for who has understood the mind of the Lord so
that as to instruct him? But we have the mind

(10:06):
of Christ now. Depending on context and how it's used,
mind and reference is going to be capitalized or not capitalized.
But the important thing is to see is what's being
talked about in the context here. In the context, it's
really talking about judgment of one another in the church,
and judgment from people outside of the church and all

(10:27):
of these things, and talking about the mind of Christ.
What's really being said is that no one and it
goes on to say that no one is going to
understand these things unless you have the understanding via the spirit.
Verse eleven says, for who among men knows the thoughts
of man except the spirit of man, which is in him.

(10:49):
Even so, the thoughts of God, no one knows except
the Spirit of God. So what's being said here in
the mind of Christ and what's being referenced is basically
the truth or the wisdom of God. So if someone says, man,
I just don't understand, we'll pick on my producer because

(11:10):
he's standing in front of me. No one understands the
mind of Neil. That's because no one's inside that crazy
brain of his except him. So when it's referring to
the mind of Christ, it's referring to the wisdom of God,
and that no one can no man can understand that
in any way, shape or form, including scripture or anything
else without the help of the spirit. So having the

(11:34):
Spirit of God in you and being led by the
Spirit of God is to understand truths and wisdom that
God gives. And that's why they talks about casting pearls
before swine and things like that, because if someone doesn't
understand the wisdom of God via the Holy Spirit. Then
the things that you say will seem silly to them

(11:54):
to the point of absurdity, and they'll go, oh, it
doesn't make sense that they are missing it. The same
way that a child wouldn't understand something that an adult
was trying to explain to them or kind of breaking
down or or showing them some sort of truth or
wisdom or things about home buying a home, or being
in love, or a child's not going to comprehend that.
The child may just go, you know, you're silly, daddy,

(12:16):
or you're silly mommy, and shake their head and walk off. Likewise,
the world that doesn't have the understanding of the things
of God because they don't have the Holy Spirit, that
it becomes absurdity. So in one Corinthians two sixteen, when
it's talking about but we have the mind of Christ,
doesn't mean that you know everything, that you will know everything.

(12:37):
It means it's the only way for you to understand
what God is laid out for you is by the
Holy Spirit being inside you, leading your life and therefore
giving you understanding towards the things of God. Mohammed, Welcome
to the Jesus Christ show.

Speaker 2 (12:56):
Hi.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
I am well, how can I help you?

Speaker 5 (13:00):
Christmas?

Speaker 1 (13:01):
Merry Christmas to you? Thank you.

Speaker 5 (13:03):
Actually, I am a Muslim and I asked a question,
and the question is if Jesus peace you upon him,
died for our sin, yes, and what is the purpose
for praying? Because the purpose of praying is to get
riscue from the hell fire and go to paradise.

Speaker 1 (13:26):
Well, sure, but that is a that is a Muslim belief,
not not a Christian belief. Prayer is not There is
nothing that you can add to the death and blood
on the cross that would get you into heaven.

Speaker 5 (13:40):
So I mean, if Jesus died for our sin, the
main purpose is to be free from sin.

Speaker 1 (13:48):
For those that believe, for those that receive that.

Speaker 5 (13:51):
Yes, yeah, if we are free from sin after we
accept Jesus as a savior, and then what is the
purpose after that we do good things or greet people good? Honey?
We are guaranteed that.

Speaker 1 (14:06):
Oh no, no, no, Mohammed. If you think of it
this way, if you had children and you love them
very much, and you purchased a vehicle, a car for them,
and they crashed that car, it could very well be
a mistake and you would say okay, well you crash
the car, I love you, We'll get you a new one.
There's a point where if they kept crashing the car

(14:27):
and they never said anything to you, and they didn't care,
and they didn't give you, you know, the the attention
you deserved for being so kind and giving that car,
you would assume that they don't love you, they don't
respect you, and they don't appreciate what you've given them.
So Christians don't pray for salvation in that sense because

(14:47):
salvation is not something that can be earned. If it
could be earned, you wouldn't need God. So your question
would be flipped in reverse and say, well then why
if you could pray your way into heaven, then why
have God come and die on the cross. So in
this sense, it's not about praying to guide you out
of the hell fire. What it is is it's it's

(15:09):
it's praying to have a relationship with God, a personal
relationship with God, to know God's will and to continue
to better yourself. Not not so that you can save yourself.

Speaker 5 (15:22):
Well, I mean, if you don't believe in Jesus, then
you will be in hell.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
Well, every belief system in this world Islam. Included is
exclusionary by its very definition. That's the way truth works.
You can't say that whenever you make a truth claim
two plus two equals four, it can't equal three as well.
So every belief system, Christianity included, believes that their way
is the true way and that every other system is not.

Speaker 5 (15:52):
If I were to live, if you don't believe that
it's not true, and then you're not Christian, well.

Speaker 1 (15:57):
Yes, indeed, and I'm agreeing with you. I'm saying that Mohammad,
there are there Mohammad is the number one uh given
name on the planet. Correct. There are more people that
have the name Mohammad than any other name in the world.

Speaker 5 (16:11):
Does that mean they're all you No, actually mean the name.
It doesn't matter. I can't put my name like Chrest
or something else they believe the matter, Yes, but.

Speaker 1 (16:26):
It does matter who you are. You are a particular Mohammed,
and I can't just, you know, go to anybody's house
whose name is Mohammad and get you there. So there
is specifics to that. You can't just call upon the
name of God and assume that it's all the same
God anymore than you could call and say Mohammed and
it would all be the same Mohammed there there, and

(16:46):
so there are different gods at stake here there are
different Now they may be for the same.

Speaker 5 (16:51):
The God of Mohammad and Jesus pieces up on them
are the same. Even the abraham all have the.

Speaker 1 (16:57):
Same Abrahamic's faith me and and as those that believe
in Islam would refer to Christians and Jews as people
of the book as well. And that's all fine, But
there is a difference where we all would go in
different directions. Islam would go in one direction, Judaism would
go in one direction, and Christianity would go in another direction.

(17:20):
We all have differences because the Christians would believe that
I am the Savior, that I came and died for
their sins, where as a Jew would not believe that
he never.

Speaker 5 (17:30):
Said somebody else said that he claims people claim that
Jesus said, and he never personally.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
Said that I absolutely did. As a matter of fact,
in scripture it says what Mohammed. In scripture, it says
that they came and they picked up stones, and I said,
for which good act do you want to stone me?
And they said, not for a good act, but for
you a mere man claiming to be God. That was blasphemy.
That was the act of blasphemy. Throughout Scripture. I made

(17:58):
that claim. I claimed to be the great I Am
that has spoken about to Moses. I absolutely I received
worship and didn't correct anybody, even angels from heaven Mohammed.
When people bowed down to worship them, they said, do
not worship me. I'm not God. God is the only
one to be worshiped. When people bowed down to me,

(18:20):
when doubting, Thomas put his hands in my side, his
fingers in my hand and said, ikusmu, theeosmu. When he
said in the Greek the Lord of me, the God
of me, he was not reprimanded if he and he
wasn't ex he wasn't going, oh, my God, because he

(18:41):
would have been reprimanded for that. That would have been
blasphemy under the context. He referred to me as God,
and I okayed it absolutely absolutely. It's not just about
saying you don't have to go hi, I'm Mohammed. If
someone sells yells hey, Mohammed, and you say yes and
answer to it, you've told them your God. I answered

(19:05):
to being God in scripture. I answered to Thomas. I
answered to others, I said today in this hearing, this
has been fulfilled as I read scripture about God. I
absolutely claim to be God. And there are major differences.

(19:26):
And this is where the discussion becomes open Mohammad, where
people decide as to what they believe. But make no
mistake about it. Christianity, Islam, and Judaism all have the
same Holy land and similarities in the beginning, but there
is a fork, very definite fork in the road between

(19:49):
our brothers and sisters of the faith, both in Judaism
and Islam, and there is difference is enough to dictate
saying this is Islam, this is Judaism, and this is Christianity.
They are partitioned specifically. And and so that you know,
that's where a lot of you know, anger comes in

(20:11):
because it sounds and I understand that a lot of
Christians make it sound like they're a have and you're
a have not. And the Jews don't get this, and
is the Muslims don't get this, and all these different beliefs.
I get that, but really all of them are making
truth claims, and truth by definition, truth claims are exclusionistic.

(20:33):
They will be exclusionary by the very definition of making
a truth claim. If you say something is round, you
are excluding it from being square. So if Christians say
that I am the Son of God that came, that
died on the cross so that you could have eternal life,

(20:53):
there is no second option there, and then you have
your view, and the Jews have their view. So they
can't just all be mashed together and everyone could be wrong,
but they can't all be right because they're contradictory in
certain parts of the beliefs. Muhammed brought up a question

(21:17):
that lingers a lot and is normally posed to Christians,
and I find this interesting because every belief system, as
I said, is exclusionary. If you believe there is a truth,
then you believe that anything outside of that truth is false.
Every belief system believes that. Even Universalism listen to this.
Universalism believes that, in different forms, depending on the form,

(21:41):
believes that all are kind of children of God and
all finding their way and we'll all eventually get there.
Like everyone's right. But if you were to tell them
everyone's not right, they would tell you you were wrong,
which means that there's still even in universalism, there's still
a belief that you can be wrong, you can't escape it.

(22:04):
But for some reason it seems to be put on
Christians all the time. Is if Christians are the only
ones that believe that not true. But if you set aside,
because you hear the things like well, so if I
don't believe in Jesus, I go to hell. But think
of this conceptually about math again, because math is not personal.
People we use in math analogies on the air. It's

(22:26):
just easier because it doesn't seem personal. So if I
said two plus two equals four, than anything that doesn't
equal for when you have two plus two is wrong.
When you remove my name from the equation, when you
just say this, this is the way to God, then
people receive it differently. It's when you start attaching names

(22:49):
that it becomes personal and it's like, well, that's my
group or this is my group. It's not about that.
Push that aside. I liked when Mohammad, when I gave
him the analogy, said it's not about my name, and
that was an excellent point. It's not about the name.
So let's put this aside for a second. Yes, scripture
says there is no other name under heaven, and which

(23:10):
man can be saved. But it's not talking about fowls
and consonants, Jesus and the J and the E and
the ask and the U and the S. It's not
talking about that. It's talking about the power and authority.
Just like in the old movies. Stop in the name
of the law. It's not talking about law. It's not
talking about anyone's particular name. It's talking about the authority

(23:33):
of the government that applied that to the individual who's
now wearing the badge and the gun. So in the
sense there's no other name in which one is saved,
is referring to the power of God in Christ. So
that's where my authority comes from. Now, it's very difficult

(23:54):
for people of different faiths to understand the Trinity and
you know what it means for me to be God
as well and all those things. And I get that
that's confusing. And plus when you're in different belief systems
and Christians, I warn you about this all the time
on the program. Don't believe things about another belief system
just because you're told that. We see this about Muslims

(24:16):
all the time. I hear all kinds of garbage that
is taught saying well, this is what Muslims believe. That
is not and I hear it about Jews as well,
and I hear it about all kinds of different belief systems.
You don't like it when people do it to you,
don't do it to them. But Christianity it's not about Oh,
if you're not a Christian, you're not in the club
and you don't get in. That's not what it and

(24:37):
that's how it always comes out sounding. It's not about
that at all. If you think about being in a
home that's on fire and the fire department coming and
the firefighter cutting a circular exit for you, you wouldn't
look at that firefighter and say, well, goush, you know what.

(24:57):
I grew up believing that I'm supposed to exit outside
out of a square hole. Should I be caught in
a fire, you receive the salvation and you say thank you.
But when it comes to God, then it becomes a
battle front for the different ideas. Rather than a search
for truth, it becomes a battlefront of this is what

(25:19):
I believe, this is what I was taught. So this
is the truth. No, And as I said before, Christians,
Muslims and Jews and all the rest can be all wrong,
but they can't be all right because the very nature
of the belief systems are different and contradictory. So if

(25:40):
someone says this is black and someone says this is white,
they can both be wrong. It might be blue, but
they can't be simultaneously right. And therein lies the.

Speaker 5 (25:52):
Rub.

Speaker 1 (25:53):
It is to search out and to seek without bias
based on what you grew up with or what you're
comfortable with, or any of those things, and really search
and seek that which is true because it's truth, not
because it's always what you believe, not because your parents
believed it, not because it's convenient for you, but because

(26:14):
it's true. And that should be the concern, whether it's Islam,
whether it's Judaism, whether it's Christianity. Now on this show,
it's called The Jesus Christ Show, What do you think
we're going to be preaching? What do you think we're
going to be teaching? This show is unabashedly pro Christianity.

(26:37):
Why would it not be. But ultimately, above all things,
this show is focused on truth, seeking truth, knowing truth,
spreading truth, and being accountable to that truth. And that's
what's most important. That is truly the focus of this

(26:57):
program seeking truth. Scripture says to test all things, hold
fast to that which is true, which is good, which
is righteous, And that is the very purpose of this program.
As you go through the hustle and bustle and finish
wrapping some of you, yes probably men, getting your last

(27:19):
minute gifts and making food and spending time with family,
remember that that it's not just about my team or
your team, or it's about truth, and some people will
be wrong. There are groups that claim to be Christian
that aren't by the definition of what they proclaim. There

(27:40):
are individuals that claim to be Christians but don't follow
it in a way that you'd ever know. There are
people in other parts of this world that don't know
what the word Christian means, but are living Christian lives
and they know God through that experience. So shed those

(28:01):
biass and look for the truth, not just for those
on your team.

Speaker 2 (28:07):
K f I A M six forty on demand