0:00

Doug wlson put it really well I I related to this so hard becoming a calvinist was like like grinding teeth

0:06

like it was hard it was like oh God why how could you you know the problem of evil is doesn't that make you the author

0:13

of evil what about Free Will what about this what about that that was like a year of reading studying wrestling in

0:19

poed baptism it was hard in a different way because it was so Paradigm shifting and I needed to be convinced from

0:24

scripture so study study study study look watch debates watch YouTube videos this kind of stuff um but then with

0:30

postmillennialism man it was it was like we this is fun we win we win you

0:45

know hello my name is Will Spencer and welcome to the will Spencer podcast this

0:50

is a weekly Show featuring in-depth conversations with authors leaders and influencers who help us understand our

0:57

changing World new episodes release every Friday Friday my guest this week is Joshua hes the host and founder of

1:04

the outstanding Reformation Red Pill YouTube channel if you don't subscribe to Joshua's Channel or listen to his

1:10

show you should because Joshua has had a remarkable couple of years starting his show and blazing to the top of the

1:16

reform charts if such a thing exists because it seems to me that Joshua understands and responds to the need of

1:23

those of us who consume theological content to experience some new flavors of delivery Joshua is sharp enviously

1:31

well produced and creative in the content that he produces he hosts everything from extended discussions

1:36

about infant baptism to online debates between men like Jared longshaw and James White and even a review of

1:42

unbelievably dank Christian memes with his Pastor Brooks potager and much more

1:47

Joshua has also hosted Pete hegseth on the show and if that name sounds familiar it should because Pete attends

1:54

church with Joshua and Pastor Brooks and is currently nominated to be the Secretary of Defense in Trump's second

2:01

term pretty cool right put all this together and you've got something unique in the reformed world or any podcasting

2:07

world really because it's difficult to consistently produce creative and engaging content while having fun with

2:14

it and not letting the content grind get you down ask me how I know this is

2:19

especially true because not too long ago patreon the platform that facilitated much of reformation red pills income

2:26

canceled them for being too Christian you know caring about abort and gender roles things like that now I thought for

2:33

sure the ban would be overturned especially considering the shifting political winds but it turns out I was

2:39

wrong this was especially tough news for Joshua to take considering that his 2-year-old son is in need of a kidney

2:45

transplant which Lord willing will happen very soon so not only does Joshua face the same grind that the rest of us

2:52

do but he also does it uphill both ways in the snow you Whipper Snappers now I

2:58

think there's a lesson in there for everyone about the value of hard work and commitment to a path that lesson is

3:04

if you really want to get somewhere if you're truly committed to a vision for yourself and whatever project you're

3:10

working on you have to burn the ships that's a metaphor for the earliest explorers who crossed the Atlantic Ocean

3:17

seeking the New World when they arrived at the far shores of the Western Hemisphere they burned their sailing

3:22

ships meaning that there would be no return trip back they would explore and settle the land or die trying there was

3:30

no third option and in an age when many men and in this case I do mean men are afraid to commit to a life path whether

3:37

it be in marriage career or a creative Pursuit we can find inspiration in the

3:42

example of other men who likely feel the same fear we do and act with boldness

3:47

anyway because if you don't feel fear it literally can't be courage it's the

3:52

overcoming of fear and the active and often expensive choice of righteousness that communicates true virtue we admire

3:59

the firefighter who rushes into the burning building to save the family because he is afraid of the fire pain

4:06

and death just like we would be we admire the Special Forces soldier who kicks down the door to grab the

4:11

suspected terrorist because he's afraid of the gunfire that'll be coming back at him just like we would be and we admire

4:18

the quarterback who throws a pinpoint Precision pass to score a touchdown and win the game because he's afraid of

4:24

failing in front of a crowd of thousands just like we would be yes those men and others train to overcome the fear but it

4:31

doesn't go away they don't become machines they put in the work so that their training Rises to the moment above

4:37

their emotion and that is the blessing of hard work that it gives us the opportunity to do that now while

4:43

creating content isn't like saving a life not every man is called to the same path we don't all have to be

4:49

firefighters soldiers or quarterbacks to embody courage instead we each get to choose courage or not in the life the

4:56

Lord has called us to so while I get a lot out of Joshua's content as I think you will too if you don't already what I

5:03

admire most is his commitment which you'll also see in his story in an age when many men serve themselves serve

5:10

their appetites or serve no one at all Joshua puts his faithfulness into action

5:15

and service of his church his community his family and most importantly his God

5:21

and I think that's worth talking about now friends let's be real this podcast isn't just another show it's a

5:27

conversation about things that actually matter so if you find Value in what you hear today I need three things from you

5:34

first subscribe hit that button like you mean it and make sure to click the Bell icon so you don't miss future episodes

5:41

second leave a real comment not a throwaway great video I want to hear your actual thoughts what challenged you

5:48

what made you think differently third share this these conversations matter and if something we discussed could help

5:55

someone see the world differently please pass it along if you want to go deeper check out my substack subscription or

6:01

buy me a coffee links in the show notes every contribution keeps this independent platform running because

6:07

this isn't about me this is about creating a space for real conversations and please welcome this week's guest in

6:14

the podcast the host of reformation red pill Joshua [Music]

6:19

haes Joshua haes from the Reformation red pill podcast thanks so much for joining me on the will Spencer

6:25

podcast it is a pleasure to be here with you brother I feel like this conversation's long

6:32

overdue well first of all we have the battle of the backgrounds but then we also I feel like I feel like this

6:37

conversation is is long overdue so I've been looking forward to talking with you especially after we met at fight La

6:43

Feast and uh and looking forward to learning more about you and and Reformation red pill absolutely man I uh

6:50

I had seen some of your stuff uh over over the course of being on on X for a

6:56

while I you know what actually I think the first I'm not sure but I think the first encounter with you I think was you

7:04

slamming me about a post when I first got on Twitter I think I just I just realized

7:11

this it was it was right you were right about it it was funny because it it was

7:16

uh this is what I think you'll have to fact check me on this but it was the how postmillennialism destroyed my church

7:23

plant post I think it was you I I'd have to go back and look but I remember I got totally some people really love it some

7:29

people really hated it and some people just grilled me because I think I'm not sure if it was you I think it might have been saying something like well it

7:35

doesn't seem like post millennialism killed your church plan as much it was as much as it was like Youth and

7:42

experience and some other things and I was like yeah well that's true I just didn't say all that but yeah that's

7:48

true oh man but I was like word I like the the Frank straightforward I liked it

7:53

so uh I I don't remember I remember seeing that post I don't remember saying that but that is something that I might

8:00

have said so we'll have to send the audience to I can't remember for sure but I

8:06

remember because I just remember being like oh this guy seems cool oh man oh yeah he's totally right about this

8:12

though he's totally not actually cool at all forget that guy no he's cool he's

8:17

just uh he's just giving me the the gut punch that I need right now okay well well if it if it if it was me I'm sorry

8:24

and I'm not sorry and if it wasn't me then that you could take good good yeah that's good that guy I do no I do

8:31

remember I do remember that post and I do remember um I do remember you coming

8:36

on Twitter I want to say it was like towards the start of 2024 something like that or late 2023 something I've been at

8:43

it for a year and about a year and a half so um okay right around 2023 yeah

8:51

where are we 2025 yeah yeah 2023 yeah you showed up and I I I seem to recall

8:58

that within about six months or so you had really made you had really made an impression on me in that time not just

9:04

because of the production quality of your videos but you just seem to be in a good way like aggressively pursuing

9:12

success on Twitter like in in the right way like you weren't being intentionally incendiary you weren't like you know

9:18

posting ridiculous memes like you were uh faithfully and committedly pursuing a

9:23

goal and that really registered with me like wow okay this guy's really serious and I I remember when you had your first

9:28

breakout tweet but I don't remember what it was about do you remember I think there was one that just went so super

9:34

viral I well okay there was there was that uh postmill killed my church plant

9:41

that one went reformed viral um that was my first like kind of small viral thing

9:47

um but then I think my my first like real breakout like million plus view uh

9:54

post was one about modesty I was telling a story about

10:00

um yeah that's what it was I was telling a story and you know like I appreciate you saying that because I I you know I I

10:07

I remember reading Doug Wilson's serrated edge and it really impacted me like we want to speak like Jesus and not

10:14

just the um the vers like the hippie love child child version of Jesus that we've been kind of fed in the broader

10:20

Evangelical but ra rather taking all of scripture and speaking uh you know

10:26

having a category for each of the ways of speaking within scripture and so that includes you know some harsh and even

10:34

you know biting sometimes sarcastic languages so I've been trying to incorporate that but not in a way I've

10:39

been very cautious I didn't want to fall into the ditch on that side of the road too I've seen a lot of people do that um

10:45

and so as I pursue like you say kind of aggressively pursue um kind of

10:51

consistency and in in Twitter I I wanted to consistently bring not just the harsh

10:57

truth although I think that needs to be uh brought and I try to bring that but try to balance it with like truly

11:04

seasoning with Grace and uh kindness you know I I I don't I don't want to be nice

11:10

but I think we we should be known for being kind and showing mercy and Grace and that kind of thing so anyway that

11:16

tweet was I I was telling the story of how in the big Evo world that I that I

11:24

came from there was there was a a woman who would who was coming to our church

11:30

regularly just not wearing a bra oh I remember now yep that's what it

11:36

was and uh and I and I I didn't want to

11:41

be the one to tell her anything I I noticed it because I mean I and it wasn't just me it was everyone noticing

11:47

it and I knew that because at a leaders meeting I heard all these leaders talking about it like one of the wives

11:52

brought it up and was like why is this happening why is she and she and it was one of the like pastor's wives saying I

11:58

feel bad for for all the brothers in the church who can't even go to church without you know you know having this

12:03

stumbling block placed in front of them and at that moment I was like what why

12:08

are we talking about this and not talking to this person like what is what

12:14

is going at that point I knew like this is not right like someone needs to talk about this with her so I approached a

12:21

sister in Christ which is her her was her roommate and I told her hey you

12:26

should consider telling her you know that what's going on hey it's you know I try

12:33

to do it and I told her you know be tactful whatever and then instead of going to tell her as a woman from woman

12:39

to woman she went and said hey Joshua said blank blank blank blank and

12:44

everyone's noticing and it be it became this whole huge now it was the most awkward conversation I've ever had

12:49

because then I had to confront her and talk to her about it which I didn't want to do anyway the whole point of the post was like Sisters in Christ one don't

12:57

cause your brothers to stumble yes need to control their lustful thoughts yes and women need to dress modestly so that

13:03

was the one point and the other point was and sisters uh you have a responsibility to confront your sisters

13:10

when they are doing this like you especially older women what's the what's the command in scripture older women

13:16

teach the younger women and so it used to be common practice for uh you know a

13:22

uh scantily clad lady in the church an older woman to come and just put a little blanket over them and say you

13:29

look cold sweetheart you know yeah and act but actually address

13:34

it like disciple them like confront the issues and so I I told that that little anecdote and boy howdy that uh that went

13:42

bananas I think it got like eight million views or something like that and

13:48

the vitriol man but not just vitriol a lot of people going yes and amen you know any tweet that goes really viral is

13:55

passionate on both sides usually um anyway so I think that was my my big

14:01

tweet uh that kind of went into the the stratosphere as it were yeah that was

14:06

that was exactly it because I had seen you pursuing the consistency and just tweeting regularly like a you know

14:12

staying on your themes and then you hit that one and that just blew up and I I remember watching watching that you know

14:18

like a like a rocket taken off I'm like that's that's really exciting to see okay so so um so I've had I've had a

14:24

couple of those and and I want to get your thoughts about something so here's the weird thing about here's the weird thing about Twitter when you write a

14:31

tweet there's no way that anyone can write anything for millions of people

14:36

right like how am I going to sit down and come up with a tweet that I'm going to write that millions of people are going to see right and so it's always

14:43

like a almost like a leap of faith to say to speak into a few controversial issues because if it goes to that Global

14:50

level and you have millions of people looking in commenting it's almost like no idea can stand up to the scrutiny of

14:57

like 8 million people it's kind of ning actually that is true yeah that's funny

15:03

yeah and I think part of that I think for me is all

15:09

right it's funny you bring that up because I've been very trying to be more thoughtful about and very intentional

15:16

about not speaking on things that I don't have a firm grasp on that I don't

15:22

really understand well um and and things that you know even things because I I

15:28

try to typically my my MO is to confine things I would say I'm trying to embody on X the

15:37

sufficiency of scripture um that the the word of God is sufficient for all of faith not just all of Faith but all of

15:44

faith and all of life and so I my I tell people all the time my goal is to get

15:50

people to ask this question about everything and that's what does God's word say about that um and so that's why

15:58

I'm kind of a generalist on X I know my audience and so and it's really my

16:03

audience is really guys who are my Prime Target anyway is guys who are 18 to

16:09

probably 40 somewhere in that range and have a are are Christians that are that

16:17

actually do pursue a deep Faith but they're coming out of an I would say I'm

16:23

targeting people who are discontented with the current Evangelical landscape looking for me more um because that's

16:30

where I was about 5 years ago and by the grace of God he's kind of brought me into this

16:37

confessionally uh what I call dark roast reformed which is the three C's of dark roast reformed is um calvinistic and

16:44

your soteriology confessional and covenantal and so uh a lot of guys found

16:50

Calvinism but didn't get the other two C's and those other two C's are the secret sauce I think and so I've been

16:55

kind of targeting those guys and and trying to be an encouragement to guys like that um to point them to people

17:04

wiser and smarter and more uh more experienced than I am kind of me being I'm seeing myself as like a signpost

17:10

saying hey look over there look at this check this out like me so people can go yeah me too you know so that's kind of

17:16

myo that's fantastic because um because I I skipped past the mainstream

Navigating Faith and Reformed Theology

17:23

Evangelical world and went like light speed right to the 3 C's right from getting

17:29

yeah praise go praise God for that it's all it's all him but one of the experiences that I encounter being in

17:36

the faith is men that have grown up in the faith or been it for been in it for many years who are discovering reformed

17:42

theology recently and they have a bunch of unplugging to do whether it be from you know uh from from eschatology or

17:50

especially that or other or other forms of you know non- denominationalism that experience of

17:56

having to unlearn is not something that I have in quite the same way I have had my own set of things to unlearn from the

18:01

new age but not from Christianity specifically so maybe you can speak into a little bit of your own Journey maybe

18:08

what inspired you to start the podcast to start the show and what what that Journey looked like for you because I've

18:14

heard many men speak on it or or speak about it being part of their lives including like Doug Wilson and Ben

18:19

Merkel like even they came from different backgrounds so I'm always interested to hear because it's something that I can understand I guess

18:26

you'd say conceptually but not it's not something that I personally experien maybe you can talk a little bit about

18:32

your journey like where you started and how you got a bit to where you are today yeah that's great I so I was born

18:39

into a southern baptist family uh my dad is a Southern Baptist

18:46

preacher and I mean from a very early age I had a drug problem I was drugged

18:53

to church on Sunday I was drugged to church on Wednesday I was drugged to

18:58

know I'm Baptist when I use that joke so I've never I've actually never heard that joke before so I was like where's

19:04

really yeah that's right you really are new to this world am actually so uh no yeah I so I I was in

19:12

church all the time and I was your typical Southern Baptist preachers boy I

19:17

was um rough and rowdy and kind of went my own way and then um and then really

19:24

came to the faith in a serious way in college

19:29

that's whenever my faith really became real that's whenever I started actually loving the word of God uh I would say

19:35

that's when I that's whenever I fell in love with Christ that's whenever I really fell in love with the Lord Jesus

19:41

and everything changed and um so from there I was a part of um not quite

19:48

non-denominational it was technically it was a Southern Baptist Church that I was a part of a Southern Baptist Church

19:53

Plant in college but it was effectively non-denominational you don't you wouldn't know that it's Southern Baptist

19:59

and it's kind of in this act 29 world where a lot of these act 29 churches are in fact Southern Baptists but they don't

20:05

really claim that they give to the Cooperative program they're technically a part of the denom denomination but it's not a big part of their identity

20:12

and so I was a part of that and you know I don't want to in any way belittle that

20:17

experience with that church I love the I love the pastor who's still there I love that church to still to this day love

20:24

love love them um man that's that was the Cradle of my faith in many ways

20:29

and I'm so thankful for the time I spent there and the people that I was in community with and and they were so in

20:36

that world uh in the kind of the Acts 29 world that's what I call light roast Calvinism which is basically uh

20:45

just discovering tulip like calvinistic soteriology and then saying okay I'm a

20:51

calvinist and the reality is Calvin would be like excuse me you uh the way

20:59

that you handle the sacraments you don't baptize bab you are not a calvinist you know but but uh it became kind of it was

21:07

the the young Restless reformed uh kind of the second phase of that uh was the

21:13

Matt Chandlers the David Platz um these kind of guys who were like I said calvinistic in their serology but

21:20

predominantly baptistic in their ecclesiology um and so that's where I

21:25

kind of came up and I discovered Calvinism at least tulip calvinistic

21:31

serology and you know I fought against that for about a year I hated it when I first encountered it um because you know

21:37

how could God choose some and not others and all these classic hard to hard to deal with questions especially when

21:43

you're first coming to them and eventually the Lord just I mean I mean the Lord just softened my heart to

21:49

where I I came to the point where I wanted whatever the Bible taught that's

21:54

that's the faith that I want what this Bible teaches and uh the thing I love about reformed

22:01

theology and Calvinism is that it it holds

22:07

mystery it's able to hold the mystery in while still you know taking logic to as

22:13

far as we can take it without crossing the boundaries taking all of revealed scripture and trying to um systematize

22:20

it make it make sense you know we we believe that God's not going to contradict himself and so yeah coming to

22:27

love systematic theology but we can hold in in in in this in our hands at the

22:32

same time the mystery I mean predestination and election and Free Will that's the big one obviously like

22:37

how can God really be um so totally Sovereign and yet you know as the Westminster says that we still have free

22:45

will well in a manner of speaking we have free will um our choices actually matter and how can we believe both of

22:51

those things well as Sinclair Ferguson says you know where the Bible makes an

22:57

end of teaching I make an end of learning you know and so you know I can

23:02

I can hold that mystery yeah thank you thank you um a lot of people don't know

23:07

this about me but I'm actually fluent in six or seven accents so um not languages

23:13

but accents hear we're gonna need to hear those through the course of the interview so if you could just deploy

23:18

them strategically oh yeah that that's a good idea really spice it up but anyway so I

23:25

I I came to really love uh the fact that that the reformed tradition can it'll

23:31

hold the mystery and uh SE like search out the depths of the truth that's found

23:37

in the word of God and just strictly say like if the Bible makes an end of teaching on this well I'm just going to

23:44

believe it I'm just going to believe it I don't have to marry everything uh and and make it all make sense I'm going to

23:50

just trust God if I knew everything I would be God but I have to have faith and so anyway I came to uh the

23:56

calvinistic caterology and it kind of stayed there

24:02

it stayed there I just I I got really involved in missions and church planting and things like that and I would say I

24:09

really enjoyed my time in that world but then 2020 hit and this is really the

24:16

Genesis of the my whole you know what I call my Reformation red pill journey and

24:22

the podcast and and everything what I had just planted a church in Los Angeles

24:27

and I'll tell you right now I was 27 and along with the other two other 27y old Elders right and my Elder

24:35

process was something like oh you're really passionate how's your heart bro it's good okay go get them you know

24:41

that's that was basically my Elder process very script yeah right yeah no

24:47

I'm telling you um man I I have a whole that's a whole Soap Box just we're just

24:52

pimping out our the youth the Christian Youth and saying like here you're strong you're passionate and yeah go get go

24:59

into that church planting graveyard and and do your best instead of actually maybe you should train under wise

25:05

leaders for a decade you know before you undertake this position anyway that's a whole another thing but I planted this

25:12

church in uh Los Angeles in 2020 and I planted March 1st 2020 so uh two

25:20

weeks before the world shut down good timing yeah and very quickly we have

25:25

covid in LA and we have black lives matter all this stuff is happening I'm

25:32

watching all of these Christian leaders in my world the ACT 29 uh the kind of

25:38

more the smaller subgroup of uh um that I was a part of is called s and I'm

25:45

watching all these leaders essentially just go with the talking points of the

25:52

culture um and just my Spidey senses were just

25:57

tingling you know I was I was like some this isn't passing the sniff test why

26:03

are we are you really encouraging people to march in Black lives matter par you know all this stuff all in the name of

26:10

compassion all in the name of um really all in the name of trying to win a seat

26:17

at the table so that you can win some you know like got to be win some so you

26:23

can win some you know um and loving these these puns dude this is amazing

26:28

yeah yeah yeah yeah I'm full of a man um but uh yeah and and really just seeing

26:35

that that what I would call now I would capitulation in the face of tyranny in the face of not just government tyranny

26:41

with Co but cultural tyranny with all the black lives matter stuff and I I just knew something was wrong

26:49

and luckily the the other guys that I was pastoring with did too we were all

26:55

on the same page we were just like you know we were Proto woke I would say a little bit we you know one of our our

27:02

Church's um values was diversity you know uh that kind of thing we we were we

27:08

were on that train a little bit but but man as things started to turn harder and

Eye-Opening Encounter With Ideological Roots

27:14

harder left it be it began to become clearer and clearer that something is really wrong and actually what really

27:21

you know set me on on the straight and narrow in in one sense would be bod Bam's book came right at the right time

27:27

uh fault lines and he just explained the the genealogy of the ideas

27:35

that we're currently dealing with with cultural Marxism and how it relates to standpoint epistemology and all these

27:41

other things he he really just laid laid out like the source of these ideas being

27:48

fundamentally not just non-Christian but anti-christian um and that he's been

27:54

thinking through this and prepping for this and warning about this for decades and kind of this lone profit in the

28:00

night saying hey this is coming and here it is here it is and so luckily I I got that book right at the perfect time and

28:08

it it it saved me from being that Pastor who was posting the black squares and

28:13

talking about my my little bag of white privilege that I could reach into and that was Matt Chandler um yeah so I mean

28:21

I uh I I didn't go that way thank god um and uh but but then I started to notice

28:27

okay who are the guys who are the men who are holding the line on these issues

28:33

uh these cultural issues whether it was covid or black lives matter or all these different things and it was these

28:39

confessionally reformed guys it was guys like you know uh Doug Wilson Moscow all

28:45

those guys James White um V bacham was reformed Baptists and and and

28:51

Presbyterians and I I just saw Christianity with a spine and thought

28:58

well gee I I want that I don't I I'm I I

29:03

see what's going on on in my world and I'm like it the best way that the word that fits it best is just squishy it's

29:10

just squishy it's just it's not solid it's just going with the flow it's like a jellyfish I don't know like I love I

29:17

mean even uh Doug Wilson has that book even jellyfish that's that's about right

29:22

and uh yeah and so I saw these guys holding the line and I thought to myself

29:28

whatever they have I want that so I started to realize oh they're not just calvinistic they're confessional um

29:35

they're and they're covenantal um and not only that but they they have a theological framework that was prepared

29:42

for this madness um and particular I was most impressed with their response to covid uh they had a theological

29:50

framework that Reed them for that battle right while these other churches are

29:56

saying all right Co is saying or I'm sorry the you know the government is

30:01

saying you can't worship together you have to wear the mask if you worship together and all this other stuff uh

30:07

Moscow is saying no the word of God says that you do not have the authority to

30:13

prohibit us from worship you do not have the authority to mask us that is outside the jurisdiction of the state God has

30:20

given the state responsibilities God has given the state actual Authority that does not fall in your purview so we will

30:27

not obey you because we have a responsibility to obeying Jesus and when I realize they're not just pulling out

30:34

Bible verses out of a hat like these other uh pastors the other pastors are saying well Jesus says love your

30:41

neighbor so we should wear the mask it's a that's that's that's all you got but over here we've got people who

30:48

have they're a part of a theological tradition that has prepared them for this kind of thing and I so all of that

30:53

kind of climax in and me realizing whatever they have I want that what do

31:00

they have okay it's this confession like I said the three C's and so really

31:05

ultimately what that led to is me um realizing I haven't been trained in this

31:11

and so I I need to uh it kind of led to us pulling the the plug on our church plant because I kind of when I came to

31:17

these convictions I realized hey actually I'm too I'm too young for for

31:23

this position um I and I'm too young and inexperienced and if I want to be a part

31:28

if I want to plant a church like that or be a part of a church like that I need to learn I need to step back and I need to learn for a while um and all of us

31:35

felt the same way me and all the leaders and so um yeah we ended up pulling the plug on the church and moving across the

31:43

country to be a part of a cc church here I am um in Goodletsville Tennessee under

31:49

uh Pastor Brooks poiger with uh Pilgrim Hill reform fellowship and I could not be happier it is so so good so that's uh

31:57

that's the mildly condensed version of how how we got

32:02

here that is so interesting okay because because because my experience is so

32:08

different from that because I just came right in to that world providentially

32:14

right as soon as I found apologia so so I want to ask you some questions about this this about this experience because

32:21

now I understand the title Reformation red pill like it was kind of like your red pill moment in a sense where you got

32:27

red pilled from all the stuff okay cool okay and this is making sense that that as you're watching you know covid

32:33

tyranny woke tyranny descend on Los Angeles and descend in the Evangelical world you're you're you're feeling the

32:40

Temptation or perhaps the pressure to go in that direction because everyone else is doing it and then you discover that

32:45

there are actually Christians that are standing up to something that you feel in your heart and your gut like this is not right but I can't quite say why and

32:53

everyone else is doing it so you're feeling that pull in that direction and then you discover that there are other Christians out there who are standing up

33:00

to it which appeals to you intuitively spiritually perhaps as a man as well and

33:05

you like I want some of what they have and when you look into what they have you see it like oh this all makes a

33:11

whole lot of sense so as you're as you're looking at that maybe we're going back into I'm guessing this is sometime

33:17

in 2020 maybe 2021 that we're talking about as you're looking at these three C's like you have the you have the the

33:24

calvinistic kind of mindset at this point but you don't have the confessional and covenantal Viewpoint so

33:31

as you're encountering these ideas for the first time you're perhaps you're reading books or you watching YouTube

33:36

videos like how did you find these ideas first yeah yeah I would

33:43

say it was a it was definitely a mix of all of those things I like you it was a

33:48

good summary whenever I started to ask that question what is it that they have

33:53

I started to really look into the reformed tradition that's whenever I started to make some distinctions

33:59

between light roast and dark roast Calvinism which is funny because anyone who really likes coffee hates this

34:05

illustration because light roast is actually the good stuff so um but um but

34:11

uh but yeah this when I started to really make this distinction and realize oh calvinistic soteriology is just the

34:18

tip of the iceberg uh underneath that is is a history of developing covenant

34:24

theology the Creeds and confessions and all that stuff and so I um whenever I

34:29

discovered that that okay the those those those elements the

34:35

Creeds confessions covenant theology that's under ging this uh this tip of

34:41

the iceberg of of calvinistic aerology I said okay I need to dive in head first into that and so yes and so I did and so

34:50

I started to you know go get all the books I could get my hands on with

34:56

Covenant with regard to Covenant Theology and it's interesting I actually was at Western Seminary which was the

35:02

Seminary that um the Bible project guys uh that they were a part of and I was

35:09

their Tim Mackey's Professor was my professor for a while he was great guy um but I uh I ended up realizing like

35:18

okay this is not what I'm what I'm looking for this is not what I'm looking for um and I was just I remember being

35:24

in class at at a certain point being like okay this is I convinced that the reform tradition is right I don't need

35:31

like a a big survey of like all these different Traditions like I want to go deeper in my tradition the one that I'm

35:39

that I'm convinced is true so I ended up uh making the transition from that Seminary to Westminster Theological

35:45

Seminary particularly Philadelphia Westminster so I'm on the online program with them and I'm jumping in and every

35:52

which way I can find getting into all the reading I'm listening to all the sermons and podcasts and

35:58

and I mean it's it's like we were building a an airplane in the air we had planted the church and we're building in

36:06

real time and going through all these changes we're like hey you know the church has always had a thoughtful

36:13

robust liturgy throughout all history maybe we should have one too you know uh

36:19

maybe we should do that you know so we're we're introducing lurgical elements we're uh I mean we're changing

36:27

in real time like major theological positions I realized man I'm telling you I mean honestly part of what had me

36:33

close it down was when I finally transitioned to Westminster theological sem Seminary and I took my doctrine of

36:39

God class theology proper and as I'm going through that doctrine of God class

36:45

I'm realizing oh my goodness I am a pastor and I could not have answered

36:51

these questions I would have said something heretical like oh my goodness this who

36:58

let me do this like what what is going on you know good grief and so I mean

37:04

part of that was that that was a pretty big wakeup call like I've got a I've got some learning you know that's when I

37:10

entered I think I finally exited my sophomore Sage you know the Wise Fool

37:15

you learn just enough uh just enough to think you know something until you come

37:20

to realize how much knowledge there is that you don't know and so I finally I think that's whenever I finally realized

37:26

oh my goodness just because I was the most theologically Adept or passionate

37:33

guy in my little you know Evangelical bubble does not mean that I know things

37:39

um does not mean that I have a firm understanding of the the Christian faith Orthodox Christianity as it has been

37:46

historically understood and so anyway yeah so um what was the question I just

37:52

went all the way off it doesn't even matter because I'm loving this so much because I because

37:57

because I can I can I can understand being in the Moment Like wait I'm a pastor of a church and you're changing

38:03

things theologically back and fourth how many how many people were in the church how many people were church at this

38:09

point yeah we so when we launched we had a pretty for a church plant in La we had

38:15

a good sized launch we had like 80 people there um yeah it was it was good but then Co happened and it really

38:20

whittel it down until like the faithful VI it's like 40 um or so um roughly you

38:27

know it would kind of vary up and down but uh yeah and so really we started we

38:32

met it's funny we we took a few weeks off of worship until finally we were

38:39

like no no we're not doing this we're wrong we shouldn't be doing this so we

38:44

met we didn't have anywhere to meet so we met outside at the park in Venice in the neighborhood of Venice um every

38:49

Sunday for two years I think two years yeah um we didn't miss a Sunday it with

38:55

that's LA weather for you we literally just never miss Sunday it was amazing um but winter yeah I know it was a little

39:02

chilly we brought our jackets our light jackets um but uh oh boy and did we have

39:08

some I mean it was we had a lot of homeless folks coming up and uh joining us and man we had I got some stories for

39:14

you around that but uh um but yeah so we we started worshiping together and and I

39:20

successfully whittel that group of 40 uh with my with all our transitions down to about 20 you know um we did uh we we had

Theological Dinner Changes Discussion

39:29

what we call dinner and theology which is um once a week we would have a dinner and then we would um go through one of

39:36

these these pretty major theological things that we're CH changing in real time and so we're learning how to teach

39:43

them and we're teaching it to them and saying hey this is this is why we're changing you know uh whether it's our

39:50

you know the way we do communion whether it's our you know lurgical elements um uh eschatology we

39:57

all came to postmill convictions about the same time and so we taught on that we're bringing people through all of these things until

40:04

eventually it just kind of got to the point I think and I mentioned this in my

40:09

uh postmill killed by Church Plant article um we're going through all these changes and we're wondering should we be

40:15

doing this should we be here and then I think the the uh the straw that broke

40:20

the camels back was going to a c presbyter meeting so uh

40:27

um right before that we had uh gone to

40:33

our non-denominational denomination meeting which is basically just all the

40:39

churches in my non-denominational uh denomination I don't know what else to call it um uh get together and kind

40:47

of have sort of some like encouragement accountability that sort of thing and by

40:55

this at this point we had gone pretty we kind of gone off the reservation with going all right we're all the way in in

41:01

the good way I mean when I'm saying like we became the black sheep in that world because we're we're we're moving into

41:10

liturgy we're saying no we should be meeting and not you know succumbing to the tyranny of actually black lives

41:16

matter is not a good thing like we're we're you know becoming kind of the the odd balls so we go and it's it's our

41:24

church and one other guy one other Church presented who's kind of been listening to he who must not be named

41:30

which in that c those circles is Doug Wilson um oh my goodness because because

41:35

you know he's calling out churches for not meeting for you know succumbing to all this tyranny and and so all these other pastors you know they're having

41:42

their congregants come up their particularly their more conservative congre congre congregants come up and uh

41:49

you know call them out for it and so Doug Wilson's causing a big headache for all them so anyway one other guy's been

41:54

listening to Doug his name was Justin he's big like bald huge like uh CrossFit

42:01

guy and we were talking about how we've been coming to postmill convictions and

Boldly Addressing Biblical Sexuality

42:07

hey maybe that means we shouldn't just be so Winsome with the culture but we should actually like bring the sword of

42:13

the spirit bring the truth to bear in the culture and not just bring nice words you know not just you know beg for

42:20

approval everywhere we go and uh so we were having this group discussion about how how to engage in God's mission in

42:26

2021 whatever it was 2022 and uh and and

42:32

Justin big CrossFit guy I I'll never forget one of the guys said um I brought

42:37

up homosexuality and how uh how we need

42:43

to be preaching on sexuality from the front uh and preaching against

42:49

homosexuality from the front you know some people would say oh but no one in my congregation struggles with that one

42:55

first of all you don't know that number two everyone in your congregation struggles

43:01

with the fear of not speaking up and telling the truth and if your pastor

43:06

won't speak up and tell the truth then what do you how are you going to expect your congregation to do that in difficult situations and so I was kind

43:12

of going on that soapbox a little bit and I I did that truly assuming that everyone in the room agreed and that

43:20

they had preached about like biblical sexuality within you know at some point

43:26

from the front and one of the guys was like we haven't done that um because you

43:32

know we just think that's a divisive topic and you know we hold to the truth of God's word but we really want to see

43:38

it at the table you know we don't want to needlessly offend somebody and uh you know lose a seat at the table and then

43:44

Justin bindle goes well Doug Wilson says that we should be building our own

43:52

tables dude oh the temperature dropped ice cold there baby and I was like oh

43:59

snap Voldemort you said Voldemort you said it he and so uh um

44:07

anyway and so we got all hyped and we started talk and then it became kind of like us all talking about that stuff and

44:14

it became very clear that we just were you know we were the odd oddballs you

44:19

know and it was interesting because the very next week we had been invited to check out the CC Presbyterian meeting we

44:25

were we didn't want to be non- denominated any we knew okay we need to find oversight and accountability we're

44:31

three young men we need oversight and accountability so we need a denomination so then we reached out to the CC they

44:36

said hey come check out our presbyter meeting so we did and let me tell you man it was night and day we were Oddball

44:45

weirdos over here and then we come into dark roast reformed world and it is just

44:52

like it was like coming home it was like going to Narnia like it was like met

44:57

with like whiskey and cigars and this beautiful dinner and they're like all right we're going to sing some Psalms

45:03

and they hand out uh some bulletins and I'm like okay where's the guitar and the

45:09

projector what do we what do we do you know oh no someone gets on the piano and then we sing Psalms that are really hard

45:15

to sing and I'm like having trouble keeping up and there's like six-year-olds doing cartwheels singing along and they're just they know it so

45:21

well that I'm like where am I what is this this is incredible and then the song ends and the heartiest amen that I

45:28

have ever heard in my life amen every man just shouts it and the Earth shakes

45:35

and it was just exhilarating and I was and at that moment I thought I'm home

45:40

this is this is the culture that I want for my parishioners this is the church

45:46

Christian culture that I want for uh my family um unfortunately I might not been

45:52

trained to do this so that was honestly one of the nails in the coffin my church plan but the big one besides that was

45:59

witnessing a uh an ordination exam so they do this at all the presbyter

46:05

meetings and it's public you can just sit in on them uh and it's two hours of just grilling this potential Pastor all

46:13

the elders just grilling this potential Pastor he took an eight- hour written exam and they just Grill him on

46:19

everything he said and they ask him all these questions to make sure he knows and they ask him all these questions to make sure he can actually communicate

46:25

what he's saying and they will press him and press him and press him hey what do you do you're you're in your in your

46:31

congregation a 12-year-old boy comes up to you and says he hasn't told you he hasn't told his parents this but he is

46:37

attracted to the same sex what do you do there pastoral questions questions

46:42

like questions like what is the the main purpose what is the main point of Psalm

46:49

103 like you just what what um and you

46:54

don't have to Ace it per se but uh but man I mean just they Grill them and so they I sat through that and I thought to

47:02

myself this is why I have impostor syndrome because I was never grilled

47:09

like this I was never no one made sure that I was qualified like this uh these

47:15

men care enough about the the people that he will be pastoring to make certain that he is biblically qualified

47:22

and man that just that just changed me um that was the final STW I would say

47:29

and so I was like you know what we got to shut this thing down uh we I need to train and learn and grow and read and

47:37

and be mentored and so um yeah and but that also kind of sealed the deal for me

47:42

that I that I wanted to be a part of a cc church I'll I'll move I'll go wherever I have to go to be a part of this kind of culture because the cool

47:48

thing was this wasn't Moscow This was um this was uh um anel ST anel presbyter

47:55

which is the West Coast presbyter and that just told me like you know I had been window shopping Moscow for a

48:01

while looking through the screen oh Sabbath dinners at Doug Wilson's house that looks amazing you know um but I

48:07

wonder is it just Moscow no it's not this is the culture of the CC and it was

48:13

it was magical and then I had my first taste of a uh Covenant renewal service

48:19

um and oh my goodness it was it changed me it just changed me like the way I I

48:27

the the Liturgy the the way that uh communion was honored uh the way I mean

48:33

I it was it was it was incredible and so really that's what sealed the deal for

48:38

me to say I'm going to be a part of this whatever it takes wherever I have to move whatever I have to do this is what

48:44

my family's going to be a part of um yeah so that was my my journey uh into

48:49

this world this is so cool this is this is

48:55

awesome cuz I feel like I feel like I'm right there with you as you're narrating your Awakening through all this cuz I

49:01

have my own versions of each of of each of these things in in a different way so but so I can relate so I feel like I'm

49:07

kind of like you know a fly on the wall watching you just have all these Awakenings realizations deprogramming

49:15

reprogramming like what's going on what is this version of Christian Christianity that I've just encountered

49:21

that could not be more different from how I was raised that where what I came

49:26

came up in you know what what the bulk of my experience was in it's it's a little bit like night and day I can

49:32

understand now why you why it's your Reformation red pill like it's you know the whole everything starts falling

49:38

apart all at once you think that's air you're breathing now oh man absolutely

49:44

it's it is it's like waking up out of this fog you know it God is so kind to us he's gracious

49:52

and that he gives us these like seasons of growth seasons of you know it's like

49:58

it's like a greenhouse effect for for a few days weeks months years whatever and

50:03

then you just you kind of almost like you sit in that and then you learn there and then it's almost like it grows not

50:10

stale but um oh it's uh it cures always on the

50:17

move you always got to be going to the next thing um and if you if you're sitting still then you're actually dying

50:25

you know you need to be you need to be chasing after and so you sit in that for a while and then you have another kind

50:30

of like Breakthrough kind of thing and I've had a few of those throughout my life like like three or four of these

50:36

big aha Jimmy Neutron brain blasts you know um and and that changes that

50:43

changes everything and really this I would say other than my

50:48

salvation this is the the the biggest thing there was this there was me really starting to follow Christ at 18 um and

50:55

then lots of growth in different kind of little mini breakthroughs and then there was this whole thing and it just

51:01

reshaped and recontextualized it took everything that I had learned here and clicked it into place um and made sense

51:08

of it all and man it has been it has been

51:13

awesome so and and I can I can feel that in your enthusiasm and I can feel it in

51:21

uh how real quick how how long of a period of time are we talking about so you of the church in early March 2020

51:29

and then when you finally left LA and moved to Tennessee what period of time was that how long was

51:37

that I planted in March 2020 I got to La I was actually I spent about three years

51:44

in La before 2020 just learning study learning the culture I was a part of a

51:51

um of a local church just I'm taking kind of a learner posture for a while I

51:56

was there uh 3 years then 2020 and then left in 2020 at the end of

52:04

2022 um okay no beginning of 2023 actually technically um so all told

52:09

about six years okay but the but the but the theological Evolution period was

52:16

like concentrated in the course of like a couple years it was really 2020 to

52:23

2023 or so yeah okay from still still going but it's that big shift was in

52:32

that time yeah so you're kind of experiencing sort of theological warp

52:38

speed as like everything's just just going through the tunnel get the Stars whipped by like what's even happening

52:44

right now I'm telling you I mean the Paradigm Shift like the two biggest Paradigm shifts I would say within that

52:51

were was post-millennial postmillennialism and uh pedal baptism

52:57

pedal baptism that one um that one just turns everything upside down um does it

53:05

it I mean everything that all the par like the entire Paradigm that you

53:11

understood I mean the yeah I mean it really did it it changes everything um

53:17

the way that you understand what Christianity even is how someone becomes a Christian um the role of regeneration

53:23

in the Christian's life and what I mean it I mean obviously this is one of the primary sacraments baptism and and uh

53:30

and getting like that shift it's been awesome but man that was that was pretty

53:36

wild and then uh postmillennialism that one was you know of all of all my

53:42

theological transitions that one was definitely the most fun I will say okay yeah yeah it's

53:50

I mean Doug wson put it really well I I related to this so hard he said and this was my story exactly becoming a

53:57

calvinist was like like grinding teeth like it was hard it was like oh it was

54:02

it was like God why how could you you know the problem of evil is doesn't that

54:07

make you the author of evil what about Free Will what about this what about that that was like a year of reading

54:12

studying wrestling and poed baptism was another hard one it wasn't it was hard

54:18

in a different way because it was so Paradigm shifting and I needed to be convinced from scripture so it was study study study study look watch debates

54:25

watch YouTube videos this kind stuff um but then with postmillennialism man it was it was like this is fun we win we

54:33

win you know um actually the Gates of Hell really don't Prevail we we win you

54:39

know and uh and man it just it it it I tell people uh when I became postmill I

54:45

started writing incursive it changed my actual like real life like in every

54:50

little way I literally I like beauty is important hey it changes the way I plant

54:55

in my garden like it changes everything because I'm thinking now generationally I'm thinking long term I'm not waiting

55:01

for Jesus to come back next Tuesday and and you know this all to to burn you

55:06

know I'm I'm I'm building for the long term for generations to come uh yeah and

55:12

and praying that my children will benefit from my work and that they'll pass it on to their children and that we

55:19

as the hes family will be Kingdom advancers and builders on you know

55:25

generation to generation to generation it just I mean it just totally changed everything it was so much fun so but

55:31

yeah those Paradigm shifts I mean it changes everything like the way that you engage the culture the

55:37

way you engage God's Mission you're your you know what I tell people is um when you when you actually believe that

55:44

you're going to win the war it will change your Battle Tactics so your

55:50

myology Changes Everything Changes whenever you um adopt uh an optimistic

55:55

esqu ology and so anyway that's it's been it's been crazy but it's been a lot of fun which one of those two happened

56:03

first was it po baptism that happened first and then postmill or was it the other way around no for me it was

56:08

postmill first and then uh and then poed baptism postmail that one was about a

56:17

year of study and you know reading all the different views reading the

56:23

arguments um really going into the word of God and like like is this I don't is

56:28

this wishful thinking um because it would be cool if this were true and so I don't wanted to just you know believe it

56:34

for that reason no it does the word of God really teach this and uh yeah and so

56:40

it was postmill and then it was P baptism yeah poal baptism that one took a little bit longer but really whenever

56:46

my wife got pregnant with our first I was like okay I got to figure this out

56:51

that'll do it I've heard that does it that does it that does it for sure y

56:57

so can um so can you walk people through now I know to some extent that uh the

57:04

question of baptism is not is a is a question of worldviews meaning it seems to me at least from my own experience

57:11

going from going from KOB baptism to PO baptism that was in 2023 was it was just a gigantic shift of

57:19

the way that I understood everything like it's not like there was a fact that helped me re-understand it was just a it

57:25

was just a giant like suddenly everything shifts and it all looks different so to some extent that seem

57:31

that seems to be the process I don't know why or how it happens I don't fully understand it but I remember it just

57:37

shifted the totality of my thinking about so many things so can but but for

57:43

me though I didn't come pre-bundled with a lifetime of of of Doctrine about it a

57:51

lifetime of teaching about it I had at that point I think I had only thought

57:57

seriously about baptism maybe at that point for like a year and a half at the most right it was just like because you

58:04

come into you come into the Christian world and my first stop was reformed theology because that was the first real

58:10

church I started visiting about a year that was apia in November yeah exactly so obviously there's like Stacks and

58:18

stacks of books to come up on so it's not like I don't understand any of this so I'm just going to be content to sit

58:24

here and listen but I I did still have thoughts about the question so I didn't have all that much to unwind and un

58:31

unplug right it's just my own perspective well I have a year and a half or at that point yeah I have like a

58:37

couple years worth of experience on this topic from my own personal experience that's what I have to draw from here's

58:42

my conclusion it was never on any solid foundation because I never put it there so when I when I encountered po baptism

58:49

it was relatively easy to shift things cuz I didn't have it as deeply entrenched in culture and lifestyle and

58:56

upbringing and all that stuff so can you maybe walk people through a little bit of what that shift you said it took

59:01

about a year to go from crater to P baptism can you walk through some touch points along that um and and maybe some

59:08

some key works or some key realizations I mean obviously like your your wife getting pregnant was a big part of

59:15

that yeah the only thing I could one of the things that came to mind when you're as

59:21

you're asking the question is um the dirty the dirty little secret is that

59:26

that uh nobody in the in my world thinks about baptism it's like there's you

59:33

weren't you say you know you brought up like not having to have years of unlearning to do um no no Baptist has

59:39

that because they're not taught it I mean I mean I mean in general it's

59:45

this is the argument that you get it's I don't see no baptizing babies in the in

59:51

the New Testament so it must not be true show it to me on the page

59:57

that's is that accent number is that accent number two oh yeah that's that's oh that's me that's that's a that's

1:00:03

that's so Bob deep deep deep whose accent sounds

1:00:11

exactly like that is awesome I I love the South don't I love the South and I

1:00:16

love southern people I wish I had a Southern accent oh man I hope my my kids do but uh no yeah they really don't they

1:00:25

just don't um it's it's just not a thing that's taught so I mean that's that's part of what took you know so long I

1:00:31

think any major theological transition should take some time but is I needed to study both because I mean I wasn't given

1:00:37

the baptistic arguments either I was basically it really was the extent of it was I don't see babies baptized in the

1:00:43

New Testament therefore it must not be true and and then man throughout this

1:00:49

whole process I just came to the realization that like any any theological issue or position

1:00:57

that divides Bible believing denominations is not going to be cut and

1:01:02

dry it's not going to be simple it's not GNA be easy you know um and so so yeah

1:01:09

you know I realized I needed to study both I needed to study um what do the reformed Baptists uh what do they have

1:01:18

and what do the Presbyterians have and and I put them up against each other and let them go to go to war for a while and

1:01:25

you know there were a few there's just there's a few um I I will say this I am

1:01:32

I am poed Baptist while seeing the arguments that the reformed

1:01:38

Baptists bring as there really are some good argument um and I think what it

Reframing Baptism and Covenant Debate

1:01:44

comes down to with a lot of these kind of theological doctrines that divide denominations are you know which one has

1:01:52

the least problem passages in in in a sense you know um and I and honestly so

1:01:58

here I'll just lay out a little bit of my journey for it there was a few arguments that I just have not had good

1:02:05

satisfactory answers um argument number one and I'll do the the elevator version

1:02:12

of it is uh the argument from silence and that is that I used to ask the

1:02:20

question where do we see babies baptized in the New Testament now I realize that's the wrong question

1:02:26

we should be asking the question uh has the Covenant membership of

1:02:32

children changed from the old Covenant the New Covenant because in the old

1:02:38

Covenant children were included in the Covenant they were circum given the

1:02:43

Covenant sign on the eth day now has that changed in the New Covenant and the

1:02:48

reason that framing is important because then I realize once I ask it that way the burden of proof no no longer is on

1:02:56

the PO Baptist needing to show in the New Testament where there is a baby

1:03:02

baptism now the burden of proof is on The Credo Baptist who's saying no now in

1:03:09

the New Covenant it's changed from the old Covenant because we ought to assume unless we're told explicitly otherwise

1:03:16

that um that the the reality of this old Covenant the children were included we should probably just assume that the New

1:03:23

Covenant is going to have that too unless we're told otherwise and it seems that it was the case that it was assumed

1:03:29

and the reason I say that is because whenever there's a change in Covenant Administration um when there's a

1:03:35

covenant change we're given instruction we're given teaching about it we're given example about it in the New Testament um and so if it is the fact

1:03:45

that now children are excluded until they can make a profession of faith we should have some clear teaching about

1:03:50

that now uh the the Reformed Baptist may say that yes there is clear teaching about it I don't I don't see that I

1:03:56

don't see that at all because if if it were the case that that was changed why

1:04:02

didn't Paul talk about it right so he whenever the change happened from the uh

1:04:10

circumcision being necessary to no longer being necessary how much ink was spilled over

1:04:15

that issue so much ink was spilled over that in the New Testament so if it is the case that something which I think

1:04:21

would be a much bigger deal which would be that children are no longer included how would that not be a huge issue in

1:04:27

the New Testament churches why would he not be speaking about that left and right why would because I mean you have

1:04:32

to imagine the scene at Pentecost you know um you know David is holding baby

1:04:40

Solomon the first two Jewish names you know Hebrew names that came to mind you know David is holding baby Solomon and

1:04:48

they're at Pentecost Christ has been crucified resurrected ascended Peter is giving his sermon um you know now the

1:04:56

all those who are far off are now brought near repent um for the Kingdom of Heaven is here you know um and and

1:05:02

the promise is not the promise is to you and to your children and to all those who are far off okay David is hearing

1:05:10

that what what that would mean is what the cedo Baptist position is is that

1:05:16

yesterday before Christ you know before the Ascension Resurrection Pentecost

1:05:21

little baby Solomon was a part of the Covenant now today in the new better bigger better Covenant little baby

1:05:28

Solomon is out he was in in the old one but now you're holding baby he's not in

1:05:33

he's got to prove it to too bad kid and if that were the case I think there would be a lot more written about that I

1:05:39

think that would be a big deal to people so that's the argument from Silence um that one really got me the other you

1:05:45

know I'll just for the sake of time I'll just do one other one the other one is I mean going man I mean

1:05:52

the the the testimony of the church throughout all history what you have to believe as a CREDO Baptist is

1:05:58

that the New Testament Church the first Christians got baptism right and then

1:06:04

the entire church throughout all of church history got one of the two

1:06:09

sacraments that our Lord left us to do got one of them completely wrong the the

1:06:15

church throughout the entirety of History until the Reformation when the anabaptists figured it out

1:06:21

um that to me is untenable um and I've heard counterarguments like

1:06:28

Dr White will say um yes but uh the

1:06:34

reformed version of pedobaptism is a different theological framework than the

1:06:39

papists or the Roman uh po baptism which is true uh true the PO the papus

1:06:46

position is that um in in baptism you're washing Away original sin and uh we

1:06:51

don't believe that we don't believe that at all um now the reason why I don't think that argument holds water

1:06:59

unintended um and the reason the reason is because we're not

1:07:05

Gnostic the actual Administration the actual water and being baptized in the

1:07:11

name of the father and the sprinkling or the pouring on the child or the person like that's actually a real thing that's

1:07:19

happening to the real Flesh and Blood person in real life and it's doing something we're it's not the Baptist

1:07:26

believes that baptism is just an outward symbol of an inward reality the reformed we do not believe that we believe that

1:07:33

Grace is really being bestowed according to the Westminster Confession Grace is really actually being bestowed on that

1:07:39

child or the person when baptism uh happens it's a it's it's a real thing that's happening God is putting his name

1:07:46

on you claiming you that's a real thing that's happening so when it comes to Dr White's position well it's a different

1:07:51

theological framework yeah that may be true but guess what we didn't have the trity worked out for hundreds of years for centuries we didn't have the Trinity

1:07:58

worked out theologically and yet people the church was baptizing in the Triune name so we

1:08:05

didn't have all the tees crossed and the eyes dotted when it came to working out the Theology of the Trinity until NAA

1:08:12

and even after that with the um not just the not just the Trinity but then with the person of Christ um but uh we didn't

1:08:20

have that theology all worked out and yet we were still in practice worship

1:08:25

the Triune God baptizing in the name of the Triune god um and I think that

1:08:31

speaks to the reality that okay yes we we want to understand we want to get our theological ducks in a row but there is

1:08:38

something what we're Flesh and Blood humans and and what happens in in our physical in this physical world I mean I

1:08:46

love that it's like that uh that line in the screw tape letters if you're familiar where um screw tape says uh for

1:08:55

those of you haven't read it you should it's about it's a demon writing to his demon nephew about how to um how to keep

1:09:01

uh human beings away from God and deceive them and whatnot and he said and screw tape says or the screw tape says

1:09:08

to his nephew um convince him that there's really no need to get down on

1:09:14

your knees and pray that really what's the point of that you can do all your praying just sitting in your chair in a

1:09:20

comfortable comfortable position he said don't let them realize that they are in bodied souls and that their actual

1:09:27

posture has an effect on the on on the spiritual reality um don't let them realize that let them just basically be

Gnostic Beliefs vs. Church Sacraments

1:09:34

gnostics let them just think it's all spirituality it's all in our heart all in our head that our body has is totally

1:09:40

disconnected from it um that's that's effectively what you have to believe um

1:09:46

if if you if you believe that throughout all church history we can get the sacrament wrong you know anyway um so

1:09:54

that's I went on so many different rabbit Trails there but bringing it bring bringing it all the way back home

1:10:01

to uh it was a different theological formulation but so what we did the thing

1:10:07

the church has sprinkled the babies and baptized them in the name of the triun name the father son and spirit

1:10:13

throughout the entirety of church history and then so to say that they got that wrong I it's not a knockdown drag

1:10:20

out argument you know it's not a you know it's not a it's not conclusive

1:10:25

because God could have done that right he could have had the church miss one of the two sacraments that he left for for

1:10:32

1500 years he could have done that I find it to be incredibly unlikely that

1:10:38

that that is the case and so um yeah so like I said it's not that's not conclusive but for me it's it seems

1:10:45

almost untenable to believe that the church missed the sacrament for the entirety of its history so there was a

1:10:51

lot of biblical uh there's a lot of Bible verses that that got me to um but those are the two like kind of broad

1:10:58

level arguments that I have not been able I've not encountered really a good

1:11:03

poun or to um I mean you can get into all the household baptisms household baptisms in 1 Corinthians 7 what does it

1:11:11

mean for a child to be born clean born a saint um all these different things so there's a lot of scripture but but those

1:11:16

are the two I would say biggest ones for me thank you for that you speak about

1:11:22

these issues very articulately and I I think that um I've I've encountered a

1:11:28

one at least at least two of probably two of those arguments probably both of them um but the way that you the way

1:11:33

that you put it was you know of course very very clear I I don't usually talk about uh theological issues I can but I

1:11:41

find that I don't have kind of quite the the grasp or the Mastery of them in part because I don't come pre-bundled with 20

1:11:47

years of Christian framework understanding I um can I can I share a little bit about sort of what it looked

1:11:53

like for me just just just by way comparison so um I I didn't really

1:11:59

understand that there was a big discussion about baptism uh until there was a debate hosted at

1:12:05

apologia um between I think it was Gabe brench and he came to town and uh a man

1:12:11

named Isaac who's whose Name Escapes me who was banagas I watched that yeah yeah

1:12:16

so I thought that but I but when I came into apologia um I was listening to Jeff

1:12:22

Durban I'm like oh this guy is great very Dynamic exciting speaker right very very charismatic and then on other weeks

1:12:28

there would be this other guy this other old guy who'd be like talking about baptism it was just like way over my

1:12:33

head come to find out later that's James White but I I I didn't know so um so but

1:12:39

I knew that it was a subject that people were very uh were very passionate about but I didn't think it had any greater

1:12:44

significance for Christians than it did like flag football like we're in reform theology we like to argue about baptism

1:12:51

it's just the thing that we do you know what I mean like we smoke cigars drink whiskey we have ual conversations about

1:12:56

baptism you know there's no real stakes and then of course I come to find out like oh wait people get super super

1:13:02

invested in this discussion saw things happening on Twitter saw the passion involved with it I'm like okay there's a

1:13:08

lot more going on here than I realized and sort of my own transition when that

1:13:14

happened in 2023 was the the conclusion that I came to just based on my very limited range of experience was that

1:13:21

well I got baptized and when I when I got baptized I had to speak a commitment I had to say unlike all the other New

1:13:28

Age stuff that I had done I actually had to profess that I wanted to be part of something and and I I took my word very

1:13:35

seriously that I'm going to speak into this and I'm going to agreed or participate in this and when I give my word to something I commit to it if it

1:13:42

if it doesn't work out if I discover you know like I like I had many times in the past that things were false or whatever

1:13:47

be like well I guess there's no truth anywhere on earth like I was probably on some level I was prepared for that

1:13:52

because that was like the attitude that I came in like if it's not here it's nowhere cuz I've looked but that

1:13:58

commitment meant something to me as I was going into my baptism that day um which which accounts for how I was

1:14:04

feeling walking up to that moment I think but then so you can't get an infant you can't have a baby make a

1:14:10

profession of Faith a baby doesn't get the chance to make a promise a three four five-year-old can make a promise

1:14:16

and when thinking about their faith they can go back and say Hey you remember how you made this promise all those years

1:14:22

ago how do you feel about that promise now that was the framework that I had to understand it by that was like speaking

1:14:27

into it that may not be a correct framework but that was my framework and what did I know but it wasn't until I I

1:14:33

think I read um the case for the Christian family by Jared Longshore and had a conversation with one of the

1:14:40

elders at CR wy's Church in uh Battleground uh Battleground Washington

1:14:46

where I understood that no it's not about me at all that's not what this is about this is about the sign of the

1:14:51

Covenant being made on a child in the way that it was done in the Old Testament a bloodless sacrifice versus a

1:14:57

bloody sacrifice this is this is expressing this child is now part of

1:15:03

this not just multigenerational this multi-millennial family going all the way back to Adam that you are now part

1:15:11

of this evolving story this growing evolving changing family that links you past present and future to the entire

1:15:17

story of Christendom you say this child is part of this story and that's what baptism is about he said a bunch of

1:15:24

other things but that was the thing that really landed because the things that are interesting to me are questions around masculinity fatherhood Etc you

1:15:31

know sort of rebuilding a a patriarchal vision of the West and so a father saying I mark this child with the sign

1:15:38

of the Covenant he is part of my family now will raise him in the nurture and admonition of the Lord because we're all

1:15:43

part of God's family that was what clicked it for me that it's not about me speaking a promise and making a commitment it's about something much

1:15:50

greater and so that was the big that was the click that was the click for me and the same in the same token when you said

1:15:56

I'd also thought about like well imagine this is the days after uh Pentecost

1:16:02

right and the first baby is born to this fledgling Christian Community and they're holding this little baby and

1:16:08

they're like so what do we do yeah right so so some some these were some of the

1:16:14

questions that I was that I was sitting with in that in that period of time that was my own particular red pill my own

1:16:20

and that again that's the framework that I was working with so that's what I had to unwind versus you know an a baptistic

1:16:26

like where is that in scripture kind of mindset because someone pointed out to me later we also don't see women taking

1:16:31

communion in scripture in the New Testament either and yet we still we still do that so depending on how

1:16:36

legalistic you want to get but thank you for sharing that story because that obviously makes a whole ton of sense

1:16:42

about what you would have to learn and unlearn and perhaps relearn as you come

1:16:48

to the as you come to really embody the covenantal calvinistic and confessional

1:16:53

standard because that's that's kind of where it all lands right that's kind of where that's kind of where it all sits

1:16:58

is right there what do we do with these infants born in into our family and

1:17:04

especially in a postmill perspective as well so maybe that was was that the final piece clicking into place for you

Struggling With Presbyterian Doctrine

1:17:10

I mean that was definitely a big part of it um I think on in a very in a very

1:17:17

practical way something that I struggle with and especially my uh um my

1:17:24

Presbyterian brothers who are kind of on the Spectrum like you know like the ones

1:17:29

who are like no buy the book buy the Westminster what is it you know I got to get it just right and I get it I appreciate that actually kind of

1:17:35

presbyterianism kind of uh I think invites those people like the people who are just really want to like search out

1:17:42

the scriptures and get the systematics just right um but that is something I struggle with and I appreciate those

1:17:47

guys because like I mean in my denomination we allow both uh reformed Baptists and uh Presbyterians in uh to

1:17:55

be you know members in good standing and it's weird because we affirm the Westminster but the

1:18:02

Westminster says to deny the sacrament to a child is a grave sin um and so it's

1:18:09

like you know kind of holding that in tandem with like okay for me and the way

1:18:14

I've explained it before is that we're kind of in a season in church history right now where like we you know the

1:18:22

Orcs are at the gate and we we have enough in common with fellow brothers

1:18:28

and sisters reformed and Baptists and Presbyterians that says hey this is important this Sacrament issue very

1:18:35

important uh we got to make sure that those Orcs don't overrun us let's you take your axe I'll take my bow and my

1:18:42

bow and then we'll go and and we'll we'll go out to battle and then we'll we'll work this out later you know um

1:18:51

and uh and so that's kind of how I how how I think about it but when it comes to fatal baptism like I I get why it's a

1:18:57

big deal because I mean to there is something to be said

1:19:06

or thinking through how exactly am I raising this child in the faith because

1:19:14

if I'm denying them baptism if I'm denying them the Lord's table

1:19:21

and you know you have a four-year-old who's saying I believe in Jesus or a three-year-old says I love Jesus what I

1:19:28

mean who are you who are we to say no you get to prove it you're you're not

1:19:34

welcome at the Lord's table until you can I need to see it I need to Pro you need to prove it um that's another big

1:19:41

thing that really pushed me over was I don't see that in scripture I see our Lord saying let the little ones come to me and do not prohibit them um I I see

1:19:50

David saying that at my mother's breast I knew knew you um I see you know I see

1:19:58

John the Baptist jumping for joy in utero Bingo um so I think people say

1:20:06

well you know infants can't have faith well I think I think uh David did you

1:20:12

know or they or they might so they'll either say they can't have faith or they'll say um we can't know they they

1:20:20

have faith and therefore we shouldn't give them the Covenant sign because that might give them a false sense of

1:20:27

Salvation to which I would reply you can never know if anyone actually has been

1:20:32

regenerated how many adult how many kids in Baptist Churches apostatized you know it's like it's you can never know you

1:20:40

can never know and so really what it comes down to is what is baptism I just got into a little miniature debate

1:20:46

discussion with a guy online today about that he said baptism he said the two

1:20:51

things the uh the baptism is for it's four um it's uh the reason we baptized

1:20:58

two reasons to obey our Lord because he commanded it and two uh as an outward

1:21:05

sign of an inward reality to which I replied all right show me that in

1:21:11

scripture where where does in scripture does it say the purpose of baptism is to do an outward sign of an inward change

1:21:17

um I don't think that baptism is a coming out party that says like hey check it out I'm this happened in here

1:21:24

let's celebrate it in fact if you're reformed and you believe in

1:21:30

election it's like it's almost like yeah I mean infant baptism is the ultimate

1:21:36

sign of election in my opinion because here is a child who could not have earned anything and yet Grace is

1:21:44

bestowed Covenant membership is bestowed election is bestowed now we don't obviously we can't know who is actually

1:21:50

elect um but we do I mean as the Westminster says and I agree that real

1:21:55

Grace is given to them at baptism and it it's not confined to the moment of baptism as it says in the Westminister

1:22:03

necessarily um kind of Tak into account the fact that apostasy happens but um but real Grace is bestowed at baptism

1:22:11

and so when it comes to how we treat our children like are we if we're denying them the table we're denying them the

1:22:16

sacrament like and we do we doubt their profession the three-year-old says I love Jesus we say no you don't or I

1:22:25

can't know that you do that's a strong man they no one would say no you don't but there's just a well we'll see I hope

1:22:31

so seems like you might be teaching them to doubt and not have faith you know um

1:22:36

but we want to teach our children to have faith we want to say when whenever my son who's two and a half says I love

1:22:42

Jesus I go yes you do son we're a Christian household of course you love

1:22:47

Jesus he's my God is your god um that's that's what I want to instill at a young

1:22:52

age I I don't believe that he's just a Viper in a diaper you know he's he's

1:22:57

he's he's a Christian he's a Christian um yeah that's that's my thoughts on the Infant

1:23:06

baptism oh that's I mean I I love all of those thoughts my because because my experience is getting baptized as an

1:23:12

adult you know I can say I can talk about you know the changes that happened in me and the six months leading up

1:23:18

until that moment in September 2020 and then I can talk about the changes that started and began accelerating over the

1:23:24

course of a couple years after after that point but again that's that's as an adult I can't go back into that moment

1:23:31

and say something fundamental changed in me I didn't think of it as like a coming out party for me like I because I didn't

1:23:38

have any of these theological Frameworks I I wasn't reading books about baptism I just knew that I would like to be part

1:23:44

of Christianity and baptism is the doorway into Christianity and so yes I

1:23:50

would like to come in right you had it right I guess I guess so on some on some

1:23:55

level yeah I want to I want to transition to talking a little bit about the about the Orcs at the door because I

1:24:01

think I think that's important I think they're already inside the door in in many ways although maybe we've kind of chased them out with the inauguration

1:24:08

you know past the inner Court yard but so so it seems to me that the question

1:24:14

of and because this was this was part of my own shift in understanding baptism it seems to me that if if this is going to

1:24:21

be if this is the case which it it appears to be it appears to be we're in a form of ideological conceptual War for

1:24:27

minds and hearts that's that's what's going on we're not in a hot kinetic War bullets are not fly are not flying but

1:24:33

there are bad ideas you know dangerously bad ideas damnable bad ideas that are spreading from both from both the left

1:24:39

and the right we'll talk about that so um so when fac with those set of circumstances it becomes even more

1:24:46

crucial to figure out well what are we going to do with our children right but like can we start can we baptize a

1:24:54

children begin raising them in the nurtur and admonition of the Lord treat them they're not our kids they're God's

1:24:59

kids treat them that way and begin and begin building and and having the experience that that you talked about

1:25:06

that started get you thinking generationally you're thinking not just about Joshua hes and his family right

1:25:11

now you're thinking about your son any future kids and you're thinking on Down the Line isn't that the way that we need

1:25:17

to be thinking rather than sitting and saying okay we have a child or a couple children and we're going to wait for

1:25:23

four five 8 8 10 12 18 years be like okay I believe you now and now now you

1:25:30

are a Christian you get full participation in the Christian family that seems I mean I don't know I could

1:25:36

put a lot of words to that but there's there's something about that that doesn't feel quite right let's just put it let's just put it that way yeah I I

1:25:43

mean I totally agree with you I think you're I think

1:25:49

the one of the primary ways that we experience the Lord Jesus Christ is

1:25:57

being fed by him at his table uh as I said before so much of American

1:26:04

evangelicalism has succumbed to this Gnostic this old Gnostic heresy that

1:26:10

wants to spiritualize everything and rejects the fact that we are embodied souls and our lord gave us a Sacrament

1:26:19

that is physical that we get to Su with the Lord Jesus Christ at his table

1:26:25

hopefully weekly um hopefully weekly and have real Grace bestowed to us in that

1:26:33

meal in that Covenant meal and it's a huge deal and so to to deny the most

1:26:41

tangible aspect of our Lord's uh one of the most I would say the most

1:26:47

tangible aspect of our Lord's Ministry that he left us right in the sacrament to deny that to children or to anyone

1:26:54

um yeah I I think I think that has devastating effects I really do and I I

1:27:01

also think that um yeah even to deny baptism I think that's a big deal because in baptism God is putting his

1:27:09

God's name is put upon you and I do believe that your baptism has what my

1:27:15

pastor likes to call like a gravitational pull um that like God's

1:27:20

name is on you you are a covenant member you just are you are Covenant member um

1:27:26

and so that comes with uh with Covenant responsibilities and not only that

1:27:31

Covenant blessings and I think as you apostatize you're not just a pagan anymore you are an apostate who was

1:27:38

baptized you are a prodigal and that's the thing if you're never baptized you

1:27:44

know you're you're not a prodigal you're just you're just a pagan and you need to come to come and um repent and believe

1:27:51

but if you're baptized if you're a covenant member uh there is a gravitational pull you are a prodigal

1:27:56

you have been in the Covenant and now you're eating with the pigs out there or

1:28:02

maybe you're still partying um but you once you get down in the dump to e with the pigs you have that gravitational

1:28:08

pole of your baptism of the father's house that you once enjoyed beckoning you um I think that's real and so I I I

1:28:15

I do I think it's a big deal not to uh um not to allow or to to withhold you

1:28:22

either of the sacraments from from our little ones so this is the kind of stuff that

1:28:28

you were grappling with as you were leaving Los Angeles postmill poed baptism and you're like I don't know

1:28:34

where I got to go or what I got to do to be part of a denomination that believes these things you got convicted of the

1:28:41

three C's of uh of uh of the dark roast you might say and these are the things that are kind of going on you just need

1:28:48

to go someplace where you can be part of and then you witnessed the it was the um

1:28:53

it was the uh ordination the ordination exam you talked about and then there was the and there was the was it the

1:28:59

presbyter meeting for the C that you went to or it was it was something yeah that's where the ordination exam was but

1:29:04

yeah it was that it was it was a pres Presbyterian meeting with a with the party and the exam and the service and

1:29:11

all that okay so so you're marinating at all of these things you're reading Doug Wilson you're listening to podcasts

1:29:17

you're changing seminaries and so and so then you're you're like okay this is this is where it's at for me something

1:29:23

has grabbed hold of you grabbed hold of your heart and you're like I got to go to wherever I can where I can where I

1:29:28

can be a part of this why did you go to Tennessee yeah there's there's a few

1:29:35

reasons um see where to start I would say that

1:29:41

in my postmill convictions I began to like I said

1:29:49

earlier um if you believe you're going to win the war it changes your battle tactic so I was in Los

1:29:55

Angeles and I came across the concept of a strategic

1:30:03

Retreat um and Doug Wilson lays this out man in my early stages of this journey I

1:30:09

just read like every Doug Wilson you know so he was a big influence um him

1:30:14

and all the guys up in uh um mosco but uh I think it was uh rules for reformers

Christian Strategy for Cultural Renewal

1:30:22

and he just it was a playoff on uh Saul alinsky's Rules for Radicals and uh kind

1:30:29

of trying to adapt some of the Rules for Radicals but uh um for Christians and to actually get things done um and and one

1:30:38

of them what had to do with this strategic Retreat realizing that in the current landscape in the

1:30:45

current cultural landscape uh we are in you know uh Aaron

1:30:50

Ren's heris the negative world we are currently in negative world and we if we

1:30:58

are going to win like the postmill conviction is that we're going to actually rebuild prum 2.0 and we will

1:31:04

see the kingdom of of Jesus Christ advance and Conquer and um and uh if

1:31:11

we're going to do that well we need to plan like that's going to happen um and

1:31:16

think strategically on how to do that and so part of that is realizing okay um

1:31:23

if we're going to to select a location on the

1:31:28

map where we are going to buckle down put our hand to the plow and um you know

1:31:35

pursue what uh Eugene Peterson calls a long obedience in the same direction where we're going to we're going to work

1:31:42

um to advance God's kingdom and build where should we do that um and

1:31:48

Doug makes the case that we ought to think through this um strategically and

1:31:54

say we we we should pick a location that is both winnable and

1:32:01

strategic um so uh so oh actually no I'm

1:32:07

sorry strategic and practical strategic and practical so uh La for example where

1:32:12

I was is strategic but not practical um if we won LA if if we saw churches a

1:32:19

church planting movement explode in Los Angeles and we saw you know the culture shift and change to become a very

1:32:25

Christian one good grief what that what impact that would have on the rest of the nation the culture to to win Los

1:32:31

Angeles the Hollywood you know that'd be amazing it really would and God could do that but um is is it practical really in

1:32:38

our current landscape no it's it's not um that's not to say everyone should leave every city or anything like that

1:32:45

but it is to say just on a broad scale if we're thinking about how how to change the culture um and part of this

1:32:51

gets to um one of my deep convictions which is that we uh the Great

1:32:58

Commission uh isn't just winning Souls it's about cultural Reformation so to to

1:33:05

advance the Great Commission to obey the Great Commission is not just to share the gospel with people it's to make

1:33:11

disciples of all Nations and teach them to obey the commands of Christ so so when you're teaching a nation when

1:33:17

you're discipling a nation and teaching a nation to obey the commands of Christ effectively you are changing the culture

1:33:23

it's cultural ref the that will be the result and so if we're thinking through this not just

1:33:29

winning Souls that's part of it but really seeing cultural Reformation happened we need to think strategically

1:33:34

about how we can make that happen where where should we go to do that so if La is strategic and not winable then uh

1:33:39

piyu in Mississippi Podunk Mississippi one stopline town that might be practical you might within a generation

1:33:46

be able to like have a pretty Christian town you know like for the most part um

1:33:52

but it's not strategic has no impact on the broader culture um and and that's

1:33:57

not to say no one should live and do Christian work in Podunk towns not what I'm saying at all what I'm saying is is

1:34:03

where let's take the Apostle Paul for example where did he go where did he where did he start a seminary Ephesus

1:34:09

like that's the the the on in a very strategic location to have impact on all

1:34:14

the surrounding cities in what is modern day Turkey so if we're thinking

1:34:20

strategic and practical that that that became kind of like the uh um kind of the Continuum

1:34:29

that I'm thinking of thinking through this on and so the Doug when he made the case for uh Moscow Idaho he's like okay

1:34:35

this is um it's it is a more liberal Town um but it's it's it's strategic in that it's a college town and and what

1:34:42

happens in Moscow actually tends to have outsize effect because the college and some other things like that and has

1:34:47

outside effect on um on the broader culture of Idaho and so it's like Okay this not like you know it's no LA but

1:34:54

this is a strategic location it's not just podon out in the middle of nowhere so that really you know kind of struck

1:35:02

me is yeah that's that's what I want to do I'm thinking I'm a church planter so you already know I've got delusions of

1:35:07

grandeur right I'm I'm the one who's going out and trying to conquer Los Angeles um and so I but I but I still

1:35:16

invested in like I whatever I I want to do the I want to be the most dangerous I can be for the kingdom where is that

1:35:21

what is that where where can that be and so I started using that strategic and practical so really it came to all the

1:35:27

people in my church plant we all moved from the south most of us so we know the South um and the South um broadly

1:35:35

speaking still has a Christian culture uh it's it's not so Pagan it's it's very

1:35:41

nominal in many ways um but man you just go into a coffee shop in the South South you know 50% of them are going to be

1:35:48

playing you know some Christian music you know there's it's still very U um

1:35:54

culturally accepted to be Christian and to hold Christian views broadly speaking

1:35:59

and so that to me makes the South particularly winnable like the Bible

1:36:06

Belt in general say like okay they they're uh you know they have not

1:36:12

apostatized to the extent that a lot of the rest of the country has so really if

1:36:17

we can just get these good old boys to uh get their priorities straight cuz they're God and they're country and God

1:36:23

is really what it is for a lot of these guys if we can just get them to flip it and say God family country you know get

1:36:30

their you know their their loves ordered like St Augustine says um man this could they could be dangerous and that was

1:36:36

honestly that was Pete heth's Journey he and I talked about that he was like that he was a nominal Christian who had that

1:36:42

country politics and got Jesus is kind of my lucky rabbit's foot right I prayed

1:36:47

the prayer and he's a part of my life well if we can get that order right where Jesus is King he's already in your

1:36:53

life we can get it right man that's that's that's um the ingredients for a movement right there and so yeah so that

1:37:00

was the the kind of the winnable side of it and then when it came to strategic I was like man I want to be close to a

1:37:08

bigger city so that we can conquer it so we're in Goodletsville um in

1:37:14

Hendersonville which is kind of on the outskirts of Nashville and this is like okay

1:37:20

Goodletsville Hendersonville like broadly speaking pretty conservative Hendersonville more conservative than Goodville um but uh um man I you plant a

1:37:29

bunch of churches around Nashville and then eventually it's almost like you can surround it you know and you can conquer

1:37:34

eventually you can conquer Nashville you can build um little Parish communities that are committed to King Jesus and um

1:37:42

yeah and so really it became this vision for uh picking a location that is both strategic and winnable and for me the

1:37:51

South made a lot of sense my roots are in the Bible Belt and I've spent a lot of time in the South so that just made

1:37:56

sense um and then I saw it as yeah like I said kind of a pretty good balance between strateg strategic and winnable

1:38:03

or prac after after arriving there and that makes that makes total sense like

Winning Souls vs. Winning Culture

1:38:09

where if you're going to be part of this where can you where can you have an impact where can you have a positive

1:38:14

impact where can you see you know again this the things that you're saying are so incredibly helpful for me to hear

1:38:21

because I encounter these ideas is kind of environmentally but I don't understand how they collash on the

1:38:28

ground so for example the difference between winning souls and winning the culture I've heard people talk about

1:38:34

both of those things but I I until you talked about it right there I didn't understand what a profound difference in

1:38:39

in uh world worldview or mindset that shift must be when you grow up from a

1:38:45

perspective of we're going to win souls and then when you try to understand the difference between that and winning the

1:38:51

culture and the friction that those two who will create between them not that in winning the culture you shouldn't win

1:38:57

souls because if you if you try to win the culture and you detach from the winning of souls you're you we could

1:39:04

probably both agree there are some problems with that right but at the same time if you win souls if you just try to

1:39:09

win souls and you forget about the larger culture there are going to be problems there as well so now the way

1:39:15

that you articulate I can understand like oh wait there's a larger battle to fight than just within the hearts of

1:39:21

individual men and women and potential Believers there's this whole Battlefield kind of out there so that makes sense

1:39:27

why you would you know thinking in that way in that postmill way in that in that uh win the culture for King Jesus kind

1:39:34

of way why you would go to where you did when where did the red Reformation red

1:39:39

pill podcast show idea come from where where was that after that stage of the journey because you went from like just

1:39:47

bathing in it right like just having your whole world turned upside down and backwards and your theological framework

1:39:53

being ripped out new ones put in like we got to move we got to go somewhere to be part of the fight and then you go uh you

1:40:00

go across the country to Tennesse and where and when and how did you get the idea like okay I'm the guy to speak into

1:40:06

some of these things with a with a platform or a podcast or YouTube channel yeah I think great question part of it

1:40:14

was I mean there there were a few different factors that I really considered one was you know I'd spent

1:40:20

all this time like you say bathing in it and just studying and and even teaching on it uh and then whenever we shut our

1:40:26

church plant down I was like okay what do I do with all this all this information that's really transformed my

1:40:32

life and I'm a you haven't noticed I'm kind of an enthusiastic guy um I get

1:40:38

excited about I starting to get sense yeah yeah I know it's it's hard to pick

1:40:45

up on sometimes but um but uh I I've gotten to know you a little bit so I can

1:40:50

kind of start and see it yeah yeah I I like to bring people along whatever I'm

1:40:55

doing I mean I'm a church planter right I mean it was hey everyone come do this with me come out to Los Angeles and pled

1:41:02

I'm a big like come like I want to share what I'm learning and I want to share what I'm doing what I'm excited about I

1:41:09

want to get other people excited about it you know um and because obviously if

1:41:14

it's I'm excited about it it must be objectively exciting so you should get excited you know but uh um no but I so I

1:41:21

I I I like to bring people in on what I'm doing so that was part of it I think uh one big piece of the puzzle was that

1:41:27

I I moved to Goodletsville Tennessee and part of the arrangement was I just came to help with this young church that

1:41:35

Pastor Brooks had planted Pilgrim Hill reform fellowship and initially it was basically train up to plant another

1:41:43

church in this mold but pretty quickly I realized you know what I love pastoral

1:41:50

Ministry I love the ministry in general and I can see myself being a part of uh

1:41:55

of ministry at some capacity my whole life um but I want to put down Roots I I

1:42:02

with people like I I I don't want to be here for a few years then go do something else like I want to put down

1:42:07

roots and start getting to work building the kingdom with with a Covenant Community and so a lot of most CC

1:42:14

churches don't have like multiple full-time pastors and so I uh when I was talking with Pastor Brooks you know I'd

1:42:20

seen the success of Canon plus and kind of the relationship that Canon has with uh Moscow and Christ Church and things

1:42:27

like that and thought you know Pastor Brooks I what if I tried to do like a

1:42:33

great value version of that for our church you know like what if I tried to

1:42:39

because we have a lot of just really talented people we have a lot of uh wisdom in our church we have a lot of a

1:42:45

lot to offer what if I started to start a company that could put out resources

1:42:50

that could make use of the time and the talent and the treasure that we have in our community um he thought that sounded

1:42:57

great and I had brought over some support from the church plant uh some financial support that that that

1:43:04

actually followed me to say hey we'll go with you through this transition so uh

1:43:09

Pastor Brooks kind of gave me leave to say okay I'm going to give you some responsibilities with the church um

1:43:14

preaching uh some Ministry opportunities uh some administrative stuff um but then

1:43:20

I'm going to also say yeah and then why don't you just put a good bit of effort and time into into this over here this

1:43:26

project that could maybe pay you enough to not have to do something else to say like maybe this can be your gig um

1:43:33

that's the goal with the forge really is to for it to put food on the table so I can buckle down and do ministry here

1:43:39

with uh um with the Saints of Pilgrim Hill reform Fellowship um so that so

1:43:44

really that was part of it and the other parts like I said I've learned all this stuff and honestly I am where I am

1:43:50

because Faithful Men took the time to create resources put them online for me to find and so you know people you know

1:43:58

roll their eyes oh I start another podcast or whatever you know what I say go for it if you've got something to say

1:44:04

and you can build an audience and and you should like there's no like the rising tide lifts All Ships you know I

1:44:12

think I I really for me I see it as like a way of paying paying it forward um I

1:44:18

if I can bring people along into this journey and encourage people that's that's that's what I want to do and so

1:44:24

I've I've been so privileged to actually get to en have a lot of conversations and meet a lot of the guys who have been

1:44:30

watching the podcast and been blessed by it and it's been it's huge it's a it's a Ministry that I didn't know you know I

1:44:36

didn't know that this would be you know it's a it's a very unique form of ministry right you know it's it's not as

1:44:42

satisfying as necessarily having Face Toof face with a lot of people but um it is and afterwards when you realize man

1:44:48

hey I baptized my baby last week because of that podcast you know because because you guys open the door to this um way of

1:44:55

thinking and these theological perspectives and stuff like that so yeah and so I I think yeah those were kind of

1:45:02

the main reasons you know I want to stay at Pilgrim Hill I I I I've learned a ton and I want to share it with people and

1:45:09

then um I love uh serving the broader body in whatever way I can so that's all

1:45:14

that kind of came together in the form of making the Reformation red pill

1:45:20

podcast I really like how full send full commitment you are like I I really like

1:45:26

it's like you know you you're you're here in Los Angeles and the world's melting down you're exploring these

1:45:32

ideas and you just like throw yourself into it it's like I gotta be I got to be a part of this and you just move to

1:45:37

Tennessee and you throw yourself into it then you start Reformation red pill in 2023 and and as we started out talking

1:45:44

about like on Twitter that was like the first place I saw it was clear you had just like thrown yourself into it like

1:45:50

like full commitment I think that's I think that's actually really inspiring especially considering I think that

1:45:56

there's a a a sort of plague maybe a little bit uh between men and women but in this case we'll talk about men of

1:46:02

like a fear to commit of of to really like put your full weight on something whatever it is whether you're putting

1:46:09

your full weight into a relationship and a marriage or you're putting your full weight into a career choice into a creative Pursuit whatever it is to

1:46:15

really say like no I'm going I'm going to do this this is happening and you

1:46:20

know I'm going to make it or make it or die trying that kind of attitude and maybe that wasn't the way that you

1:46:26

framed it to yourself at the time but I see that attitude like you're just getting into these theological Concepts

1:46:32

and you're just going fifth gear just go and I think your enthusiasm for these things probably drove you in the same

1:46:37

way and then when you start Reformation red pill it's like well let's do it and like let's just not just buy a little

1:46:42

webcam and start a small thing let's build a studio and let's get lights and let's get cameras and let's if we're

1:46:48

going to do it let's do it like put it into overdrive I just I think that's awesome

1:46:54

yeah you know it's it's uh it's you know in the in the job interview whenever

1:46:59

it's like what's your uh what's your weakness and your strength it's that it's it's both it's both it's definitely

1:47:07

like my my superpower in My Kryptonite you know because it can be you know I'm all I'm definitely an all-in kind of guy

1:47:14

and I'm I'm here man I I don't know if it's gonna work I hope it does sure you

1:47:19

know um and I'm going for it that and uh it's funny yeah at you say like no it

1:47:24

really was like it's funny cuz I'm on the clock in many ways like I had this support that came with me um over from

1:47:30

my church planting and that is soon coming to an end so it's basically like

1:47:36

all right you can you build it can you build it to where you can put food on the table so it has been like a fire

1:47:42

under my belly like I will do this I will commit I will go all the way if it doesn't work and I have to get some job

1:47:49

and I don't know videography or something like that me okay but uh but

1:47:54

you can't say I didn't try well let's let's talk a little bit about that about that then because like

1:48:00

one of the things that I enjoy doing on my podcast is talking about worldviews that's a big big part of what I do

1:48:06

talking to authors and stuff like that and helping understand their books and the worldviews that that inform them one of the things I I don't do is I don't I

1:48:14

don't talk theology I can I just don't feel that I have a good enough grasp of the concepts of someone who went to

1:48:20

someone who went to a seminary or someone who went to a Bible college or a pastor or something like that so so what

1:48:26

I what I appreciate about what you do uh is that these are things that you clearly have many years of experience in

1:48:33

from multiple different perspectives and that you come to deep convictions that you can articulate and I think that's

1:48:39

really necessary in a reformed environment where you have uh many

1:48:44

people that have been doing it for quite a long time have been doing it very well and they've done they've built institutions we're talking about Moscow

1:48:50

we've we've talking we could talk about James White and as what 200 moderated public debate something

1:48:55

like that you think of these giant meaningful Ministries that have deeply impacted this theological world I guess

1:49:03

we would say we we inhabit and so as part of the generational shift that just happens there's room for new people to

1:49:10

come in and begin contributing their voices you know in a in a chain of hierarchy like you recognize who came

1:49:16

before you and you give difference to them right and and you be respectful to them and you you learn from them you

1:49:22

learn at the feet of the master until the time comes when you're handed your own swords like go out and now you get

1:49:28

to do that so what I like about what you do is is it seems to me that you fit in that that chain that um I don't know

1:49:35

quite how to describe it it's like it's like a we'll call it a chain of Mastery that's what we'll call it right and so it's like here's here's the generations

1:49:42

you can mark them you know a two or three that have that are still around with us today and and and doing

1:49:47

productive work and so I see you as very much fitting fitting into that and so this makes this makes a lot of sense so

1:49:53

maybe we can talk a little bit about um you mentioned that the support is coming to a close and you're kind of getting to

1:49:59

a point where like okay we're going to we're we're we've got the hang glider and we're on the cliff and we're going to run and we're going to jump off the

1:50:05

cliff and we're either going to fly in the H glider or something more dramatic than that so maybe we can talk about

1:50:11

some of the challenges that the forge uh press has faced I mean we you and I chatted about them briefly and some of

1:50:16

the things that are that are going on in your personal life if you're willing to speak about that I mean you post about it on Twitter so presumably you want to

1:50:23

talk about here maybe we can talk about the because I see a lot of streams coming together in your life in this

1:50:29

moment we can we can name some of them there's a theological stream you know the three C's that you talked about

1:50:35

there's a there's a life shift you're you're a husband and a father there's a career and a Mastery shift like these

1:50:41

are these are the three big things of a man's life like what's what's your theology what's your family what's your

1:50:46

Mastery and it's all Landing for you like right here right now and I I think that's exciting and for you it's

1:50:53

probably got to be a little bit unnerving so but I think the things that you do might be interesting to my

1:50:58

audience for those of you for those out there who haven't heard about you know some of the some of the things that you've been through yeah that's great no

1:51:06

you're totally right it's uh it is it's exhilarating and you know I Funny even

1:51:12

you saying that it's like it's good to remember that because in the grind right now it's just like every single day it's

1:51:19

like all right I've got to make this work how do I make this work I'm G to make

1:51:25

this work um and uh yeah and so you know with the forge it's uh it's it's going I

1:51:33

mean I would say I am I'm very pleased with the direction uh and even with the

1:51:39

success we've had so far I'm very pleased with it um and now but it's it's

1:51:45

also to the point where it's like all right and I've got about six months to break through the next threshold um in

1:51:52

terms of being figuring out how to monetize you know um and so uh and it's

1:51:59

good man I it's I had a conversation with um my cousin uh her and her husband

1:52:06

are just like very very successful in real estate and we were I I was

1:52:13

originally pitching them to like invest in the company or something like that

1:52:18

and uh and basically give us a a head start to like you know because it's expensive to get all this stuff going

1:52:25

and B and we would you know it' be um and we had a good great great

1:52:31

conversation they they were they are so wonderful but basically uh after the

1:52:37

conversation they were like uh my cousin said

1:52:42

uh we could do this like we have it to give this x amount to get it going um

1:52:50

but I think you will be better served grinding

1:52:55

and they were right they were really right uh they

1:53:00

were like CU they grinded they were like when we uh we learned more about ourselves

1:53:06

more about God and more about uh the business itself in the grind than I we

1:53:13

could have ever had we not had to do that and that's I I am thankful to this day

1:53:21

for that conversation with them and that they didn't just like boom here here is everything you need um because it I had

1:53:29

like I had to man up I've been I I've been in here's the thing about

1:53:36

Ministry I've been in some form of full-time Ministry my entire adult life

Ministry vs. Vocational Accountability

1:53:42

and Ministry is wonderful it's great um there's also something about it where in many circles you can actually

1:53:50

be a really crappy Minister and still basically be okay you you don't get Market feedback

1:53:59

in Ministry in the same way that you do outside in um the broader vocational

1:54:05

world uh you can just kind of do the bare minimum a lot of pastors are great

1:54:10

and don't do that they do wonderful work and hard work and they you know but you you can kind of hide you know uh and and

1:54:18

and you know they'll still love their pastor and and whatever but when you get into the the world of you know outside

1:54:25

of the ministry and the The Vocational world man you you you got to produce a product and people got to want it you

1:54:32

know you got to have a product or a service that people actually want um and

1:54:38

so man I it was it was it's been a a lot of learning about myself a lot of

1:54:44

grinding a lot of uh failing a lot of failing um and then also just like

1:54:50

problem solving saying we're going to figure this out and you know I I am a better man for it

1:54:56

in so many ways um so you know what no matter what happens with the forge I hope I I hope

1:55:03

and pray that we're able to figure this thing out and you know kind of hit that next threshold and and make enough to

1:55:10

keep keep going and everything um which we're getting close I would say like I said I'm working against the clock so

1:55:16

we'll see um but no matter what this has been like God has taught me so much

1:55:21

about himself about faith in him about about hard work and and discipline and

1:55:28

um yeah I like I said it's it's it's hard to describe all the wonderful things he's taught me in the grind but

1:55:34

it's real um you know father of two one's got health problems um and I just

1:55:41

lost my job I remember like whenever we shut the church down I this is the first

1:55:46

time I ever like had panic attacks uh because I I I didn't have we shut the

1:55:51

church plant down in La I didn't have a backup plan I hadn't yet CH even decided to come here I was just like we know

1:55:57

that we need to shut it down we know that's right um so we're going to do that and so we did I can remember just

1:56:02

like i' never had this sensation but like tears not coming out of my eyes

1:56:08

always being behind my eyes all day every day like it was crazy it was nuts

1:56:14

um like my son is in the hospital because of his medical problems and I don't like what's my income I have do I

1:56:19

even have marketable skills you know and uh but man God has just brought me through that and and um yeah as I

1:56:27

mentioned my son has a kidney disease tweeted about that today um and man

1:56:32

God's just been so incredibly faithful through this process and so I think that kind of answers your question not sure

1:56:38

if uh you may want to follow up on that yeah actually I I like may I offer you

1:56:43

something in in response to please so um I uh I was part of the.com

1:56:50

Boom in the late 90s and I was in college and I left left college for a couple years to to go and

1:56:57

and do that I was 21 I think I came back when I was 23 something like that

1:57:03

started a company hired a bunch of people was very cool very formative experience so one of the things that I learned from that experience and I I

1:57:09

think you can you just spoke to this is that if you take the path of

1:57:15

Entrepreneurship now there's like in front of all men there is the there's the tried and true path of uh of you

1:57:21

know get it get a you know a job your career you can have an hourly salary you can have an hourly or a salary whatever

1:57:28

there's the the tried and true path there's nothing wrong there's nothing wrong with that there are positives and

1:57:33

positives and negatives to that the path of Entrepreneurship however is is very very different um and of course there

1:57:40

are POS positives and negatives about that as well but the thing that I don't think a lot of people understand about

1:57:46

the path of Entrepreneurship is if you you take that road and you get to the

1:57:51

point where you ship a product you ship a product and and and product goes out

1:57:56

and money comes in you develop a proof of concept it does not matter what

1:58:01

happens after that point you can succeed wildly or it can fail for reasons

1:58:07

outside of your control like obviously you're you're doing your part there many reasons why businesses succeed and fail

1:58:13

not all of which have to do with our work right but so you're doing your part and the business fails for whatever

1:58:18

reason just the fact that you did that makes you 10 times more valuable than

1:58:25

someone else who might be applying for the same job later that you put that on your resume this was my company this was

1:58:32

this was the income this was the product we did we served this many people we shipped a product it didn't work out for

Real-World Experience Trumps Education

1:58:37

any number of reasons if if an employer is then looking and comparing two resumés side by side if you have to go

1:58:44

back into the workforce you will get that job probably like nine or 10 times

1:58:49

out of 10 simply because the things that you will have learned along that process of grinding of building of you know

1:58:56

managing profit and loss and all of that the skills you can't even name about yourself your strengths your weaknesses

1:59:02

about like well I got to ship a product this week and I'm not feeling it doesn't matter I still got to do it the things

1:59:08

that that person will have learned makes him just infinitely more valuable than

1:59:13

someone even someone who has the best business school education yes I sat in a classroom for 3 years and I talked to

1:59:19

all of the professors but no I haven't started a business versus the man who

1:59:24

stepped out started the business that has the on the ground research because that was my experience I'm 21 years old

1:59:31

you know we'd raised all of this money and I have business school graduates coming from the East Coast from like MIT

1:59:37

and Harvard and all that stuff and they're coming they're flying out to work for the company and they're trying to tell me how it is now these guys are

1:59:43

like six seven eight years older than me and I'm 21 years old and I'm like no it

1:59:48

doesn't actually work that way at all the books the books that they told you are wrong so I I offer that by way of of

1:59:56

encouragement like in God's in God's Providence I believe hard work does pay off and lack of hard work does not pay

2:00:02

off so hard work pays off but you know I offer that to encourage you that whatever the future may hold for Forge

2:00:10

Reformation red pill that even if for example you should have to go back to work somewhere for someone I'm sure they

2:00:17

would take you on board that you could show such you know such deliverable such success such growth that you built that

2:00:24

with your own effort will be so infinitely valuable to to a potential employer that you've already won you you

2:00:31

Maybe not maybe you haven't won the game yet that you set out to play but you've already run simply by anteing into the

2:00:37

table that's good that is yeah I think that's true and

2:00:43

also praise God yeah I love I love sharing that with men because it it they

2:00:49

of course the entrepreneurship journey is scary it's very it's very scary whether you're

2:00:54

working at the small content creator level or you're working in like the boardrooms of Silicon Valley level it's

2:00:59

still it's still scary and so it doesn't matter what it looks like but to know that by simply showing up to be counted

2:01:07

and putting in the work and delivering something that is there's no feeling

2:01:12

there's no feeling like that and men who know can look at that and recognize that and say that's the that's the dude that

2:01:18

I want on my team if it should come to that that's good that's

2:01:23

good so do you want I've got about five minutes no problem so speak really quickly about what's uh about what's

2:01:31

happening with we'll talk about patreon really quick and then what's happening with your son to set the stage for where you're at and encourage people to to how

2:01:37

they can support you in your mission that's great yeah so um patreon

2:01:43

cancelled us which is just wild uh yeah they gave us a bogus excuse um it wasn't

2:01:50

even true uh yeah they said we were selling uh food and pills or something

2:01:57

like that what yeah yeah I know and we were like no we're not um anyway it was super weird uh we

2:02:04

violated their Community guidelines essentially my theory my running theory is that uh I had some posts go pretty

2:02:12

viral with Pete hegf and someone got wind of that and can and they someone

2:02:19

who works at patreon got wind of that and you know had enough sway to be like yeah we can just canel these guys we can

2:02:26

you know under whatever pretext we want um yeah that's the only thing I can think of uh so they canceled us and I

2:02:36

lost like a third of my income boom just like that and uh by the grace of God we

2:02:41

are rebuilding and we're we're rebuilding with a Christian company kind of a uh anti fragile alternative to

2:02:48

patreon um that we'll be that we'll be using hoping to get that up and running by the end of the month um but we have a

2:02:55

a membership a club membership now uh that people can join that so we've successfully transitioned probably like

2:03:03

60% or so of our uh of our old crew and

2:03:09

we still haven't gotten back to where we were but we're working on it and hoping

2:03:14

you know I may be having a a gig with uh Charlie Kirk might be picking up the

2:03:19

story and if that's the case that would be a boon for sure um I know so working

2:03:25

on some of those things those pieces of it you know big Tech canceling a small Christian podcast or whatever so um yeah

2:03:33

anyway uh that's that we're uh um yeah we're ultimately it's going to be a

2:03:39

blessing you know now we can't be canceled so that's I think that's that's good um so you can uh we have on the

2:03:48

link to all our videos and uh podcast episodes we have our club membership Now set up so I think I went back and

2:03:55

changed all our patreon in all our videos it should have our club membership opportunity um yeah so that's our that's

2:04:03

our kind of patreon cancellation um oh anything you want to say to that or anything wasn't sure no I mean I I was

2:04:09

I'm shocked that they didn't overturn it because I saw that happen like oh yeah they're clearly going to overturn that with the shifting political wins and no

2:04:17

they they they Perma shafted you they did they really did and and man it it

2:04:22

sucks too because there's some videos that I didn't have backups and I don't have access to getting them so like

2:04:28

luckily I backed up most of them um but I there's a few that I couldn't find and

2:04:33

it's just yeah there that's gone you know but that's all right it's

2:04:39

it is what it is and so lesson learned for there for sure now I'm going to have backups for everything I do um and uh so

2:04:46

that's that and then with um with my son he is getting a kidney transplant in the near future future we will be finding

2:04:52

out actually tomorrow a little bit more of uh kind of how quickly that will be

2:04:59

but uh yeah and I'm doing a GoFundMe to raise money for that for his kidney transplant I'm selling a t-shirt that is

2:05:06

really cool my sister made it and it's his three favorite things Cowboys books and uh um trains and we put on a cool

2:05:15

little t-shirt and so we're selling those we have a GoFundMe and just asking for people to pray for us it's uh you

2:05:22

know it's constant medical attention it's constant Med medicine it's constant doctor's appointments and surgeries he's

2:05:28

had five six surgeries now um he's two and a half um but man he's he's a

2:05:34

trooper and he's doing really good in spite of all of that so um yeah so

2:05:39

anyone who wants to be a part of that I maybe uh you can I had a post on on here you can link whatever you want to in the

2:05:46

description yeah that's yeah that so everyone keep can keep in mind mind that

2:05:52

as you've been building you know particularly the men as you've been building you know going through this big theological transition you know moving

2:05:58

out to Tennessee building Reformation red pill behind all that you've had struggles with your platform and you've

2:06:03

had health challenges with your son right and that lend that lends context to the man that people are listening to

2:06:09

that enthusiastic cheerful you know highspeed you know what I mean like let's go go go and it's like despite

2:06:16

despite major challenges you've made committ you've remained committed to the mission I think that's very admirable

2:06:21

sir thank you thank you that that's good that's encouraging yeah it's you know

2:06:27

you don't think about it when you're in it but then you when I hear put like that I'm like oh yeah that's that's that

2:06:32

has been tough that's good it's it's uh it's formed it's definitely been

2:06:37

formative I'll say that amen amen well I know that you've got family commitments and things to take care of tonight so

2:06:44

where I I would like to encourage everyone listening and everyone watching to head over and subscribe and become a

2:06:50

club member where would you like to send everyone to find out more about you and what you do yeah I would say the two places would

Focusing on YouTube Content Expansion

2:06:57

be uh probably X that's where I'm most active X in YouTube I'm I'm really

2:07:03

pressing into YouTube uh over this year I'm planning on really um cranking out a

2:07:09

bunch of new content kind kind of pressing into some shorter form content

2:07:14

um we'll have our podcast that will continue uh continue to be stable

2:07:19

planning on hosting a lot of good debates in the near future but also wanting to kind of lean into some short form I don't see a lot of reformed guys

2:07:27

in our kind of dark gross reformed World um pressing really hard into the short form stuff so I'm going to try to try to

2:07:34

do that um and see what I can see there so yeah YouTube and X are the two big

2:07:40

places that that you can follow me Reformation red pill and uh hes Joshua I

2:07:46

think I ex I will send people there and I'll also post a link in the show notes in the description to the tweet that you

2:07:53

wrote about your son oh thank you thank you and you guys keep listening to the will Spencer podcast you you're a great

2:07:59

conversationalist like you're very good at this thank you yeah I love what I do

2:08:05

yeah well you are good at it so just there's your you encouraged me back at you buddy thank you very much see this

2:08:13

is what Bros do fist bump that's right there we go well thank you so much for

2:08:18

your time Joshua thank you so much for your work it's blessed me and thank you so much for your wisdom and and again I'd like to encourage all my listeners

2:08:24

to go support you as well well thanks for having me brother God bless