Tenets of Faith | Austin Molt | Episode 26

Speaker 1: 0:01

Pull up a chair across the counter. You're one stop shop for a variety of perspectives around Jesus and Christianity. I'm Great Lockridge and I'm here with my co-host, Jared Tafto, and today we're interviewing Austin Moult from Pheos, Theos whatever you wanna call it university. And Austin, just tell me where you're from and kinda your story.

Speaker 2: 0:27

Yeah, it's actually pronounced Theos. No, I'm just kidding, we were just talking about how to pronounce it. Thanks, no I am and not definitive. I live in Tri-Cities, washington, which is a small area in Washington state. I was originally born and raised in the Portland metro area, portland Oregon metro area, and my dad was a youth pastor for quite some time over there at a church. So I've always been super involved in church and whatnot and my parents were actually moving over here to it's about three hours away from Eastern Washington, we're kind of or from the West side of Washington three hours away and we were moving over here actually to take over a church that was kind of in our network of churches. And, long story short, about two months after we had moved out here and right before there was kind of this relaunch of the church, if you will, with a new lead pastor and all that stuff the pastor wrote an email to the small congregation that we were taking over that my dad was a wolf in sheep's clothing and the Lord told him to go take back the church or whatever. It was just a weird situation and so we lost a bunch of the people who were gonna, you know, who were supposed to stay, and as we were taking over this church and kind of doing a transition, and we had nowhere to go when we had church starting, we had been promoting it and we have nowhere to go in like three weeks. So my dad and I and my brother, we all love movies, so we started going to started in church and in movie theater, not out of some cool vision or something like that or to be edgy or whatever. It was just out of necessity. We had nowhere else to go. So, anyways, I was in high school when we moved. I started in youth ministry really young, that now means I have to do a lot of counseling and I just transitioned out of being a youth pastor about a year ago and doing other stuff at the church. So that's a little bit about me. I got a beautiful wife, two amazing kids, eight months and four years old.

Speaker 1: 2:46

So that's awesome. So how'd you get involved with like Theos and that whole crowd?

Speaker 2: 2:54

Yeah, so Nathan Finocchio, who's the founder of TheosU, his family and my family have known each other for a very long time, and so his dad was part of a network called MFI or Ministers Fellowship International. It started a long time ago. It's based out of Portland, oregon. They were kind of the charismatic movement who really cared about exegesis and scripture and things like that, and so they had a Bible college there. So, literally, because of this network, that's where a lot of the relationships and connections come from, and so John Finocchio, nathan and Gabe Finocchio's dad knows my dad and knew our pastor, and so there's just a lot. Yeah, so Nathan went to the same Bible college that I did. I did it online, though, but he went to the same Bible college that my dad went to I did it online and so we had reconnected. We were both at an event in early 2015, I believe it might've been 2014, but one or the other and we were sitting at a buddy's house in Portland till 1.30 am talking about theology and having a drink and catching up on life, and I hadn't seen him in years and I was a youth pastor at the time, and so we were just chatting. He came out to our church to speak months later and kind of rekindled that relationship again. And that was right before Theos you had launched. So yeah, it was a cool story, but that's how we got connected. Our families have known each other for a long time.

Speaker 1: 4:36

So what's the 10,000 foot view of what Theos is?

Speaker 2: 4:43

Theos, you takes Bible college courses and distills them down into maybe 30 to 40% of what they would lengthwise be at an actual seminary Bible college and then they make them palatable for anybody. So if somebody just wants to, man, they would love to go to Bible college or learn what you learn at Bible college or something like that. But they don't have the time and they don't necessarily need the degree, but they're wanting to learn. For like 15 bucks a month they can get a lot of those classes that have been distilled down into those shorter, easy to understand courses and then they have podcasts on there and they have hot topics. They do stuff on church history and all you know. But yeah, so it's basically an educational tool for lay people who aren't necessarily going into ministry but they want to learn a lot more about the Bible.

Speaker 1: 5:39

So and we saw the meme page which one of our buddies brought that to our attention and he was like their meme page slaps. And I was like, all right, we've interviewed a lot of meme guys. We did, if you know, meme Lord Monday or meme through Jesus guy. We interviewed him and you know, we just we enjoy a good meme as much as the next guy. So that was fun.

Speaker 2: 6:07

I yeah, I love memes. I mean, it's like funny stuff on the internet is 90% of everything I share. You know, I rarely see something inspirational or like a good sermon clip. I'm like, oh, oh, I gotta send this to seven buddies. This is really gonna convict them. Oh, I never do that. I'm always like, oh, this is so edgy, I think they're gonna be offended. I should send this to him right now. This is so you know. I will send it to my mom's probably not gonna see this podcast, cause she never sees any podcasts that I ever do. I will send my mom. I will send my mom stuff that I know is way past her threshold of what she can handle, just to see how quickly I get a response back from her. I mean, like, like the type of humor that you're like she's not that she won't get it, that she would deem as very inappropriate or just too far. I do it all the time.

Speaker 3: 7:01

And I just wait to see.

Speaker 2: 7:03

Yeah, but no, I love memes. I'm minimally involved in the Theo Su meme page, not much. I do another sort of page with Theo Su that's a little bit more video based. I'm not as good at making the memes as those other guys. Those other guys are geniuses at it.

Speaker 1: 7:22

Yeah, video is tough. Wait, that's kind of in our future. We're trying to figure out how to do video. But man, how do you even do that? Like short form, like short form video and stuff like that just seems like a nightmare. So what are you?

Speaker 2: 7:37

trying to say, well, I mean. So what's funny is I will go like a week and a half without posting anything or something like that. And then I'll be like, oh my gosh, I haven't posted anything on this page in like a week. I should post something. And then I just kind of wait for like inspiration to hit me throughout the day and like, as I'm just working, I have other things I do. You know, I have a job and I have two jobs technically, and then something will hit me. I'm like, oh, that's funny. And then I will make enough content for like, if I space it out for like two weeks and I just don't care. So I end up posting it like all in one day or something like that. But what's funny for me is the video stuff is easier for me. Then, like the memes, I feel like I have to like stop and put real creative thought into it and I end up overthinking it and trying to art, whereas the guys who at least you know that I know who do the Theos U memes stuff, they just pump it out like crazy. And I have no idea how the video stuff is, what I feel like I could pump out like crazy. I just don't, you know, I'm just like, okay, I got to get this stuff done for my church and or you know whatever it is, and but I but I feel like if someone told me make five funny videos today, I'd be like, yeah, no problem. If they told me to make five really good memes, I'd be like that's gonna be tough. Hopefully I can get one. I don't know why, that's just how my brain works, yeah.

Speaker 1: 8:59

So I want to circle back to that thing you said about your dad and the wolf in sheep's clothing and all that cause. That sounded super interesting. You want to go a little bit more into that Cause that. I don't even know what you're talking about.

Speaker 2: 9:14

My dad is a wolf in sheep's clothing. So I just want to say I'm just kidding, Just confirming.

Speaker 1: 9:21

I just want to back up that guy.

Speaker 2: 9:23

I don't like my hat. No, no, this, you know, this pastor was retiring and basically what was basically what was communicated to my dad was you can change the name of the church. Every elder, you know, every person on the board, staff member, whatever they're going to step down. We really want somebody to come in who who fits, you know, kind of our DNA but also has a fresh vision and passion for where the church is going to go. And so that was what was communicated and that was true, and it was a small church. I mean, it was a church of like 85, including cats and dogs, and I think at one point it had been bigger, but you know the congregation was just getting older and whatnot. So I'm I'm used to a much different church experience. And so we show up and my dad's preaching. He hasn't offered him the job yet, but obviously you want to hear the guy preach if he's going to potentially take over and like the, there's like water damage in the ceiling and it's like kind of caving in and it's just a very different environment from what I'm used to it. But I'm like, okay, you know, my dad built relationship with these people. They offered him the job. We moved out our family and the guy said that he just didn't like though we were going to sell the building and the property, because the building had a lot of damage and the property was could be used, could have been sold for a lot of money. And so we have a board of directors from like different churches and stuff like that as we're getting started, and we were going to take that money and put some of it in savings for maybe a potential building. And then you of course you need sound equipment and all the other stuff and I don't know which of it all he didn't like. But he didn't like some of it. So he basically was saying this guy's going to steer us in the wrong direction. He had moved three hours away. He's like I'm moving back, I'm taking the church over. So we lost the property, we lost about 50 to 60% of the people who had were in that church, and it was just. It was really difficult because if you think like you move your whole family over right before you're about to relaunch, everything's going good. There was no like issues or anything like that. This guy I don't even know exactly why. He just felt like he was, we were about to leave people a stair or something like that. It was kind of bonkers, honestly. I remember walking into my dad's room this was right when he found out and my dad was like emotional and I remember asking him what's going on. I was just turned 16 or just about turned 16 years old and he had said he had just briefly told me the story, like I don't even know why or what's happening, but the property like we didn't fundraise any money. We didn't like even our church back home was like hey, we want to take an offering to kind of help financially support you guys. You know you're a family of five and we had this property and so we're like we don't need it, we've been totally blessed. We can like save that money for missions or whatever. So we were really out in the land and so all of that got wiped out. So it was difficult but we did. The theater there was pros and cons. We literally had a guy one time walk in with popcorn, actually thinking that there was a screen showing happening that's not a joke, literally and he just stayed. And he was like this it was so weird, like, do you smoke popcorn? Bring your popcorn to church, hey, yes. So yeah, that's what happened. It was weird, it was very weird, and I don't have any bitter feelings or anything like that, you know, like it's not like I'm holding onto that. It was so long ago, but, man, it was bizarre. And it was also, you know, you felt I felt bad for, like my parents at that moment, cause I was 16, I couldn't process all of it. But, just like man, we left our baseball team, basketball team, all of our friends, and then it feel like we just got out here and then everything stripped of you right away. It's just not the best way to start off. You know, a new church Adventure and all that other stuff. So yeah, it's a little bit more detailed as to what happened, but a lot of it's still unclear to me.

Speaker 3: 13:51

I don't know so what you got, jared what, what, what church network were you guys a part of? Or was it a denominational affiliation or non-denom, or yeah, it was, I think I mentioned earlier.

Speaker 2: 14:08

It's called ministers fellowship international. It's it's a charismatic, slash, evangelical Sort of network. It's yeah, it's not a denomination, there's not a, there's a governance within its own network, but that's attached to no you know local church or anything like that. And so, yeah, it's started in Portland forever ago and I Can't remember the number of churches that are part of it now, but you know there are some, there's a lot of churches who are part of MFI, who are part of Denominations or other networks or something like that. It's not like some exclusive thing per se, but, yeah, ministers fellowship international, it's like. It's like a really old-fashioned name. You could tell that they came up with the name a long time ago and it's never changed.

Speaker 3: 15:00

But yeah, so got a logo of a of a dove or a flame.

Speaker 2: 15:08

Exactly well, the church you, the church it came out of originally was called Bible temple and then so man, I'm forgetting the other one, but just very and literally it was like a cross with the flame and that whole thing.

Speaker 3: 15:24

Yeah, yeah. So what Happened to your family's faith After that?

Speaker 2: 15:34

do you mean after the whole incident? That happened once we moved over here, and yeah, well, Why'd you stay?

Speaker 3: 15:41

Yeah, you know, yeah Also. Yeah, just a random question. So it was a active movie theater, like there were movies being shot and then you guys were doing sermons on. So yeah, we had just yes, yeah.

Speaker 2: 15:55

So we had done it early enough to where we tried to time it to where we were, where we would get done Before any movies were being shown on Sunday morning, and my dad became friends with the manager and so we literally did it on a handshake. $800 a month, like this is not good advice, but yeah, on a handshake. No, no contract. I mean they could have just totally screwed us if they wanted to and just say, no, you can't come anymore. And then you know, we end up using More and more theaters for the kids, and so, yeah, we had to. And then we built they allowed us to build underneath the screen Storage units so we could be out of there faster, as long as we remove them once we were done. And so we, we got quicker and quicker at doing it and so, yeah, we were using like four of them for, like, kids ministry Nice.

Speaker 3: 16:48

Yeah all right, so continue on that first and I'll give you another question. That will come back. But what do you miss about those days?

Speaker 2: 16:54

Oh, Not much.

Speaker 3: 17:01

You know, sometimes you look back and you're like man, that was, that was good.

Speaker 2: 17:06

No, okay, yeah, no. I mean, if anything, just the simplicity and the excitement of it. Right, my dad would, my brother, my cousin, who moved over from Portland, oregon to Tri-Cities, three hours away because he got in trouble with pot at school and need to finish. So he's living with us and us three my cousin, my brother and I Would go with my dad before anybody else on those Sunday mornings and the train to help set up the kids classrooms. My the trade-off was we got McDonald's breakfast, and I don't, and obviously that's not a good deal for our work, but you know, you're 15 years old, what are you gonna say? And I gotta say I love, I love McDonald's breakfast. I don't care what anybody says, it's, my favorite thing at McDonald's is the breakfast. So I was like easy, you know, I'm probably have to do this anyways. So I mean that was just fun, exciting, you know, fresh, but no, it was a lot, a lot of work and it's very restricted doing a movie theater. So that's what I miss and don't miss about it.

Speaker 3: 18:10

Yeah. So back to the. The follow-through of that would then be you know what happened to your faith as you because you can't speak on your parents and your family's faith, so that was maybe a bad question, but what happened to your faith as you watched your dad? You know you're 16, these are like formative years, yeah.

Speaker 2: 18:29

Well, to be honest with you, I don't know if it, you know, affected my faith Too much, or at least in the immediate. I Was a pretty outspoken, extraverted kid. So you know, like I did a Bible study in my school my freshman year of high school and would invite all my friends, and it wasn't because I saw myself as, like some, you know, something like amazing but biblical teacher or something like that. I was just a passionate guy and I kind of liked Doing things that I thought were like uncomfortable, like I almost welcomed it. I wanted to, you know. So I was very outspoken about my faith. I wasn't like a jerk to people or anything like that, but I, you know, I definitely was not scared to talk about her. And so when I moved over there, I think seeing some of Going through that situation, and then probably some other ones as well, early on, made me almost more zealous or More like I'm gonna hunker down, you know, and that probably sounds weird to say, but you know, when you are 15, 16 years old and you think your dad is Amazing, like and I, I still do, I still do, and you don't have the perspective to be able to see multiple angles, you know you, your, your scope is very limited and you see somebody kind of screw over your dad and you think it's unjustified. You kind of get I kind of got this mentality because I'm kind of a confrontational guy in the sense of like it doesn't bother me to go confront something or whatever I. In fact it bothers me if I can't. You know, my wife's the opposite. She's like I don't want to go. You know cause any drama? I'm like I don't care at all, let's go start war. You know that's, that's our dirt. So she balances me out. She's like you don't need to go there. I'm like okay.

Speaker 3: 20:37

She's like how much.

Speaker 2: 20:38

Yeah, exactly, it's just like calm down, simmer, simmer. And so I Think you know, you see that, and I already kind of had a keen sense of justice in my mind and I just thought, you know what, some people are gonna screw you over. But I'm not gonna do that Like, I'm gonna go to, I'm gonna go to war for you, like, and I meant that in a good way. So I think it actually made me more loyal to the, the church and my dad and things like that. But I I don't mean that all in a positive way. I think there's loyalty to a fault at times. Not that my dad is a bad person. I think he's actually one of the most integral, humble guys I've ever met. I have the utmost respect for him. But I think there was at times, instead of thinking about you know, what should I do or how should I handle this, I was thinking about how do I Stay loyal or safeguard my dad, or something like that. And I and I I actually didn't realize that Until about two and a half years ago I had a panic attack that sent me to the ER. I didn't know I was having a panic attack, and I don't mean like, I was just kind of like, oh my gosh, I'm just kind of hyperventilating, like I legit thought I was gonna die and and all this stuff was going on and the doctors like you need to talk to somebody. That started counseling. And then months into that I realized that my perspective on a lot of different things Was formed from this sense of I'm a very loyal person, but to a fault. So I think that scenario, you know, really it drove me in that direction and there's good and bad in that.

Speaker 3: 22:29

But Like it definitely affect my decision-making. Like to a savior complex or to a Like rider like I got to be, rather die like probably a little bit of both.

Speaker 2: 22:41

I mean, it'll give you a kind of like a hypothetical example or not hypothetical? Give you a real example. I'm like wait, this is a hypothetical. There's a very similar situation as me in Boston instead of Austin, no, so okay, here's an example. I Was trying to figure out what to do after high school. You know, you know, when you're a senior and everybody in the freaking world asks you what are you gonna do next year, what are you gonna do next year? Was she yep, and I'm like what am? I gonna do next year. I wanted to go into youth ministry. I Loved youth ministry. I loved working with middle school, high school students. I loved how crazy they were because I thought I was crazy. I Did enjoy. I love theology, that's my biggest passion point. So. But I also played basketball and baseball and I had some offers for basketball nothing big I'm, you know it wasn't like I was going to vision one or something like that. I'm trying to make myself sound like you know I was gonna play a Gonzaga or Ohio State or something. But I Did have some small schools reach out that I didn't reach out to at all. I was a shooting guard and and I thought, okay, I could go to Portland Bible College Because that I wanted to get a degree in Something in, you know, historic theology or something like that. And yeah, it's not the coolest school in the world to play basketball that, but who cares, I get a play basketball, I get. I Get to go to the school for free. And I remember talking to my pastor in Vancouver, washington, right next to Portland Oregon, right before he moved, and he said, well, I don't want to go into everything he said because it would take too long, but he eventually said this yeah, if you go to Portland Bible College, you play basketball. I think you would love it. I think you do well, but I think at one point you might get offered a job. Austin, you're a good communicator, you're, you know, you're authentic, you're, you are who you are. Because I think I think you'll get offered a job. And I think you'll get offered a job and you'll get offered more money than the new church plant that your dad just started, whatever be able to offer you in these next few years, and I think you're called to try cities. I think that's where God's placed you. I'm not saying anything is said was wrong or right. I'm just saying it was that kind of mentality of this. You know you got to stick this out. Hmm, you could make more money over here. Now, I agree, I actually don't think I should have went, and for possibly different reasons, but Again, I, there was so much good in that. But also it was just my mentality was like okay, I want to be here for him and my dad was here right now. He'd be like okay, but Austin, I didn't say anything like that to you. I always and my dad's always been like I encourage you. If you wanna leave ministry, if you wanna do whatever my dad has literally said I'll be your biggest cheerleader, I'll help you find the job. I don't care what you do. I love you because you're my son, not because of what you do Like he's very he's explicitly said all those things and I 100% believe him and he's a great father for that. But in those earlier years that was definitely molded into my brain so a little bit of savior complex, but a little bit of but probably a little bit more I'm gonna ride or die. And then you get married, you have kids and you start to pick up on that more and more and just having a healthy, okay, yes, I do wanna be a loyal, loving son, but my first priority is my family, my wife and kids and all those things and so so you said theology is your favorite thing, so obviously gotta talk a little bit about theology.

Speaker 1: 26:55

So I just have a question that I'm curious about what is something that you recently studied and then changed your mind about? Something that you like maybe preached or maybe told people for a while and then you're like, dude, I was just wrong about this one. Anything come to mind on that one. Oh plenty, that's a good start. That's a humble approach, right there.

Speaker 2: 27:24

Okay. So I would say this this isn't recent, as in like two weeks ago I was reading and something I changed my mind two weeks ago, but this would probably be in the last few years, about four or five years ago the more I studied within church, history and theology and things like that, on the topic of the sacraments, specifically baptism and communion or the Eucharist, those changed, those changed. I grew up in a tradition that believed that communion was symbolic. You did it in remembrance of me. I believe the bread and the wine are the real presence of Christ.

Speaker 1: 28:06

So you're.

Speaker 2: 28:07

Catholic I believe. No, well, I'm a lower seat. Here's how I like to say it. I am too Catholic to be Roman Catholic, so I am Catholic. I'm not Roman Catholic, I don't understand what that means.

Speaker 3: 28:26

Yeah, it's like so what I mean by that is yeah, what I mean by that is Catholic.

Speaker 2: 28:32

The word Catholic essentially means universal, in some sense universal. So when the Apostles Creed says I believe in the Holy Catholic Church, it means those who believe in Christ Jesus all over the world, not just in my local church. So what I mean by I'm too Catholic it means I'm too in the middle of the different traditions. I'm too universal in that sense to be Roman Catholic in that defined or that specific. That's all I mean by that. I'm too friendly with all the different Christian traditions to be that narrow. That's what I mean.

Speaker 3: 29:17

So I think we take a much of a he's too much of a mutt to be called any specific breed.

Speaker 1: 29:23

Sounds like he subscribes to the heresy of ecumenism is what it sounds like.

Speaker 2: 29:28

Oh, I subscribe to every heresy.

Speaker 3: 29:30

Not every heresy. Yeah, you're a friend of this podcast.

Speaker 1: 29:35

Yeah no.

Speaker 2: 29:36

No, I'm joking, but no, so I believe. What was that?

Speaker 1: 29:41

Maybe he said we are too.

Speaker 2: 29:42

Like. We're not just like stabbin'.

Speaker 1: 29:44

We're just like huh.

Speaker 2: 29:46

No, I mean there are definitely. I'm not trying to make it sound like I'm so complex and educated and articulate that I cannot be in denial. You can't enjoy. Yeah, yeah, I'm so layered you don't even know where to begin with me. No, I'm not trying to act like that.

Speaker 3: 30:04

I'm just as sweet, that's actually a great video.

Speaker 2: 30:08

We just came up with a video. So are you like a? Are you a, are you Catholic or are you Baptist? You cannot put a definition on me. I think that would be good.

Speaker 3: 30:19

Think of the finest meal you've ever tasted, and you haven't begun to approach the depth that yeah yeah, yeah, so my view on hell changed and these are slightly, I'm not talking about like.

Speaker 2: 30:36

I mean, maybe some of them were big 180 turns, but my view of hell was the way I would articulate or understand it from scripture slightly changed how so, by the way, what was that?

Speaker 1: 30:51

How? So what the hell?

Speaker 2: 30:54

Well, I would say I think it was 14 when Rob Bell's book Love when it Came Out, I was nearly 14. And remember reading Now listen, I could be remembering this wrong. You know how, like sometimes you have this memory and you have this narrative in your head and then somebody comes along who remembers it better and they're like that's not at all how you, that's how you remember, you remembering it. So this could be the case. But I remember thinking this is a very compelling book. But it felt weird to start off the premise going does God get what God wants? Because I remember reading a book from Lewis where Lewis poses the opposite question Do you get what you want? You're talking in CS Lewis, yeah, cs Lewis. Yeah, cs Lewis poses the question do people get what they want? And so I just go in this is very compelling and I think all it did. I'm not saying that book alone, but I was a little bit more open to some different possibilities and things of that nature the older I got and listen, I guess my mind could be changed on this as well. But I got a little bit more sure of where I landed, on the different views of hell and I think. But I will just say this I think overall my approach to the Bible and my approach, like my philosophical approach to scripture has probably been the biggest change. How do I know? How do I come to the conclusion I come to? My methods have probably been my biggest changes. So yeah, I used to be like float between annihilationalism, that people in hell just stop existing at some point. I used to kind of go I would lean that way. I'm not sure if that's true, but that's how I would lean. There's a part of me that just wishes God overrides people's will or something of that nature, and everybody switches teams down at some point. But I couldn't justify that in my reading. That was just like that'd be awesome. I don't know, but I can't get there on paper so it's just like we'll see. I'm not sure. So that's kind of where I was at and the more I read and recently as in the last few years, I became more concrete going. I wouldn't articulate my understanding of hell in any of those ways, although I still hold that view with humility I would. I think I believe hell's eternal. I think people's definitions of hell is sometimes more culturally based. The whole idea of fire and what does this mean, I think some of those things, people are just taking imagery way too literally and there's some false, preconceived ideas going into it, but the difference would be, I think it is eternal. I think, yeah, and everything that goes along with that, which we could get more into the details, but I'm not sure if that's where you wanted to go, so yeah, Actually we interviewed this guy, josh White, that interviewed Rob Bell, and I listened to that interview and I don't know you remember watching those Rob Bell like Numa videos.

Speaker 1: 34:58

Did you ever watch it?

Speaker 2: 34:59

Yes, Like Youth Group or whatever. My dad would play them at the youth ministry.

Speaker 1: 35:03

Yeah, I watched those suckers and it was always like you know, super in the box kind of thing. You know you were like, all right, rob Bell's, you know spitting fire on true Christianity, right. And then he comes out with it's love wins, that changed everything, right. That was when they they're like he's a universalist and like all this stuff. And what's going on with Rob Bell? And I just listened to that interview with Josh White. Rob Bell and dude, just sounds like a really, really nice guy, like he, just like he wrote this book Where'd you Park your Spaceship? That's just like a fiction book and he's just like making art now and it's like that's so interesting. I don't know, because he went full out Now he's writing like fiction books and I don't know.

Speaker 2: 35:53

I think Rob Bell is an absolutely incredible communicator. I mean there is no doubt he has just gifted. He was back in the Numa videos. He's persuasive in his writing. I mean he's a great communicator and I mean that was all sincerity. My, I probably leaned a little bit more excuse me if this is bad terminology, but just to be quick-handed but more of a progressive-ish approach earlier on in some ways. And Well, I have found, just as I've gotten older in my journey, my study, my learning has been Rob Bell and people who are a little bit more on that spectrum where they would, they would lean more into universalism or whatever it might be, you know, versus the fundamentalist person who's like, if a woman wears a dress that doesn't go down to her ankles, she's going to burn in hell. You know dancing self the devil because it leads to fornication. You know like you have these two extremes, and I'm not trying to even say that those are your equivalent, but just for the sake of the argument, I think what I think, for lack of better terms, the progressive and the fundamentalist both make the same mistake. On the opposite end, the the progressive side says that all the things that used to be close handed are now open handed issues, so everything's open for interpretation or debate. Well, it's not that clear. Well, you know, this is even the argument that Rob Bell makes for hell. Well, there's all these different words used. And you know, christians, a lot of Christians, have gotten it wrong over the centuries and maybe we need to, maybe we're discovering this and it's it used to be a close handed issue. It's not open, it's an open it, you know, an open handed issue. I'm not even trying to get into the weeds of all the hot topic stuff, I'm just trying to give you some examples.

Speaker 1: 38:04

Yeah, I guess.

Speaker 2: 38:05

Well, on sexuality it was this way, but now it's open. You know it's open handed. It's everything becomes open handed on this end, on the fundamentalist end, things that should be open handed or secondary or like, hey, we can disagree and be brothers and sisters in Christ. You know we can both be Christians, we can both, you know, be friends. Here. Everything becomes a close handed issue, you know it's like it's like their personal convictions becomes the community standard by which everybody has to subscribe to. So don't watch an R rated movie. You can't listen to music that doesn't quote, unquote, glorify Christ. You know you can't do this, you can't do that. That's all bad, it all leads to demonic portals and evil. And you know, don't drink alcohol and cigars are evil and don't. You know it's like just craziness. You know it's like oh my gosh, this is. You know you're so annoying and you're holier than now. I think both of those camps make the an issue with their, their philosophical approach to the truth. Um, it I have found most comforting going what? How do I know what the close handed issues are and what the open handed issues are? What? What are the definition markers that, like I have to hold on to these and the. These are concrete, and the rest I'm going to just talk about with humility. Obviously, I think I'm right. Everybody thinks they're right or they would change their mind, but I'm going to have enough humility to just go. I could be wrong and I'm open. My ideas are like a T shirt If you find a better one for me to wear, I will do it, you know. So I dabbled with the Rob Bell stuff and everything and I but anyways, that's that's what I think is. The issue, though, that I found as I got older is, uh, one is too loosely defined and one is over defined, and trying to find a middle ground somewhere.

Speaker 1: 40:05

So as a pastor. What's the? I'm sure you'd like get those two separate camps. You know reasonably often what's the best way to like love somebody, care about somebody. That's like one of those camps in your own congregation or just that you meet. Or like what, would you tell our listeners the best way to like loves somebody different than you would be that has different viewpoints on that jazz.

Speaker 2: 40:34

Yeah, well, I would just say point number one is loving people is really good theology, you know, like literally just loving people is is, is is part of God's will for your life, so that's good. I'm not talking about that. Everybody needs to quote, unquote love each other and ignore reality, or, you know, ignore um facts, or I'm not saying that I, I. What I don't mean by loving people is pretending like there's no issues in the world, or there's no offenses, or there's no such thing as sin, and let's just all hug each other and act like everything's good. Um, no, like with my marriage and family, there's tough conversations. We don't ignore when there's an issue, but we love each other and the midst of all of it. That's what I mean. So that's number one. Number two is um, there's what I found is a lot, not all the time, but a lot of times what people struggle with or the reason they may disagree sometimes is because of a semantics issue. Sometimes I'll say something and and I've had somebody come up to me afterwards and they go hey, I'm just not fully understanding. Here's my thoughts, and they're kind of trying to tell me they disagree, but they don't want to hurt my feelings and I'm like you're not going to hurt my feelings, and then I will explain to them, like okay, here's what I meant by this and here's what I don't mean by this. I'm not. When I say this, I'm not saying this, and I just define what I mean more clearer for them and they go oh, that makes way more sense. So I think everybody just needs to take a chill pill a little bit sometimes and be better at communicating. What did you mean by what you said and what did you not mean? Sometimes people are a lot closer to agreement with you, but they frame it differently or they verbalize it differently, or they're coming from a different perspective on it, and so some of it is just the patience to clarify with with other people. I think that helps the time. There's been so many times where I I try to do this whenever I make a statement. That is a little bit, you know, jarring. What do I mean by this and what do I not mean? Here's what I'm not trying to say as well, because I've noticed this I don't know if you've ever seen this on Instagram. I will see a preacher post something that's like God loves you no matter what, and then people in the comments will be like this Are you saying that God doesn't care about sin? You know, now it's Instagram, okay, it's Instagram, let's. But people actually do that in the real world. When you say a statement, depending on where they're coming from, they want to know what you don't mean by that as well. So I think that helps a lot. And then I think the third thing when it comes to dealing with people better is yes, I do think, in my humble opinion, if you know what is central and what is the closed handed issues, the things that are like this, is the core it will give you. It will give you room to be able to disagree and work through things with other people, because they're open handed issues, and that might be a process of figuring that out, but, like you know, for me I go. I want to have, I want to agree with what Christians have always agreed on on the core issues. All Christians have believed that Jesus Christ was fully God, fully man. All Christians had a very high view of scripture. All Christians believed in the virgin birth. They all did I'm not saying that there wasn't one or two fringe crazy, but all people. When Jesus said he would lead you into all truth. The word you there in Greek is plural. He's talking about the body of Christians. I don't believe. I personally believe that the Holy Spirit has led the church Christians for 2000 years, so I'm like they haven't got it right on everything that's so obvious. But I think where there's been agreement for 2000 years on these core issues, I want to be in agreement with them. So knowing what is closed handed and open handed allows you to disagree, allows you to learn from other people, allows you to just and not feel like you got to fight for tooth and nail for everything. So that's that's how I would answer that. What'd you get, man?

Speaker 1: 45:04

Um, it's just like you got pages and notes over there. He's been, he's been writing notes, man.

Speaker 3: 45:10

It's just a lot of really good stuff. Austin, I'm like it gets hard to ask you know, one question. I try to. I try my best when we sit with someone to hear what you know how you can talk over God's voice sometimes, but you've got an edgy and so sometimes it's really hard to be still and just listen. So trying to piece together a next question with some things you said earlier that are related to what you just brought up, and you talked about your loyalty being a strength and a a strength and possibly a stumbling block, and what I wrote was unwavering loyalty to the death can be dangerous when or if one's chosen loyalties are off. For example, if you're chosen doctrines end up being wrong, they may be hard to release, or a man may die with one in whom he should have not ridden, and following that I'm thinking about the way that our palates grow Like Grant laughs at me because I was a cook and did kitchens a lot and like everything is just food. Man Like.

Speaker 1: 46:37

He does a food reference every three minutes.

Speaker 3: 46:40

There, just literally, aren't that?

Speaker 2: 46:41

reference. That's like my dad, though I will tell you. My dad has said if he wasn't, if he wasn't in ministry, he would. He'd want to be a head chef at like the nicest restaurant he could possibly work at.

Speaker 3: 46:52

He loves cooking and he's pretty good, let me just tell you, man, like there are very few languages in the world that don't have to be taught and that everybody understands. And good food. Like you sit on a table with good food and like you don't need to say anything. You just look across the table and it's like, hey, you feel what I feel. Like you know I do. Look at me.

Speaker 1: 47:20

So anyway, food, music and nature, yeah that's what I'm saying. It's like, if you look at the Bible, I mean that's a great point. If you look at the Bible, I mean you know, food is a huge thing, right, people are trees. Right, there's a whole thing going on there.

Speaker 3: 47:39

Go read Isaiah and be severely weirded out.

Speaker 1: 47:44

Yeah, all sorts of stuff, All right.

Speaker 3: 47:45

Go ahead, man. So I also process out loud. I'm trying to be a better man, which means a man that has less words, and that's hard for me. So you mentioned that like the idea of loyalty. And then when you were talking about like extreme sides, like often left and right is what we use. But a friend of mine once showed me this analogy that was like a horseshoe and that the further you go to the end of each extreme like, the closer you are to one another. And I wrote, like thinking about your comments, the you know the most emotional that you're ever at, at the end of the left or the end of the right, like you're the most passionate, you're the most sold out, you're the most. You almost go beyond that like radicalist side where, like you realize, not everyone anyway, you go, you break through radicalism to just like passion and courage on your given side, not just like consuming hate. And this is what I'm processing so you can just give me feedback on this. Is there such a thing as closed handed and open handed rightness when we're talking about humans? Now that the law has passed away, that ministry of death as scripture talks about, is now they're not but one issue, to look through the Amago to the day and know his love. So when you make a statement and people assume all the things that you don't mean, it seemed that Jesus didn't go around giving giving defense for all the things he didn't mean. He just said this is good food, this is good song, this is a good guy, this is my good father. And he did on occasion combat the injustice or the phariseical nature, but it wasn't in this degree that he needed to explain what bad people were. Like we know what badness is and we also know, through the experience of goodness, what goodness is. And I don't wanna be heretical here. Right, like anybody could use what I'm saying to say like oh, just follow your heart. Like I understand that. So maybe I'll tie all this in a bow with one of my first questions, which is you're talking about, theos, you being a seminary distillery like, where you just get the white lightning moonshine out of seminaries. But can you do that Like, can you distill down these courses and this ability and this training? And then, if you do, like, how do you not just make, how do you not just make people like drunk on the power of knowledge? So, all right, I'm gonna stop rambling and just I guess what's on my heart or thought is like what does it mean for us to learn to draw near to the heart of God but there still be such a thing as right and wrong and then how we relate to one another? You feel free to go any direction you want with any of that Easy question.

Speaker 2: 51:20

No, I mean a lot of good stuff in there, and as you're talking, I'm going okay, let me remember hit this point, oh. And then I'm like, oh, that's a good point, let me yeah, yeah, thanks.

Speaker 3: 51:31

That's why all my pages of notes? I don't know man.

Speaker 2: 51:34

I have to get it out of this. I should have been writing stuff down, okay. So I would just say this number one is by the way, I'm not suggesting you are making this comparison, but I have seen this comparison made in conversations I've had with people where they pit almost loving God against seeking truth or knowledge.

Speaker 3: 52:02

And they may not yeah. Okay, say that again another way deeper, like just yeah, sure.

Speaker 2: 52:13

I've had conversations with people where they would put first, I want to know God and love God over. They would create this dichotomy between the two over understanding theology or learning about the Bible. I would rather love God and draw close to Him and have intimacy versus just head knowledge right. Okay yeah, and I would say so. Attacking that first number one is, I would say, of course there is a possibility of. The Bible talks about how knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. Now that's right after you're talking about worldly wisdom and all these different things. Okay, but it also says a little bit after that love rejoices in the truth. So love and truth are not pitted against each other, although they can be when they are taken out of what they're meant to be right. Truth without love is not good and love without truth isn't good. They're meant to go together. So I would say it like this I love my wife more today. We're coming up in seven years of marriage. I love my wife more today in part not solely, but in part because I know her better. I know what she likes, I know what she doesn't like, I know what her love languages are. I know what's gonna make her heart skip a beat, more so than when I first got married to her. I may have had more emotion that I expressed on my wedding day like, oh my God, that I didn't have this morning, but I still can serve her better today because I know more about her. The problem is, if I know more about her and I learn more about her, but I don't have a willingness or a heart that engages with her. It has to be both and right, and so that is where you merge the both. And I don't learn about the Bible. I have my Bible over here. I don't learn about the Bible to know the Bible better. I learn, I wanna know the scriptures so that I can love God better. Yes, I can actually love God better. What does that mean? Well, god's a person and there's a relational aspect to this. I don't come to my wife and go hey, it's your birthday, I'm going to make what I want for dinner. I figured out what does she want for dinner. I want to serve her. Well, god has like things a certain way too, and I want to love him well, just like God loves me personally. So, okay, I don't want to belabor the point anymore, but I think that's how love and it's knowledge. Yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 3: 55:02

I don't want to lose this thought because I can't write it. It's moving too fast. But what's fascinating about what you just said is one person in the relationship between man and God is absolutely pure, and you will find nothing but a deeper love for you when you discover more about him. So what's fascinating about what you just said is the more you get to know God in learning how to love him, you'll only find more perfect love for you. He's never like in you and your wife, me and my wife getting close we just celebrated nine years. You'll learn thoughts as well as perfection, but what you just described is to learn to love God better is to also learn how much better he has loved you.

Speaker 2: 55:56

Yeah, totally. Is that valid Absolutely? Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 3: 56:00

So it's like an endless like.

Speaker 1: 56:02

Yeah, it's living water. Yeah, and it's just constant you know, so you can keep going.

Speaker 2: 56:09

I interrupt it, but I just no no, no, no, that's great, I totally agree. You know, I absolutely agree. Now I will just say, when I'm and I don't know exactly where you guys stand on everything, so I'm making assumptions to some degree. But your comment earlier I thought was interesting, about Jesus not going around and I'm paraphrasing, obviously, but sharing also what he didn't mean and having to explicitly define everything. I would go. Yes, I think there's a great point to be made there. I'd also say, you know, I think there's some. Jesus had a pretty good pulse on what the general Second Temple Judaism and kind of what they were facing and what they believed and what you know, the Pharisees and the Sadducees and all the different sects of Judaism, what they taught. I think he had a pretty good grasp on that. So and then, on top of that, the Gospel writers are not writing word for word. I mean we know this, like, for example, the Book of Acts. We know that their sermons were not literally two sentences. You know repent, believe and be baptized. We know they probably said more than that. But their goal is not to, you know, write downward forward sermons, as you guys would understand and know. So but I do think this I mean you look like when Paul starts going to different cultures and he's talking to the Athens or the people in Athens, and he's talking at Marysil and these other places he is defining and describing in great detail this is what you believed, but here's what the God of Israel has done and he's come in the flesh and his name is Jesus and you guys believe this. But this is what the Gospel says. And I mean he does go into there more. It's almost like the further they got away from that context, the more he had to kind of dissect their cultural understanding of things and then bring in a Gospel understanding. I'm not saying that's a silver bullet, but that's all I'm trying to say is people are coming from totally different backgrounds. Some people believe in God, some people came up in a Catholic background, some people came up in a Pentecostal background, et cetera, and on and on and on and on and it all goes.

Speaker 3: 58:19

That's what you said and that's really valid. There's less teaching needed when there's more already understood because of tradition and teaching.

Speaker 2: 58:31

And I don't know how long you guys have been friends or known each other. But, like with one of my best friends, hunter, him and I disagree violently on a few things and we don't care. We will talk for hours and my wife will be like, please don't even talk about this subject, this subject, you guys will be there for three hours, and especially if we have a drink and we're sitting down by a fire, I mean we'll just go at it. But we love each other and we agree on a lot of the main stuff, right. But when we get together and Him and I talk, I don't have to preface like, well, here's my take on what scripture is less context, because we've already had a lot of those conversations. So I guess what I was trying to say earlier but you know is I don't believe Jesus is just going around and trying to fix everybody's ideologies. I agree with that. There is a part of this where it's like. There is a part of this where there has to be a heart thing, a will thing that is transformed or transferred. It's not just head knowledge, 1000%. But I'm all the point I'm trying to make is we can't divorce the heart from the head or the head from the heart. They do work simultaneously. You don't need a theology degree, you don't need to have perfect doctrine to serve Jesus. Of course nobody would be serving if that were the case. But it's also foolish to say it doesn't really matter what scripture means or what the Bible teaches or what truth is. I'm just going to kind of search for God. It's spirit and truth. As Jesus said, he wants worshipers in spirit and in truth. So it's both and which I think you guys agree with. But that was. That was what I was trying to articulate. I will just say one last thing that I'm very, very passionate about. I grew up in a pretty kind of Pentecostal background where it's like, you know, alter calls experience the presence of God. God want nothing more than your presence. You know Holy Spirit move in this place. You know, that was, that was kind of the emphasis. And I would just say this even if people had an encounter with God, if every person had some supernatural presence of God, whatever encounter, not everybody would still serve Jesus because they would be aware of the supernatural. But becoming aware of the supernatural doesn't make you repentant. There's a difference between cognitive knowledge and the will, and this is kind of the heart of what I'm passionate about. I know that working out and running every day is good for my health. I know that, in fact I believe it. It's just not in my will to do it. Like, why is it that? I know this is actually better for me, it will improve my life in a lot of ways, and I still don't do it. People could know everything about Jesus. They could know everything about sin or whatever. It might be Absolutely so now I'm kind of making a case from the other side. They could even have an in crazy encounter with God or some supernatural, supernatural Christian, mystical experience. You know, whatever they could have all those things and still not follow Jesus, unless they have a heart that a willingness to do so, just like knowing working out is going to better your life. If it's not in your will to do it, you're not waking up early and going to the gym. But I'm. What I'm just fighting against is pitting all of those against each other and going yes, we need the head, we need the heart and we need the feet, as my youth pastor growing up said. It can't just be information, it can't just be inspiration, it has to be application, to has to be walked out. So, gosh, you ask really good questions because I just realized I'm like well, I just went on like a 10 minute rampage there from one really long question you gave me that was really well articulated, so I'll shut up now.

Speaker 3: 1:02:43

There's my answer.

Speaker 1: 1:02:45

Well, jared baby watch out.

Speaker 3: 1:02:48

That page is a note of your, your words, so yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:02:56

All right, so we this is something that we've never done before on this podcast, oh great.

Speaker 3: 1:03:02

But we're going to.

Speaker 1: 1:03:04

We're going to, we're going to ask you a question that I asked when we asked, before we recorded. We asked my dad this question and he was like, what the heck do you mean by that? That's too convoluted.

Speaker 3: 1:03:17

Like, all right, I'm just going to, I'm going to send it and this is, like you know, the last thing we're going to ask you with your story in mind when you look because we've just spent a good bit of time here hearing about your story, yeah, from your perspective personally, austin, with your story in mind when you look back, when you look up and when you look forward. It says metaphorical, so you can think of looking up, as you know, finding an anchor point in the North Star, regardless. But when you look back, when you look up and when you look forward, what do you see? So it's confusing because it's a three part question. It's just the idea of, in all those senses, looking back, looking up, you can think past, present, future. Just what do you see? And there is no wrong answer. This is just freedom to go any direction you like.

Speaker 2: 1:04:16

Yeah, it's a. Sometimes bad questions are questions that are too open ended. No, I'm saying sometimes because because you know it's like when you ask for it, when you ask something in general, you get a general answer. You know it's like what's your best advice on business, you know it's like well okay, just like in general, like pay your taxes, yeah. No no, no, but there's also good type of open ended questions, because they're dependent upon the imagination, you know, and, and so that's why, that's why I like the question Okay.

Speaker 3: 1:04:55

We hope that's what this question is. No, it was, it was.

Speaker 2: 1:04:57

Yes, I mean because I'm like, wow, there's a lot of ways you could, you could go about it. When you look backwards, what was it? Look backwards, look forwards and upwards, what do you?

Speaker 3: 1:05:06

say, yeah, when you look back, when you look up and you look forward. I love the part because I Grant said, well, like is that? Is that present? And I feel like God kind of poured this out on me. I was like, well, when you look up and you see the North Star, you see the one thing that's not moving and it tells you where you are Right. So you do, there is a looking up that locates you, but it's you're locating you by locating him. So yeah, just however you want to, go.

Speaker 2: 1:05:35

Okay, I'll keep this short and sweet, but there's kind of two parts to this that came to mind when you asked that Kind of like a mentor of mine, a pastor that I chat with every six to eight weeks on a zoom call who kind of mentors me and stuff like that. I remember him years ago telling me um, when we think of the repentance, it means a change of mind. We always think about something bad we did in the moment. He's like and I'm not saying that that's not a valid understanding of the word he is, but I think a lot of us, when we look backwards in our life, we don't view our storyline the way God does and we need to allow God to help us remember our history differently. And he's like, it's just like, uh, he's like, it's just like crap, Austin, it's crap to you, but it's manure to somebody else to burst something beautiful. And it all depends on the story in which, the storyline with which you you read it. Um, so that's what came to mind. That conversation was one of the most profound conversation I had. It was two hours at a coffee shop. I bawled my eyes out at the end and just go, I need to re-envision my story.

Speaker 1: 1:06:56

Um laughing at him crying.

Speaker 2: 1:06:59

Yeah, I started crying. We've all had that.

Speaker 3: 1:07:02

We've all had that. We all just thought of the moment that we wept in front of our own man.

Speaker 1: 1:07:09

It just says something and you just cry with him.

Speaker 2: 1:07:12

Yeah, yeah, I um. So there's that. But how to answer that really specifically is, um, you know, in my battle with anxiety, or with um guilt, or with feeling like I'm not president enough, or whatever, I really feel like when I um stop and reflect and think about Jesus, think about this, this moment, what he's given me so far, there's always kind of one ringing truth thing that I had just always come to, whether it's looking backwards, upwards or forwards, and it's that, um, if, if I just slow down, it's actually just all going to be okay. It sounds so simple, but like if everything crumbles, my life, if I lose, my car, breaks down. You know, there's moments where I just want to panic and be like, oh my God, what happens if this and this and this and this and this and this and this and this and this and this and um, and I just I just think I don't want to be lazy and not act and not prepare and plan, but, um, I have this sense that I will probably fear or fantasize um about things, that things going wrong or bad or whatever, either past, present, future. Um, that will never happen and I will one day probably be 80 and go spend a lot of time imagining things that were never going to happen and I could have just chilled or relaxed or enjoyed the moment or or not feel like I had to check that email or whatever you know, or been anxious about that thing. So that's why I want you to better out. But that's that's how I'd answer that it's actually going to be okay. Not in some dumb like put your head in the sand sense and like God just going to take care of all of it. You know, he's just a good daddy. No, no, you need to wake up and go to work and you know, and you do need to check your emails and you need to like, like they're all those things, um, it's like okay, wow, it's like Matthew six, jesus doesn't condemn work. You know, when he talks about the birds get fed and the, you know all the, all the different stuff, he doesn't condemn work, he does condemn worry. And so there's still need. We still need to be work hard, do all those things. But, um, god, if I could not worry about anything, wouldn't that be amazing?

Speaker 3: 1:09:52

Yeah, is this the first time I've ever heard this and what you just said. I keep interrupting you. These are such good.

Speaker 2: 1:09:58

No, no, those are good.

Speaker 3: 1:10:00

But it's like he doesn't condemn work. And then you use the birds being fed. What do like birds work all freaking day?

Speaker 2: 1:10:10

But the difference is they trust that the food will. That food is there.

Speaker 3: 1:10:14

I know right, but that's what. I like when you said that it's like, yeah, he'll feed the birds and then he gives them the means to go find food. That's there all the time. They're not worried about tomorrow. But every day it's like freaking, just work. So I just love the way you said that, because it is this beauty of yeah, man, they work. And then there's like they're not worried about whether or not the sun's going to rise or whether or not there's going to be seed, and so I love that. God doesn't condemn work, but does condemn worry. So in light of that, I feel like I've just got a really good paragraph on back and up. When you look forward now, what do you see?

Speaker 2: 1:11:04

You know I think slower. You know my life moving a little bit slower. There's some Navy SEAL I don't remember who said it. My buddy's one always quotes this but slow is smooth, smooth is fast. It's better to go slow because it's smooth, and when you go smooth you don't have to repeat things. And so I tell my wife all the time that I kind of envy when I see like a 70 year old playing blackjack or sitting on his front porch or playing chess at a coffee shop, because I'm like he didn't wake up thinking at all Does this, do these shoes work with his shirt? He just woke up going. I don't give a blank about anything that anybody's going to say. I'm wearing these shoes because they're comfortable and they were at Costco for $25.

Speaker 1: 1:12:06

He slept those white new balances on Right.

Speaker 2: 1:12:09

Right, he does his phone's not. He's not on his phone while he's talking to his buddy.

Speaker 3: 1:12:19

He didn't think should these socks be pulled up? Calf high.

Speaker 2: 1:12:21

Yeah, exactly, he just did it.

Speaker 3: 1:12:24

I keep my leg warm.

Speaker 2: 1:12:25

Yeah. So I think there's something to be said there. It's like the closer you get to Jesus, the less you care about just the little things.

Speaker 1: 1:12:35

Well, just go ahead and drop that sentence. That's so good. No, that's good. Something my wife told me a couple of nights ago is which relates to this past, present, future thing. That's now just clicking. As she said, if you think about the which she's a therapist if you think about the past, you get depression. If you think about the future, you get anxiety. And if you think about the present, that's kind of like the perfect equilibrium between anxiety and depression, like if you just live in the moment. So I don't know, that's ringing back at me right now.

Speaker 3: 1:13:23

You're going to make me do this. If you think about the past, you get depression. If you think about the future, you get anxiety. If you think about the present, you get a gift.

Speaker 1: 1:13:31

You get a gift that got me.

Speaker 3: 1:13:35

You're going to make me. The present is a present enough. You had to.

Speaker 2: 1:13:41

He teed that one up for you.

Speaker 3: 1:13:43

Yeah, it's like come on, man. I mean, really, the present is a gift. You didn't say it, so you made me say it. All right, well, yeah, I just want to say that you guys have been In the podcast with one of our voices, so send us out here, austin.

Speaker 2: 1:13:59

Yeah, I just want to say you guys, you guys are kind and you let me ramble, so thank you. And I guarantee you that this episode was way more engaging especially once we started getting the engines revved up way more engaging than Landon McDonald's episode. He is a really nice guy and he's kind of creative and cool and kind of like dorky, like nerdy, but there's just a sense of depth that comes with me and I think you both realize that and you just didn't want to say it, but I'll say it for you. Landon, you're cooler than me. You know you had drive a nicer car. Yeah, you live in Arizona Congratulations, buddy. But you're not going to. But with me I'm a mountain and they're just mining and they're just finding all that beautiful gold and there's just a depth there. You know I'm an ocean, he's a he's. I'm an ocean, he's a lake. So love you, landon, but you need it, you need to work out those spiritual muscles a little bit more, okay.

Speaker 1: 1:15:01

God bless you. Thanks for listening to the across the camera podcast. If you enjoyed the show, please rate us five stars wherever you got this podcast. Thanks y'all.