Theology in the Raw - A Raw Debrief of the Exiles in Babylon Conference 2024: Ed Uszynski and Preston Sprinkle

Episode Date: April 25, 2024

Ed Uszynski sits down with Preston in his basement the day after the "Exiles in Babylon" conference to debrief. This is a raw and authentic convo where we discuss and react to various sessions and speakers. We talk about the GenZ evening, the Israel-Palestine conversation, Deconstruction and Reconstruction, Women, Power & Abuse in the church, and many other topics and speakers at the conference. Donate today to join OneHope and local church leaders in our mission to bring God Word’s to 25,000 children who have never known a hope that surpasses all understanding. onehope.net/TITR Support Theology in the Raw through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theologyintheraw

Hey friends, welcome back to another episode of theology in the raw. This is going to be a different sort of episode. I sat down in my basement with my very good friend, Ed, you Zinski or dr. Ed, you Zinski to debrief our recent exiles in Babylon conference. We do this every year at six around for an extra day and we head down after an exhausting, but exciting week. And we pull ourselves together, slam a bunch of coffee and debrief the exiles conference. So that's what this is. Ed Yuzinski is well, he's been on the podcast so many times. You probably know who he is, but he works for athletes and action has a PhD in American studies from Bowling Green university and

honest and is a author of a forthcoming book, which I'm going to bring you back on the podcast to talk about. The forthcoming book is basically helping Christians understand critical race theory. Yes, he does go there and it's a fantastic book. So we'll talk about that at a future episode. But in this episode, we're just going to kind of banter around in real raw and authentic form, debriefing the recent exiles in Babylon conference. So please welcome back to the show. The one and only Dr. Ed Juzinski. Oh man. Day after exiles, we are recording this Sunday the day after a was supposed to be a three-day conference

But it turns out to be well ends up being four days of that Gen Z and then pre-conference somebody Here's what other people like speakers start coming in Tuesday Wednesday, so I'm hanging out with people dinners extra dinners So I mean I I've been talking as an introvert, talking nonstop for five days straight. I keep right here in my voice. I'm not sick. It's just my vocal chords. People listening to the podcast can't see how shocked you look. I'm glad you got the memo to wear a maroon shirt as well.

Yeah, we got our post-exiles. Her blasts in my basement. Post-exiles uniforms on. All right. I'm here with my very good friend, Ed Yuzinski, who has spoken at exiles and has been here every year. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So I always ask Ed to come out either as a speaker or just as somebody who just kind of around to kind of help me debrief. either as a speaker or just as somebody who just kind of around to kind of help me debrief eat pizza, eat pizza wings. A lot of wings. A lot of birds went down this year. So yeah, I just asked Ed to come on

and help me debrief the conference. I mean this year, I don't know. I guess I'll just, it was among the more intense, not intense like in a bad way, just like the topics, each topic had a certain intensity, heaviness, emotional depth, you know, in its own way. And they were fun, like the speakers are, I mean, lots of laughs, I mean, it was. Totally, but each of the topics just socially and out in the public arena are already

laden with so much emotion and hostility and, you know, violent rhetoric, certainly outside the church, but even inside the church, all these topics really stir people up. Yep. Do you, uh, what do you want to start? You want to go a chronological order? Yeah. Well, let's, well, how about this? What are your feelings just 10,000 feet wise as you think about how this one felt overall compared to the first two things that were the same,

things that felt different? Other than feeling exhausted right now, but that's actually normal. Interesting, I feel less as exhausted as I feel and felt yesterday, I felt more exhausted. I think I have the first one. Maybe it's because it's new, there's a certain unique energy in there. When you're not sure what's going to happen. I was more nervous, like in between each speaker, I'm just like, what am I doing again? What

am I saying? What's going on? This was a little more just used to it. So there's less like host stress, I guess. So anyway, I feel really good, man. And I feel like each session went as good as I could have asked for. I always have like little nitpicky things that I should have asked that question, shouldn't have asked that question. Maybe this question went too long, this speaker went too long, or even that was good this

year. They stayed pretty well within their time. Describe the format, because not everybody knows the format, either. Let's not take for granted that. Most of the time, what was set up for each of the segments? So at Exiles, we discuss four or so topics for three to four hours. So there's four sessions, an add to that, a pre-conference, add to that, a Gen Z evening the night before, if let's just do the conference proper. We take, we pick four topics that are, you know, either theological in nature

or cultural in nature, and we get several speakers to dive into it. So this year we did deconstruction, reconstruction of the gospel. So four people sharing different kinds of stories of deconstruction and reconstruction. LGBTQ people in the church, or what's it look like for the church to welcome and integrate LGBTQ people within a historic sexual ethic. Women-powered abuse. My, it's hard to have a historic sexual ethic.

Women power and abuse. It's hard to have a highlight of that. That one was powerful, man. Very powerful. Each speaker did incredible. And then three Christian views on politics on Saturday. Well, on Israel. In the pre-conference in Israel, the theology and politics of Israel-Palestine

with four speakers, two on kind of, for lack of better, Palestine with four speakers to on kind of for lack of better terms, each side of that debate. That was, I would say more intense in the classical sense of the term intense, but it was, it was, I feel like it was the proper level of intensity while still being curious, let people listening and dialoguing and finding points of overlap, exposing points of disagreement and laying in it. But it never got awkwardly intense. I was wondering if it was going to be, if I was going to jump in and, all right, guys, settle down.

But I know it was perfect. I thought, what do you think? No, it didn't get that way. And again, even just to go down one more level. So within the three or four hours, what was happening most of the time is that each speaker would get 15 minutes to present their side or how they came to the conclusions that they've come to about the side.

Then at least a couple of times gave each of them a five minute opportunity to respond to what after they listened to the other speakers they could respond. And then we would take a break. And through a Slido app, people were able to put questions down, vote on the questions so that there was a prioritization of the questions they most wanted answered. And then I liked that we spent a lot more time on the

couch, it seemed like. It seemed like it was longer and I thought that was good, even though you probably still got to the end feeling like we didn't get through a bunch of the questions we wanted to. They were able to dive deeper into the questions that got asked. Authentic dialogue is a huge, huge value to Exiles. I never went more than half of what people were hearing is just the monologue, where people can be polished, they'll make points that people are like, well, I don't know if I agree with that. And so the couch dialogues and audience Q&A are time when that speaker has to talk off script. And sometimes I just ask, I'll try to ask a question like clarification,

or I'll try to like maybe ask a pushback question, try to represent maybe a critique to what they said, even if I don't have that critique, just to make it an interesting conversation. Well, and the point again, man, I mean, you've been criticized for platforming people with heretical views or views that are outside orthodoxy or whatever, but the whole point is actually to bring divergent views together and let them talk to each other in front of a crowd where that crowd can even then ask questions to try to better understand why people think

the way that they think. And I would say for myself, as I listened, Preston, I came away, as I didn't agree with everything that was being said, again, that's the whole point, but even in that disagreement, I found myself having to rethink and clarify why I believe what I believe about certain things. I mean, that's the whole point of it, right?

It pushes you back to the text, pushes you back to your viewpoint to say, hey, I don't think I agree with this. But then you have to go back and say, well, why? If I was on stage with this person, how would I respond to them? And how would I handle their push back to my viewpoint? So just one of the main goals is that help us to go back and understand not just what we believe, but why we believe it. And not every session has a debatey, you know, here.

So the pre-conference, both years now are designed along those lines, different viewpoints on, you know, hot topic. The deconstruction session, even that was just four different, it was more narrative-driven, like I want people to hear why people deconstruct from a traditional evangelical conservative Christian environment and then reconstruct towards something else. What one was Catholic, one was more progressive Christian, one was deconstructed from kind of a white dominated evangelicalism. And then, and now is in a space where he thinks talking about race and justice is part of

his evangelical faith, you know? And then a guy, Evan Wickham, who probably should have deconstructed, but didn't. He had every reason to and was on that path. But then now he's more passionate about Orthodox evangelical Christianity than ever before. And so the goal there is just like, as I said in my intro, people often get asked, why do you think so many people are going Catholic or going to Orthodox? I'm like, let's ask them.

Let's put them on a stage, give them a microphone and ask that question, you know? So the whole idea of platforming, I don't even think that's a verb. Is platforming a verb? No. But that whole thing, it just doesn't, you know, it'd be like asking a baseball player like, you know, where's your face mask? Where's your helmet? You know, like, you're a fast runner, you're strong, you should have a football helmet

on. Yeah, maybe I can even play football. That's just not, it's just a weird question. It doesn't even make sense. I mean, the concern, I think it makes sense in this sense that by giving somebody a public opportunity to further their views, you're promoting it, or you might even be endorsing it in some way.

I mean, that's what the concern is. Just by very virtue of allowing them to stand up on a stage that you're supporting or sponsoring, it's implicitly saying, I'm saying you should maybe think this way too. Now again, we just said that's not at all the point. You should think this way too. So people assume that that's what the conference is all about. I mean, really the conference reflects the DNA of the podcast. Talk about that. Yeah. I'm having curious conversations with a diverse DNA of the podcast. Talk about that. Yeah, this is, I'm having curious conversations with a diverse range of thoughtful people.

It's more like conversations with your neighbor than it is with a sermon from a stage. I know many podcasts who are literally recordings of a sermon from a stage, and that's great. Like that's a place for that. That's just not what this podcast is. Now, sometimes I'll do like direct teaching while I spend an hour saying, here's what I think and here's why I'll go through the Bible. But it's more just

curious conversations. And so the conference has that kind of same DNA. I would say it even is more in the... Well, some of the... I'm just thinking right now, like the women power and abuse session, there was no debate there. That was very much a classic, like, let's talk about this issue and let's talk about how we can do better as a church with the abuse of power towards women in the church. LGBTQ, that wasn't, that's a kind of a debated topic, but it was more like how can the church welcome and receive LGBT people in the church within a historic Christian sexual ethic. Some people say it can't be done.

Well, I had four gay and lesbian people saying, here's how it can't be done. So for instance, I would, so the fear of platforming. If we did a session on sexual ethics, let's dive deep into what the Bible says about sexual ethics, I wouldn't have somebody who affirms same-sex marriage in that section. Unless it was like a debate, and that was clear that we're debating same-sex marriage. But I'm not really interested in debating that topic at X-House.

Yeah. You know, the way I thought about it, Preston, and tell me if you think this is true, it seemed like at least this year that everybody that was on the stage was on the stage representing still a belief in the cross of Christ and believing in a sense that Christianity is a priority in their life. Some people were at the further edges, the outer edges of orthodoxy and at the further edges, the outer edges of orthodoxy, and probably could even be labeled as heterodox, right? They're at the edge of that, maybe stepping across the line, a couple of them. But everybody up there is definitely representing a way of wrestling through wanting to be biblically faithful and wanting to be submitted to Christ, but it's playing itself out in different ways in their life and in different seasons of their life. That's what was represented that I used to believe this

way things happened and now this is where I'm at. Really? The only, I mean, Tim Whitaker is the only one. That's who I'm thinking about. But even he like, he would believe every jot and tittle of the Nicene Creed, the Apostles Creed. So I mean, it really comes down to marriage. And I even said from the stage, like, I think this is not a secondary issue. This is an essential part of the Christian faith, like sex difference in marriage. And he was kind of shocked at that. He's like, I didn't know.

I'm like, yeah, I've said this publicly many times. Like, I don't think this is some secondary issue. So yeah, but he wasn't talking about that. No, that's not what he's there to talk about. And he had three other people on stage that during the couch conversation, if he was trying to push a theology of affirming same sex marriage. No, he wasn not what he's there to talk about. And he had three other people on stage that during the couch conversation, if he was trying to push a theology of affirming same sex marriage. No, he wasn't doing that. I mean, he had three people who would have like stepped in and said, all right, if you're

going to push it, I'm going to push back on you. That wasn't the goal at all. It was like, we want to hear from somebody who deconstructed in that direction. Why was it? I'm curious. Why did you go that route? He raised many critiques of his even juggle back. I think 90% of the people in the audience are like, Hey,

we're on board with these critiques. Yes. I don't know if I agree with where you ended up. Yeah, you're raising some good good stuff. So yeah, because he's reacting and maybe overreacting would be the the the critique, right? The pendulum is swinging. And again, the stuff that nobody will ever really get to hear are the hours of conversations then that we had around the picnic table and around buckets of wings. And that's where we were able to dig in more to even try to understand what does that really mean then, man? Like, what are you signing on for? And

even, I will say this and I don't want to skip ahead, but I told you this, I felt like Tim was continuing to be thoughtful. He was in the spirit of the entire purpose as people were challenging him and they were saying, well, this is why I think that's actually wrong or this is why I think the way I think. He was quiet and listening. Genuinely listening.

Yeah, genuinely listening. Genuinely listening. He's built a brand that's rea... That's representing a reaction to a particular kind of Christianity that lots of people, like you said, are saying, yeah, we've had similar experiences and we hate this. What do we do with this? He swung the pendulum in a direction, but he's still in process of trying to figure out where he's going to land on some of those things. I've seen people who deconstruct, change their view, whatever term you want to use, and they become very, they almost like reflect the same black and white dogmatic militancy of

the Christianity they left. And I've, you know, it's some of Tim's, and he's going to listen to this, I'll just speak to him, you know. Some of his social media, so which I don't spend much time on social media, but when I do and I see some of the stuff he says, I'm like, I told him this before, I'm like, did you sound, you sound just like, the tone is so similar than the fundamentalism

that I grew up with. You're just a reactionary fundamentalist now. Yeah, very, yeah, yeah, yeah. But everybody's in person is different than their social media person. I wish it wasn't that way. I think it, and some people do a good job at they are who they are, either online or offline.

And I just felt like the Tim Laker I hung out with over the few days just was not that. He was, yeah, he would ask, when somebody was saying, like, I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure.

I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. very friendly and engaging and like, but people were, every speaker there at the conference, they got strong opinions and they're afraid to step in and yeah, some of these conversations went past midnight. They did, which made it just really fun actually.

Again, if you, I think, man, maybe it's a much more dangerous place to hang out in a space like that. If you're not coming from a secure place in your faith and you're in a really, really vulnerable place, I could see where that could potentially be dangerous. And I don't know what the right word is. Or if your faith is so fragile that you need to protect it from any kind of resistance, then that could be... Then you get scared like, well no, if my foundation is, my fragile foundation is attacked or somebody raises an argument that I can't respond to, then I fear, just

overwhelmed me. Yeah. Like, oh, I'm, you know. But that's just, the problem there is not that your faith is being challenged, it's that you formed a foundation that's just so fragile that it can't face any kind of resistance. So you head yourself with just people that agree with you because that's safe. That's a dangerous place to be. You're going to get challenged at some point, exactly.

You have to go outside your bedroom at some point and meet people who are really smart who are going to raise some questions. You may not want to go out of your way and travel and pay money to come to this conference right now. This may not be the best place for you to hang out at this second. Okay, well we talked about this Preston. A lot of people obviously were not present for and would not have heard the recording of the pre-pre-conference with Gen Z.

Yeah. Ernesto Duke, Mitchell West, Street hymns. Talk about that. Talk about the motivation for it and let's talk about what we saw happen and even a little bit of what was talked about. Yeah. So the very first exiles, it's almost like a last second. We kept hearing parents are bringing their 20 year old kid, their 18 year old kid who is a new Christian, a non-Christian, used to be a Christian. Like, let's just get all these Gen Z kids in our living room and having good to know each other. Coming be a Christian, you know, like, let's just get all these Gen Z kids in our living room and having a good time with each other,

you know, coming to a conference to probably like, am I the only 20 year old here, you know, and now there's actually a few dozen of you. So first one was just, they gathered at our house, we served them dinner, and I think I shared my testimony or something, and it was super informal, you know. Next year, it's like we had a lot more that were coming, so we, a friend of ours has this big barn.

And so we had kind of a little bit more of a formal like talk. Lou gave that little band, little band was there. Um, did they have plain music? They were like dancing and stuff and like conversation. It was great. It was awesome. It was maybe like 50, 60 people maybe. Yeah. So this year we just had more local interest and more and more interest. So Hill City Church downtown, shout out to Hill City today.

You can have our space. We love to host this. And we had over 250 people that showed up, man. It was packed. It was packed, yeah. And it's old, one of the oldest, I think one of the oldest like stained glass window type cathedral kind of churches in Boise is really cool space.

And yeah, we had basically, it was basically was a whole session. It was like a three hour. I opened it up. Street Hymns did a, I don't know what you describe it. It was like a talk with rap and spoken words scattered throughout videos. It was an ex sensory experience. Yeah. You had a mosh pit down at the front. You've never seen somebody white people who's like better than a mosh pit. It was great.

They loved him. Like they didn't know. He did amazing. I mean, just the talent that guy has and his little finger is more than I could ever have. And then Ernesto Duke, president of eternity Bible college came and talked about like a theology of culture. The whole theme was kind of like how to reach culture with the gospel. And then there was like, worship band came up. Oh, then we did a... Yeah, we did. Deep questions. And this is where like, when you allow Gen Z to ask anonymous questions, that they can, don't raise your hand. Most of them probably wouldn't have raised that, but deep, deep theological questions that me, Ernesto, and Street all

wrestled with. I think the first one was, can women be pastors? Pastors, predestination and free will. The first five, I was completely overwhelmed by. Do I need to have absolute certainty with my faith. And yeah. All right. So I sat in the back the whole time and I was amazed at how focused the kids were. They were paying attention. And sometimes, man, again, I just think in 30 years of doing ministry to college students primarily and sometimes doing high school ministry, there's always this tension of how much do we need to entertain? How much do we need to feed them?

How much do we need to go light and then try to sneak some heaviness in, right? Totally get that tension. I very much appreciate it though, unless these kids were just like super special in some kind of way. It was a- They were all in. Auditorium full of kids that were trying to pay attention and understand what Ernesto was taking them to some really deep places about how to minister to their friends, right? And how to think about how to bring the gospel to bear on

real issues in their life and street through spoken word was challenging them to think differently about the kingdom and about how they think about themselves as Christians. And they were all in, man. They weren't hardly getting up for snacks or anything. I know. No, I didn't think about that. They did? It's the youth pastors, like all challenges, like how can I talk meaningfully for more than 10 minutes and they're still, you know,

they were there for three hours. I know, Ernesto was almost apologetic in his intro, recognizing everything that we just said, you know, almost like street was super entertaining. Now I'm gonna come and I'm gonna make you think. And the kids didn't budge. I got up for more trips to the snack table. I saw you shoot the ping pong over there. No, I made a couple trips to the bathroom and a couple bags of almonds I had to go get,

but it was amazing, man. So again, I was just challenged to say, okay, you only get short windows with kids and that you don't want to be boring. But man, teach them the gospel. And even as entertaining as Cheat was, it was so meaningful. It was in depth theology woven through it all. The kids are picking up on it, you know, And in between his segments, he would talk a little bit. Challenging them. Like, you know, Gen Z is something my wife primarily

arranges, arranges, right? Yeah, arranges. You know, you say a word and you're like, it's not there. I don't know what you're getting ready to say. So I can't tell you if it's the right word or not. She arranges. Yeah, she arranged. It's the Gen Z night. And I kind of started with you know, so, so I don't know, I almost didn't know what to expect. And it was just huge win, man. So I'd like to see what the next one looks like. Pre-conference thoughts on the pre-conference.

Yeah. So again, the pre-conference was the discussion about Israel versus Gaza. Like, how should we think about, does Israel have a right to the land, a theological right to the land? Yeah. Right. What sort of the umbrella under which they were all speaking. Like do Christians have almost like a theological obligation

to support Israel? To support Israel. Yeah. That one was, I got so much good feedback from that one. It went as good as I think it could have gone, but even that, like, there's just, it's so complicated. And I don't, well, see, even that word, like, when people say complicated there,

it's like, well, both sides are kind of like right and wrong and you throw up your arms and like, all right, well, it's just a big mess and I'm not gonna think. I don't mean complicated in that way. I mean, there is 150 year history that is important to understand. And there's often two very different retailers that 150 year history. Well, could we even go broader?

Because I know some people are probably thinking this. There's thousands of years of history about that land and that part of the world. And even in trying to understand what's going on in the Old Testament, the way that land is being divided out at different points in time. And then you focus down into the last 150 years with what we understand politically has gone on there. So you got the religious dimension, the political dimension, the empire dimension, right? And that's what makes it multilayered and wildly complicated. And so much, there's popular narratives that you see that 90% of people, that's all they see.

Okay. Popular narratives. And typically in the West, the main narrative is going to be a more quote, unquote, pro-Israel side. And then, you know, there's the pro-Palestinian side is often associated with people supporting terrorism, you know, far left college students protesting, you know, and, and, and so, um, the expo, I will say the exposure to a thoughtful Palestinian version of the story is either highly neglected or, um, is just dismissed. Like they'll, they'll hear it. People will hear it with a lens of like,

I know this is wrong, so I hear this stuff, I don't know how to respond, I'm gonna go cite some article, but that's wrong because this article from the, produced by the IDF. I'm gonna listen for how it's wrong, yeah, rather than listening to really understand. And then it's even further complicated

by having Daniel there, who's a Palestinian Christian, right? Pacifist, yeah. Okay. And talking about the Christian presence among the Palestinians. And you know, okay, so I will say this, at the end of all that, I am not even going to pretend to say that I understand the politics or even the religion behind it, because there's so much to it. You can't say that after listening to a podcast or two or reading a few articles. It's too much. I think the takeaway, though, winds up being, from a Christian perspective, what do the hands and feet of Jesus look like from Israelis to Palestinians and Palestinians to Israelis? And throughout the history, they have been treacherous towards one another.

And that's what started happening even amongst the speakers is they kept citing these examples of treachery from the other side, which are completely legitimate. And my Christian takeaway is that in the name of Jesus, I have to find some other way to, whether I want to keep Israel on that land or not, whatever my theological background is that's causing me to think that they have some special, what's the word, claim to the land, they still need to operate in a particular kind of way that's in keeping with God's law. I felt like that got, you know, really amplified. If you really are going to operate believing that Israel should be there for godly reasons, then they have an obligation to act in a godly way.

So how do you correlate? Like Gary kept bringing this up, like every land promise is connected with fidelity to the covenant. And the state of Israel is blatantly a secular state that is not keeping at all, trying to keep like, there's no fidelity there. There's a religious component population there, but that's not the state of it. It's very secular. No, it's being used. The religious aspect is being used by secular politicians to try

to bolster their claim to being righteous. And at the end of the day, when they're slaughtering each other, there's just something wrong with that in the name of Jesus. That's what I took. How do you bring peace? Like you said, the prophets would have had something to say to an Israel, an entity called Israel. The prophets would have something to say to an Israel that was bombing a bunch of people. That would be, we have verses that kind of talk about

the shedding of blood and you know, like the prophets denouncing that. So anyway, I don't want to say frustration. It's not a frustration with this. It's just a frustration with the conversation as a whole. What was it? Well, just the, you in three hours, it's almost like you need 10 hours. It's a hundred. It's because even towards the end, when you saw like Daniel saying, well, or like Mike Cosper bring up like, well, here's this event and you have the Oslo Corps

and this is what happened. And then Daniel says, no, that's not actually happened. Here's what really happened. And then Mike, well, yeah, but you know, what about these 2000 pound bombs that you just don't, if you're targeting militants in an urban setting, densely populated, you don't drop 2000 pounds bombs and level. And then he's, you know, Mike's like, yeah,

but they're dropping them from a low level. And so that's a people come up. You know, I, and so it's like, it's just like, back and forth, back and forth. And the person who doesn't, like I was tracking, cause I've done a lot of research. So when they just reference, you know, Oslo or something, I'm like, yeah, I know, I know what that means.

And when you say 78% or whatever the land, like, I'm like, yeah, I know. I know what that means. I know what that means. And when you say 78% or whatever the land, like, I'm like, yes, I'm familiar with that. And, but the person that doesn't really know this genuine, they're just seeing a ping pong match. Like, and I just, my, I hope it wasn't like, throw up your arms. Oh, see, I just, there's no way for me to figure this out.

I hope it was like, oh, okay. So these two narratives, each they're raising good points that seem legitimate. I can't just simply dismiss one and embrace the other one. I need to, if I'm really gonna have a strong opinion, I need to do a little more study. That's what I hope the takeaway was. Here was one of the things that Cosper said

that stood out to me right at the beginning of his time. He said, we live in the stories we tell. And in this case, these are profoundly contradictory stories. And they have been from both sides for centuries. Again, for millennium in some ways, there's contradictory stories about what's going on. So when you put these two on stage together, you wind up with two just causes in conflict with one another. And that ultimately is going to make for a tragedy. I thought that was just insightful again, regardless of who you think is right or wrong, they live inside of contradictory stories and they are going to fight each other to the death because of

those stories. So Richard's con, what was Richard's last name? Richard Harvey. He was a delightful person, dude. It was so good. Yeah, so he gets to the very end and I thought his conclusion stuck to me in the midst of just kind of getting my head spun around by listening to all of it. In that he said our goal needs to be that of peacemakers. So instead of investing so much energy

even into trying to figure out, just for the common person, trying to figure out who's right to be there, how should we interpret what's coming through the news. At the end of the day, I need to think more about what does it look like to bring peace, even in the way I talk about it. Like practically, how do I think like a peacemaker

instead of trying to get vengeance or trying to claim righteousness versus the other side? And that stuck out to me. Yeah, I loved his heart. I mean, all their hearts were versus the other side. And that stuck out to me. Yeah, I loved his heart. I mean, all their hearts were in the right place. They were. They were all very thoughtful. And I thought it was a perfect panel.

I think the tone was great. It was a great dialogue. I guess here's, and I'll just show my cards. And I was the neutral host referee, so I didn't, you know. I didn't want it to be like three on two where I jump in and, you know, I want it to be genuine and really try to foster a good dialogue. In the last several months,

and I've talked about this in the podcast, like I grew up with only one side of the story, very, very hyper pro-Israel, never questioned it, lived there for a few months, you know, like I've been there, listened to, again, it was very the pro-Israel side. Palestinians are, I just, I still remember not hearing explicitly, but feeling in my body this, like when I was there in 1999, like Israel, they're really good guys. Palestinians are the bad guys. I'll never forget, check this out. When we went to Bethlehem,

I remember seeing the sign for Bethlehem Bible College where Daniel teaches. Okay. And where I've had people in the podcast, it's a Palestinian Christian Bible college. I didn't catch that. So he teaches over there. Yeah. I think now it's distance because he's doing his PhD here in Indiana, but yeah, he's part of that. It's a hub of like, I mean, like a rich theological, I mean, all these Palestinian theologians and they're, they're bred books by them now. They're, they're just incredibly thought there's a rich Christian tradition and in the West Bank, especially. I remember

seeing I'm like, Oh, there's a Bible college here in Bethlehem. And I remember, I don't know the exact wording, but somebody's whatever it was like, Oh yeah, but that's, it's, it's Palestinian. It's kind of like, so it's the Christian in name, but it's, it's, it's, it's not, but any kind of like school in Jerusalem that was like, you know, the Israel Bible Institute or whatever, like, yeah, yeah, go, go stay there. You know, like, so I was like, Oh, that'd be cool to come to like a Bible college in Bethlehem. It's like, well, yeah, it's go, go stay there. You know, like, so I was like, Oh, that'd be cool to come to like a Bible college in Bethlehem is like, well, yeah, it's Palestinian, you know, stained.

So I just felt like this, this, this, I never, no one ever said Palestinians are subhuman, whatever, but that was the scent in the air of my entire upbringing, whenever this conversation came up. And so that's what I brought to October 7th. But since then I have spent more time, hundreds of hours reading actual books by historians, Israeli and Palestinian, listening to debates with people debating up against two scholars, you know, Dershowitz and Finkelstein, you know, going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, you know, like, um, listening

to 30 hours of Darrell Cooper's, you know, history of Israel, Palestine, which is incredible. And then just, just trying to get my mind around this. And I will say this, this is just me. This is going to make people angry. They're going to send me articles and you know, whatever. When I take these two narratives and say, okay, I'm going to test each one of these. Is it just a contradiction? He's leaving it. Well, you got two sides. That's it. Whenever I do some digging and do my best to try to fact check this side of the story, that side of the story, I would say at least eight times out of 10,

the Palestinian perspective is closer, if not much closer, to the actual facts than the other side. Whenever I look at the other side, I'm like, well, here's all these claims, and I do some digging, do some research, whatever, even look at like Israeli scholars and stuff. And like, I'm like, well, this is just not true. The whole idea that like, you know, whenever they offer peace to the Palestinians, they just leave it at the table. You know, there's five times Mike said, I've looked at all those five cases and it was a sham. Okay. Like the Palestinians are totally getting screwed. It wasn't a fair deal at all. You know, and like, again, you guys can go fact check Oslo and Camp David and all these, you know.

And so what do I do it? Like when again, and every now and then there'll be something when when I'm like, oh, yeah, I think Palestinian, not Palestinian, like maybe the, you know, I'm awesome, whatever, like, like making stuff up or they were lying and stuff. So I'm not I oh yeah, I think Palestinian, not Palestinian, but like maybe the, you know, Hamas or whatever is like making stuff up or they were lying and stuff. So I'm not saying I believe, I don't believe anybody think face value. But I think most people will believe face value anything that comes on the Israel side and just anything that comes on Palestinian side, they're just like, wow, is that true? And they'll find one article that says, oh, that's a lie because of the, oh, see, it's a lie. It's like, well, you're already predisposed towards one side. Like I was for 46 years of my life.

You know? So that's just me. That's just for people. I get even saying that makes people upset. Go do your own research, whatever. I'm just saying this is in my, you know, research. That's where I have come. And can I say one more thing? Sorry, this is absolutely not keep going. So we, we, we mentioned, we mentioned that it was, it was what's going on was determined by the international courts of justice. And most nations around the world would agree with this, that what is happening is a pause is plausibly a genocide. It's worth investigating further. There's enough evidence that we should investigate this further. We all bemoan this is going to be an in in in an in this isn't an exact analogy, but we

all wonder where was the German church in 1939? Yeah, in 1935. How could they sit back and let it happen? So I do at least raise the question. If it is plausibly like what if history does determine that this was an actual genocide? I mean, the Gaza is leveled like it's almost an uninhabitable like even we talk about civilian deaths and everything but just I've looked at the satellite photos like it's not an article like a look at the satellite it is it is largely not you article. I can look at the satellite. It is largely not, you know, I've read the 84 page report that was submitted by South Africa that is here 84 pages of reasons why this is a genocide. It's very, very horrific and compelling. And

yet the majority of the Western church is on the side of Israel. To where like they're not even doing enough. Making a parking lot, you know, you hear these, you know. I at least want to raise the question, will the Western Church find itself on the wrong side of a horrific historical incident where people will look back in 50 years and say, where was the church in this? Where was the West? You got Palestinian Christians being killed and the Christians in the West are in support of that? So I, something that people need to wrestle with,

you know? So Well, if that happens, we'll have our answer to how it was that the church sat by while Hitler took over. We will. And again, I'm not making a one-to-one correlation between Hitler and Israel necessarily. No, I'm not. But there's some pretty grotesque things going on. Anyway, we got way back. Well, and there's, listen, again, this is, we did dive into that, but there are racist impulses that are cutting in both directions that got represented from the stage. Again, I thought Gasper was representing that Jewish people have been traditionally oppressed people.

100%. Throughout history. 100%. And Daniel was very clear out of his own experience, and you already said it yourself, that the Palestinians have been under oppression in trying to live there. And his question even was how long do you expect people to feel the weight of oppression before they lash back out? Okay, then you can call that a terrorist attack. We can characterize it as a terrorist attack. But at some point when people are feeling the weight of that every day, and you're not, you

can't appreciate it. If you're feeling the weight of that every day and words are not working anymore, you start burning things down. I mean, that's just the way it is with people period. You start burning things down, blowing things up, killing people to try to get attention and to lash back out. When you're five years old and your parents get killed and you grow up knowing like the people on the other side of the wall killed my parents. Yes. It's immoral for you to take up arms, but like understanding that, like putting yourself in somebody else's shoes at least gives you a broader perspective on the overarching content. And where it came from.

And that happens on both sides, dude. I mean, when the Palestinian blows up a bus and takes out your grandma, like- I'm going to fight back and I'm going to blow stuff back up on the other side. That's how the world operates, which again, as Christians, the point ought to be that we need to think in a transcendent kind of way. How do we rise above that and become, you know, Richard again said this at the end, we need to become self-critical followers of the Messiah and learn how to bring together non-adversarial discourse to form a collective discourse. I thought that was interesting. How do we become better equipped to create non adversarial

discourses in the midst of everything that we just said about this? So that peace shalom can be brought back to bear on it. That's the kingdom ethic. And we may say, well, that's impossible. And maybe it is without an intervention by God, without God coming back and doing something dramatic. But until he does that, we're supposed to represent that in the spaces we inhabit. We're supposed to be able to talk about how to bring peace and non adversarial discourse to situations. Look, we don't even do that well in our own political environment. Maybe that's the extension, right? We're not equipped to figure out Gaza and Israel, but even here at home, let's see if we could practice a more non-adversarial discourse with one another and with these radically opposed stories of progressivism and conservatism

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to financially partner with them today. All right, what else, where do you wanna go next? Yeah. We don't need to cover every session with that kind of thoroughness, but what, um, let me ask you, okay, let's, let's go, let's just go to the next one. Then the deconstruction like that. That was, uh, I'll, you know, I like to, I do like to push the envelope. I like to take risks. Um, I think I will always do that. I don't want to play. This isn't a safe podcast. It's not a safe conference. I'm going to do things. I'm like, yeah, I'm not sure I'll do that again, you know, but I'm not going to just be driven by a passion for safety and fear of somebody might, you know, whatever. So anyway, opening up with the deconstruction

talk with Tim Whitaker, lead this off who is a little roll the dice there. You know, like people that have never been to XA, people the first time, maybe they don't even know anything about me, somebody took them there. And the first talk. It's the first guy. The first talk is a guy like saying all the reasons why he left evangelical Christianity.

Challenge your program director on that. And oh, you were the program director on that. Yeah. I mean, okay, to be fair, I did have an opening talk where I tried to make it clear. You did. What's going on. And if it was, you know, I,, okay, to be fair, I did have an opening talk where I tried to make it clear what's going on. And if it was, you know, I, so yeah, I, most people there, I think they get it, they loved it.

I got a lot of great feedback, but that was a little roll the dice. What are your honest thoughts about? Well, here's, here's what I thought about what Tim did at the beginning that I appreciated. And again, we can, we can judge, judge whoever you want to judge, I guess, for the conclusions that they draw about their faith experience. But what he said at the end of his time is that the deconstruction as he's thinking about it is a reaction to bad theology, bad politics, and bad platform leaders. And I wrote that down. I thought, no, that's a good summary.

He said that in his... He did. He said that at the end of it. Bad theology, bad politics, and bad platform leaders. There's a swelling population within the evangelicalism that we've lived in across the 50 years of our life that has been struck with a lot of bad theology and bad politics and bad platform leaders. And so this is a reaction against that. And again, people land in all kinds of different places. Some land way, way, way away from the faith because of that and are very public about that and create a following for themselves around that. Some go away and then they try

to come back. I felt like Evan Wickham kind of described his own journey. He didn't keep going further away. He went away, reevaluated, and then came back closer to orthodoxy, but on more of his own terms, or terms that he thought were more biblically sound. And, you know, so people wind up in landing in different places,

but I thought that summary was a good one. Bad theology, bad politics, bad platform leaders as they exist under the umbrella of in this case, evangelicalism. So I thought that was insightful. Yeah. I mean, I love that. I would just, every time my mind went to what is a 21 year old here who's on fire for Christ loves their conservative church, you know, who isn't deconstructing come to the conference like, or just anybody like, like somebody who isn't quite sure what exiles is about. Would that have been helpful? I think by the end though, whatever disruption was happening throughout the night, cause then we follow that up with Abigail, who just

was brilliant. Yeah. But talking about Catholicism in a way that I was almost convinced we were going to have mass that night. I think everybody, I think after room was so pleasant. I mean, some of it's just rhetorical strategy, right? She was so pleasant and inviting. You just were like, give me, yeah, let's give me the Eucharist. The theological richness. See, this is where like, but again, here's the point. Protestants who just think Catholics are, they don't read the Bible. They just do, they just go through the motions. They have all this liturgy.

It's unmeaning, it's not meaningful. You go to a Catholic church and no one's really Christian. You go and they cross and they bow the knee to Mary and to Pope and kiss the ring and stuff. That's the, you know, and for her to talk about the theological richness. Yeah, the substance, the deep substance of even the iconography in the Catholic

Church and how she was more humanized as a female, even though that's all male priesthood and explaining why that is. It's just, I thought it was mind-blowing. And I've heard her talk about most of that before. And it was just, I want people to have an accurate view of the Catholic church and at least appreciate why some evangelicals say, I would rather have that than this. Drawn back to liturgy, drawn back to a tradition, a fairly stable tradition, rather than getting caught up

in all the different whims of different pastors who just are strong voices, right, but are not necessarily biblical. Like there's something attractive about that. I talked to somebody that wanted to go back to an environment where there was stained glass windows and there was, what would you call it? Iconography. Iconography, yes. Just the symbols that represent different aspects of the faith that just will create a more worshipful experience for them. Because now, you know, again, the pendulum swings so far away from the stodgy-ness of that, that it's become a show almost in some places, right?

An entertainment spectacle of sorts on some stages. You see them all over social media in different church environments. And people are turned off by that. They want something that's more substantive. And where do we find that? We find it back. We find it in those traditions that look and smell more Catholic. That's what I heard. I heard her say that very well. And I think all the speakers probably, I think when she was talking, all the speakers who are on different paths of deconstruction, reconstruction, they're all like, we appreciate like so much about what you're talking about. And some of the, not that every evangelical environment is like this, but like some of

the circus acts we see, the circus kind of like just dumbing down kind of nature of evangelicals. There's a lot of people, especially thoughtful people that are kind of tired of that. They're just exhausted. And so- Well, and then Amin talked about how to make sense of the fact as a black man, African-American man living in reform spaces amongst mostly white guys, mostly white men and women. When he realized that they were not going to take as seriously some of the issues that are affecting him as a black man in America, and just the jolt that that was again, it's not something new. It wasn't like the first time he'd ever experienced that from religious people, but it really, really bothered him that these people who are super thoughtful, who write books and articles and do podcasts, and they think deeply about all

the aspects of their faith, didn't seem to be able to do that same kind of work when it came to race, or issues around the black experience in America. And again, he's not the only voice that said that, and we've heard from in the last 10 years, or the last 50 years. Yeah, there's a whole wave. So he wasn't trying to leave the faith,

he's trying to make sense of it, and reinterpret his experience of being with the people of God, because all these people that he trusted, in a sense, turned their back on him in the time that he most expected them to step up and join him in speaking out against injustice. I feel like I was living his story

when he was talking about that disorientation, that initial time when he started to express concerns over police brutality, the treatment of black people that oftentimes gets unnoticed and now it's starting to pop up and it's starting to get noticed. And when he starts expressing deep resonance and concern, people were like, you're going woke, you're going liberal. Like, wait, wait, wait, wait. I'm talking about like, like this doesn't make you have a category. He's like, it's out of my biblical convictions that when I see injustice, I am like concerned about that. And now I'm being called liberal because I'm like reading Amos and Jeremiah, you know, like, and this is

disorientation, like what, what, what is going on here? You know, I just felt that man. I've, I mean, I felt it, obviously not, I will never be able to live his story with him. But in other ways, where you just have this like, culture of biblical Christianity, and all of a sudden, out of your concern for the Bible, you get passionate about something. Maybe it's maybe Palestinians, you know, something, you know, like, it's like out of, it's when I read this sermon on the mountain, then I turn on the news and my heart's grieved, you know, and like, well, no, no, no, here's what's really, you know, it's like, no, like, yeah, this is, this is, it's because of my biblical convictions that I am concerned about this or that. And even so, so maybe, even if somebody's maybe misguided,

maybe, maybe this police shooting wasn't all, maybe there's, maybe there's another story here and maybe it wasn't as bad as, you know, but just, I don't know, we talked about, I mean- We did, it would be because let's just, let's just call it out. You could, you could, you know, the Mike Brown incident in St. Louis is often cited. And I think Amin even mentioned it this weekend. And so there's been, you know, 10 years later, there's been documentation and deeper study that concluded that he, how do we,

how do we say it? That the police saw, there's a, according to the DOJ report. Yeah, DOJ report. With all the witnesses, I mean, it's, let's just say without getting into, it was very complex and there could be evidence that the cop, according to the standards of policing,

did not violate the standards that were placed upon him. So. And what do we say about that though? And you and I talked about that, whether that specific incident or not turned out to be an act of injustice, he still lost his life. And there's- He still lost his life.

Thousands of other ones. And he's connected, the death of Michael Brown is connected to a larger narrative that is at the very least, there's a symbolic power and even outrage that rightly should happen regardless all the details and the facts and stuff. And it does, it does. Here's, here's where I can imagine it would be most frustrating for someone like Amin is that white people, not all obviously, you know, but like they, they might spend a good amount of energy unraveling all the facts of that incident when they haven't put the same energy in racial justice, racial

reconciliation in the church. It's like the only time we hear white people talk about race is like deconstructing some police shooting and trying to show the facts of why this wasn't unjust or something. So even that's a, there's a deeper, I mean, you're the expert. Well, I just want to say this because this got mentioned several times too, that I thought was helpful. We want to be pro-life and what does pro-life look like when, and again, in this case, when we're talking about police who wind up killing black people or mistreating black people in some kind of way. Is our first impulse to try to get the facts or is our first impulse to grieve

because we understand the larger story even, there has been a loss of life again by from authority in a country that has not wielded that authority consistently well on behalf of black folks. Okay. And again, we can get it everybody just like, don't don't react to that. Can we just stand side by side and grieve with this happening and we can get into the rightness

or wrongness of this specific case. Like there's always a place for that, of course, at the end of the day, but it's tied to hundreds of years. Right, right, right, right. And you said that it's tied to a larger narrative that we have tended to ignore. And all of this is to say, so somebody like Amin, who desperately is,

he is an orthodox, the dude is brilliant, and is orthodox. They're extremely well read. It's like, if you're like, well, let me show you the facts, you're basically saying, Yeah. The's like, if you're like, well, let me show you the facts, you're basically saying, the optics of that, not just optics, but the hubris of that. And he is upset and angry and other brothers and sisters, other non-white brothers and sisters are angry about this.

And our first reaction is to diffuse the anger. Our first reaction is to bring a theological argument or to bring the facts of the case as they were finally reported from one side or the other instead of man. Our first impulse needs to be to stand to be peacemakers. Again, let's go back to the, what does it look like to be a peacemaker, to be an empathizer, to be somebody that can feel what it feels like to walk in your shoes, which is something that Max Lucado said on our way out the door yesterday.

And when I do that, that that's going to create a different posture, creates a different posture. If that was, posture was the norm. Guys like Amin would not be using deconstruction language or having to try to figure out where it is that they align themselves within this evangelical movement. They wouldn't have to do that if the first impulse was to stand together in the midst of loss of life. That's it. That's it. Let's move to the next day. And again, we don't need to hit every... So next day was women, power and abuse in the morning. I feel like that was maybe my favorite flow. And I even said, and this is how I arranged it, we're going to go on a journey of Sandy Richter kicking us off with what does the Bible say about women, the humanization

of women and how that stands out in its ancient context. It's excellent. And that laid the foundation. Then we had Laurie Krieg sharing her story of abuse and how the church must handle that. It said it was her fault and stuff. And I was wrecked. She's a good friend. I know I've never heard her, the A to Z, her tele, I don't think she's told it on stage before wrecked. And then Tiffany coming out, obviously a preacher. I mean, she lit that room on fire. I mean, she was such a great communicator. And then Julie bringing us back to just like, all right,

what is healing? Let's move forward. Let's not just deconstruct. Let's not just complain. Not complain. Let's not just identify the evil and the problems, but how do we move forward? And with such a gentle, like just seasoned spirit. Like, so I just thought that progression. Do you agree? I don't know. I sat back like this worked out exactly. That was brilliant. And even the demeanor and posture of each of the speakers, which again, you can't always predict this, the words that they use, the vibe they had on the stage, the way they presented themselves, it really took you on a journey.

And I appreciated, you know, Lori told her story and it was just gut wrenching and just wrong on so many levels what happened to her. And sobering as I think about my own responses to stories that I've heard or to, you know, as I listen to other men talk about stories of women complaining and I put that in their quotes about their mistreatment. Mistreatment all the way up to just literal abuse, physical, sexual abuse.

It had me rethinking that. And then Tiffany got up and basically what I heard her saying was, men, grow up. Okay? If the shoes fit, wear them again. It doesn't mean all men are a certain way. It doesn't mean that none of us are mature in the way we interact with women. It just says on your watch, grow up and help the other guys that you're with to grow up in terms of how they not only view women,

but how they support them, how they help them to utilize their gifts within the body. Come on, man. Like that's what I heard her say. Again, she triggered me a couple times with some of the things that she said, but at the end of the day, good, I need to hear that. I need to be pushed around a little bit on that.

That was one where I wish we, the Q&A time, had so much more I wanted to get into. Yeah, same. Here's an inch, I would love your thoughts on this. I brought up the question during the Q&A, what about the men who are genuinely falsely accused? Is that something we should be concerned about? And then Tiffany and I think there was mixed response, kind of like I think Julie said, absolutely. Like I know people, because I know a few friends of mine, not just based on their test, but like having

looked at the whole situation, I'm like, I think they were totally wrong here. I think they were falsely accused of either abuse of power or not. The ones I'm thinking of was not a physical or sexual abuse accusation. It was more abuse of power or being too kind of maybe chummy with a woman when there was zero intention. It was stuff that the anti-Billy Graham rule people say you should be doing. Yeah, yeah.

And they're all right, I'm gonna do that and then they get accused and it's like, it's kinda. But then Tiffany said that it's less than 1%. And I don't have data to verify that back it up. I did talk to a pastor in the, in the break who came up and said, Hey, I just got to say, man, I, that this doesn't seem right. He's like, I'm a pastor. I've been falsely accused. And it was a horrific experience. And I have several pastor friends who have all had the same experience. I can't verify him nor his friends or whatever, but he was like,

it just feels like it has to be more than 1%. And I said, look, I can't, I would need to do a deep dive. I don't know what the date is out there and everything. So I don't, you know, so what were your thoughts on that? I mean, we can't prove or disprove that, but just anecdotally, and it's hard as a guy who I'm trying to not be the kind of guy I've been for most of my Christian life,

where I didn't listen to women, where I didn't care about this conversation, you know, I confess my sin at the beginning of the session. So I'm trying so hard not to be that guy. What do I do with these, yeah. Well, what is the question? I mean, ultimately, does that ever happen? I also have examples.

I am a guy, I am predisposed to be partial to men. Okay, I'm predisposed to one aside with men. It just didn't, again, that sounds terrible to say, but. But you would say that that's true of any man or woman, right, predisposed aside with men. Yeah, that's really of any man or woman, right? They predispose the side with her. Yes. Yeah, that's really what I'm saying. So I just need to check that.

Here's what, again, in 30 plus years of doing ministry in the church and in parachurch organizations, which is more likely that a man has abused his power in the direction of a woman in some way, shape or form. You already know where this is going, right? Yeah, of course that's gonna be there. Like I have so many more examples, both from my own poor choices, my own things coming out of my mouth that shouldn't have,

and watching what happens with my colleagues and other men who maybe aren't even thinking or paying as close of attention to this, which is, that's another thing that I just heard them say. Like, man, you just need to start becoming aware of what it means to have a woman in the room. Start becoming aware of what her experience might be like when she is one or, you know, there's two women in a room full of 10 men or something, which is, that's usually what the case is.

Yes. Yes. Even in, even in egalitarian circles. Yes. Yes. Would you just pay attention more? So, okay. So here's the conundrum though, Preston, that I think is actually more challenging. You actually brought up a situation that happened when we all went out to dinner and Abby was with us and there was a bunch of other guys and we were- Strong voices, strong opinions. We were going at it with each other in the best of ways, right? Just voices flying, it's getting loud, thoroughly enjoying it.

And Abby hadn't said anything. Abby's temperament personality seemed to be way more chill. And she was enjoying her beer. I think she was just chill. She was cool. She was cool. But you would, it went through me too, because she was sitting right across from me.

She started to try to say something at one point. Did she? Yeah, she actually did before you jumped in with this. And it got smothered, OK, again, because it was just, you know, it was like being at a family dinner table, and the loudest voices and the people that were most assertive were the ones that were getting to talk the most. And at one point, you said, Abby, you kind of stopped

everybody and said, Abby, what do you think about this? Fully realizing Abby is arguably. She's the only female there. And she's also the smartest person at the table. By far. Okay. And so we haven't heard from her nor have we tried to get anything from her.

But here was the conundrum that you guys even talked about on the panel. Was that the right thing to do in a sense to stop things to make a space for her to get in? Or can that be interpreted as being patronizing? Yeah, where she's not strong enough to get in, right, have to help her or hey, guys, we have to calm this down so that the girl in our midst, right, right. We talked about that a little bit. And so

you end up as a guy can be thinking, I don't know what to do. Yeah, because I'm going to lose no matter what I do. That is that is definitely a mentality that can be taken. I actually haven't thought about it. What are your thoughts? I, I love that. I, that we talked about that on the panel. I brought up the next day was, so that was the night before. Then the next day was women, power and abuse. And on the panel, I said, all right, this happened like 12 hours ago. I noticed that she wasn't speaking. Was it okay to 12 hours ago, I noticed that she wasn't speaking. Was it okay to ask her? And I love it. I think it was Sandy or Julie said, that's fantastic. Just don't make it like, Hey, Abby, give us your female person. It's not because she's a female. Don't make it like we're going to

make room for the female. Just make it about her intelligence. Like, Abby, brilliant. Would you have any thoughts here? You know, we'd love to give you space if you, if you have something, you know, you want to jump in, you know? So yeah, I, it seems like that was the majority. Tiffany did have a concern. What was her concern?

I'm trying to remember it, cause she did push back on it a little bit. Well, look, that it just- I forgot what she said, but it was a good, but then even when, even then I was like, okay, so's I, I've got kind of handcuffed a little bit. Like, so there's a good way to do it and not a good way. And you know, I think if guys just ask that question though, what can I do? I think that is a, I think is at least a step in the right direction.

Like being aware there's all these loud male voices we want we do. And everybody there, everybody there would want like none these loud male voices. We want, we do, and everybody there, everybody there would want, like none of it was intentional. They were all, I mean, half of them are egalitarian. You know, just the way the game was unfolding. This is, this is where my concern is. It's not with the, the true blue narcissist, the ones who want to abuse power. It's, it power. It's good men doing things unintentionally, which I think everyone at that table would fit that.

Good, so I wind up saying, I want my posture to be, even if there's a dude at the table that's not making his way into the, I should be sensitive. Again, it's a posture that says, I'm going to agape. We just talk about like just basic Christianity. I'm going to try to do what's best for somebody else in spite of what it costs me.

And maybe what I need to do is just be aware of what's happening with the dynamic of the group. If there's a woman, it's also recognizing that she- There is a unique- There is, no, go ahead. Well, just even a dude, I still want to say if there is six dudes and then a seventh dude who's more quiet introverted, I still think, right?

You have questioned everything now. No, keep going. It still is a different dynamic than six dudes and a female. Yes. That's what I was just about to say. There's just a heightened sense again, because of history, because of gender dynamics, because of everything that they talked about, actually, the other day, that men tend to already devalue women in those spaces.

In Christian circles, they've got all kinds of theological reasons that justify them feeling like the woman's voice is not as important. Okay, and that's the history that we were confronting, and those women were confronting. So be aware, just be aware. And if you mess up and it hurts her feelings,

whatever your decision was, guess what you can do next? I am deeply sorry. Yes, help me do better. Help me do, okay, so that's a very different posture than ignoring, completely unaware, getting defensive when it gets brought up, when a woman brings something up, getting immediately defensive.

That's what I felt like they were confronting. I got a question for you. Something was brought up, I think it was Tiffany, that even, and this is directed towards you, Ed Juzinski. She said even things like height, voice, can carry a certain power dynamic that can be intimidating. So my buddy Ed here is six four. You can bench 300 pounds. Those are exaggerations, man. I'm beefy. I'm beefy.

How much can you put up? What do you rep? You're repping 225. Ben Sprez, I'm 56 years old. As Ed's a big, strong dude, you have a feel bro. Accent tone, even though you're not, you're not. OK, I know. Look, you know, it's here. Everybody always thinks I'm in the military. X, KKK. No, like you have all of that and you have a strong voice. You're opinionated. You don't know. Like you have all of that and you have a strong voice, you're opinionated, you don't mind. So you carry all of these things that is just who you are.

You can't shrink yourself. You can't like change your voice tone. Or they say, you are you and you're creating God's image. So how did you feel when even like, you know, some of the even physical stuff with the guys can carry this power dynamic? I think that's true. But like, also, what do we, is it just being aware that when I,

when you walk into a room and everybody else is a lot smaller than you and doesn't have as loud of a voice and maybe isn't as smart that what do you do? Do you just like, is it just being aware of like, you can easily overpower that room? So maybe pull back a little bit or. Come on, man. This happens. I talk about this in the context of marriage all the time with my wife, Amy, who's a very secure, athletic, tall woman, right? Like has a lot of those attributes that also command, has a commanding presence of sorts.

And this has happened, it happened a ton in our first five years of marriage that I would be, yeah, just being me in the way I talk and in the way my body is. And she would wind up crying. Okay? And we, I'd get into her, they're like, what are you upset about? She said, well, you're yelling at me, you're getting aggressive. And I'm like, I'm really not, I'm just being me, basically. And then I'd go away, you know, and before the Lord is, I'm storming out of the room or whatever, because I'm really upset now. I'd say, God, this is just the way you made me. I just need to be me.

And God would say, yes, it is just the way you are and the way you are scares the kids and makes your wife cry. So to be able to do this differently, I'm not gonna change the overall persona that I am, but you just said it Preston, I'm going to be aware because I love her. And again, if I'm in a room full of colleagues, I need to love them by being aware

of what this kind of presence does. Yeah, change my body language, make sure that I'm keeping my voice down, make sure I'm not, try not to escalate her. If I catch myself escalating, apologize right away. Man, I'm getting loud right now, I'm sorry for that. I'm really not meaning, can I start sorry for that. I'm really not meaning can I start over again? Did I hurt your feelings? It's paying

attention to the effect that you're having on somebody in the room, which again, that's a different way. If everybody was doing that consistently, we wouldn't have to have this conversation. It's really is the problem is because we don't do that. We're not aware of our effect. We're not aware of our silences sometimes, even when they need a voice to step up, right? I've had plenty of women say,

I needed another man to stand up and say something in this moment. I shouldn't have had to have been the one to say this all the time. Like when is somebody else gonna say, that's not right? The way that guy's talking to me or ignoring this women's issue that we're dealing with within our ministry.

Somebody else needs to stand up with me. I have a story that I have never told anybody. Oh, is this a good time? Is this a good time to get it out to thousands of people at once? And then we are gonna need to. We should wrap it up. Well, it's not a big deal.

It's just kind of along those lines. I'm an average-sized person. I don't have the domineering voice, I don't think. So maybe, but with my wife and I, I'm very super analytical, right? Fact-based. So whenever there's like a dispute or anything, I used to say, until my counselor told me,

don't ever say that word ever again. I would say, give me the facts. Give me the facts. What happened? I would always do that. Like just give me the facts. I'll add up the facts and I'll figure this out. How'd that go? Two plus two. You had to pay to get the advice not to do that. All right. You had to pay to get the advice not to do that? All right, keep going. And why, why did, why? Why should you not do that? It's that you're just trying to fix something and not understand how a situation is making a person feel.

How a situation is making a person feel is just as important, if not more important, than collecting all the data and spitting out the right answer. So I, and I have to bite my, so maybe the power I bring is that kind of analytical, like I can come in and assess and all right, I'm gonna have my little clipboard and like, you know, like, all right, we'll add it all up.

And then I'll say, well, no, you shouldn't feel that way because I've added up the facts and they don't match up to your feelings. So, you know, I've never actually said those words but I've almost said those words. So that's a marriage conference, right? But we've also had this talk in the context of race. Yep. Yes. Yes. 100%. We just did it again a little bit, right? LGBTQ, we didn't go there. Well, I was going to say, like, you build a whole ministry around calling us as Christian,

men and women, to take a different posture towards people that are same sex attracted, that are experiencing homosexuality. Take a different posture, man. Yes, there's a time for the facts. Absolutely. Eschewing argument or there's a right or a wrong at the end of the day. I'm tired of hearing that too, that this idea of being empathetic or really trying to understand first what it feels like to be you, that that's somehow like a compromise, an unholy compromise to do that. It seems like that is the Jesus way. That is what I thought I got called to when I came into Christianity 30 some years ago. So it shouldn't have to be that daggone complicated, man. Really it shouldn't if we would love each other well. And this is what love looks like.

It looks like maybe I don't wear tight t-shirts all the time when I come in. Yeah, I think about all that stuff. Because I've gotten that kind of negative feedback. Exactly, you and I have never even talked about that the way you just described me. Yeah, I've had all kinds of negative feedback because of how I am. So I can get defensive and curl up in a ball and, and, you know, pout about that.

Or I can say, Lord, how do you transform who I am so that it can become something redemptive for people that I can use the power I have to actually help people instead of being a threat to them in some way. That's just big boy, big girl talk right there, right? That's just growing up. Yeah. Oh, I, we didn't even announce. So exiles, we announced our, it's a big one here. Yeah. Exiles in Denver. We're doing an, a two day exiles conference in Denver, October 4th and 5th. We've got a great line. It's a shorter cause a two day conference. So you can, if you're not in Denver, you can fly in, fly out. You can fly in, you know, Friday, be home before Saturday night. So you can be at church on Sunday. Just get used to all the restaurants and Boise. I got a great YMCA here and now we're going

to go to Denver. I know, I know. We got Russell Moore, Derwin Gray, Kaitlyn Schess, Christine Ember. Tony. Tony Scarcello, Rachel Joy Welchers. We're talking about discipleship in the election year. We're talking about sexuality, post purity culture. So we've obviously, you know, deconstructed purity culture, like crazy, at least, at least my context, it's just all, it's like, okay, what, what does healthy sexuality look like? Do we even talk about things like sexual purity or is that, is that word purity gone from the Christian vocabulary? So we'll talk about that.

And then I think the third, the final session might have on paper the least sex appeal, I think, maybe, but fake news, propaganda, and healthy media consumption. I honestly think this is one of the most important. It's getting at the source of all of the problems that were happening in the church. So many of them, yeah. This person's drinking Fox News all day.

This person's drinking CNN. This person, they're like, our hearts are so radically shaped by the things that we're listening to. So what does a healthy media consumption look like? So Patrick Miller, Jay Cameron, we'll talk about that. So anyway, theologianrod.com, you can check out the details.

It's all open now. There's an early bird registration. So you will, I think that one's, because it's more centrally located, I think there's going to be a huge greater Denver, Colorado Springs contingency there. A lot of people that always say like, voice is too hard to get to, Denver is much easier to get to. So I think it's going to sell out pretty quick. So yeah.

You want to get in on that. That's especially the timing of it when it's happening, right? We'll be right in the throes of the political heat. That's going to be a good one. I said Russell Moore, right? Yeah. Hey, man. Proud of you for pulling off a third one. Seriously, I just felt like people were blessed again. I heard so many conversations. I love seeing the buzz out in the lobby. And again, people are just trying to figure out how to love better, to think more deeply, to love each other better.

Like I really sense that happen again. So, you know, God'll do what he wants to do in people's lives with it, but I appreciate you trying to make it happen. Thanks, man. Thanks for the podcast. We'll see you next time. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.