Theology in the Raw - A Response to Alisa Childers and Christopher Yuan

Episode Date: May 9, 2024

Alisa Childers recently had Dr. Christopher Yuan on her YouTube channel to discuss various problems they see in what they call "Side B Christianity," and my name often came up in their critiques. They also offered several critiques of the Exiles in Babylon 2024 conference, which I hosted last month.  In this episode, I work through their conversation and respond to several things where I believe they have misrepresented what I actually believe. My goal in this episode is not to attack Alisa or Christopher, nor is it to stir up disunity; rather, I simply want to clarify what I believe about important matters related to sexuality and gender, especially in places where others are claiming I believe things that I actually don't.  Here's the original YouTube conversation between Alisa and Christopher: https://youtu.be/aRNC9b_SZto?si=-5-dCclHfD-ySeFR 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'm going to do something that I don't do often, but I do do periodically from time to time. I want to respond to a fairly lengthy dialogue between Alyssa Childers and Dr. Christopher Yuan that they had on Alyssa Childer's podcast, YouTube channel that I watched a couple of weeks ago. I always debate whether I should do these kinds of response podcasts or videos because it's not typically my MO. Criticism for me is just Tuesday. Like it's just a part of, it's a rhythm of my life.

It's just something that for anybody who decides to write publicly to speak publicly, you just you're going to get criticism, especially if you dive into controversial topics like I typically do. So it's not it's not it's not abnormal for me to wake up in the morning and someone says, Hey, did you see what someone's saying about you whatever and so, you know, 90 plus, 95 plus percent of the time, I just don't, you know, like, yeah, cool. You know,

sometimes I'll check it out. And if it's thoughtful, I'll, you know, I'll, you know, watch it, listen to it, learn from it as best I can. A lot of the times, just there's so much out there that I just don't have time to consider. But I did decide to respond to this conversation with Alyssa and Christopher Yuan, I guess largely because partly out of respect for them. Like I actually really respect them as thinkers, as Christian leaders. I think they have a lot of good to offer the church. If it was just some like, you know, annoying critic that just no matter what I say,

they're just gonna like, you know, critique me or just, you know, there are certain kinds of critiques, critics that you just don't, you shouldn't bother with, you know, but it's really out of respect for Chris and Alyssa that I do wanna respond. And also I do think that they are bringing up some really good points that I would love to wrestle with.

And there's several places where I think they assume certain things about my perspective that I don't believe is true. So I would love to add clarity to that. So that's the spirit behind this. I mean no ill will towards Christopher or Alyssa. Again, I think they're doing good work for the kingdom. I'm not huge followers of everything they do, but the parts I've seen, I have a lot more agreements than disagreements with what they have to say. And also, I did reach out to Alyssa a couple months ago to have just a private good faith conversation about some of these things. And she never responded.

And I emailed Christopher Yuan. Same thing. I would love to have a conversation, because I know my name keeps coming up on their platforms and I never heard back from Christopher either. I'm not doing this publicly in lieu of what should be a private conversation. It's just that I would love to have a private conversation, but I'm not receiving a response from that. Hopefully in the future, we would be able to do that. And Chris, if Chris and Alyssa, if you are listening, I would love to have this offline in a good faith

conversation to maybe identify more clearly our disagreements and maybe clarify some things where you might think we disagree where we actually don't. So that's the spirit behind this podcast. I hope you enjoy this conversation. Okay. So, this comes from a... If you want to follow along or if you want to go watch the whole thing for yourself, it's titled, Is Same-Sex Attraction a Sin? The Dangers of Side B Theology with Christopher Yuan. This is on Alyssa Childers' YouTube channel. I can't see the exact date when it was published. It was published at the time of me recording this three weeks ago. But if you just go to Alyssa Childers in YouTube and you'll see that title come up is same-sex attraction

to sin. Okay, so this I'm going to begin. I'm not going to listen, you know, follow the whole, it's over an hour and 20 minutes or something. So I'm just going to try to take some rather large chunks where they speak to areas that I think are directly relevant to some things that I believe. So this begins at the 1419 minute mark. And this, you know, Chris is at the,

the kind of, toward the tail end of a thought. And then this leads to Alyssa responding. I think this is the first place really that I think is an important part of the conversation that I would like to respond to. What this is about is true repentance. Is repentance about simply the acts or more than that? That's what the conversation is about. What does transformation look like?

What does repentance and sanctification look like? So when, maybe if I could just then put it in a nutshell, it's not about semantics. It's about whether we are encouraging people to sin or not. Sin in their thoughts and in their hearts. Though people might say, well we're not encouraging action. That part I can agree with. But it's calling people to repentance in their thoughts, in their desires, and in their same-sex romantic relationships. And Psyidi does not do that. Okay, a couple things here.

I 100% agree that we should repent from any kind of sin. Sinful thoughts, sinful desires, sinful actions. So that, and this is going to be something that's going to come up kind of throughout this conversation. This assumption that I only believe that if it's an external action that sin, that that needs to repent from, but we can have any kind of sinful desires going on, sinful thoughts, and that I don't think you need to repent from anything that's internal. If I've ever said that, I don't think I have, I will publicly repent from it now,

because I don't believe that. I've never believed that, don't believe it now. So it's possible that I might have said something that could have given that impression, very possible. And if that's true, then I will certainly be clearer in the future. Or it's possible that people are reading into something I'm saying that I'm not actually saying. So, and I don't need to sort out, I guess, the source of it, but I'm here to tell you publicly

that I do believe there is such a thing called sinful thoughts, sinful desires that need to be repented from, 100%. Not just, as long as it's inside of you, it's fine, but it's only if it leads to action, then that needs to be repented of. Also, another thing, you will hear the phrase side B come up a lot in this conversation. And my name is often intertwined with you know side B theology and they'll say like you know Preston Sprinkle and West Hill and Nate Collins and Greg Coles and side B and press you know I do let me say a few things first

of all I don't like to turn side B I use it sometimes out of just convenience just linguistically if you're in a conversation with somebody that kind of knows what side a means side B sometimes it's just quicker and, if you're in a conversation with somebody that kind of knows what side A means side B Sometimes it's just quicker and easier if you're not focusing on whether side B is the best phrase to use Sometimes I'll use it. It's not a hill I'm gonna die on but I don't like that term quite honestly It comes it was used years ago. I believe in a ministry called bridges across the divide I think it was called they came I believe, in a ministry called Bridges Across the Divide. I think it was called, it came up with side A, side B,

as neutral descriptions of the debate around whether same-sex marriage is morally justified, biblically speaking, or not. And they said, okay, well, there's side A that says, this is the position that affirms same-sex marriage, and then there's side B that does not affirm same-sex marriage. I don't even like putting those on par with each other like that. I would say you have the historic global multi-ethnic, multi-denominational agreement that the Bible teaches that sex difference is part of what marriage is and

that all sex outside of that male-female covenant bond is sin. That's the historic Christian position. And then more recently, typically in the West, you have challenges to that viewpoint that I would say is advocating for what historic Christianity would call sexual immorality. Even Justin Lee, an A A or affirming Christian who is gay, even he says if anything, if we do side A, side B, the historic Christian position should be side A. By saying side A, side B almost makes it sound like the historic Christian position kind of came second. I also don't like just putting these on par with each other. I don't think it's just like, oh, you have this option, you have that option, and you know, it's just kind of, you know, just kind of pick and choose whichever one you want. That's the feel I get when I hear

side A, side B. I'm not saying that's the intention behind people that use these categories. It's just these aren't the categories I would, I don't like these categories for myself. Now, again, sometimes it's expedient just linguistically to use it. I'm not going to make a huge deal out of it, but I don't prefer this phrase, side B. I think it's more unhelpful than helpful. Also, and this is something when I hear Chris and Alyssa and other critics use this phrase that a correlate B with side B theology, they treat side B theology like some monolithic like entity. Several times as you'll hear Chris and Alyssa say something negative against side B theology and I'm like, well, I don't even agree with that.

So whoever you're critiquing here is not what I would say. And I think that's the problem, one of the many problems taking kind of this using kind of a phrase or a move or a movement maybe or an idea side B theology is some monolithic thing when there might be diversity of viewpoints within this entity that you are kind of you know describing and critiquing. So yeah I just I want to make a distinction between Preston Sprinkle and Side B theology because there's other people within that camp that will say things like, I don't agree with that, which is one of the problems with using these kind of broad brush labels, which is why I try

hard not to use broad brush labels. I'd rather deal with the content of what an individual is saying, why they're saying it, interact with their arguments for their conclusions about certain things and interact with the specific content rather than just kind of broad brushing an entire kind of diverse diversity of thought within a certain label like Side B. So I might have to come back to that again because it does this comes up a lot in this conversation Side B presence, you know, and so I just want to be specific and clear about that. Right. And so side B would be people who are affirming biblical marriage, right? They're affirming that marriage is between a man and a woman, and yet they're embracing it as gayness,

as a core identity or something on the LGBTQ spectrum, that that can actually be someone's fixed core identity. So right there, I don't hear that. I don't think someone's gain should be one's fixed core identity. 100% no. So somebody, and I would question whether most of the people I know in the quote unquote side B, a side B type community or however you want to word it. I don't know if they would say, this is my core identity. So whatever, if they do, then that's great.

I would never say that. I would say, if you're a Christian, your core identity is in Christ, your allegiance is a King Jesus, everything else is a distant secondary. Nothing else should be your core identity other than Jesus. Your Americanism is not your core identity other than Jesus. Your Americanism is not your core identity. The fact that you're married or unmarried is not your core identity.

Certainly your political party that you agree with isn't your core identity. Your core identity is Christ. Everything else is secondary. And I would even say, think about it this way. If somebody is attracted to the same sex, and we're going to get to that phrase in a bit, and out of allegiance to Jesus, they commit to lifelong celibacy because they don't believe that engaging in a romantic or sexual same-sex relationship, even if the state calls it a marriage, they don't believe that that is biblical. And so out of allegiance to their best understanding of what the Bible says about marriage and sexual expression, they say, I'm going to commit to lifelong celibacy out of allegiance to Jesus, even

though I am attracted to the same sex, even though I might use the word gay to describe the fact that I am attracted to the same sex. Well, I mean, you tell me, listener, watcher, is their gayness their core identity? I mean, just pragmatically, like if they're committed to lifelong celibacy out of allegiance to Jesus, by definition, being gay is not their core identity. If it was, they would be in a same sex relationship. I, you know, rather than assuming what somebody means when they say I'm gay or whatever,

I think we need to get to know the person and see, okay, what do you mean by this term? Genuinely, like what do you mean by this term? Because even the concept of identity can have different shades of meaning. Yeah, so anyway, so Chris and Alyssa's description of, you know, side B theology saying this is our core identity. If that's true, I don't think that's what

most people in that community would say, but even if it is, I'm like, okay, I don't believe that. That's not what, I would never say that. I've never said it, never will say it, because I just think that's just flat out wrong. In fact, on the Unshaken Faith podcast, Natasha and I read a quote from Wesley Hill's book where he said, and I was trying to pull it up so I could say it exactly, but people can go back and listen to that

if they want more about that. But it had to do with, he said, my gayness is like a drop of ink in a glass of water. It just permeates everything from the music that I listen to, or that I like to listen to, to the clothes I wear. And so what Natasha commented on is that it just made her so sad to think that these he's basically appealing to stereotypes to say this is like my core identity, like this ink in a glass. And so that's kind of what what side B is coming from as far as I understand it. And so what I think this has caused so much. I guess, yeah, so I don't Yeah, so I'll let Wes tell his story

the way he wants to tell it. I'm not gonna comment on that. But again, the correlation between here's West Hill's description of himself and then just immediately correlating that with Side B theology. And then later on when I get wrapped up in Side B theology then you're just kind of leaping from one thing to another without pinning down exactly what this person says and this person believes. And Christopher, because then people think, well, is same-sex attraction just a sinless

temptation? Is this just sort of a temptation? And then if we say that it's a sin, what does that mean? I think that's a huge question that people have. And so I'm going gonna give an example. And this is how I like to think about it, is put any other sin in the place of same-sex attraction and see if it works out, right?

So here's a good example. Let's say there's a married man who becomes attracted to a woman at work. And he starts thinking, wow, I find her really sexually attractive. I do want to, the description here, a man becomes attracted to a woman at work. And this is something again,

what we'll probably tease out throughout, but the concept of same sex or opposite sex attraction has to do with somebody's attractions to either males or females on a very general level. Like when I say I'm opposite sex attracted, that means I'm attracted to females. That doesn't mean I'm, like as Alyssa is describing it, that I'm sexually attracted to in this really particular sense to four billion people on the planet. That every time I see a female, I'm drawn to that female,

and I'm sexually attracted to that female. That's not really what opposite sex, when I say I'm attracted to females, not males, it doesn't mean I have an active sexual desire for every single female. I think that's an important distinction that will I think be important really throughout this conversation. I'm not going to act on it, but you know, I mean that's just what it is. It's just a sinless temptation. I don't think there's anybody out there. Yeah, I don't think every female in my life is a temptation. Okay, so yeah, let's keep going. That would fail to recognize that that is a desire that is coming from the inside, even though it's not being quote unquote acted on in the physical. That's a sinful desire. That

is something that I think everybody would say, man, repent of that while it's still a teeny tiny little thought in your head that's coming from your desires. Say, no, I, you know, repent of that desire. It sounds like she is it, I can't quite figure out. Yeah, I would almost want to tease this out a little bit. You find a man finds a heterosexual man finds a another woman attractive and she even added the sexually attractive. It sounds borderline less to me here. So I think later on they will distinguish like, in fact, Chris uses this illustration later on

that you can find somebody else, say a man, a beautiful woman walks by, you can notice that is a beautiful woman, but it's not quite lust yet. At that point, you can make sure it doesn't lead to lust and, I don't know, it was a classic, look through the way or whatever you do, At that point, you can make sure it doesn't lead to lust. It was a classic, look through the way, whatever you need to do. But that still does make a distinction

between an attraction and lust. We're here in, and listen if you're listening now, this is a genuine question. Where is that line, how do we describe that line between somebody finding some, like me noticing somebody the opposite sex, like just females. I go outside, I see females, I see males,

and the fact that I am opposite sex attracted just means when I see females and males, I notice females in a different way than I notice males. It's not just pure neutral. And I might even, there might be a female here, a female there that I might notice that that is an attractive female. And then what I would say is more now spilling over

in a lust is where I start cultivating and pursuing an act of desire in my mind to desire a sexual relationship with this person, even if it doesn't lead to that. To me, that is a lustful thought that that absolutely needs to be repented from. But simply noticing somebody of the opposite sex is attractive, I don't think the Bible

describes that as lust. I said that's sinful, it's not a sinless temptation. And yet when we apply that to same-sex attraction or other ones, we wanna kinda say, well no, that's different, that's in a different category. So how would you navigate that question? Your example is the exact type of example that I give as well. You know, would we allow, let's make it really personal, like your husband or anyone watching now, if you're a woman and you're married, your husband, or if you're a man right now and you're married, your wife, would you allow your

spouse to be in this non-sexual, a covenanted celibate partnership? And they're being romantic, they hold hands, but they don't have sex. So going back... I mean, no, obviously not. But who's... Okay, I can't speak for everybody else in the quote unquote side of the world. I wouldn't like Chris is saying like, this is not okay to have, you know, be in a coveted relationship partnership with somebody who's not your spouse. I don't agree with that. To be romantic, like you're a married man and also in your romantic and coveted with

another woman or something like that. I don't, if somebody advocates for that, I would say that's wrong. That's not something I would advocate for. The statement that you just said, and I actually, I'm encouraging people to actually correct the false teaching that people like West Hills, Sy B, Nate Collins,

Preston Springle, they, Greg Coles, they very much keep saying, I hold, or they would say that they hold, Chut. So again, just to point out, like here I'm being like wrapped up into a bunch of different people and just correlated with just side B theology as a whole. That's not, let's, if you want to critique me, name me, then name something I've said, quoted or whatever, accurately, full sentence, and critique that what I've said. But here, just to correlate me with side B theology and then critique your understanding of side B theology, I think is less than helpful. Traditional sexual ethic. In other words, they uphold biblical marriage. I really want to be as clear as day. They do not.

Okay, so Chris says, I do not uphold biblical marriage. I mean, I've written about this extensively, spoken about it extensively. So let me just as clear as I can. I believe marriage is a one flesh covenant union between people, two people of opposite different biological sexes, male and female. It's intended for life. And that all sexual relationships belong within that covenant bond. Any sexual relationship outside that covenant bond is sin, is sexual immorality and sin. And any kind of lust and any kind of sinful desire, including sinful sexual desire, needs to be repented from. I don't know how that's not biblical marriage according to Chris's understanding of what biblical marriage is.

Why? Because marriage never is defined just by sex. And I have never defined marriage as just by sex. So that's, me and Chris are very much in agreement here. Right. So we will say, and I, this is one part, one little thing where I would agree with them. They do say that the sex is wrong, same sex sex is wrong.

That sex is for marriage alone. That's what is for man and a woman in marriage alone. That's where I would agree, but this is where they fall into false teaching. Where they will actually incur, they think as long as you're not having sex, that's fine. And that's not biblical sexuality. So in other words- Here's a clarifying question.

Would they say lust would be okay? I don't think they would say lust is okay, would they? Or how would that be propagated inside B? People would say that's related to like a sexual desire and they would say that's wrong. Okay. But then if you have these romantic, and Nate Collins even kind of blurs the lines

even more and calls it beauty. So in his book Talked about beauty so sexy. He's like it's nuts, you know same sex sexual orientation. It's you know, it's beauty It's the aesthetic well, if a man if your husband is enjoying the beauty of another woman her breasts her her career Would you be okay with that? Alisa? I Again, so he's specifically critiquing Nate Collins here in his book, All the Invisible. It's been a while since I read it. I don't think Chris is accurately representing Nate Collins' point there.

Nate Collins has a very thoughtful, sophisticated argument of what he means by beauty there. But again, I'm not here to defend Nate. I'll let you guys go read All the Invisible. Wrestle with it. From what I remember from reading the book, and I don't think Nate is arguing for a husband, enjoying the quote, rear of another woman and just, oh, it's so beautiful. I don't think that's the way Nate would describe that. Either way, in terms of, again, here, I'm being lumped into kind of what Kate's saying, Side B or whatever saying, the way he describes this,

yeah, I agree with him. I think to me, that sounds more like lust. Just sitting there and enjoying the beauty of the breasts and the rear of another woman, yeah. Yeah, I think that's not good I don't think that's something Jesus being do but again, I would I would I think the category of I think that's Matthew 5 looking at a woman with the intent that the Greek phrase there is in order to lust after her you're looking at a woman not simply because you're not just noticing that another human being, a female human

being, is attractive, but you're looking with the intent to lust after her. And that, again, that would be lust. That sounds more like what Chris is describing here, and I would 100% agree that's a sinful desire that needs to be repented from. Don't tell me about this. Like, get your eyes off that beauty. Right, enjoying beauty. That's, this is why, this is really heresy. I'm changed my tone from five years ago,

because I think five years ago, we were still kind of figuring these categories out. Most of the church was not for anything like this that was Revoice or Pressed and Sprinkle. And now what we're seeing... I'm often, you know, Revoice or Pressed and Sprinkle. I don't want to quibble with words here. I mean, maybe he's saying Revoice, you know, Sample A, Pressed and Sprinkle, Sample B, but I often get just lumped in. like anything that's said on the stage, a re-voice is kind of like representative of what I believe.

Like, and that's just, look, I've spoken, I love re-voice, I love make-cons, I love all those people who lead it. I'm a fan, I think it's a great conference. I'm also very okay with diverse viewpoints being presented at a conference. The re-voice conferences I've been to, like there's some things that are said

from the stage. I'm like, man, that's so good. And other things I'm like, I don't know if I totally agree with that or say it like that. Other things I'm like, yeah, I think that's really off. It's not like Revoice is a category and everything that goes on there that I'm fully on board with. But I'm fine in those environments to be where I'm forced to think and hear things like, what do I think about that? And the next week, what do what do I think about? Like, I'm fine being challenged by that. But I'm not contrary to what some people assume. I'm not a co-founder of Revoice. I'm not on the board of Revoice. I was part of like an, some kind of advisory council where Revoice would, like in terms of their statements, like they would have like six to ten people give

Critiques like critical feedback on some statements. They're writing and there was some kind of I don't know the name of it Maybe advisory accounts or something and I think we met once in five years It's been like four or five years since we even had any kind of thing. So That would be but that's not even like a but anyway, so I'm not part of... like I'm not part of Re-Voice. And you're like, well you spoke there. I'm like, why are you speaking a lot of it? If somebody's gonna invite me to speak and they're gonna say you speak whatever truth, whatever you believe is true to the scriptures, it could be the first conference of Satan or whatever and I'm gonna go speak

at... well that's a little harsh, but you know, like if you think this space is kind of off and like, why would you go speak at it? Like, well, isn't that where you'd want me to speak? It's kind of like when Francis Chan gets critique at like speaking at Catholic conferences and like, well, they don't even know the gospel. He's like, well, isn't that right where I should be then? If you think that all don't know the gospel and I'm going to preach the gospel, isn't that a good thing? So I and that just might be just a different philosophy of like which places to go speak at. If somebody is gonna invite me to speak

and they're not gonna put guardrails around what they want me to say or not say, they're like, you meet you, we're having to come in and speak. I'm in theory, I'd be totally, for various reasons I may or may not go, but I mean, I'm not gonna say, oh, I don't agree with this,

conference's position on whatever and therefore I'm not going to go speak at it. Like, no, sorry, that's a long kind of footnote to just, I don't know, when he said, you know, press was big over voice. To be clear, again, huge fan. I think they're doing amazing work. I am not formally tied with weed voice. There's so much confusion and that's why there needs to be so much more clarity. It's not it's not being mean.

I think even on social media on Twitter aside the gateway sale, but Christian was like, why do you hate us? I said, here's the thing. It just be I would never say that. I never thought Chris Yolans being mean or whatever. So again, but I only say that because he brought up my name there. And then it seems kind of like I'm correlated with this. Like, why are you being so mean to us?

But I never thought that. I never really cared. You can't hate your sin without hating yourself. Where I'm critiquing the concept of Saudi gay Christianity. This is why they keep saying, this is not who I am. But all they're doing, their actions are showing this is who they are. So when I'm actually critiquing this false teaching, what do they do, Elisa? They see this as attacking themselves.

So therefore, gay does not mean just same-sex attracted. Gay for side B means who they are. As much as they it's not. And so to go back on, I'm saying they hold to that marriage between a man and a woman, they don't. And here's why. And here again, the they,

he included me in the previous they. They don't hold to marriage between a man and a woman. And I was included in that previous statement. But now he's using other examples to kind of include in the they they so I'm just a little fuzzy genuinely on like when you say they here like are you talking about me or talking about somebody else? Side B, they promote something called spiritual friendship so some of you listeners might be familiar with that term so this whole what we're

talking about is side B, G Gesell de Christianity, spiritual friendship, Revois, etc. What that framework, you might have heard in different ways, what they promote is this term called spiritual friendship. What that is essentially, as defined by them, is this covenant, so it's a covenant that they will sometimes will have this actual ceremony. Not always, but it's still some, but in many cases they will. They will have an actual ceremony where in an evangelical church and these

churches think they're doing something biblical and they will actually have two same-sex attracted men and they covenant it together and they say we're gonna be friends for life And they might own a home together There's actually in many of these large cities Revoice encouraged if your church isn't affirming you leave your church That's another false teaching another heresy and then they say create your own churches of Revoice churches. So there's so much here that I just, there's so much here that I, he's lumping me in with that I just don't agree with. Like, so let me be clear on, you know, spiritual friendship, I, it depends on what people mean

by that. So let me just state clearly what I believe or don't believe about what he's categorizing as spiritual friendship and same-sector tracking people going through ceremonies in the church and stuff. I think any kind of relationship that mimics marriage that is not a marriage is not good or shouldn't be done. Marriage is a unique kind of relationship and it is different than a friendship. It is the only kind of relationship where sex should be involved.

It has a distinct purpose, distinct purpose, distinct framework. So if somebody is in a say, Covenanted friendship, a dedicated friendship, a robust friendship, whatever. Okay, you wanna, I think people in the West get friendship pretty bad, and I think we can learn a lot from the ancients that did have this kind of like David and Jonathan kind of like robust friendship that was way deeper and richer and more committed

than our Western view of friendship today. So on that side, I'm gonna be like, yeah, I think we can learn a lot from the ancients along these lines. However, if any kind of non marriage mimics or gives the impression that it is a marriage, I think that is wrong. And certainly, I don't think any friendship, it's not a marriage, should be romantic, should obviously be sexual. And this is, I think Chris, some of the ways he described, like even, like, no, I don't think, I think having a, this is me personally, and maybe I have friends who disagree, and I would love to have this conversation.

Again, having a ceremony inside of a church between two people coveting for life, but it's not a marriage, To me, that's... No, I'm not on board with that because that is clearly trying to mirror a marriage relationship. I'm like, I just see that as problematic on various levels. Again, this is the problem that I think is happening here when I get lumped into side B theology as this monolithic thing and then Chris critiques this monolithic thing. And then Chris critiques that monolithic thing without understanding maybe some differences among

the people he's characterizing as part of side B theology. Hey friends, my book Exiles, The Church in the Shadow of Empire is out now. I am so excited and a bit nervous about the release of this book. This is a topic I've been thinking about for many many years and finally put pen to paper to write out all my thoughts Specifically, I'm addressing the question. What is a Christian political identity as members of Christ global? Multi-ethnic upside-down Kingdom scattered across the nations. How should we as members of that Kingdom? down kingdom scattered across the nations, how should we as members of that kingdom think through and interact with the various nations that we are living under? So the book is basically a biblical theology of a Christian political identity. We look at the nation of Israel, we look at the exile of Israel, we look at several parts

of the New Testament, the life and teaching of Jesus, several passages in the book of Acts, the letters of Paul, do a deep dive into 1 Peter and the book of Revelation, and then explore some contemporary points of application. So I would highly encourage you to check out my book, Exiles, and would love to hear what you think, whether you hate the book, love it, or still thinking through it, would love to hear what you think by dropping a review

on Amazon or, I don't know, post a blog, just, you know, ripping it to shreds, I don don't really care I would love for you to just wrestle with this really important topic in this really volatile political season that we're living in. So this is how deep we're going and that that's why because the conversation is so much changed even Greg Johnson who basically blew up the Presbyterian Church of America PCA and then left it, which Rezaar and I said years before that happened, was like, he's going to leave the church, which he did.

Again, I'm trying not to speak for other people here. From my best understanding of Greg Johnson, the PCA church, that is a, in my opinion, a very poor and inaccurate way of describing what happened there. I'm not PCA. I wasn't there through all the meetings, whatever, but I know several people were. I know Greg Johnson and that way of framing it. I would encourage the reader, listener,

watcher, whatever, to please do your own investigation on what went down there before you describe it the way Chris does here. Just as soon as he's left that church, he was on a radio station in the UK where the UK person said if a gay person was coming, a gay couple, and they're married, came into your church and they said, we're not having sex, what would you say?

He was like, I wouldn't do anything. I would just celebrate them and just, wow, doing what you're doing, just don't have sex. So this is the issue. Most lesbian couples that aren't a Christian, I'm not talking about so-called lesbian celibate Christians, I'm just talking about just lesbian. Many, they don't even have sex.

Sex is not a big part. So are their relationships okay then? No, no. Marriage is not confined just to sex. And so this is important. Side B, they do not hold to a traditional sexual ethic. Preston Sprinkle doesn't.

They, and the reason is because, here's the error, they limit sexual immorality only to the act. Nope, I do not, but let's keep going. That's not biblical sexuality. Biblical sexuality condemns also the sinful desires. Where do I get that? The Sermon on the Mount. So let's always go back to scripture.

Don't believe something that I said just because I said it. Listen, take notes, and open up the word of God. That is our anchor, that is our guide, and I don't see that on the side either, going by emotions and stories. And us, Jesus. I just, we need to go back to scripture. We can't just go on emotions and stories.

Let's go to Matthew five, and we're gonna go here in a second. And then, I mean, I would almost be okay if he, well, not okay, but like if he's just describing like side B theology, but he literally just said Preston Sprinkle doesn't believe in traditional marriage and then cites several things that I don't agree with. So I don't, what do we do with that? Like, what do we do with my name being publicized as believing and advocating with certain things that I've never ever have said

or advocated for. Simply because maybe, maybe, maybe other people in this broad side B world do, and then I get lumped in with that, and then my name now gets cited as believing certain things that I don't believe in. Someone on the mountain said, if a man looks lustfully at a woman,

what does he say after that? As long as he doesn't act on it, he's fine. Right. So that's just false. That's a false misrepresentation of what I believe, as if I don't believe Jesus' words in Matthew 5, which are already cited here. If a man looks upon a woman in order to epithumia her, in order to lust after her, that is a sin. Jesus said it, I believe it, that settles it. So I don't, I don't, he's correcting me with a verse that I totally believe in. And I believe I've written, I have to go back to my books and see if I cite that passage. Pretty sure on People to Be Loved I do and

other books. But he already said, but here's's the here's a confusing thing is like he already said that we do believe we side be with that I believe less is a sin he said that earlier so now he's citing this passage about last saying I don't believe that so I that's not super clear to me not Jesus says if a man looks lustfully at a woman, which by the way, that word lust is from the Greek verb epithumeo, which means to desire. It's the same word. If a man desires a woman to do what? To commit adultery. He's already committed adultery. And so we need to realize that we must call people to Christ number one. But as people are, they come to Christ, there is an end goal and that is holiness, that is sanctification. Which again, you don't hear among the society, you never hear about talk about

holiness, you hear a lot of talk about victimhood. Well, I agree with him that holiness is an end goal. I feel like I've talked about holiness before and repentance, but I'll let those who have actually read my books and listened to me speak. You can make up your mind, but here again, I'm being correlated with just his interpretation of Psy.D. and things that I just simply don't believe in and don't advocate for are being at least implied that I do. And I think that that's problematic. The marginalization about them being oppressed, which they often talk, they've been mistreated by the church, which sometimes I've heard the other side of the story. And the church was like, oh, there was no, you know, it was basically just

church discipline. So, Revoice has returned church discipline to trauma. I don't know if that's true of Revoice, but I certainly wouldn't do that. I believe in church discipline. I think it should be applied consistently. So, people live in a perpetual greed, perpetual opposite sex, sexual immorality, political idolatry, whatever. Let's be consistent. We are to be, we are to holistically live out our Christian faith. And if we are actively going against Christian values, any kind of Christian ethic, and not

repenting of that, then I think church discipline is, I totally agree with that. I've been part of that process in a few churches. Not toward me, but other people that were living in ongoing immorality. I think there's just a lot of, repentance is always a good thing, and I want to be led to repentance. And I encourage people, please contact me. If there's something that I'm saying that is leading people to sin, I wanna correct that, I want to. Okay, I mean, I'll take you up on that.

I emailed you, Chris, and you're, I mean, there's been several things you've said about me that are just false. I think speaking falsehood is sin. So I've contacted you. You said contact you, I've contacted you. So I would love repentance from that. Now, if it's something again, if

I was unclear, then that's on me. I need to be totally clear. But if it's something that you are saying another brother in Christ, if you consider me a brother, I don't know, has said and believe when I haven't actually said that. And then that, you know, how many there's been 17,000 people who have watched this video and now many of them, well, the ones who like read my books know that many things you've said are just not true of me. But the other ones that don't like now they're believing things that I've said about things about things about me that I've said and believe what I don't, I haven't said I don't believe.

And so I think you need to take responsibility for that, quite honestly. And I you've invited people to contact you and I've done that and I haven't believe. And so I think you need to take responsibility for that, quite honestly. And you've invited people to contact you and I've done that and I haven't heard anything from you. How precise. I want to repent of that. So I'm so glad that you brought this temptation part because this is sometimes in my passion to kind of defend true biblical sexuality. That is not just the act. As Rory Voice and Preston will keep saying, you know, the action is wrong and they're right there, but that's only part of the truth. That's not true of sexual sexuality. That includes also everything else. But here's

where then people then misunderstand. One more time. I haven't said it's just the act. I believe a sinful sexual desire is sin and needs to be repented from. It's not just the act. That they're like, oh, well then I'm always in sin. Well, this is where we differentiate full sexual desire is sin and needs to be repented from. It's not just the act. That they're like, oh, well then I'm always in sin. Well, this is where we differentiate between what the Bible talks about and you brought up attraction. So in my book, Holy Spirit, the name of the gospel,

I address this very issue, is same-sex attraction a sin? And I differentiate because the word attraction actually is not found in the Bible. What we find in Bible are two other words, temptation and desire. And these two words are found in the Bible. So when I was just talking about desire, what oftentimes many people don't realize is that the word desire in Greek, the verb epithomeo or or the noun epiphymia, we translate into English different ways.

This is all good. Desire or lust. If it's sin, we call it lust. Desire, if it's kind of more neutral, but it's actually the same word. So when we think that desire turns into lust, that's actually not a Biblical, that's not Biblically correct. Wrongly ordered desire is already sin. It is lust. Where do we get that? Somewhere

on the Mount Matthew 5. Now temptation, so what you're talking about, this is where we talk about the distinction between being tempted and desire. Or giving into temptation that if you've already given into temptation, that is sin. That is when you're beginning that desire, that simple desire. But being tempted is different. Now is when you're beginning that desire that's desire but being tempted is different Now this is where we get these theological concepts of an internal temptation and an external temptation And I know people are like well, you don't find that in the Bible I think I heard that argument, you know, well that doesn't say that in the Bible external temptation Well Trinity is not a word from the Bible. It's the cunt. So here again. That's a false correlation there. The Trinity is in the Bible. Sure, the Word is not, but

the Trinity is. And I guess I would question whether or not the concept of external versus internal temptation, if even the cunt, not just the word, obviously, I don't need just that exact phrase to be there, but the very conceptual distinction of well This is an internal temptation and this is an external temptation. I would I think people read into certain passages The concepts not just the term but the concepts here where again, I think of Chris's he's Trinitarian So he believes the Trinity is in the Bible just not the word But that's not that's not the point in pointing out that The the distinction between internal external contribution's not the point in pointing out that the distinction

between internal and external impotent inhibition is not necessarily being a biblical category. He does bring up a good point here in a second though about Jesus didn't have a sinful nature. And so the kind of temptation he's wrestling with, it can't be an outflow of a sinful nature. So I think that's a good point. I think these are really helpful and interesting, complex, you know, theological conversations that happen. It's a conversation I would love to have because I think we're getting now a little bit into the weeds a bit, but I think it's into an interesting theological part of this conversation that I think has some biblical complexity that we would need to work through here. And I'm hearing, you know, from a Bible scholar that even said, you know, I think it was Preston that even said, you know, well, you don't find the word external temptation in the Bible. Well, Trinity

is in the Bible. The Bible. I'm not talking about the word. I'm talking about the concept. So somebody quoted at me. Okay. So I think he's even referring to something I said on Twitter, slash X, whatever about that. that oh the same sex attraction is a sin it's right there in the bottom I said well where is it in the Bible and the person quoted Hebrews 4 or something it didn't have like nothing to do with this point and then he said well let's talk about external temptation Hebrews 4 that Jesus was tempted in every way we were though without sin I'm like there's nothing in that language that makes this internal external conceptual

distinction of course the words aren't there that's not what I'm concerned nothing in that language that makes this internal, external, conceptual distinction. Of course, the words aren't there. That's not what I'm concerned about. But if Jesus is tempted in all ways and we were, though without sin, if we are tempted both externally and internally, then it just in and of itself, that verse seems to say Jesus experienced, again, tempted in all ways that we are, in every manner that we are, whatever the exact Greek word phrase is. So I mean, to say, well, Hebrews is making a distinction between external and internal temptation, I think you're reading a little bit too much into that verse there. Now, I do think it's an interesting theological point to wrestle with.

Jesus doesn't have a sinful nature, so what does his temptation look like compared to ours? But to say that Hebrews four is making a distinction between external and internal temptation on a conceptual level, I think you're reading into the text which simply isn't there. The word is in the Bible, is the concept. Absolutely. External temptation, Jesus was not tempted by his own sin nature. He didn't have a sin nature. Satan was tempting him for 40 days. That's a good point. No, that's a good point

So that's the word external isn't found in the Bible, but it's it's an external temptation It's not coming from within it was Satan tempting him. So that's an external. That's what we would just call that You could call it Satan tempting you or whatever. I mean whatever that may be or can it be a circumstantial? That's external. Where do we get the internal? Well, that comes right from James chapter one and I'll just read it. Verse 14, but each person is tempted when he is learned and enticed by his own desire. So in other words, it's coming from within and then desire, when it has conceived gives birth to sin and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death. So the thing about the James 1 passage is just on a linguistic level James clearly makes

a distinction between desire and sin. It says desire when desire gives birth to sin and so even had the birth analogy there like a mother and a child. Desire kind of stands in for the mother and then sin stands in for the child, like a mother giving birth to a child, sin giving birth to, sorry, desire giving birth to sin. Inasmuch as a mother is not the child, so also the desire is not sin. Yeah, I mean, it could lead to that. And don't know, I'm gonna mix metaphors here. But here it does seem to make it distinct. I mean, just on a linguistic level, there's a distinction between a desire and sin. Desire can lead to sin, but these are, seems to be two different experiences that could be related but aren't necessarily the same thing.

Experiences that could be related but aren't necessarily the same thing. It's where we have This and of course this word desire is that Greek word epithumia. Yeah And so this is where we get this internal Temptation now, there's a lot of discussion. Some will Say that, you know, James one is talking calling temptations in Others will say it's not. I think that's a worthy discussion. But to me... I love the spirit here of like, yes, these are complex things. We're taking these modern categories and trying to look at biblical words, epithumia, that can mean one thing

here, one thing there, and you have different passages speaking into it in different ways. And then, man, this would be a really interesting conversation to have. And I agree. I think a lot of this stuff we're talking about here would be a really interesting conversation rather than saying, you know, you don't believe in a gospel, you're a heretic because you don't light up exactly where I am on some of these questions. I want to almost get too caught up in that, but I think we can definitely call that external temptation is not sin. It's not coming from within. It's not coming from what James is talking about, our own desire. That word desire is epitomeo. In other words, our sinful desires can actually

bring about another temptation to another sin. That's just our sinful heart. I mean, out from the heart flows, you know, adultery, fornication, you know, all these evil things. So that's where that's coming from. But what we can definitely say, if there's an external temptation, so let me just give you an example. So like Jesus, he was tempted by Satan. If a man was walking down the street in the summertime,

beautiful woman walks by. We're talking about beauty again. And it's a hot day, so she's not wearing much. She's wearing maybe a tank top and really tight shorts. And a man sees that. She walks by him. That would be a temptation for a man. That wouldn't be sin.

That's an external temptation. When does it turn into sin when he falls into temptation? Allows that. So here in my, this might be one of the most important things Chris has said here to my mind in terms of clarifying the perceived difference between what I believe and what he believes. What he's describing here, I believe is the distinction between what I mean and what many others mean when they talk about same-sex attraction not being same-sex lust. Or in this case, let's just flip it around.

He's talking about opposite sex attraction. Yet, he notices this case, let's just flip it around. He's talking about opposite sex attraction. And yet it's not like he notices this woman, that beautiful woman, and that's not sin yet. That's a temptation. And I just want to acknowledge that it can be, I think women are tired of being referred to as just walking temptations, okay? I don't think that's Chris's intention here,

but I just want to like acknowledge the language here can feel that way. But I want to stand that's Chris's attention here, but I just want to like acknowledge the language here can feel that way But I want to I want to you know stand up for Chris here. I don't think that's I Don't think he would say that the women are just reduced to that But that so let me ask you this why would that man? even be tempted By a beautiful woman walking by that's doesn't have many clothes on or whatever. Because he is what?

He is opposite sex attracted. At least that's the phrase I would use. Okay? Now, that isn't in and of itself a morally culpable sin to repent from. This woman is not his wife. He has no biblical grounds to sexually desire to want to have sex with this woman or to have sex with her, okay? He has no biblical grounds for that. Woman is not his wife, but simply noticing that she is attractive in a way that if a man walked by,

that was also not, didn't have a lot of clothes on, was very beautiful and attractive, that that wouldn't be a temptation. Why would the man walking by, the beautiful man, not be a temptation in the way that the woman would be? Because he is opposite sex, attracted. That is not yet a sin that needs to be repent from. In fact, he may go throughout his whole day and notice and just be around women

and not be tempted by any of them. He is still throughout the day opposite sex attracted as a general category. And that's not a sin that he needs to repent from simply being opposite sex attracted to females who are not his wife. Flip it around. Let's just flip the analogy around that Chris uses. I think it's really helpful. See here, even the categories I'm going to use, I need to like, I'm trying to define the categories,

but I have to use them in order to paint the picture here. So you have a man who is not paint the picture here. So you have a man who is not attracted to women, he's attracted to men. And so now in this scenario, it is a man who is a very attractive man, who doesn't have a lot of clothes on or whatever, he's in his board shorts, he's coming from the beach. And this man, this Christian man who is attracted to men notices this man. Same scenario. He is same sex attracted. That doesn't mean he is actively sexually desiring this man. It just means that I notice this man is good looking. And now he's in that kind of James one place where he needs to say no to lust, say no to sexual sin, sexual desires that are actively wanting to have sex with somebody who he is not biblically warranted to actively want to have sex with. That is different though. Like, okay, why would this man

who is attracted to the same sex, like why would this be, why would this man be a temptation to him? Because that is his, he has a, like if he is going to experience a temptation on the sexual level, it is going to be toward the same sex, not the opposite sex. Or let me just make it personal to Chris. I would ask Chris this question. If you, or maybe not if, when you experience sexual temptation, is it toward women or toward men? Or do you not experience sexual temptation? I'd probably call BS if he said, I don't know what I'm talking about. I've got the meat all in the mail. Chris, if you experience sexual temptation, is it towards men or women? And if Chris said, well, it would be, the temptation would be toward men. And I would say, why? Why would it be toward men? Because you are fill in the blank. Whatever phrase

you want to fill in that blank with, I know you don't like orientation language, you don't like same-sex, or when I hear you describe same-sex attraction is sin, I feel I hear you describing less. So whatever, what word do you want to fill in the blank with? If I experience sexual temptation, it is toward the same sex because I am what? And I'm not trying to make an ontologically, you know, strong pronouncement on a fundamental part of your humanity. I have similar concerns about some of the ontological assumptions surrounding this conversation I do. And again, this is a conversation I would love to have with you, because I think we'd actually find probably a good deal of resonance here. I'm just talking about just the propensity toward a

particular kind of temptation. Whatever language, we have to have some kind of language to use to describe that. I use a language of same-sex attraction or even same-sex orientation and yet I do, you know, even the concept of orientation has some roots in this kind of Freudian modern, you know, and again, that's an interesting conversation to have, the kind of origin of our philosophy of sexual orientation. That's not, you know, so I understand maybe some of the nervousness of using that kind of language.

But again, we need some kind of phrase to describe what is the propensity that you might experience a sexual temptation in a certain direction, whether male, you know, some, you know, you towards men, others towards women who are not their wives. So all that, so this could, I honestly think a lot of the confusion or maybe not even, that could even be taken too negatively, a lot of the maybe misunderstanding of where, at least me, I was just going to speak from where

I'm coming from, when I say same-sex attraction in of itself is not a morally culpable sin, while any kind of sexual lust is a morally culpable sin, that's an internal desire you need to repent from, I call it less, you call it less too. But I'm distinguishing between same-sex attraction and same-sex lust, or even opposite-sex attraction and opposite-sex lust. The fact that I'm attracted to females doesn't mean I'm lusting after four billion people

on the planet. In the same way, friends of mine that I know, when they say they're same-sex attracted, that doesn't mean they're just walking around actively desiring to have sex with another man or, you know, female, if they're same-sex attracted and a female. They should turn into desire, a sinful desire. Let's kind of continue with that illustration. If his eyes do that and he kind of does this, you know, it's funny that, you know, Job talks about he made a covenant with his eyes. Men, we sin with our eyes. And we do it like this. Women sin with their eyes by their eyelashes.

Yeah. I think women can sin with their eyes as well. And men can sin with their eyelashes or however you want to put it. I think he's on a general level. I see what he's saying here. On a general level, sure. But he sounds to be making a pretty absolute statement here. I know a lot of women and men listening to this might be either rolling their eyes or kind of questioning some of the assumptions here.

This isn't really a main point that he an ass. I don't want to be Subtinent spend any more time on that what I would say is an inaccurate generalization of men and women Learning that kid, you know that that one lash that could not you know knock down a man But we do we sin with our eyes and he'll follow her and kind of do this and fix safe Which then what begins the thought and the fantasizing and that is lust So he has made a distinction between a man being attracted to a female It's not lust doesn't need to be morally You know repented doesn't mean it's not a morally couple-in to be repented from. And where that could lead to less.

I 100% agree with everything. That distinction that he's making there, I agree with. Just slap that on people who are same-sex attracted and we could, I think, solve a lot of misunderstandings. That's the difference between a temptation and external temptation, not a sin. He can't help it that a beautiful woman walked by. It doesn't even necessarily need to be that she was wearing a short-sleeved shirt or whatever. It could just be a beautiful woman.

But then he begins fantasizing or he begins walking after her or whatever, or just even in his mind undressing her. That is a sinful desire. 100% agree. I hope he's not saying that I think that that's totally fine. That a sinful desire along the lines that he's describing it, Preston Springville thinks that's totally fine. You don't need to repent from that. That would be a false accusation. Never said that. Never written about that. So, I'm not sure if he names me specifically here, but I'm kind of lingering in the background of kind of everything he's critiquing here. Or even think about, let's not even talk about the sex like the whole side B.

If he thinks about, well she's so beautiful, I'm enjoying her beauty and I would love to just get to know her and just have some one-on-one time with her and take her out to dinner. That is also sin. We have to call that out. And when we get to the point when we are not willing to call out sin, call people to repentance, even if we go through the whole Matthew 18, go to them, bring two, then bring it to the church for redemptive church discipline.

We're no longer the church. That's the mainline denominations. They did that. Like the one thing that marks what the mainline denominations did. I would say, I mean... I do have a point. I mean, yeah, Matthew 18. I've never heard from Chris.

And he, this whole episode is really targeting Not people who are wrestling at this in new conference, but he says teachers Like it's the teachers are the ones hanging millstones around people's necks among which I am one of the main teachers. He's addressing and he's never Integrated Matthew 18 with his concerns for me even after I've reached out to him. So I don't even, I think Matthew 18, probably local church context, I don't think it's like, yeah, I'm not even saying he's required to do that necessarily to reach out to me,

but it sounds like he's a big fan of making sure you reach out to the person and doing that. So maybe he would say, I'm not part of your church, so you know, you know, Matthew 18 doesn't apply. But he's, I mean, he's criticizing me as if, you know, I'm part of the big C church, you know, that's worth criticizing. So

I think it's definitely, they walked away from scripture, but too they no longer discipline. And if we're unwilling to discipline, and actually, Revoice, Side B, they very much are against discipline. I'm not, so I guess, so again, don't let me into that camp. And again, I don't know if that's even accurate about Revoice and Side B, but all I can say is, speak for myself. I am for church discipline. Very much against calling someone to repentance. West Hill goes to, he's part of the Anglican church and he has no issue having a communion with a so-called same-sex married couple. He wouldn't call them to repentance. That's when a church is no longer a church. That's when it is no longer a Christian. So this is why we're not just talking, we're not fumbling over words. This truly is a different gospel. It's not even a gospel. I mean, as your book, Another Gospel, this

goes right along in line with that and so much of, you know, I mean, this is why our minute. Another gospel. The gospel is the good news about Jesus's death, resurrection, ascension, and lordship over all things. The gospel is 1 Corinthians 15, 3 to 5. The gospel is Ewan Galizemi scattered throughout Isaiah 40 to 55 about the announcement of Yahweh coming to proclaim forgiveness of sins and victory over the world and so on and so forth. So I would be nervous about,

first of all, misrepresented people saying things that people believe that they don't actually believe. But even if I did say that, well, that same-sex attraction is not a morally culpable sin that people need to repent from, or say maybe I'm okay with somebody using the term gay as a synonym for being same-sex attracted, certainly not as an ultimate identity. Anything other than Jesus can't be an ultimate identity, but I'm okay people using the language gay, lesbian to describe their experiences as a same-sex attracted person. If he says, well, if you believe that, then that is a false gospel. Again, this is a good conversation to have, I think. I think you're probably adding to the gospel and that is another, we should talk about

that. Like adding things that you find are, you know, really important distinctions, but that aren't part of the Eumgelion announcement that we see in the apostolic preaching in the book of Acts, that we see in Jesus' preaching throughout the gospels, that we see in the early church tradition, that we see in the Apostle Paul's Gospel summaries in 1 Corinthians 15, 3 to 5, that we see in the original roots of the Greek word eungelizemi, used in the Septuagint in the latter parts of Isaiah. So, I would love to have a biblical conversation about what is the specific content of Ewan Geli on the gospel? And what would constitute adding to that,

that maybe adding to the gospel, things that might be important, but aren't what the Bible calls the gospel. I think that would be an interesting conversation to have. It's dubbed here. We're not addressing exactly the same things. We are addressing the same things. It's not a gospel.

So much of Revoice is all about deconstruction. It's all about taking what these biblical truths and sort of tweaking it and nuancing it. I've worked with the one that says, we don't need more nuance. What we need is more of Jesus. And that's so true that there's so much that we can nuance things to death where truth is no longer truth Right exactly. Yes. I mean once is today's

Reconstruction and in the church. So Actually, at least I don't even use the word nuance anymore Yeah, I use that a lot because it's like like you said that was that time that Tim Keller phase where it's like we could be Nuanced and trying to that's you know, engage will hold to that Tim Keller phase where it's like we could be nuanced and trying to Engage hold to our views today when I hear someone use nuance what they're really doing is deconstructing That's that is really that's a very Astute insight there. Yeah. Wow, I guess I would in getting this is not too big of a deal I would disagree with both Chris and This is not too big of a deal. I would disagree with both Chris and Alyssa here.

I don't think that's just too new. I think that's just a misquotation of what nuance means, just on a definitional level. Let's see, what does nuance mean? According to Merriam-Webster, nuance is a subtle distinction or variation. Sensibility to awareness of or ability to express delicate shadings as of meaning, feeling, or value.

So I guess I could just go on record. When I say, if I use the term nuance, it has nothing to do with deconstruction. It has to do with the definition of the word nuance. But let's keep going. Well, okay, so speaking of deconstruction, I wanna get to this Exiles in Babylon conference, but I do wanna going. Well, okay. So speaking of deconstruction, I want to get to this Exiles in Babylon conference, but I do want to just touch on one more thing as we put a pin in this kind of foundational part of the podcast where we're just helping people understand what time it is,

where we're at, what's being taught. For the person who struggles with same-sex attraction, how does this apply? And I want you to get very practical because I'm sure a lot of people, it could sound condemning to say same-sex desire is a sin. Well, what does that mean for the person who struggles with this desire? Is it just a 24-7, they're in sin, and they just need to be like, I repent, I repent, I repent.

How does this work? Because I have a lot of compassion for how this might be being perceived because I think I have some OCD tendencies, and that would be probably my tendency, would be to be, oh, I thought it, I have to repent. And then it's almost can become this bondage, this way of living in bondage to this making sure you're repenting just for feeling the feeling every 24 seven, just help us with

that. Talk to the person who might be struggling with same sex attraction and what is it that we're really saying to them. And this is also a good reminder of what you said of just your own journey where at a time you just felt so sorry for people like me, like I have it harder. And I actually, to be honest, Lisa, your sentiment is very common in church. You hear it all the time where pastors will say,

oh, these gay Christians come into a church, they have more faith than you. That is so confident. Andy Stanley said that. And I just want to be really, really clear, even though I'm glad that people have compassion for me. I'm not saying they don't have compassion for me, but here's the issue. Community, and I'm no different than everyone else. That's good. I love that. Okay, so let's talk about the Sexiles in Babylon conference. And the reason I want to bring this up is because a few weeks ago, maybe now a couple months ago, I lose track, but I talked about this when I had Rosaria on the podcast. And I said

that you and I are going to, Christopher and I are going to dig a little deeper into this, because I was, I'll be honest with you, I was really appalled when I saw the speakers list for this conference, that this is being marketed as a faith, you know, biblically faithful conference. And so I mentioned that, you know, I told people, just go on the website, take a look at who's speaking, take a look at the way it's being presented. And you have, you're gonna find speakers

that one identifies as trans, one that is, you know, oh yeah, and there's all, yeah, there's lots of different pronouns going on. I mean, I already have a lot to say, but I let you know, let's just keep going. There are, there's a fully affirming progressive Christian. There is Brian Zahn, who is a, he wouldn't, Brian Zahn would not call himself a progressive Christian but he's one of the most popular figures in progressive Christianity and in my view is one of the most dangerous teachers out there because he uses so much language that sounds orthodox but but i and i'm going to read some quotes from his book for people who are you maybe don't believe

me you're not you know you don't really know who he is i'm going to read some quotes from his book and so the response though was that well hey this is just a conference where people are invited to bring their very different opinions. And, you know, we get up on the platform and we hash out what we think. And there's not this assumption that everybody always agrees on everything. And in fact, most people would probably disagree with the progressive Christian if he were to bring that up. But he's not talking about that issue anyway. He's just talking about deconstruction, which which by the way, like I said, in the spirit of knowing what time it is and that we are in the negative world, let me just say to everyone

out there, this is such a progressive Christian move. I have had this said to me more. So I want to be fair. I want to give the benefit out here. This episode with Alyssa and Chris, it was recorded before the Exiles in Battle and Confront. So they hadn't been able to attend it. So they are speaking based on their perception of the website.

I don't even know what they mean by all the pronouns and stuff. There's pronouns everywhere or something. I went on the website, I didn't see a single pronoun listed in the speaker bios on the website. Maybe I missed it. I looked and I was like, where are all pronouns everywhere? Yeah, I didn't see it there. Maybe it's on the social media accounts of some of the speaker.

Maybe, I don't know. I don't run around placing people's bios in their social media accounts, but pronouns were never even mentioned at the conference. So I wanna be, like, they're talking about a conference that hasn't happened yet. So I wanna be like, you know, give grace here, because they might not represent it well, because it hasn't happened yet.

I guess my caution would be to critique a conference that hasn't happened yet based on your interpretation of some of the website stuff. That's gutsy. I mean, I'd say that's pretty ambitious. Again, I would have been able if Alissa had responded to my messages I sent to her. I organized a conference. She could have just asked me like, hey, tell me about this conference. I have some concerns, whatever.

Would love to know. Like, tell me about your heart behind it, like what do you mean by this, what do you mean by that, why did you get the speaker? There could have been a really quick phone call, and I think a lot of this would have been cleared up, because even the way she describes it, that's not really accurate.

And I've already talked about the conference, and hopefully I don't want to be too redundant, so I'll just keep this short. But, Exiles in Babylon has various sessions and each session has kind of a different angle, different purpose. Some sessions are more, you know, explore, like putting different viewpoints in conversation with each other. Some of them are more kind of traditional debate style, you know, dialogues, like our session on the theology and politics of Israel-Palestine. We had two people that were more on the pro-Israel side,

two people on the more pro-Palestinian side, and we had a three hour conversation. They were all united around the gospel. They all had overlap in beliefs and stuff, and they had differences of beliefs, obviously. And even some of those overlaps and differences were exposed. Why? Because we were able to look in on a three-hour conversation where the audience was allowed to ask questions. Every session, the audience can ask questions. So if there's something they hear that they really don't like,

well, they push back on that. Other sessions, like women power and abuse, was not like a debate. It wasn't like, oh, anything anybody wants to believe about women power and abuse was not like a debate. It wasn't like, oh, anything anybody wants to believe about women power and abuse can just jump on stage and share your thoughts. We have to sit there and you know, no, like that was, that session was designed almost like to take people through a narrative progression with four speakers. Sandy Richter talked about a biblical theology of how the Bible humanizes women. Then we had Laurie Krieg share her story of abuse and how the church handled or mishandled that. Then we had Tiffany Bloom talk about on a more church,

like big C church level, like what's going on in the problem of abuse in the church. And then Julie Slattery, she's not a progressive person at all. Like, and again, a lot of these names are going to be, you know, there were many several speakers of the church would be at the conference that would be considered really conservative speakers. Julie Slattery, you know, how do we move forward? How do you not sit in identifying abuse in the church? How do we move forward and heal

in a gospel centered way? So yeah, it's not to just describe it as just like all these diverse opinions just on stage sharing, like anybody with a common sense knows, obviously it was not that. The deconstruction panel, deconstruction session was, I wanted to hear four different stories of deconstruction. One of whom was somebody who should have deconstructed and didn't.

Others, one was, you know, left conservative evangelicalism to a more conservative Catholic position, which was a beautiful portrait. I mean, a beautiful description of her journey. And Tim Whitaker, this, you know, this open and affirming person who deconstructed, the whole purpose of that deconstruction session was to hear actual stories from people who have deconstructed. You tell us why you deconstruct it. I get this question a lot, like, Preston, why are so many people seem to be deconstructing from evangelical Christianity to the Catholic Church or Greek Orthodoxy? And, you know, my response is, you know what we should do? Let's ask them. Let's go to the people who deconstructed and let's hear why they did it. And not like,

well, okay, that settles it. We have nothing more to think. They just told us why. You know, but like, at least part of our understanding of understanding why people deconstruct is going to the people who deconstruct it and and then have them just tell their stories. So even that session, you know, even describing that he's platforming and opening and affirming progressive person, just misses the point of that particular session and the conference as a whole. So anyway, I apologize to my audience for having to say this again, cause I know all y'all get it. You don't need like,

you probably rolling your eyes and maybe fast forwarding right now. It's like, get it resident. Like we know, like you don't need to explain it to us. But for those who maybe aren't aware of kind of the nature of the conference or even the nature of this podcast. Hey friends, if theology in a raw has blessed or challenged you in any significant way, nature of this podcast. And in doing so, you get access to all kinds of different premium content. And most of all, you just get access to the theology in the RAW community. We have all kinds of awesome chats and messages back and forth. And it just, it means the world to us that you support the show.

As the show has grown, so have all the expenses and all the work that goes into pulling it off. So again, if you would like to support the show, you can go to patreon.com forward slash theology raw. And I just want to thank my, to thank the people that are already supporting the show. Thank you so much for keeping this show not only going, but also thriving. So patreon.com forward slash theology and raw. We're over here. We are exiles in Babylon. As exiles in Babylon, we need to think biblically, christianly, and indeed exilically, not partisanly, through cultural and political issues. This year our topics include deconstruction, reconstruction, and the gospel, women, power,

and abuse in the church, LGBTQ people, and the church, christians and politics, three approaches. So the only indication that there's going to be any debate is potentially with that christians and politics three approaches session where there's going to be any debate is potentially with that Christians in Politics 3 approaches session where there's going to be three different viewpoints given. So, you know, if it is known as some kind of like a debate thing, it certainly isn't being communicated that way on the website. What people are going to think going to this is they're going to think, oh, I'm going to learn how to be biblical, how to be Christian, how to live exilically, and how to do these things in a biblical and Christian way. Not necessarily that I'm going to get a smorgasbord of views that I get to pick from. Yeah, and that's just not... A smorgasbord of views that you get to pick from is not

what exile is all about. And so I would say... And I want to be totally fair to Alyssa. I mean, obviously, I don't think she listens to my podcast. I mean, 95% of people to conference probably are, you know, they're avid listeners of the podcast. The conference, as everybody knows, at the conference, my podcast reflects the nature of the podcast, which is, you know, having curious conversations with a diverse range of thoughtful people. It is not simply a smorgasbord of views you get to pick from. So here, I appreciate this actually. So she got one snippet from the website. There's other explanations on the website she doesn't quote, which is fine, whatever. But maybe I do need to be clear just in the website for people that maybe come to the conference simply by looking at the website and going to the conference. I didn't meet a single person. I talked to probably at least, I mean tons of people there.

And my speakers talked to tons of people there and my family who worked, you know, they thought... We didn't meet a single person who like came to the conference because they saw the website and that's all the information they had. Like it is an outflow of the podcast, people who already know going in what to expect. I didn't personally encounter anybody that was confused about anything. And in the opening night, I think I gave a clear 20-minute monologue explaining what Exiles is all about for the few people that maybe their friend grabbed them at the last second and brought them. Even that, I did talk to some people and said, I had no clue who you were two days ago.

And they came up and I talked to them and they just absolutely loved the whole vibe of the conference. So I do think, but this is, again, to, I want to be, benefit the doubt here to Alyssa. She didn't, she doesn't know about the conference. My recommendation would be because there's a lot you don't know, maybe you don't speak publicly, negatively about something you really don't know much about, I would love her to come.

I would come to the conference. Maybe if you're scared to be there live, whatever, like virtually or something, attended, and see what you think. So I'm just saying it's deceptive in that sense, that if that is the goal and that is what is known about it, it certainly isn't being communicated on the website. And again, that's on that paragraph on the website.

Thank you, Alyssa. I will, because clarity is kindness. I want to be as clear as I possibly can. So yeah, I think maybe giving a more thorough description on the website. I haven't looked at my website in a long time. Yeah, so I'm going to make a note and add more clarity on the website. So I'm going to throw it over to you because I know you have quite a bit to say about this conference. And guys, again, we're not just picking on people.

This is so important. There are going to be impressionable people who want to be biblical, who want to have the right view of these things, and they're going to go to something like this. And I think it's, they're going to be deceived. It's going to... I will let my audience who went to the conference respond to that. In fact, how about this? I'm going to say this, I want to make this public. So those of you who are just listening to this podcast, I would invite you, and if you went to the Exiles Conference, either virtually or in person, please go share your story on the YouTube version of this podcast, because you can't leave comments on the podcast podcast,

audio podcast, on the YouTube version of this. Just go to Press and Sprinkle, YouTube, whatever, and drop a comment saying, I went to Exiles and here was my experience. So if loads of people or if a few people are just being deceived, they come to Exiles, they leave, they're just like so deceived, I would want to hear about that. So if that was your experience, please do leave a comment. But anybody who went to the conference who's listening, go leave a comment, just briefly maybe share your experience and see if it matches Alyssa's fear here.

Alyssa Rammel, PhD Very confusing. And I'll just say this final thing before I throw it back over to you, Christopher. I've seen this in the deconstruction movement so often, is that there is this idea, and it's very individualistic and it's very post-modern, but it's this idea that I need to make my mind up on absolutely every single solitary position. And so I need to go read a Four Views on Hell book. I need to go read this kind of book. And listen, I know people can pull clips and make you say what you're not saying.

So I'm going to be very clear with it. I'm not saying that you shouldn't think theologically and make sure your positions are correct on all these things. Absolutely. But maybe before you go read your Four Views of Hell Book, maybe read the Westminster Catechism, the Heidelberg Confession, the Anglican Articles, read the Athanasian Creed, the Apostles Creed, Nicene Creed, read all of these confessions, and you're going to find a core where you don't need a foreviews on Hell book because the church has decided this. There is a very clear understanding of Hell throughout church history and we live in such

an individualistic time. That's theologically and historically inaccurate. The church hasn't had a unified view on the nature of hell. Pre-Augustine, you had eternal conscious torment, annihilation, and a form of Christian universalism that were accepted in the early church. Post-Augustine, eternal conscious torment became kind of the dominant view for the Western Church, let's make that clear. Eastern Churches had variations on their perspective on hell and no, there was, there's never been kind of a monolithic view of hell declared in some kind of

universally accepted creed in the Christian Church. Where we think, oh, you know, I just have to pick and figure out all this stuff. Much smarter people than us throughout church history have figured a lot of this out. Now, I'm not, you know, creeds are fallible. They're subject to scripture. But there should be a respectful eye to history with some of these things, because this is what I see in deconstruction is that people think it's just like a buffet. I'm going to pick my view of hell. I'm going to pick my view of this. And yeah, there are some, I'm going to pick my view of how I'm going to pick my view of this. And yeah, there are some, I'm going to try to avoid the user using the word nuance. There are some differences among faithful Christians on topics.

Of course, not denying that, but like Christopher said, you can nuance yourself out of meaning. And I think, you know, read some of that stuff, going back to the early church fathers, and realize that some things are just settled. It's not a buffet. Okay, I'm through to you now. Yeah, I've never advocated for that. Just kind of pick and choose whichever one you want.

You know, there's smart people here, smart people there, I'll just pick that, pick that, pick that. Never advocated for that kind of posture. So much to say, so much to unpack here. Here's the thing, you're right, there's nothing on the website, and even looking at the past, there's nothing that there's a debate,

like we're actually gonna have some cordial, yet sharp debate over these distinctions. And here's my thing, because I think it was even said, oh, this is like ETS, for those of you who are unfamiliar with Evangelical Theological Society. And you become a member, two ways you have to have a doctorate. If you don't have a doctorate,

you have to get special permission as a student or whatever, or you might have a master's and you have a lot of experience in ministry and that you've done kind of academic work. So that's the Evangelical Theological society. The second thing is you hold to inerrancy. And let me be clear, the theology in the Royal Conference is not ETS. And I'll tell you- I never said it was. I don't think I have. I wonder if I might have, have I? I don't know if I said something along those lines or somebody else said something along

those lines. If I did compare it to ETS, it was not, never be a one-to-one correlation. There's more differences than similarities between work theology and run ETS. I think theology is way better than ETS personally. It would be similar to ETS in the sense that you have people presenting, even this, ideas that you have to wrestle with and you get an opportunity to ask questions. But even that, I joked even during the conference that even though I advertise it as, you have to come and think and there's going to be different viewpoints presented,

when you step back and look, there's so much more unity among the speakers and presentations and differences. Like there's not a single progressive, actual progressive out there who looks at theology and says, you know what, Preston has all these diverse speakers. An actual progressive rolls her eyes and say,

you're still a conservative evangelical with all your little minor differences and whatever among your speakers. There's not a single progressive is like, yay, there's a smorgasbord of views that we get the shoes from. So yeah, I don't know where he's getting the whole ETS comparison here. If I have made that correlation, it maybe has been had a specific correlation. I was trying to make not kind of comparing them one on one. He's so vastly different than ETS. And to for for people to say and defend it and press

him to say this is just like ETS, that's again misleading. Maybe I have said that. ETS is very clearly an academic organization where you have to have a PhD just to get in. Exiles in Babylon. Not to get in. You don't need a PhD to get in. You don't need a PhD to get in you don't need a PhD present You have to be either a PhD student or have a PhD to present a paper But not nothing get in Being couched to lay people not only that but the center for you know, whatever is is actually They're looking for youth And young adult.

I mean, sorry, I can nitpick a lot of stuff here. Let's just keep. That are so impressionable. And so again, I want to remind people of the verse. If anyone were to cause any of these little ones who believe me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. Okay, so yeah, so I guess we're not targeting youth with the center. The center was created

and designed for Christian leaders. It was primarily for pastors. Then it kind of broadened to helping any kind of Christian leader. We do have a youth curriculum that's for youth pastors to lead their people through. And if they don't find it helpful, then don't use it. I'm not here to tell churches, you must do this, whatever. So then we're not targeting younger people. There's countless stories that I know of churches that had to abort the video series of Preston because they said all their youths were confused. Yes, the first lessons that holds a gay marriage, but then

everything else after that, like either contradicted or they're confused, it was all stories. Here's another postmodern approach. Everything's stories. That's just not true of the curriculum. So I don't yeah. The first two videos are all about the supremacy of God and the authority of Scripture with Francis Chan and Jackie O'Perry. And we have a whole backbone in that curriculum where we go through Scripture, we show where Scripture talks about traditional marriage and why same-sex sexual relationships are not part of God's design. We do share lots of stories in there too. Yeah, they kind of embody the biblical

and theological truth that we talk about in the curriculum. Why do we share stories? Because I think stories do embody truth, and I get that from the Bible, Jesus' teaching. But whatever, if the curriculum is not for you, then don't use it. Go use something else. I think Chris is coming out with a new curriculum, and if you're like, you use it. Go use something else. I think Chris is coming out with the curriculum. And if you're like, you know what? I've sampled both and Chris is better than yours, then do use Chris's. Just do something.

Silence is not an option. We need to disciple the next generation in a biblical sexual ethic. Yeah, everything's in there. That's so postmodern, that's so progressive, that is very much deconstruction, just stories. And so if it's anything like the past, Exiles and Babylon conferences, if it's anything like Preston's normal video, you know, sort of when he gets people that are really heretics,

or people that have different views, it's a love fest. You know, oh, isn't this, you know, and then they kind of, there's, there's actually no sharp criticism in a cordial way, which I think we can do that this is where you're wrong, this is where you're wrong. We're not talking about like, yes, we have different views on the sign gifts or baptism or, you know, these, you know, even on the Sabbath, we can have. It's interesting as baptism is one of those things that the universal church kind of agreed upon for like 5,800 years. Right? I mean, how many Baptists were there pre- Anabaptists and during the Reformation?

I don't have an issue with maybe having four views thing. Yeah. When we are an editor for a book for four views on sin, on sexual immorality, that's when we're blurring the lines. Right. And that's when we're leading little ones to sin. And Preston edited the book on four views on sin, on same-sex sin. That's where we blur the lines.

Yeah. Second form of morality is not like baptism. Don't confuse the two. So that's where... I mean, I think the historic church might disagree with him on that, but I get his point. I get his point there. And I received that. I received that, Chris. I've thought about that after the fact, editing a Four Views book. Not that I don't... Like of itself. I'm fine doing that but If it's under a broad umbrella of kind of like would you edit? Would it be okay editing a four views on?

Religion like as an academic can I edit a four views book on like buddhism versus judaism versus christianity? Yeah as an academic, I think that's that's I think it's totally fine. You know People edit four views on all kinds of things. If the assumption is these four views are legitimately accepted in the Christian faith, then I think that would be misleading. So that's kind of what he's saying here. I received that critique. I don't think that book was intended or set up that way. There were some things, well, I don't know.

I'm gonna go back and look at it. I might go back and if I was gonna do that project again, I might reconsider how we went about that project, whether we should even go about that kind of project from an evangelical publisher. And I've heard other critiques on those lines, and yeah, I received that. So I appreciate that Chris. Distinction. So let me and let me pop in and offer just one clarification.

When I talk about the Four Bees of Hell book, what I should have been clear about saying is that what I'm seeing is that universalism is being brought in as a legitimate position. And so people are like, well, do I become a universalist? Or do I believe hell is the literal place? And so that's really more what I'm and I think universalist or do I believe hell is the literal place? And so that's really more what I'm and I think that's more along the lines of what you're saying. If it's four different views on a particular topics that are all within Orthodox Christianity that are going to affirm the inerrancy of scripture and all that.

Yeah, I think that's fine. But maybe first read all those precepts to kind of see that the heart of what the agreement has been for 2000 years. Again, that's historically inaccurate. pre-so kind of see that the heart of what the agreement has been for 2000 years. Again, that's historically inaccurate. There hasn't been 2000 years of agreement. Even the concept of narrancy is a very modern one to kind of anyway. But yeah, I just wanted to offer that clarification. Go ahead. Well, and also, and I want to bring that up too on health because I think what most people don't realize, even with Camps Perseid, they're strictly

using Preston's material. And staff even came in and said, why don't you use stuff like Rosario Butterfields or like Carl Truman and stuff? They're like, oh, that's too strong or that's whatever it is. And what people don't know, this is the largest evangelistic organization which has done great things around the world over the years, I mean Bill Bright, come on. See, he did such amazing things. And they're using a person that denies hell.

So Preston, the book for Francis Chan Erasing Hell, and he's changed his views. And I said, you know. That's just factually inaccurate. And I'm genuinely, I'm generally shocked that Chris Yon would frame it that way. Anybody who's studied the topic knows that the annihilation view of hell is not a denial of hell. It's a different perspective on the nature of hell is not a denial of hell, it's a different perspective on the nature of hell, which by definition assumes you believe in hell. To say people will be, say, annihilated

in hell by definition assumes that there is a place called hell. And every time I've spoken or written on my view, not my view of hell, but the view of hell that I find to be by far the most biblically faithful according to dozens and dozens and dozens of passages, we're not going to get into here. I always begin, this is not, you know, this is, it's a different understanding of the nature of hell, vanity, eternal conscious torment. It is not a denial of hell. Like anybody who's done work in this area knows that that's not how you frame this conversation.

Even universalism isn't a denial of hell. It just says people can repent and be rescued out of hell, which presupposes the very existence of hell. Otherwise it doesn't make sense that people can be rescued from it if you don't believe in it. So that was one of the more shocking things in this, yeah, in this video.

But this isn't really even the main point that we're after. But yeah, let's keep going. Let's see what he's gonna say here. Oh, he just says, it's only 5% difference that I've made. Well, outside the Bible, my favorite quote comes from Charles Spurgeon. Discernment is not knowing the difference between

right and wrong. It's knowing the difference between right and almost right. Satan tempted Jesus with Scripture right from Scripture, and it's just a little bit off. So, you know, here's the nuance part. Well, it basically does, well, Preston said he owes to hell, he does. He will say, you know, I do, but he's nuanced it to the point to be really a nuanced non-elitialism. That's not even, I mean, I'm interpreting the Greek word Appaloo me according to the usage of that word when it's used of a of God Appaloo mean or destroying another human being in the context of judgment

I Do extensive Greek word studies on what these words mean in their biblical? Subtuitive and extra biblicalbiblical context to just say like, oh, now he's just kind of nuanced seeing his view of hell and being postmodern and progressive and all that. It's just not, that's just disagree with my view. That's totally fine. But that's just, to frame it that way,

shows you have not interacted with my view, not my view, but the conditional immortality or annihilation view at all. One that was held fairly widely by several of our leading church fathers prior to Augustine. It's temporal punishment. So you're punished for a time and then you're annihilated. So in other words, it's still annihilation.

And so, and yet here we have... Then that's not even an accurate way of describing it, but... It's evangelistic and they use hell and they're using someone This is a total hermeneutic on you on hell and you go in sexuality where you are taking core doctrines of scripture Hell which has an implication to heaven if the hell is temporary wise and heaven Why can't that be temporary? But we don't live forever in heaven,

we live forever in the new creation. So yeah, our existence, our intermediate state, according to the majority view, where our souls go to this place called heaven, the place of God, that is a temporary existence, but heaven comes to earth and there's a new creation where we live in resurrected bodies in a quote unquote resurrected creation. So even that correlation, even that analogy there just, I don't get that. There's a lot of things here.

And that's sexual morality. Well, marriage is, you know, the sin, sexual morality is just the act. Scripture never says it like that. And neither has Presence Springfield. So we need to be clear and churches as well. I mean, the church that's hosting this Calvary Chapel, I love Chuck Smith, man of God, he was he was so clear. And I think Calvary Chapel is the pastor. When I spoke there just a few months ago

I had countless people from that church come to me and talk to me and they went to the elders They went to the pastor and the exact excuse that you gave Elisa was exactly what they were told. Oh, it's just a debate. We're just discussing. Here's the thing Yeah, I talked to my pastors at Calvary about that. They did not. They had a very different... Yeah, I don't... Countless people leaving Calvary Boysie. I don't think that's accurate. We can discuss about, you know, baptism. But when we're discussing about what something is sin or not, what are they doing that? Well, let's look at some of their their speakers. So we have Tim

Whitaker from the New Evangelicals. You know Tim? Yeah, yeah I do know Tim, yeah. He was unapologetically gay-affirming. Yes. Why would you give someone who's a false teacher, even a platform, is there going to be, again, is this ETS? I don't even know if ETS would have him speak at that. I can almost guarantee they would not. There's been affirming people speak at ETS. Yeah, I was kind of... Because all you have to do is assign inerrancy and the Trinity. And I know several affirming people who would affirm inerrancy and affirm the Trinity. So yeah, they would speak there. But again, Tim spoke during the session on deconstruction because I want to hear from people who deconstructed why they deconstructed

and put those in conversation with each other. He was not there to, I would never have anybody affirming speak during a kind of teaching session on sexuality unless it was a clear debate. Like we're gonna debate same sex marriage and even that I wouldn't do. For various reasons, I'm not really into those kinds of conversations along that specific topic.

So again, this is just a deep misunderstanding of the very nature of that session and what Tim was speaking on. Is this like ETS or is this actually normalizing sin? Is this normalizing false teaching and heresy? That exactly is what it is. Are there two views on sexuality? I'm just going to list the different people that they have. That's all side B, all Revoice.

They don't have one speaker from Revoice. Brenna Blaine, 2024 Revoice speaker. She's a speaker of Revoice. She's not part of Revoice. The only Revoice speaker who works for RevoVoice was Art Pereira, who is an amazing man of God, absolutely dedicated to Christ, celebrated traditional marriage and a traditional sexual ethic at the conference. It was powerful. All the speakers would affirm traditional marriage passionately Great theologian, which I think is funny. Everyone's a theologian now, especially contemporary whatever that is. Greg Colts. He's on staff full-time staff He's the one that advocates for gay marriage without the sex. He'll just nuance it

No, he doesn't. No, he doesn't. To call it a celibate partnership. And again, I'm not I'm not attacking people I know Greg. I know Preston They're both very nice people. They've been super nice to me I know Preston. They're both very nice people. They've been super nice to me. But if we love someone... To say he affirmed gay marriage without the sexism is a misrepresentation of Greg's view. We're going to call people to repent and stop teaching these false teachings. Why? Because woe to us, whoever causes one of these little ones believe in me to sin. It'd be better for a millstone. I don't want no millstone. And so we have Laura Creek,

you know, on the board member of Preston's Board of Regular at Revoice and call it a mixed orientation marriage. A marriage doesn't have a sexual orientation. Yeah. These are just marriages. We're doing a man and a woman. I've met few people that are more passionate about the supremacy of Jesus in all things than Laurie Krieg.

She spoke at the conference and she didn't speak during the sexuality session. She spoke, she told her story about being molested when she was nine years old and how that rattled her faith, especially when Christians in the church said that she was to blame for that. Well, why did you wander off? What did you do earlier that day? And how when the church blamed her on being molested in a public bathroom by some older man that she had to wrestle with her faith significantly. Took years to really work through that.

She came around and invited Jesus into that healing process. It was one of the more powerful talks I've ever heard to hear somebody who's been through that kind of situation, not just being sexually abused, but being told that it's her fault. And to spend her entire talk celebrating the goodness and love of Jesus, it was powerful. So that's the person that Chris Yuan is concerned about. I don't think a husband should say, this is a lustful marriage. It's just a marriage. Why should you, why does the whole world need to know that you're not attracted to your spouse? I mean, that, for spouse, I, you know, that's, why you say it?

Well, that would be like saying, to me, with that mixed orientation marriage language, it's so, it's so weird because think about, you know, a lot of men are attracted to all, you know, a lot of women, a lot of different women, right? So- So there she made a distinction between being attracted and lesting.

So again, I just want to affirm that. The language of attraction is different from the language of an act of sexual desire or lust. If you apply this consistently, you'd have to say we're in a mixed attraction marriage because maybe the woman is only attracted to her husband, but the husband's attracted to lots of women. So we're just going to like call our marriage that. That would be so... Nobody would do that because what the man is hopefully wanting to do is to focus on his wife.

And I don't know, that's just so weird to me. The way you describe it, it does sound a little weird. I would highly recommend having somebody on your podcast to explain, like, here's what we mean by this. Here's what we mean by this language, because I don't think you're really capturing or understanding what someone like Lori Kreeve means when she describes her marriage.

And I think having a conversation with her publicly or privately would, I think would clear up a lot. Let's just say if your wife has an accident, like a wife, not your wife, a wife has an accident and she is in a wheelchair now. It's just, when you're in a wheelchair and you're quadriplegic or whatever, there's not a lot unless you have someone help you. I mean, you're going to lose some of that beauty.

As we age, I'm getting older three I'm not looking and I was not attractive before but a beautiful woman in her 20s 30s when she's 50 so her husband is no longer attracted to her so should he proclaim that to everyone and tell that to the, you know, I mean, and again, that physical part, I mean, of course, he should say there's so much beauty goes beyond just the physical and, and, but, but we need to see that that, you know, but don't confuse, beauty also does mean the physical as well. But so we need to be, you know, just be clear with our language, not be obfuscating and

trying to make everything ambiguous, but other speakers. So the list doesn't end there. We have Art Pereira, who's been on the webinars a lot. He's a director of events partnerships for ReVoice. Evan Wickham is actually a pretty well-known musician. He's also a musician and he regularly leads music at Re-Voice. And then you have, like you said, Kate LaPurrie was transgender, Christian,

she says she's transgender. To be clear, Kate Kat uses the term transgender as a synonym for the fact that she experiences gender dysphoria. Kat is female, believes she's female, is not transitioning, or as a desire to transition. She's fine with she, her pronoun. Passionate, passionate, passionate follower of Jesus. She gave a powerful gospel center,

Jesus centered talk at exiles. I mean, just it moved my heart towards Jesus. Like, I mean, it was incredible. You should go listen to it. It's really powerful. And if you're in the conversation, you know that people use terms like transgender in very different ways. And not everybody means the same thing by the term transgender. If I talk to like 10 different people who say they're transgender, I get like 11 different explanations for what they mean by that term. What Kat does not mean is she's denying her biological sex.

What Kat does not mean is that she was born in the wrong body. What Kat does not mean is that she wants to identify as a man or so on and so forth. It simply is a synonym for the fact that she experiences a psychological condition called gender dysphoria. And she has for various reasons Which if you ask her maybe you know, then you would understand why she finds that term

Helpful as a synonym for the fact that she experiences gender dysphoria now you may still say I still think it's wrong to use that term Okay, fine. Let's have that conversation But let's not just not assume certain things about cats simply because she uses a term you don't like and so there's there is not multiple about Kat simply because she uses a term you don't like. And so there is not multiple... It's very clear the direction of this and really what it is is trying to mainstream these ideas and put in this too. And people will come and they have like, you know, people that I think don't really even know what's, you know, Max Mucato is coming. And I think don't really even know what's you know you know Max

Mucato is coming and I think they had other like well-known people in the past I don't think they really knew the depth of all this this teaching and this confusion so in other words Max Mucato is going to be sharing you know basically in the same conference that a gay affirming who says gay myth is okay, and he's going to be sharing that stage. I just, I wonder if people are truly okay with that. And I think... Max had a powerful, he closed us out the last day, point us back to the radical grace of Christ. And there were a few dry eyes in the room when Max spoke.

He attended the whole conference. I think he came in. He might have missed the first session. No, I think he was there for the whole thing. He had, and Sean looked at my text, me and Max were texting after. Well, I don't want to put words in Max's mouth. He hung out in the green room, hung out with other speakers and stuff. And yeah, I'm pretty sure Max had a really wonderful experience.

If anything, he brought so much to the conference. And Max, he listens to my podcast a lot. He listens to Theology of Real Life. He's been on twice. He understands. He's heard many of my guests on the show and he knows the nature of what I do. I don't want to put words in Max's mouth. I'm pretty sure he had a great time and would not fit the kind of assumptions that Chris is

projecting upon someone like Max. Yeah, I've had many conservative speakers at the conference, at this conference, at previous conferences, and at future conferences. Even the church, Calvary Chapel, I mean, I think we should be concerned. I'm a huge fan of it. And even a local Calvary Chapel in the same city had no idea that it was on, because it's always

couched in, oh, or even, you know, we're being missional. I've never said that. I never said X-Als because we're being missional. So I'm always couched as being missional. That's not my... That's not... I'm fine with that, but I'm not like... that's not been like part of the DNA of Excel. The biggest argument that I often hear, I just want to be really clear. Missional does not mean you use sin to win the loss. I agree, 100%.

That bait and switch. You don't use lies. Absolutely. For example, there's no such thing as sin hospitality or lie hospitality, known as pronoun hospitality. I'm not confusing a lie to try to win someone to Christ. You just use the gospel. You use hospitality, true hospitality by actions. You know, hospitality is not words, because that's what I would call lip service. I agree.

When I was one to Christ, it was not through lip service. Pronoun hospitality is lip service. Show your love of Christ through your actions. Invite someone in their home and invite others who are believers. If they won't go to church, which the church is not a building, we need to bring the church to them and that's exactly. Okay, we can stop. I'm just gonna cook a more minutes, but I think we hit a lot of this stuff. This went a lot longer than I was expecting to.

And again, I just wanna reiterate, I appreciate Chris and Alyssa's passion for the gospel. Again, defined as the death, resurrection, ascension, lordship of Jesus Christ and the fact that he bids us all to come and die with him. I find so much resonance with what they are passionate about. And so, I do want to just close with that because I don't want... I know, almost every time I chimed in and said something, it was kind of like either disagreeing to something they said or critiquing something they said or correcting maybe their representation of me.

So this could feel kind of one sided, but I do want to end by saying I think there's so much that they are saying and doing that I think is really good work. So again, I don't mean this in any, I don't have any ill will towards them. This is really, and I honestly, I've been in this long enough. Most people who, like I don't, I don't expect Chris or Alyssa to like change their view on anything. Like I, I don't, I don't know how they would respond to this. I think they would say, yeah, yeah, but you know, we still think you're saying these things and whatever.

So this is more for people who are kind of out there listening in like, well, I like Christian, I like Alissa, and you don't seem like a heretic presence. So what's going on? So I'm trying to give clarity to some of the concerns they have and maybe give as much clarity as I can to whether or not those concerns resonate with what I actually believe. So that's all I have. I hope you enjoyed this conversation.

And if you do have it, please do again, go to the YouTube version of this podcast if you're only listening. If you have any comments, thoughts, please do go and drop a comment there. So otherwise, we will see you next time on Theology in Iraq. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.