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The Lopsided Relief of Grace with David Zahl · Ministry Minded

• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of the Ministry-Mighted podcast,
• 0:16
  a show that seeks to marvel at the mercy of God that meets us
• 0:19
  in our messy ministries.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'm, of course, your host, Pastor Brad Gray.
• 0:22
  I serve as the senior pastor of Stonington Baptist Church right
• 0:25
  here in Paxinus,
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Pennsylvania,
• 0:28
  and I'm delighted and thrilled and indeed privileged to have on
• 0:32
  the show today my
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: good friend and director of Mockingbird Ministries,
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: David Zoll.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: I've known David Zoll for a while.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: I've...
• 0:42
  I've been happy to contribute to the Mockingbird website for
• 0:47
  several years,
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: and it's just a thrill to have him on the show today.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: We get to talk about his new book,
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: The Big Relief,
• 0:55
  which is all about the topic but also the doctrine of grace and
• 1:00
  why it is such an
• 1:01
  urgent message to not only share but to preach and to write and
• 1:05
  articulate grace in
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: a world that is increasingly and incessantly worn out.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: So that's what we spend our time talking about at length,
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: the notion of grace as a message of relief for those who are burdened,
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: for those who are broken.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 1:24
  it's not a secret that grace is the theme of my little corner
• 1:31
  of the Internet,
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Grace Upon Grace,
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: and it's been so important.
• 1:36
  influential and resonant for me to dive deeper into my own
• 1:42
  understanding of grace.
• 1:43
  And that sort of plays right into what Dave is hoping to
• 1:48
  accomplish with this new book,
• 1:50
  which is just to add another way in which we can understand the
• 1:53
  grace of God.
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  SPEAKER_00: Not only it's
• 1:58
  not only its timeliness for our present moment,
• 2:01
  but also how pervasive it is for everyday life.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: It is essential to our existence as human beings.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's essential to our faith as Christians.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what we get to spend this particular episode talking about.
• 2:18
  Just why grace is so essential and all those things,
• 2:21
  all the particulars that go along with it.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just delighted to talk with Dave, especially about this topic.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's a meaningful topic.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's an important conversation to have.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I think hopefully you will be blessed by it.
• 2:36
  So sit back,
• 2:36
  relax,
• 2:37
  enjoy this episode as we talk about the relief of grace.
• 2:40
  And we talk about his book and we talk about just why it's so
• 2:44
  important for him.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: for us in our current moment to understand the grace of God.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Dave, it's really good to see you.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's really good to have you on the show again.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: I always enjoy my time with you,
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: and it's always so much fun to talk about grace and writing,
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: which is what I want to do today.
• 3:03
  But just tell me how you are,
• 3:05
  how are things going,
• 3:06
  and what's been keeping you busy lately?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, thanks, Brad.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: Excuse me.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's an honor and a joy to be here.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: What's been keeping me busy?
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we're recording this a couple days after Easter.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: So Holy Week,
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: as anyone who works in a church,
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: and I only work part-time in a church,
• 3:22
  but I somehow drew the short straw and had to preach on Palm
• 3:25
  Sunday and Good Friday twice.
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  SPEAKER_01: So that's four sermons on Palm Sunday and then another two.
• 3:34
  And that combined with this book coming out in a week and then
• 3:40
  our annual big
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: conference happening in two weeks has been,
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_01: maybe it's preordained.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's a mercy that it all is happening at once.
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  So I can't sort of overly freight any one thing with too much
• 3:58
  significance or
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: spiritual significance.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: decisiveness,
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  SPEAKER_01: but,
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: um,
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  SPEAKER_01: I've been just running from one thing to the next and a lot of,
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of,
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  SPEAKER_01: a lot of promo,
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  SPEAKER_01: uh,
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  SPEAKER_01: which is,
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  SPEAKER_01: I'm grateful people are,
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: at least some people are paying attention to the release of this book,
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  SPEAKER_01: but I'm also,
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: Brad,
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  SPEAKER_01: I've got three boys and they're 14,
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  SPEAKER_01: 12 and eight.
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  SPEAKER_01: So that's not for the faint of heart.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: That's a lot of,
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  SPEAKER_01: A lot of driving, a lot of practices.
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  SPEAKER_01: They go to three different schools,
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  SPEAKER_01: partly by nature of their ages,
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  SPEAKER_01: because they're in different stages.
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  SPEAKER_01: But then three different sets of extracurriculars.
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  So it's a funny,
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  I'm sure I'll look back on it and miss this period of life,
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  but...
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like a taxi cab.
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  Part of my day is spent podcasting and talking about grace and
• 4:48
  theology and the Lord.
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  And then the other half is like I'm a taxi cab to packages that
• 4:58
  are mildly annoyed
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  SPEAKER_01: with me the whole time.
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  SPEAKER_01: So that's my life right now.
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  It's the full gamut of just schedules and trying to play
• 5:06
  calculus with everyone's
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  SPEAKER_00: calendars probably.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, exactly.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that's what my wife and I talk about.
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  SPEAKER_01: It's like every day feels like a math problem we have to solve.
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  SPEAKER_01: There's only two of us.
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  SPEAKER_01: There's three kids.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: How is taking so-and-so to mountain biking?
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  Who's picking up this person from basketball and who's going to
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  swim practice?
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  SPEAKER_01: Like it's just scouts,
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
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  all the stuff that you want to – that is part of like an
• 5:31
  American adolescence these days.
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  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: How was your Easter at your church?
• 5:40
  Well,
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  we had actually,
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  as part of my gig here,
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  I'm not there on the two big days of the year.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not there on Christmas or Easter, which is a sadness to me.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: I've been there a few times,
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  but we got to go attend my brother and sister-in-law's church
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  in Richmond,
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  SPEAKER_01: which was wonderful,
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_01: full of joy.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: But our church...
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: I mentioned it in the book,
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  but our church is going through a period like I hear more and
• 6:06
  more churches are,
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: but of enormous explosive growth.
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  And I don't want to say revival because it's been an outlier
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  for a long time,
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  SPEAKER_01: at least in the mainline context in which I operate.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, we had 1700 people in church.
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  SPEAKER_00: Oh, wow.
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  SPEAKER_01: So that's for our denomination.
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  SPEAKER_01: That's absurd.
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  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, I don't want to take it for granted.
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  SPEAKER_01: So but I was really churched out,
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: to be honest,
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: like having to do Palm Sunday and Good Friday and Monday,
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Thursday,
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  SPEAKER_01: because that's our tradition.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_01: I was, some people say that's a richer experience of Holy Week.
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  SPEAKER_01: For me, it was just, I was wiped.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_01: Just like, you know, I need a relief.
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  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
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  Yeah.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: How about you?
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  SPEAKER_01: Did you have a nice Easter?
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we did.
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  SPEAKER_00: We had a really good Easter.
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  SPEAKER_00: I did something a little bit different this year.
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  SPEAKER_00: I didn't preach from a traditional Easter text, if you will.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I wasn't trying to be inventive or innovative,
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  SPEAKER_00: but for whatever reason,
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  SPEAKER_00: I was drawn to that scene in Acts 7 where Stephen...
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  SPEAKER_00: sees Jesus standing.
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  And just kind of using that as like a hook to understand the resurrection,
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  to understand how the resurrection actually sort of resonates
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  with the early church.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so it was really, I was just really moved by that scene.
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  SPEAKER_00: And so hopefully it translated well.
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  SPEAKER_00: Um,
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  SPEAKER_00: just talking about something that's,
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  SPEAKER_00: you know,
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  SPEAKER_00: a non-traditional Easter passage,
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  SPEAKER_00: not going to like,
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  SPEAKER_00: you know,
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  SPEAKER_00: John or Luke 24.
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  SPEAKER_00: Um, but you know, the Lord works in different ways, I guess.
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  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of people were, um, they, they came up to me afterwards.
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  SPEAKER_00: Not that I'm always looking for, you know, um,
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  SPEAKER_00: But it was nice that some people were – they were surprised,
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  but they were also encouraged after hearing some of what I had
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  to say about Acts 7,
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  SPEAKER_00: which is perennially one of my favorite chapters.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I say that about a lot of chapters in Scripture, but that one –
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  SPEAKER_00: There's just so much going on with Stephen and how he's talking,
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  SPEAKER_00: but then it culminates in this,
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  what a moment for the early church and just how we can look
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  back on that and also
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  SPEAKER_00: understand that that moment is not exclusive.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that was kind of like my point that like...
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  SPEAKER_00: the heavens were opened, it says, and he sees Jesus standing.
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  SPEAKER_00: And like that same idea, that same notion is what happens every Sunday.
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  SPEAKER_00: When the word is proclaimed,
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  SPEAKER_00: when the gospel goes forth,
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  the heavens are opened and we see Jesus standing on the pages
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  of scripture.
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  And so we can be confident and assured and have that sense of
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  surety in what our
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  SPEAKER_00: Christ has done for us.
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  SPEAKER_00: So anyways, I was really pleased with how it turned out.
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  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
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  SPEAKER_00: Take a risk.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: You're not trying to be cute, but that's what's speaking to you.
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  SPEAKER_01: It's going to rumble across the aisles.
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  SPEAKER_01: I love it, Brad.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thank you.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, there's a lot I want to talk about with you, Dave.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm looking forward to, well, is that next week?
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's next week when we go to New York City at Mockingbird.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: I always love the New York City conferences.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's really fun.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'm looking forward to that, and it'll be a trip.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I'm looking forward to that.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm also looking forward to your new book,
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  SPEAKER_00: which is what I really want to spend a long time talking about,
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  SPEAKER_00: uh,
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: the big relief,
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  SPEAKER_00: the urgency of grace for war not world.
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  SPEAKER_00: Um,
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  if you can just kind of give me the elevator speech of the big
• 9:44
  relief and just kind
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  SPEAKER_00: of where,
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  SPEAKER_00: when you kind of started,
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: um,
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: this,
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  SPEAKER_00: not just research,
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: but just writing about the idea of grace as relief,
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: because I think that's a
• 9:56
  Um,
• 9:57
  but I would love to,
• 9:58
  to hear kind of how that kind of materialized for you.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, especially as you were putting these chapters together.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: That was a great question.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um,
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: well,
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  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
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  SPEAKER_01: I'm always looking for words that aren't too degraded,
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: um,
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  SPEAKER_01: that haven't been too freighted with negativity or culture war baggage,
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I think grace is one that hasn't.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's remained pretty untarnished, I think.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: But still,
• 10:30
  it's a confusing word for folks because it means something very
• 10:35
  different when you
• 10:37
  talk about the grace of a ballerina or of Princess Diana versus
• 10:42
  the grace you say
• 10:43
  before meals versus the way that a Roman Catholic understands
• 10:46
  the word grace versus
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: the way that a Baptist or a
• 10:49
  understands grace like it's um we all know it's something good
• 10:52
  right we all we all
• 10:53
  basically i don't think anyone that hears the word grace and
• 10:56
  thinks oh that's the
• 10:57
  that sounds like an insult you know um or that sounds like a a
• 11:03
  bad thing so so i'm
• 11:05
  always looking for fresh words that's why i when i wrote
• 11:08
  seculosity i tried to come
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: up with one when i wrote um low anthropology i tried to you know kind of
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: almost put one together out of existing words that I'd heard.
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  SPEAKER_01: So I'm always looking for a semantic but also emotional hook.
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  And I think the experience of grace is oftentimes the
• 11:30
  experience of relief.
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  SPEAKER_01: That's not to say it's a purely subjective thing.
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  I think that objectively grace brings relief from the
• 11:40
  condemnation of the law.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: If you want to go...
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_01: Paul line, like immediately scriptural.
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  SPEAKER_01: But,
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm,
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: I'm very,
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: I'm interested in my work increasingly in sort of how do I can convey my,
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: the,
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: the,
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: the beautiful good news of Christianity,
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: to the rest of the world.
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, not to Christians.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
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  SPEAKER_01: But I would love for Christians to hear it and think that we love to be
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: re-evangelized ourselves as something that is imperative and wonderful.
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  SPEAKER_01: But that's what I'm trying to do.
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  SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to make the gospel...
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  SPEAKER_01: Emotionally immediate,
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: or at least not just intellectually plausible,
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: but emotionally...
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  SPEAKER_01: I hate the word applicable,
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: but emotionally resonant to contemporary people.
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  SPEAKER_01: And so my sense, relief was another...
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: from the experience of pressure.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_01: And pressure is something that I feel pretty strongly in today's world.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: Our experience of life is not necessarily for everyone one of...
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: even condemnation, though there's a whole lot of that.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: But pressure can include condemnation,
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: can include guilt,
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: can include,
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: because guilt exerts a sort of pressure on a person.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_01: You know, debt exerts a sort of pressure on a person.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: Regret exerts pressure on a person.
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  SPEAKER_01: But just most generally speaking, the
• 13:32
  life that I describe um in my of my own life which is a pretty
• 13:38
  comfortable
• 13:38
  existence you know in the epoch of American you know grandeur
• 13:43
  where we've never had
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: more material wealth or um we've also never been more unhappy but
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: I want to say that if it feels this pressurized for me,
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: and I feel like life is a treadmill that's getting faster,
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: and I could say that as a parent,
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: I could say that as a husband,
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: I can say that as someone in ministry.
• 14:07
  I mean,
• 14:07
  here you and I are doing something,
• 14:09
  a podcast that was not part of the gig that
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: uh, if ministers, uh, 25 years ago.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: but now the pressure to be a brand and to have a newsletter and to,
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: to do all these things,
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: like it's,
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: it's real.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: There's an opportunity.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: There's exciting things that we get to do as a part of it,
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: but it's,
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: there's just more and more and more,
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: it's like,
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: what more is coming down at me?
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: What more demand is about to be laid up top of my shoulders?
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: And so,
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_01: yeah,
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_01: I thought grace,
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: it was,
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: I knew that I wanted the subject of this book to be grace,
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: because the subject of my last book,
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Low Anthropology,
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: was really sin and human limitation and creatureliness.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: mortality, that's a downer.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: And so I tried not to make it a downer.
• 15:00
  I tried to make it fun and winsome and full of illustration and
• 15:04
  pointing to God's
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_01: grace in every single way.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: But I wanted this book to be, I wanted it to look like relief.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted it to feel like relief.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted it to be about the best thing I know, which is the grace of God.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well, amen to that.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that this notion that grace is a relief,
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: really helps to articulate the gospel well,
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: if you want to speak theologically,
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: because it's interesting.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: There has probably been,
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: at least in recent years,
• 15:37
  more writing and publishing about this topic of grace than
• 15:42
  probably in years past,
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: at least to my knowledge,
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: at least my awareness of it.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: And
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: Number one,
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: I'll ask you,
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: how did you,
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: quote unquote,
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: sell another book about grace in a market that's flooded with that?
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: But then also,
• 15:58
  why do you think that there needs to be – I'm not asking – I
• 16:03
  don't mean to put you
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: on the spot.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: But why do you think there needs to be more –
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: writing about grace,
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: especially not,
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: as you said,
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: not just for the church,
• 16:11
  but for individuals who may not be in a church or may not be a
• 16:15
  part of a ministry,
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: so to speak.
• 16:18
  Why do you think it's so fundamental for them to understand
• 16:22
  this notion of grace,
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: especially grace as relief,
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: if you will?
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hmm.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean it depends on your context, right?
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Because the context I live in,
• 16:33
  which is like the edge of evangelicalism and like the edge of
• 16:37
  the crumbling
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_01: mainline church,
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: like I'm not quite in either of those worlds.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: And sort of the vanguard of just sort of this secular media –
• 16:49
  Um,
• 16:49
  I find a lot of the books have been very,
• 16:51
  uh,
• 16:51
  issuey driven that I see.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: There are very,
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of isms,
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of,
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of books about justice,
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of books about,
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: important topics,
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: but I,
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: I actually don't see that many books about grace that there,
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: there was a fad of the gospel in defined or gospel influence this,
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_01: or the gospel approach to such and such,
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: which usually is a euphemism for grace in some way.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 17:18
  I felt that there was like a reaction against – I sort of felt
• 17:20
  there's been more of
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: a reaction against that.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: I would agree with that.
• 17:24
  And so – but the basic thing is you can't have too many books
• 17:29
  about grace.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's like why write another sermon?
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's –
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: We have enough sermons already, so stop preaching.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: Like, no.
• 17:37
  The truth is that God's grace is the most important thing to
• 17:40
  get across to listeners.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: And depending on the person who speaks it,
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: at the time they speak it,
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: it will be delivered in a slightly different key.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: And that's all I can do.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: to be a little more crass about it,
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: Brad,
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: like my work with Mockingbird,
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: to the extent we've built a platform,
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: it's grace is the word that's usually,
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: somehow combined with our platform or that's how people associate us.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, those are those grace people.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes that's, Oh, those are those hyper grace people.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: Or sometimes those are those,
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: or those antinomians or a lot of times it's like,
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: Oh,
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: those are,
• 18:18
  that's the place where I always hear about grace and I love it
• 18:20
  and I can't get enough.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: so I thought it was,
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_01: important for me to write a book that was,
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: well,
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: this is what we mean or what I mean when I talk about grace.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh,
• 18:33
  but also the grace of God is the most counterintuitive element
• 18:36
  of the Christian faith.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: And,
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: it's the element that's the most easily or most often subverted,
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_01: and,
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_01: qualified.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so, um,
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: And it's so counterintuitive.
• 18:53
  It's like that Luther quote about why do you preach the same
• 18:56
  message every single week?
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: It's like,
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: well,
• 18:58
  once you come in here looking like a people that believe that
• 19:02
  you're forgiven,
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: then I'll stop preaching to the forgiveness of sins.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: The final reason,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: though,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: why another book about grace or why I wrote this book,
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: because I need it.
• 19:12
  Brad,
• 19:13
  I can't write a book that's detached from my personal
• 19:15
  experience of the world.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: I could pretend that I could,
• 19:18
  but it's not going to have any gravitas or any kind of
• 19:21
  attraction in people's lives
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: if it doesn't have attraction in mine.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so I have a very, very active inner critic.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: I always have.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm very familiar with the voice of the little L law and the big L law.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm maniacally focused on the grace of God.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I needed to write it for my own self.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: Those are the three reasons I would give.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's interesting too,
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: just to note how essential grace is to the Christian faith,
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: as you've noted.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_00: And yet,
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: at least in my experience,
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_00: and maybe you would agree,
• 19:57
  how misunderstood the concept of grace is or the doctrine of
• 20:02
  grace is within
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: certain Christian circles,
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: which one thing that I've...
• 20:08
  grown to realize is that for as much as the Big C Church loves
• 20:14
  to maybe share grace
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: to other people or think that they do,
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: one thing that I've noticed is that we don't often trust
• 20:25
  grace to do what it's going to do in the lives of sinners or
• 20:29
  the lives of believers.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where we get into,
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: we're going to preach it,
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_00: but we got to make sure it's qualified,
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: or we're going to preach it,
• 20:36
  or we're going to make sure that it fits within certain
• 20:38
  parameters that we can
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: define or that we can at least moderately control,
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_00: which is kind of
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of counterintuitive to the whole notion of what God's grace is,
• 20:52
  which I think comes back to why I would say a book about grace
• 20:56
  is important,
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: not only just any time,
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: but I think especially for our present moment,
• 21:02
  which I think is really apt for you for understanding the
• 21:05
  moment in which I think
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: we do need this conversation.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: yeah, you can call it revival.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: We'll call it a resurgence of understanding grace, especially as relief.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: As you said,
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: our society,
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: and I don't mean to just go on one of those our society rants,
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: but our society is very pressure-filled in a lot of different ways.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: And that pressure doesn't just appear in workplaces, but it definitely...
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: appears in the church.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: And the pressure cooker of church ministry,
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: even church ministries that would say,
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: oh,
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: we're grace-centered,
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: oftentimes,
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: not to just cast dispersions,
• 21:44
  but they don't understand what grace truly is because we don't
• 21:48
  trust it to do what
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: it's going to do in the hearts of sinners.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where we get into...
• 21:53
  But to use Paul's language,
• 21:55
  he would probably just write Galatians all over again to us.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like,
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: hey,
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_00: do you think you were,
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: you got in by the flesh and now you're kept,
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_00: or you got in by the spirit and you're going to be kept in by the flesh?
• 22:06
  Like,
• 22:07
  anyways,
• 22:07
  he would go on a rant like that,
• 22:08
  I think,
• 22:09
  similar to what he says to them.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, 100%.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't want to – it's hard to say like,
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_01: oh,
• 22:19
  I don't want to say that I've somehow got grace right because I
• 22:23
  need God's grace
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: because I get it wrong.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: That said, I have two eyes and two ears and a brain and –
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: a lot of the books I read about grace,
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: they take with one hand what they,
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: they give it the other,
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: you know?
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: so,
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: I do think there's something,
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: yeah,
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: the tendency to want to put guardrails around it or to,
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: to qualify or use grace as a means of control,
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: even like I want to,
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: be a little riskier,
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: push it a little further,
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: be a little more radical and,
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: and,
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: and trust that,
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: that,
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: that if you let the gospel speak,
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: beautiful things will happen.
• 23:11
  They may not happen according to your timeline or in the way
• 23:13
  you would like,
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: but,
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: to not put,
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_01: a fine print at the end of this book,
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: I was trying to think,
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: Brad,
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: when Mockingbird was founded,
• 23:28
  we had a lot of energy around legalism and the damage that does
• 23:34
  in the lives of Christians.
• 23:37
  And it's usually behind most forms of what today is called deconstruction,
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: what used to be called loss of faith.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: And there's usually some sort of legalism at play.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: I'm less...
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: That terminology doesn't get thrown around in quite the same way,
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: but I wanted to address people more as like,
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: what is actually an urgent...
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: life or death importance in this thing called Christianity,
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_01: which is so maligned and so,
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: the church is always,
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: breaking and renewing,
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: it's,
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: it's,
• 24:24
  it's a oddly decadent institution that somehow God uses for his
• 24:30
  glory and has used
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: in my life and all sorts of ways.
• 24:32
  But how do I pull out what I think is the main thing for the
• 24:40
  sake of,
• 24:41
  of hurting people?
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's a really good point, Dave.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: And I also think that,
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: well,
• 24:47
  you've mentioned it and I've just seen it and everyone's seen
• 24:50
  the quote unquote
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: data that there's declining rates of church attendance,
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: no matter what denomination that you're in.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: And
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'll put it this way.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of,
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: as you're writing a book like this,
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: what kind of gives you hope for the future of the church?
• 25:11
  Not just because we know that the church is not going to go
• 25:13
  away because that's
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: what it says in God's word,
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: but just fundamentally,
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: what kind of gives you hope about the future of the church?
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: And why do you think grace is so pertinent to that future,
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: so to speak,
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: if I can ask it that way?
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: what we're living through right this moment,
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: because we have lived in this long,
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_01: long period of decline.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that as this book was being written,
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: and as you and I are talking right now,
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: there's increasing amounts of reports of a sort of a resurgence of,
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_01: or that somehow the decline has paused or plateaued.
• 25:50
  And in Europe,
• 25:50
  you hear about rates of baptism are up 50% and things like that.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: And
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: And I see it in my own context.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_01: I see a hunger.
• 25:58
  I see an exhaustion with the replacements,
• 26:01
  what I tried to write about in Seculosity.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: I see a disillusionment.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: There has been a disillusionment with Christianity,
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: but as you watch a lot of people migrate from that...
• 26:13
  into other forms of replacement religion and oftentimes just
• 26:16
  bringing with them
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: their fundamentalist sort of praxis,
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: their actual rhythms,
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: if not the substance.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think you've seen some, now you've seen exhaustion with that.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: And you say, well, that's not going to work either.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: We need meaning.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: We're living in a culture of despair.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: Why live and not die?
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: And the reality of God is going to appeal to people.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I see that when that happens,
• 26:49
  my hope is that it's a view of God that does not edit out how
• 26:54
  God has actually
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: revealed himself,
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: which is through Jesus Christ,
• 26:57
  which is therefore in the cross and the resurrection and the
• 27:01
  forgiveness of sins,
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: not through a kind of...
• 27:06
  clearer understanding of the natural order or a different form
• 27:10
  of right-handed power.
• 27:15
  I want to say that the great thing about Christianity is that
• 27:21
  it provides an
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: alternative to all of that.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: that happens to also be true.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I feel tremendously hopeful right now about the reception,
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: if not the book,
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: but the reception that the Christian faith is getting in a hearing.
• 27:40
  And it's not been a hearing that's come about through reason
• 27:43
  and argumentation.
• 27:44
  It's come about through spiritual exhaustion and despair and
• 27:49
  folks being like,
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_01: well,
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_01: I try this other stuff.
• 27:51
  and i love hiking but my hiking club just isn't doing it for me
• 27:55
  you know i've tried
• 27:58
  this form of politics tribal politics and what i found is that
• 28:02
  i was became just as
• 28:04
  anxious and unhappy and the purpose that i thought we had i got
• 28:08
  disillusioned by
• 28:10
  maybe there was something more to the christian the church
• 28:15
  because the church like
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: it or not
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_01: does have grace at its center.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like,
• 28:21
  you have to really do some inventive cartwheels to have a
• 28:27
  version of Christianity
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: which is only about the law.
• 28:32
  At least you can for a while,
• 28:34
  but then someone will actually read the Bible.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: They'll be like, wait a second.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_01: Wait a second.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: There's more in here.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: There's something in here about, like, absolution.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not just a different version of power.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: We have a... Forgiveness is being mandated, but also proclaimed, like...
• 28:54
  you can't hide that stuff forever within the Christian faith in
• 28:58
  a way that,
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: political tribalism,
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: the cults of productivity and career,
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: those things are not going to naturally,
• 29:10
  forgiveness and mercy are not going to naturally find a spot at
• 29:14
  the table unless
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_01: you have some very,
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: peculiar types running those companies.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Speaking of that,
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: like this idea that,
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_00: like it or not,
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: grace is,
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: essential to what it means to be the church and to proclaim the gospel.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_00: Why would you say that it gets obscured so much?
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know,
• 29:35
  you and RJ and Sarah talk a lot on The Mocking Cast about
• 29:39
  seeing or finding grace
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: in its absence in everyday life a lot.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: But why would you see an absence of grace within churches?
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you think that happens?
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you think that occurs?
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thanks for the, that's a great layup.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: The sin is the reason and a control.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: And those are two very interrelated things.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: We don't like grace.
• 30:07
  The law as a default mode of operation,
• 30:10
  which says,
• 30:11
  if you do this,
• 30:12
  then you'll get that.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: If you obey my commands, then you'll be rewarded.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_01: Then you'll be protected, et cetera.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: That's the basic sort of animating principle behind the law.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: and the little L law.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it derives from what I would call the big L law.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_01: But that's a manageable, predictable understanding of the world.
• 30:33
  SPEAKER_01: If I do these things, these things will happen.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: And life is so scary,
• 30:38
  and there's so much out of our control that if we can find
• 30:40
  something that can help us...
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: control it, we can master the world, we can be less afraid.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so the human inclination,
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: as much as we respond to grace and love when it's directed our way,
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: when it comes to other people,
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_01: when it comes to systems,
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_01: when it comes to headlines,
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: We always reach for the law.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: And we reach for it with ourselves, too, by the way.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: Because it promises control.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't deliver that control.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_01: But it's very...
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_01: It seduces us for that sake.
• 31:19
  So grace is the kind of,
• 31:23
  as we talked about earlier,
• 31:24
  it's not another form of control.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's what happens when control fails.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's what happens to a person when they fail or what can happen.
• 31:33
  So the human's DNA as sinners,
• 31:37
  as fallen sinners who are full of unbelief and fear...
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: We resist God's grace.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: That doesn't stop at the miracle is that God is alive.
• 31:48
  The Holy Spirit is real and that these things break through
• 31:52
  whether we want them to or not.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: And when they do,
• 31:55
  our lives change and everything gets easier and we do breathe a
• 32:02
  big sigh of relief.
• 32:04
  You talk about in the book,
• 32:07
  this notion that grace is fundamentally lopsided.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_00: Can you kind of unpack what you mean by that?
• 32:13
  And what does it mean that we would say that the gospel gives
• 32:18
  us a lopsided message,
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_00: so to speak?
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_01: what I'm trying to get with the word lopsided,
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to,
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: again,
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to eke my way into a radical understanding of grace,
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_01: where God's grace is not responding to something in you.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: God's grace creates something in you.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: Meaning,
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_01: I don't bring something to the table,
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: some sort of virtue,
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: some sort of action,
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: some kind of even material thing.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: that God then blesses by being gracious towards me,
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: forgiving me,
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_01: absolving me,
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: healing me,
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: resurrecting me,
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_01: that grace for it to truly be grace is a lopsided transaction.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: And by that,
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: that's sort of a nice way of saying it's completely lopsided,
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: meaning it's all God and it's nothing us.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: But that doesn't mean we're not there.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's not some sort of abstraction.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_01: The...
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's what I mean by lopsided.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: The gift,
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: and I talk in the book,
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_01: I try to use gift as a euphemism for grace because that's how Paul was,
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: that's how he was using it oftentimes.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: The gift is not indexed to some sort of attribute in the recipient.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not giving my son grace.
• 33:45
  a really amazing super abundantly good birthday present because
• 33:51
  he's been a good
• 33:52
  boy or if I am that's what you call a conditional relationship
• 33:57
  and that will create
• 33:59
  enormous amounts of rebellion later on I'm giving it to him
• 34:02
  because he's my son and
• 34:04
  I love him and I hate to say it I love him even when he's being
• 34:08
  a total you know
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_01: So and so.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: So that's the nature of grace.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: And that's how God treats us.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_01: At least that's my conviction that I'm trying to get across in the book.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yes,
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: that notion of incongruity,
• 34:22
  which I don't know if that's from you or if that's from John
• 34:25
  O'Leinbach or if
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_00: that's from John Barclay,
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: but that notion of grace as this incongruous gift.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's so,
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know,
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: that has really resonated with me,
• 34:37
  especially just further deepening our articulation of what it
• 34:41
  means to preach this message,
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_00: which truly is not only life-changing,
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: but I would say world-changing,
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_00: this notion of relief,
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: of this gift that is,
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_00: as you said,
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_00: it's entirely lopsided.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not,
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: as you just articulated,
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_00: it's not indexed to any sort of merit within the recipient.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: It is entirely...
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: one-sided, one-way love, as your dad would say.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I also think that,
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: and again,
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_00: you can look at this in pop culture or whatever,
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: but you can also look at this biblically.
• 35:16
  I keep returning to that scene in Genesis 15 where Abraham and
• 35:24
  Yahweh are going to
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: make covenant with each other
• 35:27
  But the only one who actually goes through the covenant
• 35:30
  ceremony is God himself,
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_00: which is if he wanted to pinpoint— Abraham's asleep,
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: right?
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: He's asleep the whole time.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: He's asleep, a.k.a.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: almost dead.
• 35:40
  And if you wanted to find or pinpoint any one scene where you
• 35:45
  could say—because I
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_00: recently got into some online discussions about the idea,
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: does grace have strings attached and all those kinds of things—
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you don't have to look anywhere than in Genesis 15.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: There's no strings attached to this covenant.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: This word of promise that God is making with his people is right there.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: Like, he doesn't leave them any other option.
• 36:06
  And this is kind of—and again,
• 36:07
  not to get too preachy,
• 36:09
  but like Hebrews 6—
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: which is just a wonderful chapter,
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: but the end of Hebrews 6,
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_00: the writer of Hebrews,
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: whoever it might have been,
• 36:18
  he references that and he talks about the idea that it had to
• 36:22
  be that way because
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: now God's promise is founded upon two unchangeable things,
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: his word and his oath,
• 36:29
  which means that there's no possibility of this covenant being
• 36:34
  broken because it's
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: made by God and kept by God and
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: which if you want to talk about incongruous,
• 36:42
  just look at the fundamental aspects of how the gospel and how
• 36:46
  the word of promise
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_00: is initiated by God himself.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_00: Again, nothing to do with us.
• 36:54
  And again,
• 36:55
  not to just keep hammering the point home,
• 36:56
  but what a relief that is.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because we have no end of the bargain.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_00: We have to keep up,
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_00: so to speak,
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: which isn't to say that we don't have anything to do,
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: but it's just to say that this whole thing is not based on us,
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: which,
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: I mean,
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: that's relief in a nutshell.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think so.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: I love this word, incongruity.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's a...
• 37:18
  It's also a way to like,
• 37:19
  you're not assaulting people by saying,
• 37:21
  there's nothing you can do.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: I may believe that in the final analysis.
• 37:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a monergist.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_01: But I want to lead people there by saying, actually, it's incongruous.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's lopsided.
• 37:37
  And then slowly but surely,
• 37:38
  the more you look at it,
• 37:39
  you're like,
• 37:40
  wait a second.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: By lopsided, he means God does it all and I do nothing.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: And that really is what I mean.
• 37:46
  But incongruity is a great word to sort of help people get
• 37:52
  there rather than hammer
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_01: them in an almost ungracious way with the radicality of it,
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_01: which is not to be diminished in any way,
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: but it's more to be for the sake of communication.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: You bring people there.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that's Barclay's word.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's not Linebow.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_01: My wonderful John Linebow has picked up on it and written about it.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I just read it.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I read it and I was like, oh, I'm going to steal that.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: Everything's a remix.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: I think someone said that.
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_00: So we can remix that and use it to our own volition.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: Truly.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_00: In one of the chapters of your book,
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: you talk about the idea,
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: and maybe this is,
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: speaking to incongruity,
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: but this idea,
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know the page number,
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: so forgive me.
• 38:40
  but you say God would rather surrender himself than allow his
• 38:43
  children to be
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_00: swallowed by sin and death.
• 38:46
  Can you just unpack what you kind of mean by God's surrendering
• 38:52
  and like how
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: pertinent that it is,
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_00: especially like,
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 38:57
  you mentioned earlier that maybe this book wasn't geared
• 39:00
  towards necessarily a
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_00: person within church,
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: within church ministry.
• 39:04
  How would you explain this idea of God's self-surrender to
• 39:08
  someone and how...
• 39:10
  essential that is to understand our understanding,
• 39:12
  not just of the gospel,
• 39:13
  but of grace itself.
• 39:15
  Well,
• 39:15
  that comes in a chapter about control and surrender being the
• 39:20
  relief from control.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_01: And that's often how the life of faith is actually experienced.
• 39:25
  And if you talk to an addict,
• 39:27
  the 12 steps always begin with an act of surrender.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's where you run into God.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_01: You realize maybe later on that God was orchestrating the whole thing,
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: but you have to surrender your kind of will.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: And it's very scary.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_01: And it usually happens when surrender is your only option.
• 39:46
  So I think the pressure to control everything in the world
• 39:49
  around you is a very,
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_01: very real pressure.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_01: It's extremely oppressive,
• 39:54
  but it's what all of advertising is built around and all of our
• 39:57
  world sort of
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_01: promises more dominion,
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_01: more control,
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_01: more optimization,
• 40:02
  SPEAKER_01: more streamlining,
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: more efficiency,
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_01: et cetera,
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: et cetera.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_01: And what we come to find out,
• 40:09
  God often works in killing in order to make alive so that we
• 40:14
  come to the end of our
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: sense of control.
• 40:17
  And so how do I find – where do I – I always want to punt to
• 40:21
  Jesus because it's not
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_01: – if the chapters end by telling people,
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_01: okay,
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_01: just surrender more,
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: faster,
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_01: or harder –
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_01: That's the law.
• 40:30
  What I want to say is that this is not simply something that is
• 40:34
  true from a
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_01: spiritual perspective or biblical perspective.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: It was true of Jesus, Jesus who surrendered his will.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to get into some Trinitarian tennis match.
• 40:48
  I just want to say when he says,
• 40:49
  not my will,
• 40:50
  but thine be done,
• 40:52
  that is a posture of surrender.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_01: He's going passive.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_01: He's saying, take this cup for me.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want it.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: But if it be your will, I will go to the cross.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: I will submit.
• 41:04
  I will surrender to what Pilate and the Pharisees and the
• 41:09
  Jewish councils and the
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_01: crowds have in store for me.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_01: And that pattern,
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_01: there's enormous hope there,
• 41:16
  there's enormous relief to be told that actually not only can
• 41:18
  you not control
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: everything in your life,
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: you don't have to.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_01: And Jesus did not actually come to bring you extra agency or control,
• 41:28
  but to surrender his life for the sake of those who were dying
• 41:33
  on the ladder of
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: type A control freak-itis.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: So that's where I'm going with it.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: it's more of like a Philippians 2,
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: which is,
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 41:48
  we just had the readings on Good Friday and the epistle reading
• 41:51
  for us is always
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: Philippians 2.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: And that's about Jesus not considering himself,
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: to be equal with God,
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_01: but submitting himself to death.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: And that is an act of surrender.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_01: And my deepest experiences,
• 42:06
  personal deepest experiences of grace in my own life have
• 42:09
  usually come through some
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_01: form of surrender to life as it really is,
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: to stop trying to narrativize or cope or...
• 42:25
  soften the pain but to to move into it to say I can't I can't
• 42:33
  God I can't I've
• 42:34
  tried I've been preaching grace but I don't believe it for
• 42:38
  myself so here I am
• 42:41
  letting go because I had I can't do anything else and I've I've
• 42:46
  personally seen
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_01: God show up in miraculous ways,
• 42:50
  God doing for us what we could not do for ourselves in ways
• 42:54
  that are numerous,
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: numerous,
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: numerous that are not.
• 42:59
  And so I find that to be a tremendously hopeful and a great
• 43:01
  relief to those who are
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: dying on the vine of control,
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: the control that we don't actually have.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's such a great point.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: I would also point to Galatians 1,
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: where Paul talks about the idea that Jesus gave himself up to deliver us.
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_00: He talks about that in Galatians 1, 4, I think.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_00: of God's own son in order to rescue and relieve us.
• 43:36
  It should be something that's endlessly compelling for us not
• 43:43
  only to think about,
• 43:44
  but to try to articulate this notion of self-surrender of God's
• 43:49
  own son on our behalf.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_00: And
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: That is – I think like you're right,
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_00: like this notion of grace in our own lives practically,
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_00: functionally,
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: it begins with the surrender of,
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: not our rights,
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: but the surrender of maybe necessarily –
• 44:08
  sometimes our comfortability in order to meet the needs of
• 44:12
  someone else or to
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_00: dispense relief for someone else.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's really fundamental to human relationships,
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_00: to the way in which we interact with others.
• 44:25
  I think you shared some stories about that and your talk at
• 44:28
  Mockingbird Tyler in September.
• 44:30
  But I think that is really essential to understanding this
• 44:35
  notion of grace is this
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_00: notion of surrender too.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: Grace is the organizing principle of the book, and so is relief.
• 44:46
  But I want to get away from a completely zero-sum way of
• 44:50
  thinking grace only has to
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: do with guilt,
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_01: or grace only has to do with reconciliation of debt.
• 45:00
  You know,
• 45:02
  the Bible gives us a lot of different ways of thinking and
• 45:06
  talking about grace.
• 45:07
  And there'll be times in people's lives when they identify more
• 45:13
  with a courtroom metaphor.
• 45:15
  And then there are times when they identify more with a balance
• 45:17
  sheet metaphor.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_01: There's going to be times when they view more of just death,
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_01: like they think of more in terms of their mortality.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: And all of these things are just dimensions of God's grace.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't see them as necessarily in competition with one another.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_01: And we get in trouble when we see them as,
• 45:37
  I think we get in trouble and we just start to really get mad
• 45:40
  at each other.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_01: I will say that there are times, like sometimes like,
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_01: There are epochs when you're thinking,
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_01: like when plagues happen and death is going to be the most,
• 45:51
  resurrection is going to be the most interesting and immediate
• 45:54
  form of grace that
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_01: people think about.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_01: Life where there should be death, that's grace.
• 45:59
  There'll be times when anxiety is the dominant paradigm and
• 46:04
  surrender might speak
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_01: more to that or imputation.
• 46:07
  Identity formation is a huge source of anxiety for today and
• 46:10
  when I talk in the
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_01: imputation chapter,
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_01: I'm really talking a lot about
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_01: God giving us, imputing us righteousness.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_01: And that's a huge relief.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm trying not to...
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_01: The challenge of this book,
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: Brad,
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: is it's tough because it had to be short.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_01: They mandate a word count that you have to hit.
• 46:30
  And so you have to be really economical with what you're saying
• 46:33
  and you cannot
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_01: explore everything to the degree you'd like to.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_01: And accessibility is very, very important.
• 46:43
  But it was important to me that I didn't over-freight or rule
• 46:48
  out too many dimensions.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: Or maybe because I'm sure I have ruled them out,
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to present the ones that are most trenchant in my own life.
• 46:59
  Because those would be the ones that I would speak about with
• 47:03
  what today we would
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_01: call the most authenticity.
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_01: And people can tell when you've got skin in the game.
• 47:09
  SPEAKER_01: And so these are the nine,
• 47:12
  SPEAKER_01: there's nine chapters,
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_01: elements of grace that I find to be most immediate in my own life.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well,
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: yeah,
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was just going to mention that if anyone's looking to pick this up,
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_00: not only would I recommend it,
• 47:23
  but I'm intrigued by the idea of just all of these different
• 47:28
  elements for ways not
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_00: only to understand grace,
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_00: but maybe to encounter it only because,
• 47:34
  SPEAKER_00: as you just mentioned,
• 47:36
  grace is not this formation that's only good for this notion of
• 47:42
  guilt or relief
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_00: from guilt.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_00: It was way more pervasive than that.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_00: it permeates, I would say, our entire lives.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it should.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_00: And rightly understood, we can perceive that.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's when,
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_00: if you want to say faith is born,
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_00: that's when worship is,
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_00: emerges out of that.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_00: This wonderful concept of being able to perceive that as this
• 48:10
  essential,
• 48:11
  this undercurrent of life is we could just steal from Robert Capon.
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's rediscovering 200 proof of grace almost everywhere you look.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_00: And that's kind of the point is that it is that essential to our lives.
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's just to see how pervasive it is.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, good.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_01: Pervasive is a wonderful word.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_01: And persuasive is another word here too.
• 48:45
  I don't want this to just be a book where people help to
• 48:47
  understand grace.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_01: I would love for it to be a guide almost to how you encounter grace.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's a book.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's words.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's not God.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's not God's word.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the Holy Spirit.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_01: But I also want it to describe with some degree of
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_01: Creativity and humility and playfulness,
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_01: what it might look like for grace to be operative in our lives.
• 49:19
  You know,
• 49:19
  you mentioned earlier that,
• 49:22
  you know,
• 49:22
  you maybe,
• 49:23
  but also like Mockingbird in general.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_00: kind of gets the,
• 49:29
  gets the aspersion cast on them sometimes about being
• 49:31
  antinomian or quote unquote
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_00: hyper grace.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_00: What,
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_00: what's your,
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_00: what's your go-to response when,
• 49:37
  when someone sort of says that about you or about what you've
• 49:41
  written or about,
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_00: um,
• 49:43
  SPEAKER_00: something that you guys have published?
• 49:47
  Um,
• 49:48
  I usually want to hear more of what they're,
• 49:50
  what they're mean by that.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um,
• 49:54
  Do they mean that we're putting our whole trust in the grace of
• 49:59
  God and not really
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_01: reserving any place for when it comes to salvation?
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then also, I believe sanctification is by grace.
• 50:10
  I don't think effort may come into it in mysterious ways that
• 50:18
  we can't quite figure out.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_01: There might be some
• 50:20
  tension there in terms of our participation but i think i don't
• 50:24
  want to leave much
• 50:25
  space for that i don't want to i don't want to tell god how god
• 50:28
  can work you know i
• 50:30
  don't want to say well it never happens this way like yeah i've
• 50:33
  been around long
• 50:33
  enough i know some people are like well i this discipline was
• 50:36
  super helpful to me
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_01: but i but i think mainly the cases that uh
• 50:42
  SPEAKER_01: God is in, we're in relationship with God and it's a love relationship.
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_01: And that's,
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't mean,
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not talking about romance,
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_01: but I think that there's,
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_01: if you,
• 50:56
  if there's a lot of criticism and condemnation and falling
• 51:00
  short in any kind of relationship,
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_01: you sort of distance yourself.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_01: You run away, you hide, you prevaricate, you don't tell the truth.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I want...
• 51:13
  I think the most powerful intimate relationships with God are
• 51:17
  usually those in
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: which grace is the dominant theme.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_01: I think when grace gets lost in the life of the Christian,
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_01: faith becomes a project and it becomes a burden and,
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: and then,
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: or it becomes a weapon.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_01: And that's really, really dangerous.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: But how do I specifically respond to the antinomian thing?
• 51:39
  SPEAKER_01: Honestly, Brad, I'm just not that worried about it anymore.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_01: I'm worried about other things.
• 51:45
  I've seen too many people that were worried about antinomianism
• 51:52
  just completely collapse.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_01: You live your life long enough and you'd be like,
• 51:58
  SPEAKER_01: wow,
• 51:59
  the people I know who are still in ministry are the ones who
• 52:02
  kept getting accused
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_01: of being antinomians.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_01: What's going on there?
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_01: All these folks that were very serious about their own
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_01: sanctification, they burned out.
• 52:14
  SPEAKER_01: I'm 46 now and I'm not that old,
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_01: but you kind of have,
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_01: as experience happens to you,
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_01: you just get less and less worried about it.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I do think Paul got accused of antinomianism.
• 52:25
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think anyone can truly outrun the law.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think anyone we can truly vilify,
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_01: act as though the law is not operative on us like it is,
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_01: whether we say so or not.
• 52:40
  So I don't want to sound arrogant because there's a sense of
• 52:46
  which I feel like
• 52:50
  there are some reckless ways to talk about the role of the law
• 52:54
  in the life of the believer.
• 52:55
  And there's some callous ways and there's some just youthfully
• 52:58
  arrogant ways.
• 52:59
  SPEAKER_01: I want to avoid those as best I can.
• 53:03
  but I'm no longer willing to allow my fears about being called
• 53:06
  an antinomian to,
• 53:07
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: to lead me to mute or qualify the grace of God.
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_01: It's that urgent.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_01: It's not, it's, it's people are dying.
• 53:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like people are in despair.
• 53:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like I don't need to give them a quote unquote balanced view.
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_01: Like I want to,
• 53:23
  I want to say this is what we're really talking about when we
• 53:26
  talk about the grace
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_01: of God.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: I don't, um,
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm less interested in coloring within the lines in that respect.
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I'll come to regret it.
• 53:39
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 53:43
  I'm like right there with you only because not just about that conversation,
• 53:47
  SPEAKER_00: but as I've been in ministry for a while now,
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_00: there's certain conversations that,
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_00: again,
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_00: like you said,
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to come across conceited or hubristic or anything,
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_00: but like
• 53:57
  there's just conversations that I'm not really interested in
• 54:00
  having anymore only
• 54:01
  SPEAKER_00: because I don't really think they are beneficial.
• 54:05
  They're just kind of,
• 54:05
  it's sort of cage stage conversations that just lead to distraction.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um,
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_00: and like you said,
• 54:12
  SPEAKER_00: um,
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_00: there's,
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think there's any more urgent message than the message of grace,
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_00: as you say,
• 54:18
  SPEAKER_00: the subtitle for your book,
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_00: uh,
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_00: a worn out world.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_00: We are very weary of,
• 54:23
  of not just bad news,
• 54:25
  but weary of pressure,
• 54:27
  weary of the burdens that we feel and endure.
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_00: And as we've talked about,
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_00: at length so far,
• 54:33
  that we feel that we are the only ones who are capable or able
• 54:39
  to carry those burdens.
• 54:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why the message of grace, I think, is so urgent and why
• 54:46
  You know,
• 54:48
  I've been talked to in the past about,
• 54:52
  you know,
• 54:52
  my hyper focus on Jesus.
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, why aren't you preaching about something else?
• 54:58
  SPEAKER_00: Well, because I don't think there's anything else worth saying.
• 55:01
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think there's anything else worth preaching about.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_00: Why would I want to give someone any sense of finding...
• 55:10
  SPEAKER_00: relief,
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_00: identity,
• 55:11
  SPEAKER_00: meaning,
• 55:12
  SPEAKER_00: purpose,
• 55:13
  and any other thing other than Jesus and the gift of grace that
• 55:16
  he gives us.
• 55:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't want to pretend that that's possible.
• 55:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you can't risk.
• 55:22
  As I've said,
• 55:24
  it's helpful to me to say,
• 55:25
  I cannot risk talking about anything else.
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_01: It could be that there can be a Bible study class on Sundays where you...
• 55:34
  SPEAKER_01: go into slightly more,
• 55:36
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
• 55:37
  different areas of the Christian life and ways to cultivate a
• 55:42
  relationship with
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_01: prayer life and things like that.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think those are bad.
• 55:45
  I think there's lots of very grace-based folks who can have a
• 55:48
  lot of wisdom to
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_01: share about those things.
• 55:50
  SPEAKER_01: But when it comes to Sunday morning,
• 55:51
  I just can't risk the fact that if someone comes in there and
• 55:54
  they're at their
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_01: wit's end or their child has died or their spouse has just left them,
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_01: I just can't risk not preaching the gospel.
• 56:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 56:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, but this also depends on it.
• 56:08
  SPEAKER_01: When people look at the world,
• 56:09
  do they see folks who are lazy and totally out to lunch and
• 56:19
  taking advantage of the
• 56:21
  SPEAKER_01: grace of God and need to have the whip cracked?
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like,
• 56:27
  if that's what you see and you think that the preaching of the
• 56:31
  law is going to
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_01: address those people...
• 56:34
  SPEAKER_01: then I understand why you would go there.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't see that.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_01: I see people who are burned out and are incapable of rest.
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe I don't think it's a socioeconomic thing.
• 56:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's pretty across the board.
• 56:47
  But I see people who are trying to do way too much who think
• 56:51
  that the whole world
• 56:52
  depends on them and need to hear a word of pardon and
• 56:59
  resurrection and hope that...
• 57:03
  SPEAKER_01: And it's the great quote,
• 57:04
  SPEAKER_01: if you think people are too free,
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_01: your preaching will try to bind them.
• 57:09
  SPEAKER_01: And if you think people are too much in chains and too much in bondage,
• 57:13
  SPEAKER_01: your preaching will try to free them.
• 57:15
  SPEAKER_01: That's Verde, I think.
• 57:17
  SPEAKER_01: Some bastardized version of Verde.
• 57:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 57:22
  Even the people I look at who do perhaps seem to be super
• 57:27
  comfortable or non-serious,
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_01: if you get to know them,
• 57:33
  SPEAKER_01: almost always you find out they're not.
• 57:35
  SPEAKER_01: So that idea that you afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted,
• 57:39
  SPEAKER_01: you come to find out that everyone is afflicted.
• 57:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's true.
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I...
• 57:49
  SPEAKER_01: That will inform your preaching.
• 57:53
  It doesn't mean you have to compromise on what you believe to
• 57:55
  be true or what you
• 57:57
  SPEAKER_01: believe the Bible says about this or that ethical situation.
• 58:03
  SPEAKER_01: But I think that it does dictate how you approach folks.
• 58:11
  Do you think that everyone is basically suffering and in knots
• 58:15
  of their own tying
• 58:16
  SPEAKER_01: and also that of their past?
• 58:18
  Or do you think that they're sort of free agents making
• 58:21
  decisions and some of which
• 58:22
  SPEAKER_01: are bad and selfish and some of which aren't?
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_01: I happen to take the former view and not lightly.
• 58:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I take seriously.
• 58:34
  SPEAKER_01: And that's why I don't take myself that seriously.
• 58:36
  SPEAKER_01: But I take seriously the fact that everyone is in pain.
• 58:40
  And if I don't think they're in pain,
• 58:42
  that's only because I don't know them that well.
• 58:45
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I think – not to bring this full circle, but I guess we can.
• 58:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like this brings us right back to your previous book, Low Anthropology.
• 58:52
  Like your view of quote-unquote human capability or the ability
• 59:00
  of human beings to
• 59:02
  perform certain standards or meet certain standards or live up
• 59:05
  to certain expectations,
• 59:07
  SPEAKER_00: that's going to inform –
• 59:09
  The way in which you articulate the truth of Scripture and
• 59:13
  especially the truths of
• 59:14
  SPEAKER_00: Scripture that are articulated in the New Testament or whatnot.
• 59:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to be directly,
• 59:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think,
• 59:19
  SPEAKER_00: informed of how your level of anthropology,
• 59:25
  SPEAKER_00: how you're seeing human beings and what they're capable of.
• 59:31
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't say it better.
• 59:33
  SPEAKER_01: That's the book, yeah.
• 59:36
  SPEAKER_01: Low Anthropology was, I see my books as a trilogy.
• 59:38
  SPEAKER_01: The books I've written are a trilogy, Brad.
• 59:41
  SPEAKER_01: And Seculosity is a book about justification.
• 59:44
  So are you going to be like Quentin Tarantino and only do like
• 59:46
  10 movies,
• 59:47
  10 books?
• 59:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 59:49
  SPEAKER_00: that are all somewhat loosely related in the same world?
• 59:51
  SPEAKER_01: If it were up to me, I wouldn't write another book.
• 59:53
  SPEAKER_01: You want to know the truth?
• 59:54
  SPEAKER_01: If it were up to me, I don't want to write another book.
• 59:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'm too sensitive, and I find it too difficult.
• 59:59
  But I need to also pay for my kids' college,
• 1:00:02
  so I'd probably be writing more books.
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a privilege, and I happen to enjoy the process on some level.
• 1:00:08
  SPEAKER_01: But it is...
• 1:00:12
  I'm not desperate to get deeper into the cultural discourse
• 1:00:15
  around religion.
• 1:00:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's fundamentally toxic.
• 1:00:20
  SPEAKER_01: I would love for this to be it, but it won't be.
• 1:00:25
  SPEAKER_01: There'll be more to come.
• 1:00:26
  SPEAKER_01: I just,
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think that I've,
• 1:00:28
  what I would like to think is I've built something of a
• 1:00:30
  foundation and then I can
• 1:00:31
  SPEAKER_01: sort of talk about maybe some other things or in a,
• 1:00:37
  SPEAKER_01: In a fresh way.
• 1:00:39
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I'll say it's a quadrilogy next,
• 1:00:41
  SPEAKER_01: but I feel like I talked about,
• 1:00:43
  I'm trying to translate the things that I find most compelling
• 1:00:46
  about Christianity
• 1:00:47
  SPEAKER_01: into contemporary language.
• 1:00:48
  And that's what I've tried to do with each of these books in a
• 1:00:51
  different way.
• 1:00:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's such a helpful lens,
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_00: seeing the ways in which we,
• 1:00:56
  SPEAKER_00: to reference your first book,
• 1:00:57
  SPEAKER_00: Seculosity,
• 1:00:58
  seeing the different ways in which we seek meaning and
• 1:01:02
  community and identity
• 1:01:04
  SPEAKER_00: through these different avenues that are not the church and seeing their
• 1:01:09
  SPEAKER_00: limitations and
• 1:01:11
  And then I think Low Anthropology is such an essential book for
• 1:01:15
  church ministry
• 1:01:16
  only because it plays into those conversations that the church
• 1:01:20
  has had for several
• 1:01:20
  SPEAKER_00: centuries relating to what are humans capable of.
• 1:01:24
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to be theological,
• 1:01:25
  this is the old Augustine versus Pelagius sort of conversation
• 1:01:30
  all over again.
• 1:01:31
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not something that is time-specific.
• 1:01:37
  SPEAKER_00: This is something I think the church,
• 1:01:39
  SPEAKER_00: but just humans in general,
• 1:01:42
  SPEAKER_00: struggle with all of these notions.
• 1:01:44
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why I think the message of relief,
• 1:01:47
  the big relief that comes through the gospel is so pertinent
• 1:01:51
  and why it's so
• 1:01:52
  SPEAKER_00: enduring and why it's so relevant,
• 1:01:53
  SPEAKER_00: which again,
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_00: not to...
• 1:01:55
  SPEAKER_00: sing your praises,
• 1:01:56
  SPEAKER_00: but I think the trilogy of what these,
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_00: if you will,
• 1:02:00
  SPEAKER_00: the trilogy of what these books sort of seek to articulate,
• 1:02:03
  I think is such a helpful window into understanding the message
• 1:02:08
  that Jesus came to
• 1:02:09
  SPEAKER_00: not just articulate,
• 1:02:10
  SPEAKER_00: but embody,
• 1:02:12
  SPEAKER_00: which what other thing can we as ministers or preachers or writers think
• 1:02:19
  SPEAKER_00: seek to give to the world.
• 1:02:21
  This is,
• 1:02:23
  like you kind of said,
• 1:02:24
  this is the only thing that I ever want to be known for.
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you're doing it, Brad.
• 1:02:33
  SPEAKER_01: You're an amazing communicator about these core things.
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I
• 1:02:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you're right.
• 1:02:41
  SPEAKER_01: What else is there to do with one's life?
• 1:02:43
  SPEAKER_01: Or what higher calling is there?
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_01: There are plenty of other things to do, but I hope and pray that this...
• 1:02:54
  I will remain most likely fixated on trying to find new ways to
• 1:02:59
  convey the old
• 1:03:01
  SPEAKER_01: message because that's what I feel like God's given me.
• 1:03:09
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah,
• 1:03:10
  I hope this book does that for some folks and also maybe turns
• 1:03:14
  them onto some cool
• 1:03:17
  SPEAKER_01: books and movies and documentaries in the process.
• 1:03:21
  SPEAKER_00: Which,
• 1:03:21
  SPEAKER_00: uh,
• 1:03:22
  SPEAKER_00: speaking of which,
• 1:03:23
  if you had to pick sort of the best we could say grace and
• 1:03:28
  practice TV show or
• 1:03:30
  SPEAKER_00: movie that you've seen recently,
• 1:03:32
  SPEAKER_00: what,
• 1:03:32
  SPEAKER_00: what would that be?
• 1:03:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'm always curious for your take on this.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so many, um,
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_01: I was watching the King of Kong last night with my son,
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_01: which is a documentary about Donkey Kong.
• 1:03:50
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a huge amount of grace in that in that movie.
• 1:03:55
  SPEAKER_01: But it's in a slightly you kind of have to unpack it a little bit.
• 1:04:02
  SPEAKER_01: What would I say right now?
• 1:04:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh,
• 1:04:04
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 1:04:05
  SPEAKER_01: I love,
• 1:04:06
  SPEAKER_01: I talk about a number of different documentaries in that if you haven't,
• 1:04:10
  SPEAKER_01: if people haven't seen the rescue,
• 1:04:11
  SPEAKER_01: uh,
• 1:04:13
  SPEAKER_01: that I talked about in the last,
• 1:04:14
  about the national geographic documentary about the soccer team
• 1:04:19
  being rescued from
• 1:04:20
  SPEAKER_01: the drowning in the caves in Thailand,
• 1:04:24
  SPEAKER_01: that is about as,
• 1:04:28
  SPEAKER_01: um,
• 1:04:32
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
• 1:04:33
  SPEAKER_01: tear-jerking,
• 1:04:33
  SPEAKER_01: but also miraculous and almost head-scratching,
• 1:04:38
  SPEAKER_01: an example of grace in practice that I've ever seen.
• 1:04:45
  SPEAKER_01: And if you'd written it, people wouldn't believe it.
• 1:04:48
  SPEAKER_01: So that's one of the reasons why I like to use documentaries.
• 1:04:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:04:53
  SPEAKER_00: The one for me is,
• 1:04:55
  SPEAKER_00: and I was really late to the game because I just watched it,
• 1:04:57
  SPEAKER_00: is the movie The Holdovers,
• 1:05:01
  SPEAKER_00: which I was just so moved by.
• 1:05:03
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, gosh.
• 1:05:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's it, too.
• 1:05:07
  SPEAKER_01: Big time.
• 1:05:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mentioned I have a list in the book in the atonement chapter.
• 1:05:14
  I talk about people can criticize ideas about substitutionary
• 1:05:18
  atonement all day long,
• 1:05:18
  SPEAKER_01: but try not crying at the holdovers or at the end of Harry Potter.
• 1:05:26
  When we see someone give their life for another person in their stead,
• 1:05:31
  we have an emotional...
• 1:05:34
  SPEAKER_01: the floodgates open.
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so you can debate all day long about the particulars of,
• 1:05:41
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 1:05:41
  SPEAKER_01: penal substitution or whatnot,
• 1:05:43
  SPEAKER_01: or however you want to put it.
• 1:05:44
  SPEAKER_01: But if you've,
• 1:05:47
  you have to also trust the way that the storytelling kind of
• 1:05:54
  punctures all of those
• 1:05:56
  SPEAKER_01: defenses and renders them almost insubstantial.
• 1:06:01
  SPEAKER_02: Hmm.
• 1:06:04
  SPEAKER_01: Mare of Easttown is another one.
• 1:06:05
  SPEAKER_00: I love that one.
• 1:06:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 1:06:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's a really good one, too.
• 1:06:09
  SPEAKER_00: Dave, it's so good to see you and have you on.
• 1:06:11
  SPEAKER_00: I don't want to hold you up, but I'll just give you a last word.
• 1:06:14
  SPEAKER_00: Anything else that you want to share,
• 1:06:16
  SPEAKER_00: not only about Big Relief,
• 1:06:17
  SPEAKER_00: but Mockingbird next week,
• 1:06:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'll just give you a last word.
• 1:06:20
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm just really grateful for your time.
• 1:06:22
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Brad.
• 1:06:26
  SPEAKER_01: No, I mean, I wrote this book as something that
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to say I wrote it totally for – I wrote it for people.
• 1:06:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't try to make too much of a distinction between Christians and non.
• 1:06:37
  But I would love it if it became – the thing that makes me the
• 1:06:40
  happiest about low
• 1:06:41
  anthropology is when people say I gave it to my family members
• 1:06:45
  or I gave it to my
• 1:06:45
  SPEAKER_01: friends who were –
• 1:06:47
  sort of spiritually curious but you know also turned off by
• 1:06:52
  this or that aspect of
• 1:06:53
  Christianity like I love hearing those stories and so yeah if
• 1:06:58
  it becomes a gift you
• 1:06:59
  I wanted the world is in need of more books that you can hand
• 1:07:04
  to the friend who's
• 1:07:05
  SPEAKER_01: curious or maybe at a place in their life where
• 1:07:08
  SPEAKER_01: They're open and say, here's something.
• 1:07:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's not written by an Oxford professor from the 1940s.
• 1:07:15
  SPEAKER_01: As great as those books are, that's a different cultural context.
• 1:07:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is written from ours.
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I hope that it will speak on that level.
• 1:07:28
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm grateful for the fact that anyone is paying attention.
• 1:07:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so thank you, Brad, for having me on.
• 1:07:35
  SPEAKER_01: And thank you, anyone who's listened or followed our work.
• 1:07:38
  SPEAKER_01: We sure appreciate it.
• 1:07:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thanks so much for listening.
• 1:07:41
  SPEAKER_00: I hope you've been blessed by this episode.
• 1:07:43
  SPEAKER_00: If you haven't yet,
• 1:07:44
  please go to wherever you find your podcast and subscribe to
• 1:07:47
  Ministry Minded on Apple,
• 1:07:49
  SPEAKER_00: Spotify,
• 1:07:50
  SPEAKER_00: or right here on Substack.
• 1:07:52
  SPEAKER_00: Once again,
• 1:07:52
  I'm so thankful for Dave and his availability to come on and
• 1:07:56
  talk about his new book,
• 1:07:57
  SPEAKER_00: The Big Relief.
• 1:07:57
  SPEAKER_00: If you haven't yet, make sure to go to the link in the show notes.
• 1:08:00
  SPEAKER_00: Get that book ordered.
• 1:08:01
  SPEAKER_00: It releases on April 29th.
• 1:08:04
  SPEAKER_00: So this is coming out right before the book releases everywhere.
• 1:08:08
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure you go there, get your orders.
• 1:08:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I think you won't want to miss this book.
• 1:08:13
  SPEAKER_00: I can guarantee you that.
• 1:08:15
  So also,
• 1:08:16
  I just want to say I appreciate all your encouragement,
• 1:08:20
  all of your support.
• 1:08:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much, as always, for listening and subscribing.
• 1:08:24
  SPEAKER_00: And until next time, I'll see you on the next episode.
• 1:08:27
  SPEAKER_00: Blessings.