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Tragedies in our World & Charlie Kirk · Red Couch Theology

0:18
All right, so final question, and we're on pace actually.
0:23
So look at this. My question is about the part
0:25
where you in this sense, breezed over all the tragedies in the
0:31
past week at the beginning of the church service and called
0:35
Charlie Kirk a political commentator instead of diving
0:38
into how ugly this was and helping us process healing.
0:43
And I think that that's maybe the the crux of this question is
0:48
this like it felt so big. The time that we spent wasn't
0:53
enough time to heal. So hopefully you can dig into it
0:57
more on the right couch theology, which we had planned
0:59
to. And I feel like maybe you wanted
1:01
to play it safe or something. I just sort of curiosity around
1:06
how it was handled and and it felt lighter than the emotion
1:11
was for some folks in the room. Yeah, yeah, this, this is a.
1:16
Oh, even the language of like, was he a martyr?
1:18
Was he not? He was his family.
1:20
He was a man of faith. Yeah.
1:22
Yeah, so these these ones are always super.
1:26
I think hard to know like, like I, I actually think we, we were
1:34
hit as people, as a community with, with actually 3 tragedies
1:40
in a short space of time like, and sometimes tragedies as huge
1:45
and abstract. Like you, you pick up a
1:47
newspaper or you go online and you see 200,000 people died in
1:52
an earthquake in Nepal or India or you know, some, some country
1:59
far from here geographically. And you feel like you're
2:01
supposed to feel something about it and you actually or
2:05
unequipped to really feel it because it's very distant to
2:09
you. And then you have three things
2:11
that, depending on who you are, like, really affect you deeply.
2:20
A young lady, Irina Zorozka, immigrant from Ukraine, come
2:26
escaping war. And then she's killed like
2:30
brutally on a train. And for some people, that's,
2:35
that's that's the big story, Yeah.
2:38
And then you've got another school shooting in Colorado, 13
2:43
and. 25 minutes from here. Yeah, and 25 minutes from here
2:47
with people in our community that have and do live in that
2:50
area, like we have some friends that they're they're right in
2:54
that space. Their kids happen to go to our
2:56
kids school, but it's it's right there.
3:01
And so we were actually having a conversation with a guy before
3:03
the service who kind of tongue in cheek said like, you know,
3:06
you're going to talk about banning assault weapons because
3:10
like he's lived in that environment and you know, so, so
3:14
you got tons of teachers in a place like South who like maybe
3:19
come in with that on their mind. Like that's the the least.
3:22
Story shooting, yeah. Like this has happened again.
3:25
We've got families that went through STEM, the shooting there
3:28
in Highlands Ranch, like this is like come so close to our
3:33
community over the years. And then you've got Charlie
3:36
Kirk, who is this figure that especially if you love online
3:42
videos is larger than life. Like, like, and, and actually, I
3:47
actually said to someone, I didn't plan to call him a
3:50
political commentator. I actually had not written
3:52
anything at all. And then suddenly had this
3:54
moment on stage where I'm like, there's probably some people
3:57
here who don't even know who he is.
3:59
Like there's some people that are that are not online, people
4:03
that are not. Yes, I know several of them
4:05
where they're like, what happened and who is this guy?
4:07
So, so like this, you're suddenly aware like, oh man,
4:11
I've got to really quickly tell people like this is a story all
4:16
of the time. While doing that, you're aware
4:19
that there's all sorts of people that want one story, maybe to be
4:23
the the the the lead story. And then also, if you don't
4:29
point people to Jesus as a pastor, you know, you've really
4:33
failed in the moment. Like if you can't move people to
4:38
and our only hope is in Jesus, like, what do you do?
4:45
So like, like, actually the challenge is this is a worship
4:49
service like, and I actually love that there's, you know,
4:51
there's people that are, are finding ways to grieve well over
4:56
some of these horrific things. But we're in a worship service
4:58
where you're trying to keep Jesus the lead story when it'd
5:04
be really easy to look at some other things.
5:08
So I actually, I actually felt like I spent as much energy,
5:11
like space and time thinking through what to say about what's
5:15
going on in the world as the sermon this week because it
5:21
feels like it's a felt need, understandably like and all
5:25
three of them just like. When the emotions raw, it feels
5:28
like a gaping wound. And just like, are we going to
5:30
talk about the gaping wound in our soul?
5:31
All three. Of them are just horrific as
5:33
well, aren't they? They're like all three of them
5:35
are things that I would hope everyone in South like
5:38
regardless of where they are, like from a back ethnic
5:41
background or from a like political stance would be able
5:45
to look at and say these these are just like.
5:49
Deeply troubled these. Are just deeply troubling and
5:53
and I think actually I'd, I'd want to say if you feel one
5:58
story is bigger than the others, that's actually fine.
6:01
Like that, that there's no judgement on that.
6:03
You connect with the story that you connect with.
6:06
Yeah. And I actually like, for me,
6:13
like I really felt like all of them hit me on like a wave
6:18
level. Yeah.
6:21
You know, you, you kind of like, I actually was really connected
6:25
to the the arena story because as an immigrant coming to a
6:30
different country and and like how young she was and like just
6:34
the, the IT was all on all the news videos and everything and
6:38
just the loneliness of it. She has this moment where she's
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just left on a train and everyone just walks off like and
6:45
you watch it and you're like, what the hell is wrong with
6:48
people? Like you just do something like
6:50
this and you just leave. So that story, like I actually
6:53
spent a lot of time just almost like, what is wrong with this
6:57
world? What's wrong with the psyche of
7:00
people? Yeah, like, and I, so just to
7:03
interject my emotion around it, actually the Charlie Kirk one
7:07
maybe hit me the most, but I actually had almost some guilt
7:12
about that. And I started asking myself,
7:16
well, like, has there been that many school shootings that it's
7:21
starting to just become like par for the course that my emotions
7:25
can't like rise to the occasion anymore to like meet that
7:29
travesty the where it should. And I do full confession, watch
7:35
a lot of YouTube videos and I have spent quite a bit of time
7:38
listening to him debate folks and stuff like that.
7:42
So it's just like I have a stronger face recognition,
7:47
ideology, recognition, whatever with this particular character.
7:51
And so I was actually, like, caught in the middle of, like, I
7:56
felt it more immediately about Charlie Kirk, but I felt like I
8:01
should feel more about the shooting.
8:04
Well, I and. So I was like, Now I'm afraid
8:07
that I'm misfeeling. Things so I, I think in the end,
8:10
like, so I had that first story and that really, yeah, it really
8:15
just hit me hard for some reason.
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I couldn't, you know, and, and, and obviously she's, she's a
8:22
young, like beautiful woman as well.
8:23
So actually people talk about that.
8:25
Like there's something about beauty that's like almost sad.
8:27
And so you like, you almost feel like, which isn't a value on
8:31
people. It's just actually, just
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actually something we've talked about philosophically, like see
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something like that removed from the world.
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There's almost like a, you know, like a, like a, a loss to it.
8:41
And then and then with the school shooting, there's this
8:44
immediate sense of like, you know, this is happening right
8:47
now. It's right down the road.
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It's like you and I both have school age kids and you actually
8:53
at times start to feel like we just like playing a lottery.
8:57
Like it's just like, you know, like, hey, I guess your odds are
9:00
OK. Like is that?
9:03
Is that what you? We dodged another one.
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And then there's other people that are writing, I mean,
9:08
they're one of the kids is still in, in hospital right now.
9:10
And and then there's people in the community that, you know,
9:13
that are tied to the others. Like there's a trauma every time
9:17
this comes on the news. I was just, I think I said in
9:20
that the, the, the time I spent, I was just chatting to someone
9:24
from Columbine the other day. He was there.
9:29
And just like as soon as she says that, you can see just her
9:33
face just almost dropped. She's.
9:35
A part of who she is. Dealing that story and it's 2025
9:39
years old and then when it got to like I actually happened to
9:44
be at home working when the they announced that that Charlie Kirk
9:50
had been shot and I actually that that actually like story
9:54
for me hit really deep like to the point of like just just like
10:02
a lot of prayer like joining a lot of people in prayer in the
10:05
moments after that before they announced that that he died like
10:14
in that that story I carried really deeply in a way that that
10:20
I don't know if I would say it surprised me I I'd watched a
10:23
fair amount of his videos online and I but like like with
10:28
everyone with me there was stuff he said that I really agreed
10:31
with and stuff he said that I didn't agree with but that's
10:33
like every person who's ever lived except Jesus and and we.
10:37
Actually, even Jesus, I've had times where I struggled, but
10:40
yes, yes, yes, I shouldn't. Yeah.
10:42
And with Jesus like my, my, my, my tension has been, well, I
10:48
disagree, but I'm going to accept that I'm almost certainly
10:51
wrong. Yeah, so, so I, yeah, definitely
10:54
stuff that I thought was, was brilliant and I and I, I valued
10:59
and almost actually envied some of his courage and his like,
11:04
willingness to carry a debate. And then also like stylistically
11:08
felt like we're actually polar opposites.
11:11
Like for me, like there's a gentleness to like how I
11:16
approach conversations and a like a posture and, and, and so
11:21
like I, I didn't connect with the like the style which.
11:25
The tone. The tone of voice.
11:27
So, so obviously just brilliant in his recall and his mastering
11:33
of debate. So, so I'd like, I'd watch, but
11:38
but actually like, and I think this is just the human level,
11:42
actually just connected with a young person or you relatively
11:47
young adult of faith with young kids and a wife doing something
11:52
really publicly. And then like the fallout of
11:59
that of like this. Not only shouldn't this happen
12:04
in, in, in a country that's healthy, where you can't hold
12:11
like, well reasoned safe debate when no one's forcing people to
12:16
come and have a conversation like that's and, and any of us
12:20
that have debated with someone who's smarter than us know how
12:22
deeply frustrating that is. Yeah.
12:24
Yeah. It's, it's, it's a horrific
12:26
experience. Yeah, I do it every single
12:28
Thursday at 11 AM. And and so you kind of like not
12:37
only should this not happen, but but it's actually not even just
12:42
the, the like the world has lost a light thing that the thing
12:49
other people carry. And I and I really get that.
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But for me, like a wife lost her husband, kids lost a father.
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Yeah. And I think that that's also the
13:00
like the weird human psychology that is totally understandable.
13:05
Yeah. Like you have a face and a name
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and an encounter with like more of a humanized personality that
13:16
may that that anchored all the tragedies that we've mentioned
13:21
into an actual person. So I think it almost like the
13:25
emotion can kind of consolidate on him, and rightfully so,
13:29
because it was a, a face you recognized and a story and A and
13:33
a knowledge of the family situation that allows you to
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then feel all the travesties consolidated into a into a
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narrative. And I think the other component
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of this conversation that I think is hard to address in a
13:46
service and if efficiently is the the surge of angst and anger
13:55
on the political parties that associate specifically with
13:59
Charlie Kirk. Because you see on one side of
14:04
the aisle, on one extreme side of the aisle, you see a whole
14:07
bunch of people like celebrating.
14:09
We took them out. And that feels so gross that
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you're just like, what is our world?
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Almost in the same sense that you felt with the with the
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immigrant. What's her name again?
14:25
Yeah. Irena.
14:26
So like the fact that a whole bunch of people could just,
14:29
like, walk off and leave this, like, solitude travesty sitting
14:35
there on a train. It's like, what is our world?
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And then on the other side of the aisle you have folks saying
14:42
like, see, we've lost this, this like great voice for our
14:47
community and this is just proof that we should basically snuff
14:53
out the other side fully, basically retaliate like blow
14:58
for blow. Not I like the eye for eye,
15:00
tooth for tooth kind of mentality, which also doesn't
15:03
feel like the way of Jesus. That is like I choose to be
15:07
killed and murdered on a cross to die for my enemies, not to
15:10
kill my enemies. So and both feel really, really
15:17
confusing and toxic and emotional and all of this stuff
15:21
and you're just like, wow, it's just a lot.
15:23
It's a lot. It's a lot to it always reminds
15:25
me of that phrase. I'm trying to remember who the
15:27
author was. Like man's inhumanity to man
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like that is uniquely a human thing.
15:37
Like the delight in the suffering of another person.
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And, and you see that in this instance.
15:45
You see it when there's the like the brutal removal of
15:52
immigrants, even if it's legally like a right thing to do.
15:57
And there's people that are going about a hard task that
16:00
they feel like Paul to do. Like, again, not trying to wade
16:03
into that political minefield, but the delight in the suffering
16:07
of people, the delight in, in like, oh, justice is gum.
16:13
And that feels so like actually like that's not who we're called
16:17
to be as humans. Like the way of Jesus is, is
16:22
categorically the love of an enemy like that.
16:26
That is the most groundbreaking thing that he says.
16:29
If you like Jesus, then the hard thing you're asked to wrestle
16:33
with is love your enemy and no and that.
16:36
Means your political enemy, yes. And not no like, well, it was
16:42
deserved thing or they had it coming thing justify.
16:48
There's no level it can get to according to Jesus.
16:52
Like if Jesus can love his enemies in the midst of the
16:55
single worst thing that's ever happened in the history of the
16:58
world, which is the crucifixion of the Son of God.
17:03
If he can do that in that, then that's our call, even when it's
17:07
stupidly hard. And that has been the most
17:09
transforming thing in our world. Like the author Malcolm Gladwell
17:14
talks about how the thing that brought him back to his
17:18
childhood faith was he went to interview a couple in in Canada
17:23
whose son had been murdered. And he went to them.
17:28
The the couple went to the man in the courtroom and hugged him
17:33
and said, we love you. Our prayers are for you.
17:37
And he couldn't believe that anybody could do this, he said.
17:41
There's no natural explanation in my mind.
17:43
There has to be a spiritual power that is enabling these
17:48
people to do what they're doing. Yeah, yeah.
17:52
And you get the impression that. So maybe this is like from God's
17:59
perspective, you get the the impression that if Jesus were to
18:05
weigh in on this, this all these travesties, he would be able to
18:10
with genuine from the bottom of his heart, empathy, empathize
18:15
with the left, with the right, with all those involved, and see
18:22
right past the brokenness to the actual humanity behind it, and
18:26
then embrace with with so and. This is the appropriate love
18:29
because I agree with you. Like, the only thing I would say
18:31
in that is that, and I don't think this is what you were
18:34
saying, but I, I just worry it's what people might hear.
18:37
I don't think Jesus empathizes ever with political groups.
18:44
I don't think he emphasized empathizes with.
18:46
Yeah, yeah, yeah, with. Structures and things.
18:49
He empathizes. With people, with people like.
18:52
Individual people like you. I mean the ones hurting on the
18:56
left, totally the ones hurting and.
18:58
I totally agree, but I just I think it's an empathization with
19:03
with like the the any philosophy, like all
19:07
philosophies must bow to Jesus is constantly what we hear.
19:10
King of Kings, Lord of Lords, His Kingdom, No.
19:12
No others. Yep.
19:15
And so like, like, I think he empathizes with people in their
19:20
anger over these situations. The person who looks at an
19:24
immigrant from another country and says this, like, how can
19:27
this happen? And feels that anger, you know,
19:31
maybe the failure of courts or the brokenness of humanity, all
19:36
of those different things. The person who looks at another
19:40
school shooting and says what is wrong with us as a country that
19:43
we haven't done something to stop these things happening,
19:47
whatever it takes. And the person who looks at
19:51
Charlie Kirk and says like this needs vengeance.
19:57
He understands, I think, the emotion, and he's with you in
20:01
those feelings. But he constantly points us
20:05
towards his Kingdom. And that has never felt fair.
20:08
It doesn't feel fair that Stephen, like a young man
20:11
following Jesus, is stoned to death.
20:16
It feels like there should be vengeance.
20:19
And the early church practiced love of enemy to the point that
20:22
the the person who was most involved in it, they welcomed.
20:27
Into their fold and became one of the greatest leaders ever.
20:31
It it it is never felt fair. But.
20:35
But it's not always not fair. Yeah, it's not fair.
20:39
But the the the the grace of God is not fair.
20:48
Yeah. So yeah.
20:51
There you have it. I feel like I feel like
20:54
anything, any treatment of. So here's the reality in these
21:00
in when travesty hits, especially when they're layered,
21:05
like you said, a wave, it's like, OK, one wave hits you and
21:09
then another one hits you and then another one hits you.
21:11
It's like the meter on the car that's just redlining
21:15
Emotionally, it, it feels like talking about it is never gonna
21:20
be sufficient. It's just some time the Spirit
21:25
of God, the kindness of Jesus, though some sort of combination
21:33
of all those things are the things that bring healing.
21:36
Because no matter what you and I say on a podcast, it's not going
21:40
to feel like it's enough. It's I feel like that's just.
21:44
Yeah. And, and yeah, I agree with
21:47
that. And I, and I, you know, I, the,
21:49
the person that sent the question in, we've talked like
21:52
1:00 to 1:00 and we talked about like the, the feeling and I
21:57
understand this, that it might feel like the, the, the easy way
22:01
out. Actually, what, what I said is
22:05
to me, it's the opposite of the easy way out.
22:08
Like, the easiest thing you can do is just have a church that
22:14
just says this is the thing that you all must be worried about
22:18
and speak only to that to pick one to say we're just going to
22:23
lean into that. Or to pick a political science,
22:25
we're just going to lean into that.
22:28
And those who don't like it won't stay, and the ones who do
22:31
will consolidate. Around.
22:32
Yeah, absolutely. It's far harder to to just point
22:38
people to Jesus in the midst of three equally horrific things
22:44
and say in the midst of all our combined grieving, we're going
22:50
to try to turn our eyes towards Jesus.
22:55
I actually think that's the hard way out, not the easy way out,
23:01
but but I also could be wrong on that.
23:04
Yeah. And so a moment in the service
23:06
that I didn't like this is like a beautiful thing about how the
23:10
spirit works. But this was comforting to me in
23:13
all of this. You hadn't decided.
23:17
You told me early in the week that you would maybe say
23:20
something, but you didn't know what to say yet and that you
23:24
were processing. So I had had a prayer planned
23:28
for the service, just a normal service.
23:31
And then you came up to me on Sunday and you said, like, I
23:34
spent a a significant chunk of time thinking and processing,
23:37
praying. And I've written up a thing.
23:39
Let's move that prayer out for this week.
23:41
And can I have that space? So that means the songs that I
23:45
chose were connected to either this prayer or to your sermon.
23:50
They weren't connected to the thing.
23:51
And then I felt like in in God's wisdom and kindness and knowing
23:55
in advance what he was going to speak to you and in planning the
23:59
setlist right after you shared this stuff, I it felt so right
24:04
to sing the words of good grace. People come together, strangers,
24:11
strangest neighbors. Your blood is one children of
24:15
generations, every nation of Kingdom come.
24:18
Don't let your heart be troubled.
24:20
Hold your head up high. Don't fear no evil.
24:23
Fix your eyes on this one thing truth.
24:26
God is madly in love with you. Take courage, hold on, be
24:31
strong. Remember where your help comes
24:33
from Jesus our redemption our salvation in is his blood like
24:40
that was so moving to sing that with my church family after you
24:44
sharing this and no out there like if you're a member of South
24:50
we as S leaders are gonna try and if this ever isn't true
24:55
anymore. You have my full permission to
24:59
depart S But we're gonna try our best to make sure that Jesus is
25:03
the lead story in every single service as much as we can
25:08
without also ignoring the travesties of the world.
25:12
Because the gospel is more beautiful when we see Jesus
25:14
meeting. Those Well, well, this yeah.
25:16
And, and I think I would would add I, I am pretty convinced
25:21
that when you think of like how politics effects effects, I
25:24
think see things that the spectrum of politics is not a
25:27
line, it's a horseshoe. I actually think the extremes of
25:30
the left and right have more in common with each other than than
25:35
almost everybody else. Yeah, if you want that unpacked
25:37
fully, there's another podcast called This Cultural Moment that
25:40
kind of uses that. Yeah, unpacks that.
25:42
Which has been So it's a horseshoe like the the two
25:44
points almost meet at the end, and yet Jesus took people from
25:50
the very extremes of the horseshoe of his day and brought
25:54
them together as his followers. Which speaks to the pull of
25:59
Jesus, the magnetic pull of Jesus that says wherever you
26:03
might be, he can lead you in making his Kingdom.
26:07
The only thing that really matters, that in this world you
26:11
will have sorrow. But take heart.
26:13
He has overcome the world. And so whatever you feeling
26:19
right now, I think that's his invitation.
26:21
I think we should definitely end with prayer in the midst of the
26:25
grief. And maybe we'll end up splitting
26:27
this part of the episode from the other part.
26:30
I don't know. So, so that it's easily
26:32
accessible. Yeah.
26:34
But that, that's, that's what we've got in a week, though.
26:36
I think you're always, you know, the hardest funerals for me to
26:42
do are ones that are personally full of grief.
26:46
Yeah. Actually, the weeks where the,
26:50
the times where I've done funerals where I don't know the
26:52
person, I can actually function as primarily A carer to other
26:58
people and you're actually somewhat detached from it.
27:02
But when you end up doing funerals where you're like, I am
27:05
so involved in this thing. Yeah, this thing like, like it's
27:09
hard. To be a comforter.
27:10
One of my first funerals I, I did was my grandmother.
27:17
And you feel that deeply. So, so when you're a church
27:20
pastor in these weeks like this, where you've had three things
27:23
that grab at your heart in different ways, and you, you're
27:28
trying at the same time to care for the people, that's not an
27:34
easy thing to do. And so I don't say that saying,
27:38
hey, you should really feel really sorry for me.
27:41
It's just a reminder that when you see someone trying to
27:44
navigate those things, you're also watching a person also
27:49
trying to navigate for themselves too.
27:53
And so if you imagine with all your different emotions, what it
27:56
would be like to try and do that, like I think you start to
28:00
see some of the challenge. Yep.
28:02
Because I think people think if I got up there, it'd be really
28:05
easy to say what I felt. But you're not.
28:09
Yeah. So I think it's it's hard.
28:11
It's harder to to to navigate those things than it seems, I
28:15
think. Yeah, well, let's pray.
28:19
Jesus, we are a grieving people. It's like so often in this life,
28:27
maybe there's something personally in this season that's
28:30
different to all these things. That is the lead story for some
28:34
of our listeners, a loved one who's going through some deep
28:40
traumatic sicknesses and we're getting ready to say some
28:46
goodbyes that that are very close and very personal.
28:51
In some ways bigger than these stories that we've talked about
28:54
because you're in it, in this deep personal relationship.
29:00
Think of those people that we know in our community who have
29:03
loved ones that are sick and in pain and we ask that you would
29:08
be with them. Think about those people in our
29:12
community and listeners that there's a lead story here this
29:16
week that just stands out from the others and you know their
29:22
frustration and angst and you're with them.
29:29
You care for them, you feel those feelings with them.
29:34
Yes, and yet we're also just deeply aware that your purpose
29:40
in our grief is not to lead us into anger and to hate, but is
29:47
to lead us deeper in the way of Jesus, which is most exemplified
29:54
by your surprising and earth shattering command to love our
29:59
enemies. That feels like it's out of
30:04
reach a lot of the time. And yeah, it's what your people
30:08
look like. And so, in the times where we
30:11
feel like we can't do that anymore, help us to believe what
30:16
you say, to trust that you are potentially a fair bit wiser
30:22
than us, and to obey your call. I pray for us each and our grief
30:31
that you would bring healing to our hearts and to our country.
30:35
Amen. Amen.
30:38
All right, everyone, thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next
30:42
week. Send your questions.
30:43
This actually makes the show what it was meant to be.
30:46
Appreciate it. Bye.