Latest / Millennial Mustard Seed / S6 209. Days of Noah Pt 2 - Navigating Authenticity in a Controversial World

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S6 209. Days of Noah Pt 2 - Navigating Authenticity in a Controversial World · Millennial Mustard Seed

0:01
Hello folks, this is Princess. You are listening to the
0:04
Millennial Mustard Seed podcast. Thanks for listening.
0:07
Don't forget to share with your friends.
0:11
That's tough. We're in a very tough spot.
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I think that what we're doing right now is a great benefit and
0:17
virtue because. It's an end.
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Around between this whole corrupt informational system,
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media system, we claim to believe in a God who spoke the
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universe into existence and literally raised himself from
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the dead. And yet we're not going to
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believe that anything else exists in the spirit realm, even
0:37
though His word tells us that they do.
0:40
Their bodies weren't permitted to go to sleep like humans do,
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and they weren't permitted to go to heaven, so they wander the
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earth. You know, I've seen the eyes
0:50
turn black to unknown tongues being spoken.
0:55
These Giants would love way up in the Highland.
0:58
The young Braves, the young men would might have been the trees.
1:01
They wait for one of these 12 footers to come.
1:03
Walking down the bath and. They would jump on them and kill
1:06
them, drag them back to the village, and the village would
1:08
feast on the body. Then people start to get
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weapons, they start to get armor, they start to build
1:18
cities, they start to fortify their cities.
1:20
Now God looks down and there's violence everywhere.
1:24
The battle, this war that we are at, is not against each other,
1:28
it's against these principalities and these rulers
1:30
and these archons in the high places.
1:32
It's really worthwhile to read the Bible yourself.
1:35
Fear is one of the primary drivers of mind control because
1:40
we have to take every thought captive and resist fear.
1:46
You're going to have a testimony that is a justice case against
1:52
the Kingdom of darkness. Welcome Music to the Days of
2:25
Noah podcast where we talk all things biblical, supernatural,
2:28
and strange. Luke, myself and Rod Smith from
2:34
the Millennial Mustard Seed podcast conclude our
2:37
conversation on the deconstruction and
2:40
reconstruction of our church meetings.
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Understanding that there is a huge gap between how we were
2:49
meant to meet and the fully functioning body of Christ and
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the limitations and the potential sapping man made
2:58
traditions that have been added to how we meet as believers.
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We try to flesh out, even just briefly, many of those bullet
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points that need deconstruction, those man made things, and then
3:14
contrast that to how we are meeting as some of us are
3:19
meeting in homes. Not that the home is a
3:23
necessity, but that it is conducive for that face to face,
3:28
eyeball to eyeball, every member participating church meeting.
3:35
Guys, thanks so much for being out there listening.
3:37
We do appreciate each and everyone of you coming back week
3:41
after week. If you enjoy this content and
3:44
you would like to support us, the easiest way to do that is to
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simply take a moment to leave us a five star or positive written
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review on your favorite podcast platform and then share the link
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to family and friends. With that, let's conclude our
4:02
conversation about the fully functioning body of Christ.
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You know, overarching in the Bible, God tells us subdue the
4:15
earth, conquer, procreate, right?
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So we know that we're supposed to have land, we're supposed to
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have houses. Doctor Monzo goes through and
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shows that in the Hebrew, there's the construction that
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the pictograph at the ancient Hebrew even demonstrates every
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root letter and meaning equates to the same value of a house, a
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family and land. So I just want to challenge, and
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this is not for your individual question, Luke.
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This is for the zooming out to the macrocosm of this issue.
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How many churches own buildings in your local city?
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Now I want you to start to look at the cities as you travel
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across your state. You know I'm in literally the
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population census of New York City to Washington DC, huge
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population. If I was to do a search on how
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many churches own a building and what that building generates tax
5:08
credit wise, the maintenance of that building, right?
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And I was to reflect and look for any of that in the Bible, I
5:17
can't find it. But what I can find is the
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absence of a highly detailed edifying structure that God has
5:24
created for the pruning of the perfecting of his body, which is
5:29
fivefold ministry. So I would start to say things
5:32
like, if you have a building that's paid off, maybe sell it
5:35
and get land, right and pop up some small buildings with a rec
5:40
center in the middle, middle of that land.
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Why are there so many churches that own buildings?
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And I'm saying this with a right heart because literally it's
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just like being meek, reserving my power, right?
5:52
I could come for the jugular of so many people and do it
5:55
righteously and with an anointing on me.
5:58
But I'm reserving myself in a gentleness to say, listen, let's
6:02
think about what is wrong here, right?
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Because God is, is going to in his perfect timing, move a
6:09
generation of people to be completely in agreement with
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this idea that we have been institutionalized and the
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function of the institution, the tax credit and the dynamic of
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the what do you call this denominational preferences is is
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not found in the Bible. So I would say get land.
6:31
If you have a big building and it's paid off, sell it, get
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land, get a smaller building and encourage a biblical model of
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meet ups. That's from my perspective.
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Not everybody's going to agree with me.
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You know, the whole cult thing that you brought up where 12
6:44
people. I think that that's a little bit
6:45
religious and strict. I think there needs to be a
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period, almost like a honeymoon, where you're figuring out what
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are the highs and lows. Can I really trust you?
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You know, I wrote this little quote in my book, Luke.
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It's it says trust is built when you're in danger and I get
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closer to you rather than running away.
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That's the premises of love. So like when you're going
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through it, you're in the gutter.
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And this is what the men's prayer group does that that God
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has given me. This is why we're so involved.
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This is why we're driving to meet and sharpen and just
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engaging with each other on a daily, weekly basis is because
7:20
you have the opportunity to show yourself a soldier of Christ
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Jesus bearing each other's burdens and so fulfilling the
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law. So like as it grows, we're
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busting out the seams. You said, OK, well then let's
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look for land first because there's obviously SRA survivors.
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There's real widows out there who have lost their spouses, who
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have not opened up their legs to any and everybody walking by who
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are a true biblical widow. And there's true orphans out
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there who have been disconnected from their their mother and
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their father. Their bloodline has been cut
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short of having that role model who need that's good and perfect
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understanding that God is giving us.
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So I'm I'm my whole thing. God has been planning into me
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land and it the land belongs to the people.
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We've been usurped. We have abdicated our authority
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in so many ways that we're sitting here trying to play
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minus and plus in the construction of what is ensnared
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us, rather than zooming out and just saying God, are you doing
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something new? What is happening?
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What do I do? There's something like 300
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billion billion dollars worth of real estate that churches have
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in, in this country alone, United States.
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Do we really think that our couple hours a week and maybe a
8:38
few midweek activities is worth that, that multimillion dollar
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mortgage in most cases when there are these people
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suffering, like Rod says, I mean, our, our group in our
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living room, there's only two or three of us that actually give
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to this out of a dozen regularly that is.
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But I have a savings and we've been able to bless people with
9:04
benevolence when they have a need or a ministry opportunity.
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Boom. What do you guys think?
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By consensus, not democracy, consensus.
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That's how you discern where to go with these funds.
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I, I think we have, I think Satan loves the traditional
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church model, even though it's doing good, even though God
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blesses it because people's hearts are willing towards him
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because it hinders it. And, and maybe this is a good
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point where we can kind of switch gears to kind of the pros
9:35
and cons of, of these different deconstruction reconstructing
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things. So let me just jump through this
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list quick and we'll unpack some of these.
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And then I have a few quotes too from Frank's book Reimagining
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Church. So these are some things I I
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jotted down before we recorded last time with Rick Ecclesia
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versus church, right, or you could say it organic church
10:02
versus institutional. So as we're just talking about,
10:06
right, we have the building, we have the cost, we have the
10:10
function of a stage versus spectators.
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So we're creating passivity. We have a over arching, a over
10:20
reliance on this elder board, this pastor or team of pastors
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to teach us the right stuff. So what what ends up being, oh,
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we want to protect against bad doctrine actually entrenches it.
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We have a professional clergy which you do not see in
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scripture. That's something that came about
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man made where they are the ones with the answers.
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They are the ones we pay. And just to unlock those funds,
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if we didn't have to pay for the building, if we didn't have to
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pay for the pastor, I mean the church here in my hometown.
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Yeah, I'm still confused on that one though, because like I gave
11:01
the example of a missionary, what if an individual has the
11:05
giftings of a of a shepherd and wants to do that full time?
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So like actually being sent out or his day-to-day?
11:13
Let's say the the the mission field.
11:16
Let's let's go back to the missionary.
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So instead of me going to Iraq to minister.
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I do it in my big. City supported by Yes.
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OK. Then, then, then, then gather
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around as a body and and pray on that and do it.
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But do it because you're going to give that guy 60 grand a year
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and not 60 grand a year plus and an administrator and a youth
11:39
pastor and $1,000,000 mortgage, right The.
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Apostle Paul, he even says not all of you should be doing like
11:46
getting married, right? So he's talking about because
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when you get married, your first ministry is your wife and your
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household before you can minister outside of that.
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So like these are also things we need to consider with that
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question because that's an excellent question.
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And Luke, Luke, you're on point with some of the stuff because
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I, you're, you're literally going through it in your mind
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like and then well. Well, Pete, like if if you're
12:08
you're home church or you're Rod, you're you're home church.
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They identified a gifting in you guys where you don't have to go
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to the 9:00 to 5:00 anymore to make ends meet.
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The body is going to support you, you know, financially so
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you can still put food on the table and have a family.
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But you now you're taking your effort that you were doing at
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the 9:00 to 5:00. Now you're devoting yourself to
12:36
prayer and to praise and to growing in the Lord.
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You're you're growing those giftings that you have that
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other people have identified in you because they see, you know
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what, if this guy could go full time, it's going to benefit the
12:50
whole group because they are going to sharpen their skills.
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No, this is fantastic. I've never thought of this this
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way. Luke, this is awesome.
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Think about this. Isn't that what what we're
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trying to do right now in the traditional church is an
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individual has not necessarily and.
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We're not necessarily. Let me let me let me paint the
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picture here. So at the, the the local non
13:13
denominational evangelical church that I was on the worship
13:16
team for 15 years, that's down the street from me that we left
13:19
four years ago. OK, their budget, I don't know
13:22
what it is today, let's say a half, $1,000,000 a year, OK, I
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guarantee you. Well, let me rephrase that.
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They paid off the mortgage a few years ago, OK, They still have
13:35
overhead, they still have staff, all that stuff.
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The budget for a couple decades was dominated by that building,
13:45
its needs, and the growing staff for a growing church.
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What if you took a half $1,000,000 and identified 8 or
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10 people that got 50 to $70,000 a year to do those full time
14:02
things and you didn't have to pay for that building.
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Now, instead of a pastor, a youth pastor and an
14:09
administrator and all the overhead of a building, you just
14:13
equipped eight people or 10 people to full time.
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And now think of it this way, too.
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Do you really get that much value from your pastor sermon?
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I mean, really? Yeah.
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If you don't, read on your. Own if you don't read on your
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own, then you then I I hate it. I'm sorry if anyone says this.
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I hate it when people say I I'm not getting fed there.
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That's not why you're there. You're supposed to give.
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OK, fed, yes, but give. But no, I I think Luke, you're
14:44
on to something. Honestly if someone is really
14:47
gifted. Our listeners that have followed
14:49
us for a while and heard Tim Bentz talk about money and
14:52
stuff. So look at it like the way he
14:55
described, especially that church that that as a body
15:00
looked at everybody's financial needs, right?
15:04
And you had that one individual that he testified that got
15:07
themselves. She was the biggest giver in the
15:10
in the church, in the organization.
15:12
But. But she got herself, she had a
15:14
need and she went to the traditional route and got
15:18
shafted, you know, by high interest and stuff.
15:21
But what if the body you're you're describing your church
15:24
paid off building. Now they're going to look
15:27
internal, They look at all the needs amongst the body, but also
15:33
there's needs in the community. So now you have this extra
15:36
revenue because people are still working and and stuff like that
15:40
now. Now you could turn that on its
15:42
head and pay off everybody's debts in the whole place.
15:47
Let me tell you something, Luke. That's why we left when they
15:51
announced they paid off the mortgage.
15:54
This was 2019-2020. I think my question at the
15:58
business meeting was, hey, you've got 15102 grand a month
16:03
now freed up in cash flow, whatever their payment was.
16:07
What are you going to do for evangelism?
16:09
What are you going to do for the community?
16:11
Oh, well, we've, we've hired a A-Team and they're going to come
16:15
look at our campus and they're going to help us project what
16:18
what we're going to need here in the next 5 to 10 years.
16:21
I said, what about outreach? Well, you know, 2 Sundays a
16:25
year, they pretty much come to us, Christmas and Easter.
16:30
That was the answer I got from the lead pastor and one of the
16:34
elders. I said I'm out, I can't support
16:38
that. So you're absolutely right,
16:42
Luke, if we did those kind of things when we paid off a
16:45
mortgage at a building, maybe it would happen if.
16:48
You look at the books of Acts, there was nobody that had needs,
16:54
those that had much and those that had little.
16:58
I mean, in modern terms, it would be like a a culture, you
17:02
know, was a compound, you know. A commune.
17:05
A commune. But but in a in a healthy
17:09
biblical way, everybody sharpened everybody and you
17:15
know. And.
17:17
I I love the scriptural basis where a debt's got erased every
17:20
5050 years. You know, that's kind of a.
17:23
Whole. Yeah, but the early church did
17:28
exactly what Tim Bents was kind of describing.
17:31
You know, they internalized what they had, the benefits they
17:36
could help to their neighbors and every big everyone was a
17:41
beneficiary of it. That's.
17:44
Literally what I was jumping at the seams to say what you just
17:47
said, Luke, because it says in Acts they all came together and
17:52
met each other's needs with the likeness of mind.
17:55
And so it's like instead of the institution having all this
17:58
money, you have the giver. They go into debt.
18:02
You know, somebody with the best heart ever goes into debt.
18:04
Because I mean, what about even having a system where the the
18:09
church feeds back into you when you're in hardship and look,
18:12
looks at your track record like okay, you're not in hardship 3 *
18:16
a year because you just make poor decisions on everything you
18:19
do in life. You might need more help than
18:21
just a handout. But seriously, something
18:24
traumatic happens like you've been doing, like, you know, in
18:27
my case, I was doing good for 10 years on top of the world Dream
18:32
girl, dream car building, my family.
18:34
I literally get my employment pulled out from underneath of me
18:38
and I have to reinvent myself and walk on this this Cliff
18:43
where it looks like I'm going to fall off.
18:44
And God is faithful. I'm telling you right now, He
18:46
came through. He continues to come through,
18:49
not because of anything Ioffer, but this is just the testimony
18:51
building right, But what if the the body, the ecclesia at large
18:56
was going? You know what, Pete, you've been
18:58
doing the right thing and good for so long, man.
19:01
What's an elimination to free up some more of your time?
19:04
Why can't you fly over to Philly and hang out with Rod into a
19:08
live podcast in person? Why can't you guys go, right,
19:12
because I'm doing this local stuff, going to Ohio, going all
19:15
around and we're, we're seeing people are getting baptized.
19:17
People are literally crying and coming out and like, why can't
19:20
we do that together, right? And it's like, oh, because I
19:24
have my 9:00 to 5:00 and I have a mortgage and I have so I think
19:27
allotting the money to the right place and saying, man, you,
19:30
you've been in the gutter. Like I've been in the gutter
19:33
doing this. People have no idea, right?
19:35
The last four years, especially the last year, Oh, Lord have
19:39
mercy. If I would have known, I might
19:42
have gave up. I might have really gave some
19:43
stuff up on what this calling is.
19:46
But yeah, I know you want to get back to your list, Pete.
19:48
But what I'm saying is if we all came together and and the
19:52
meeting was not about a new sidewalk on the building, but it
19:57
was about how to free up time for somebody who's been battle
20:00
tested and is trustworthy. And he has fifty men who look,
20:04
who can look you in the eye and say this is a man of God.
20:06
I've been I've been locking arms with his brother for 18 months.
20:09
He's fearless. Let's unleash him in California.
20:12
Let's send him over there that. Is a game changer.
20:16
That and and that's exactly what the early church did.
20:18
The apostles identified and they called them elders like these
20:24
individuals are going to help us so we can focus our time on
20:30
prayer in the word. But it was the bleeding of the
20:36
Lord that led to that decision. And it was the fruit in these
20:41
individuals lives that got them promoted to the elder.
20:47
I mean, it, it's kind of a mix of what we do traditionally, but
20:50
yet it was, I mean, it was a new thing.
20:52
It was the early church. It had never been done before.
20:56
So I know that's kind of where we're trying to take this is
21:00
where have we gone wrong? And how can we fix it and get it
21:04
back to its its true. It's we need Elon Musk on the
21:09
church Doge to bring efficiency and cut out the the excess fat.
21:16
Yes, course corrections. Essentially what we have guys is
21:20
we have old wineskins, right? And and like your example, Luke,
21:24
with the cell church thing and the things that went wrong,
21:28
they're trying to put new wine in an old wineskin.
21:30
You can't do that. It doesn't work.
21:33
You have to tear the whole thing down and start from scratch.
21:37
So let me jump through these things.
21:39
So we mentioned the building, we mentioned the clergy lady class,
21:44
non participatory spectators, the few leading the many ritual
21:49
versus relational, right? Do you want to stare at the back
21:52
of someone's head for an hour and a half?
21:54
Or do you want to look eyeball to eyeball and go, how was your
21:58
week going? How is your prayer time going?
22:00
How can I pray for you? Hierarchy, you know, and there
22:05
may be some debate about this in in Matthew 23, whether he was
22:09
talking to his disciples, Jesus was or if this is an instruction
22:13
for all. I guess I haven't looked into
22:15
that. But when he said to him, his
22:18
disciples do not let anyone call you father or rabbi, for you
22:23
have one father and he is in heaven, nor nor are you to be
22:27
called instructors. You have one instructor, the
22:29
Messiah. We mentioned last time, my last
22:35
recording on the spirit leading versus the soul.
22:38
I think a lot of the things that we do in a modern church service
22:42
are soulish and they mask what may be brokenness in our spirit
22:50
in our week that we just went through and we got songs and
22:54
it's like, I can't even talk to anybody.
22:57
No one knows the real me and I'm just anonymous here sitting in
23:01
the back. And a real quick I want to just
23:04
mention an anecdote as far as that goes because we have a girl
23:09
who's been meeting with us on our church group for a couple
23:13
months now who's a non Christian who doesn't have any measure of
23:18
faith. By her own words.
23:20
She did it because a significant other had some form of faith, at
23:26
least enough to say I want this in my future wife.
23:31
That was enough motivation for her to come meet with us and she
23:36
loves it. She this is someone who grew up
23:39
in foster homes her whole life shows, so she recognizes the
23:44
spirit of family when we're together and looks forward to it
23:48
every week, even though we're talking about all sorts of
23:50
Christian stuff that she doesn't buy yet.
23:53
And she said when we she first started coming, she's like,
23:57
yeah, there's churches around, but that's a little too much.
24:01
It's intimidating. But she was like, you know what?
24:04
I could dip my toe in when my wife put out a post on the
24:07
community page advertising kind of what we do.
24:11
And we don't do this very often. We've probably only done this
24:13
three times in a year and a half that we mentioned of the
24:17
community. Hey, this is what we do.
24:19
Come, come visit if you want. That's how she found us.
24:24
She's like, I can do that. I can see myself doing that.
24:28
Let me keep going down the list here.
24:31
Perfunctory order and elements of the worship service once
24:34
again kind of having everything just polished and perfect and no
24:39
room for the spirits leading limits.
24:43
Christ and the spirit instead of the full expression of his body.
24:47
So we're seeing a lopsided expression of his body where
24:52
every member is not functioning. The sermon, it's a monologue
24:56
versus a dialogue. It's meant to be a dialogue.
25:00
And I think Luke, we mentioned on the last recording where
25:03
there's a section that Paul says if someone is giving a word and
25:08
someone else has a revelation, the first person is supposed to
25:12
sit down and let the second person speak.
25:15
And, and I think it's awesome that you said last time that
25:19
you've experienced that even in traditional churches.
25:22
But by and large, that's not, that's not normal.
25:25
You're going to get scolded by the pastor if you try that one.
25:29
This is a big one. This next one, entrenchment of
25:32
bad doctrine and tradition. You know, some people think if
25:36
you have a denomination or you have a covering, this whole idea
25:40
of spiritual covering is not biblical and and it entrenches
25:46
bad teaching. And we rely on these people that
25:49
have gone to seminary and learn these, you know, pre agreed on
25:55
summations of Scripture. They've learned systems instead
25:59
of learning how to read the Bible.
26:01
And now we have outsourced our sense making to someone else, to
26:06
use Kevin Thompson's term, to do the work for us and go, oh,
26:11
that's what that verse means. Instead of doing the work for
26:14
ourselves and going. I don't see it that way, pastor.
26:17
This is what I'm getting out of it.
26:20
Another thing, slow moving, institutionalized, difficult to
26:25
changed, difficult to change and centralized.
26:29
You know, I think it was a Chuck missler we mentioned last time
26:32
that was quoting somebody says, I think the attack on the on the
26:38
people of God is going to come from the institutional church in
26:41
the future, that there's persecution coming and we need
26:46
to be nimble and decentralized consolidated power, which
26:52
corrupts, right? How much do we know about that
26:57
creation of the secular versus sacred, you know, having that
27:02
religious divide? I think at least in our group
27:05
Rod, when we meet a chunk of the time is talking about, you know,
27:11
someone's car breaking down or you know, what went on at work
27:15
with Co workers. Like we're doing life like
27:17
that's it's it's funny because it's not spiritual at all for,
27:22
you know, a good portion, but that's a part of us.
27:27
We are body, soul and spirit. We're trying to minister to all
27:30
three, right. The damage to the one man LED
27:36
church too much to take on there man.
27:39
You want to look into pastors getting burnt out trying to care
27:44
for these flocks is never meant it for one man to take on all of
27:49
this burden. Here's another big one.
27:53
Christ is supplanted as the head and his body impotent to
27:57
function as it was intended. We put a human head, just like
28:02
Luke you mentioned back in the Old Testament.
28:06
Hebrews were freaked out by God. Nope.
28:08
Give us a a human head. You're scary.
28:12
It discourages real relationships and covers up our
28:16
real selves, warts and all. And it's a financial burden and
28:21
wasteful spending that we've already kind of touched on.
28:24
So those are just some of the bullet points for what what we
28:31
need to deconstruct and why. And if I could read just one of
28:37
these quotes and then you guys jump in with comments.
28:40
I have a few sections here from Frank Viola's Reimagining
28:44
Church. He says institutional churches
28:48
are a lot like trains. They're going in a certain
28:51
direction and they'll continue to go in that direction for a
28:54
good long time, even if all hands try to make them stop.
28:59
As with trains, the options for turning the direction of
29:02
institutional churches are limited at best.
29:06
If a switch or siding is available, the train could turn.
29:10
Otherwise it's just following the tracks.
29:13
So everyone on board had best hope that he is on the right
29:16
train, headed in the right direction.
29:20
Organic churches, like those in the New Testament, are
29:22
different. They're not like trains, but
29:25
more like groups of people out for a walk.
29:28
These groups move much more slowly than trains, only a few
29:32
mph, but they can turn at a moment's notice.
29:36
And more importantly, they can be genuinely attentive to the
29:40
world around them. Does that seem like an apartment
29:46
analogy? You know, you think about
29:49
institutions, Luke. We talked about it with Rick
29:51
last time. You know, the Heart Association,
29:54
Cancer Society, These things are institutions that are slow to
29:59
change. You know, if if they, how many
30:02
years were they telling us, you know, fats are bad.
30:05
Now they're coming around saying, oh, well, actually
30:07
natural fats are good. It's like they're slow to
30:10
change. They're institutions versus a
30:13
group of people out for a walk. We can pay attention and go, oh,
30:16
I see a need over there. Let's help that need.
30:19
That's that's why I kind of was jokingly talking about Elon Musk
30:23
and Doge because I mean, he when he bought Twitter, he fired 80%
30:29
of the staff and it's running better and more efficient
30:34
because all that extra stuff wasn't needed.
30:37
And you know, Trump's looking to use him with the federal
30:41
government. But if but if you're but if
30:45
you're looking at it from the church standpoint, you obviously
30:50
can't fix corporately, right? But if but if from the
30:58
grassroots in an organization that 150 whatever size church
31:04
you know, starts to have this epiphany, we want to do
31:08
something different. We want to do something like the
31:10
book Acts. Let's change the paradigm.
31:14
How can we more be a more efficient with our, our, our
31:17
money and, and the offering that that comes in and, and the
31:21
outreach and all that type of stuff.
31:23
You are one individual feeling that at your local church.
31:26
But what if you would have had allies that were right next to
31:31
you in the pews that actually would have got the pastor to
31:35
listen? You know, then you're then
31:38
you're actually getting somewhere.
31:42
I mean quicker you're still getting somewhere, but I get
31:44
your. Point but that but that's what
31:46
we're discussing. I mean in year 2 experience you
31:51
up and left the traditional church and are starting a new
31:54
thing. That might not be the case for
31:58
everybody. No, I don't think it's the case
32:02
for everybody or nor would I prescribe it.
32:05
But yeah, if someone is coming across this this information,
32:09
they read Pay in Christianity and then his reconstructing
32:13
books on organic church and they go, yeah, I can see this.
32:17
These are things that are man made that we have added.
32:20
You know, having this clergy, this pastor that I pay is
32:25
actually damaging to me. Having this building in this
32:28
mortgage is, is damaging me. I mean, there's no substitute
32:33
that's we've, I can't speak to it to the level that Rod has,
32:37
but even just some of the things that we've experienced, I can't
32:44
say has ever happened in a small group or in a church service.
32:48
You know, some of the things that we're able to really get to
32:51
the heart of ministering to people and, and insight and
32:56
it's, it's so amazing. We'll, we'll have a theme almost
33:00
every Saturday that will come out.
33:03
No one planned it. No one planned.
33:05
This is the topic. This is the sermon.
33:07
And yet one by one, we're all talking about the same thing,
33:12
that, that, that is the focus, you know, whether it's a
33:15
relationship in the family or whatever.
33:19
And it's, it's just amazing how that comes out organically.
33:25
So I think, you know, the last thing that I really want to just
33:27
get out to both of our audiences is I want you guys to think how
33:34
many pastors on record stood up in front of their congregations
33:39
and encouraged the shots over the last few years.
33:47
And now that information is inverted.
33:49
It's a it's a no go. Big time bad, bad news,
33:54
dangerous. Look at the control and the
33:59
influence that one person had over each one of those
34:03
buildings, and I want each one of you to go show me one example
34:08
of that in the Bible. Wow.
34:12
Yeah, it's a bit like people saying, oh, Jesus was a
34:16
socialist. He would want, he would want to
34:20
us to give our money to the government so we can distribute.
34:23
The government can distribute it.
34:24
It's like, no, no, he was what can you do individually out of
34:29
the goodness of your heart? Yeah.
34:34
This is another section from Frank, Frank Faiola's
34:37
Reimagining Church that kind of paints another analogy to how
34:44
God has a design for how he wants his body to function.
34:52
And again, we said at the very outset here, the disclaimer that
34:57
a lot of good things do happen in the institutional church.
35:02
A lot of wonderful people are doing amazing things for God's
35:06
Kingdom. We're not saying they're not.
35:09
But here's an analogy that kind of paints this picture of maybe
35:14
how we're missing the mark from how our church gatherings are
35:18
supposed to be. So he says, imagine a general
35:23
contractor, and I believe he got this from a friend of his, I
35:26
think it was Hale Miller. Imagine a general contractor who
35:30
purchases 20 acres of land by which to build a housing
35:34
complex. And after the houses are built,
35:36
he wishes to have a landscaped garden at the entrance.
35:40
This is his goal. So he hires someone to plant
35:42
beautiful trees. Another one to lay large rocks,
35:46
another to plant beautiful flowers, another to plant shrubs
35:50
and bushes. And so the person who plants
35:53
trees comes and plants them randomly throughout the complex.
35:57
The one who lays rocks does the same.
36:00
So does the person who plants the flowers.
36:02
The person who plants the shrubs and bushes also does the same.
36:06
When the contractor observes what they have done, he's very
36:09
disappointed. His goal was a landscaped
36:12
garden. Instead he sees the flowers,
36:15
rocks, trees, shrubs and bushes are all disconnected and
36:20
scattered about haphazardly. Is it good to plant trees?
36:25
Yes. Is the planting of flowers a
36:28
positive thing? Certainly.
36:30
But these things in themselves were not the contractors goal.
36:34
He wanted a landscaped garden and that describes the Kingdom
36:39
of God today in the institutional church.
36:42
Many good deeds, but an overwhelming disconnection from
36:46
God's ultimate goal, which happens to be from Him, through
36:50
Him, and to Him. Thoughts on that at all guys?
36:58
I don't know me, I was kind of picturing, you know, the
37:01
traditional church and the landscaping that you might have
37:04
there and stuff. And like you said, you know, how
37:08
much do we really get out of one day service, you know, hour or
37:13
two or whatever. So to me it, it, it seems like
37:17
it's, it's more important that relationship wise with your
37:23
fellow believer in your community that you're connecting
37:27
on a, on a regular basis, more regular basis than once a week.
37:31
Because that's where in my mind, there's more value than coming
37:38
to 1 central place once a week. Because if you don't have those
37:43
type of relationships throughout the week, you, you show up, it's
37:46
just small talk. How many people really come
37:49
early, stay late, really get to the heart of the matter when it
37:54
comes to talking to your brother and sister.
37:56
It's, it's all chivalry, you know, it's all just fluff.
38:00
And then you leave there and you might leave there still wounded
38:04
or your needs are not met and the need could have been met by
38:08
your brother and sister sitting next to you.
38:11
But if you had that relationship throughout the week, you know,
38:16
you can help one another. So I think that I think that's a
38:20
failure in traditional churches and probably in the
38:25
untraditional churches that you guys have experienced, that you
38:30
need that relationship to to flourish and to grow.
38:34
And hopefully it it, it, it happens, you know, more than
38:39
once a week. Yeah, that that's the goal.
38:42
And we're so broke and busy these days.
38:45
It's so hard and. We got and we got limited time.
38:47
You know, I get it. I mean, even Pete, our own
38:50
family, you know, I live out of state and how often do I talk
38:55
and connect with which I, I, I saw this, this TikTok and this
39:02
individual had epiphanies. Like, yeah, when you get
39:04
married, your your spouse is your immediate family, your
39:09
parents and your brothers sisters are now your extended
39:11
family. You know, so you do get consumed
39:14
in that bubble of who you're around the most.
39:18
It, it, it, I don't know. That's just what I was picturing
39:23
when you were describing that. Sure.
39:25
Well, let me mention this too. So we have probably half of the
39:29
group that meets with us go to a traditional Sunday church and
39:35
they actually meet with us because of the connections that
39:40
we have, the things that we are free to talk about that they
39:44
can't and don't have on Sunday. And you choose to meet on a day
39:49
that doesn't interfere or actually benefit.
39:52
Yeah. So I mean, you guys could have
39:53
met on a Wednesday potentially. And and that's, I think that's
39:58
awesome. It brings an added benefit to
40:01
the the body of Christ in your community.
40:05
I think what what you're mentioning there, Luke, you're
40:07
touching on is, is the unity. You know, Jesus prayed.
40:11
I wish that that they would have the same unity that I have with
40:14
you as the Father. And then the Trinity has right
40:19
one of equality, but varying roles.
40:22
And I think that's that's kind of what we're all talking about
40:25
is, is a lot of these things, they're good, but the good can
40:31
be the enemy of the best. And you know, we want Jesus to
40:37
be the central figure, figure and functionally head of his
40:41
body, But we can quench it when when things are are man made
40:47
structured there. There was a quote I heard, I
40:52
think in in Frank's book. I don't can't remember someone
40:54
famous said this God made man is in in his image and man returned
41:01
the favor we we made him in our image.
41:06
You know we make the church like a business or all these
41:10
different models yeah you know there there's just so much
41:16
damage to to denominations. Think about that guys, where we
41:22
craft a statement of faith like Rod you were mentioning, and
41:28
this is what we adhere to. And if you join, then sometimes
41:33
strictly, sometimes not strictly, you're expected to
41:36
believe these things, affirm these things and we divide, you
41:43
know, even the word denomination.
41:45
Think about like a fraction, right?
41:46
In math class, you have a numerator denominator.
41:51
The denominator is what divides. So this denomination says, oh, I
41:57
think baptism saves you literally salvifically.
42:02
Oh, I think that the body and blood literally becomes Christ
42:08
when the priest says something. All these denominations has has
42:12
divided us. And I can say maybe this is a
42:15
good question for you, Rod. I can say in our group we have
42:18
very different differing opinions on some big, some big
42:26
theological issues. We try not to talk about those
42:31
because they're not the central thing.
42:33
We don't want, you know, when it when before we kind of launched
42:38
this experiment to do this church out of our home.
42:42
And I don't even consider myself a church planter, but maybe
42:45
that's what happened when we did this.
42:47
I was reading a lot of Frank's stuff because I was trying to
42:49
figure out what are the pitfalls, what do I need to
42:53
watch out for? And he had a lot of good
42:55
information on that. He said, don't let it become,
43:01
you know, church mini, you know, where you you just try to find a
43:07
pastor. And now he's going to give a
43:08
sermon right in the living room. Don't make it about like a pet
43:13
doctrine, like, oh, everyone's got to be into the end times.
43:16
And that's what we're all going to talk about.
43:19
So we keep the main things, the main things, and we don't want
43:25
to get into that statement of faith, 'cause it divides.
43:29
Yeah, I mean, I set except on the essentials, but even on
43:33
that, it's like we have an unbeliever in our midst.
43:37
But maybe Rod, you can speak to kind of how do you guys?
43:42
No, you, you're asked. I want to hear your question,
43:44
but it popped into my head. Some of these groups in in Asia
43:49
that were we're doing house church and they would they would
43:54
have an ashtray in the center of their their meeting because you
43:58
had all kinds of different people that would show up.
44:01
And it wasn't about excluding anybody.
44:06
It was except about accepting everyone, but focusing and
44:10
leading everybody to the truth of who Christ is.
44:15
And even if it's not establishing, this is our
44:18
mission statement and everybody must adhere to this at some
44:22
point. You know, it's got to be
44:25
welcoming enough. And it seems like, Pete, you've
44:27
done that in your home with the community posts and stuff that
44:33
people that were on the fringe are afraid of traditional church
44:36
is willing to, you know, go through your doors, which is
44:39
which is awesome. And in fact, in fact, even the
44:45
first people, when I very first put it out there a year and a
44:48
half ago in kind of, I kind of put it out in a provocative way,
44:52
like is the way we do traditional church not the best?
44:56
And I, I forget how I put it. And, and the, the couple ladies,
45:01
one of them still still comes. The other one decided that her
45:04
family wanted to go to a traditional church.
45:06
So she's doing that now, but they weren't going at all, which
45:09
is why she started joining. But the other one's still
45:11
coming. Both of them felt ostracized and
45:18
alienated from the traditional church.
45:20
They hadn't gone in years and but they but they enjoy the
45:26
fellowship that we have. A third person used to go to the
45:30
the church in town that I used, used to go to, used to be on the
45:34
worship team with me in the band.
45:37
And and she too kind of felt cast aside, didn't fit in, you
45:44
know, no one to really talk to, no one to really understand her
45:47
situation in life. So, yeah, there's a lot of
45:51
people that are slipping through the cracks that we're not
45:56
ministering to because we've got a service, we have a program
46:01
that needs to run Florida State. But yeah, I was if you want to
46:06
comment on that, Rod. Now I was just going to ask
46:08
about kind of how how churches for you with different beliefs
46:12
or or how you deal with it, but. Well, so I don't want to, I
46:21
don't want to really do this, but I'm going to.
46:23
I'm going to answer with a question.
46:26
OK. Now I'll save that for the the
46:30
last part. Actually, this is a this is a
46:33
point that I can put in front of that Peter talks about first.
46:38
Peter 2, four and five is talking about these living
46:45
stones that that builds the spiritual house, the church.
46:50
And he says as you come to him, a living stone rejected by men,
46:55
but in the sight of God chosen and precious, you yourselves,
47:00
like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house to
47:04
be, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices
47:09
acceptable to God through Christ Jesus.
47:13
So each believer is a living stone.
47:15
We're contributing to the construction of a spiritual
47:18
house, a body that God dwells in.
47:23
He moves in and threw us. If the same spirit reside in you
47:26
that raised Christ from the dead.
47:28
So the diversity is fine. I have no issues with that.
47:32
You know, my question really just to put in the audience's
47:36
ear. I'm going to build this for all
47:38
of us. If you are attending a building,
47:42
OK, Luke, maybe you are right on on the regular, Would you feel
47:47
comfortable taking once a week the list of people you've
47:54
interviewed on this podcast over the years?
47:57
Say every week you're taking a guest with you and you have to
48:01
go through the list of people that you've interviewed.
48:03
You got to take Ryan Peterson. You got to take Gary Wayne.
48:06
You got to take me at some point in time.
48:07
Don't let me get the microphone if I show up.
48:09
Just kidding. Would you feel comfortable doing
48:12
that at your location? Right.
48:15
And and now to Pete, it's in, it's in your court too.
48:19
And the listeners, it's in your court too.
48:23
I'm only asking you guys this so that you'll evaluate.
48:28
Do I have to live in a dual manner to be true to my calling?
48:35
Is there a limitation on the building where my creativity,
48:39
what God has put down inside of me, the the function of my
48:42
living stone, is it being hindered or restricted by any
48:49
means? The Bible has a lot to say about
48:50
that. I'm going to spare us the time
48:52
to go through all those verses, but I've done that.
48:57
I'm not 200 episodes into most of you guys on Air Lord, the
49:02
first podcast. I think we did like 50.
49:06
I can't even tell you how many conversations I've had.
49:09
I can't even tell you how many times I've went to church with a
49:12
simple question to a building and and was ran out myself.
49:17
I don't know if I could take Gary with me.
49:19
So do you know? If I could take LA with me.
49:21
Let me let me clarify just so I understand your question.
49:24
Are you saying take them with you and have them experience
49:28
what goes on? Or are you more saying take them
49:32
with you and introduce and let them be a speaker and let them
49:37
talk on the things they talk on? Would the church, would the
49:40
church welcome him, her or her? However you see it OK, however
49:46
that affects the listener who's listening to this and you 2 as
49:49
individuals. I know if I took, let's say,
49:54
Gary Wayne with me and we're sitting there in service and
49:58
you're doing a meet and greet, let's just say if he's being
50:03
genuine to who he is, as is an encyclopedia for the weird, let
50:08
some questions fly, you know, and then I believe Gary would be
50:13
true to himself. I don't think he would put on a
50:15
different face because he's in a building, although I mean, you
50:18
never really know. But for the benefit of the
50:21
doubt, I would imagine, 'cause if you get me in church or out
50:25
in the Walmart parking lot or on a podcast, you're getting the
50:27
same person regardless. Like I, I don't have a different
50:31
face to put on when I go to the, the corporate building versus at
50:35
home. And, and it took development for
50:37
that because I felt small, insignificant.
50:41
It's not important. I'd ask or make statements and
50:44
it would literally be cast to the wayside.
50:46
But I'm like, no, no, no, no, no.
50:48
God told me this was important. And instead of me getting angry
50:51
with you, I'm going to move on. And I played that game for so
50:53
long. I was just over it.
50:55
I was just like, done with it, right?
50:57
But the question really holds true.
51:01
Taking guests or close friends of yours in this fringe space
51:07
into the church environment, to the building and keeping them in
51:11
their genuine natural state. How?
51:15
How many times could you take a guess there before you may be
51:20
asked not to not to protect? No, I think you bring up an
51:23
interesting concept as I'm thinking about your question
51:28
that how much, how much of going back to the train analogy,
51:35
right, The institutional churches on these tracks, you,
51:39
Frank says you better hope that that church is going the right
51:43
direction, the right destination.
51:48
How much of the body of Christ is actually being prepared for
51:53
what's coming in the earth? Who has a worldview that is
51:59
compatible with reality, even if it's weird?
52:02
Because guess what? Truth is stranger than fiction,
52:05
right? You had supernatural questions,
52:09
Rod, that were Pooh poohed at best.
52:15
People don't have a place to deal with these deep dark
52:18
things. So how much are we failing by
52:22
having this single person LED institution for preparing the
52:27
body of Christ? How much are we not teaching
52:32
people how to fish by actually looking at their Bible
52:35
inductively and observing the text, not bringing their own
52:39
biases to the text? How much are we trying to tell
52:44
them? Oh, here's a system of thought
52:45
you can apply to the Bible instead of just reading for what
52:49
it says. You know, we, we boiled
52:54
everything down. So I think to your question, how
52:57
much damage has been done by we hope the guy up front has the
53:03
most important word for this week.
53:06
And sometimes he does. I mean, there's some there's
53:08
some superstars. I mean, Luke, you got John
53:11
Kilpatrick. He's awesome.
53:13
OK. I'm sure the people that go to
53:15
Jonathan Cahn's church are, are pretty well blessed with his
53:19
messages. There's great people out there.
53:21
We're not saying they're not, but you better hope they're
53:25
filling in all the blanks. And that's why I think it's such
53:28
an exciting thing to be in this day and age with podcasting Rod,
53:33
that we can bring on the Gary Wayne's, the LALA Marzulli's and
53:39
the Tim Benz's and go, OK, tell me about your walk with the
53:42
Lord. OK, tell me about UFOs.
53:44
Well, I think. From one episode, I think we've
53:46
we've covered the fact that you can't get all that you need in
53:50
one Sunday service. You know, even my pastor, John
53:54
Kilpatrick, for the first time in his ministry, how many
53:58
decades he's been a pastor, has taught the whole Book of
54:02
Revelation. And he did it on a Sunday
54:04
morning, which he knew was going to be controversial because he's
54:07
never done that before. He did that at Brownsville
54:10
before, but it was like a midweek service.
54:14
But to do it as the main message, you know what I'm
54:18
saying, He's never done that. So and there's all these
54:22
different, you mentioned, you know, these different guests,
54:24
would we bring them into our our fellowship?
54:28
I think they if, if they're good guests, if they're asking the
54:31
the right questions, you know, whether it's on a Saturday
54:36
morning or a midweek or something with it, you should
54:39
have a healthy environment where you bring in those conversations
54:42
because we talk about it all the time.
54:44
The supernatural has been lost or pushed out the door by
54:49
traditional church. They don't want to talk about
54:52
the things they don't understand.
54:54
They, you know, but OK, then let's meet on a Tuesday night
54:59
and let's discuss it. You know, let's break the mold.
55:03
Let's do something different so. Yeah, and that's what we hope to
55:10
do on our show, right? Right.
55:13
Let's have those conversations on your show, Rod.
55:16
Let's have those conversations. Yeah.
55:20
So I mean, hopefully, you know, everyone listening, you guys
55:23
have some food for thought if you haven't considered these
55:26
concepts of of what institutional versus organic
55:32
church. And I think even the phrase
55:33
organic church, I think it was T Austin Sparks that coined that.
55:38
If I remember Frank saying that correctly.
55:42
And I got I got to dig into hit some of his stuff.
55:45
I guess Watchman Knee was mentored by T Austin then those.
55:51
It was the other way around. T Austin was the other T Austin
55:54
Sparks was went meant. Did you say T Austin Sparks was
55:57
mentored by Watchman Knee? No, no, he mentored Watchmen.
56:01
I thought, I thought, didn't Watchmen learn?
56:03
I thought it was the other way around.
56:05
I think Watchmen was But anyways, yes, they did have a
56:09
connection. Yeah, there was a connection
56:11
and. And Pastor Doug Riggs, who
56:14
really dug into T Austin Sparks and used his material
56:20
methodically in his messages because he just, he was one of
56:25
those individuals in the body of Christ, like Watchman Knee or
56:28
the Apostle Paul that just got amazing downloads of revelation
56:33
and was able to expound it. And I, I need to get into it as
56:37
well, But I know we don't have much time left.
56:40
Pete, let's let's kind of recap some of the deconstruction
56:44
because I know you wanted to do a Part 3 on construction.
56:48
Is there anything else that we need to hit on bullet point wise
56:52
that we didn't deconstruct? I tried to take it from a basic
56:56
standpoint of 150. Congregation, how would you
56:59
break it down? Yeah.
57:01
But I don't know, is there anything else that we need to
57:05
talk about on the deconstruction side?
57:08
Well, let me let me mention a few things and Rod, feel free to
57:10
jump in. You know, I just, I want to hit
57:16
on and we'd have talked about it, just the damage that has
57:19
happened and we can't possibly encapsulate the damage that has
57:23
happened over hundreds of years of of doing church in this way.
57:28
But some of the things that have happened in the past, If anybody
57:32
knows about this, look up the persecution of the Anabaptists.
57:39
They were literally killed. They were zealous for God.
57:44
They didn't have all of their theology perfect, but they were
57:48
literally killed because they were going against the
57:50
establishment of traditional doctrine.
57:55
Similar abuses happened in the prior to the Reformation where
57:59
common people were not allowed to read the Bible.
58:01
They only had ordained ministers to do that.
58:07
You know, I think of, if you guys know the band Primus, they
58:11
had a song called to Defy the Laws of tradition.
58:15
It's a crusade only of the brave.
58:18
He said. Such a great lyric.
58:22
That's that's kind of what we're talking about.
58:25
If you've ever seen fiddler on the Roof tradition, we're we're
58:29
going against tradition here. The the status quo does not like
58:34
this stuff. And we said this last time,
58:36
Luke, that that that wonderful quote that somebody came up
58:41
with. It's very difficult to get
58:44
someone to understand something when their livelihood depends on
58:48
them not understanding it. So this kind of stuff is not
58:53
going to be popular if you talk to your traditional pastor about
58:57
it. But yeah, I think the biggest
59:00
things for deconstruction, if we were to recap, is that the body
59:06
of Christ is meant to express Christ in his fullness with him
59:11
being the head led by him. And when we meet, we, we want to
59:18
have the freest, fullest expression of that with the Holy
59:23
Spirit's discernment. So essentially when we meet as
59:27
believers, each one of us with the Holy Spirit, all of those
59:32
Holy Spirit in dwelt people come together and their collective
59:37
discernment helps guide and direct what happens in that
59:40
meeting. What's said, what's not said,
59:42
what's song, what's asked, you know the direction of it.
59:47
It's discerned as a collective body.
59:51
And we've touched on a number of the damage that looking to a
59:55
single person or group of people can have.
59:58
You better hope they're going in the right direction.
1:00:00
And are you free to have your gifts function if you're if
1:00:05
you're kind of passive and waiting on that person.
1:00:08
So that's kind of how the every every member functioning meeting
1:00:15
is supposed to work. And when you have a sermon?
1:00:19
Which comes from Greek rhetoric. When you have a pastor, a
1:00:24
clergy, which is a holdover from the priesthood of the old
1:00:27
covenant. When you have a building that is
1:00:31
faced like an auditorium where the action happens up front and
1:00:35
everyone else is passive. When you have a burden of
1:00:38
seventy, 8090% of your church budget is going to overhead with
1:00:45
10 or 20% left for actual ministry.
1:00:49
You really have to question how much are you getting out of
1:00:52
those two hours? You know, I used to think, and I
1:00:55
still kind of do. Wow.
1:00:57
I've listened to thousands of sermons over the years.
1:01:00
That's pretty good. I I bet I've got a lot of truth
1:01:03
out of that, and I probably have.
1:01:06
But is it worth what I paid? Was it worth me not doing my own
1:01:14
work? Probably not.
1:01:16
Probably not. I think we all have to take
1:01:19
responsibility for our own learning, our own growth, and
1:01:26
realize that this clergy system, this building, these
1:01:32
denominations, God doesn't approve of this stuff.
1:01:35
He blesses it. He does, but he doesn't approve
1:01:39
of it. This is not how his body is
1:01:41
meant to function. And to deconstruct to Luke's
1:01:46
question, if you have 150 person church, I don't know where to
1:01:50
start. That's a tough one.
1:01:51
You'd have to ask God. But for me and my family, it was
1:01:56
the right time to do this. I was actually, I actually came
1:01:59
across Francis Chan letters for the church and Frank Viola,
1:02:02
Pagan Christianity probably like 8 years ago.
1:02:06
And I was convinced at that time, but my family wasn't
1:02:10
ready. I wasn't ready and it was more
1:02:14
recently when as I mentioned that that church meeting, that
1:02:17
budget meeting, hey, we paid off the mortgage where I, I started
1:02:21
to dig into this again. At the same time, I came across
1:02:24
the book that from Tim Kurtz called Leaving Church Becoming
1:02:30
Ekklesia, which I highly recommend, where he mentioned
1:02:33
that among other mistranslations in the KJV, the King James
1:02:39
translators mistranslated ekklesia as church, and that was
1:02:47
what we're meant to be as an ekklesia.
1:02:49
It's a ruling body, a an assembly, a ruling council
1:02:54
taking dominion on the earth. And when we supplant Christ by
1:03:00
having these human heads, we're missing quite a bit.
1:03:04
So yeah, it's messy. We're only a year and a half in.
1:03:09
We're still figuring it out. But I would, I would, I would
1:03:14
preface that I mean, God uses people, God uses human heads,
1:03:19
and God uses the frailties of all of us.
1:03:25
And there's a lot of good individuals in the traditional
1:03:30
church. So God grace the body of Christ
1:03:35
to fulfill its mandate and to be fiscally responsible, you know,
1:03:41
because we talk about money a lot and this subject, you know,
1:03:46
because it's supposed to be his, you know, from the family's
1:03:51
budget to the church's budget, it's supposed to be God's.
1:03:55
And we want to be good stewards with, with said funds.
1:03:59
So I think I think the best thing out of this is we're
1:04:05
asking the questions. You know, you asked the question
1:04:09
to your old pastor. Maybe if he would have gave you
1:04:11
a different answer, you guys would still be there, you know,
1:04:17
Or at least, hey, let's have a discussion about this as a body,
1:04:22
as a church, what we should do with the funds.
1:04:26
And that and that. Let me say this real quick,
1:04:28
Luke, that's what I wanted. I didn't want to jump ship.
1:04:30
I would rather fix the ship and repair the holes now.
1:04:34
Now I see it with new eyes that no it's old wineskins.
1:04:37
It couldn't have worked, but I. But that's why I asked the
1:04:41
question. You know, the 150 church from
1:04:43
the top down, they want to re they they're willing to
1:04:46
deconstruct the whole thing, the whole shit.
1:04:50
How how do you do it? And I don't know that Frank, I
1:04:53
don't know that this author has all the answers, but he asks a
1:04:56
lot of questions that are that are valid.
1:05:00
Yeah, and he and he's lived in this organic setting for
1:05:03
something like 3-4 decades now. So it's really just a wealth of
1:05:08
information. So I highly recommend going
1:05:10
through his books. Neil Cole is another one that
1:05:14
that does this kind of thing. And then someone that my wife
1:05:19
and I have gotten to know personally, I forget his last
1:05:23
name, but Gavin and his wife Carla.
1:05:27
And they have a something called simple Church, I believe it's
1:05:30
called. And he's been a mentor to us.
1:05:33
So kind of a shout out to to him.
1:05:35
But Rod, why don't you give us any final word there as we wrap
1:05:40
up? Appreciate you coming on.
1:05:43
Yeah, well, thank, thank you both for inviting me.
1:05:46
I always enjoy the opportunity to sharpen and learn from each
1:05:49
other and and grow. For I consider that the
1:05:54
sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared
1:05:57
with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
1:06:02
For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for
1:06:06
the revealing of the sons of God.
1:06:10
For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but
1:06:16
because of Him who was subjected to it in hope, Because the
1:06:21
creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of
1:06:24
corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
1:06:31
For we know that the whole creation groans and laborers
1:06:35
with birth pangs together until now.
1:06:39
Not only that, but we also who have the first fruits of the
1:06:45
Spirit, even we ourselves, grown within ourselves, eagerly
1:06:49
waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.
1:06:56
Romans 818 through 23. It's always an honor to be here
1:07:01
with you guys. Thank you.
1:07:02
Yeah. Thanks, Rod.
1:07:04
Thanks, Luke. This was great.
1:07:07
I hope that this was interesting and edifying and and thought
1:07:12
provoking for the audience. If if it was, if you guys have
1:07:16
questions, comments, disagreements, or yeah, just
1:07:21
good questions to really dig into this and say what about
1:07:24
this in this situation? What about that?
1:07:28
E-mail us the days and old podcast@gmail.com or e-mail Rod
1:07:34
head over to the Millennial Mustard Seed podcast and check
1:07:39
out his stuff. So thanks so much guys.
1:07:42
And hopefully we can do it again with a Part 3, focusing more on
1:07:46
the reconstruction of of what it is from both personal experience
1:07:52
and things that we've gleaned from those like Frank and Neil
1:07:56
that have gone before us to do this kind of thing.
1:08:00
And even not that the New Testament is a blueprint per SE,
1:08:05
that would be a mistake to think of it that way.
1:08:07
But there are plenty of good clues to how they met and what
1:08:12
sort of things were going on that we can take from and learn
1:08:17
from. So with that, we will wrap up.
1:08:20
Thanks guys. God bless.
1:08:39
Straight from the heavens, you really owe me.
1:08:42
All of my life I was beating up. All in my life I didn't handle
1:08:46
hope. All in my life I was stuck in no
1:08:48
trap. All in my life I didn't handle
1:08:50
rap. I didn't know why my life was
1:08:53
away. I didn't know why my life was
1:08:55
alright. I didn't know why I couldn't get
1:08:57
up. I was so stuck.
1:08:59
And the monkey was stuck till I found out.
1:09:01
And I broke everything till I found out.
1:09:03
And they took everything until I was hurt.
1:09:06
My heart was straight. Yeah, I was broken.
1:09:08
I had all this pain. Held on home.
1:09:10
It got harder. Then I went to the side of the
1:09:13
smoke. I had no truth but to look to my
1:09:15
guy. He gave me to me.
1:09:17
Your foam in my eyes. He gave me earrings.
1:09:19
And he told me I'm blessed. He told me he just believe in
1:09:22
this time. I told him I can't change all of
1:09:24
my ways. He said I got you to look at
1:09:27
this time. I looked at him and he showed me
1:09:29
his ways. Then he just told me how I am
1:09:31
this time. Then he just told me you're not.
1:09:34
He told me I'll come from the heavens above.
1:09:36
I'm a new creature. I come from the sun, from the
1:09:39
one and only straight from the heavens.
1:09:41
You really owe me. I came from the sun.
1:09:43
I was really with them. And heavenly places I'm sealing.
1:09:47
Y'all can't even go that way. Y'all don't even know that way.
1:09:51
Y'all want to play like Patty Kay, but this ain't no game but
1:09:54
the star, right? You wipe this on bake when you
1:09:58
walk under me and I know you're a snake.
1:10:01
You think you can beat me but you got no power.
1:10:03
You all in a way I take out that chopper, I'll put on your
1:10:08
chopper and I'll prank on your face.
1:10:10
I see you laughing. You think that you got me but
1:10:13
you got no way. The evil you said for my life is
1:10:16
OK because it's made for my good.
1:10:19
My God is created. He created you so you really is
1:10:22
good. I said all these things because
1:10:25
I know what is true and you know you don't like when I know the
1:10:32
things that's going to happen to you when you die.
1:10:36
You didn't live in your life because you know you can never
1:10:38
go and get safe. You know it's crazy.
1:10:41
His mercy was too from you when you're my son in the pot.
1:10:44
I thought you can take on my God's spot now, but you can die
1:10:48
hot. You was really tweaking.
1:10:50
I come from the sun, from one and only straight from the
1:10:53
heavens. You really owe me.
1:10:54
I came from the sun. I was really with him and
1:10:57
heavenly places I'm still living.