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Why many Christians are really leaving church · Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News

• 0:26
  If you're a Christian, do you have questions occasionally or maybe even often about whether you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ and if it's real?
• 0:36
  Or do you question does God even exist?
• 0:39
  Do your questions about Christianity feel like a crisis of faith?
• 0:43
  Many have doubts about what they've told and what they've learned.
• 0:47
  Today's guest, Pedro Garcia is a former atheist who helps skeptics pursue God.
• 0:53
  And the conversation explores taking our faith from our head to our heart.
• 0:58
  Welcome to the Tenpenny Files, everyone.
• 1:00
  I'm your host, Dr.
• 1:01
  Sherry Tenpenny.
• 1:02
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• 1:26
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• 1:28
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• 1:37
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• 1:41
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• 1:49
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• 1:51
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• 1:52
  Welcome to all of our regulars who have been following us for a while, and welcome to all the new people who are here.
• 1:58
  We are I am truly grateful for everyone.
• 2:00
  So now let's get started.
• 2:02
  Today's conversation is with Pedro Garcia, the outreach director of the Dominican Fellowship, a Christian church located in Nashville, Tennessee, that focuses on discipleship, community, and outreach to talk about his book for those who doubt, is it because of Jesus?
• 2:20
  Pedro, welcome so much to the Ten Penny Files.
• 2:23
  Thank you so much for joining me here today.
• 2:25
  Absolutely.
• 2:26
  Thank you for having me.
• 2:27
  And uh just to clarify the the name of the church is the Donaldson Fellowship.
• 2:33
  And it's fine because I know Dr.
• 2:35
  Timpenny, you're interviewing so many people, no worries at all.
• 2:39
  The the name of the church is the Donaldson Fellowship.
• 2:42
  But yeah.
• 2:44
  Yeah, what did I say?
• 2:45
  What did I say?
• 2:47
  The Dominican.
• 2:48
  Oh, yes.
• 2:49
  Well, thank you for clarifying that.
• 2:51
  So we got the right church in the right group there in Tennessee.
• 2:54
  Absolutely.
• 2:54
  Thank you for thank you for the clarification.
• 2:56
  I appreciate that.
• 2:57
  Oh, yeah.
• 2:58
  Your spiritual life went from being an atheist to a devout follower follower of Jesus.
• 3:04
  Your book describes that atheists all have different reasons for their non-belief in God.
• 3:10
  Why is it that they're those their opinions vary?
• 3:14
  Well, um, an interesting way to put this, uh, I mean, it's it's uh it's funny, it's a fun way to say it.
• 3:21
  Uh, it's that atheism has denominations.
• 3:25
  And yeah, well, it's it's just a way to communicate an idea that it's very simple.
• 3:30
  So if you become an atheist uh in a culture like let's say Spain or England or France, you're not going to be the same atheist because of uh how culture functions and the context, the social cultural context in your country and society.
• 3:47
  So um here in Tennessee's south of the United States, I would say in the United States in general, Christianity is more culturally expected.
• 4:01
  So when an atheist becomes when a person becomes an atheist in a let's let's say specifically in Tennessee, they're going to be people that in general will will know the Bible pretty well because uh their churches everywhere, and there's uh there's something about them in general always.
• 4:20
  We could I cannot generalize, but usually people become atheists in this culture because there's something emotionally happened to them and uh that you know it was hard, and then they spend lots of time to build walls around them, walls that usually are you know, the tendencies to build uh how do you say this?
• 4:48
  Uh intellectual shielding, which is just building intellectual arguments around the broken heart so that you look rational in your non-belief, but what you're doing is actually uh protecting a broken heart.
• 5:02
  So it depends on the person, of course.
• 5:04
  This is I'm overgeneralizing here, but in my 10 years having conversations with non-believers here in Nashville, that's a common uh threat that that I've seen.
• 5:16
  So they something terrible happens to them or something difficult happens to them, and they say, how can there possibly be a God if that was allowed to happen?
• 5:25
  Is that is that sort of the framework?
• 5:27
  Exactly.
• 5:28
  Yeah, and usually, because I I went through the same thing in Spain.
• 5:32
  Uh something bad happened to me, and I didn't have the, you know, I wasn't rational enough at the at the time, I was 13 to know how to distinguish between the people who claim to follow God and God himself.
• 5:45
  So you put all of them in one place and then you reject the whole thing.
• 5:50
  So yeah.
• 5:51
  That's interesting that there's different denominations of the Church of Satan.
• 5:55
  I guess there would be.
• 5:56
  I mean, why wouldn't there be?
• 5:57
  I mean, there's different denominations in the in, you know, in Christian faith, you know, there's Baptists and Methodists and you know um non-denominational churches.
• 6:06
  I guess that would be so.
• 6:08
  But does so does that mean that the Church of Satan has different types of doctrines?
• 6:15
  Well, uh that uh as I said, as I said, it's just a way, it is a way analogically to understand, because we're saying when a person says I'm an atheist, they're saying that they don't believe in God, but the their journey to get to that belief of not uh not believing is going to be completely different.
• 6:33
  So as I said, a person that becomes an atheist in Spain, they actually are more apatheist, which is apathetic about God more than I'm an active atheist, and I wake up every day finding arguments to reassure that my non-belief is rational.
• 6:51
  Someone from Spain, they live in a culture that is very secular, and the big questions in life are not prominent at all.
• 6:58
  They're not prevalent in the in their lives.
• 7:00
  Their lives, so they they wouldn't know even what Jesus did for them on the cross.
• 7:00
  So they they wouldn't know even what Jesus did for them on the cross.
• 7:04
  While an atheist from the South, they would know what Jesus did on the cross, but they're still rejects, you know.
• 7:04
  While an atheist from the South, they would know what Jesus did on the cross, but they still reject this, you know.
• 7:10
  So it depends on the culture.
• 7:10
  So it depends on the culture.
• 7:13
  Yeah.
• 7:13
  Yeah.
• 7:13
  So that's what I meant by it.
• 7:13
  So that's what I meant by, yeah.
• 7:14
  Yeah.
• 7:15
  That's important information for people that, you know, if if I think many people have atheists or agnostics in their life and they're not really sure what that comes from.
• 7:15
  That's important information for people that, you know, if if I think many people have atheists or agnostics in their life, and they're not really sure what that comes from.
• 7:25
  You know, I've had a lot of guests on the show that have talked about um.
• 7:25
  You know, I've had a lot of guests on the show that have talked about um the educational system here in the country.
• 7:32
  And on the 10 penny files, and they've written about uh many times they've talked and talked about, you know, their their children are raised in a Christian home, and then they go off to college and then they come home for Christmas break and they go, Who are you?
• 7:45
  And what did you do?
• 7:46
  What happened to my child?
• 7:48
  And they have this whole conversation.
• 7:51
  The child, the the 20-something-year-old brings up this whole conversation about I've decided to deconstruct my Christianity.
• 7:59
  Explain what that really means to one's faith.
• 8:03
  Yeah, so well, that this is a term that is kind of new in this type of conversation.
• 8:09
  And what happens is so you have a faith that could have could have been usually people that deconstruct, not always, but most of them have a what is called a borrowed faith, which is a faith that you gain from someone next to you, let's say your father, your mother, a brother, someone that you love, but you're not rooted in your faith yourself.
• 8:31
  So the actual root of the faith is another person.
• 8:34
  So when they go, let's say this happens a lot, they go to college and they start seeing many, you know, if different experiences and freedom, whatever.
• 8:43
  So what they do with the deconstruction is um I'm going to go um belief by belief, say and see if I if I actually support the belief belief itself.
• 8:56
  If I don't like it, then I'm going to remove it.
• 8:59
  So they go, uh, do I believe that Jesus resurrected?
• 9:02
  Yes.
• 9:02
  No.
• 9:02
  Um let's say that he says yes, yes.
• 9:05
  I grew up in a legalistic home.
• 9:07
  Is that the way Jesus wants us to be?
• 9:10
  No.
• 9:10
  Okay, then that one needs to go.
• 9:12
  That's not that is not what Jesus wants us to be.
• 9:15
  Then what about signs and faith?
• 9:16
  It could be anything.
• 9:18
  So at the end of it, what you have done is to deconstruct, which I'm using the same term.
• 9:23
  Um, my apologies for that, but it's like unbuild a house to rebuild it, hopefully, to a faith that is closer to Jesus, that is far far from it.
• 9:35
  The problem is that many people deconstruct, and when they try to build the the house back, they're not Christians anymore.
• 9:42
  So they become, I don't know, it could be they don't have a faith at all, or they become new age followers of the universe, wants me to be happy.
• 9:51
  Uh, it could be, you know, there are many options, but that's what deconstruction means.
• 9:56
  And it's a process of that requires lots of sincerity and honesty, because many uh say I'm deconstructing, but they actually know the goal that they want to achieve, which is I want to leave Christianity.
• 10:11
  But uh a true process of deconstruction would mean I'm going to deconstruct, but I'm going to deconstruct towards Jesus because I still love him, so that I become closer to him.
• 10:22
  So that's a way to explain it.
• 10:25
  You know, your book for those who doubt, it's um it's written in a really unique way that just kind of draws people in because it starts uh just uh uh for the audience for listener, you know, it starts with two friends.
• 10:40
  One is obviously a strong Christian, and the other one you come, they have coffee, and the uh the one says, you know, I'm not even sure how to say this to you, but I I'm deconstructing my faith, and I'm not, I think that maybe I only believe in God and Christianity because my parents did, and I'm not so sure that I do.
• 10:58
  And then your entire book is this journey that they take together of the one character, Peter, who's talking to Thomas, which I think is so unique, the doubting Thomas, you know, that you do that of talking through all of the different elements of where people generally run into impediments in their faith.
• 11:19
  And I think that that's really it, and it's such a unique way to write because it's so much better than just you know, like paragraph form, this, you know, that there's a lot of books like that.
• 11:30
  But your book with this conversation really, you know, a couple things.
• 11:34
  One is it brings out different elements of the of the of what they're talking about, that you can you can make your point.
• 11:41
  The other thing is I'm sure that people who read this can see some of the conversations they may have had with their children or their neighbor, their friend or whatever, and you offer them a way to respond to that.
• 11:54
  So, how did you come up with that idea?
• 11:57
  And what were some of the questions that were addressed in the conversation between Peter and the doubting Thomas in your book?
• 12:04
  Absolutely.
• 12:04
  Yeah, thank you for the questions.
• 12:06
  Here's the book.
• 12:07
  And so what the book does for those who doubt, is it because of Jesus is you know, I had conversations with non-believers and Christians who were doubting for almost 10 years.
• 12:17
  And the one thing that I realized about this was that no one ever told me I left Christianity because of Jesus.
• 12:25
  No one ever said that to me.
• 12:28
  So I said, This is not because that would be the actual reason.
• 12:31
  The best reason to leave Christianity is would be I just don't like or don't believe in Jesus.
• 12:39
  Leaving Christianity for any other reason, it's almost like you're not leaving real Christianity.
• 12:44
  So I realized that this question was so important that I started asking this question to some friends, and they actually, yeah, they told me I no, actually, Jesus wasn't the main reason, and and it this moved me so much, and that's why I wrote the book, so that they if there's a Christian who is doubting, they can read the book, and the book is a story, it's narrated in the present tense, so that people feel that they that it's just that it's happening, and they're part of this table where these two characters are having conversations.
• 13:15
  There are many other characters in the book.
• 13:16
  The book is very raw, like it's not like you know, it's like a very raw uh novel.
• 13:23
  Hard, funny sometimes, but hard.
• 13:26
  And um the reason why I I wrote it that way is because I want people to feel that they are part of the conversations because many Christians don't have opportunities or they don't feel prepared to sit down and have these conversations.
• 13:41
  So I want them to uh I wanted uh them to have an opportunity to do so, but in a way that feels safe for them, and also um the book uh tries to help the Christian who is doubting to get to the end of the book in a way that they need to face the question themselves.
• 14:00
  Face the question themselves.
• 14:02
  Is it because of Jesus?
• 14:02
  Is it because of Jesus?
• 14:03
  Many times many friends and people at church and other people outside of the church, they tell me, Pedro, I have my brother, I have my mom or my father, they're doubting.
• 14:03
  Many times uh many friends and people at church and other people outside of the the church, they tell me, Peter, I have my brother, I have my mom or my father, they're doubting, I don't know what to do, my son.
• 14:13
  I don't know what to do.
• 14:15
  My son.
• 14:15
  And of course, I love to hang out with all of them and listen to their story.
• 14:15
  And of course, I love to hang out with all of them and listen to their story.
• 14:20
  But the main reasons why I wrote this book is so that this is the type of book that you give to this person.
• 14:20
  But they the main reasons why I I I wrote this book is so that this is the type of book that you give to this person, so that this person is reading a story that is going.
• 14:26
  So that this person is reading a story that is going to lead them to ask themselves the question, is it because of Jesus at the end?
• 14:38
  Yeah, that really does open up your heart space from a different perspective.
• 14:42
  What took you along your journey from being an atheist to a Christian?
• 14:46
  How did that transpire?
• 14:49
  Yeah, so um I was I was raised nominal Catholic, which that that and being secular are almost like the same thing in Spain.
• 15:00
  And um, you know, I was a saxophone player all my life, a musician, and I got to be a finalist on Spain's Got Talent, the TV show in Spain.
• 15:11
  With the saxophone, and that allowed me to travel all around the world teaching at universities and playing.
• 15:17
  So they invited me at to pla to be a guest professor at MTSU in Murphy's bro in Tennessee.
• 15:24
  And that's when I became I I started being in contact with Christians.
• 15:29
  Even though I was a musician, my passion was always the big questions in life.
• 15:33
  I would have loved to study philosophy instead.
• 15:35
  So I had a passion, even though I didn't believe in God, I it was undeniable to me looking up to the stars and seeing the universe just there, uh, wanting to be explained.
• 15:45
  It was very hard for me.
• 15:47
  There's nothing, and this is just mere you know, pure chance that we are all here, yet I didn't believe in God.
• 15:54
  So I was in contact with some Christians, and some of them, because Christianity entered in my brain first before it came to to the heart, which which by the way, it's not the best way for it to happen because that means that I didn't understand the cross well.
• 16:12
  I didn't understand it.
• 16:13
  It was more intellectual uh uh ascent at the at the beginning.
• 16:17
  But well, I met uh my father-in-law, which uh at that time wasn't my father-in-law, was a Bible translator, so he he was an expert on Aramaic, Hebrew, and Greek, and then I was so you know, with the big questions.
• 16:33
  I met someone that actually cared, it wasn't like, oh yeah, believe in God because he exists, and if not, then you're you know, but that the simplistic answers.
• 16:42
  So he opened my mind to linguistics to history and then my passion with uh philosophy as well.
• 16:49
  I started reading, I I started, you know, uh delving more into the rationality of believing God, and then I realized that throughout history in the Western civilization, like in interacting with the with the question of God is an actual but like they respected thing to do.
• 17:06
  I was very ignorant about this, whether you believe in it or not.
• 17:10
  So that kept opening my mind to it till I read the Sermon of the Mount.
• 17:15
  Oh Matthew 5, 6, and 7.
• 17:17
  When I read that, Sherry, I thought I want the world to be like this, first of all, clearly, and I want to be like this.
• 17:27
  Second, the person that was relating the Sermon of the Mount claimed to be God, and third, he claimed to have conquered my biggest fear, which is death.
• 17:39
  All of this came to me like a shock.
• 17:44
  So it was the Sermon of the Mount what brought me to my knees and said, Okay, Jesus, uh I'm going, I don't understand any of this, but I'm going to follow you.
• 17:53
  And my life is not mine anymore, it's yours.
• 17:55
  But I know that you're giving my life back with such love because I belong to you.
• 18:01
  And after that, you know, process of sanctification.
• 18:05
  We're not perfect in the letter of first John, it's expected that we're going to sin, but we're not slaves of sin anymore.
• 18:14
  We run back to the Father, and he forgives us, and this is the process on sanctification, becoming better and more like Jesus every day.
• 18:23
  And that's, you know, I don't play music anymore.
• 18:26
  I I'm just full-on ministry.
• 18:29
  I do ministry with um well here at the church, I'm a translator too, and I've uh I'm currently working with the Bible projects.
• 18:38
  I don't know if you have heard about them with the Bible projects, they just make animation videos.
• 18:43
  Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes.
• 18:44
  Yeah, so I'm a translator for them, English to Spanish.
• 18:48
  Oh, wow.
• 18:48
  Yeah, so everything that I do and now with the book and what what I do in social media with like short videos to help Christians help those who are doubting, uh, to analyze what they say from a more like a psychology perspective to help them help the person behind the comment.
• 19:07
  I just love Jesus so much, so that's what I'm doing.
• 19:10
  Wow, that's beautiful.
• 19:11
  You know, you said you like psychology, and you actually do presentations on the psychology of doubt.
• 19:17
  Yeah, tell us a little bit about that.
• 19:19
  Yeah, so what I do um on social media to help people, and um I do some presentations too as a speaker, is you know, I go on online and I find the most mocking, outrageous fears comments about Christianity.
• 19:40
  So I I take them out of their videos, and then I analyze them.
• 19:45
  I analyze what we the tendency, Sherry, is to see the comment and to interact with the with the intellect.
• 19:54
  No, no, Jesus resurrected, let me give you evidence.
• 19:57
  So no, no, science, this or that.
• 19:58
  Whoa, so I'm trying to help people see that behind the comment with that mockery or whatever it is, the comment is fears.
• 20:08
  There is a person that had a journey that took him to make that comment.
• 20:12
  Wow.
• 20:13
  And usually the comment is not the in the intellect of the comment is not the reason why they put the comment there.
• 20:22
  It's because there's something that is not working in them, and that is the person that I like to reach with Jesus.
• 20:32
  So what I do is an analysis of you know, a little bit of philosophy theology just to answer, but then I go, hey, but what is the person behind?
• 20:41
  And then analyzing, you know, the journey of the person to get to that type of comment and mockery or whatever they are saying.
• 20:48
  So yeah, just trying to help people.
• 20:50
  Um, you know, we would all be better served if we thought about all the comments we sought online that way.
• 20:57
  We would just be, you know, the the spouting off or the anger or you know, the slander or whatever that they're doing.
• 21:00
  Off or the anger or you know the slander or whatever that they're doing, we would all be better served if we said, wait a second, what's going on with this person that prompted them to put that post on X or on Instagram or whatever.
• 21:05
  We would all be better served if we said, wait a second, what's going on with this person that prompted them to put that post on X or on Instagram or whatever?
• 21:15
  That's really beautiful.
• 21:15
  That's really beautiful.
• 21:16
  Um you also say that followers of Jesus live in a continual paradox.
• 21:16
  Um you also say that followers of Jesus live in a continual paradox.
• 21:21
  What does that mean?
• 21:21
  What does that mean?
• 21:23
  Well, um, the scripture itself is is so paradoxical that.
• 21:23
  Well, um the scripture itself is is so paradoxical that I mean the nature of Christianity is we are walking saved because of his grace, what he did on the cross, but yet we wake up in the morning and we've experienced fear because of someone that we love is you know sick, or this email that I sent, I'm not getting an answer to whatever.
• 21:53
  Uh life is very hard because Christianity doesn't promise happiness, it promises joy through suffering.
• 22:01
  Uh that's the promise.
• 22:02
  So it's paradoxical in nature because we know that we're saved.
• 22:06
  We know that when heaven and earth unite again, we're good, it's everything's going to be incredibly good because of Jesus and because of God in the spirit.
• 22:15
  Yet on this side of eternity right now, we need to deal with fear, inconsistencies, our uh, you know, shortcomings as people.
• 22:27
  And it's paradoxical in nature because those two things are happening at the same time.
• 22:34
  What are some of the reasons that uh people start to question their faith?
• 22:38
  If they've been raised in a in a Christian home, they've been in church, they've been gone to summer camps, they've done all the things that they've done.
• 22:46
  What are some of the reasons that people start to question what they believe?
• 22:52
  So, yeah, there are many, many, many reasons, but the most common ones I would say is um when a person is like grows up in grows in in the church, meaning is you know, goes to church all their lives, and they they're kind of they're treating church like a maybe a social club, like a bubble, a bubble where you are there, everything is fine, you are just hanging out with people that think like you, and you're you're not being challenged, challenged in the way, like, hey, the world doesn't look like this at all.
• 23:27
  So, for example, many parents are spending time with their kids every day with this beautiful opportunity to disciple them, like Jesus discipled his disciples, which is in a way that they would bring them to difficult situations to show them that the world is very difficult.
• 23:46
  And after showing the difficulty, show them the way of Jesus, he would show them that what the way the thing that he would do.
• 23:53
  Parents could do this, for example, with their kids, but usually disciple making is not happening at home as much as we want to.
• 24:00
  So, what happens is that when a kid goes to college and they face reality, they just don't have the tools to face it because their faith was like something social.
• 24:11
  It wasn't something that it was that was rooted in their heart.
• 24:15
  I would say that even though people want to show that doubts are rooted in intellect, they're rare rarely solely an intellectual tendency.
• 24:28
  It usually it's something that emotionally broke in their heart.
• 24:34
  Could be a relationship, it could be a comment from a pastor, it could be something at church, it could be anything.
• 24:40
  Rarely, we're talking about intellectual doubts only.
• 24:43
  You know, I read a post on Facebook, this was a while back, of uh a teacher that was teaching at a Christian school, and he she realized that these kids were not being taught why they believe what they believe.
• 25:00
  They were taught to memorize Bible verses and understand, you know, the Christian stories and know the Ten Commandments, and but they weren't taught why.
• 25:10
  And so she took it on herself.
• 25:11
  This is a true story.
• 25:12
  This is a gal that was posting on Facebook that she took it on herself to she had gone to a a uh a Christian teachers conference, and she was ran across a book or two about teaching kids why they believe what they believe.
• 25:27
  And she started having them look at the Bible and looking at their lessons from a different perspective and writing essays and doing things to really support why they believe what they believe.
• 25:39
  And it transformed everything.
• 25:41
  And she and she and the kids were different.
• 25:44
  And one day the um the principal at the school called her into the office and said, What are you teaching these kids?
• 25:50
  She's and so she was like, she was at first like really kind of scared, like maybe she was going to get chastised, and she laid it out for the principal.
• 25:58
  The principal said, You're right, we need to do more of that.
• 26:01
  So they changed the whole school.
• 26:03
  This was a Christian school.
• 26:04
  They changed all of it, they changed the curriculum, and it just created all these young disciples because they really understood, not intellectually, like what you were talking about, not intellectually about um just the mechanics of the Bible, but really understanding why the whole gift of what what Jesus did for us, the whole gift from God, the whole uh uh principle of our faith about why we believe it, not just that we do.
• 26:34
  So it was really interesting.
• 26:36
  Yeah, that is beautiful, and yeah, what I've I've mentioned in this conversation the intellect a few times, not in the most um, you know, not in the most prettiest of ways, we could say it that way.
• 26:50
  I'm not saying that the intellect is bad at all, right?
• 26:53
  Right.
• 26:54
  I'm just saying that when a person says, you know, uh, I hate Christianity because of this or that, the most important word of that comment is hate.
• 27:05
  Anything that comes after that, it's just walls that's rational, we call them rational, that we're trying to build around the heart that is inside, you know.
• 27:17
  So that's what I mean.
• 27:18
  Apologetics, uh theology, beautiful.
• 27:21
  I love it, I love it myself.
• 27:24
  But a person, a person is not just uh a composition of molecules wanting to learn the mechanics of the universe and the scripture, scripture's goal is for us to form a relationship with the actual person that created us, like that's the and everything is in the context of relationship.
• 27:43
  So that's why that I wanted to clarify just in case that someone is listening.
• 27:47
  No, but that's really true.
• 27:48
  I mean, even but you need your intellect to even understand the why.
• 27:51
  So you're right, there's nothing wrong with that.
• 27:53
  Well, hold that thought for just a second, Pedro.
• 27:56
  We're going to take a short break to hear from our sponsors from America Out Loud.news.
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• 28:33
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  Liberty and Justice for all.
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  Liberty and Justice for all the Well, welcome back, everyone.
• 35:25
  Well, welcome back, everyone.
• 35:26
  Today's conversation is with Pedro Garcia, the outreach.
• 35:26
  Today's conversation is with Pedro Garcia, the outreach director at the Donaldson Fellowship, the Chris uh Christian Church located in Nashville, Tennessee, that focuses on discipleship, community, and outreach.
• 35:39
  We're talking about his incredibly important book, uniquely written for conversations to talk to your friends and family members who are starting to doubt their faith.
• 35:51
  His book, for those who doubt, is it because of Jesus?
• 35:56
  Let me tell you just a little bit more about our guest today.
• 35:58
  Pedro Garcia is not just a skeptic, but he was a self-proclaimed atheist that changed as he started a multi-year journey to prove Christianity is nothing more than a crutch for the ignorant.
• 36:11
  That what he discovered was quite the opposite.
• 36:14
  Soon he began hosting public conversations through his ministry and podcast, Ask and Wonder, encouraging open discussions about faith.
• 36:24
  Pedro, welcome back to the show.
• 36:26
  I'm so grateful to have you here with us today.
• 36:29
  Absolutely.
• 36:30
  Thank you so much.
• 36:31
  You know, just the name of your podcast, Ask and Wonder to encourage open conversations, because I think most of the Christian community sort of shuts that down.
• 36:40
  Like with something that you had said previously about just you know, knee-jerk answers, you know, like you can't question it because if you question it, you're going to go to hell.
• 36:50
  You can't question it.
• 36:51
  Yeah.
• 36:52
  And suddenly you've you've created a space to open that up for a great conversation.
• 36:57
  Yes.
• 36:58
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 36:59
  And that that was a ministry I was doing for for uh 10 years.
• 37:03
  It was to ask and wonder.
• 37:04
  And I had a podcast and also had this uh public meetings where I bring I would bring Christians and atheists together to have conversations, and it was beautiful right now because of uh the the question that has truly changed um you know my ministry and uh now the podcast is called Is It Because of Jesus, and that's what I'm trying to do is uh as I said, Sherry is to help people analyze the psychology of doubt to really know what is behind the commons and what is behind the intellects.
• 37:35
  But yeah, no, uh it has been quite a journey uh meeting people that doubt Christianity, all those that are Christians that are starting to have doubts, and they have this tendency of uh secluding, self-secluding because they don't want to share that they're doubting because of the fear of rejection, and most of them they don't share it, and they start building resentment because they feel that they cannot share it, even though it usually is not true.
• 38:04
  There are some situations where it's true, some people don't have anyone to share this because they would be ostracized, but in general that is not the case.
• 38:12
  So that is the reason um for the book, and just to help people truly say, hey, read this book because it's gonna take you through story uh to the moment of uh the most important moment in your doubt journey is asking if all of this is happening because of Jesus, because if it's not, then you could you can go back to Jesus with the most refreshed and deepest of all of relationships, you know.
• 38:40
  You know, it's really hard, you know.
• 38:42
  The statistics are pretty dismal.
• 38:44
  The fact that you know, less than 30% of people in America are going to church even once a month, and the Gen Zs are really doubtful about and Gen Z is like from age 14 to 25, sort of that age group, they're really doubtful because they're very discouraged about the state of life and the in their future, uh, given the economy and the price of everything and the job market and all of that.
• 39:09
  So you've got a really big job, and I'm really glad that you've taken it on to make this outreach even bigger because it's so important to be able to reach people where they are, and that's that's what your book does in this conversational style that you wrote in.
• 39:25
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 39:27
  So you also say that one of the that you write about all the great figures in scripture experienced doubt at some point in time, like Abraham, Jacob, Job, David, you know, they all had experienced doubt.
• 39:42
  What set them apart from the rest of us?
• 39:46
  Well, um, the one thing I would say about uh doubts when someone is doubting Christianity, the many people think that they're very unique in their doubt.
• 39:58
  Oh wow, yeah.
• 39:59
  And and we're not unique.
• 40:02
  I would say there are two ways to doubt.
• 40:04
  You can doubt away from God, or you can doubt towards God.
• 40:10
  And many people in scripture did that, they were doubting, but they were doubting towards God.
• 40:16
  Just to give you one example, Sherry.
• 40:18
  The last prophet of the old testament was John the Baptist.
• 40:23
  I mean, if there is a person that you would you wouldn't expect to doubt that this is him.
• 40:29
  He doubted.
• 40:30
  He saw this period descending over the waters, the baptism, he saw everything.
• 40:36
  He was in jail, and he doubted.
• 40:39
  He sent his disciples, go and and ask Jesus.
• 40:43
  Are you the one that was supposed to come?
• 40:46
  He didn't know.
• 40:47
  He he was doubting.
• 40:48
  And what Jesus, what did Jesus do?
• 40:51
  He actually praised after he answered, see the deaf hearing and the blind seeing.
• 41:00
  And then the disciples left of John, and then he turned to the crowd and he said, John is one of the greatest.
• 41:08
  So uh Jesus is not ostracizing John because of the doubt.
• 41:13
  He's celebrating because John decided to bring the doubt to him.
• 41:18
  Instead of just building resentment with it, or uh, you know, bring it to people that are not Christians or whatever, you bring it to Jesus, and there are many people like that.
• 41:30
  Elijah in the mountain, he was asking God, please kill me now.
• 41:35
  I mean, it is it truly like doubting is not new in the Great Commission, last chapter of Matthew.
• 41:42
  All the disciples are missing Jesus in Galilee in a mountain, and there was a this small comment.
• 41:50
  Everyone was there, everyone was excited, you know, I'm paraphrasing, but there's a there's a uh there's a uh small phrase, but some doubt it.
• 42:01
  You go, wow, like they're seeing Jesus resurrected, but some people still doubt it.
• 42:01
  You go, wow, like they're seeing Jesus resurrected, but some people still doubt it.
• 42:06
  And the script scripture is not afraid to show us you know that doubt is part of the journey.
• 42:07
  And the script scripture is not afraid to show us.
• 42:12
  You know, that doubt is part of the journey.
• 42:15
  But if we doubt towards Jesus, then the relationship is going to get deeper and deeper as those doubts are satisfied in who he is, what he did, and what he keeps doing.
• 42:15
  But if we doubt towards Jesus, then the relationship is going to get deeper and deeper as those doubts are satisfied in who he is, what he did, and what he keeps doing.
• 42:29
  You know, in
• 42:29
  You know, in your book, you also say in your book, for those who doubt, is it because of Jesus?
• 42:35
  Why do you encourage us not to worship theology?
• 42:39
  Yes.
• 42:40
  So many times we think that in order to reach a person, what we need to do is to learn so much information, you know, to try to convince them to try to make Christianity sound so rational and super intellectual.
• 42:56
  I would say it is, and it can be, but that is not what uh what it really helps a person that is doubting.
• 43:04
  A person that is doubting feels alone, feels that there's no place or person to go.
• 43:12
  And nowadays, with the internet, you can listen to the most incredible thinkers in the world.
• 43:20
  You don't your friend Bobby or your friend Sarah, you can meet with them, they're not going to give you the videos, the content that you can see at home on YouTube, but by great thinkers.
• 43:34
  We cannot do this anymore.
• 43:35
  What we lack is an actual relationship, and that is exactly what Jesus gave to people that were broken.
• 43:42
  It wasn't, hey, let me tell you why I'm God.
• 43:45
  Let's go through the old testament scriptures, the old covenant to show you.
• 43:49
  He would show them that he loved them first, and after love, that this type of love feeling seen, then he would bring the the arguments or the you know, the old covenant uh conversation to see that he was the Messiah.
• 44:07
  You know that that um what you just mentioned about you know, John the Baptist questioning, and Jesus said, Well, he's the greatest.
• 44:14
  It's almost as though he's inviting us to ask and the question.
• 44:20
  Is that correct?
• 44:21
  Exactly.
• 44:21
  Yeah.
• 44:22
  I mean, the the name Israel in Hebrew, it means the wrestler, the one that wrestles with God.
• 44:28
  Like it is truly expected.
• 44:30
  On the we're not in Eden, we're outside of Eden.
• 44:34
  So we are going to be going through things that we really don't understand.
• 44:38
  Sherry, I was seeing two years ago, I was seeing my father dying right in front of me at a hospital in Spain.
• 44:45
  And I was asking the Lord, please don't let him go.
• 44:49
  I love him so much.
• 44:50
  And I usually, when I pray, I always say, always, always always say anything to for anything, I say, but please, Lord, may your will be done, not mine.
• 45:01
  But when I was praying that over my father, I really didn't want to say it.
• 45:06
  Because that that phrase meant something very important and urgent in that moment.
• 45:12
  But I had to say it because I love him.
• 45:15
  I love him, and I know that he's with us.
• 45:17
  So it is it is all based in relationship, it is all based in uh in the emotional encounter with the person that created us, and the intellect comes like that.
• 45:32
  Yeah.
• 45:33
  You know, I did an interview with a with a gentleman that was on my show.
• 45:37
  Um he's been on the show a couple of times.
• 45:40
  He wrote a book called Is My Child Saved.
• 45:43
  And he talked about this uh conversation about um just like all the things we've already been saying.
• 45:50
  Kids go away, they come back from college, and they're like, I'm an atheist, I don't believe in any of this stuff anymore.
• 45:55
  And then the parents or the grandparents are like, wow, what does that mean?
• 46:00
  And the the bottom line of that book, which really meant a lot to me, was he said, you know, there's a difference between a relationship and fellowship.
• 46:10
  And relate, he said it's sort of like you can get married and have a great relationship that kind of dwindles over time, which means you're still married, you haven't gotten divorced, you're still married, that's your relationship, but you've lost the fellowship.
• 46:24
  And what Jesus really wants from us is the fellowship.
• 46:27
  You know, once once you've accepted him as your savior, you know, it's once saved, you know, he's nothing's gonna snatch us from his hands, you know, even from the worst condition.
• 46:36
  But what he really wants is fellowship with us, and that that conversation that I had with him about that book, I've gone back to it and listened several times because just laying it out in that language in those ways made a lot of sense.
• 46:51
  You know, you can meet Jesus and have a relationship, but it's over time, spending time with that relationship that you're developing the fellowship.
• 47:00
  Wow, that is beautiful, Sherry.
• 47:02
  Wow, I want to think about that.
• 47:04
  Yeah, it's really it was really, really good.
• 47:06
  I can I can have him send you the link on that podcast that we did because it was really good.
• 47:10
  The title of his book was Is My Child Saved?
• 47:13
  It was really good.
• 47:14
  So, how do you address atheists and agnostics who use the argument that science doesn't support the presence of God?
• 47:24
  Uh this might be one for people, one of the most difficult questions to answer, to answer, yet for me is one of the easier, easiest ones because um I mean when I discovered, not because I'm super smart, but because people that are smarter than me told me that there is a written language in the universe through which we can understand it, and we can get to it through mathematics.
• 48:01
  That I mean so the universe is written in a language that we cannot see, but people with with brains, we can through through the graphs of mathematics, we can get to determine what the universe is, how it functions, and we can actually determine things that are going to happen in the future at the physical level because of mathematics.
• 48:26
  I mean, there is order everywhere, and in order to understand order, you need you need intellect, and we happen to have intellect to understand that order.
• 48:37
  Meaning the the question of creation being the will of someone is so clear to me.
• 48:46
  It is so clear to me.
• 48:47
  So the question of science gets to the, you know, the when the battle happens is when you know, for example, you have people at the hospital, and they say, Hey, it's actually a doctors who are uh, you know, healing your mom.
• 49:00
  They say, hey, it's actually a doctors who are uh you know healing your mom.
• 49:06
  It's it's not your prayer, you're just sending thoughts.
• 49:06
  It's it's not your prayer, you're just sending thoughts.
• 49:08
  But the ones that are doing this are people that are there, right?
• 49:08
  But the ones that are doing this are people that are there, right?
• 49:12
  So, and you get to these false dichotomies, because the rescue involves both the prayer and the people that are actually helping your mom survive.
• 49:12
  So, and you get to these false dichotomies, because the rescue involves both the prayer and the people that are actually helping your mom survive.
• 49:23
  These two things are happening at the same time.
• 49:23
  These two things are happening at the same time.
• 49:26
  The people that are doctors uh don't know why they exist.
• 49:26
  The people that are doctors, uh, don't know why they exist.
• 49:30
  They just showed up in the world and now taking care of your mom, and they're studying a world that can be studied.
• 49:37
  There are patterns that they recognize in a body that is made with mechanisms that we can also understand.
• 49:44
  I mean, the question of intelligence is just inescapable.
• 49:48
  So I would say uh it's like out there, it's very conceptual, but truly.
• 49:54
  Uh, Psalm 19 begins with uh the the universe speaks a language that that we cannot see, and then ends talking about the law of God with special revelation.
• 50:08
  So in the Belgian confession of Christianity, we have the book of nature and the book of scripture, and if there is any some type of tension between those two, is because we need to do a better job to understand how they merge, not because of uh those two uh having a problem to coincide, you know.
• 50:29
  So very good.
• 50:30
  What advice would you give someone who's question starting who's questioning their faith?
• 50:35
  Where should they begin?
• 50:38
  I would say, I would say the first question that they should uh wonder about is it because of Jesus?
• 50:46
  Because if it's not, then they might be they might be moving away from something they think it's Christianity, but it's not.
• 50:56
  The first question should always be, is it because of Jesus?
• 50:59
  If the answer is no, then they should do their best to bring their questions and their doubts to Jesus first.
• 51:07
  The second thing I would say, please, please don't isolate yourself.
• 51:14
  If you are in an environment where maybe there's a church that unfortunately they don't they don't acknowledge doubts or they don't want to hear questions, then I would gently consider move to a different church.
• 51:28
  Find someone that really wants to listen to you instead of fixing you with sudden immediate theology.
• 51:37
  That is not what you need.
• 51:38
  You need someone to listen to you because the doubt, as I said in this in this conversation many times, the doubt is rooted probably in something that is emotional first, it's not intellect only.
• 51:54
  And yeah, so is it because of Jesus?
• 51:58
  Don't isolate yourself, and I would say doubt towards God instead of away from him.
• 52:05
  That's good, because the Bible is our instruction manual, and if you know it's good for teaching and and and you know, it and instruction, and it's all there for us.
• 52:15
  All we have to do is dig in and look.
• 52:17
  And while you're reading, ask the Holy Spirit to direct you to find the to find your answers and lead you to the right place, or you might have read that same verse 20 times, but the Holy Spirit can open your eyes to go, I never saw that before.
• 52:32
  Exactly.
• 52:33
  And how it implies differently.
• 52:34
  Well, Pedro, this conversation has just been great.
• 52:37
  And I think that we've given your book for those who doubt, is it because of Jesus a pretty good overview?
• 52:43
  But what reason would you say that people really need to uh get this book, read it and really digest it and have it be part of their part of their armamentarium?
• 52:54
  So this book uh primarily is for I'm just talking to the to the listener uh right now, which is the audience, is for that person you've been praying for for so many years.
• 53:07
  You really don't know what to do anymore.
• 53:10
  This book is for that person.
• 53:12
  I wrote that book for that person.
• 53:13
  That person you feel sometimes I I actually feel I don't want to pray for them anymore, not because I don't want to, because nothing is happening, you know.
• 53:23
  That is that is the person I wrote this book to.
• 53:26
  There's a second person I wrote this book to, which is Christians who want to understand what's going on in the most difficult questions so that they can learn how to approach them.
• 53:36
  So any anyone that would like to help those people and they feel they don't know what to do anymore.
• 53:43
  For those who doubt, is it because of Jesus?
• 53:46
  This is the reason exactly why I wrote the book.
• 53:49
  Because the book is gonna bring this person that you love to face the ultimate question through the story, which is it because of Jesus.
• 53:57
  If they want to also interact with this, my social media handle is is it because of Jesus on TikTok and Instagram, Facebook, and also uh YouTube.
• 54:10
  And I'm sharing videos where there's a fierce, uh a very uh fiery comment mocking Christianity, but then I kind of dismantled the the comment to focus on the person that is behind and the journey that might have taken a person to say something like this, focusing on the heart.
• 54:30
  Oh, that's beautiful, and it's really really great.
• 54:32
  Say your social media again so people can certainly come and follow you.
• 54:36
  Well, thank you, Sherry.
• 54:37
  If the handle is, is it because of Jesus?
• 54:40
  If you type that, both I have a podcast to help Christians help others who are doubting, and also social media handle, is it because of Jesus to uh to to keep helping that way.
• 54:52
  Well, Pedro Garcia, thank you so much for being here today.
• 54:56
  You are uh certainly a blessing to your church for sure to be the leader there because um what you have a great uh a huge uh you you've been tasked, the Lord's given you something to do that's very very important, and you're following through with it, which is you know what we all hope that we hear someday, well done, good and faithful servant.
• 55:15
  Well, you are actually walking in those steps to really try to meet people where they are who are questioning their faith, questioning God, questioning whether or not I should believe in this, um, like Hoval Horry Hurari says from the World Economic Forum, you know, the big mythical thing in the sky that we can we can start believing of.
• 55:37
  And you've taken on the great commission of making disciples and meeting people where they are and leading them to the world to the Lord.
• 55:43
  So God bless you for that.
• 55:45
  And thank you.
• 55:46
  Thank you for writing this book.
• 55:47
  And you could find his book at our bookstore, which is bookstore.drtempedi.com, bookstore.dr tempetty.com, because we put all of the books from all of our authors there, so it makes it easy to find.
• 55:59
  So in case you've you're watching this today or you're watching this sometime, you know, in the future after this has been posted, you can go back and find all of that in one place.
• 56:00
  You've you're watching this today, or you're watching this sometime, you know, in the future after this has been posted.
• 56:05
  You can go back and find all of that in one place.
• 56:08
  So I want to close out with all one of my favorite verses from the Bible.
• 56:08
  So I want to close out with all one of my favorite verses from the Bible.
• 56:11
  I close all of my podcasts with, whether they are live or pre-recorded, which is Romans 12 12.
• 56:11
  I close all of my podcasts with, whether they are live or pre-recorded, which is Romans 12 12.
• 56:17
  Rejoice in hope, be patient in trouble and be persistent in prayer.
• 56:17
  Rejoice in hope, be patient in trouble, and be persistent in prayer.
• 56:21
  Remember to lean into God for everything.
• 56:21
  Remember to lean into God for everything.
• 56:23
  He will never let you down.
• 56:23
  He will never let you down.
• 56:24
  His time frame may not be your time frame, but he promised he will never leave you.
• 56:24
  His time frame may not be your time frame, but he promised he will never leave you.
• 56:29
  He will always be.
• 56:29
  He will always be right there with you.
• 56:31
  So thank you for joining us here today.
• 56:33
  It's been such a pleasure to talk with you, Pedro, and it's been such a pleasure to share this information with my audience.
• 56:39
  So we'll see you.
• 56:40
  So I wish you to have a great rest of your day.
• 56:42
  We will see you tomorrow or the next time, right here at 3 p.m.
• 56:46
  Eastern, Monday through Friday at the 10 Penny Files.
• 56:49
  Have a good rest of your day, everybody.
• 56:51
  Goodbye and God bless.
• 56:52
  Amen.
• 56:53
  Thank you.