Live from the Pathway Studios in Johnston proper. You are live from the path. And you're listening to Live From The Path. We're coming to the Pathway Studios here in Johnston Proper. Yes. Yes. We are. Yes. Yes. That's us. I'll start asking this question so we got something to jump off from. Apparently so. Hey. Here's what we got going on the show today. Hey. So and I'm gonna give I don't mean don't really don't wanna give this away. I feel like this is

this is how you keep people on because you got you got a what what am I thinking of? You could build some momentum, some suspense. Yeah. But here's the thing, the results are in from the, the Life in the Path Facebook poll. The question Oh, buddy. Question was, Buva has never heard of Pat Sajak of Wheel of Fortune fame, have you? And after I mean, let's just go a decent number of votes. It's 93% to seven.

And Wait a minute. How many how many votes were there? 14. Oh, buddy. So We're gonna call that a land sale. So I was the only one to vote a no. You were the lone person to have not have heard of Pat the only one who's never heard of Pat Sajak? Did you look him up? No. What? You still haven't taken him in? No. I haven't taken him in. You're missing out on that. I know see, here's the deal. I know the show, but, like, I didn't know the name. What do you what do you what goes on right when they start Wheel of Fortune? They go and the host and you like, what? I've never run away. Intentionally watched a show of Wheel of Fortune. Do you know of Anna White? The the gal yes. The gal who does the the letters. Right? Boy. Live such a sexist,

life. The gal that does is she not identified as a gal? You remember the woman but not the dude? Oh, how okay. Interestingly that I'm sexist against men. Yeah. No. I just I've heard her name a thousand more times in my life than I've heard Pat Sajak say. I like to all the records. She is more attractive than him. That's true. I would agree with that statement. I have looked at her more than him I was I that's fair. Flipping through the channels. If if she were on, I'd stop back in the day and go, hey. Hey. That's miss White. Those are nice letters. Hello. Those are Hello, Venna. Those are nice letters. I would not think to Pat, that's one nice suit you're wearing. I've yeah. I guess I've never looked at how Woody dresses. Maybe he dresses alright. I I would not know. I didn't know that by name until a few weeks ago. Okay. Alright. Anyway, it was it was a resounding defeat for Booba's way of Here's the deal. I'm gonna do that I'm gonna do that poll on my personal Facebook and I'm Okay. I'm gonna see what happens with the with you know, I'm You will embarrass yourself. I would not do this. I'm doing it. Here's the deal. My social media exists,

for things other than my glory nowadays, which is exactly why I'm If you struggle at all with self confidence, self image Dan, if you ever met me? No. I'm just saying if secretly, sometimes the most vocal people are the most people Okay. Fair enough. Alright. Valid point. If you struggle at all, I wouldn't do it. Do not do not invite. I'm just giving you see? Not everyone listens to me, but I'm saying it. Dan, this is exactly say things if I mean it. I'm going in to do this. How do you make a poll on Facebook? Well, here's what we'll do. We'll catch up. We we'll have two weeks because, we're out next week, but we'll catch up two weeks from now and see, the evaluation is, one, does do Buva's friends know Pat Sajak? And two,

should Buva always listen to Dan's wisdom? I believe the answer is gonna come in in in tandem. How spell his last name? S a j a k. Is it Jack? It says say Jack. That's ridiculous. Are you intentionally say it wrong?

Yeah. Well, I mean, I can't say it aloud. I'm just gonna I was just typing it. I know. But but you've worked in call centers. People call and give you your name, and there's people in the call center who who, like, say it wrong. Like, they respell it in their own mind and then pronounce it wrong even though someone who knows their name legitimately Have you ever heard of Pat Sajak? Alright. Alright. Anyway, that's, that's okay. Got that out of the way. That's that's what we're going on here at Life in the Past. This is outstanding. Second so secondly, I don't know, Dan, did you see the article someone had posted an article about how effective the the title of the article is from The Atlantic. It's called, they tried to start a church without God for a while it worked. I started reading it but whatever I was doing, didn't have time so I I was gonna go back but didn't. It's so it I skimmed it. It's super long but, like, it's we're gonna read through some of it because it's I it's pretty interesting and I think You had speakers and Yeah. Excitement

and but just no god. That's right. It's people trying to replace the church experience but do it without god because, well, people still need community. Because everybody comes for the show. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So so it so we'll we'll talk through that because I thought it was there were some interesting not only to know what people are trying and basically how it's going because I think, otherwise, what we believe, oh, you know, people are competing with the church and they're just creating community and that it's going off, on rockets and that's not really what's happening. Yeah. And secondly, I think it does have implications or teaches us, I think, things that we already know about the the core of why people do attend. Regardless of what the periphery things are, you know, kind of what what what they're actually being drawn into and that the as as a core effect, Jesus actually matters.

Yeah. Like, it's integral to what we do. Yeah. So, anyway, I thought that was an interesting article. There was also, do you guys remember the bible man, answer man, Hank Hannagraph? Oh, yeah. Yes. Yeah. So Pat Sajak? Pat Sajak? Yes, I know Pat Sajak. I think he's in line next when when Hank retires. So so Hank so Hanegraaff, the bible answer man. Oh, Just talk about boo. Anyway,

so he got booted off a lot of stations. You get we talked about this when it happened because he became an Eastern Orthodox. Mhmm. But anyway, there there was an article about him, it said, Hank Hanegraaff, also known as the bible answer man, revealed how God supernaturally saved him during a recent brush with death amid his ongoing battle with cancer, allowing him to see his 60 birthday. So I I thought this was just kind of interesting. It said, in a video posted on July 17, the host of the nationally syndicated Bible Answer Man radio broadcast announced that he recently underwent allergenic stem cell transplantation, a potentially curative treatment for mantle cell lymphoma, and the surgery was successful. Quotes, weirdly. During his four hundred day hospital stay, the radio host said he had the time for reflection and thought of what it is that God has for me to do in the remaining years of my life. And I do believe God's going to give me many more years, he said. I don't want to be presumptive, but I almost died. I had passed out. I had gone unconscious.

And the time in ICU is just a blur. I remember little bits and pieces of it, but when my kids and my wife told me about what I went through in the ICU, it was like they were talking about a different person. Anagraph revealed that if it weren't for his son, David, visiting exactly the right time at the hospital, he wouldn't be alive today. But he's the one that saw that all of sudden my speech was incoherent, and then I went unconscious and got the nurses in and got me in the ICU. I was a close breast with death, still feeling a lot of the effects of that. Said it came within a whisper of being in the presence of the Lord. He says it makes you look at life completely differently. I will not die but live and will proclaim what the Lord has done. He saved supernaturally saved me from dying. Anyway, I just thought well, the movie, what what what you pictures of this this categorization? No. Just just

anytime the whole supernaturally thing comes in, it just it it hits me weird. Is it is just should we just stop using the phrase supernaturally? Yeah. Because because if you said, hey. The Lord stepped in and did something, I'd be like, yeah. That happens. Yeah. Exactly. But if we go if the Lord did the voodoo on it or did the supernatural Right. Yeah. Exactly. There there's nothing supernatural about it. It's just how he works. It's how he does things. Whether it was whether it was through medicine or not, just because it was miraculous or not didn't mean it wasn't god. If if god saved you through chemotherapy, that was still God saving you. There was nothing supernatural about the concept of chemotherapy working. Not to say he doesn't do things supernaturally like, no. We didn't seek any medical advice. We didn't see what happened. And then, you know, my loved one was miraculously cured. That's awesome. Still like the word supernatural. Yeah. I suppose it is it is I mean, it is framed from a human perspective. It is something beyond what we believe is natural but really, it's superhuman natural. For god, it's just natural. Yeah. That is how the

lord can and does behave. Right. It's just how he does things. So okay. Here here's I'm got a little different twist on this Okay. As I was listening to you talk about this. I'm I'm thinking, okay, he was 69, you say? Yeah. So he does he have like, he's really attached to this life. Does for being the bible answer man, I'm I'm, like I mean and then that was my first thought and I thought, well, at what age do you start thinking, well, I mean, I am 69. I mean Actually, you know, it's interesting Or 85 or or well, you know, I don't know what age that is. Because when he said, I came within a whisper of being in the presence of the Lord, it made me think of Paul. I could be in the presence of the Lord or I could stay with you and he's like, well, you know, I I got work to do here so I guess I'll stay but this I came within the whisper of being in the presence of the Lord, felt like, shoo, I just skimmed by, I made it still. I think I'm still here. Right? Exactly. In the presence of you all, I'm like Yeah. Hey, that just kind of struck me, like, woah, wait a minute. I mean, does that is that off? Am I I would say shoot. I was almost in the present. Yeah. Exactly. I was almost in the throne room of king Jesus. Do regret who came in my room? Right. Yeah. What what stupid kid I had. What would be what would be your regret? You're out of the world. Leaving this earth or would you regret be missing heaven? Like, that's the deal. I mean, like, we don't, like, you know, want to die, but but he seemed like he was really glad he didn't die. Right. Thankfully, I'm here with you still. Yeah. I don't know. That just says shit like me made me just kinda wonder. He's big big radio guy and may maybe that's it. Maybe he's just get a certain ego. You think, yeah, but other people need to die, but I don't know if I really want to. I should I should remain. I should abide. Yeah. Interesting.

Hey. Just a heads up. What? We're five minutes into my poll. I have 12 votes that, yes, they all know who Pat Sajak is. I hope you are strong. Oh, boo boo. You're in a real business. The comments the comments go from sounds like a wheel of fortune clue to a GIF of Jack Nicholson going. I don't I warned you, my friend.

It's only gonna get worse. I'm just saying. On our live from the path poll, we got 14 votes. I wanted to ex like, get an exponentially large amount of votes. And if we're given this two weeks, we're we're six minutes in. I got 12. Oh, man. We'll see when you break. Oh, no. This is gonna be great. At the end of this, I'm gonna be like, I had no idea who this was, and then I'm gonna have a horde of people that are gonna be upset at me. We're gonna find Bubba in the fetal position. Just sucking on a break. Bubba. I don't know who they're Sucking on an orange. I know who Pat Zajac is. I'm sorry. Come cuddle me a tweet from Pat Zajac that's like, I know who am. I should tag him. I'll I'll tag him on the Twitter. Certainly, tweets. Pat Sajak, do you know who Pat Sajak is? I'll ask the same question. Pat Sajak, have you do you know John Boover third? We'll see. He'll probably be like, yes. I hope there's a Jack Nicholson gif with him going. No, sir. Nope. You can't handle the truth. Okay. Wait. He'll say, yes, I do, and that does not look like him. I know that reference. Does that have anything to do with past day Jack? No. Jack Nicholson. Okay. I'm just making sure that he wasn't in that movie also because I obviously don't know the man. I don't think he does movies. So I don't know him. He was in the background on the TV. Yes. There are three r's. In the courtroom, he's in the background.

Wait. Is that Pat Sajak back there? Yes. It is. Oh, man. I hope I don't owe him money for saying his name so many times. No. I don't think he can copyright his own his own likeness. Can you? I mean, not your name. Right? Not for casual conversation. I mean, yeah. We can't, like, make his T shirts probably, but but we can say it. Right. I'm gonna be a T shirt that says, I don't know who Pat Sajak is. Pat Sajak. Pat who with a question mark on it. You have any w's? This is gonna be great. You know caused him to question, Booba, is is is really what you do with your time. Because, like, obviously, the rest of the world has at least used some of their precious time to understand who Pat Saint That's a valid point. I'm I I am I wrong for not knowing him? Is that what you're trying to argue? Yeah. It's it's not it's not, I think, explicitly that you're wrong for not knowing Pat Sajak. It means that you could be otherwise doing nefarious things with your time for having not been exposed to it. Yeah. So so the lack of wheel of fortune in my life and the lack of understanding who Pat Sajak is could lead to nefarious things. Yeah. Like, you could be spending all your time on on 4chan plotting how to create a video game out of shoelaces. Shoelaces. Right. Exactly. Like, this whole time, I could have been tagging subway cars or or understanding who Pat Sajak was. That's right. That's right. Gotcha. That makes sense. You make a mean afro with the spray can, but otherwise don't know anything legit. Boova. Pat who?

Okay. Let's see. So let's get to this article and then we're gonna catch up with BUVA had a wingding of a day and so we're gonna catch up with it. So the this was from The Atlantic, so kind of an interesting source for this. It was the title of the article again was they tried to start a church without God. For a while, it worked. Secular organizers started their own congregations, but to succeed, they need to do a better job of imitating religion. And there are a couple conclusions in this article that I, I think they've come to the wrong conclusion, but let's let's at least kinda talk through the setup. That when Justina Walford moved to New York City nine years ago, she never felt more alone. She'd left behind her church, her god, and her old city, Los Angeles. Then a secular congregation called Sunday Assembly filled the spiritual void, at least for a time. Walford had just turned 40. As a child, she had been deeply religious. Her parents had no interest in religion and didn't understand why she would. They'd sent her to a Christian school in hopes of good discipline and education. Goodness, what we're known for.

Spankings. But Justina fell headlong into faith, delighting in her church community and dreaming of one day becoming a pastor herself. By the time she turned up in New York, her faith had long since unraveled, a casualty of overseas travel that made her question how any one religious community could have a monopoly on truth. What's interesting is that, Christianity is pretty prevalent almost everywhere. I don't know what about overseas does this Pretty much everywhere. But still, she grieved the loss of God. It was like breaking up with someone that you thought was your soul mate, Wolfer told me. It's for the better. It's for your own good, she remembered thinking. Even though it no longer made sense to her to believe, she felt a gaping hole where her church, her people, her Psalms, her stained glass windows used to be. So it's interesting because, like, that's the description of it. I I I think that the attempts to frame the article as if it's a community issue, of which I think this she she believes as well

and what it'll be my first inkling to say, I don't I I'm not sure that's what the gap is. I'm not it's it's I don't think the hole's just people. I think I Right. I've in fact, I've made the case that, like, when it comes to straight up community, camaraderie, people kind of supporting you and whatever it is your life circumstances are, you the average bar on a Saturday night can is is is will compete with the the with the shape of the thing. Right. People around asking you how you are, remembered your stories or whatever but, like, there's something distinctly different about a religious community that is not the same thing as your Saturday night bar, even though most post evangelicals,

would will claim to have found it in in the bar. There's shades of people, but it's it's not the same thing. Anyway, says, then Walford read an article about Sunday Assembly, a community started in Great Britain in 2013 that has spread quickly across the Atlantic to her doorstep. Members gather on Sunday, sing together, listen to speakers, and converse over coffee and donuts. So far, nailing it. Meetings are meant to be just like church services but without God. That's it, she thought. That's what I want. When Walford shed her faith, she joined a large and fast growing group, the nuns or the religiously unaffiliated. So we've talked about these folks, the people who are otherwise, walking or say that they're not affiliated, and they do not, they're not particularly antagonistic about it. So they're not necessarily people who would say, look, hey, we're hardcore atheist or agnostic. The the how you would think of agnostic except they don't even care, like, they're just not they don't care to speak on. Says secular congregations such as Sunday Assembly and Oasis, a similar group started in 2012, seek to offer a solution.

Both were founded by faithless seekers hoping to carry on certain aspects of religious life, the community, the moral deliberation and the rich sense of wonder. When they were growing I like this moral deliberation point. I don't ever really deliberate. Does that go on in in your church, Dan? You were like, hey, thou shall not and people are like, well, let's speak this over. Can we can we can we have a conversation about this? Yeah. I wanna talk this over. Not how I wanna live my life. Are you sure? Now is the thou, like, the them, they, or or or is it As long as it were not it's not me. Right? Because I'm I'm having problems with the pronouns. When they were growing so let's see. When they were growing so rapidly in their early years, these congregations were heavily covered by media outlets. The Hot New Atheist Church, gushed a 2013 Daily Beast headline about Sunday Assembly. HuffPost noted that the number of assemblies had doubled in a single weekend in 2014. The media coverage emphasized the new community's high energy services, its celebratory message, and the top of your lungs group renditions of pop anthems such as Living on a Prayer. For these uncomfortable those uncomfortable with the level of overt spirituality even within relatively liberal denominations such as unitary universalism, secular communities offered a different option.

But even as the growth of nones has revved up in the intervening years, the growth of secular congregations hasn't kept pace. First of all, does that surprise? That surprise you? No. No. Yeah. I I don't I'm not surprised either. People are stupid. Well, right. Right. Like, they they they know that you've, this is it's put on to a certain extent. Like, it's a it's a it's a put on for something and the question is is, like, what is the value of the shape of it if the thing in the middle isn't there? Like, can't I just solve this in a bar on a Saturday night or at somebody's house Mhmm. For for game night or something? Yeah. It it it took the it it took the the the aspects of the thing and said, if we can mimic this, it will grow without missing the it's it's taking the leaves, actually, so or or the the fruits of the vine, the grapes and putting them all together and moving them somewhere else and saying, look, they didn't have to be attached to the vine and I think that's the mistake. Yeah. You could get rotten grapes. And what's interesting and I thought bringing up how other places had talked about it was interesting because I do remember seeing articles like that. I remember seeing people like, hey, man, it's a hot new thing, like, atheists are finding church communities and because I don't care to find follow-up on it, I would have no sense as to whether they're succeeding or not and it's interesting to find out that things aren't going very well. So the question is, let me ask you guys before we get to that part of the article, What what are the what are the complications? Why don't you think these things are succeeding? Besides, like, the core answer of, obviously, they're missing Jesus.

Well, they've been going on for years. I mean, I I go to Kiwanis tomorrow morning. For some people, that's their church. It's it's a civic organization. There is service to the community and the world involved. There are national conventions. We we say a pledge of allegiance, you get your little national in there. For some, that is that's their this community, they they hang out, they do stuff. I mean, like, you can find community anywhere. Right. Right. It's not outlandish that you can't, like, set up a communal thing that provides support networks and people getting together and It's a concept of poker night. Yeah.

And people can smell if they're just trying to make a buck, a business out of it. Like, oh, the church makes money. We can make money. It's like but I'm not gonna give to you because I for the purpose of giving. And there are are they are they anti church? Is that is that a fair way to put this? Like, are they trying to go against the establishment of new church? And that's one of their motives for it? Or is it just trying to find community outside of religion? Or That's I think it's that. Okay. Alright. I'm just trying to make sure that I'm framing correctly in my in my thought process. It's a it's a dollar thing. Really? There there's big dollars. How much money does Hope Lutheran bring in on a weekend? I mean, yeah. A lot. Right? I mean Okay. That's not a bad business Right. When you're not selling anything. Right. Yeah. Exactly. And then people start realizing, you know what I was asking You gotta have a building and some overhead. Yeah. You know what's interesting though then, I guess, now that I think about your Kiwanis example, there there is at least a center around a moral good for Kiwanis. An intent to otherwise help do something good Right. As a group and it's not just moral right and wrong, it's we get together with an intention of positively impacting the world around us. Yeah. That does not appear as if that is the center of this No. Of this thing whereas the the the morality or let's just think of the belief system of a Christian church

implicitly like, has an implication that it changes what you do which otherwise impacts the way the world is around you or how you interact with it. Right. Without that moral center here or a specific moral guiding principle like like Alliance Club or Kiwanis or something like that or would have, that does feel like it would admit, like, you just don't have an imperative to be there. Well, moral directive becomes unifying. And so without that, you know, yeah. Yeah. Your I see your point, like, doesn't really make sense. Like, if it's purely social, I can't imagine it stays very strong for very long. Like, hey, let's go to a house of non prayer and go hang out together and listen to Bon Jovi. Right. Like, that that just seems like something that people may get involved in on a whim and be excited about kind of the concept of them being big at the beginning Yep. But dwindling entirely. Like, I just I don't see I don't see a motivating factor that allows me to want to be involved in that even, you know, anti church, whatever it may be, or or pushing for for for a social venue without the need for religion. Yep. You know, I I just don't see it as something that's unifying. I think it's it's purely entertainment and people get bored of that pretty quickly. Yeah. People jump on things as a fad for a reason.

And if that fad doesn't stay, it's because people get bored of it. They move on to the next thing. Yeah. I mean, that's why bars change the types of things that they do every five years. Yeah. There's not many bars that last for twenty plus years unless it's a group of locals that have gone there for fifteen years, and it's only because they drink for free most of the time. Everybody they know is there, and they don't know anything else. Right. They don't know what else do. So it says, the New York Sunday assembly was everything that Justina Walford had been hungering for since leaving her faith. Meetings involved sermons and quotes from scientists, artists, and academics. Members sang pop songs together and snapped their fingers to poetry readings. Old timers chatted by the snack table and invited newbies to meals outside the group. I just fell in love with it, Wolford said. I love the singing. I love the interaction. I love once a month seeing the same people. Once a month? Wow. Either she only people even once a month? Either she only attends once a month or other people only attend once a month or they only have it once a month. Right. It's not clear. She became an organizer, one of the leaders of the chapter working long volunteer hours to put each service together. That lasted for a couple of years and then things began to fall apart. I think that's I think that's a pretty so think of that as initial clue, right? That's the every church goes through that Right. Is you need people to commit to serving others in this way or another. If I have a long term if I think the thing that we are otherwise gathering for is of a level of importance of which my sacrifice is worth it and is an even a good way of in being in service to that, I'm in. Right. To the extent that there is not something in the center that serves that, now it's just kind of self immolation, like, what Yeah. Why have I been doing this for this long when I don't really have Yeah.

If it's not if it's not otherwise providing a good and it can't just be a good, it has to be a certain weight of good. Now, I could be wrong, Dan, and stop me if I am but, like, there's not 200 people showing up to the Kiwanis meeting, right? Like like, there there there's different levels of the impact of the world you're having. It's enough that you'll get, in any given town in The United States, there's a dozen. Right. You know, maybe maybe slightly more than that in bigger cities but, like, it's they're not bowling down the door. Right. But because the level of interaction, there is a good there but the level of good is distinct from, you know, the Red Cross or something. And so, even if you thought, hey, it's good to for to provide a place in which people can come and hang out together, the only other people who think that are people who are running businesses at which they want you to come buy coffee at their shop. It takes a lot to be the volunteer who who just wants to support people coming together and singing Bon Jovi. Like, it's a different ask. And so she said, there just weren't enough people. Making your congregation happen basically meant putting on a big show on a regular basis. Somebody needed to book bands, find speakers, set up chairs, pick up snacks.

Anna Clayson, who was also involved with the New York chapter at the time, told me the same thing. The core group worked their hearts out, but it wasn't sustainable. And that's not foreign to church work, I guess, like, go back to our previous point. Like, I I think it is hard, especially when you're starting a church, you have to have a kind of and Dan Dan knows this way better than everybody else but, like, like, you have a core group who's working hard in anticipation of providing a space where other people can come and and be part of that community and it does it does require a lot out of them. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. But, like, I but you have a sense that you're working for, whatever your human effort is, there is a greater there's a the it is of the greatest opportunity. You're you're doing the best you can and so that people could do something that could, like, radically and actually change the world around them. That's not this.

It's missing that core element and that it takes of all the things that I think about in in our individual lives which I might commit time to, it becomes very difficult to create a a good space and raise money and find speakers so that Ted and his 10 friends can come listen to some guy that I could do a TED talk online Right. And, you know, otherwise, like, can sing Bon Jovi at home or at the bar, at the Duke area. Right. Was gonna say, you're probably gonna have a lot more fun at the bar when you sing Bon Jovi, just saying. Well, they've taken some of the some of the anchors of, like, the some of the the hardest part of of, like, the business aspects of having to to keep a church afloat And they've taken the full responsibility out of that without the inertia that otherwise might come support things like that in a church where people are, like, willing to sacrifice so that you can have a a place to serve food and donuts and and and and a building so the people have a place to gather. And, like, again, I just a moral imperative is not there.

It says let's see. Oh, yeah. It here we go. In New York and elsewhere, the basic mechanics of keeping a congregation running have proved difficult. To hire musicians and speakers, buy refreshments, and rent out a venue takes a lot of money. A traditional church has tidings, but leaders of secular communities have found that attendees are highly suspicious of any plea for donations. Many lapsed believers harbor strong negative associations with the collection plate. Yeah. Again, I I I think that's a stretch. I I think they're cheap and I think they have a reason to be. Yeah. Because really what I'm saying is is, like, let's whoever leads it, right? Like, you're no longer talking about someone who has at least some sort of calling on their life to lead people spiritually,

you're talking about, a Walford what was her first name? Dean shoot. Hold on. Justina. You're talking about Justina who goes, who now my faith is in her and for no reason except for she's putting together a social gathering Right. That, again, can be expressed itself in many different ways. Yeah. Great. She's a good party planner. Yeah. Give me money. Yeah. And and and here's the thing, I don't think, especially in that situation,

even if I wanted to give money, I don't trust that anybody else is gonna give money Right. For the same reasons that I might be hesitant. And so now, I like, I'm not Yeah. Now I'm just giving $10 to nothing. That's right. I'll give to the church because it's good. Because it's long term good, it's faithfulness, it's obedience, I'll do it. But, like, giving to this type of organization, now we're talking about a value exchange. Am I going to get something out of it worth my money? Yeah. And I don't think so. What happens the one time I show up and the band wasn't that great? Right. Never given money here again. That's not worth paying for. Yeah. Exactly. I mean, if you're you're talking money approaching a tithe, that's a considerable amount of of

giving. Yeah. You might as well get like a box office at a at a major sporting event and that becomes a community. You have all kinds of entertainment and if it's a ball game, you might sing at the seventh dinner whenever they do the Stretch. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you know, you have all those elements and you didn't have to buy the building. You're just bought renting the room. Right. And you have some great community and it's an inner I mean, you have the you have the home right there. You're gonna spend that kind of money Right. I mean, it's a lot less energy. You just show up and pay give the ticket to the dude and go on. A much better investment. Yeah. And and again, absent the center of a religious figure of God or whatever, yeah, now you're just talking about investing in community. And and Dan's right. There's a there's wiser ways to do it.

And I okay. So let let's let's, keep going. It says but and this goes to, I think, a question you asked, Buva. Beneath the service were other rifts, even within the community of non believers, were different groups with different priorities. Some ardent atheists wanted to rail against religion, for example, or have heated debates. But at Sunday Assembly, the point wasn't to put down faith or even to celebrate being faithless per se. The point being there was being was being there, just being there together. I'm just imagining a celebration of not being faithful. So here's That doesn't sound like a it doesn't sound like a fun time. So what do we believe in? Nothing? Nothing. I'm committed to that. I mean, a lot of you so here Preacher, brother. Here's the thing. Think about it from this way though. I I I do believe that it is innate in us to want community like that. Absolutely. Right? And to and and and the the You're social beings. Yeah. So so, like, like, there was there was some someone I knew that had said, hey, you know, I I I checked out, I think it was, a Unitarian church

and my first my first reaction was, oh, man, like, Unitarian church. But then then I thought, like, I totally I I get it because I think people are wired for that. I think we are wired for that. I think God has wired us for that to be able to to to want to come together in groups. The picture is incomplete without without God though and so, at the best, the Unitarian Church, just like these, are are are false promises, they're things, they're shadows, they're things that otherwise

make it look like they're gonna do something but ultimately can't produce the same because they're missing Jesus. And so and so I remember but I remember thinking that I you get I had I wanted to be careful about my reaction to the congregation itself because I think I think that is actually innate. I think there's an element of God having brought our need to that and people trying to fill those needs makes sense to me just like this woman trying to find this in this in these congregations makes sense to me. It's just that they will be shallow. They will not actually meet the need without god as the center because it's through god that our community gets the proper definition. Right. I would think the people who probably support financially the most something like this is like your atheist who's angry at God. And the problem is

anger will not sustain movement, you know. Right. Faith will zeal but anger, you can only go so far, you're like, okay. How do you weather a storm in anger? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. You don't. You get just get tired as well. It's like, I just gave you $8,000 last year and and, like, okay. I'm not I guess I'm not that angry anymore. Now I'm kinda angry at myself. Pretty much. Exactly. Yeah. I could've done or, you know, more. I mean, but yeah. Well and and I suppose back to like, if I couple that with what they were talking about here, to the extent that I'm giving out of anger and then the organization I'm giving to does not have the same level of passion as my anger, I've I've Now I'm leaving. I'm supporting the wrong thing. Yeah. I'm appreciate it. Of Jesus, not just not mention him. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. I'm not just I'm not just anti from the perspective of why I wanna walk away. I'm anti from the perspective of I wanna, like, outright bash. Yeah. And then I just it's unproductive. Like the atheist conference we went to a few years ago. Like, dress up day was all priests and nuns and, you know, it's like,

we get it. It wasn't a non religious Yeah. It was yeah. Right. No. This has nothing to do with bashing the church. This is all about just understanding and celebrating science Science. And celebrating the understanding that things can be outside of faith. No one's dressed up as Sir Isaac Newton. Yeah. Not one of them. Yes. Exactly. Yeah. Right. That is completely right. Yeah. Nope. Nobody showed up as their favorite geneticist. Oh, Gregor Mendel. Oh my gosh. That was wonderful. Oh, I I don't know. I know Gregor Mendel's the father of genetics, but I don't know those guys. Crick. That's what it is. Crick. Yeah. Yeah. James Watson and Francis Crick. I I was up on the Mendel. I'm not that far into genetics too. Sorry. I had a Wait. Did they head up the the Human Genome Project then? Or did they or were they They were Was their work the one that based or the Human Genome Project was Yeah. Yeah. They discovered DNA in the fifties.

Really? Oh, okay. Well, I mean, I think I think there was another guy who discovered it like a a Swiss dude in the Who's their intern? Mid eighteen hundreds but, like, they they whatever. They got the popular distinction for having discovered DNA. Ah, gotcha. Okay. Yeah. Like the structure Sorry. It popped in my mind because I, like, I expected a joint costume with two guy like, there's 10 guys who showed up in the Crick and Watson outfits and were like, oh, lame, look what we did. But you're right. No, priests and nuns. Right? Yeah. There's nothing like having your definition of your life based upon what you're against. Congratulations. Yeah. Not everyone can, like, operate like an from from Princess Bride.

Spent twenty years just hating a guy and that's the entire definition. It's like, oh, crap. What do I do now? Now what? Yeah. So I suppose what's interesting though is if you look at these congregations, like, it it isn't, like, predominantly that they wanted to try to fill the gap that that that they felt was missing from the church and didn't wanna do this. But it also attracts the type of folks who folks who were, yeah, I I I hate this, which I think is I mean, the church attracts all kinds in the Christian church. It's not like you don't run into elements of this, of people there for different reasons. Little bit. But it says, still in a city like New York, people have plenty of other options on a Sunday, on a Sunday morning. Boot camps, Soul Cycle. What's that? Soul Cycle? Oh, yeah. Oh, I bet it's a cycling class. Oh. Teach you how to teach you how to bike on a stationary bike? It will may yeah. But maybe, like, the whole concept of, like, we're gonna go out and exercise, and that's gonna help us, like, refine who we are. Again, the central premise has a moral good. I feel like Exactly. Yeah. There's something that's that that brings together a congregation of people that go to the same gym together. It's gotta be something that That's better than just showing up to a place and singing the Bon Jovi. Like, we wanna be, like, hey. We wanna be smarter.

Like, I here's the thing. Enlightenment. It's it's a it's a it's a shallow understanding of the church because it the things that attempts to to to copy are not the core premises of why the church meets. Like, people don't listen to sermons to be smarter. Right? Like, oh, hey, I just wanna hear, like, a TED talk type of guy or physicist and blah blah blah. We're they're not yes, we're trying to gain knowledge, but that's that's the surface level of it. We gain knowledge in obedience Right. In application of what it looks like Yeah. To be part of Like, it's it's always two steps deeper than I think what they're the the actions of these types of communities are trying to represent And, like, I again, I get it but I I think that's those are the core things that are missing. So it says, you're competing with hundreds of other events at the same time. I mean, again, the church knows that too. Tough model.

Sucker. Getting enough people to show up felt impossible. The chapter officially Hey, I've been having the hardest time. Like, some of kids, we're we're getting past the time of where we can play soccer that that there was a there was a Walnut Creek downtown had a soccer league and so, like, of course, they never scheduled anything on Sundays and so there was on Saturdays and stuff and, like, we're getting to they're getting to the age where, like, you're really running out of options and I'm, boy, I wish my kids could keep playing, like, they can't because I I I won't accept a Sunday option but, like, it's, we're reaching that time where, like, the the the the the stuff starts dropping off like flies and you either gotta play Sunday or you can't play and I'm like

Let's see. So it said getting enough people to show up felt impossible. The chapter officially closed down in early two thousand sixteen, three years after opening. So I did the question I did have, Dan, as I was thinking about this is the the the statistics for churches starting isn't crazy better than this, though, is it? Right. No. No. What is it? Is it three out of four fail in the first five years, something like that? It's a It's not great. It's intense. Now now some of that might come because and and maybe this has changed some, but it used to be the Baptist would start one every three days, you know. You They had, like, six people in it and and then after

a while, you know, three, four years later, they had eight and Right. You know, they decide, well, I guess we can't afford this. Right. But that that that includes, like, more efforted churches as well. Gotcha. Right. You know? Right. Yeah. So so I suppose, like, when they said this lasted three years, like, oh, you know, okay, like, I I don't know trying to fire up anything like that even in a Christian church sounds like it's not, you know, it there's it it's it's it's unique to be able to persist

as a church planner. Because even, like, in in the church world, there's always a 150 other churches you could go to Yeah. Right. And believe in the same god. You might have a slight, you know, different flavor but but if there's ever resistance or, boy, this this Matt, this isn't giving me the passion I was hoping I would have Just go down the street. That yeah. We'll go down the street because they they they'll, you know, they'll give them a try. Right. Right. I suppose what's interesting here to that extent is that you might see whereas Christian churches, people could go from to different con congregations. I I think the assumption here is that when they close down, there aren't a ton of other

non believer or secular churches like this. You have to ride your bike on your own. Yeah. Yeah. You're you're going to the bar, to the Zumba class or it's that's bailing. It's not they're they're not transferring around or otherwise maintaining numbers. They're actually losing numbers. People are not committing to this. It says these issues didn't just affect the New York chapter. Sunday Assembly has reported significant loss in total attendees over the past few years from about 5,000 monthly attendees in 2016 to about 3,500 in 2018. Oh, where's the where do these survey people that that that never give me information that's useful to me? I'd like to see the growth of Christian church or Christianity or Protestant denominations or whatever against secular churches across The United States. It would be interesting to see, like, is it a cultural thing? Because that that we say, oh, the churches are declining and the assumption is it's in reaction to Christianity specifically.

Is there a reaction of people's behavior as a whole against funeral Right. Things like this. Societally, are we changing Yeah. Religious Yeah. And I it it it doesn't I mean, it tells you something slightly different at least. There's a different implication. Anyway, let's see. The number of chapters is down from seventy three years ago to about 40 this year. Fustaining any kind of new congregation, indeed, new group activity at all is hard work, but religious groups have more tradition, history and institutional support behind them. And these factors can stand as a kind of safety net behind religious startups. So I think that's true

from denominationals, but, like, like, there there's a finite amount of time in which you can float, like, through church planting networks or non denominational churches, like, they won't continue to hit up money into something that won't sustain itself. And I suppose the proof of that is kind of what Dan was talking about. If you're three out of four, don't make it five or ten years, like, obviously, we're willing to let them go. Right. Exactly. It said, if Sunday Assembly was a Christian community that suddenly had brand recognition, a flock of pastors would come and bring all their skills and experience, said Sanderson Jones, one of the founders of Sunday Assembly. You could buy training videos, there'd be conferences. Oh, I I think he's making the case that, we don't know how to do this. But these are all different pre existing structures. But without the structure,

there's no there's, like, there's for secular congregations, there's no training videos. There are no church planting experts to help them grow roots, they're starting from scratch. I don't know. Does that sound right, Dan? Like, you you feel like, for what they're trying to do like, they're event planning, really. Right. Yeah. They're, like They're saying there's no resources in how to make a good party happen every month? Yeah. That's That's not true at all. Yeah. That's what I'm I think we have to figure out what is really their goal because yeah. Yeah. I think it boils down to their it's a business. Yeah. I I wanna say that their biz it's a hard it's a it's a failed business plan because there's all kinds of opportunity to do the things they're talking about. Right. Even if they're not trying to turn a profit specifically to sell a business, and you're absolutely right. Like, it's yeah, how do we get people to show up to a place? That that there's no there's no, like, support on that. I I doubt that. Very much so. But the only thing you don't have is is, again, kind of the deeper well thing and, like, you weren't going for that anyway. Yeah. You're not being supported by anyone because no one there's you're not a cause. Mhmm. There's no cause for what you're doing. If you had some kind of moral cause,

you could get someone who would be willing to give money towards what you're doing. Even if you don't you wanna make this work? Make your rally monthly about some different disease. Yeah. Make it something because then you can contact some, foundation or some some group of people that that have been affected by said disease who will tell you how to throw it, who will host it, who will sponsor it, whatever. Wanna get together and have cake and sing Bon Jovi? People will still show up because everybody's gonna wanna feel good about showing up to the event. Same reason a bunch of people show up to a five k for ovarian cancer. Yeah. They're it just it happens. People naturally go to that. There. I I fixed your congregational problems. You know, I I think if I were a non believer and I I look at, say, some of the television preachers who bring in millions of dollars or or the large churches and the budgets they have, and would look at that and think, well, these people are just idiots giving their money to this and these are just, you know, shucksters that are getting the money out of them. We can create a legitimate business model based on what do these churches do, the things you're mentioned, you know, dynamic speakers and programs and blah blah blah. And they're they're just looking at it completely as a business thing and saying, well, we can duplicate that and and not have this false,

you know, silly Yep. Make believe character Right. And and and people will love it. If not improved upon Just happens to be that when you miss the spirit of god, there's something missing. So yeah. Just as an update, we're up to 26 comments on Troy's posts and not a person has affirmed of not knowing Pat Sajak.

Here we go. Seriously, Troy, who hasn't? I say no one's gotten nasty yet, have they? No. And if they do, don't care. Yeah. No. No. It's it's relatively clean. It'll turn about 01:30 this morning. I don't remember not knowing who Pat Sajak is. Boy, boo. This is including every my teachers are commenting on this, family, people I've worked with, my employees have commented, customers of mine have commented. Yeah. It's it's it's a it's a large group of people. That's why I kinda wanna do this on my Facebook. Yes. Yeah. You're not wrong. You're so wrong.

So it says, even more challenging than the logistical barriers are the psychological ones. Linda Woodhead, scholar of religion and culture at Lancaster University in Great Britain, told me that structured communities just aren't easy to form. Meeting in a building with the same group of people every week, I don't think there's any natural need for that, she said. Now hold on a minute. Take away the building aspect of it so that you can think of this more universally. But, like, people meeting weekly or with some regular cadence seems like a very normal thing to do. Yeah. Yeah. Families do it. Friends do it. I think you could go to any culture in the world, whatever whatever tribe that speared that poor John fellow who went to go take him Jesus. Like, I bet they still meet on a weekly basis in some way or another. Yeah. Showing up on a Tuesday night for for poker night. Everybody does that. Yeah.

I don't and there's not a natural need for that. I I guess I I disagree with that. I don't think that's true. I think people do have an inherent need for that type of thing. I don't think it is a forced behavior. I think I think it is a behavior that is otherwise natural that has been presented with a number of, individual competitions that I'm not sure are for our own benefit within our society because we have the freedom to not do that. But, like, think of normal things that happen as communities get together. They get rid of our technology and some of our improvements in humanity.

People get together to share food. Right. To to to to contribute their part to whatever the society is doing, to talk about things that are going on, to meet about people that are sick or to gather in either religious or just cultural ceremonies. Like, it's a pretty natural thing to do together. If any argument in my mind could be made with that would be societally, I could say that social media is kind of eroding our need for that kind of community, to an extent because people feel like they could be be connected through the Internet versus needing to actually show up to things. But I don't think that plays out perfectly because I think people still do exactly like you're saying, show up and still have a meal a week and show up and still do, you know, let's go to a baseball game once a month as friends to make sure that we still have that connection and stuff like that. Yeah. Yeah. So You said, Woodhead believes that communities can be hugely important to people, of course, but you can't just meet for the sake of community itself. So I would agree with that. I think it's it's associated with something because, communities have inertia. Right. They're they're doing something.

There's Nobody wants to be just in a pond sitting in scum. Right. They're like, hey hey, at least we're at least we're just standing around Streams are moving. You need a very powerful motivating element to keep people coming, something that attendees have in common. So what's interesting is based upon what she said though, the desire for not being affiliated so the not, I don't wanna be affiliated with with, God. But, like, I wanna grow in knowledge and I wanna be around people and I wanna join music and I want some, to do it weekly, like, that

seems like that would be uncommon and yet it's not playing out. What's happened? Yes. You got somebody? We gotta know. Unbelievable. I will read it. Bye. From a fella named Josh whose wedding I'm officiating in two months, and now I'm doing it for free. After all these posts, I'm ashamed to say no. I looked him up, recognized him from Wheel of Fortune, but never knew his name. Bam.

We finally gotta know. Understandably, though, it's from the same it's from someone from my graduating class. So maybe there's something about Sally Spok in 02/2009 that messed up the Pat Sajak. I mean, maybe. I think your level of vindication is not warranted. You're still Oh, no. I'm still completely wrong. No. No. That was not vindication. Okay. Okay. That was just appreciation for community. Okay. Okay. Tied it back in. I found some support. Tied it back in. Me and another dude. He said some congregations have that so that,

the motivating element. The Salt Lake City, oh, that Salt Lake City is home to one of the most successful Oasis chapters may not be a coincidence. Why not? What do you think the point is? Why why is the secular, oasis or the secular, commute church community in Salt Lake City, one of the most successful? Well, in that specific place, I think that's running away from the from the church community. Exactly. 100%. Exactly. That church community is Yeah.

That community is very interesting and tends to breed a lot of dissension. Yes. And I so it here's here's what they said. That chapter has become an important hub for ex Mormons. These members are bound by the shared experience of leaving the denomination they grew up in and feeling isolated in a hometown over which The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints looms large. For many nuns, however, their lack of religion is not a strong part of their identity. Alan Cooperman, director of religion research at Pew Research Center, says about one third of nuns fall into category of principled rejecters of organized religion or principled embracers of atheism or humanism. But the majority of nuns are just indifferent. On what basis would you pull them together? He asked. Being uninterested in something is about the least effective social glue. The dullest possible mobilizing cry, the weakest affinity principle that one can imagine. Viva la viva la revolution. We don't believe in it. Yeah. We just we're out. We don't believe in that specifically. Let's meet.

In an interesting there's a psychologist, Ara Norazian, who's studying religion at the University of British Columbia, told me that secular communities might have trouble getting members to inconvenience themselves as people of faith routinely do for their congregations. He cited a study by Richard Sosus, an anthropologist, who studied 200 American communes founded in the nineteenth century. Sosus found that 39% of religious communes were still functioning twenty years after their start,

but only 6% of secular communes were alive after the same amount of time. It because most secular communes are kind of those cultist ones that commit suicide? What are secular communes? I don't know but that isn't where my brain went first. I just assumed that, like, like Jim Jones and guys like I was gonna say David Koresh and all that stuff? Well, that guy was that was religious. Oh, that was religious. Right? Yeah. So he this is interesting though. He determined that a single variable was making the difference. So what what do you think? What makes up the difference between the success of religious communes, 39% versus these only 6% persistence of a secular commune after after twenty years. The the secular are malicious and they're shooting each other. It says they're inherently violent.

I I think it's the same argument we make make in this entire argument is this entire article. The the whole concept that, like, there's no there's no social glue to use their verbiage. There's nothing that's keeping them together. No no moral guideline, no no moral high ground that everyone has, no, no driving factor for for unity. But I think you're close. He said he determined that a single variable is making the difference, the number of sacrifices, such as giving up alcohol, following a dress code, or fasting that each commune demanded of its members. That for religious communes, the more sacrifices demanded, the longer they lasted. However, this connection didn't hold for secular communes. The implication, he said, was that challenging rituals and taxing rules work only when they're part of something sacred, back to your point. Yeah. Once the veil of sacrality is removed, people no longer no one says sacrality.

People no longer care to commit to things that demand their time and dedication. I don't wanna give my money. I don't wanna sacrifice for it. I don't wanna spend three years for people who don't wanna commit to it. There's no sense of higher purpose to it. If it's come and go as you wish, that's not going to work. Even if secular congregations create could create a sense of the sacred, they tend to attract people who are explicitly looking for community without costly rituals, one that lets you do what you want. And so, ultimately, secular communities also have a focused sense of self. Right? So, like, to the extent that I am willing to be here because I am able to be myself without otherwise submitting to some mores or cultural aspects of the group,

then you have no sense of shared bond except for the fact that we all just wanna be who we wanna be. Right. And to the extent that something starts to become a shared bond but starts to change your identity, you bail because you no longer get to be who you are. Which is an interesting thing because, like, as a society, like, that is kind of a, you know, a a movement in how we think of ourselves is that, like, the the ultimate realization, or self actualization is realizing the who the true me is and being true to that. But that that almost, that often, I would say, separates us from

communal bonds, things that, like, types of rituals or things that we voluntarily change about ourselves and things that we do say whatever, so that we fit in with the community. Like, with the rejection of that, you lose the value or the sense of what comes with a community anyway. Ex unless you're unless you are a a commune of individual of, specifically of individuals, that is the the the presiding thing, it's not that there's anything alike about you, it's that you're intentionally associating with each other as unique individuals and your uniqueness is the common denominator which which I think is not sustainable. Mhmm. Right? There is something about community

and to the extent that you don't allow communities to shape you, to allow yourself to be changed, Even think of something basic as, hey, I hang around hanging around, people with strong marriages to otherwise help shape your behavior on how you look or think about marriage or whatever. To the extent to say, no, I reject that because I am who I am and, like like, the strength or the bonds that are built up through communities don't actually occur. And so I I I think they're just, they can they can start up but, ultimately,

the elevation of self will carry thing people away from it Because at some point, other communities ask something of each other that of a blending and, to the extent that you're not willing to blend, your communities won't actually. Right. You think so so to more to the point of the the sacrificial thing being a glue for them, I think that's the concept. Like, do you think sociologically it's because people band together when they they feel like they're, for lack of better term, suffering together? Like, it it Yeah. Sacrificing something for even for the the good of, from the religious standpoint, you're sacrificing something because it's abstaining from sin or abstaining from from an issue because it that's that's what we're meant to do. We're called to to to being better in in the in the Christian church. Like, sociologically, I think the people are banding together because of the fact that, like, in suffering, you find companionship. And in suffering, especially especially mutual

suffering that may not have the same face, but has the same body, if you will. You know, we may not all be giving up alcohol, all giving up something. You know, that kind of drives people together because it's it's natural empathy. It is I understand your sacrifice and the suffering if you have Yeah. Because I too am doing that. I am also giving something up. I am I am giving up, you know, drinking. You're giving up pornography. You're giving up this and all this different stuff. It's it's a call to to to to communal empathy. Yes. And I think that's, think of the strong bonds in, like, conceived marginalized communities. Right? That's exactly what I was thinking when I was saying that too. Right. Right. So that's that's where this come from is, like, hey, we are we are all equally being mistreated in some form or another Yeah. And so we are bound by that Right. Experience. Yep. It is so, like, you have bonds that are that are that are tied to what we think or how we think or belief systems that we have and you have bonds that are tied to by events. Think of high school reunions or, like, think of it, right, the the we are we are our community or our sense of community is based upon a shared circumstance,

or a shared way of being either treated by the world or a shared place in the world or whatever that is. Or even think of like, guild, like trade guilds or like like shared work. Yeah. I was gonna say everybody hates their boss. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It it it's it's the crew of cooks that hate the chef. So so and this is where social media has permitted us a means to hyper specialize in those types of things and very much niche out, like, our group is disenfranchised cooks who are also left handed and bike to work and, like, that is a that is a unique community. It's not hyperspecifically. The problem is is that because think think of those you can debate me on the reality of a group like that but, like,

the niches of those things exist, it becomes very easy to fall out of the group. Mhmm. Yeah, absolutely. You may always remain left handed but maybe you find a good boss and now what? You lose you lost your community because the thing that brought you together went away. And that see, that's the thing is as I suppose that's true for the church too because you can walk away and say, look, I just don't I don't love to follow Jesus anymore and so, yes, you've you've lost the notion to that community but, like, the the fickle nature of who we consider, part of our community, who we spend time with, what what we get our sense of identity from, I think is becoming harder Mhmm. Because we know more we're we're we've been taught to categorize ourselves in certain ways and and put put each other in in in buckets and that define that say, we this will be our community because these people are like this, are are in this bucket. And the Christian community, besides the fact that we otherwise agree that Yahweh is king, is not otherwise our,

the definitives start to go away. Right? Like, it's it's agnostic of skin color and cultural background and money and whatever, like, all those other things that separate people. I don't know. And so so it's it's interesting. So they said, while costly sacrifice might not be present in these communities and they may be suffering for that reason, they have other tools in their toolkit. So things that that might otherwise resurrect this type of behavior. Mhmm. They already have collective singing in live music, for example, which sets meetings apart from everyday experiences. I mean, I guess. Yeah. So in in lieu of of of a sacrificial nature that brings us together, hey. We dance and sing. Hey. Now now I I'm sorry. I would not show up to a church if the only promise was that we're gonna sing together.

When when we first started Pathway, there was a small group I had meeting together, and I we weren't suffering. And I honestly I literally was thinking I need them to suffer, right, to bring them together for that break. And and so small group, I would pull out my guitar and sing these songs. Right? We would sing songs, and everybody hated it, and I acted like it was the most serious thing. Like, you know I love that. About six months in, I I I finally said, you guys done with this? They were like, please. And it was it was it was the greatest conversation. They threw things together. Done with dance singing? I mean, no. It was wonderful. It was wonderful. It it totally did exactly what I wanted it to do.

That's awesome. Interesting that that was your motive. It anyway, I won't Does that have any was it Sean Ingle over there? Say, does that have anything to do with my parents? Rick and April Babcock? Oh, man. That's great. That is The Rockwells? I'm super excited to hear about that fourteen years after the fact. Yeah. Yeah. It was a they they still will talk about I just lost the name of the song. Well, it didn't matter. Yeah. Oh, man. It was all old school nineties. These people have to suffer. Let me bring my music.

I can't punch them, but I can make them sing. Let me bring people together. Dan, you were the social glue. I tell you, there's a reason I do just about everything I do. I usually don't tell anybody. That's wonderful. Ask me, I'll deny it. Yeah. Exactly. No. That never happened. Always a reason. Talking about. I love that singing. Oh, man, Dan. That's great. Hey. Hey, Buva, think of that. Anytime you ever look at Dan, just know he's plotting something. Right. Exactly. I am.

I'm if I'm ever listening to Dan sing, I wonder if he thinks I need to suffer. He's doing it. He's doing it. Oh, man. I feel social glue for me. What is happening? I hate this, Dan. You're a genius. I feel closer to god than ever. Oh, man. This is great. Deny myself. Come to the lord. So I so they aren't so, anyway, you have collective singing in live Sorry. I distracted you. Which sets meetings apart from everyday experiences.

What? I don't That's a stretch. Yeah. I don't know that that's a I mean, it is a bond, but it's it is it is momentary. And here's I can't imagine, like, for all the trouble that you have in churches of trying to figure out the types of songs to sing so the people are okay, you open that playbook to freaking every song that's been popular over the last sixty years. I mean, I can't imagine that you're not gonna find people who otherwise hate the tunes that are going on in your secular community. Yeah. That's saying that people are gonna show up to a wedding and the music is the reason they're showing up. Yeah. People jump and dance and have fun at a reception. I know that. I'm a wedding DJ. Yeah. But they're not there for the music. That's just an added bonus to the fact that they're there to celebrate the union of friends or family members. Yeah. He says, he believes that they can and will adapt over time, evolving into something closer to conventional religion even if no deities are involved. Secular congregations can become as meaningful as religious ones, he said, but there has to be a sense of transcendence.

Yes. Yeah. Hey, Ooty. He means pot. I don't There has to be marijuana. I don't believe that's the argument this Craig Groves from the triple x church says, yes, if you would only introduce the Panama Red. The Christian cannabis. The Panama Red. The so he says, transcendence is what gives the community a higher level of meaning than going to Johnny's Little League game. Again, I I think that over cranks on I I suppose it depends what he's getting at with transcendence, but, like, communities have been getting together for a very long time. It doesn't have to be a hyper spiritual event, I guess. I mean, I I can understand that, like, people coming together and and and a social congregation, secular in nature, I'm sure the conversations are gonna start happening where people are gonna start talking about moral moral,

moral similarities they may have. Oh, yeah. And, like, things that they're passionate about. And and then that becomes, well, hey. If we're gonna be here anyway, we might as well start either advancing our congregation by having these conversations or even working towards the betterment of certain situations Yep. Like people showing up to a Kiwanis. People showing up for a reason. There is there's there's social good to be done. You know, we're we're sponsoring an orphanage or we're doing this or something like that. Like, there is a natural outpouring of, hey, we're coming together. We might as well be helping. No one's gonna show up to a party once a month for the rest of their life just to party for no other reason. Yeah. There's gonna be similarities they find. It says it might mean, the transcendence, is it might mean developing more rituals or sharing more stories. Here's the thing, like, is there is a commonality, like, common stories, common sets of beliefs, common understanding of how to look at the world. Those are those are inherent things that otherwise come with being in a community

and they they might be things that you learn but but they they all that they flow from here's the thing, is that they flow from from from Christianity or even take, like, Hinduism or something. Right? Like, they flow from, a sense of something being greater than any individual person. Yeah. The problem with the secular community trying to mimic that is that, at its core, they all come from an individual Like, no one is fooled. This was Ted's idea. Right. Ted said we should start singing Guns N' Roses. And you're like, okay, Ted, but I don't like Guns N' Roses. And why would I like, I might have to submit to the fact

that that, like, if if God has a way of thinking about something, I I we we all implicitly agree that God is higher than me and so I have something to submit to. Mhmm. I have no reason to submit to God. Mhmm. Right. Exactly. Yeah. Because even in the music, you'll have different in in the church, you'll have different styles of music people prefer but they will they will yield their preferences thinking, well, the younger generation likes this. Oh, right. Yeah. And we want them to know Jesus. Yeah. Or the older generation likes this. We want them to, you know There's there's a top of the pyramid there. Yeah. But if it's a purely selfish thing, it's like, I don't like this. I'm going somewhere else. I'm here for my personal benefit. For some reason, the only thing I can think of right now is the is the Flintstones with, with what is it? The Royal Order of the Water Buffaloes, the with the with the blue hat and the horns. I don't know why that is the only thing that keeps popping up in my head is Fred Flintstone wearing that that that blue hat with the star in moon. Sorry. Yeah.

Actually, that reminds me of, like, even even Masons. Yeah. Absolutely. I just I was at the gaze zig shrug the other night. Shrug. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was I don't get that whole thing. I I'm almost I'm almost intimidated to ask. Yeah. Like, there's so much there's so many intricate intricacies to it. And when I find out someone is a Freemason, I'm just like, oh, cool. So I grouped with a guy and so we we actually had a conversation with a a friend of mine who, I think he's the head of the thing of a of a of a of local one. Local chaplain. And we we we we were talking about similar things about trying to encourage people to otherwise be part of communal activities that that that,

call into service. Express what you believe in ways that you serve. And so there were there were consist there were consistent things, across those two types of organizations, which I think speak to the, again, the persistence of both of those things. There was a center to them. They're not the same type of center but, like, it becomes Freemason, if you think of basins, lodges and things like that, like, or having some akin to, Kiwanis and stuff. Like, there there there is a moral center. There's a core to it that says, we're in service of something. Mhmm.

And so but so it's it's interesting what they're talking about is developing more rituals and sharing more stories, that's consistent across these types of organizations. Says it might mean that ideals they already espouse, such as helping others or finding wonder in nature, get elevated to a sacred level. Again, I the the problem becomes it's humans chew still choose those things. One guy loves the mountains, and he's like, hey, you know what? As a group, we're gonna love the mountains. And then, like, again, you know, Shannon in the back goes, you know what? I don't I don't dig on mountains. Right. Yeah. I worship raindrops. And then what are you gonna do? You know, what are you gonna do? We don't agree on the thing. Mhmm. And then you end up in micro niche groups, like, here's the mountain folks and here's the rain droplet people and, you know, I think it's a lot harder. And people would say, religion is then false. Is is like, isn't it convenient that everyone kind of chucks their brain at the door and has to give up those types of preferences to kind of submit to this thing of god? I'm like, well, as a controlling thing, I suppose you could look at it that way. Absolutely. But the question is, if it's true though, if it does come from a higher authority who would know better than me, then submitting to it is not unreasonable at all. It's completely reasonable. Just because the mechanism works doesn't mean that it's wrong. That's right. Like, effectiveness is not that's it's the only time Effectiveness is inherently evil only in the church. That's right. Only in the church. That's right. Oh, man. They're effective. Well, isn't that convenient to be a deal for god? It's like, well, yeah, it is. It's effectiveness. There's nothing wrong with that. I had the same conversation with someone who was, talking about,

oh, well, isn't it convenient that the church just happened to exclude all these letters and books into the Bible that otherwise called it into question, like, that didn't say the same things everything else said. Like, I was like, no. That's that's exactly how it should work. That's effective to make a cohesive work work of books, work of books. Hey. This thing's a lie. Let's not include it. Yes. I see the evil you've propagated. Yeah. Dare you throw out those outliers? Yeah. Because they weren't true. That's what that was The variables were incorrect for our data. That was the that was the end result of the conversation which is is that, like, the thing if you were to do it and do it right and it's going to look exactly like the accusation that it is evilly manipulated, to what end can I even satisfy this conversation? Right. Exactly. Right? I can't do anything about it. Anyway, this is into into the article. Secular community organizers are trying their hardest every day to prove that Sosus is right, that their non religious congregations can provide the same fulfillment as religious ones. Some have spent time researching what makes a lasting religious community, hoping reverse engineer its machinery for secular use. Sunday Assembly's Sanderson Jones, for example, has developed a framework of five core components in any congregation. Here we go. Alright. Community life,

transformational gatherings, personal growth, helping others, changing the world. Yeah. Does this may sound like clumsy marketing speak? It can feel awkward to watch a so called atheist church work evangelization strategy in real time.

Then again and here's the thing. I I I think you've separated the the circle has separated itself too far from the normal church world. We are talking about people who are who are imperfect people trying to follow a perfect god. This sense of awkwardness and not quite getting it right or whatever, I exists think in a lot times. That's there too. Yeah. We're like, you know, we're we're doing our best here human humanizing what it looks like to follow a creator god. So, I mean, you're not the only one with these kind of challenges. Because then again, traditional religious groups have spent hundreds of thousands of years figuring out how to get people in the door. Yeah. Yeah. What? Hundreds of thousands of years? Hundreds of thousands of years? What? That's just poorly written. Well, they've done their research. Yeah. Yeah. That's a in fact, even even I've been doing this since the Mesozoic era. I don't mean to go, you know, hyper new or anything, but even second Corinthians has a whole section on how to get people in the door.

What the heck? I feel like you've not taken in any of religious texts that I'm familiar with. Oh, man. It's a thousands of years. Drink my blood. Let's see who stays. Anyway, then again, traditional religious groups spent hundreds of thousands of years figuring out how to get people in the door. We just aren't seeing the shaky early experiments happen in front of us. Again, I I'm not sure this now here I'm gonna make two, things just things are gonna sound converse. I think the things, since supporting this, I think the things that worked, say, two thousand years ago or eight thousand years ago work today, pointing people to the true God. I I I think they work. So, it's gonna sound like I'm agreeing with them. But then again, like, the the the human means of which you otherwise get people's attention and what holds their attention long enough for them to take in something true

are certainly not the same from, say, two thousand years ago, two hundred years ago, two hundred days ago I was gonna say. Yeah. Let alone a 100,000 ago. Hundreds of thousands of years. Let's see. Some leaders of a Sunday assembly in Oasis told me they're trying to make those weekly meetings so interesting, so entertaining, so powerful that people will keep showing up and that's where they completely lost me. I felt some sense of where the church can make the same mistake. Because, again, the thing that I do believe is the same over time over time is is is through whatever means you're introducing people to the true god. To the extent that your focus, your primary mechanism is to make interesting, entertaining and powerful meetings that are absence of people meeting the true God, they will otherwise render. Yeah. And that's true in the church and it's true in the Sunday secular congregation. And so,

it's interesting that the things that we are we are talking about on the right ways to approach people's humanity and and can hold and keep their attention to say something true, are the same things that the secular church community is looking at and going, heck yeah. Let's embrace that. It's working for the church. Right, exactly. And the church is is asking, this is working, is it doing what we want it to do? In some means, yes and some means, it's not. We're having a refining conversation, they're jumping in full hawk into the deep pit. He says, the quality of the content is what keeps people coming back. I don't know.

I don't know. There's plenty of there's plenty of of churches knocking out, like, true quality content. People will leave in the face of quality content that they do not personally like And that and that, frankly, I think seems like 10 times the risk in a secular church again because you're you're you're talking about folks who are more likely to be like, you know, I believe what I believe and so, like, I don't really need you telling me what to believe and so if you say things that I don't like, I won't go back. Yeah. You're fishing and your only draw is make make to make sure the lure is shining. Yeah. I mean so, I mean, we can we can share an ale over your troubles in this care in this area but, the quality of content is is isn't necessarily what keeps people coming back. And I would say to the extent that it is, you have just started a series of event planning, of which you are ill prepared, poor fundraising, and are are in for a terrible world heartache. And this doesn't like, like, you you may be calling it a church community but, like, you're you're a you're an event planner. Right. Yep.

And and and so yeah, it's it's weird, like, that that really I think the way to sum this up then, the way to rescue these things is, at least for if if if the core goal is to say, how do these things sustain? Regardless of what I think about the fact that they're happening. But if you wanted to sustain an organization, it sounds like your best option is to come up with a focused moral center even if it expresses itself as simply, look, we're raising we're our job is that we wanna help blind people. Mhmm. That's even if that's your core, people can get around that. People will show up to that. Yeah. 100%. Yep. Let's see if it oh, shoot. Those who stick oh, let's follow-up with Justina. Justina Walford, for her part, has been without a community since the New York Sunday Assembly closed down. After relocation to Dallas, she tried out a Southern Baptist Church near her home, and she loved it. She loved the services, the singing, the people. But the more enmeshed she became, the guiltier she felt about the secret she was carrying. She didn't believe in God.

So she stopped showing up. Sometimes she thinks about starting a Sunday assembly chapter in Dallas, but the idea is daunting. She knows now how much work it is and how much it hurts when things fall apart. For those who stick with Sunday assembly or Oasis, the challenge now is to make the community last beyond their own generation and to find new congregants as the number of nonbelievers grows. Organizers hope that the other adults will see how wonderful it is to be accepted and accepting to sing Bon Jovi badly in an abandoned church oh, they're doing it in a church building. I mean, I I don't care, but I do care. Or hear a talk about quantum physics in a local why with other like minded and familiar people. And that, have you had these experiences, they'll keep showing up. Hold up. One of the ways that they were bringing people in were talks about quantum physics? Yeah. Wow. I mean, don't get me wrong. I actually dig on that stuff, and it's it's pretty cool when you break that stuff down and hear someone who's passionate about quantum physics talk about it. But, like, I'm weird, though, and I'm currently wearing a Star Wars shirt. So I can't imagine there's that many people that are like, hey, man, you know what's happening this week? We're gonna go talk about quantum physics.

Yeah. Ben, has that ever attracted you to show up to a group? No. Here's the deal, I don't like groups and so you might say, here's a video about quantum physics and I'm like, I might check that out. As a matter of fact, I started randomly reading a calculus textbook on that I found online that was really quite good. But, I mean, if you said, here's a community people talking about calculus, they'd be like, no. No. I don't know. I will not be there. Yeah. You are, like, a lot. The lord Jesus is the only one, frankly, that has compelled me into any sense of community. I would hermit myself with the options. See how it works? Jesus is the only one who brings the introverts to the community. He's done it.

Okay. Anyway, that was it. That was a long one. Sorry. I I I think there's a lot of there's a lot of interesting stuff. And I think I I think if we make a mistake, though, if we don't recognize that there are sections when we see those articles about the the nuns and whatever, whatever, the N N O O N E S, that have have a desire that I believe is innate for community. Somehow, they've they've either not misunderstood or been misrepresented by not understanding Jesus. Like, to have so want the thing that that exists as it does because of Jesus,

how could I possibly look and say that Jesus is or real or true? Like, the the nature of the community around it, at least somewhat implies that there that there is something there. Although, you could make that same case for every other religion that isn't Christianity. They look, implies that there's something there. Alright. So, yeah, that doesn't hold. I take that back. Okay. Alright, Bubba. You had the day. Oh, man. Do we have time? Yeah. We got time. Alright. Yeah. I I I really did have have quite a bit of a day, today. It's actually been a couple of days running

that that I've been having some issues. And so people who've listened to the show for a long time probably, at least some semblance or a bit of this story. But, so I've actually so the last couple of days have been kinda rough, and they kind of came to a head in the last I'd say fifteen hours. So tomorrow's my birthday and I'm I kind of dread that day to be honest. So I lost my parents about a decade ago,

I lost my dad when I was 18, lost my mom 19, and that was kind of the beginning of it. You know, I lost my uncle a couple years after that. I was very close with and actually I shared a birthday with and so it's his birthday now too and this is I think sixth one, sixth or seventh one since he's passed away. And then, you know, a couple years after that, my grandmother passed away. And so the majority of my father's side of the family has all passed away. And, like, I've just I've I've lost a lot of people, and I don't say that to to give a woe is me. It just kinda gives context here. And so, you know, this this some things are happening in my life that,

that I'm I'm having to make a lot of major changes. And, you know, I've been a big guy my whole life, and I've I've struggled with, addiction to food, and I've struggled with, you know, being overweight. I've lost hundreds of pounds from my peak weight, but I'm still not healthy and I still I still have a lot of struggles with that and have a lot of issues and within the last week I've actually kind of I hit a low point last week and I had to go to the hospital And I was in the hospital, and they so I have I'm a type two diabetic, and my blood sugar was over 400. And so I went to the hospital and took took my blood sugar, gave me some insulin, and there was some scare about diabetic ketoacidosis,

which is basically what happens is your blood sugar is so high, your kidneys and your lungs stop functioning properly. Your kidneys actually stop filtering through most of of the liquids in your body and getting rid of the liquids in your body and so your body stops expelling the acid that builds up, the natural way it's supposed to through your renal system. And so basically they took my blood and there was acidosis in it which means that there's acid buildup. And so that affects things very quickly and so that's kind of the step before going into a coma, when you're a diabetic, is diabetic ketoacidosis or what they call DKA. And so I've been a diabetic, at least diagnosed for about five years now, six years maybe, and I've never come that far into it. I've never tested positive for any kind of acidosis and it was scary.

And so that led me to this this crisis where I was like, you know, need to start losing weight and, you know, need to get back on the horse and start doing this stuff. And so I started, I I decided I was actually gonna fast, last Wednesday when I got back from the the hospital and it it went pretty well and, you know, that kinda led up to this thought process that I've been running into recently that, you know, I need to start, I need to start giving things to God more and stop fighting the way that I'm fighting. Right? Like, my weight loss has always been a thing that I fought for. I've been the one on the front lines, whether that's decisions that I've made to get healthier, whether it's I've done a diet plan that was fairly strict, or whether I started working out or built some kind of health regimen that was that was to to make me lose weight. And I've always failed.

Every single time I failed. And it it it even if it was under some length of success, whether it was I'd lost a couple 100 pounds like I just said, or I would go a couple weeks without eating like crazy or no binging or anything like that, it always ended in some amount of failure. And so, this last week has been really rough for me, because I decided to do a Daniel fast, and it's kind of from the scripture in Daniel three and Daniel 10, not kind of it is exactly from there. And so the the the the scripture in Daniel 10 talks about eliminating delicacies and meat, and I I drank no wine is what he says.

And so there's a lot of different interpretations on what that means, and you could break down the Hebrew of what delicacies means and things like that. But a lot of people break it down to be kind of like a vegan diet where you, kick away any animal products, no meats, no no animal products like, dairy or anything like that. You're eating basically vegetables, fruits, grains, things like that, and it's important. Most people kick out sweets of some kind, so they don't eat candy even though there's no animal proteins in most of that, and they kick out, you know, caffeine and stuff like that. I've decided to do a fairly strict version where I basically break out everything besides you know, legumes, vegetables, fruits and nuts and stuff like that. Pretty much all I eat. And so all that to say, within the last

twelve to fifteen hours, I'm not sleeping very well and and I didn't really sleep last night and so I woke up, today about five hours after I planned on it. Couldn't sleep last night, got to bed around 06:30 in the morning and then finally went, fell asleep and woke back up and I was just hitting really really low. Like I just woke up, I mean, just depressed. And and I go to counselor for for my depression and things like that, and I've I've been diagnosed with PTSD because of, you know, my mom, actually committed suicide and and attempted pretty much through the majority of my my, the latter half of my childhood, and you know losing my dad and losing a lot of other people. So like I I I've been diagnosed PTSD, I've I've been diagnosed with severe depressive disorder, and you know I have anxiety and things like that, and so I've been battling those fairly hard, recently, and and I've been fairly successful, but sometimes I hit a low. And today was probably one of the worst lows I've hit in a very, very long time.

And so I just woke up really late, and I just I had no desire to get out of bed and was just laying there just hurt and sad, and like, I have I have this insane fear of failure, that irrationally stems from a lot of personal problems that I have. Like, I I I was talking to Ben about this before the show, I'll I'll share a small portion of it, not all of it. But like, I have a fear of failure because of the fact that, like, I equate all of the loss that's happened in my life irrationally to be some sort of failure on my part. And so, like, my mom attempted suicide first when I was 11 years old,

and I had to save her. I had to pick her up out of her bed. She had just taken a bottle of pills and drank a bottle of vodka. I was 11 years old, I picked my mom and carried her into the bathroom and woke her up and called 911. Had to get them to come and and basically save her life and pump her stomach and stuff. And it just kept happening. Busy every six to eight months like clockwork, my mom would start drinking again and then attempt suicide again. And, for eight years of my life, that was it. And so, basically, what what's happened in in my brain is this thought process that if I wouldn't have failed so hard at being a son, my mom would have wanted to stay around. And that's irrational, and it's not true. I won't go, in-depth into that. My mother was a great mother, and, she did not make me feel inadequate as a son, but it just that's how it happened. And losing my dad, my thought process in in a brain that's kind of rattled with trauma, think to myself, you know, if I just would have tried harder with him and if I would have lost weight with him, then he wouldn't have had a heart attack and died when I was 18, which is untrue, but it's how I've rationalized. And so that's led up to this this insane and built up fear of loss and failure in my life. And so I woke up this morning in this thought process that I was just ready to fail at this thought and just ready to fail at at this Daniel Fast.

And my thought process was if I quit, I'm exercising some semblance of control. If I just quit, there's control in quitting. I'm making a conscious decision to be done. If I fail, there's fear in that because there are there's let downs to it, I'm letting myself down. That means I actually attempted and wasn't good enough. Whereas if I quit, it has nothing to do with me being good enough. I can rationalize it as no, didn't I just I made the choice to quit, right? And so I woke up feeling that way, and I was just I was feeling rough and, like, it literally it it came to a head that I was seriously and and I'm trying to battle embarrassment, but also be open about this. I was literally laying in bed, and I was clutching my pillow, and I was bawling. I mean, I was in I was in serious serious tears, and, like, I was I was I was my it was dripping off of my face. I was crying so hard, and I could barely speak. I couldn't breathe, and it was just it was the it was the for lack of a better term, weakest and most depressed

I felt in years, and it was it was horrifying, and I was scared, and I was I I literally I feel like I seriously regressed to when I was 11, and, like, that I had the fear of a child in my brain. It was crazy. And so I share all of this to say that this beautiful thing has happened to me recently, and I was reminded of it today, and and it and it hit me really hard. And, within the last week,

I've read this story probably 10 times, but when I was thinking about how I was gonna battle this and start losing weight again and get better and things like that, interestingly enough, god led me to, to the story of Gideon. And, in Gideon, the the the concept that after the after the fleece in in that part of the story, it goes to he's battling the, the Midianites and the Amalekites and then a couple of other, other armies that are banded against Israel. And, like, they're they're innumerable. They show up and and the the the thing is they're like locusts, and there are so many of them. They descend upon the crops and upon the livestock of the Israelites, and they just can't be counted. There's that many. And so God shows up to Gideon or, yeah, sends an angel to to speak to Gideon and say, you know, you will be the one to deliver the Israelites from this army. And Gideon goes through the fleece and says, are you sure it's me, God? If if if it's truly you, you know, let the fleece be damp and everything else be dry. And then, okay, you did that, but if it's really you, everything else be damp and the fleece be dry, and then that shows up. God calls him, and so he shows up, and he shows up at 32,000 soldiers.

And God looks at this group of soldiers and and says there's too many. There's too many. And Gideon's kinda just sitting there like, wait. What what do you mean there's too many? There's 32,000. We're going against armies that are innumerable. God, this is not too many. God, responds with, if you go with too many, basically, you're the boast will be for Israel. It won't be for me. The wind will go to you and not to me if you show up with so many soldiers. And so he says, basically, just take a toll of, a poll of who wants to be here and who wants to go? And so they lose, like, 20,000 soldiers doing that, and there's still 12,000 soldiers or so. And so god says it's still too many. There's still too many soldiers. It will still be to your boast and not to mine. Lead them to the water. Have them drink. Separate those that lap up water like a dog with those that kneel to drink. So he does that, and there are only about 300

that that lapped up water like a dog, and god says, send them. I think that's funny, by the way. He chose the dog lappers. Oh, totally. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. It it there's a certain desperation for the water that happens when you're when you're a dog lapper. Like, it's Yeah. Yeah. You it doesn't matter. It's not about presenting yourself and kneeling and sipping from your hand. Tooth. Exactly. You drop and you drink like a dog. You are thirsty. And god says, take the 300 there and go to the to the Midianites, and that will be who you battle with. And so it's this beautiful story of God's identity to to to Gideon, and he's letting him know the numbers are not important to me. That is not how I battle. It does not matter if they're innumerable. It doesn't matter how many there are. I am your god. I am Yahweh. I am your father. I am is the one who sent you. You will take the 300, and I promise you, you will not die. That's exactly what he says to him. He promises him that he will not die. He's saying that he's his safety, and Gideon responds by building an altar and saying, god is my peace. And that's so important there. And so I've taken that story, and I've run with it because for years, I have failed at this. For years, I have failed at being good enough to battle my addictions, to battle my depression, to battle my circumstances. I am not good enough to do it. I'm not strong enough. I'm not smart enough. I don't have the right battle. Right?

And God showed up and showed off and said to me, dude, you don't need to be the one that fights. Stop fighting. You are not the warrior in this. I am. You are not the fighter in this. I am. You cannot defeat it, but guess who can? And it was this beautiful moment of realization to where I was not trusting god with something that I thought had more power over me than he had power over it. And that hit me hard today because that's exactly how I woke up. I woke up thinking, god, you are not strong enough to beat this. You are not trustworthy enough for me to give in to you. You are not faithful enough to keep your promises, and it was a low point for me, and I was in desperation. I was crying for my for my life. My heart was broken. And in this moment, I realized I was like, I'm sitting here fearing failure

towards a god that I feel like I should be running to right now, but I'm not. And my failure says run further, but the truth says, no. No. No. No. No. Just because your faith is failing does not mean God is. Just because your trust in him is is failing does not mean God is failing. He is your rock. He is your peace. Run to him even in your failure, and run to him even in your heartache. He is holding his arms wide open for you to run back to him. And so in this in this primal moment, I decided that I was either going to do one of two things. I was gonna quit, and I was gonna run, and I was gonna fail and fail epically. And when I fail in this stuff, it is rough. I will be gone for months. People will not speak to me. My shame will take me captive and hold me in shackles.

Or I have the choice to run to my father, the creator of this universe, and say, dad, I'm not strong enough, and I can't fight. I need you to go fight for me, and that's exactly what I did. And I started crying out to God and telling him, father, I'm not strong enough for this. I'm not good enough for this. I do not trust you in this. Help my unbelief. Father, I need you to show up right now and shatter my enemies. I mean, psalmist style, I need them under your feet. You trample my fear right now. You trample my inadequacy, and you trample my faithlessness, and I need you to take charge of my heart and run to that. And it was one of the most liberating moments of my entire life when I realized there is not a single thing in my life that is an ailment,

that is a hurt, that is a sin, that is is a deprivation of my actual nature as a son of Christ that God is not strong enough to trample, and that he is not faithful enough to take care of and handle. And I've never given that to him like I did today. And you know what I did today? You know what I did all day today? I laid in bed, and I prayed about it, and I talked to him about it. And I didn't binge eat for the first time in my life when it came to those depressive moments. I didn't run to go crazy. I decided that my binging was a spoonful of peanut butter, and I decided to make bread. That's ridiculous. I decided to to knead bread with my hands and to recognize that he is my sustenance, and he keeps me going, and he's the reason for living. He's my father, and he is my king. He is faithful, and he is my peace. And just like Gideon, I didn't need 32,000

to go and battle the Midianites. I just needed God on my side and his promises to hold on to in trust and in faith. And I know that I'm not done or out of the weeds, but I can promise you, I saw a glimpse of my triumphant king father today and it was beautiful. It was a very it's well, I we we kinda talked about this a little bit. Like, there's there's aspects of that that are very unique to you and then I think there are aspects of that that, like, everybody everybody goes through. Everybody has has moments of of of up against something or other Yeah. Of which they have attempted on their own to defeat Right. And have found that it defeats them. I'm kind Absolutely. Yeah.

And and humanity the humanity within it says, I need to be stronger. I need to fight harder. This is this is a test of who I of who I am as person. A Right. When at its core, like, we look at things rightly, it is a is is often a test of our understanding of the faithfulness of God and our willingness to submit to it. Yeah. And and there's not there's not there's not magic in it. And I think this is where people struggle, Boubaix. Tell me if I'm wrong. But this is where we struggle was, like, the even the phrase give it to God is difficult

for people because, like, that does that they don't know what to do. Like, what does it mean to give it to God? Because if I say, okay, I give this to God and I'm still sitting in my bed grabbing my pillow Right. Exactly. Now what am I supposed to do? Yeah. Like, I gave it to Lord and he failed me because I'm still hugging pillow. Right. Yeah. It's it's we do we do not have an understandable measure of success. And is it is it because, as part of that is I think think through through your day is a misunderstanding of of success. Yeah. A misunderstanding of what it is to conquer or to be the win.

Yeah. Absolutely. I was still clutching my pillow in tears after I cried out to the lord. He his his help for me not was not to cure me immediately. Like, my expectation was not for God to be my genie, which I think is where we where we miss the intention of it a lot. I think the whole concept of the give it to God is this thought process that, oh, God's powerful enough, therefore, he will make it all nothing. All of it will go away. I won't remember my parents. Won't I remember my fear of failure, anything like that, and it's wrong. God doesn't promise that. There's no promise ever that God is just going to eliminate all ailments here. That doesn't happen. Yep. And it's it's unfortunate, but it because I think that's where a lot of people do lose faith is when we have expectations for what his power does, not is, but does, we run into problems. It's the same reason why peep most people are afraid of praying for healing, legitimate healing. Not just, oh lord, I hope you help the person has cancer, but no. God, you control their cells.

You control the universe, and all creation cries out to you. If you want to eliminate cancerous cells, there will not be a trace left. That is powerful healing, and we we run into that because people think that that when praying for that, God failed if that if that person isn't healed. God failed if if the lame don't walk. God failed if the deaf don't hear. God failed if the blind don't see, but that's not true because when you truthfully pray for that stuff, you realize the prayer isn't in the outcome. The prayer isn't in the in the solution. The prayer is in in giving up all expectations and giving into the will of the creator. If it's in God's will that he makes the lame walk, they will walk. It will happen. If the if the will of the creator is in the fact that, yeah, I may still be sad about a lot of my situations, but I didn't fail today because I recognize that God is my success,

and my father is where strength comes from, and my father is where peace comes from. If I look at him like a genie, he failed me today. But if I look at him like the bread of my life and the sustenance of the next day that I have, today was a beautiful success. It was a beautiful moment. Absolutely. And you read like, is that, do you see some commonalities just in your life, like, your pastoral life types of things that, like, that Buva was talking about today and kind of those, I don't know, turning points or whatever for folks on being absolutely trust God with with things like that? Yeah. Absolutely.

It's it's kind of funny as as a a young preacher, I remember that's one of the buzzwords, give it to Jesus. And I I said it many times and one day I thought to myself, I don't even know what that means. You know? It's just a phrase. Someone probably asked me, how do you do that? I thought, yeah. I mean I mean, really, you know, just give it to the cross. You'll go to Jesus, you know. You have all these little phrases we throw out that sound good and religious and spiritual, but but people are honestly wanting

I want to give it to Jesus. Right. I I want to. And I struggle with that and I don't know how and and I still don't know, you know. And now, I'm I've gone through some of the overeaters anonymous stuff and I thought, what you said is echoing exactly what that is, you know? Mhmm. Of course, they'll they'll say higher power or alcohol, know, all the way down, Anonymous is. But but we know who the higher power is. Absolutely. You you know, the one who called the 300 is is is is him.

And so that that is the challenge to guide people on that walk when we're all walking it at the same time. Right. You know, all I can say is, well, come with me and and and let let's let's do this, and you're gonna have those moments and and you just call out to god and ask for help Right. Like you did, you know. And and then still, you still have to get up and make that bread. Oh, yeah. Exactly. Or, you know, not

have six Big Macs. Right. Exactly. Yes. You know? And that's that's hard. That's hard because there's effort. There is effort involved. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. But but you call out on on god and his power and in his help and his guidance and that that's in people trying to get out of affairs to people with, you know, alcohol or drug addictions or food or, you know, you name it. We all there's we all have our thing. It's it's it's it breaks my heart to to to walk that path with so many people. Like, I don't know if it's if we are more addictive now than we ever have been or if it's just now we talk about it more Right. Or something. Right. But it just seems like we're everybody's addicted to something. Yeah. Yeah. You know? And and and gosh, I wish it wasn't so. Right. Yeah. You know? Agreed. Right. I mean, because I'm there too. You know, like I say, I I'm I'm on the food thing, you know? Mhmm. And Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's funny because because now you bring up this whole give it to God thing. I I I still even after today, I have no idea what that means. Yeah. Like, I I cannot I cannot I just gave it to God. I cannot define it and I cannot quantify it. I I there wasn't any specific action. It was just it was the choice of the matter that was,

father, you're my strength. Yeah. I think it gives us moment to doubt. Absolutely. And, yeah, I would agree with that more. Yeah. I did can can I done now. Right. My addiction isn't gone. Like, I'm not gonna wake up tomorrow and suddenly not want food. Like, I'm I'm certain that I will want. That's that's the whole reason I'm doing this this this fast is the concept that food is an idol for me. It is something that gets in the way of God and I. I'm running to it for sustenance, for for for strength. I I run to it from an emotional perspective when I'm having a bad day I wanna eat. To be communal with people I wanna eat. It defines me, and I'm tired of being defined by it and not the the the creator of this universe. I want Yahweh to be the thing that sustains me, or I want I want God to be the one that is my bread and my things like that. And so, like, I I don't know how to to quantify the statement of give it to God. All I know is is that it was a it was a moment of of revelation of identity to me that that I can trust him. And that's not to say that I won't have a weak moment tomorrow. Right. Right. Know, it's not fixed. The ailment isn't gone, and I won't be I won't be I won't be trusting forever for the rest of my life, but I can certainly call upon this. And it's it's kind of the same concept that I've been Ben and I have actually been talking about for a couple weeks of of of putting up altars. You know? I wanna put up a altar today to let them let everyone know that God is trustworthy, and God is faithful. Today is proof of that. I woke up not being able to handle the stressors of the day, and I ran to God with my problems. And for lack of a better phrase, I gave it to God, and and I I found success in him. And that's exactly what happened was was when I stopped realizing that or when I stopped thinking about myself as the one that's fighting, just decided to step back and be let the god be the one who fought for me. Mhmm. He's the one who tramples my enemies, not me. I've never understood David in the Psalms more than today with the whole God trample my enemies under your feet.

You know, it them to me broken down. Exactly what happened today. I I I had enemies this morning, and I was not the one who needed to go out to battle. God was. And that's exactly what happened. You know, there's there's this verse in Psalm 20 that's I think it's 27. It's it's some trust in chariots and others in horses, but we will trust in the name of the Lord. And that's exactly true. God doesn't fight conventionally. Doesn't matter what swords he has, and it doesn't matter how many camels he has, and whether there's chariots involved. It's just him that that causes victory, and that's throughout the Bible. The the major battle scenes that we see in the Old Testament all the way up to the battle scene in Revelation, God's presence and existence is what what what defines that win. And it's actually kinda funny in Revelation. There's really battle. Jesus just shows up and everything's done. Yeah. But,

but but that's it. He's the vic he's victory, and it's for his boast today. If I would have just gone through today and said, yeah, I went great, my addiction sucked, but I had a great day and I just didn't eat. There's one thing. But instead, I get to boast for the name of the lord because I ran to him and cried out to him as my papa and as my father to to handle the situation, to trample underfoot, and now I get to boast for his glory today rather than my own. And I just now recognize that until right now. That's exactly how that happened. I love it. Yeah. Alright. Well, hope you are, that was encouraging. Thank you for boo boo for sharing, on kind of what's going on, things that got us done. Right? Yeah. And actually so I'll and then I'll I'll make this super quick, but, like, this this seems minor. This is a big thing to me. I, I've been struggling the last few weeks just on on stuff that I've been teaching, and it just didn't feel like it was going well. And I was worrying that I, like, I

God's word is good, and when I don't do a good job, I'm like, crap. I'm not being faithful in the things I'm trying to do. And so I you know, I was real close to that even this Sunday just before I was gonna start talking on stuff, and I just I just was was praying and said, god, I just I need you to sort this out for me because, like, however I'm thinking about it, I just can't get it sorted out. And, within the within kind of two minutes of as I was praying that thing, things just kind of aligned, it wasn't miraculous. Like, I I wasn't I didn't do anything, genius on on on what I taught about. But, like, god cleared a path for something that that has been a I've been struggling with for the last three weeks, and, there is no explanation. My I'd been thunking about it. I'd done plenty of that, and it not resolved itself. It resolved itself then. And so

it's just the same size altar. I'll build it right there. I think the Lord stepped in and helped me with something that I really needed help with. I've been trying to do something right in his service. And so That's awesome. Things that got us done. That's awesome. Good news. I love that. Okay. Alright. We are gonna skip, advice. Okay. No advice this week. So, we're glad I thank you guys so much for hanging out. Like I said, we'll be out next week. That's on me, because I won't be here. But then we'll be back in the saddle starting back in August. And so we appreciate hanging out. If you got anything you wanna talk to us about, you can use the complaint line, (515) 517-0085. We do love to hear from you. And we do love, that you guys are, you know, spend time hanging out with us. I was looking actually. I just added, a pod the podcast. My my oldest kid wanted the, the Life From The Path podcast on her phone, and, we got 200 episodes going back just five years on there's plenty of Life From The Path to dig up on as we're out a week. So you wanna do that, go ahead and jump in. In the meantime, be faithful means. God will hand to the ends. You've been listening to you, Life From The Path.