The Worst Phrases Christians Use

Summary

Thinking Fellows Podcast: The Worst Phrases Christians Use

Episode Date: December 10, 2025
Hosts: Caleb Keith, Scott Keith, Adam Francisco, Bruce Hillman
Duration: ~45 minutes

---

Overview

In this spirited and humorous episode, the Thinking Fellows tackle some of the most “cringe-worthy” and problematic phrases commonly used within Christian circles. These are expressions that, while often meant to comfort, encourage, or express faith, can undermine sound theology, cause confusion, or even unintentionally wound. Throughout the roundtable, the hosts analyze the phrases from theological, pastoral, and practical perspectives, often peppered with jokes, stories, and pointed honesty.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Let Go and Let God

• Speaker: Bruce (02:49)
• Analysis:
  • Superficially sounds humble, but subtly teaches that "God can't work until you let Him" (03:03).
  • Puts burdens on believers and shifts sovereignty away from God.
  • Bruce: “What the phrase is really teaching is that God can't work until you let him. And I just have a real problem with that.” (03:29)

2. God Won't Give You More Than You Can Handle

• Speaker: Scott (06:48)
• Analysis:
  • Considered trite, especially when people are suffering grievously.
  • Neglects the reality of overwhelming experiences in a fallen world.
  • Can deliver weak law—a milder, more insipid version of God’s demands—without true comfort.
  • Scott: “It seems like a really kind of trite thing to say to somebody who's really suffering... Just doesn't seem helpful to me.” (07:29)
  • Caleb: “It's the law of Christian accomplishment and self-preservation and perseverance.” (09:59)

3. Abrahamic Faiths

• Speaker: Adam (13:38)
• Analysis:
  • Adam’s “chicken tikka masala” level of spicy annoyance.
  • Critiques the term’s implication that Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are fundamentally related branches.
  • Theologically misleading, as all three faiths make exclusive claims on Abraham.
  • Criticizes modern interfaith efforts for “fuzzification” of real doctrinal differences (18:06).
  • Adam: “It’s a very new sort of term... as if they’re all sort of part of the same olive tree... But the implication is that they all worship the same God, just in different ways.” (14:02-14:13)
  • Caleb: “To serious practitioners of any of these religions, it's seriously insulting.” (18:56)

4. Niceness as Witness – “A Great Witness of Christ’s Love”

• Speaker: Caleb (21:12)
• Analysis:
  • Critiques the idea that simple kindness or civility inherently witnesses the gospel.
  • Proclaims that actual Christian witness requires explicit proclamation of Christ.
  • Risks reducing Christian behavior to mere “niceness”—a weak law masquerading as gospel.
  • Caleb: “It's not a witness at all of Christ's love unless you actually preach about or proclaim Christ... your kindness is that witness... That's a lot of assuming that's going on.” (22:37-23:44)

5. Speak the Truth in Love

• Speaker: Bruce (28:26)
• Analysis:
  • Can justify unkind or manipulative behavior under a veneer of loving correction.
  • Sometimes becomes an excuse for unnecessary confrontation.
  • Also, can be used to inaction—claiming to wait for the ‘right’ loving moment.
  • Bruce: “I think it's only used for manipulation. And it's an unnecessary thing to say.” (33:24-33:26)

6. Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin

• Speaker: Scott (33:54)
• Analysis:
  • Scott finds it “bad preaching”—wrongly separates sin from the sinner, which doesn't account for the total depravity of humanity.
  • Points out the importance of forgiving the sinner, not just the sin.
  • Traces the phrase back to Augustine; its context originally was more about ethical restraint than theology (38:22-39:46).
  • Scott: “You don’t hate the sin and still love me at the time. You hate both of us.” (34:19)
  • Bruce: “Everyone who goes to hell is loved. Love doesn't say loved.” (36:38)

7. Judeo-Christian Civilization/Scriptures

• Speaker: Adam (43:47)
• Analysis:
  • Another phrase Adam finds deeply problematic.
  • Historically used to form alliances or express supposed shared moral roots.
  • Adam disputes the accuracy and theological honesty of the label, noting differences in law, soteriology, and social ethics.
  • Adam: “I don't think Western civilization has a Jewish root…Their theology…could not be more opposed to classic Christian theology and their moral standards.” (45:14-47:40)
  • The panel distinguishes between ancient Israelite values, rabbinic Judaism, and Christianity, finding the term reductionist.

8. Just Wait for God to Bless You

• Speaker: Caleb (54:41)
• Analysis:
  • Usually said to fill an uncomfortable silence in the face of someone’s misfortune.
  • Functions as a way to avoid direct help, shifting personal or communal obligation onto God.
  • Sets up unhealthy spiritual comparisons (i.e., the more materially blessed are 'favored').
  • Caleb: “A lot of these phrases are you hear your neighbor, the words of your neighbor calling you to action, and you want to pass that action off to God.” (58:02)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On “Let Go and Let God”:
  • Bruce: "What the phrase is really teaching is that God can't work until you let him." (03:29)
• On “God Won’t Give You More Than You Can Handle”:
  • Scott: “...people need to kind of read the book of Job a little bit.” (07:08)
  • Adam (on hospital visits): “This is bad. So I, I'm, I'm just going to stick with 'God can't give you more than you can handle.'” (08:24)
• On “Abrahamic Faiths”:
  • Adam: “It’s a term... invented really... maybe you could find it late 20th century at some point. But post-9/11... and it really was a theological compromise.” (15:03)
  • Caleb: “It’s just kind of wild.” (18:43)
• On “Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin”:
  • Scott: “You are the one separated from the love of God because you are a sinner... It gives this impression that the only thing that needs to be corrected is the individual sin.” (35:17-36:06)
  • Bruce: “Love doesn't say loved. The cross does.” (36:38-36:39)
• On “Just Wait for God to Bless You”:
  • Caleb: “Usually, it’s sort of like the let go and let God, but with physical... expectations.” (54:58)
• Comic Relief:
  • Adam: “Christians are the only children of Abraham who can eat ham.” (19:51)
  • Bruce: “That would be my tattoo.” (34:21)
  • Multiple moments of playful talk about hymn-singing, hospital visits, and wedding music choices.

---

Important Timestamps

• 02:49 – Bruce introduces “Let go and let God.”
• 06:48 – Scott attacks “God won’t give you more than you can handle.”
• 13:38 – Adam introduces “Abrahamic faiths.”
• 21:12 – Caleb targets “X is a great witness of Christ’s love.”
• 28:26 – Bruce addresses “Speak the truth in love.”
• 33:54 – Scott on “Love the sinner, hate the sin.”
• 43:47 – Adam and the term “Judeo-Christian civilization/scriptures.”
• 54:41 – Caleb: “We’ll just wait for God to bless you.”
• 58:02 – Caleb closes with a strong point about dodging vocation by shifting to platitudes.

---

Tone and Style

• Candid, Lay-level but Theologically Deep: The hosts use humor, personal stories, and frankness, but always tie back to confessional Lutheran theology.
• Playful Banter: Frequent jokes (especially about hymn selections, spiciness of phrases, and inter-host teasing) lighten the mood, even on weighty subjects.
• Challenging Listeners: Regular invitations to reconsider commonly held expressions, with intent both to comfort and to provoke deeper reflection.

---

Takeaways for Listeners

This episode encourages Christians to critically examine common phrases for their theological accuracy and practical impact, advocating instead for honest communication, clear law/gospel distinctions, and authentic service of neighbors. The hosts remind listeners that Christian life is about truth, compassion, and real engagement—not just platitudes or surface-level piety.

Memorable Challenge:
“If you feel like uttering that phrase, it's actually the conviction of the law probably telling you you have to do something.” (Caleb, 58:41)

---

For more lay-level but wise discussions, subscribe to the Thinking Fellows or check out the 1517 Podcast Network on your favorite platform.

Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

Hello and welcome to the Thinking Fellows podcast. My name is Caleb Keith and today I'm joined by Scott Keith, Adam Francisco, and Bruce Hillman. The Thinky Fellows is part of the 15:17 podcast network of shows. You can go to 15:17.org podcast to see our shows. You can also follow 15:17 on YouTube. You can see some short versions of these episodes. We do like a recap of 15 minutes or less recap of these topics over there. So you can see that by subscribing to 1517 on YouTube and if you watch the Thinking Fellows on there to forget to like and subscribe to this channel as well. Okay. Our topic today is kind of a fun one. We are talking about the worst phrases Christians use. This is coming. We did something like, kind of adjacent to this a month ago or so. I don't remember what it was, but it did very well. Everybody liked it.

Lots of downloads and things like that. So figured we should. We should do a similar topic. And this one actually came to us by our co worker, David Ruffner, who suggested that we cover the phrases, the cringy phrases that Christians use or the worst ones that they use. Maybe phrases that defeat or overcome their own theology or confessions of faith sometimes too. And I think depending on how this goes, everybody will get a chance to do one or two of these. So I'll just pass it around. I'm going to pick. Let's see. Let's do. Bruce. Bruce, you can go first.

[A]

You went with the safe one first. Of course you do.

[B]

Bruce can have a spicy one. What was that episode we used an Indian curry rating for our last hot taste.

[C]

Oh, yeah, that's right.

[A]

Yeah. I don't know anything about Indian curry.

[B]

But, Bruce, what chili pepper level do you have for us today?

[C]

Well, how are we rating. How are we rating the chili pepper rating? Like it, like it's a. Theologically.

[A]

Geez, man. You just asked a question like that of theologians and philosophers. They're going to argue about the nature of chili pepper ratings for an hour.

[D]

Vindaloo, Bruce, go vindaloo.

[B]

I don't.

[C]

I don't know if I have a vindaloo, but I. Here's one I hate. I like. I really, really hate.

[B]

Spiciest.

[C]

Yeah, Vindaloo is like really, really hot.

[A]

Let go, jalapeno.

[C]

Let go and let God.

[B]

One.

[A]

That's.

[C]

That's my.

[D]

Go and let God.

[A]

Jalapenos.

[C]

Yeah, I. This is. I don't like this one.

[A]

Did you say let go and let God.

[C]

Let go and let God.

[A]

Yeah. Oh, yeah. God, that one's awful.

[C]

I hate. I hate this one because it sounds like people are, you know, if you don't scrutinize it, it sounds like, oh, this is an act of humility. And this is something where, you know, know, I'm getting my ego out of the way and I'm giving myself over to God. But actually, what the phrase is really teaching is that God can't work until you let him.

And I just have a real problem with that. I have a real problem that people think that the reason why they're suffering or the reason why they aren't being delivered from whatever trouble is assailing them is because they. They haven't yet.

Gotten out of the way enough so that God and his very gentlemanly cardigan Mr. Rogers Way can then come in and help them out. And this is not the fierce sovereign God that we see in scripture.

[B]

Who.

[C]

Is, you know.

Smites people. Yeah. And making his own decisions. Even if you take a case like, for example, when Jesus looks out over Jerusalem before he enters in the triumphal entry, and he says, o Jerusalem, O Jerusalem, how I would gather you up as a hen would gather her chicks, but you would not have it. And so it seems like, okay, this is playing into that type of statement. The problem with that is that Christ's work is still accomplished, and he ends up gathering Israel up in his work on the cross anyway. So I think it puts a burden on people, and I think it limits God when we say things like, you know, you just have to surrender or give up and give it to God or give it to God and things like that.

[D]

So that wasn't very spicy?

[C]

Yeah, I didn't say it was spicy.

[D]

I mean, it was very safe, as Caleb said.

[A]

What's not spicy? Pepper.

[C]

Well, to be fair, no one told me how, you know, we were rating the peppers here.

[D]

So what you're saying is.

[C]

I'm saying if it's theologically, you know, right or wrong, it's. It's, you know, it's getting towards vindaloo. If it's controversial, then I'll give it. If it's controversial, I'll give you. It's like, you know those canned. Those canned, like, Mexican peppers in the can? They're really not that hot. It's like. Like tostito salsa.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Dan, do you have a couple.

[A]

I mean, I got a.

[B]

He's got spices, basically.

[A]

I can't. Any Christian phrase that you could think of probably drives me crazy, up to and including I'll pray for you, which Is probably shouldn't make me crazy, but it does.

[B]

Maybe you should explain why do all Christian phrases bother you? Because I'm sure there's a reason behind it. Or are you just that impious?

[C]

See, but that's not theologically wrong. But it bothers you for a different reason.

[A]

Well, okay, con. Given a context, it doesn't bug me. Like if, you know, if a good friend of yours, something really bad has happened, a good friend of yours is a thousand miles away and they can't do anything else and they say, hey, we're praying for you. You know, that's great. I'd love for you to pray for me. But if it's just sort of like said in passing all the time, I guess I am very impious because I just have a hard time believing it most of the time.

[C]

What about when thoughts come with the prayers? Does that help?

[A]

Oh, yeah. Oh my gosh. But let go and let God was on my list, so good job. I mean, I put it up there with Jesus, take the wheel.

But at the same time, how about this one, right?

This one was spouted to me. I'm not going to say by which relative. As I was growing up all the time.

I mentioned her in a sermon on Sunday and I loved her to death. I wouldn't be who I am without her. But God won't give you more than you can handle.

Okay.

I think people need to kind of read the book of Job a little bit. Maybe there though.

[C]

He slay me.

[A]

Yeah. It's a distinct possibility that such things could happen. And even if you don't think it's God, that doesn't mean that the world, the devil, or your own sinful flesh aren't going to give you things that you have a very, very hard time handling.

It seems like a really kind of trite thing to say to somebody who's really suffering. Hey, don't worry, your spouse just died and you found out that you're in financial ruin. But God won't give you more than you can handle, so you're probably. It's good. Don't worry about.

Just doesn't seem helpful to me. And most of these phrases that drive me crazy. I think you're just what people say when they're uncomfortable and they're trying to find something to say. It reminds me of me. One of the reasons I didn't actually become a pastor is because of how bad I knew I would be at hospital visits and such. Because this is the type of stuff that when I didn't know what to say. I'd say idiotic things like this up to and including me walking into a hospital room after somebody just had half their brain taken out and going, how you doing? You know, Because I don't know what else to say. They're doing bad.

This is bad. So I, I'm, I'm just going to stick with God can't give you more than you can handle. Just because I think you have some scriptural proof that at times you will be challenged even by God, beyond what you feel like you can absorb. And that saying that does not take into account the fact that you live in a sinful world, that you're surrounded by sinful people, and that you yourself are sinful and corrupt, and that the devil does try to assail you, and that these things can all be very overwhelming at times. And it's just not helpful to say that he won't give you more than you can handle.

[C]

I don't know if it's Ezekiel or Elijah. I sometimes get them confused on this point. But one of them says, I, I don't know if it's Elijah after he calls down fire and flees from Jezebel, or if it's Ezekiel when he's by the brook, cherith or whatever there. But the statement that they make is, it is enough. O Lord, take my life. I'm no better than my fathers. That's someone who's definitely gotten to the point where they have more than they can handle.

[A]

It's also weak. It's weak law being preached at you, right? So if you're going to give me the law, just give it to me. Don't tell me, hey, you should be doing better with this adversity than you are, because God won't give you more than you can handle. Say God is assailing you right now, but don't worry, Christ has still died for you. Your sins are still forgiven. I mean, you can give me, like, just give me the law. Like, this is all of your own making, you know, whatever, just give me the law, but then set me free in Christ.

[B]

And it's the law of, like, Christian accomplishment and self preservation and perseverance as well. Because I think a lot of it two in these contexts have to do with the fear or the experience people have had with other people in their life, a family member where enough bad things happened. That's what caused them to stop believing in God. That's what caused the unbelief. And so I think people who use these phrases like you were saying, it's an attempt to comfort and do a weird type of apologetics as well that is like, I need to do whatever I can to keep this person in the faith right now or to encourage them to keep going to church or keep persevering or keep trusting. And so all of it is a work.

[A]

Yeah. And I think I stumbled into why I don't like any of these phrases. They're just all weak law. I mean, let go and let God. That's weak law. God won't give you more than you can handle. That's weak law. Like, come on. Just. If I need the law in that moment, which I very well might just.

[D]

Give it to you.

[A]

Just kill me, Break me if I'm almost broken. Just break me all the way so that I can be built back up in Christ. Just take it down to the root and stem, man. Get me out. Burn it out.

[C]

Do you like the hymn? Because I do, but I don't know, in this context, I could see where some people might not. Do you like the hymn it as well? Because I feel like that hymn speaks to, like, only the gospel can be your source of hope sometimes. Because, I mean, that guy, like, his whole family was killed.

[A]

I struggle with that hymn. I actually, with my wife, sang that hymn as a duet at my grandmother's funeral.

[C]

But not so well.

[A]

No, it's. I do like it. I like most of it. It just feels so gnostic to me. Because it's not just well with me, it's well with my soul, and that's fine.

I'm exceedingly anti gnostic, even though I understand that within the church, it's okay.

[B]

To talk about your soul and your heart and things like that.

[A]

It just bothers me.

[B]

The theme of this episode is like, everything bothers you.

[A]

But they don't know.

[B]

That by.

When Pietists are like, we're really concerned about an intellectual faith that has no feeling. They're talking about you, apparently.

[A]

I think they're talking about Adam, too. To be fair.

[D]

I didn't know you sang, Scott. Like, duets. We should do a duet.

[A]

What would you like to sing?

[D]

I don't know. Maybe go tell it on the mountain. And Afflicted. I wanted that song for my wedding. Stricken and inflicted.

[C]

Married.

[A]

Stricken, Smitten and Afflicted.

[D]

One of my favorite hymns.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[D]

But not appropriate for wedding, apparently. Stricken, Smitten and Afflicted.

And my wife is like, we're not singing that at our wedding. I was like, okay. Thy Strong Word. We went with that.

[B]

If we want to talk about this Isn't a phrase. But you want to know something that bothers me? Weddings with no singing, with no hymns.

[A]

I think. I think once we get some distance from this summer, we need to just do an episode about weddings in general. But we just got to get some distance so that people don't listen and say, hey, are they talking about my wedding?

[C]

Oh, I had a guy in New Jersey walk down the aisle to Bon Jovi and I told him no, and he didn't want me to do the wedding anymore.

[D]

That's all.

[A]

Well, you dodged a bullet there, didn't you?

[C]

Yeah, I did.

[A]

All right, Adam. Yep. Give us your phrase.

[D]

I have two. I'm going to go with the. I've got the vindaloo one that's set for if there's time then, because it could get me in trouble. The chicken tikka masala one, which I had last night for my birthday dinner. Oh, I love Abrahamic faiths.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[D]

Drives me nuts.

[B]

I agree.

[D]

That's all I'll say about that because it's. Yeah, so you probably are.

[A]

Because there's not more than one Abrahamic faith. That's why.

[D]

Yeah, it's a reference. It's a very new sort of term to describe Christianity, Islam and Judaism as if they're all sort of part of the same olive tree, if you will, the same root.

[B]

The implication is that they all worship the same God, just in different ways.

[A]

Or manifestation, different systematics.

[B]

That's maybe something to dive into. So, I mean, I agree with this proposition, but for listeners. So would your problem be that you would say we don't worship the same God, that, like the incorrect religions within this triangle are worshiping a demon or a false. They've created a false idol using the name of God, like.

[D]

So first, I'm glad that you agree, like you said.

Sorry, little comic relief. Okay. It's almost Thanksgiving.

[A]

Does that have to do with comic relief?

[B]

I don't know.

[D]

Yeah, that's it. And it's a term that was invented really.

Maybe you could find it late 20th century at some point. But post 9 11, when all these sort of interfaith, you know, of these three monotheistic religion gatherings are taking place. And it really was a. A theological compromise. It what really gets me going. So maybe I have sort of issues like Scott here is there was first decade of the 21st century, I want to say 2005, ish, a bunch of Muslim scholars got together in Amman, Jordan, and they wrote this letter. This is like high profile scholars, like leaders and thought leaders and so on they wrote this letter called A common word between us and you, and they sent it to the Pope and patriarchs and presidents and Rick Warren, who's who in the zoo of Christianity. Right. And basically said to them, we need, for the sake of human civilization, we all need to find some sort of common ground to have a conversation. Otherwise we're gonna. We're heading towards a clash of civilizations. And so then they're buying the myth.

[B]

That all violence, like the worst violence in the world is also religious violence, for instance. Yeah. This whole secular lie.

[D]

Yeah, In a way it was sort of a. I don't know if it was a direct response, but certainly a response to some of the claims that like new atheists were making that all of. All of violence minus the 20th century. Let's just push that to the side.

[A]

Let's just push the most violent century in human history to the side.

[D]

Yeah, Ye. And so they send this letter, A common word between us and you, which is a reference to a couple verses in chapter three of the Quran that has Allah or Muhammad. I don't remember exactly saying to Muslims that they're to reach out to Christians and say, let us come to a common word between us. And you suggesting that there is this commonality. But then you just read a verse or two later, it says, Abraham was not a Christian, he was a Muslim. So it's kind of a sleight of hand sort of thing. And the response, I mean, it made its way into the New York Times and the whole movement, I think it's kind of fizzled out now. But all these Christians from Rick Warren, and there are even people within our own church body, missiologists who should have known better, who signed on to that. And then shortly thereafter, Hartford Seminary in Connecticut has the oldest place to do the study. Academic study of Islam was called the Duncan MacDonald center for Islamic Studies or Center for Islamic Studies and Muslim Christian Relations. That was started in the 19th century purposely for Christian missionaries to prepare for going to the Muslim majority world. Then it was described, it's changed names, but about 10 years ago it was described as a seminary for the Abrahamic faiths. And that's the stuff that bothers me.

[A]

But ultimately the fact your objections are so intellectual.

[B]

Well.

[D]

The theological root is, as you suggested earlier, this.

Fuzzification. Is that a word?

[A]

It's less intellectual. I like it. Yeah.

[D]

The blurring of the lines between. I mean, I would go so far as to say that Judaism, certainly modern Judaism, isn't even of the same root as Christianity in That it purposely rejects the root that is Jesus. So.

Yeah, that's me. Clearly, I have issues like.

[A]

Well, even if it's. Even if it's got.

A historical benchmark that can be traced alongside Christianity to a point, they've rejected. They're not the Abrahamic faith anymore because they've rejected the faith of Abraham.

[D]

Correct.

[A]

And so this is the problem with saying, oh, an Abrahamic faith, they're claiming. Much like the Muslims, they're claiming an Abrahamic faith that is not the faith of Abraham.

[B]

I mean, what's funny is, to serious practitioners of any of these religions, it's seriously insulting. Right? Because as you said, Adam, they all make an exclusive claim on Abraham. Christianity does. Paul says, we are the children. Christians are the children of Abraham. Then you have Israel, who, obviously the whole religion is hinging on being the children of Abraham. And then if. If Muslims make this claim as well, it's just, like, insulting to say, no, you all are. You just chose different paths, you know, that's just kind of wild.

[D]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the interesting thing in the whole sort of interfaith conversation is the orthodox representatives of the three religions, maybe they'll participate, but they reject this notion that we're all basically the same, you know, heading up the same mountain to the same peak. So cool.

[C]

Christians are the only children of Abraham who can eat ham.

Just want to throw that out there.

[D]

That's. That's a dad joke.

[B]

And you're not even Bruce. Have you seen that Theological dad, The most Christian thing you can eat is a bacon cheeseburger.

[D]

I'll tell you something. When I used to go down to my Arabic.

Classes in my Islamic theology classes at the center for Islamic Studies there in Oxford, not always because I couldn't afford it, but at least once a week, I would stop by the Eagle and Child and get a bacon sandwich and drink a beer before going there, just to sort of remind myself.

[C]

That's streaky bacon. That's streaky bacon.

[D]

Thick streaky bacon. Mm, streaky bacon.

[C]

Did you get some mushy peas on the side?

[D]

No.

[A]

Too bad. Did you like mushy peas?

[D]

No. I mean, if I jam them in mashed potatoes, it's fine.

[B]

So I've got one.

[D]

Sorry, Sorry. To heighten the mood.

[B]

Yeah, it's not fun.

[C]

I think you put a lot of cream in that vindal by the end.

[A]

You do specialize in that.

[B]

Yours was legitimate, though, so we'll give it to you. All right, here's mine. I'm actually.

[D]

Wait, wait for my next One.

[A]

Breath.

[B]

Here's my next one. Blank, blank, blank. Is a great witness of Christ's love. And insert before that any sort of kindness you could display to another person, usually another Christian.

And this drives me crazy for a similar reason that I think witness came up when we were talking about. I think this was great Christian, the Christian lies episode. That's what it was. And.

The problem for me is that especially when it's something like kindness. So one of the examples I would have is.

I heard this about welcoming new people to a church, like having a greeter. And if you are welcoming to people, that is a great witness of Christ's love. It's not a witness at all of Christ's love. Unless you actually preach about or proclaim Christ to that person. You actually have to witness it. So it relies on a couple of things. So number one, it's weak law, like my dad said, which is essentially saying the reason your behavior matters now is not that you're going to hurt your neighbor. It's not that God wants you to behave in a certain way in accordance with his law, that is the Ten Commandments and the other commands in Scripture.

It is everything you do is scrutinized under niceness now. And niceness is the witness. So if you can do things with a smile or if you can be polite to people, that encompasses all your activities now. And is this new law that you should always be following. And it's a law proposed as gospel because it has to do with the love of God. The love of God. The love of God. So really it shouldn't be an imposition on you Christian. You shouldn't feel guilty about it. It should just be an encouragement to be a better person every day. And that being a better person has the reward of being a missionary. Essentially, you get the reward and the bounty of being a missionary just by being a good person as long as you think about God when you're doing things. So that is problematic. I also think it gets people off the hook for actually doing real Christian witness.

[A]

Like, yeah, you don't actually have to have the proclamation of the gospel. You just got to stand there and shake somebody's hand.

[B]

And it works on the assumption that people know you're a Christian already, so that all your actions can be plus.

[A]

If you're witnessing to people that are.

[B]

Already coming to church, but or even if you're out in the world being this nice witness. The problem is it assumes that people can tell you're a Christian and that when you do nice things, they will associate with that with the death and resurrection of Christ for them. That's a lot of assuming that's going on. It also, to me explains things like why people in certain traditions have their car covered in Jesus bumper stickers and they wear a T shirt with Bible verses on them everywhere they go. And you're doing various things that would physically identify you as a Christian so that then your kindness is that witness, so that the assumption is there. I just see a snowball of things like this, and I think that Christians can tell people actually, like my dad was saying, just use the law to be nice without doing this. So, for instance, like this was happening.

[A]

Stop being a jerk.

[B]

I get this message periodically from a group I'm involved with. And a lot of the messages or the emails will close with this. You know, be welcoming. And that will be a witness to so and so just tell me to be welcoming if I'm the one not being welcoming in our group, likely. So just say like, hey, if you haven't learned everybody's name yet and it's showing, do that. Don't tell me it's because it's a bad witness of Christ's love. It's not a witness of Christ's love. It might be a witness like Caleb's a jerk, but.

It'S not a witness of whether or not Christ loves people. I also think it's dangerous to associate the love of God with the behavior of others to you too, because basically you're teaching people that, like, if somebody's not kind to you, you're not getting God's love. Also, there's just a lot with it. And again, it's one of these ones where the intention is probably good, like you're trying to correct a behavior or get people all working towards the same goal.

Or just give somebody encouragement to being nice. But again, that is better accomplished, I think, just through the law. And just said there's an expectation of you to be nice, to be kind, to be courteous, to be polite. And one of the reasons is your own reputation or the reputation of this church or whatever, and the reputation that you ruin or you present or even cause reputation damage to your neighbors or your church can be a roadblock to. To witness. It can be a roadblock to the proclamation of the gospel. If Christians are jerks, that may limit your possibility of having contact with people to then have a genuine conversation or a genuine proclamation to them, but it is in itself not the thing.

[D]

So what you're saying, Caleb, is that you disagree with the apocryphal saying of St. Francis that one should preach the gospel at all times, but use words only if necessary, or something like that. Yeah, yeah.

[A]

And sometimes with words. I think it is, isn't it? You know, it's funny. What did St. Francis say, Bruce?

[C]

Speak the gospel of all times, if necessary, use words.

[B]

There you go.

[C]

Which he actually took from Corinthians with the. With the.

[D]

I don't think he said it with.

[C]

The Christian woman who. Paul says, you know, if your husband is pagan, you know, he may become a Christian by, like, childbearing and good works. So that's where he was working from, not saying, I.

[A]

Well, that's a stretch.

[B]

But can I say that's an interesting one to my assumptions, because your husband will very well know that you are a Christian. Right? Like. Like your pagan husband. But the people in the grocery store absolutely do not. Like, this is, you know.

[D]

Well, you know, it's funny, Caleb, as you're talking about this, I was thinking about lately another thing that's been bothering me, but it's not what things that Christians necessarily say is everybody yelling at me to tell me to be kind on the bumper stickers, the T shirts, the now the yard signs, Make America kind again, blah, blah, blah.

[A]

Boy, the Midwest. I tell you, we don't get that in California. Over here, nobody's worried about being nice to each other.

[B]

Over here.

[D]

I just assume that's a secular sort of commandment, like it is. You know what I'm saying? Like, it's. Anybody can be kind.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

Doesn't. You know, just because someone's kind doesn't mean they're a Christian. Right. I mean, my.

[C]

My friend's a pastor, and he was in the car with his brother, and they saw the bumper sticker, my boss is a Jewish carpenter. And his brother got really mad because he's like, why do I care if the carpenter's Jewish? Why does he have to tell everybody? He didn't really understand the context, what was going on there.

[A]

That's great. All right, you're up, Bruce.

[C]

So I don't, like, speak the truth in love.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Because I think it's the. Often I think both. I think on both ends of that statement, it can go bad. So the more obvious way I think it can go bad is it just justifies people to actually be jerks or manipulate other people because they can claim some higher authority behind what they're going to say, which cuts against the other side of the statement, which is sometimes the loving thing to do is to not speak and that's never said. I mean, sometimes you just have to bear with your brother or sister, or you just have to say, yeah, they did that sin, but it's not like, habitual and ruining the whole community. So I'm just going to let that one go. I'm not going to judge them. I'm going to take the plank out of my own eye and I'm not going to really worry about the speck in theirs today. But that's almost never the case. And maybe I'm ultra sensitive to this as a pastor, previous pastor, because I saw it used all the time in church community as a way to sort of say, I have permission to tell this person they're wrong. Because as long as I do it in a way that's kind, because that's what loving means in this case, then it's okay. So I don't need to really care about their context. I don't really need to think about what they're going through. I don't need to think about anything because I'm justified in telling you this because my motive is good. And I think more often than not, it really actually causes division and breaks down the Christian community. I get the sentiment right, which is like, if you're going to have a confrontation, don't do it in a way that's devoid of loving the person. Okay. But as soon as you say, like, speak the truth in love, we should always speak the truth in love. So the statement is always, in my opinion, used as a way to say I'm justified in calling this person out.

And yeah, I don't. My experience is it's not good.

[B]

Bruce, I really agree with you on this one. And I think there's two ways that this goes bad that you have brought up, which is the one set which uses it to say that when you speak the truth, you need to moderate how you do it. Right. So you need to do it in love, which means in kindness or with patience or some other qualifier, which sometimes.

[C]

Usually leads to manipulative behaviors.

[B]

Sure. Yep. Or I'll even. It can also lead to, like, waiting to do it till the right opportunity comes up. Right. Or whatever. And then on the other side, you see, and I think you. I've seen this quite a bit to where then you have the person who is just berating people and says that and then changes it to say, love means not letting your neighbor, you know, go against God's will. And that means you have to do everything right now. No, you pull all the stops. You be as Rude, yell, scream, do whatever you need to do to make it stop, because that's really loving. And so then everybody is just changing whatever, just adding qualifiers to whatever love should mean for them. Well, it's not Christian love if I don't stop you from doing bad behavior or it's not Christian love if I don't stop you from doing bad behavior in your own time or in a way that doesn't push you farther away from God or blah, blah, blah. And it just goes so, so bad with everybody trying to make it fit in this. If you're going to confront somebody, just confront somebody. If it needs to be done swiftly, it needs to be done swiftly. If you're not going to confront somebody, don't say you're not confronting them or you're waiting because you're waiting to find an opportunity to do it in love. It just seems like an excuse for.

[C]

What's interesting, too, is in scripture, the sort of advice for confrontations. The key advice for that is Matthew 18. And Matthew 18 talks about it as a sort of redemptive purpose. Now, of course, obviously there would be love behind that, but it's not so ambiguous as just like, well, go to your brother just because you love him. There's a redemptive point to the confrontation. You're not just calling someone out if.

[A]

Your brother against you. Yeah, it's the premise.

[C]

Yeah, exactly. And if you're. Say you're on the other side of this, like, say someone says something to you, quote, air quotes in love, and you don't agree with the. With what they're saying. And say you go to the pastor or the elder or something. You say, this person keeps calling me out on this, and I don't agree with it. And then they talk to that person, the person who confronted you. That person's gonna go, oh, well, it's okay, because I said it in love. I was just upholding the truth. So there's no way to win. It's just a manipulative tactic. And it just. It doesn't even need to be said. Like, it's just. It's only used as. I think it's only used for manipulation. And it's an unnecessary thing to say.

Is that a little. Is that a little vindaloo Adam or not?

[A]

I want to do mine, which will be a quick one so that we can get to Adam's spicy one.

[D]

I don't know if I want to.

[A]

I knew you were going to do that.

[B]

We have to make him do the hot takes first because he Always backs.

[A]

Out by the end of the episode.

Give me a brief. All right, I'm going to get this right because I always. In my head, it always goes backwards. Don't ask me why.

Hate the sin.

[C]

Love the sin. No, it's backwards.

[A]

Did I do it backwards?

[B]

Yeah, you did it backwards.

[C]

And I like this one.

[A]

Love my friend. No, Yeah, I did it right.

[B]

I don't think it matters as long as you get the love of.

[A]

No, I may. In my head, it's always, hate the sinner, Love the sin.

[C]

Love the sinner. Hate the sin.

[A]

Yeah. Love the sinner, Hate the sin. I. I just.

You know, listen, that.

[C]

Would be my tattoo. That would be my tattoo.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. We're all sinners. And when I sin against you, right, You're a sinner, I'm a sinner. I sin against you. Let's just be real with each other. You don't hate the sin and still love me at the time. You hate both of us. You hate the sin and you hate the sinner. The point is not to forgive the sin as though it's an independent entity. The point is to forgive the sinner who has sinned and thus is deserving of retribution and punishment. And hate. Right? In order to forgive the sinner, you have to hate that evil within them. You have to burn it out. You have to break it down. You have to preach against it. You cannot. In other words, you get up in the pulpit, you don't just go there and say, listen, listen, all of you people out there, you're great, right?

[B]

God doesn't hate you.

[A]

But the stuff you do, God doesn't love. Okay? What you say is, you say, listen, you are. You are the sinner. You are the one in need of redemption. You are the one separated from the love of God because you are a sinner. You don't say your sins are separated from the love of God. Those sins were never loved by God. You're separated from them, from the love of God because you are the one that is a sinner. And thus sins are coming out of you. It gives this impression that the only thing that needs to be corrected is the individual sin and not the fact that you are, in thought, word and deed, a sinner who is separated from God, apart from Christ, and. And needs the gospel redemption.

[C]

And I still loved by God anyway.

[B]

So that's. And that's the.

[A]

Not apart from Christ.

[B]

Can I. Well, that's where you got to. I think this is the most.

[C]

Well, I don't know for God. So Loved the world for God did.

[A]

So that he sent Christ.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And then the rejection of Christ in favor of being a sinner separates you from that.

[C]

Yeah, but he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked.

[A]

I didn't say I don't take pleasure in. Nobody takes pleasure in hate.

[C]

But everyone who goes to hell is loved. Love doesn't say loved.

[B]

The cross does.

[A]

Oh, my gosh. Bruce, this is the tattoo you would get that I found, the Vinda houshi.

Okay.

[D]

Oh, my gosh.

[B]

The biggest problem, I mean, is not when. I mean, it's bad and cringe when, like, people tell you to love the sinner, hate the sin. I think the worst version of this, though, is because the way I hear this the most is God loves the sinner, hates the sin. And this is usually, for me, this is all like people who have. Maybe they know the words long gospel. They even think they can tell you when something's law or gospel, but it's not truly distinguished in the sense that they don't see God's two attitudes. There's actually, like, there are two competing attitudes from God. The hate of sin, the giving of the law, the bringing of death. I mean, the law is the power of death. The law is given by God. It's not its own separate power or entity. God does hate sin and sinners and destroys them. And yet he loves the creation. He loves you. He sends Christ, and that love is revealed particularly and as you said, only through Christ. And so apart from that, God does hate you.

[A]

And I knew you were gonna say John 16. I knew it. Now I was sitting here going, I'm gonna say this one in my head. I'm like, bruce is gonna go, John 3:16.

[C]

You know who coined this phrase, right? You guys know who coined this phrase? I'll give you a clue.

[B]

He's gonna say the Apostle Paul from the.

[C]

It's from the four hundreds.

[B]

Oh, great.

[A]

Thank goodness.

[C]

It's Augustine of Hippo.

[B]

Bruce, I was genuinely worried you were going to find some sort of, like.

[A]

Let me clarify. I understand the sentiment, and I understand what people are trying to say when they say it right. I do. I just think it's bad preaching at the end of the day. And I also. I don't want to get into it now, but maybe we should do a show on it. This whole idea, if. That. If God actually damns people to hell, which we call eternal punishment, that he still loves him when he's doing that. You do have a problem with a capricious.

[B]

No, no.

[C]

That's I don't think he's doing that.

[A]

He was saying, oh, okay, good.

[C]

Well, I believe everyone who goes to hell is loved. I don't think he's loving them by pouring out his wrath on them. That's.

[A]

Yeah, because this is like. This is like, you know, some German for your own good stuff at that point. Like, yeah, yeah, no, I don't think ye.

[C]

God can pour out his wrath and still regret.

[A]

What you hear when you hear this, though, is you hear people that have a bad theology of sin, right, that think that the problem is the sins, not the fact that you are the sinner who needs total redemption in every cell of your body. And not just that you need, you know, you need an attitude readjustment where you don't really think about doing this bad stuff anymore.

[C]

It also context. Augustine is using it as an ethical mandate to essentially stop people from overly judging each other over their sins. He's trying to say in the context of where he coins the phrase love the sinner, not the sin. In other words, don't treat people just based on their behavior. You have a higher calling to treat them in a way that Christ would call you to treat them. That's the context.

[A]

So even within a Christian context, though I think it's kind of interesting is that I would say for people, for simil Christians, simultaneously saint and sinner Christians.

They are loved even though they sin. They're in Christ. They're loved because of Christ and on account of Christ and for the sake of Christ.

And they still sin. And you're not supposed to love that sin, even though they are redeemed in Christ, this is still preached against and this is still forgiven. I just want, you know. But when you preach against it, you're preaching against the old Adam still in them, right? You're still. You're drowning that again. Yeah, it must be killed, must be drowned again. You're still just not preaching against the sin. Like when you're a parent and your kid does something wrong, you don't just correct them for the thing that they did wrong. You try to bring the law to the thing that is in them too. The outpouring of which was throwing a rock at your brother or sister.

You don't just say, hey, my father used to say to me, well, it's not just consequentialism. Yeah, that's it. It's not just consequentialism. It's not just like, the only reason you don't do this is because of the consequence of it. You're trying to say this is wrong and this. This wrongness has come out of you. What's wrong with you? Oh, you're a sinner. You need to learn that. Right. And you need to learn to war against that. And the way you war against that is through the absolution and by coming to church. And how else do you teach that if you're just saying that? Well, the only. Otherwise you fall into this weird. I think, and I'm going to get probably burned up for it. But evangelicalism, that is always preaching against the individual things that you're doing.

[B]

Yeah, I agree. The truth behind this is the. While we were yet still sinners, Christ died for us. The thing is, it reveals, potentially, and this is a better way of doing it, that the command to proclaim the gospel or to forgive others is really a law on Christians. It's a hard. It's a hard one, too. Right. Because it's asking you to do what God has done, which is love his enemy and to die for you while you were still a sinner. And so that's. I mean, I think the phrase is definitely problematic because of the thing with sin, but there can be an attempt to say, you do have to forgive the sins of those who hate you or whatever.

[A]

I totally agree with that.

[B]

And so that. And that. And that. That's difficult. And so. And I can see, even if it.

[A]

Were a phrase in sin, that's like, hate the sin, but forgive it anyway.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Like, you know, yeah, I'm looking forward to. Hey, or how's this? This is even harder. Hate the sinner, but forgive him anyway.

[B]

Yeah, forgive him anyways.

[C]

Yeah, I'm looking forward to the day when we're in glory and Jesus says, well done, good and faithful servant. And then he goes up to you, Scott, and he just gives you a big hug. And then he bends down and he picks a heavenly daisy from the celestial soil and he puts it right between your ear.

[A]

People say, talk to me about heaven and just make me not want to go.

[C]

And he says, you're precious in my sight.

[A]

Oh, my gosh.

[B]

ASMR style. All right, Adam, your take.

[D]

Maybe he kisses him on the forehead, too.

[A]

Oh, stop it.

[D]

Okay, you ready for this?

[B]

It's. It's.

[D]

You could. It could relate to my earlier one, but it's also different. There's two.

[C]

This is Vindalu, to be clear. This is you're going to do it.

[D]

Or you changed your mind. It's probably the wrong time to even talk about it. But hear me out, Judeo. Christian civilization or Judeo Christian scriptures.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

Oh, saying that term, those phrases.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

You were expecting to get pushback from.

[D]

Yeah, not from you guys. But at the moment with all the stuff going on in the interwebs. But.

It wasn't too long ago I was talking with a guy who's. Who's real smart.

[A]

Part of the.

[D]

I think he would describe himself as a confessional Lutheran. Even referred to the Judeo Christian scriptures. And I was like. And it reminded me of how the term Judeo Christian civilization has been used for maybe 50, 60 years quite a bit. And I've always wondered. I've probably used the term myself accidentally or because I just sort of. That was sort of the common.

[C]

You inherited it.

[D]

But it's just. I don't know what it describes.

[B]

Right.

[C]

You mean because we don't kill people for certain things like in the Old Testament law and we eat shellfish and.

[D]

No. So a couple things. One is I know why the term was invented and used. You know it's especially post Holocaust to throw Jewish people a bone or something like that. From the standpoint of Christian theologians.

[A]

Hey, it wasn't us.

[D]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

This isn't. What happened to you during the Holocaust was not a Christian thing and should not have been justified through these lens of Christianity.

[D]

Yeah. So I get that we're with you and please understand I think like you guys, I don't even consider like those progressive Christians who have the trans flags hanging from their churches, who have bishops who deny the historical bodily resurrection of Jesus as Christians preach it.

[A]

Brother.

[D]

Having anything common to my faith. So I'm not going to think that especially I'm not going to think that Judaism has anything really common. Contemporary Judaism has anything common to my faith. Certainly does not. When you think about like the Reformed and Reconstructionist Judaism has a common war root. Baloney.

So. And what really irritates me is if you talk like this all of a sudden you're branded an anti Semite or something like that for just trying to be accurate in your language. I don't think Western civilization has a Jewish root. In fact the history of Christianity in Western civilization has been very persecutorial. Is that a right word?

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Towards Judaism. Yeah.

[D]

Sadly in fact that's part of the.

[B]

Narrative of Judaism today. So it's especially of Israel. Right. Is that it's a long standing persecution from the west as well.

[D]

For sure.

[B]

So then it's a contradiction for you know a prime minister say we built the west together while you hated us and persecuted us and you know, and threw us in a corner and all this stuff. And so I, yeah, I agree the.

[C]

Term related more to the Ten Commandments, but you're. Yeah, I'm hearing you talk about bigger kind of.

[D]

It just, it kind of depends on the context, you know. But yeah, it, it seems to emphasize the common moral root. Like the best use of the term is when it emphasizes a common moral root if it's anchored in the Ten Commandments. But I mean, having done a deep dive in Judaism over the last year or so, I'm increasingly aware that there are of course, many Jews that are just fine people in a sort of temporal, secular kind of sense of the term. Their theology, though, could not be more opposed to classic Christian theology and their moral standards. Like a good at least half of Judaism. And Judaism is a small religion, right? In terms of per capita. But.

Major, I mean, basically whatever the latest progressivist political ideological trend is, that basically becomes Reform and Reconstructionist Judaism.

[B]

So you know what the Ten Commandments thing that bothers me is for like, okay, maybe this is just Lutherans or similar, which is that they do not confess even remotely. The law always accuses. And this is actually sort of like a lot of Paul's sort of preaching about the problem he's having going to the. And even Christ's is they do not see the law as an accusation. They see it as a doable thing.

[A]

This is Christ in the Gospels. Every time a, you know, he's called out by a Pharisee.

[B]

So we don't really share why. They're brood of vipers in a religious sense. We don't share the Ten Commandments either in the scope or what God is using to accomplish with that. So out maybe the first use of the law, like God using the commands or temporal authority to restrict behavior. Potentially, yeah. But I think every religion agrees with us on that.

[A]

The context where I've heard that this phrase used the most is sort of like political commentary from conservatives that are trying to get a greater coalition together. And they'll say Judeo Christian values, which again, like Bruce said, they're referring to the decalogue. But to Caleb's point, they're referring to the decalogue in the first use as a completely civil use. They're saying we have a common civil morality here based on the Ten Commandments is handed to Moses. The problem with that is that unless you're dealing with just the second table of the law, that's just not true. The first table of law, in our case, the first three commandments are not civil commands at all. Those are commands that are directed towards God's people, as his people.

Have no other gods before me. Remember this, you know, and.

You'Re talking to people about how they relate to God in those first three commandments. It's the last seven, you know, especially as. As you get to not taking his name in vain and remembering the Sabbath day. I mean, the third one's literally about how to worship. Then you get. Then you do get civil in the last, what we call seven.

But even some of those outwardly civil ones, the. The outwardly civil ones that you could actually to some degree have a common morality to legislate on in our. In our case are what, 4, 5, 6, and 7.

[B]

Can'T really legislate. Coveting.

[A]

Yeah. And so.

[C]

But I would say I don't know that I'm. I don't know enough about the history of the term to accept or reject it per se. But I did read a book. I had to look it up because it's packed away, like, 20 years ago, which I thought was pretty good on this. I don't know. I don't remember that.

[B]

The book.

[A]

You packed that book away.

[C]

I have lots of books packed away. Unfortunately, I don't have enough room.

[B]

Wow.

[D]

He has to rent this facility for all his books.

[C]

It's called the Gift of the How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels by Thomas Cahill. He did one on the Irish. He's a historian of civilizations. And this was his one on Judaism. And if I remember correctly, some of the values that he espouses came directly from Judaism were things like the value of an individual as a self.

[A]

Yeah, but that's not Judeo Christian, is it?

[C]

Well, I'm just saying this is his argument. You can see in the book where he's trying to. He traces it directly from. It didn't exist before Judaism. Oh, and he says, I heard that, too.

[A]

And I think Jonah Goldberg makes that argument in.

[D]

Shoot.

[A]

Which one? Modern fascism.

[D]

Yeah, that sounds right.

[C]

He adds, if I remember right, too, though, that that means in the Jewish context, an individual.

With a unique destiny.

[A]

I have a question.

[C]

Simply at the fate of the gods.

[B]

I have a question.

[D]

Hold on. It's liberal fascism. Just for the record.

[B]

Liberal fascism, Bruce. My only question with this is a lot of this, like, they, like Cahill will, comes from, like, the Old Testament, like ancient Judaism, even. They'll say, like, this is a unique thing they've always had. But then Christians would say, no, that was Christianity. They Believed in Jesus. Like that's actually a Christian contribution to the world.

[A]

Like, because there's a portion of it that's not completely corporate.

[C]

Yeah. But then you have to say there never really was any Jews. This is all redactive. Then you're just saying they don't exist at all. That's, that's a different kind of.

[D]

Well, they weren't called. They were the Hebrew people, right?

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

And they're not called Jews until the time of the Babylonian exile. Roughly thereabouts. Right. So and then when you, after they, the return from Babylon, that's when all of a sudden it's, you know, it's kind of fuzzy. Exactly when it all happens. But where, where Judaism, especially when they don't have a temple before the second temple's rebuilt and then after the second temple's around, you get all the, these new, like Sadducees, Pharisees and so on, like Rabbinic Jud starts to take root. And that's quite a different thing. We would argue, Christians would argue than Abraham, Isaac and James, for instance, if.

[B]

The contributions were from like Rabbinic Judaism, probably would. But I'm just. Bruce, I'm not trying to say. I just think most of these contributions are probably not going to be ethnic. They're going to be religious, philosophical. And Christians would say up until a certain point, that was also our religion and philosophy. And then these split and the one that's called Judaism or is identified as Judaism doesn't get to have exclusive ownership to the Old Testament or those ideas. Christians could claim.

[A]

I think that's why they connect them though. I think your more salient point is.

[C]

Disciples think of themselves as Jews until much, you know, after the resurrection. I mean, even some of the early Christian literature, like the Didache, doesn't refer to Christians as Christians. I mean, the name identity of a group sometimes needs to.

[A]

Okay, we're getting off track here. People sound like pointy headed nerds.

[C]

Hey, he had a vindaloo one.

[A]

He did.

[D]

It's pretty spicy, right?

[A]

I didn't want to.

[B]

Spicy.

[A]

The salient point is that Caleb brought up is that, you know, this isn't common because for Christians this isn't just civil. There's a condemnation aspect to this too that will never be. But if you're just talking about sort of a common moral authority again, I even think that's really limiting to as we number them, what, 4, 5, 6 and 7 of the decalogue?

[B]

Yeah.

All right, well, I had one, but I'll squeeze it in. I'll squeeze it in.

[A]

I'll squeeze it in.

[B]

Do you want me not squeezing in?

[A]

I go for it.

[B]

It's fine.

[C]

Go for it.

[B]

Yeah. It's just quick. It's one I heard, which is, we'll just wait for God to bless you.

[A]

What does that mean?

[B]

We'll just wait for God to bless you. So I never heard that. Yeah, well, I heard. Yeah. So it. Usually.

It'S sort of like the let go and let God, but with physical. The expectation is sort of physical. So money, property.

[A]

Oh, this is like Joel Osteen kind of stuff.

[B]

So. Or like, or even like Joel Osteen's like, hey, we know, like, your husband lost his job, your car's breaking down.

You know, we're just going to wait for God to bless you. He's going to bless you. And the expectation is, meanwhile, if you're.

[A]

More, if you're Mormon, the whole community is gathering around you to help you.

[B]

Yeah. And.

[A]

Like, some dude that owns a factory is offering you a job. This family's got an extra car so you can drive around. Hey, I've got an apartment building. It's got a vacant apartment. I'll give it to you at cost for a couple months. And meanwhile, Christians are like, we'll just wait for God to take care of it.

[B]

And.

That'S where it's sort of funny, too, because when it is tied to financial or physical blessings, which I would say, like that your wellbeing is a blessing from God in a very particular way. You're now in this competition of, well, geez, he's got a working car and a bigger house than me, and his heat never breaks. And he hasn't lost his job in 20 years.

[A]

Can you talk? Caleb's heaters on the fritz.

[B]

My. Yeah, my heater's broken. I don't think God did that. I think I did that. But the, the.

[A]

I would come over to help you, but I'm just waiting for God to bless now.

[B]

Don't.

[C]

Yes, just wait for God to fix it.

[B]

And God is going to bless me. When I call my plumber, my plumber and heating guy, who is a great guy to come do it, he's going to use that vocation to bless me, but correct. I just think this competition, it is a competition too, is like, are the richer people in your congregation or context more blessed than you? I mean, certainly they have physical blessings.

[A]

Sure feels that way sometimes.

[B]

It just sets up this weird tension. And also this thing where.

The time I just heard it, it was because there was an awkward silence after somebody Talked about something bad happening to them and somebody just wanted to fill it, you know, and instead of saying, I'll help you or I have a car I'll sell you.

[A]

It's my problem of visiting people in hospitals.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

What do you say?

[B]

You just don't. You need to train yourself to just shut it. Right. I think some of these times you just have to not speak or, you know, sometimes it's difficult. But maybe you are like, maybe you heard this and you're saying that because you do have an extra car sitting in your driveway that you could sell to that person a huge discount or let them use for three weeks or whatever and you just don't want to do it.

[A]

And maybe like, probably because you're worried about liability.

[B]

Yeah, like all sorts of things. And maybe it's time for you to take the risk and something bad will happen to you for doing something nice to somebody, but because you're not going to get rewarded for doing something nice, maybe you will let them borrow it and they'll crash your car. But you were still, you still should have done it. It doesn't matter that God's going to bless you or not bless you.

[A]

There you go, baby. Some straight up vocation with a little hard law.

[B]

Yeah, and vocation has the law, man. It's obligations of your neighbors. And I think a lot of these phrases are you hear your neighbor, the words of your neighbor calling you to action, and you want to pass that action off to God. And that's a lot of these phrases are dodging vocation because it is hard to be in a relationship with people and it is hard to like be the advantaged person who then gives up something or maybe loses something or is disadvantaged because your neighbor was disadvantaged. And I, I would turn. If you feel like uttering that phrase, it's actually the conviction of the law probably telling you you have to do something.

[A]

There you go.

[C]

Know what you could do when you visit the hospital next time and you go in, you just say, ooh, that looks like it hurts. Always starts a great conversation.

[A]

Can you do that?

[C]

I have done that if I know the person wrong.

[B]

To this fun episode of the Thinking Fellows podcast. We hope that you had an excellent Thanksgiving and we are coming into the end of the year here. 1517 does have a big campaign going on. It's called Welcoming Sinners Home. You can follow the links to donate and support 1517 now. I mean, if you just listened to the, if you got to this point, you listened to this entire podcast ad free and one of the ways we do that is by having really generous donors. The cost of podcasting continues to go up. As you know in your own personal life, the cost of everything continues to go up, sometimes even when you make no changes. And with that, so does our fundraising obligation in order to keep things like this going. So we do hope that you have already supported us or can support us if you're a regular listener of this show and the other podcasts at 15:17. Also, go check out the show notes and the links below. There's a pre order link available for my Dad's next book, and I'm sure we'll talk about that in future episodes. We'll catch you next time.

[A]

Bye Bye.