When the Word’s Don’t Match the Method Pt 2

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast making Theology Central. Good afternoon, everyone. It is Saturday, April fifth, twenty twenty five. It is currently four nineteen pm Central Time, and I'm coming to you live from the Theology Central studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. Well, we're going to continue what we started in the last broadcast. I hope this proves to be beneficial. Things did not go quite as smoothly, maybe as I wanted them to go in the last broadcast.

0:43 Maybe I didn't have it mapped out perfectly. The one thing I never do very well is try to really figure out how long something is going to take. I should have known, Hey, if you're going to do a review of this audio interview and it's what sixteen seventeen minutes long, you're not gonna be able to get anything else done in that episode because to review sixteen or seventeen minutes of audio takes you about an hour and a half. So why do you have fifteen pages of notes and that you're going to do this and then you're going to do this. You're never going to get to that. I should know that. But I still, after all of these years, continue to make that mistake, and so sometimes it kind of messes with the flow of things.

1:29 But I'm gonna try to put it all back together. I'm gonna try to walk us through this. I hope you're ready. We're gonna go. We're gonna be visiting a church in Indiana as where we're ultimately aheaded We're gonna be talking about a church in Indiana. But let me remind you of what we're really trying to do. Okay, because people will see this as Oh listen to this episode. It's a hit piece on this church in Indiana. You've missed the point. Oh listen to this it's an expose on this church in Indiana. You're missing the point. What I'm trying to do is give a case study, a discussion about a bigger problem in American evangelicalism, in American Christianity, and it goes way past the church in Indiana. It goes way past this church that we're using for a case study. This church is really it's almost irrelevant to the story itself.

2:25 It's about this. Bigger, bigger issue because what we're trying to look at. What I'm trying to explain, and I stated this in the introduction in the last episode, as I'm trying to provide you a careful look at how churches and pastors can say all the right things about God, say all the right things about preaching. They can say all the right things about the authority of the scriptures. They can even say all the right things about what the church should do and what the church should be. And even though they say all of the right words, they can turn around and build and operate a church that contradicts every single thing they say. And they can do this in such a way that the people in the pew will be like, my church is committed to this, and it can committed to this, and it's committed to this and not even see. No, your church is doing literally the opposite of all the things you say you're committed to, but nobody can see it because somehow they're able to market this in a way that works. I'm going to try to explore, and I started this in the last broadcast, but I'm going to continue trying to explore how words and methods, in many cases quietly, maybe silently in some ways,

3:59 sit as far as nobody's saying, hey, guys, we're contradicting ourselves. Nobody's going to mention it, but they ultimately the words and the methods drift apart. Everything may sound biblical, everything may sound faithful, everything may sound that it's philologically grounded. But guess what, in reality, it's none of those things. It's something completely opposite. How it's marketed. What the words are used is not what you actually get. But I think all you have to do is sell it, say it, convince the people of it, and they will buy into it, not even realizing the contradiction. I don't know how pastors pull this off, but they obviously do frequently, because it's very common today to hear pastors say preaching should glorify God. The Bible is our found foundation. Were We are here to build up believers, not entertain consumers.

5:07 We believe in the expository preaching. We read the text, explain the text, apply the text. Because all of those things sound like convictions. They sound good, they sound like they're offering clarity to the purpose and the function of the church. But what happens when the actual structure of the church, the actual Sunday worship service, the actual content of that preaching and maybe even the messaging on the website seem to tell a completely different story. What happens when the form undercuts the function. I'm not here to criticize personalities, but I'm here to investigate a larger problem that touches thousands of churches and millions of Christians. Can a church say it's committed to biblical preaching while using the stage like a platform, using the Bible like a slogan, and the sermon like it's a motivational boost. What happens when the method actually contradicts the message. That's the question or the questions that I'm trying to discuss and talk about. Now, I got more here I could say, but I think that you're getting.

6:33 Hopefully you get what I'm trying to do here and what I'm trying to accomplish. Now, let me state this again. I stated it in the first episode. I'm miscing to state it again. My concepts, my ideas, my philosophy of what church should be. I understand my philosophy and ideas will never work. They will never ever work. That people don't want my ideas, Nobody likes my philosophy of what church should be. They will say they do because if they hear me say, what should the church be? The church should be a place of focusing on nothing more than the infallible and. Errant Word of God. It should be focused on teaching, preaching discipleship. It should be focused on teaching theology, doctrine, church history. We're not here to entertain. We have no fun food and fellowship and activities. You show up to learn, you show up to study. People will say amen, until they end up in a church like that, and they're like, well, it feels too much like college. It feels like a seminary.

7:30 I don't like this, and what about this? And I think we need to get together and have a picnic, and I think we need to have an ice cream social and I think we need to have small groups where we can hold hands and see Kumbaya, and I think we need and all of a sudden, all those they sounded like they wanted one thing. But then I'm like, well, you just want what every other church in America offers. So then why do you say you but all those churches in America who offers all of those other things? What do all the statistics keep pointing out Christians are biblically illiterate, philologically illiterate, they're illiterate about church history. Yet everyone says, oh, we even need to find a good church. No, you want a church that offers all those other things.

8:10 So I understand my perspective is rejected. My perspective is outdated. It is seen as archaic, crazy, insane, and I and trying to actually utilize my idea it failed miserably and so and I'm willing to accept that. But guess what, even though I will acknowledge from a human perspective that my ideas are foolish, that my ideas are they fail, they don't work and practice, I'm willing to admit that from a human perspective, but I'm never going to change my opinion from the moment I became a Christian as a teenager, and I walked into the church, and I'm like, I don't need your stupid games. I don't need your lock ins, I don't need your pizza parties. I don't need any of this stuff. I can entertain myself. Could you teach me something? For crying out loud? This place is a joke, all right. I've been saying this since I was a teenager. It's never changed. I've never wavered one bit that I'm sick and tired of the church trying to act like it's there for all these other purposes now. And that's fine, Obviously that's what everybody wants.

9:13 They say they don't, but they do. So here's what happened. I got on YouTube. I saw a video the church is starving its own people, and I'm like, WHOA, that sounds really good, that looks awesome. The thumbnail artwork for it was a pastor standing in the center aisle of the church. You got pews on either side, You've got all the people, and he's holding a plate of chicken nuggets, right, And it's the idea that these people are starving and even if we do feed them, we just give them chicken nuggets. The people are starving the church. The church is not doing things right. So I listened to the interview, and in the interview, the pastor sounds so good, right, He's very articulate. He talked about the purpose of preaching like this, and I'm quoting from the interview that we reviewed in the first episode and the last episode.

10:10 He stated this, I quote, preaching is giving. Voice to what God wants said. Oh that sounds good, doesn't it. Right preaching is giving voice to what God wants said, what God has already said, and is never changing word to an ever changing culture. Oh you could write that down. That's how good preaching is giving voice to what God wants said, what God has already said, and is never changing word to an ever changing culture. He said that his priority was glorifying God, edifying believers, inviting non believers. He criticized the megachurch model that caters to seekers at the expense of feeding the church. It's like, sir, and I'm quoting, it's like serving chicken nuggets every week while a group of people is starving. If you just read the Bible and explain the Bible, that's at least a base hit. All of it sounded like someone committed to the faithful preaching of the Word, someone resisting the trend of turning Sunday worship into a spectacle. It sounded so good.

11:16 I was like, oooh, tell me more. I want to know about this church. Let me look this church up. I was ready. I was interesting, and then things start falling apart around the thirteen minute mark, And that's what we're going to go back to because at the thirteen minute mark, some kind of weird disconnect happens, so a glitch in the matrix. I don't know what happens. Something goes weird because the interviewer obviously doesn't know much about the pastor he's interviewing. Because the interviewer begins to be basically speak against what's going on in the modern church. This worship tainment where it's is it entertainment, is it worship?

11:59 It's a mixture of entertainment and worship. It's worship worship tainment, right, and talking about trends and among some young men to kind of leave the evangelical circus and go find more historical, liturgical base kind of churches. And I was kind of like, oh, okay, well, clearly this pastor is against that, but almost are against the worship tayment and the and the circus. And I'm like, okay, well then this is good. But immediately you begin to realize something's wrong because once this interviewer asked this very long winded question that goes on for about two minutes, the pastor immediately begins to push back. He's not he's not rude, he's not explicit, but he kind of like, well, let's let's not go too far, and he begins to try to justify this worship tament that is present in many churches. And it's kind of weird because the first part he was like, you know, I'm not like I don't want these watered down ted talks.

13:01 I'm all about giving people the meat. And it's like it sounded so good, but right here in the interview, you can already tell something goes haywire. And I believe this is the first sign that all the stuff he said completely contradicts everything his church is really about. Because if the interviewer knew anything about this church, if you just go to their website, what's right there on the front page a big stage, led screens, big lights. It looks like a concert. It looks like a stage, it looks like worship tainment. So I don't know if the interviewer did not know that, I don't. It's really weird. So we're gonna go back and then we're gonna take this apart. Then what we're going to try to do is that we're gonna do a little examination of the church website just to show you more contradiction between all of these wonderful things that he said versus what they actually do. And then we're gonna get to the sermon.

13:59 I don't know if we're gonna to the summer. We're gonna try on Isaiah chapter fifty, and it's a it's a complete train wreck. It contradicts everything he says about what preaching's supposed to be. It's it's I mean, just from the beginning, it feels like a watered down ted talk is what it feels. Even though he's like, no, the we teach. The focus of our church is teaching and preaching, and it's just it's so maddening. But are you ready to do this? Here we go, So we're gonna go to the interviewers, getting ready to ask a long winded question. Goes on for like two and a half minutes, right three minutes. Now you're gonna hear the interviewer say the word sacrament sacramento multiple times. The pastor who's clearly not a pastor of a Sacramental church, he's a pastor of an evangelical megachurch in Indiana. He does it correct it, which already bothers me. I'm like, well, if you're all worried about theology and not watering things down, he should immediately say, whoa wait a minute, we don't believe in a s sacramental system. Sacramental system has some major phiological implications. We would hold the ordinances because if it's a sacrament, then it's a visible means of grace.

15:10 It's salvific. That means baptism actually washes away sin. It doesn't just picture the washing whibsin. It actually does it. It's actually regenerative. And the Lord's Supper is not just remembering the blood of Christ who paid for our sins, but by partaking of the Lord's Supper I receive the forgiveness of sins. That when it becomes a sacrament, becomes a means of grace, and we get into a whole philological issue. The pastor doesn't even correct the interviewer. He just ignores that, which is another red flag. If you're all about theology and you're well, then this is a good time to have a good theological discussion. But okay, so we're gonna listen to this and then we're gonna take this apart because a lot of things go wrong really fat once the pastor starts answering, this interview.

15:58 Just goes off. Every thing falls apart here we go. One thing that I'm starting to really think through is when maturing believers, it seems like there's like a conversation happening. And I mean, you know, this is probably more than I do, like being in ministry for so long, but there's always cycles, and people seem to be more wanting tradition, more wanting something rooted or sacramental, or a liturgy of some sort to redecrete every once in a while, to go back to a hymn every once in a while, to actually take I would actually like to talk to you about your theology on both the eucharists slash communion and baptism, like kind of what you think about that. But it seems like historical Protestantism was really like firm on sacraments and liturgy, trying to have some type of rhythm of spiritual disciplines. And I think somewhere along the line we were like this is fundamental, this is traditionalist.

16:49 Like we're just being legalistic now, like we don't even know what these things are talking about or care about them. We just do them and it's not coming from the heart anymore or something like that. But of course society just always circles back around, and there's all these kind of stats that are coming out, especially young men that want something more simple, want something more slow, or we're in right now just the fastest paced lifestyle in human history, Like we're just constantly bombarded. And then I mean, I think, to my opinion. Now a fair critique is now we walk into church and it's kind of entertainment as well, and so like we have these lights, we have these like just parading smoke and all these this kind of what people are calling worship tainment. And I don't know how I feel about that yet, but worship tainment. And it's like, man, I thought this was a place I could come escape to to be a little bit more slow, to be a little bit more reverential, to be with my believers, not in a dark room looking at this super lit up stage where everything is just so timed out and I have no breath, And I'm starting to kind of understand that. And I don't know if it's because I'm just kind of growing in my faith and wanting to slow down a little bit with my relationship with God and try not to distract myself and just be as intentional as possible with all my disciplines. But it seems like that's kind of what even the outside world is kind of expecting, Like when they think of Christianity, when they think of religion, they think of something to kind of hit the brakes and to answer questions. Don't entertain me, don't try to slide of hand me. I just want the real thing is what do you guys truly believe?

18:21 And then believers on the other side are saying like, hey, maybe we've been eating chicken nuggets for a while, we kind of actually want to move on to that next meal. How do you feel about that? Do you think that there is ways that a larger church can pivot to answer some of these things, especially with young men, that like are you against liturgy? Are you against creeds? Are you against hims? Are you against bringing back communion to kind of be a more sacramental type of mentality? And like are you hearing any of those conversations in your own Like I guess pastor groups people like believers coming up to you and saying like, hey, can we slow it down a little bit? Like what are you hearing on that side. Okay, Now, if you're listening to that question, obviously the interviewer is like, hey, you know, people are tired of the entertainment or the worship tainment. They want something different.

19:09 They want something where they can ask questions. They want something deeper. They don't want chicken nuggets. They want something deeper. And he asked these questions because the pastor at the beginning of this interview seem to assure him that he's on the same page. He doesn't want to water down ted talk. He wants he wants to preach the meat of God's Word. He wants to expound the scriptures, expository preaching, teach the scriptures. He goes against the trend of megachurches. So the interviewer is asking a question that seems to make sense because the assumption here is that this pastor is not like all of these other mega churches because he said all the right words. What this interviewer doesn't know this pastor is literally the very thing you are describing.

19:53 He's feeding the people chicken nuggets, from what I can tell, And we'll look into it to see if you agree. But if you'll just go to the the church website. I did this in the first message in the first episode on this I'll do it again. Go to the church website yourself, go to the go to t p C C dot O RG T the letter t p CC dot O RG Trader's Point Christian Church in Indianapolis, Indiana. And the very first thing you see when it opens up, dark room, bright stage lights. You've got drums, you've got guitars, you've got a keyboard, you've got a praise band of one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight nine people. Oh and you got someone and they got a cameraman. Oh and you got two big, big screens on high side. You got staging, you got lighting.

20:49 It looks like a concert. It's worshiptainment. It's literally he see. It's just so weird because like you're literally talking to a pastor who that's his church. That's what he I know he didn't sound like that at the beginning. He said all the right words, but it's the same thing. It's it's literally making the point that I make. There is this constant disconnect in evangelicalism and even many reform churches. They talk a big game. We want to be about teaching. We want to be about preaching, and then when you really break it down, you just a you're just a reformed version of what every other church is. You got your small groups. It's about community, it's about this, it's about that, it's about this activity, and we're gonna do this, and we're gonna do this, and we're gonna get together for this, and we're gonna get together for this, and it's all the exact same thing you just mouth. May have some times where you emphasize theology, but other than that, it's it's the same template. It's like it's like one day someone put together here's how churches should operate. They send it out to everyone, and every pastor was like, that's how we'll do church. We'll just wrap it up up in our own theology. But that we're all going to use the same template. Our websites are going to look the same, the language is gonna look the same, we're gonna use the same buzzwords. Every It's like someone just went to a factory and said, okay, what's the template for church and turn on the equipment. There's another one.

22:19 There's another one, and everyone's like, okay, now it's it's basically, here's the template. Now you just put your theology on top of it. That's all it is. There's nobody can be unique or creative because everybody thinks this is what church is supposed to be. And then at the same time you convince the people going, my church is all about the Bible, it's all about teaching, it's about the mutual God's Word. And it's like your. Church is just like every other church. It's a community club. You just may throw in a little extra teaching maybe maybe. And then even then, nobody's actually doing hermonutics. They're only regurgitating the hermoneutical system that they all agree with. Nobody's actually doing theology. They're just regurgitating the philological system that you have to be to agree upon. Nobody's doing theology.

23:08 It's just it's maddening, all right, it's maddening. So that question is really good. Now, the whole sacramental thing is crazy because you have to get into a major what do you mean, go sacramental? What are you what? Oh? And then yeah, we can get a. Whole discussion there. But now this pastor who talked a big game in the first part of the interview, what is he going to do? What is he going to do? Now if he's honestly be like, whoa, well, wait a minute here. I don't know about this word worship tainment. But on my church, man, we got the staging, we got the lighting, we got the production, we got the smoke machine. We go all in here, right, like, just defend it.

23:50 But he he's going to try to not defend it. He's going to defend it. You just what, just here we go. This is how he's going to defend it. Yeah, No, I appreciate that. Wow, man, there's a lot there. There's a lot. I mean, I think, first of all, I would say, like, I'm totally with you in this sense. I've got a heart for young men as well. And I think really what they're desiring is like just authenticity and real talk. Which is why I think they're attracted to podcasts like Rogan and Jordan Peterson and those types of things, is they're just like man. Just in fact, I think there's been the watering down of a lot of pulpits. So the young men are running a podcast. I think there's a lot of stuff that's happening in all of that. I'll preach. The watering down of pulpits are leading a lot of people to podcast. Yeah, I would know. What's funny. He doesn't think his pulpit is watered down. That's the funny part. Now, when we listen to the sermon, you can tell me if it's watered down. He doesn't. He doesn't want water down ted talks. He thinks he's preaching the meat of God's word. And it's like, I think you're literally you're the ones giving the chicken nuggets. It's so weird how on one hand he doesn't say that he's the very thing that he's criticizing. It is bizarre, but I will completely agree and my and my estimation the pulpit is not a place where you can there's no real reality, real discussions and struggles, no real talk. That's why people go to podcasts because the pulpit is watered down. It's not all. The church is not a place where you

25:20 can come to struggle, do theology, do hermoneutics. It's just a place where you get here's what our team says, and we're just gonna recite what our team says Monday or well, I'm not at Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, just Sunday after Sunday, after Sunday, after Sunday there and then everyone just put oh, just man church, church, church, church, church, church. But at least they are even acknowledging. Hey, watered down pulpits lead people to podcasts, and then pastors get mad at podcasts. These podcasters out there criticizing the church. What is wrong with these podcasters? They all need to shut up? Okay, well, okay, well I've heard plenty of pastors yell and scream about the podcasters. I could say a lot. Okay, what's stopping you, pastor?

26:05 I mean, you have a building, you have a church, you have a budget. Does it take you a lot to turn on a microphone and talk about whatever you can? You can record your own you know, and you do realize you're searching. I hate when pastors say those podcasters. If your sermons are online and there's an RSS feed, you're a podcaster. I don't care if you want to call yourself a pastor or a church. If your sermons are online and they're using an RSS feed to be fed to different platforms, you are a podcaster. Okay, whether you like it or no, just our sermons are online and a podcast format because there's an RSS feed and then this podcast app can pick them up in this podcast.

26:47 You're a podcaster. I hate to break it to you. You're a podcaster, right, so but all right, so I do agree that the water down pulpits lead people to look for something more. And it's weird because so many people have been criticizing water down pulpits and the church is not giving me enough, but they will only go to churches that continues to give them all the other stuff. If you really want a church to give you what you say you want, then all the other stuff's got to go so that they can focus on that. But once you get that, then you don't really want that because you still want the I don't think the people on the pew really know what they want. If that pastor speaking, he has twelve thousand people twelve thousand people show up to their weekly services. Now, depending on where you read the statistics, some have it at nine thousand something, some have it at ten. Somewhere between nine and twelve thousand people weekly show up to this church. And he doesn't think he has a watered down pulpit. Well, you can draw your own conclusion. Sorry, let's see where how he's going to defend all of this here we go.

27:57 Is that from a sermon is not from the Bible, that it's a culture observation. But so I do think that that, uh, there's lots of young men wanting something substantial. Now, whether that comes in the form of liturgy and like slow it down and it could be maybe not. Like I just think that really, I think we got to like cut through all the melees to say, hey, like, what does God's word like really have to say on that give it to me straight? What's how do I how do I follow after him? Help help me? How to do hard things in this culture? I think that's a that's baseline, and I would I'm with you in the sense that like, uh, once again, we could look at all this stuff, you know, worship tainment, we could we it's all in the way that we describe it.

28:38 So billowing smoke, flashy lights. I've seen that done really poorly and tacky. I'm seen it done quite well, you know. And I think we talked about this a little bit. I don't want to overstate this because once again, we don't need to get lost in the weeds. But oftentimes a critique is what you're just trying to be like the culture in order to you know, engage more people. I would say, we back all the way all that up. There's a lot of people that would say, I'm into hymns, are just like where it's at. Well, the hymns didn't come out of the New Testament, then comes out of a cultural moment. Actually, I don't know you can fact check me on this, but like I believe the tune Amazing Grace was set to a bar tune. It came out of a saloon. Pianos were not allowed in churches because that was a saloon instrument, and so whoever wrote Amazing Grace said it to the tune of a popular saloon tune, and they brought it into the church.

29:30 All right. So his first say, what's to push back on this worship tament? I don't know if we really want to call that. He kind of pushed back. He's trying to be careful. And then his first real argument, if you really kind of break this down logically, is hey, wait a minute, wait a minute. It's around the thirteen minute mark. He basically the pastor begins to offer up, what is a widely circulated but a completely historically and accurate story about Amazing Grace? What's funny? His first real argument against, Well, let's not really go after worship tame and let's be careful because even the hymns and so his first argument, his first pushback, what does he use a completely historically inaccurate story. Now you want to know why people run to podcast, I don't know. Maybe because pastors can't get their history right. I don't know. But of course this is on a podcast. So then but of course then his sermons are a podcast.

30:25 All right, whatever the. Case may be. I mean, all right, we can get into that never ending argument. So let's let's try to go here. Here's basically the section in question. I'm just going to quote what he said. Well, the hymns didn't come out of the New Testament. The tune Amazing Grace was set to a bar tune. It came out of a saloon. Pianos were not allowed in the churches because that was a saloon instrument. And so whoever wrote Amazing Grace set it to the tune of a popular saloon tune, and they brought it into the church very controversial at the time. Now, this story is false in a number of ways, and we talked about this in the last episode, but I want to put this all together because this is just hilarious because he's tried to set himself up that he's not like mega church basters, he's all different, and then when someone criticizes what happens in megachurches, he kind of now pushes back, well, you know, I don't know if we want to go after worship tainment, right, and well, I mean, we got to consider the hymns.

31:21 And then he tells a fraudulent story. Why is this story falls? While Amazing Grace was written as a poem, not to a bar tune, Amazing Grace was written in seventeen seventy two by John Newton, a former slave trader turned Anglican clergyman. It was written as a poem meant to accompany a sermon for New Year's Day in seventeen seventy three. Newton did not write it to the tune we know today. The tune we know, sometimes referred to as New Britain, came later, but not from a saloon. The melody most commonly associated with Amazing Grace today is called New Britain, a traditional folk tune that first appeared in a eighteen thirty five and William Walker's Southern Harmony Hymnal.

32:04 There is no historical evidence that the tune came from a bar or a saloon, nor that it was a drinking song. The bar tune myth is likely confusion with Martin Luther's use of popular folk melodies and Reformation hymns, which is often oversimplified. Pianos and churches. It's true that pianos were once controversial in some church traditions, particularly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. However, there's no connection between pianos and saloons and the context of Amazing Grace's composition or its early use. Newton's hymn was sung a cappella with a simple company, not with a piano or in saloon style context. Now, why does this even matter. The pastor is using a fabricated story to make a philological and an aesthetic point. He wants to make a point about the esthetic used in worship, what we use in worship, because he's got to defend the very thing that this person in the interviewer just condemned. But he can't just come out and say what we like worship tainment. You know what, we like big stages, we like dark rooms, we like smoke machines. We like to provide a little bit of entertainment because that's what the people want. Obviously we're doing something right. We've got twelve thousand people. The people who don't use this, or in the middle of nowhere, Texas with four people with a four cell sign on their church building because they won't use what works. Just come out and say it. I would have more respect.

33:27 But he's trying to walk this a little Oh no, no, no, no, no. It's about the Bible, it's about preaching. It's not about this this megachurch culture, even though that's exactly what we're doing. But so hang on and so basically his point is, see even amazing Grace use cultural music, so we can too. But the story is wrong and using false history to justify current methods is dangerous, especially when you're shaping church culture, you're influencing thousands of people, and you're claiming biblical. Or historical authority. The pastor is not just telling the story casually, he's developing it strategically to defend the very esthetic. The interviewer is critiquing stage lighting, smoke, theatrical production, entertainment driven worship, what the interviewer and others call worship tainment. The strategy he's using behind the story basically is like this, This is kind of what the pastor is doing. Rhetorically, The interviewer critiques worship tainment, light, smoke, hype, overprogramming as distracting, shallow, and inconsistent with.

34:37 Reverent, historic worship. The pastor responds by saying, well, even the hymns like Amazing Grace came from saloon tunes, and we're controversial in their time. His implied point is, what you're criticizing now is no different than what previous generations criticize. Today's lights and fog are just this generation's version of amazing Grace. Conclusion is, therefore, don't judge the aesthetic. Just because it's new or emotional doesn't mean it's wrong. Well, why does the argument fall apart? Well, the entire history is false. Amazing Grace does not come from a bartoon. Pianos were not saloon instruments in this context. Newton didn't write it to popular music. He wrote it as a theological reflection on grace. It's a false analogy, even if the history was true. A folk melody in a hymn book is not an anagural a now, if I can say, it's not a perfect analogy, okay, to program lighting, smoke machines, led video, led video walls, immersive stage designs, and a concert style atmosphere that visually psychologically shifts the attention from God to the stage. And when you open up their website, boom, what do you see? The stage, the lighting. You're not drawn to scripture, You're not to God. And that's okay.

36:01 I'm not even here criticizing it. If that's what you want to do, go for it. I got no problem. Let me make this very clear. People are gonna say, well, you're criticizing, saying church should be done only this way. No no, no, no, no, no, no no. I'm not saying that you do church any way you want. I don't care. I literally don't care. What I'm The point I'm trying to make is you talk. It's all about God. It's all about scripture. Our primary focus is to preach the word of God. We're not gonna give people chicken nuggets. We're not here to entertain people. We're not here to give people watered down ted talks. If you're gonna talk the game, well then don't turn around and and give people something opposite of what you're saying. Just be up front, you know what, all of that old stuff, we don't care about it.

36:49 But the point is he can't just throw it all out because then you'll, you'll the Christians there will go, oh no, no, I want a church about this other stuff. See what you have to do is tell everyone that they're really getting a church focused on scripture, focused on all the right things. You got to say the right things, and then you can give them the complete opposite. And Christians are more than happy to sit there and say, oh see, it's good. So it's a false analogy. But my point is, I don't care. Give them the stage, give them the lighting, give them the concert, give them entertainment, give them water down pulpits, give them, give them application over exegetical preaching. Do it. I got no problem. Just say what you're doing, just admit it, and I got no problem with it. Just don't pretend to be doing something you're not the best analogy I can have. I say it all the time, you can have one side of the street a house. The house, the people who live there are atheist, they're agnostics. They don't care about religion of any kind.

37:53 And they have a bunch of people over. They're sitting in the backyard and they're having they're grilling, they're having fun, they're having a great time. Across the street is a bunch of Christians who get together and they're doing the same thing. They're sitting around a grill. They may be have ice cream, they've got a pot luck that the atheist will say it's a party, it's a get together, we're just hanging out. The Christians will. Say, it's a fellowship. It's blessed this time of fellowship. We're doing something spiritual. We're doing something godly. We're doing something that's beneficial for my Christian life because there are no lone ranger Christians. I need my brothers and sisters. Oh, this is so important to my Christian life.

38:39 Give me a break. You're hanging out, putting food in your face, just talking about the weather. But we gotta spiritualize it. We're doing a time of we're not gonna have the sermon this evening because we're gonna get together for a time of fellowship. Don't you feel so spiritual? If you go across the street, that's not fellowship, that's pagans. But we're doing something spiritual. Just say we want to get together, hang out with each other and have some food. Okay, it's okay to just say that. Don't make it out like it's. Oh, we're doing something so godly. It's an ice cream social but oh no, no, no, it's a fellowship so pious, self righteous. Give me a break. You just don't you just want to get together and have fun. That's okay, Then just call it what it is. Drives me crazy.

39:44 The interviewer wasn't just concerned with style, he was concerned with substance. Church is creating emotionally driven experiences rather than spiritually formative environments, worship that looks like culture rather than shapes culture, a vibe of entertainment instead of a posture of awe, and the pastor's response doesn't address that. He simply deflects with a half true I don't even know half true story. I'm gonna say fraudulent story and reframes the conversation old people just don't like new stuff. That's kind of already saying, well, people just don't Back then it was controversial and we're just doing the same thing. None of that gets to the actual substance of the critique.

40:26 The interviewer was asking some real questions about the modern church culture, and what appears, according to some statistics, is that young men are sick of the worship tainment and they're looking for something of more substance. Now, I don't know if we have enough statistical evidence to back that up, but that's the root of the issue. And he would ask this pastor this question because the whole interview is framed that this pastor is different than. All of these other churches. He's different, but everything about this church is literally what's being criticized. It is the weirdest thing I've ever seen. But he's not done because he's going to come into argument number two. Number one, amazing grace comes from a bar tune, completely fraudulent. So he uses a fraudulent story to make his first point. What's his second point?

41:15 Very controversial at the time. Now a lot of people will go, oh, man, just give me some amazing grace. But via piano in the realizing that came out of a cultural moment that wasn't in the Book of Acts. So I think we just got to contextualize a lot of that. The other thing I would say, is it, man, if you read Revelation for that sounds a lot like a kind of a modern day worship service the Throne Room of Heaven, and there was like all of these colors, There was this smoke or haze, there was the you know, laying down their crowns, singing Holy, Holy, Holy. It doesn't necessarily seem so much like a like a liturgical kind of moment. Now, I don't want to overread that. I will say this, if we're talking about like John's glimpse and into the Throne room, could it quite possibly be because everybody in culture, regardless if they've acknowledged God or not, has been made in the image of God.

41:57 So that actually what's happening at Rock Conserts is they're trying to unknowingly mimicing what's going on in Revelation for and so I would say that it's not always because we're trying to mimic the culture. We're trying to get vertical the glorification of. God in this moment. I'm not against hymnals. I'm not against liturgy. The catechisms I think are great. Obviously, that's that's a tool of discipleship to try to help people. So his second argument is Revelation four. So first a fraudulent telling of a historical account, and now second Revelation four. Revelation four that's worship, damn it. Revelation four is smoke machines.

42:39 Revelation four is bright lights. Revelation four is my justification for In fact, he basically says, and I'm going to quote, if you read Revelation four, that sounds a lot like modern day worship services. All those colors, there was smoke, haze, people laying down their crowns, singing Holy, Holy Holy. It doesn't necessarily sound like a liturgical kind of moment. It maybe what's happening at rock concerts is that people are knowingly mimicking Revelation chapter four. Now when I heard this, I couldn't really believe that this was happening. I had to I had to almost like, I had to almost laugh that this was happening. So let's try to critique this, all right, This, I believe, is an allegorical justification for modern esthetics. It's not an exegetical justification. This is an allegorical Now again, he's all about expository preaching.

43:32 Preaching. Well, if you're gonna use Revelation four, then show me how Revelation four has anything to do with your smoke machines and your big stage and lighting in your church. This is the I can't even believe you have to even critique this Revelation four first as apocalyptic literature. Okay, I mean someone who's an expositor of scripture should know that, right. It's not a how to manual for church stage design. The vivid imagery, thrones, creatures, lighting, thunder, smoke are meant to reveal the majesty, holiness, and the infinite otherness of God. They are heavenly. They are heavenly symbols, not earthly templates.

44:17 To say that Revelation four justifies smoke machines and led lighting is like seeing Ezekiel's vision of the wills within the Wills authorizes the use of drones in worship. It's ridiculous. Hey, hey, wills, I think that's I think that's a drone. Well, okay, Ezekiel had wills upon and wills we're gonna have drones in our worship service. Maybe they already do. I don't know. This isn't biblical warrant. It's creative reverse engineering to valid it, to to really try to validate a predetermined esthetic. They already have the aesthetic, So now they're going to go to the Bible and reverse engineering to now validate what they're already doing. Revelation four just ask you, is it describing a wholly terrifying, unapproachable throne or is it teaching or describing a comfortable atmosphere? And revelation is the response fear all falling down and unceasing worship. I don't know how about whenever the living creatures give glory, the twenty four elders fall down before him and they cast their crowns Revelation four, nine through ten. Contrast that with modern worship entertainment. Lights program for emotion, fog used for ambience, loud music designed to stir excitement the goal, and Revelation four is reverence the goal, and worship tainment is really engagement.

45:47 I don't even know how you can try to say it's the same thing. Now you can go look at Revelation four and draw your own conclusions, but I don't. I mean, right now, I want to pull out the Bible and just like, let's go all in on Revelation four. We don't have a time to do that now. Maybe at some point we will do that, but you can go do that yourself. Just this is the pastor's like, it's all about exposition of scripture, the glory, and then this is the justification. And then he talks about mimicking heaven is not the same thing as mimicking a concert. The pastor suggest that perhaps concerts are unintentionally mimicking heaven, but biblically, the desire to ascend into Heaven like awe without holiness is exactly what paganism has always done. Golden calves and SnSe, dramatic rituals, hypnotic chanting, sensory spectacle without truth.

46:37 Even if the culture resemblance exist, it's the wrong direction. The church is not called to look like Heaven by mimicking concert stages. The church is called to declare the Word and participate in God's presence by the spirit through the sun. So even if you say, well, concerts are trying to mimic heaven, so then you're saying that that we're trying to mimic heaven, and what by us looking like a rock concert, Like, I don't even understand how that work. If the rock concert's trying to mimic heaven, then I guess then you're saying, well, then we're trying to mimic heaven as well. I don't, but I think paganism has always tried to do that to. Some level, right, So I don't even know what that would prove.

47:21 Well, hey, look at those people over there in that concert. They're trying to mimic heaven, all right, so we're going to do the same thing. I don't know. I don't know. The pastor says, I'm totally out on watered down TED talks. I love expository preaching. I just want to read the text, explain the text, and apply the text. He said that earlier in the interview, but then he uses revelation for out of context to justify theatrical elements he validates doing it well with Hayes, lights and immersive tech. He gives a culturally relativistic argument hymns came from bars too. So while he's saying he's against entertainment, he's defended the entertainment architecture, which is the very basically creating the very structure that shapes the modern sermon experience and a motivational performance. So there's a complete philological disconnect. It's completely that's just a complete disconnect. That's all I can say. There's a complete disconnect, a complete disconnect.

48:30 And which is my whole point. My whole point is he says one thing, but then once push comes to shove, he then defends the very thing that's opposite to everything that he said. The church is supposed to be about. And that's okay. You want a concert atmosphere, you want it to be like worship tainment, you want it to be culturally relevant, you want all of that. That's fine. Just don't come and try to talk a big game like, oh no, it's about the preaching, it's about out the teaching. And then I open your website and the first thing I see is the performance. The picture is is of the of a performance. And look what And if you go to the church website, I mean you'll just see they're not even a cross anywhere to be seen. There's no cross, there's nothing, there's just a I could be any concert that could be anybody, you just name the band.

49:24 I looked at it. I don't go, oh, that's sure. I guess the only thing I could see that possibly is church is because the one singer she's holding up her hand. So there we go that you know it's church because she's got her hand lifted up. That's that's how you know. It doesn't matter what you're singing. There you go, oh, and there's some people in the audience got their hands lifted up. But if you go to some concerts, people have their hand hands lifted up too, So I. Don't but there's nothing there says, oh. This is a church. Now, so there's the interview. Now let's look at the church website itself. I'm just gonna go through a little bit of information here about the church, because I think we're going to begin to see is there a bigger disconnect than what we've already uncovered here.

50:05 And I've got plenty of notes here, plenty of notes here, and I'm just gonna skip so much of what I got here because there's I mean, we could go on for a couple of hours here, all right. So here's a little bit about the church. Trader's Point Christian Church is a multi site non denominational church based in the Indianapolis, Indiana metropolitan area and a please note non denominational. Non denominational meaning they're not going to be committed to any particular philological identifier. We're non denominational. Okay, you may like that, you may not like that. Just remember a church that seems to be doesn't want to be, you know, like one of these watered down megachurches wants all to be about preaching and teaching, doesn't want to just give people chicken nuggets. You gotta start with a non denominational idea. That means you have no real philological identifier. Even to now, in some ways that's a thing, right, A lot of people don't like the theological identifiers. They like a Bible church or a non denominational because it feels like, okay, you know, well, we're not going to get cut up in all of those theological wars. And I can understand that to some level.

51:16 All right, the church emphasizes biblical authority, so they're going with that. They're going to keep stressing that relational evangelism and intentional discipleship doctrine and beliefs. They uphold core values. Relational evangelism, striving to remove unnecessary barriers that keep people from Jesus biblical authority, holding the Bibles the ultimate authority, and encouraging its application in daily life. Intentional discipleship focusing on deepening faith through study, prayer, and relationships. Outstanding environments, creating spaces that prioritize kingdom purpose over personal preference. Hey, we don't want personal preference, we want kingdom purpose. Again, although that sounds good, it sounds so spiritual, what is it really saying? See, that's the thing I'm trying to get at. When is it marketing versus what you're actually getting?

52:12 Why are you being sold this? But you get this? Now, here's a little bit more information about the church. From the latest figures that I can find. This goes back about two years the church Trader's Point Christian Church brought in thirty million, two hundred and fifty two thousand, two hundred and fifteen dollars with an expense amount with the expenses amounting to twenty five million, three hundred and eight thousand, three hundred and ninety four dollars, So they brought in thirty million.

52:54 It takes. It took up them twenty five million to operate, so they have a surplus of over four million dollars. Thirty million dollars. I cannot wrap my mind around that. I cannot wrap my mind around that for one second. I cannot. And it takes twenty five million dollars to operate. Now I know why they got such a nice stage. Now, I know why they got a fog machine. I now know when they got all the lighting. I know why they got those big screens. Now, typically the church delivers one primary sermon each week during their weekend services. Now they do multiple services, but it sounds like one primary sermon, right.

53:47 There may be multiple services, but it's like you go to this service and then have those people leaven in other people. Because you have so many people coming in, you've got to have multiple services. I mean, what a problem to have, right. That's how you're bringing in between ten ten to twelve thousand, between nine thousand to twelve thousand people a week, So you have multiple you keep bringing other people in, bring the people in, and you basically give them the same sermon. All right, So if they basically deliver one primary sermon each week during their weekend service this week results in approximately about fifty two sermons annually. All right, So if we go, let's just water. Let's let's lower this from twenty five million. Let's lower it down that. Let's just say the total giving is nineteen million, seven hundred and twenty five thousand, two hundred and eighteen, and I'll pull that number from twenty nineteen.

54:36 So I'm going to reduce the amount of money coming in from twenty five million to nineteen million. Now, if this, let's say this figure represents about the annual operating expenses, because twenty five million is what the expenses amount to in twenty twenty two, Let's just say they basically are about right at twenty million to operate. So I'm lowering the number coming in. I'm lowering the number it takes to operate, all right, because I want to be fair, and I'm trying to pull from older numbers to find lower numbers to try to be fair. All right. So then if we do that, we can estimate the cost per sermon by dividing the total expenses by the number of sermons. Right, So if you have about nineteen million, seven hundred and twenty five two hundred and eighteen dollars you get basically fifty two sermons, well, this means it's about three basically three hundred and seventy nine thousand, three hundred and thirty two dollars per sermon. If you get basically fifty two sermons, then basically you're paying three hundred and seventy nine thousand dollars per sermon. I remember he said in the interview himself, the main purpose is to teach.

55:45 The main purpose is to preach. Well, if that's the main purpose of the church, well, then you know you should be getting a lot more than fifty two sermons. Now maybe there are getting more than fifty two sermons, but if you review the website basically, and if you look at the the well they don't call it a podcast, but their sermons uploaded online, you looks like you get one per week. You know, I don't see two, I don't see three. I see one. So then if that's if that's basically the number, then you're basically paying almost four hundred thousand dollars for one sermon. He said, Well, we're not. We're not giving just for that. Now, what else are you getting? If that's the main purpose of the church is to preach the word of God. So I asked Artificial Intelligence. I said, hey, am I being unfair to question this? AI says, in fact, you're doing what many people don't do enough. When evaluating churches today, we should ask hard, honest questions about stewardship, priorities, and outcomes.

56:43 So AI said, let me walk through this, and I'm going to try to be clear and fair. All right, So AI says, I'm going to take your the numbers that you found and I'm going to round them for simplicity. Approximately twenty million dollars a year comes in twenty millillion dollars a year in expenses, approximately fifty two sermons a year. That's about three hundred and seventy nine thousand per sermon. The weekly attendance, let's say, is nine thousand, So that's about forty one dollars per attendee per sermon. So everyone's basically giving forty one dollars to hear a sermon, forty one dollars to hear a sermon, forty one dollars ladies and gentlemen, to give us to hear a sermon. And what what are you getting in that? Sermon for forty one dollars, and it's from a podcasting perspective, we're I'm already almost at two and a half hours of content for this Saturday, two and a half hours of content for this Saturday, more than that church will give you in two weeks. But yet they're bringing in millions and millions and millions and millions and millions. Ai says this seems absurd. Nearly four hundred thousand dollars for a sermon.

58:00 That's an enormous cost for what should be the ordinary, faithful ministry of the word. Most of church history, house churches, early church gatherings, Reformation pulpits did this for next to nothing. What are the people actually getting for that cost. If the sermon is Christ's centered text, driven rich with theology, faithful to the passage, that investment still might raise eyebrow eyebrows, but it could at least be justified as pouring resources into formation. But if the sermon is a motivational talk loosely attached to scripture, then yes, it's absolutely fair to ask we're spending this much to be told to try harder.

58:42 AI says, it's not unfair to be asking, you know, should churches be spending how are they spending the money? Should they spend it in a better way? So there's the church. There's the money, right, the money to keep this machine operating, right, And it's just so crazy because all right, there's more I can say. But wait, there's more. If you look around on the website. If you look around on the website, and again, churches put all this stuff out there online, and I put it out there online, so anyone has a right to look at it and to ask questions. Anyone has the right. Okay, I mean it's perfectly okay. But if you do a little bit of researching here, you're going to find this whole thing about basically.

59:37 Joining a group, joining a group. What they're basically their version of small groups. All right, I'm going to go down here in my notes. I was going to go to the website and just start reading everything there, but that will take forever. I'm going to do a lot of summarizing here. So what I did is I gave AI the link. I said here, AI, can you break down everything here and summarize what they have to say about small groups? Right? So this is what AI says. Okay, if the real spiritual formation is happening in homes, coffee shops, and online groups. Because when you join a group, these small groups that they have at this church, they don't meet in the church. They meet in homes, they meet in coffee shops, and they meet on online groups.

1:00:31 So you're paying twenty five million dollars to keep the church operating per year, but the real discipleship supposedly doesn't take place in the church. It takes place in the. Groups that doesn't even meet inside the building that you're paying twenty five million dollars for. How does anyone not see that this is ridiculous? Ai says, If the real spiritual formation is happening in homes, coffee shops, and online groups, then why does the institution require twenty five to thirty million dollars a year to operate multiple campuses and a concert level production each weekend. The question isn't cynical. It's essential if we're going to evaluate how effectively the church is being a steward of its resources and fulfilling its missions.

1:01:16 All right, so Ai says, let's break this down. Number One, they promote groups as the heart of discipleship. They explicitly state discipleship happens best in small groups. That's literally what they say on their website. These groups don't use the massive, expensive building that you're paying twenty five million dollars to keep operating. They meet in homes, they meet in coffee shops, they meet online, places that cost the church absolutely no money. The rooted program, which is a part of these small groups is lay led. No pastors are teaching or leading the groups. So you're paying twenty five million dollars to maintain a building when the actual discipleship is happening outside of the church and groups not even lead, but people are being paid by the church. Well, if you're gonna have the people lead the discipleship groups where real discipleship's taking place, then stop paying the stink in pastors and pay the people leading the small groups. I can't I can't even function trying to understand the modern church anymore.

1:02:38 So and Ai asked this question, if that's where the actual discipleship is happening, well, what are we spending all the money on? So AI says, what is the twenty five to thirty million dollars actually funding from the structure. From the structure in public facing materials. The money appears to go towards maintaining and staffing multiple large facilities, high production worship services, lighting staging, sound, video, marketing and branding efforts. A large page staff whose primary output, as we can find, is about thirty to forty minute messages a week every coordination event, coordination, tech, campus management, and likely administrative overhead.

1:03:23 Very little of that directly fuels actual philological training or spiritual formation. So then AI says, if the buildings aren't used for deep learning, if the groups are self led and offside, if discernment is largely motivational or topical, what are people actually paying for? And perhaps more pointedly, does this model reflect New Testament Church or a business model wrapped up in spiritual language. That's the words of AI. Because I gave AI everything and said you analysis, Am I being fair? You critique this because I don't get it, and even as like this makes no sense. And again you can go to the website, you can go to TPCC dot o RG and if you say take your next step, then it says join a group.

1:04:19 Here, here's what it says. And the picture when it when it shows the picture in the group, they're sitting outside around a fire pit. The men are wearing shorts, nobody's holding a Bible, and they're talking. We learn in rows, but we grow in circles. The mission of groups at Trader's Point is simple. We want to create environments to help you connect with others and grow to be more like Jesus. In a big church, you don't need you don't know. You don't need to know everyone. You just need to know someone. Groups provide that opportunity. So groups provide the opportunity that I get to know someone. I thought the groups were there to help me learn about Jesus, all right, and it says here, let me go here. If I join a group, here we go. Small groups are typically consist of eight to twelve people, meeting weekly in homes, at coffee shops, or well, okay, at least here, it does say at least here. If you click further, if you go far enough into this you start finding some things, or at Trader's Point campus, so I guess sometimes they do meet on campus, which would then okay, that makes a little bit more sense, right if you're paying twenty five million dollars, But they also meet on these other places, so I don't know how many times they meet on actual.

1:05:50 Campus or not. It says here, I'm looking here. The more you dig into this because I want to be fair. See here, I'm not getting a lot. I'm not getting a lot here about that? Oh my goodness, to take the rooted this is ridiculous. If you want to rooted is Rooted is a ten week experience designed to connect you to God, to the church and your purpose. This. Oh okay. So the groups meet in person at their home campus, laying by a train facilitator who comes alongside you. Now, I don't know if the train facilitator is on church staff or not. But guess what it's gonna cost you forty dollars to even do that. So you gotta give pay forty dollars to even be a part of one of the groups. Ah man, I should have known that there was going to be money more money involved here, all right? I see? Can I get more information here? Okay? Here?

1:07:08 If I join a group, uh well, they don't give me see the small group. They don't give me any more information. They just keep sending me to the Rooted, the Rooted program, and the Rooted program. I have to pay forty dollars. Okay, uh that's uh. I see. And then here saying if you want to lead a group, then you can you can complete a form. So see that that means they're they're recruiting lay people. They're not. They're not having the church staff do it. So man and and there may be some slight like exceptions here where they do have someone on paid staff. But if you're bringing in twenty five million dollars, you bring in in thirty million dollars. But if you're if you're bringing in thirty million dollars, people shouldn't be paying forty dollars to join a group so that they can be connected to God. That's what Well, maybe that's why you're bringing in thirty million dollars. Okay, Maybe if you're bringing in thirty million dollars, all the groups should be led by people who are on paid staff, because they should be earning their paycheck by doing the tay, the training and the discipling, or at the very least, there should be paid leaders who receive adequate training philologically and biblically to lead the groups. And I don't know how it looks like a lot of this is done online and a lot of this is done where it doesn't require any

1:08:38 money people's homes. Well, then what is the point of paying thirty twenty five million dollars to keep a building open? Now, remember the whole thing is, Hey, this pastor is not like the megachurch. This is the typical megachurch. And you don't even have to be megachurch for this. It's the same. But it's the megachurch ideology that is so infiltrated all kinds of churches. We have a church, but we gotta have small groups. We gotta have smoke groups. We gotta have small groups. We gotta have smoke groups. Everybody's gotta be in a smoke group. Join a smoke group, and joice smoke groups, smoke group, smoke groups, smoke groups, smoke group. It's like, you can't, you won't, You'll die and go to hell unless you join a small group. Churches can't function with all small groups. And then what do you do. You meet somewhere other than the church, led by someone not being paid, but hey, still give your money to us. Hey, discipleship's gonna happen outside of the building, led by someone who's not on paid staff.

1:09:31 But we need twenty five million dollars to operate. Well, if discipleship's gonna take outside of this building led by someone who's not unpaid staff, I don't need you for anything because the most I'm getting is fifty two sermons in an entire year. And then we can talk about the quality of said sermons, which we'll do next time. I had have the. Sermon ready to go, but I wanted to go back and break this down a little bit more. Now you can go look at the website itself. So here's what I'll summarize this. The interviewer challenged worship tayment and the modern church mentality. This pastor, after already given the impression that he's against it, has to kind of push back and try to defend the very modern church mentality. He does so by giving you a false history example about amazing grace, and then he somehow tries to correlate Revelation four to stage lighting modern day rock concerts. It's insane what he does there, which demonstrates not expository mindset and how to handle Revelation chapter four.

1:10:33 That's crazy. You go to the actual website, which is TPCC dot org. What we end up with is boom as soon as it opens. Dark room, bright stage lights, a concert, a stage, big screens. Okay, which is exactly what the interview the interviewer was condemning. But somehow Revelation four justifies this and a fraudulent story about amazing grace. And then when you do a little bit digging around, hey, join a group now, because why do you want to join a group? Why do you want to join a group? Because we may learn in rows, but we we we grow in circles, so we need to be in a group. And where are you going to meet in these groups?

1:11:24 For the most part, you're going to meet outside of the church. Oh, in one of the groups. If you want to be rooted so that we can connect you to God and the church and your purpose, you need to pay forty dollars. I mean, even though the church is brought in thirty million dollars and has a four million dollars surplus, we can't let people join these groups for free, or at least the rooted group. We can't let them join that. I mean, no, no, no, no, no, no, no no. We got to charge you forty dollars. But is anything going to ever disrupt this industrial complex of big of churches. No, churches just operate as a business. They just operate as a business. You are just the thing that provides them the money to operate, and what you actually get for the money. In this particular case, you're paying almost four hundred thousand dollars per sermon, and considering the small, the rooted group, you're not even getting that for free. You get to pay forty dollars to get that.

1:12:30 Oh man, do you know what a podcaster with a computer and a microphone could do with twenty five million dollars? Do you know how much content someone could produce? Do you understand that I have produced what. About a little over four years, maybe five years, well over four thousand hours of content, Well over four thousand hours of content, well over four thousand hours. How many How long would it take that church to produce four thousand hours of content? When they're producing about fifty two hours of content a year now. They may be doing that same sermon multiple times, but I mean, they're not producing additional content. They don't even they had a podcast.

1:13:29 They had one and it ended thet They didn't do anything with it, So they're not doing any additional content. Because I went to look to see if there was additional stuff. There's not been a new episode, so it's like twenty twenty three or January first to twenty twenty four, so they're not doing any new content. You look at the church site, the quote unquote church podcast, their church podcast with basically their church sermons. You get one sermon a week, not even additional content there. So for twenty five million dollars, you get fifty. Two sermons in a year. In any podcaster, anybody with just even a slide amount of dedication can produce probably close to an hour content a day Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

1:14:28 But people will make sure the church brings in all this money. So even if you use all the right words, you ultimately produce the very thing. That you say you're not. That's the disconnect I'm trying to point out. That's the disconnect. And it's not even about this church. It's not even about this church. The only reason I'm using this church as a case study is because I come across this video basically saying we're not like all these other churches, and it's like it's the exact and I see this all the time, even. In conservative churches. Oh, these churches do this, and these churches, and then you go looking like and you do basically this. You've got the basic same template, you just wrap it in different language, you dress it up. You still have the activities to find the food, this, the youth group, this and the butt luck and this and this. You still do all the same things. And many of you still do the small groups where everyone's leaving the very building you're paying just to getting money to maintain. And then you'll claim that the small groups is where really it really happens. Well, if it's really happening in the small group, then I just say get rid of the building and just meet in small groups and be done with it, right, And then you don't need twenty five million dollars. Oh yeah, then, oh what would happen if everyone broke up into small groups and they're all ran by lay people. All the

1:16:00 people in the church would be without a job. We can't have that. All right, This has been a long Saturday. We've spent way too much time on this. But that's okay. I just man, it's just hard to pray. All you do is you start digging into this and you just like, it becomes insane. So we've done enough for now. We will review the sermon. We will review the sermon next time because it's on Isaiah fifty. I mean, come on, it can't get much better than that, right, So we will review the sermon and hopefully, hopefully it will be entertaining to listen. I mean, it'll fit perfectly with our Isaiah stuff. It'll fit perfectly with our Isaiah stuff. So yeah, there you have it. That's what's going on in the modern church. Now you may say, well that's a horrible example.

1:16:52 Just remember what does your church claim what is actually happening. There's sometimes a disconnect, and it's easy for all of us to get deceived by that disconnect. God bless