Ep. 139 Skye Jethani - What We Get Wrong About Heaven

everything to acquire. But when you go, Oh, no, no, Jesus is just the means by which I get to the real goal, which is heaven, then in a weird way, you have replaced Jesus with heaven, and made him into a means to an end. And that is idolatry. And yet, that's the way most of us think about the gospel. Most of us think about our faith, most of us think about our mission. And it's not what we read in the Scriptures.

a rating and review. It's easy, it only takes a second and it helps us find new listeners to the show. Just go to the Show page on the app that you're using right now and hit five stars. Thank you so much. Previous guests on the show have included Caitlin chests, AJ Swoboda and Pete Gregg, if you go back, listen to those

episodes and more. But today's guest is sky to Tawny and award winning author, speaker and co host of the holy post podcast sky has written more than a dozen books and served as an editor and executive at Christianity today for more than a decade. Raised in a religiously and ethnically diverse family. His curiosity about faith led him to study comparative religion, before entering seminary and pastoral ministry, with a unique ability to connect to Christian thought

and contemporary culture. His voice has been featured in The New York Times USA Today and the Washington Post. And he's spoken to audiences throughout the world as diverse as the US Naval Academy, the Chautauqua Institution, and the loads on movement. Skye, and I have a fantastic conversation around what we get wrong about heaven. Spoiler alerts, almost everything. How can we center Jesus in our faith and not heaven? Why is the gospel more than just going to heaven when

you die? How can we taste heaven here? And now? How can we be people where heaven and earth overlap? What is the new heavens and new earth? Will the earth be burned up in fire at the end? Well, we answer these questions and more. So join us as we get a Jesus centered view of heaven and be inspired to live a life that carries the presence and Spirit of God in the world here. And now. Here is my conversation with Sky chottani. Sky. Welcome to the podcast. Thank you so

much for joining me. I'm really excited to have you on.

mental map of heaven. And as anything changed over the years for you, and what were some epiphanies for you? Well,

gatekeepers and let you in. And even as a kid, like, you know, I used to joke by the time I was in college, I'd been to far more funerals, and I had weddings. And my brother died when I was young. I grandparents, like many people do, who passed away and like just, it was a rat. I was always around that. And then I grew up in a very medical family. My father is a physician. My mother was a nurse. My grandfather was a

physician. I like lots of medicine, and so disease and death and like those kinds of conversations were not at Normal in our home. And so I was just kind of always aware of it. And, and so I just kind of had this general sense of, Well, if you belong to God, you're going to be okay. You'll go to heaven when you die. And so then as a teenagers, I started really thinking more deeply about meaning in life and God and faith and religion and studying all kinds of different

traditions and stuff. You naturally carry those assumptions into your reading of the Bible. So like a lot of people, I just assumed that's what the gospel was about. And then going into college, I was very involved with a campus ministry, and they were very missionary minded and evangelistic. And of course, they teach you to talk to people about, you know, if you were to die tonight, how would How do you know you would go into

heaven? It's so everything about my early Christian formation was with heaven as the centerpiece in the assumption that the gospel was all about, how do you get into heaven? Or how do you avoid hell? And it really wasn't until later in college, as I started really reading the gospels, especially and noticing that when Jesus talked about the kingdom of heaven, it didn't seem like he was talking about just Where do people go when

they die? So that was my first clue that may be our understanding of Heaven is weird. And it's not what I thought it was. And then post college going to seminary reading, folks like NT, right? Dallas, Willard, these others, like whether it was the the gospel understanding of the kingdom of heaven, which Willard talks about, or just the heavens and the new creation and all that that NT, right and numerous other scholars talking about.

It's like the scales fell off my eyes, and I realized, Oh, I'm not the only one who's gotten this wrong, like 1000 years of Christian Western tradition has completely screwed us up and the way we read the Bible, and so that was sort of the journey. And so I'm very indebted to these other scholars and philosophers and theologians that were looking at the Jewish roots of the gospel and the New Testament and the biblical view of things that has helped me realign my own mental map of this stuff.

It's not biblical, and where we position heaven in our understanding of our faith, that sort of mental map idea is also wrong. So let me start with a definition of one we tend to define heaven, as I said earlier, a celestial paradise people go to after they die, right? That is not how the Bible to find heaven at all. And the, the root of it comes down to even the word itself, like throughout the both the Hebrew Old Testament and the Greek New Testament. The word for heaven

is almost always plural. It's the heavens. So Genesis, one one actually gets it right in our English Bibles. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The problem is, for some various reasons, English translations of the Bible, change the plural thereafter, to singular. So when we read our English Bibles, and you know, and Jesus says, The kingdom of heaven is at hand, it actually says, The kingdom of the heavens is at hand, but we

change it to singular. And when you make it singular, in our imaginations, we assume then that Oh, heaven, it's like a choking it's a it's like Chicago, or it's like, Florida, or it's like London, it's a singular place, when it's singular in the English language. But when you realize it's plural throughout the Bible, it's not speaking about a singular place. It's speaking about a realm, the way we talk about the atmosphere or the oceans, or, you know, another

dimension. It's there are multiple heavens, in Scripture, multiple realms that are defined as heaven the heavens. And so once you erase this idea that heaven has a singular destination or location, and it becomes an ever present realm, that's right here, that changes all that and it's not just where the dead reside. In fact, you can make an argument that's not where the dead are at all. It's a whole different conversation.

It is where God is present and these spiritual beings and it's ever present in a reality that is right here and now that though invisible is no less real than any other realm of creation. So there's that definition. But then there's the positional error we make. And this is the one I was talking about earlier, which is we tend to view heaven as the goal of our faith. It is the purpose of our lives. It is the mission of the gospel to get people into

heaven. That is also a fundamental misreading of the Bible. And in a weird way, it actually makes an idol out of heaven. Because we put heaven at the center when in fact, it's Christ Himself, who is to be the center of our faith, he is the goal he is the treasure in the field, for which we would sell

everything you acquire. But when you go, Oh, no, no, Jesus is just the means by which I get to the real goal, which is heaven, then in a weird way, you have replaced Jesus with heaven, and made him into a means to an end. And that is idolatry. And yet, that's the way most of us think about the gospel. Most of us think about our faith, most of us think about our mission. And it's not what we read in the Scriptures. Yeah,

refugees. We often some people would say, if you die today, do you know you're going to heaven? It never worked. When I had people come in and say that, but a because they have a view of the spiritual world that is all around them right now. So if we can start to change our mental map, and we could say that, okay, the kingdom of heaven is all around us. And it's just, we just need to unveil it, we need to reveal it so that we know it's there. And we could enter

into it. what implications does that have for us and the way that we live today?

cultures were. And then the middle ages come along, and what what Plato and these other, you know, Greek philosophies, Gnosticism, came along and said, the material world is inherently evil, and only the immaterial non spirit, non material spiritual world is what matters, and we inherited that in the West. And then we go, okay, so God doesn't care about bodies, God doesn't care about the world, God doesn't care about the creation or the planet, all he cares about is souls, the

immaterial part of us. And so that must be what is being saved, and that will go off to this celestial, distant place in heaven. That is not the worldview that the writers of the Bible carried. And so when you jettison that whole thing, it opens up the possibility for more things to matter. So I was just actually this morning, I was interviewing, and he writes about his new book, and we were

talking about this. And he mentioned how, you know, if you believe that, going to heaven, when you die is the point of the gospel, then the only real thing you can be concerned about in this world other than getting other people to go to heaven, when they die, is well, I at least should probably live some kind of moral life that is a good well behaved Christian life, so that I can make sure that I don't have any barriers, getting into that place when I

die. But if you believe that God is actually in the process of reconciling all things to himself, and then our fate is not to go to heaven when we die, but it is actually to rule with Him upon the earth, then this material creation actually matters now. And part of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus is learning how to use a biblical word rule or rain in this world, as his image bearer and representative, which means all of the world matters, and all of creation matters and all

that we do matters. And part of being a follower of Jesus is learning the process of living our life, as he would like us to live it as His representative. That's a long winded way of saying, being a disciple of Jesus. It means discipleship matters. And everything in the world matters because this is our destiny. This is our inheritance. This is the world God is redeeming, and we will rule it with Him for eternity.

So it matters and it changes then the the outlook that a believer has on what I should be focused on. Of course, morality matters, but so does all my activity in this world in order to reveal the kingdom of God, here and now.

and restore all things. And look at this, we get a new city as well, that God says, Oh, that's not even going to go away. Like, I'm going to take that and I'm going to make make it new. And we could have your human expression of work here on earth actually matter in eternity. I think that's pretty incredible. And amazing. I know we're getting like to the end of of your book here is like, what's

what's happening in eternity? I mean, you talk about the passage about, he's going to destroy things with fire, the earth that, you know, a lot of Christians have this belief that the earth is going to disintegrate is going to go away. How do you answer that question? How do you see that? What does that look like? That it will be destroyed with fire? And we actually have this new Earth that we get to live in? Yeah,

scriptures. It comes out of dispensational theology, it has a very specific historical origin that made it so popular, especially here in the United States. And that was coming out of the Civil War for various reasons, I won't go into that tangent. But when you go back and you read, I mean, Paul talks about this in Romans eight, he talks about the creation will be set free when the children of

God are glorified. When when we are when Christ returns, and we are resurrected, and we rain on the earth with him, the the creation itself will be set free from its captivity, to sin into Cain, all these things. And so the vision that Paul carries, and that he inherits from his Jewish tradition, is not one of God's people being taken away to some future world. It is of God returning to the earth and raining on the earth with His people. This is what Isaiah talks about. This is what the

prophets talk about. This is what the Jews at the time of Jesus talked about. They were expecting Yahweh, to come back rain in Jerusalem, and his people would rain on the earth. It was all about God and people raining on the earth. It's exactly what you see, at the end of Revelation. You mentioned the New Jerusalem, the city of God, the dwelling place of God descending from the heavens to the earth, and the great proclamation that the dwelling place of God is now with his

people on the earth. That is the fulfillment of the Jewish vision of salvation. It's not escaping the Earth. It's raining with God upon the earth. So then you get the big text here that people get hung up on is Second Peter three, this world will be

destroyed by fire. You have to read it in context, Peter begins by talking about the flood in Genesis, and how God destroyed the world with water in the flood, and he preserved a remnant Noah and his family through that, then he uses the exact same word, destroy, and says, God's judgment is coming, but this time it will be with fire, he will destroy the Earth

with fire, okay. There is not a single interpretation of the flood in Genesis that I know of, of anybody who believes that the world the planet, this earth was materially destroyed by the flood, and God created a brand new planet. That is no one's interpretation of Genesis. When Peter says he destroyed the world with flood or with water. What he means is he destroyed the systems of the world. He destroyed the corruption of the

world. He wiped out humanity and all of its civilization, because it was so corrupted and evil. And he washed it clean. And it was a new beginning. He started with Noah and his family, he started this new beginning. So then he says, that's what's going to happen, but this time it will be with fire. And he talks about how the earth will be revealed. After talking about it being destroyed, he says it will be revealed well how do you destroy something materially and then reveal it right? It's not

what's going on. He's talking about this this coming day where God's purging fire will like the waters of the flood wash away or burn away all that is unholy and ungodly and destroy it. Paul talks about Got this in First Corinthians three. And interestingly, he uses the same fire metaphor, but he talks about judgment of believers. And he says, each person, each person's work will be judged tested by fire. And if you built with wood, hay or straw it will

be consumed. But with gold, silver, precious stones, it will endure. And so similarly, Peter talks about this fire, this purging fire that will burn away all that is ungodly on the earth, revealing the truth of what's actually of God and what is not. So it's not a material destruction of this world and the replacement with a new one. It is the renewal of this world, through the power of God, and even the word new heavens, New Earth, which Peter uses in that

chapter. And then John uses and revelation, again, poorly translated, similar to like heaven versus heavens. In Greek, there are two primary words that can be translated as new. One, me us means young, we, it's a word that we use for a child, right? They're young, they're neoss, they're, they're new in the world. And then there's kind on are kindness, which means new and quality, not necessarily new in age. And so the new heaven and new earth uses the word highness, meaning new

inequality. So it's not the replacement of this earth with a brand new one that God's gonna you know, whip up. It is the renewal of the earth to its like new state without any imperfection. That's the new heaven and the new earth. In the first heaven in the first Earth, passing away means that old age, when there was evil and decay, and death and destruction, that's gone. And we have this renewed creation, that is, as God always intended it to be.

beautiful here. But we also live in this place where Jesus has has gone to the cross, He is resurrected, He has new life, the kingdom is here. The kingdom of heaven is here. And now it is at hand. How are we to live? What does that look like in the in the here, but not yet?

And Paul talks about this, like Romans eight, again, another example. You know, he talks about suffering in this world and the groaning of creation, and we in our spirit grown as well. And we share in the

sufferings of Jesus. And so part of the way we operate is realizing sort of, you can imagine a Venn diagram of the old age of, of sin and evil and death and decay, and the New Age, the new heaven and earth which is to come, which is, you know, God and people inhabiting the world together and no more death or disease or decay or anything like that. Those two circles, they overlap right now, we already have the reality of the Kingdom among us, but we still exist in this fallen

world. And Paul talks about that in our own bodies, like we've been given the Spirit and are brought to New Life, the oldest passed away the new has come anyone in Christ is a new creation, He says in Second Corinthians, and yet, I don't know about your body, but mine is not perfect. Like my, my body is subjected to disease and baldness and all kinds of other problems, and it will eventually

one day wear out and decay. But he talks about we have this treasure in jars of clay, like we are wasting away on the outside, but we are renewed on the inside and we await the coming day of our physical resurrection, when our physical bodies as well will be renewed as Jesus body was. And so we live in the already not yet.

What that means is we have all people should be empathizing with the pain and struggles and brokenness of this world, both the physical realities that we face in pain and disease, the injustice that is still present in this world, the evil I mean, just this week, we've seen unbelievable horrors and in Israel and and now the suffering of the Palestinians and the retaliation innocent Palestinians, I should say, and the retaliation like it's horrible what we see in this

world but our our understanding says, yeah, that's, that's what's going to happen because this world is so broken and evil and wrong. And yet We also know the kingdom is here among us, which means we are to be in our own incarnation, as children of God signpost to the reality of that kingdom and collectively as congregations and churches of,

of assemblies of believers. We are to be oases where there is healing, and forgiveness and reconciliation and justice, and where there's an abundance of resources so that the poor are not hungry, and the orphans are cared for and the widows are fed and like, like the church is supposed to be assigned to the rest of the world of what is breaking in of what is to come. And we ourselves are still subjected to sin, and injustice and brokenness and disease and

all those things. And yet we carry the hope within us, of what is being birthed in this world. That's the tension they already not yet. And so if we have this mindset, oh, we're only here to rescue souls so they can go to heaven when they die, then we're not going to be motivated to really build systems of justice, we're not going to be motivated to make sure bodies are healed, or divisions of race and economics and other forms of separation

are reconciled. Why do any of that if it's just about putting souls into a celestial heaven, but that's not the mission, the mission is to bring heaven to earth, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven? That's our mission. And so we do that individually. We do that as households, we do that as communities of believers. I

we should be doing? Like the most important thing you should be doing is evangelism or the most important thing you should be doing is social justice. So the most important thing you should be doing is caring for the poor, or the most important thing you should be doing is, you know, fighting injustice in government, whatever it whatever the hobbyhorse thing is, and, and what that what, what that stems from is, is okay, I've read the Bible. And I think I know what God cares most about.

And I know if you've heard this cliche before, but you know, it's it's well intentioned, but you'll hear people say, I want my heart to be broken by the things that breaks God's heart. Well, okay, not to be glib about it. But what the heck does not break God's heart, right? In this world, right there. Do you think, you know, like, we're trying to rank horrors and evils, and then based on that decide, well, this is the thing I should be giving my life to.

And all of that happens, because we have not maintained a biblical and even a reformed theology of vocation, which says, God calls different people to different tasks. And you see this in the Gospels. I mean, John 21, he calls Peter says, Feed my sheep care for my sheep. 10 My sheep, right? And then Peter looks at John down the way on the beach and says, What about him? What's his calling? And Jesus says, know your business, what his calling is, that's for me to decide, you

follow me? He, he tells some disciples, you leave your fishing business and come follow me. He tells the demoniac that he heals across the sea, who wants to go with them? No, no, you go back to your village, right? He tells one guy, go and sell all that you have and give it to the poor and come follow me. He doesn't say that to everyone like Jesus has particular callings for different disciples. And so what does it look like for us to be

in this already? Not yet? Well, the first thing that's applies to all of us is of course, we live in deep, abiding communion with Christ through His Spirit. That's true for all of us. But then in that posture, in communion with Him, we discern what are you calling me to in this world? What part of this broken creation? Have you gifted and called me to be uniquely reconciling to you through my presence as your child? It might

be? I'm going to preach the gospel and welcome more people back in communion with you great it might be. I'm going to be a scientist that learns how to cure cancer, and I'm going to heal people who are sick, it might be I'm going to make sure that they're I'm going to build a business where people are employed and have the dignity of work and are provided enough food. And that's what whatever it is, you're called to do do it to the glory of God. But I can't

tell someone else what to do. I have to draw them into communion with God and hopefully in communion with His Spirit, they discern with the help of others, perhaps what God is calling them to do. But we've got to recover that theology of vocation otherwise, it just becomes who can most persuasive persuasively convinced me that their mission is the one I should be on? Yeah. And I'm so tired of those arguments. And it's just not worth it. Yeah,

city? And build transitional housing? And and do that, like, what are the things that God has called you to do? And I think people are coming alive in it. They're saying, Oh, God has a part for me to play. And he's gifted me in in these areas are given me a burden for something and I could walk into it. And I could be a part of God's kingdom and help unveil what it looks like to live in the kingdom, it's pretty amazing shifts for people in their mind to see what that looks like. Right?

it. And if you are not involved in evangelism, you and your work and your time on this earth does not matter. So we have to have this bigger vision. And it's the thing that's, I think, inspiring about it, is, once you see this, in the New Testament, you realize it's been there literally from the opening words of the Bible. God created the man and the woman to be his representatives on the earth, they were created in His image to represent him on the earth, and He gives them dominion to

rule on the earth. Theologians talk about the fact that the man and the woman were created to be priest, a priest is a bridge a link. And that bridge is meant to carry the needs and concerns the prayers and laments and the worship of the world up to God, and then to bring God's presence and power to the earth. And of course, Adam and Eve rebelled against that vocation against that calling. And so we don't need God, we can do it without

him. And then he calls Abraham and Israel and he rescues them from slavery. And he brings them to Mount Sinai and he says, you are going to be a kingdom of priests. I am going to through you reveal my glory to the world and my bring my presence to the earth. And then you are going to bring the worship of the world and the pain of the world up to me in your sacrifices and offerings and prayers. And of course, Israel, like the first man and woman rebelled against

God and they get exiled. Jesus then comes along, the God man, who is the great high priest, and what does he do? He brings the presence of God to the earth. He brings healing and reconciliation and forgiveness and wholeness. He raises the debt, he brings the power of God to Earth. But what does he also do? He carries the pain and struggle and literally the sin of the world to God. And he cries out and in complete empathy with all of us, why have you forsaken me? He is that

bridge. And now we are called as His people to be priests. We carry His presence and His Spirit, we bring healing and reconciliation. We do that through our different vocations in this world. But we also do the opposite. We also carry the pain and brokenness of this world up to God. This is again what Paul talks about in Romans eight in the groaning of the Spirit, in our prayers, that this world is a broken and terrible and sinful and unjust

place. And as we experienced that, just as Jesus did, we express that in prayer to God, and we carry the the lament and pain of this world before him. We are that link. So where you are called to do that, in what environment in what setting with which people? That's all your particular calling, but we are all priests, and we bring God's presence to the earth and we bring the pain of the Earth into God's presence. Hmm,

place. And ultimately, we're told that God's glory would fill the earth as the waters cover the sea, and that all the nations of the world would be blessed, because from Israel would come, you know, the king that would reign over all the earth. So Israel was always just to be the starting point. And that's what you end up seeing then with Jesus coming along. And you say, No, that building in Jerusalem, that's not the temple, he says, I'm the temple.

I am where heaven and earth intersect, and now you might people through my spirit will be, we're having an earth intersect. And the kingdom as it spreads throughout the world is fulfilling what Israel's purpose was, to bring God's presence to the whole world and to reconcile the world to God. So in a very real sense, Israel's mission is fulfilled in Jesus, who is I mean, we can get into some of the nuances, it's how his story parallels that of, of Israel.

And then through his people, as we then carry on the the vocation that was originally given the Abraham. So yeah, I mean, that's, that's the short answer to it.

But the American church is uniquely just screwy on this stuff. Yeah,

reader? What would you like them to get out of your book, one,

tourism books, right? People who claim to have died and gone to heaven to come back and written a book about it like people are can't get enough of this crap. And if it is crap, I'm sorry. It's just not Biblically sound. But it sells millions and millions and millions and millions of copies, partly because so many Christians have put heaven at the center of their faith. But like my slowest, worst selling books, are the ones I've written about

prayer. And that's not just me, I have other friends who have written books on prayer, and they've never sell well. Why is that? Because people don't think prayer is essential to their faith. They don't see prayer as critical because they don't see Jesus himself and communing with him as the very, you know, heartbeat of what we are to be doing as Christians. So part of my hope for this book is I hope Christians just frankly, think less about the details about

heaven. And they take all that energy and attention and imagination and they put it back onto, I want to live in communion with Christ and really flesh out that part of my life and mind and communion with God rather than just this hope for the future. So that's one big As the second one, is what we've been talking about that realization that part of my calling as a priest now is to manifest God's presence on Earth, right where I am. And the

future matters. And I care about people living for eternity in communion with God. And that's good and right. But what does it look like for me to care about this world the way God does? And what does it look like for me to manifest His kingdom? Right now right here to be a point where heaven and earth overlap. That's what a temple is a temple is where heaven and earth overlap. That's why Jesus calls himself the temple fully God fully man, the intersection of heaven and

earth. We are now the temple. Paul says this explicitly in First Corinthians and elsewhere. So we are to be the place where heaven and earth overlap, how can my life, my relationships, my work, my character, be a glimpse to others of the reality of God's presence in heaven right now where I am, that is an inspiring mission. So those are the my two hopes, deeper COMMUNION WITH CHRIST rather than just fantasizing about heaven, and manifesting the presence of God in heaven right now.

world. And I'm grateful, incredibly grateful for those interactions and those scholars and writers and I wish I had started earlier and kind of deconstructed some of the nonsense that I had bought into from American pop Christianity, or I call it pop consumer Christianity. I wish I'd done that earlier. That'd be number one. Another bit of advice. It took me a long time to reestablish a theology of vocation that validated the diversity of callings people

had. It really wasn't until I left my role in full time church ministry that I could really have my eyes opened. And I think to be brutally honest, part of the reason I went into vocational ministry was because I thought it mattered more. And I wonder, I do look back and wonder if I had understood the real calling of, of the believer. And if I really understood the that each person's work, finds its value, not in the particularity of the activity, but in the one who's

called you to it. I don't know if I would have gone to seminary. I know it sounds weird. I don't have any regrets. I'm not saying what I'm doing is bad. But I think on a subterranean subconscious level. Part of the reason I went to seminary and entered into a ministry vocation is because I believed it made me matter more.

And if I had convinced my 21 year old self that No, no, no, what Matt, what makes you matter is the fact that you're a child of God, and that your holy and dearly loved by Him, and it's your communion with Him that defines your identity, not your work for him. And that all of our vocations matter, because of the one is called him. I wonder what route my life would have taken that may have been

different. God used it, he uses our screwed up motivations and, you know, impure desires and things like that at times to do his, you know, accomplish his purposes. I believe that and I believe that in my own life. But I think I had been shaped and formed by a ministry culture that told me I would matter more by being in ministry, and I think that malformed me for longer than I could have admitted at the

We're working with God in the restoration and redemption of all things. Like what does that look like to do that? So your book with was was instrumental not just for me, but our organization. So thank you for that. A couple of other things. One, what? Is there anything you've been reading or watching lately? You could recommend?

brilliant. And it touches on a lot of the same themes like he repeatedly in his book talks about how our preoccupation with heaven causes us to completely misread Romans and that, Paul, you know, and pretty much everyone regardless of your theological tradition, pretty much everyone agrees that Romans is Paul's greatest theological writing. And it is where he articulates most robustly his vision of the gospel. Paul never mentioned Heaven. In Romans,

it's just not there. And certainly not heaven is defined as where you go when you die. It's not there. And so if Paul and his vision of the gospel doesn't include that idea of heaven, if the apostles throughout the book of Acts never mentioned heaven, in their gospel proclamation, why is it so central bar so this book is fresh in my mind, it's

brilliant, it's so good. In my daily devotional with God daily, I'm doing a series right now I'm calling the lessons from Lincoln, by Abraham Lincoln, which sounds weird, like Lincoln, arguably wasn't even a Christian. But I'm using sort of the Civil War and the and a lot of what Lincoln did in that era as a launchpad to discuss other more biblical themes, like right now and the study of what was it that made the south so delusional about the evil

instant of slavery? And how are we deluding ourselves about sin and evil times. And so I love history, I love taking disparate ideas like civil war, you know, 19th century or 19th century American history and connecting it to theology and scripture. So that's a fun thing I'm in right

now. And then I try to think of one other book that I've had my nose in recently that I think would be worth recommending, well, I reread Philippians, his book, what's so amazing about grace, he's got a new edition of that that just came out. And I think Philip is a gift to the church. And it's on the opposite end of the spectrum of like the the scholarly density of vente writes new book Philippians. He's writing for a popular audience and taking storytelling and illuminating scripture in a

really accessible way. So highly recommend that too. Great.

young kid. And it's about a kind of a poor family in the South. It's and Kevin Costner plays a dad who's recently come back from Vietnam and dealing with PTSD and and it's mostly about the kids, right, the children in this community and stuff who Dilip Nicky's where this incredibly poor kind of hillbilly family and kind of the rivalries and fights that exists

between these kids. But Kevin Costner being a really broken man who's dealing with his own demons from Vietnam, nonetheless, exhibits he's kind of a Christ figure in the story, and shows incredible kindness to his enemies and to Indians trying to teach his kids how to be kind to their enemies and to the simple story, but a beautiful, I think, application of a glimpse of the kingdom in

in a simple way. This is a weird one, but one that comes to mind kind of recent and so really popular, animated Disney movie. I don't know if you saw on Konto

was really really beautiful. But yeah, I mean, I can find a gospel angle in virtually any movie I mean, I've joked many times that apart from, apart from scripture, all truth comes from the Godfather movies. So there's truth all over the place.

YouTube channel as well. And then, with God daily.com Is my webpage where people can access you can see my books there. But most importantly, with God daily is a daily devotional I've been writing for almost 10 years. That's a subscription based devotional, available for free if people want it or you know, donation of any amount that kind of keeps it going. And it's available via email, and online. And it's an audio as well as

written devotional. And I like to call it the devotional for people who hate devotionals. Because I hate most devotionals I find them to be too sentimental, and cliche. And so I've tried to write one that is smart and brings together science and history and philosophy, and obviously a lot of Scripture that explains the Abraham Lincoln series I'm doing right now, and historic prayers

of the church. So there's scripture involved in every one of those and prayers that foster your own communion with God and hopefully insightful ways of reading scripture and recognizing our life with God. So those are the big kind of pieces that people can find me through.

conversation was fantastic. So thank you for that, so that we could figure out how we could be temples that Heaven and Earth can meet us here, and now and today, so that we can actually see some peace and justice and righteousness that the kingdom of heaven is at hand. It's here, and it's present, and we could actually be Jesus centric, and not having Cedric in our faith. So sky. Thank you so much for this conversation.