Is “Seeker Sensitive” Just Dumbing Down the Gospel?

You need to be able to go into a church and give a deep biblical teaching. Explain what the passage means. Show how the Bible is relevant today, and it should be in a way that everybody can understand. And it should always include something for people who don't believe yet and don't know. And it's like, hey, if you're new here, this is for you too. That is good teaching. Most churches are listen, learn, leave. And that's the problem. Bill Hybels, Rick Warren and others felt like there was this massive cultural disconnect between church and the world, and because of that, it was creating unnecessary barriers for people to come and experience God. Where it goes wrong is when the primary lens is you're listening to the Provoke and Inspire podcast. What's up guys? Welcome to the Provoke and Inspire podcast, Finding Jesus in a Broken World. My name is Ben Pearce. I am the host of the show and I'm joined by David Pearce, my dad Luke Greenwood, and Chad Johnson. What's up boys. Welcome to the show. Yes great to be with you. Thank you, thank you. I feel like I should be in Luke's room right now. I'm prepared for the green motif. Oh, I don't know what you just said, and I don't care for it. Okay, so today we are going to be tackling a couple of very tough topics. We want to ask the question. The very critical question is the church for believers and not evangelism. This is a sentiment that if you haven't come across it, it's definitely out there. And some would argue that Sunday gatherings, they're not necessarily for being sensitive to seekers. They're really about discipleship and formation. And evangelism is something else, and it happens out there. What brought this topic most recently to my attention was a clip from doctor Frank Turek. And so rather than explain it, I'm going to show it and then we are going to react to it. Was he the guy that you just interviewed recently, by the way? that's what I thought. Absolutely. Uh, so you can check that one out. But in the meantime, check this clip out. They know how to build a church. We Protestants are built in warehouses that there's no reverence. The pastor comes out in ripped jeans and a t shirt. He looks like he was just cleaning his garage. I'm tired of it. Church is not for evangelism. What is church for? According to Ephesians four, to equip the saints to equip his people to do ministry. In other words, the purpose of the church is to make disciples, not get people saved. The church is for believers. Here's the problem with the seeker view. The seeker view is we've got to get people in the door and not offend them. So they accept Jesus. And later on we'll tell them about all this stuff they don't like. Yeah. Okay. First of all, it's bait and switch. Secondly, Jesus never did that. In fact, Jesus was so anti seeker. You remember in John chapter six when he gives that speech about the bread of life, you must eat my flesh and drink my blood. And he says, does this offend you? And they say, hey, this is a hard teaching. We can't follow this guy anymore. His disciples leave. Not all of them, but it was so anti seeker. Even some of his disciples left because Jesus spoke the truth. He didn't try and sugarcoat stuff. He didn't try and whitewash things. He told people the truth. And even Bill Hybels, who started the seeker movement twenty years ago, admitted, we haven't made disciples. You know what? You know what the problem is? We're getting people in the door, but if we convert them at all, it's a half conversion, which isn't a conversion at all. And then they wind up looking more like the world than Jesus. Why are we having him in church at all? Why come to church if you can sit home in your pajamas and listen to the Communist News Network And get the same message without an offering plate. There you have it. In the words of doctor Frank Turek, we have the argument for the role and nature of the church. And he does raise some interesting questions. Have we unintentionally reshaped church services around seekers instead of saints? Have we diluted depth in the name of accessibility, or have we misunderstood the purpose of corporate worship entirely? He does talk about the seeker movement, which I do think is part of this whole conversation. For those who are not familiar, the seeker movement was something that rose up in the seventies and 80s with Bill Hybels, which he does mention of Willow Creek, and also Rick Warren of Saddleback. And it was birthed out of this frustration with the disconnect between traditional church culture and unchurched Americans. And so these leaders, they redesigned the Sunday experience around spiritual seekers, which is where the name comes from. They attempted to remove liturgical barriers. They adopted contemporary music and they used more accessible, felt, need based teaching. Now, of course, a lot of people have come out and criticized this, saying that it's gone too far. It's theologically weak, it's avoiding hard messages. And that, as Doctor Turek alludes to or suggests, this has created half converts, which in his mind are no converts at all. And so I thought this would be a very interesting conversation for us to react to, because in our mission, we talk about relevance all the time. We talk about evangelism all the time. How do we contextualize our message to people in a way that they'll really get it? What do you guys think? How do you react to the vitriolic rant that puts it a little pejoratively, but how do you guys react to this passionate description of the seeker movement by one doctor, Frank Turek? I thought it was very interesting that he made the ripped jeans and t shirt comment, like, somehow that was dumbing down the gospel or wasn't bringing a clear message about who Jesus is. And at the same time, he's wearing a suit and tie. And so if you want to analyze that to start out with, I mean, there's been more evil done by guys wearing suits and ties than by anybody in ripped jeans and a t shirt. So, I mean, I just found it crazy, the examples he was giving. I think it's not about dumbing down church to be a place where people who are not outside of the church can come and understand what we're talking about. It's what Jesus did all the time. He had this authority that the religious people didn't have. And yet he's trying to make this idea that if you are trying to understand the culture you're speaking to and communicate to them in a way that takes away barriers to them understanding the truth, you're somehow dumbing down the gospel. And I think there are churches that do that as well, but that's a different point. Yeah, it's interesting coming from him, like that was kind of confusing to me because he's somebody who's really out there in the public, you know, places and having debates and stuff as far as I know. Um, so it was interesting to me. I think he's used to speaking to non-believers. Um, how was it Ben, when you had him on was what was the topic you guys talked about? Well, he did actually bring this up, interestingly enough. And I think that speaks to how much this is currently on his mind. We talked about a lot of things. I mean, for those who aren't familiar, he was thirty feet from Charlie Kirk when he was murdered. He was in the SUV on the way to the hospital. He had a very close personal relationship with him. I actually wasn't aware. It wasn't coincidental that he was standing there. I mean, they talked often. They were friends. He would. Charlie would look to Frank for apologetic input and advice. He would often bring guys like him on the road with him so that if he encountered questions he wasn't able to answer, he could kind of point it over to someone like doctor Frank Turek to be able to handle those questions. So of course, we talked a lot about that and more of the reaction, the ramifications or legacy, rather, of the death of Charlie Kirk. And my contention was that it produced more us versus them political fervor than crossing the aisles. Speaking to people that are unlike me, which I argued was not Charlie's real legacy, though he was quite political. He was famous for talking to people that didn't agree with him. And I said to doctor Frank Turek, I think that would be the better outcome that it would produce across the aisle. Speaking to people who are unlike me. So this didn't really come up in that context. But then even to Chad's point earlier, one of the Instagram reels that we released is exactly on this particular topic, funnily enough. And so I don't know. I mean, I think he has very strong views, obviously, on the creating firm distinctions between various roles within the body of Christ, because clearly, as you said, he goes out and speaks to people in college campuses, much like Charlie Kirk, but he clearly sees that as profoundly different than the role of the church. So yeah, I think he, uh, he would double down on those views, certainly still today. I had problems with what he said. I, I'll be honest, I really didn't like what he said. I had two problems with it. One was the one that David made already. That's um community. What is church? What is community? And um, I don't think I agree with his concept of church when he says, you know, church is not for evangelism. It kind of sounds like you're trying to exclude anybody who's not a, I don't know, a experienced, mature Christian or I'm not sure what he meant by that. But and then the other point for me is what teaching is about what discipleship is about, because he was emphasizing that church is a place where to equip the the believers. And I don't think I agree with the idea that you when you teach a believer, it's not for anybody else. So. So it's some kind of. And that concerns me because it sounds like we're wanting to. Create this space where the teaching is. So I don't know if academic is the word or. Um, just deep in a way that's not intelligible, not understandable for people who are not from the church. And that worries me. So I would say those are the two things that are most important for me in this is like, what is church and what does good teaching look like? What does good discipleship look like? I would say that isn't good teaching something that anyone should be able to come in and understand it. I mean, didn't Jesus say that need to be like a child to understand the kingdom of heaven? Right? I don't think he necessarily meant that it shouldn't be understandable by a young or new believer. I think he's just saying where it goes wrong is when the primary lens is, how would someone who doesn't believe at all view this, and I should shape and gear my entire church experience around that. But wasn't he saying that with the idea to make it something that people who are seeking truth could come? You're not making disciples in the church, right? Wasn't that what he was saying? Well, what he's saying is primarily in response to the seeker sensitive movement, which, as I said, Bill Hybels, Rick Warren and others felt like there was this massive cultural disconnect between church and the world. And because of that, it was creating. And I would actually agree with this. It was creating unnecessary barriers for people to come and experience God. Now, of course, where this can go too far is where you actually change the message, or you take what is sacred and you get rid of it in the name of trying to attract people. I think of our own context. I think about no longer music. The band that you and I are in, and over the years, the band has changed a lot in terms of its style, its aesthetics, the way we represent things. And we often have what I think is a very healthy. Nothing is sacred approach except the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, both visually and verbally explained. Right? So for us, I think that is an example where we, of course, are seeker sensitive in the sense that we want those outside of the church to experience the gospel in a way that's not going to be confusing or unhelpful to them in any way. But we also won't compromise. And so really, this entire thing is a baby with the bathwater situation as far as Turek is concerned, in my opinion, which is, yes, there are negative versions of your movement being overly sensitive to seekers, but that doesn't mean you abandon the good parts of that, right? Chad. There's got to be a degree of caring about your context and the people and how they're going to receive the unchanged truth that you're going to communicate, right? You guys are kind of like taking the opposite approach. Like you mostly disagree with what he said. As far as I can tell so far. I would actually largely agree with this one point, and this came from the work that I'm doing in my new role with Steiger. Ensure that I'm communicating who Steiger is, what we do, and where we're going in the. The clearest way I can. For someone who doesn't understand or hasn't. Maybe ever heard of. Steiger and I came across a slide and it was a twenty twenty four Barna study where it said ninety nine percent of pastors feel like their church is really poor at outreach. And then the second factor on the slide was that only three to five percent of churches in America grow by actual conversion and not by transfer. So the way I see this conversation framed is that the greatest problem the church has is that people aren't coming to Jesus. And at its core, what I think I hear this guy saying is that the church is not pulling people into Jesus because it's become so soft. And while I don't care whether someone would wear jeans or a shirt or whatever, I think that at its core, the pain point he's addressing is that people aren't coming to Jesus through the church. I don't think he was saying that. I think he was saying so. I was misunderstanding him. He was saying that the church is not about bringing people to Jesus. It's about discipling Christians. That's what he was saying. So he's saying that there that the church shouldn't have anything to do with evangelism, basically not its primary purpose. I think he would say that, biblically speaking, the primary purpose of the church is to edify believers, that that's what its point is. Edify, I don't know. For those of us who are not so theological, edify what is edify? To learn more and become more like Jesus. Okay, so if you become more like Jesus, you're going to bring people to Jesus, right? I'm just trying to represent his perspective as charitably as I can just to frame this conversation properly. A live church has people coming to Jesus all the time. Now there's seeker friendly churches that are. They kind of watered down the message, and they have pride flags out in front of their church and they do all kinds of things. So I think progressive and seeker, you have to differentiate that. That's too much. Let me finish. But those churches don't see people coming to Jesus and they're dead. They usually die because there's no power in them. But the churches that I have seen that are rocking are super engaged with the culture. They're super sensitive in that they want people to understand and feel welcome and loved. It's like this church I went to in LA, and they met me at the door with a cup of coffee and a pastry. You know, I walk in the door and they hand me this. That's how you gain David. It's like, that's how you reach David a pastry. And I'm like, this is the church for me. Now that's not watering down anything, but it's like, yes, I want to come in, hear what they have to say. Then it's about bringing Jesus, his teaching in a strong way. And then when you do that, people come to Jesus and the church grows. And part of my being more like Jesus is, I will start to have a burden and a broken heart for people around me. Well, it just makes me think all over about. And we've had a few conversations like this, but about what is church? What should church look like? And it sounds to me when when we. That's what I've been thinking. When when, when Frank Turek was talking like that, it made me think, okay, he's thinking about this public meeting and some approaches will be, oh, the public meeting is supposed to be more for non-believers to walk in. And he's saying while the public meeting should not be for non-believers to walk in, it should be for believers to be there. And then we can go deep into, I don't know, Bible teaching or discipleship and, and so, but for me, the, the, you know, what church is, is so much more than that, right? It's a community of people. It should be, but it also, it also makes me think, where are the people who want to know more are supposed to be. Well, that's that. Yeah, exactly. exactly. If it's more than than a public meeting, then it's a community of people that. And you can't. If you're trying to make a welcoming community of people, you can't control it so much in terms of who comes and when and how and where. So. And if you're going to do a public meeting, it's then, then you really have to be ready to, to welcome all kinds of different people. Maybe you do a smaller, you know, meeting somewhere where you select more and it's a certain theme, but if you're doing a big public open meeting, you really shouldn't be selecting and saying, oh, this, this, you know, the content here is only going to be for this kind of person. Yeah, you could have a special meeting where people have to wear suits, right? Can't wear, they can't have t shirts and ripped jeans. So they can be more, more holy. You see, it was good. The point you made about clothes because clothes. I was thinking about this. Clothes reflect its culture. It reflects culture and it reflects the people you hang out with. And so if you hang out mostly with people in suits, I don't know what that would be. Maybe it's like, you know, people in banks or politicians or something, something like that. Then sure. Then, you know, you probably should be wearing a suit and you'll fit in, you know, but if you're hanging out with normal people, then what are they wearing? And so it's, you know, it should be a place where people can feel welcome in all kinds of different styles should be there. You can't avoid culture and style in clothes. Isn't it all about context though, because he's. So now I do understand. It seems like maybe I was mistaken, so I have to. I have to retract everything I said totally wrong. Chad. I'm sorry guys, I screwed it up. Uh, surprise, surprise. The whole idea of having a biblical approach to church and then comparing it to the definition of an American church, almost like, what is that though, right? Because it's like in the most basic form of church from a biblical perspective, wouldn't it be where two or more are gathered in Jesus's name and most likely in someone's home. Not, I mean, what church building exists from like biblical times that we could say it looks like church today. So to me, I wonder if the problem is that what he doesn't like about church is maybe what a lot of people don't like. The whole thing is a false dichotomy. Yeah, the whole thing is not being able to live in the tension that is required to navigate faith. Because the more I do this, the more I recognize that it's always the extremes. It's the ditches on either extreme of the balanced perspective. That is where you get in trouble. Because why is there a presupposition that if I care about my culture, if I try to be an authentic member of my community, if I try to communicate in a way that will resonate with their felt needs and their desperations and their longings, if I use words that actually make sense and don't just create barriers, why is there a presupposition in that? That I have to then compromise the truth of the gospel in order to do that? I reject that false dichotomy, trying to say I reject the idea that I can't be edifying believers and discipling and also creating an environment that if someone, Lord willing, would stumble into my church, they would not be like, whoa, I clearly don't fit here because I don't look like these people or sound like these people. Yeah, but I think Chad was making a good point on what church is and like making it the American church or whatever country church is totally, um, far, often, often far from what biblical teaching is or what Jesus demonstrated. Like when I look at how Jesus lived, church looked more like a movement. It looked like a group of people doing things together and meeting and eating food together, and then going out onto into public places and meeting new people and sharing the message of the kingdom of God is near. And, and, and it is praying and healing and helping people and feeding people. It was this combination of different things that they were doing together, and people kept joining. And that's how the Gospels describe it. You have this group of people that keeps growing, and more and more people keep joining and getting involved. And that is the example we have of church in the New Testament, including after Jesus. When the disciples continued it, they continued doing the same kind of thing. So the fact that today when we talk about church, we immediately jump to, well, there's this building and there's this public meeting, and it's got to be fine tuned to a particular style, you know? Oh, this one's more seeker friendly, and this one's more conservative with suits and ties and, and biblical teaching that is like, you know, hard to understand. It's like, why, why do we jump to those things? You know, it's not. Well, the irony is you just trade one non-essential cultural baggage for another. That's all you do. You just say rip jeans are the problem. Suits and ties are the way. All you've done is just replace one contextualization for another contextualization because it suits and ties are authentic and it makes sense then. Exactly. Dang suits and ties, I don't care. What I care about is the I reject the baby with the bathwater out part of this. Which is to say that I can't be firm on truth, communicating the hard truth, and at the same time care about my neighbor to the degree that I'm gonna look and wear and act in such a way that's not going to be totally alien to them. I think in a more culturally diverse sense, we have no problem with this. We don't go, why does the Ghanaian church not look like Dallas? I thought you were saying, if anything, but weirdly, you know what I mean? We're like, no, like they they should look like them. They're building their culture, the music, like they can do all that and still be faithful to the Word of God and disciple and evangelize. And it's like you said, the book of acts is hardly this perfectly like bifurcated. Well, we have our worldly stuff that we do, and then we have our inside the church stuff where we teach the Torah and we don't do anything else. It was this messier, organic life inside outside of the world. It was alive. And because it was alive, it was messier. And maybe that's the problem. I guess to ask this question, what is the heart behind this? Like to charitably view his opinion on this? What is he saying? What motivates him to feel so strongly about this? We don't want superficial Christianity, you know that. And then people try it out for a while and it doesn't work. So they go, I try, Jesus, it doesn't work because Jesus, we can get behind that, right? So of course, we've all seen that. I mean, one funny, really funny example, I maybe have said on the podcast a while ago about was when I went to this church in Berlin. It was the dance church or the rave church or whatever. And so I go there because I'm speaking and it's like a, like you're in a, I don't know, a nightclub kind of thing, you know? Yeah. The DJ's and all this kind of thing. It's a dance party. Yeah. Berlin. So it's all, you know. Hey, Klaus, pass the offering bucket. Tons, tons. Party. So I go in there and it's so I didn't have a German Bible with me, so I said, I'm in their church. This is a church. They called it a church. I go, oh, there's some I need a German Bible. And they didn't have one. So I mean, it's a it's a church and they didn't even have a Bible. I mean, come on. I mean, that's we have a dance party playlist. They were relevant to nothing. I mean, if he's reacting to that, okay, I get it. But I don't think there's anything noble about making it so people can't understand who Jesus is. I mean, I think if we are like Jesus, we're going to be communicating and being in a way that people understand it. As far as what I saw. Anyway, Jesus didn't dress like, you know, he didn't have like the long robes, like the Pharisees. He was like a normal guy from what I understood. Anytime we make the gospel into this weird thing that's so hard to relate to and understand, it's wrong. It's not like Jesus. And if we're talking about making people more like Jesus, we need to give them strong truth, of course. But I think when you do that, people want that. But when it's combined with cultural relevance and with boldly preaching the gospel, man, that's when the Holy Spirit moves. Yeah, I totally agree on this thing of teaching. I feel like it's very important to have both depth, but also knowing how to communicate with a broad audience. That's just good teaching in general. It's good communication in general. So and there's not enough of that actually in the broad picture of the church, because you, as you guys said, you know, there are some churches that have become just too superficial and the teaching is just, you know, an inspiration. You know, I've heard this a lot like, oh, you know, our sermon on Sunday. It's more of an inspirational thought. Well, I've had people say, you know, can you give a positive message? Not an evangelistic. Yeah. And the other and on the other side, you've got. So that's one kind of side of the church. On the other side, you've got like, okay, we do deep biblical teaching here, which is great. But if you walk into a church and you can't understand the teaching. Um, as a, as a Christian, which is often the case, like it's just too complicated or too full of, uh, academic, you know, the person's trying to share all of their, all of their studies of the commentaries when they're up front, then then Christians don't follow it and non-believers or new believers don't follow it. And I don't think that's good, good teaching or communication either. What is seed in Greek? What is the Greek? So I think you need both. I think you need to be able to go into a church and give a deep biblical teaching. Explain what the passage means. Show. Show how the Bible is relevant today, and it should be in a way that everybody can understand. And it should always include something for people who don't believe yet and don't know. And it's like, hey, if you're new here, this, this is for you to that. That is good teaching. And I think there is a lack of that. It's just a lack of nuance. Like I know plenty of pastors who absolutely navigate this balance. They know the difference between sacred and compromise. They know that their responsibility is to help those who come to their church come to know and love Jesus more, and yet they are always conscious of and aware of the idea that someone could walk in. They always find a way to incorporate the full gospel into every sermon that they give, but not in a weird, forced way. They know the the line between cultural compromise and just also being not weird and alien. This isn't that complex in the end. I think if you really love people, all people, you're going to find a way to cater to those in your church that need to grow and be discipled, but you're also going to be sensitive to people who may not know anything at all and find themselves in your church. Heaven forbid what you think would be the point, right? You think that's what you would want? If we want to get out of that transfer growth dilemma and shenanigans, we should want for people to come to know Jesus. So you can have both. You can keep your baby and your bathwater. I am pro doing both. It's okay. And also, I just think we need to be on guard against the. I think a hard heart that can come from this message is hard. And you soft people. And we like it hard and we like, oh, the wrath and hell and the tough messages and, and we like the deep stuff and we go, we spend nine years going through Romans one word at a time. And, and there can be, there can be a pride and arrogance in that side of things. And look, if you're wired that way, great. If you're wired that way, not great. Here's the I'm just saying we gotta be on guard against that sort of pharisaical. It's hard and we like it hard. And we. We're not. We're against all those soft people and soft messages. I remember we were doing a concert in with no longer music in a church, which is rare for us, but we were doing that one time and this kid came into the church and he goes, this is the best bleeping thing I've ever seen, you know? And, and someone says to him, this is a church. You can't talk like that. So, so the guy leaves, you know, and there was going to be a really clear, strong message about Jesus. But because of that attitude, you know, he leaves. And I think in this day, we need to not be so religious that a guy can come into the church like that and he can, but then we don't change the message. We don't turn it into something that's lightweight and compromising. But man, I think people, if they would come into the church as Jesus would want a church to be, it would be so welcoming and so, so like people who are not from the church would want to be there. And let me just say this one last thing, because you can go back and listen to my conversation with doctor Frank Turek. But one thing I did say to him, where I feel like I pushed back a little bit, is that what's hard for someone outside of the church? Ultimately, if giving the true, full on, watered down gospel is your priority? Why are you fixated and hung up on? Well, it's got to be deep exegetical work on the Greek and Romans. Look, that's not not what the hard part is. The hard part is you're a sinner. You need to surrender. You need to repent. And that message, while being hard is also very simple. And so that's kind of what I rejected because sometimes I feel like, well, faithfulness is just the deep grind of daily nerdery and discipleship. And yeah, there's place for that. But what makes following Jesus hard, what makes it countercultural? What makes it give up your life to find it is dying to yourself. And so if that message is being communicated, then that is what makes it hard. Sin is bad and we need to repent of it, right? So I think that is a little bit of a point where I think it's worth emphasizing, because that sometimes feels is what's propped up as the thing we should not get rid of in the name of softening the message, when in reality, the hard part of the message is not the the deep exegetical study of Jeremiah. That stuff's important, but that's not what makes it hard. What makes it hard is self-denial. And that is actually quite a simple message that every church should be preaching all the time. My most important contribution to this conversation is going to be to go back. I know you think I'm about to say something really dumb, but I'm not. We're gonna go to the. We don't know yet. You haven't said it yet. We gotta go back to bro. Luke was not thinking that. I'm gonna go back to the idea of what the biblical church was, if I could define it in the simplest way, I would say the biblical church was a come and see, go and do model. And the average church, which is not to say every church come and live. Not every church, but most churches are listen, learn, leave. And that's the problem. They're like, they're like completely different and opposing issues. And I think that's got to be the prayer, you know, like, Lord, help us to be the kind of people that lead churches and attend churches that are like, I want to go. I want to be a part of it. And then I'm, I'm so inspired, so moved that I just like, I want to go do and like, I want to go express my faith and share what God's doing, what he taught me in church. And so I guess I do completely disagree with the doctor guy, but it took me a cool podcast conversation to realize that. Doctor Quinn, medicine woman, doctor. All right. Well, David, I can only imagine, only imagine how you're going to wrap this up in a beautiful David's random story style, but I believe in you. I would love to hear what you have to say. Ready? So anyway, I'm I'm inspired by the whole, you know, you shouldn't have ripped up jeans or t shirts and all that kind of stuff. So I was thinking, I want to bring back the phylacteries. Oh, you know what phylacteries are? No. Is that a Dutch word? No. Clearly no one does. And that's the point. It's like the they would wear these boxes on their head with parts of the Torah in it. Oh, you know what I'm saying? So apparently. Well, that's really going back. They would have these boxes with leather straps that would go around the back of their head, like. And it'd be pretty radical if you think about it. It's like, that's quite a radical fashion. I don't know if anyone will know who this band is. Saviour machine. It's kind of like that. Yeah, you know, I know. Saving machine. That's a that's a that's a name I've not heard. You know them. Yeah I do. Yeah. Yeah. That's an era I was mercifully spared from. They were cool. Saviour machine had like a metal cross stuck to his forehead. Save your machine sounds like a band name that you were given as a punishment for losing a bet. Yeah, no, but save your machine. They were cool. What were they? Kind of. What were they? Gothic kind of. It was. Yeah, they were gothic. They were like Gothic metal. Opera. Opera. Metal. They like operatic. Gothic like something. He had this like. And he wore this big robe and everything. So he was like ghost before ghost or sleep token before sleep token. So he had take this box and then they put it around on the back of your head. It's a small black leather box. I would like to challenge you guys if you want to really be serious about this with scripture on your head in a box. Exactly. Did I disappear? Oh, no. You did. That's so beautiful, Luke. How you said that. The only problem with doing these back to back things is I gotta pee. All right, that's fine. Is that bad to say on air? All right, let's, uh, let's move on. Uh, that was great, David. That was whimsical and wonderful, and I never want to hear it again. Uh, okay. That's it. Thanks for listening, y'all. Uh, that'll be interesting timing. My interview with doctor Frank Turek came out last week. This conversation shall come out a few weeks afterwards, so that's great. I wonder if he'll listen. I highly doubt it. He'll be like, oh, they talked about me after the interview. I highly doubt it, I bet. So let us know what you think. Send an email, all emails to Luke at org. Uh, especially you doctor. If you have any thoughts, you want to have a coffee to discuss this further, DM us go on our socials. Send Chad a basket of fruit because he loves it and needs it for reasons we won't divulge on this podcast. Oh please don't. And that's it. We'll talk to you next time. Peace.

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