Unpacking Andy Stanley, Albert Mohler & The Unconditional Conference
Music.
To the Uncut Podcast. I'm Pastor Luke. I'm Pastor Cameron.
And this is the Uncut Podcast, where we have uncut, honest conversations about faith, life,
and ministry. Today, we are going to be diving into, I don't know, is it a current topic? It's
a current church topic of maybe some debate, some back and forth, controversy. He said,
He said type of the type of thing that's been going around the internet the last,
Couple weeks. Yeah. Um, yeah this specific this specific one, but the the the controversy surrounding some of the characters involved is,
Longer. Yeah, it's nothing particularly new,
so And I didn't I wasn't aware of this until yesterday until you brought it to my attention it escaped my eagle eye,
Of what's going on in the church world and,
How do we want to frame it well.
That's a good question because I would like to give,
Even though I have my own thoughts and perspectives, I would like to give an equal.
An equal um fair shake essentially to each of the parties involved right which we'll link
we'll link all we'll both we'll link both parties yeah responses to each other and statements in the
in the show notes so that you can go and look at those yourself you can even go do that before
you listen if you really want to okay so i guess i'll just explain yeah the situation so in down
Down in Georgia, there is a very influential pastor by the name of Andy Stanley,
son of the famous Charles Stanley, if you're of the church world.
Andy is pastor of North Point Community Church, one of the largest and most influential churches in America.
He is probably one of the most, He is one of the most influential pastors in America.
And I've always respected his ministry, liked his ministry.
I've never really paid that much attention to him, if I'm 100% honest.
I don't think I've ever listened to a sermon by him or anything like that.
Maybe read a book that was required of me at one point. He's a really good communicator.
Yeah. Very, very good communicator and a really good writer.
Writer, read a couple of his books that I thought were excellent. Probably his most excellent book
was in response to the last controversy that he was a part of, a book called Irresistible.
Excellent, excellent book, but it was in response to a controversy that was created after he
made some comments about unhitching the Old Testament from current Christian experience
in theology, and that book was essentially his explanation of that comment in a very,
very long form.
Yeah, I thought it was excellent. Okay Okay. Bye-bye.
So his church, essentially.
After experiencing what he described as starting way back.
In 2011, I think, had been experiencing lots of-
Pastoral concerns, shepherding responsibilities. And the main concern, or the main things
that were coming up were that they were finding
middle schoolers and youth group age kids, students,
who were expressing in their small groups,
that they were having same-sex attraction, they were having a homosexual desire,
they didn't know what to do with it,
they were scared, they were confused, they were, they didn't know how,
why they were feeling the way that they were feeling.
And they were confessing these things to their small group leaders.
And they're small groups.
It was 10 years ago. And so, what they were experiencing then was this sense of like,
how do we shepherd these kids through this and in this?
But equally as important is how do we support the family unit, parents in particular,
as they parent their kids through these really difficult situations and questions
in a way that honors Jesus,
in a way that allows them to remain in relationship and connection with their kids
without just like flat out, you know, ostracizing them.
And so they started a ministry back in 2013 called Parent Connect. Yep.
Which gave parents who were having similar experiences essentially a small group of their own.
And that eventually grew and grew and grew and grew and grew and grew and grew
to like 300 some parents.
I mean, understand this is a church of tens of thousands of people.
Right, right. So yeah.
And so as they were, as this was happening, they were saying like, we were this parent connect group,
as a whole and the leaders of that were saying like, we need a bigger resource to help these parents.
Navigate through these very difficult waters. And so the leaders of that ministry went to Andy,
with the pastor and said, could we hold some kind of training,
some kind of conference.
In order to bring perspective, help encourage parents, maybe bring some resourcing,
that will help them to navigate through this. And so Andy said, absolutely. I think that's a
great idea. And so they established a conference called Unconditional, which I'm assuming is meant
to express, you know, unconditional love for our kids.
The, if you go to the website for Unconditional, the conference, the stated goal of the conference
is, you will be equipped, refreshed, and inspired as you hear from leading communicators on topics
that speak to your heart, soul, and mind. No matter the theological stance you hold,
we invite you to listen, reflect, and learn as we approach this topic from the quieter
middle space.
Okay. Okay. So.
That's what happened. He hosted a conference that came out of an ongoing pastoral need and or
ministry that had been ongoing to parents of LGBTQ+. And yeah, so it seems like a very natural
thing to do from all of that backstory. So the reason it hit the news, or it hit kind of like
the blogosphere, like it became a talking point was because Albert Moeller, who is...
He's president of Southern Baptist Convention. And he's also, he hosts, he does a lot of political social commentary. He has like a
podcast that's every day. It's like, you know, a 15, 20 minute podcast where he just talks about
the headlines and talks about like theological implications for social things. He wrote a
article for where, what was it? World.
World where he calls out, he sees the conference prior to it having happened. So conference, I think when he wrote that
article, the conference had not yet happened. It was like, no,
he know it was it hadn't happened yet. Yeah. So it hadn't happened yet. It was scheduled to happen. molar got on the
website, read about the conference read about the
speakers became knowledgeable what slash already was knowledgeable about who those speakers are.
Moeller is a, if nothing else, a very intelligent man with a mind that has like a steel trap.
He seems to be constantly reading and aware of things.
He reads that and he essentially kind of calls Andy Stanley out for having.
Departed from biblical Christianity, raising concerns over the language when you stated
that the purpose of the conference, Moeller takes particular aim at this, the quieter middle ground.
In particular, he says, and I'll quote him here, he says, He says, ministry leaders working through these issues.
In clearly biblical terms would be a welcome development, but the advertising for the Unconditional Conference
indicates clearly that this event is designed as a platform for normalizing the LGBTQ revolution,
while claiming that the conference represents the quieter middle space. Right.
And his assertion behind that is that the speaker, the speaker list... Speakers, yeah.
Contains three prominent speakers, I think, that I remember he mentioned specifically,
who he identified as clearly not holding biblical or New Testament Christian sexual ethic
in concern with homosexuality and homosexual practice. And so he sees that as a clear red
flag, warning sign that this is wrong, that this conference is about normalizing homosexual
practice in the Christian faith, and kind of fires that shot across the bow. And that's...
And that becomes at least the spark for all of the subsequent people talking about it,
responding to it. And the conference happens. Andy Stanley on this past Sunday, if I've got my timing right.
Dedicated his Sunday morning church services, didn't have a traditional Sunday service and
give a traditional message, but gave it time to essentially just respond to that article.
And that's up on, again, all of the articles, the responses, all that's linked in the show notes.
He gives what was like, I think it was like 49 minute talk Um in response where he kind of outlines the history that you just gave,
so, uh, which is I think is a key important like part to the story um,
Is you know is that at that point andy kind of made visible what was invisible to a lot of people,
Was that his historical?
Or historical thread that carried them to the decision to hold the conference and stuff like that.
And then he kind of gave his explanation, and we'll talk probably more about that, so,
I don't want to dive into Andy's response too deeply, other than simply to say that
Andy gave the explanation that you sort of gave, that story, and affirmed conservative
Christian sexual ethic, and then kind of move forward.
So then Albert Moller saw that response obviously and gave another response
I don't know if he wrote an article, but he did release I listened to his podcast response,
and So he He kind of doubled down,
calling out some of the wording and responses that Andy used in his response and so
That's at least where this kind of stands. It's probably pretty much the end of the conversation. I don't imagine that either of them,
Have too much more to go back and forth on no, I don't know. I can't imagine why,
but when you're also seeing like,
You know you say that okay, Andy Stanley has a pretty big platform. Yes. He does have an extraordinarily large platform.
There's good argument to say that Albert Mueller's platform is larger probably,
Um, the Southern Baptist convention is the largest Protestant denomination in the United States. Yeah.
Um, and there are some big heavy hitters in the SBC, um, they, uh, and so, and so it is
obviously filtering into the followers essentially of both Andy Stanley and the SBC.
I'm sure that the conversation itself is not over, but the primary, the primary, the Stanley
and Moeller, I don't imagine will exchange much more than they already have.
I think all the followers, the subsequent people like us will continue the conversation though. Right. So...
I... Where do we want to go from there?
Yeah.
So I wrote a lot of questions down. Yeah, that are that I want to kind of wrestle with.
Also recognizing that.
It's I think it's difficult and I was why I appreciated Andy's message The sermon that he gave this week. It's difficult to divorce the
the conversation around it from the reason, ultimately, that the conference was developed in the church.
Yes. You can't divorce it from the people that he's seeking to care for.
Right. If I could characterize, like, I don't want to overly broad sweep this and say that Albert
Moeller has zero pastoral heart or intention, but it seems to me that Albert Moeller is
particularly concerned with theological orthodoxy and clarity, and Andy Stanley, I don't want
to say he's unconcerned with those things, but he seems to be primarily more emphasizing
shepherding and pastoral care concerns over the particular clarity and being hyper-clear
and like, you know, line by line affirming kind of traditional Christian ethics, sexual
ethic.
And so it, that's I think where some of the conflict is coming from, Moller coming at this from like a...
More detached theological perspective, Andy coming at it from a more,
integrated pastoral perspective. Right. So.
Right. And one of my questions, you know, one of my ultimate questions is, is like, what is the,
you know, is this a pastoral issue, or is it a theological issue, or is it both,
and what is the connection there.
And maybe we can come back to that. But I'm not, you know, like I'm not,
I don't wanna come down at least at this point as saying I agree with this,
I agree with Andy or I agree with Al or I agree with, you know, whatever.
What I will say is that I do feel for Andy in this situation.
I feel for him because I do get the sense.
I have no reason to not believe him that this came out of the reality.
Of the people that he's pastoring that are just really confused and really hurt
and don't know how to proceed.
And his desire is to respond in some way to those, to their hurt and to their confusion.
And I mean, as a father of children with some non-normative issues myself, Mm-hmm. I.
I like have myself been in a place of like I'm suffocating under the weight
of not knowing what to do, not knowing where to go,
wondering who I can talk to about these issues because they're not normal and not everyone experiences them
and I kind of just feel out on an island about it.
And so, if my pastor was like, we're gonna get, you know, like,
we're gonna surround you with a community of people that are experiencing the same things as you,
we're going to do our best to resource you with people who are mired in the conversation
for longer than we are.
We're gonna take this issue that's serious for you, I guess for you, we're gonna take it serious as a church.
That would be life-giving, life-giving.
So I feel a little bit sympathetic towards Andy because I feel like he responded pastorally
and is getting a lot, taking a lot of heat from it.
The heat from it.
Now, that's not to say that,
when every time we respond pastorally, we have to do so with an absence of theological perspective.
Meaning like we can't, I don't think that we can. Because people's lives are involved,
I get to kind of make theology foggy.
Right, or soft.
Yeah, right. I don't have to take a strong theological perspective because it's a sensitive issue for people.
We don't, that's not being pastoral, actually.
Being pastoral, I think, is integrating a deep care for a person along with a commitment to,
what we believe the truth of God's word is,
knowing that the truth of God's word actually offers the most deeply pastoral response
people. It's just, I think it's in the nuancing of biblical truth that the pastoral heart comes out.
Yeah.
You know, because there is a difference between.
The classic line of beating someone over the head with the Bible, right? Yeah.
And speaking the truth of God's heart and God's word into the midst of a relationship
that's already been developed of trust and love,
and respect, you know.
So I there I feel some I feel some sympathy. Yeah, some empathy or sure Yeah, I feel sorry for right a little bit and and I'll be honest like I've never watched an Anley Stanley sermon
I'm not sure that I've read an Anley Stanley book. So I'm really very just not familiar with him,
But having watched his response video,
My respect for him went up. Yeah, I was like, oh oh, there's some robustness here and a pastor's heart
that I can really resonate with and actually respect.
He said something towards the end, it was like kind of his last main section of his response,
which was essentially.
Okay, there was the history of how this came about and why we decided to do it,
but you all want to know, what do we believe as a church?
Because it would seem that if we believe that homosexuality is indeed a sin according to scripture
and incompatible with Christian teaching,
that there is a Christian sexual ethic and it does not include homosexual practice,
then what is it that we believe, Andy? Why are we, what do we believe?
I thought his response was really good and not one that I ever really stopped
to consider the difference, the nuance, because he said something to the effect of like, what we believe.
Is really the wrong question. Because in a church as large as ours, this is him speaking,
yes, in a church as large as ours, yes, you're going to find people that believe,
1000 different things on the same topic, right? And even a church as large as ours, yes,
you're going to find that people believe different things. Yeah, on different topics,
Around the same topic, right, but what do we teach? Yes, but he said the question is not what we believe,
The question is what do we teach? Yes. Mm-hmm. I thought that was a really helpful distinction. Yes. Well,
before you go on I do think that like.
I Read a paper. It's like there's not very many papers I read in my degree that like I actively remember but there are a handful
One of them was an argumentation for a hermeneutic of love. So, hermeneutic being,
like a fancy word for how we read and understand a text. The lens you look through. And that can be applied to the Bible. Usually when
you're talking with pastors and Christians, hermeneutics is applied,
strictly to the Bible. Hermeneutics is also a larger discipline in scholasticism and can be applied to any text as a larger philosophical question.
But this paper or book, it was arguing that, like, one of our key lenses we need to read
through is with a lens of love and charity.
He was a professor, if I remember correctly, and he had a student who, like, in a lecture
class said, like, oh, the author of this book is so dumb, and, like, just decided, just
tried to kind of just, like, ride over this author's opinion and his argumentation in the book.
And the professor stopped his student and said, would you say that to the author's face?
Is that how you would treat him if he was here in the room?" And so, the professors,
the guy who wrote this article, he is just like, can you enter into a dialogue with who you're
reading? And can you choose to do so with charity? Christian charity, Christian love,
seek understanding, do not become determined to misunderstand, right? And for me, that's something
that's resonated with me for a long time, still stands out in my mind. And as I hear these three,
pieces, the article, the response by Andy, and then Albert Muller's podcast, there are instances
in all three of those where I feel like they are committed to misunderstanding and speaking past
each other. And what you're pointing out is one of those reasons. Is that distinction
between what do we believe and what do we teach, right? And that is a ecclesiological distinction,
that is probably very necessary at the size of church that Andy Stanley pastors at.
And the complexity of that, that I'm not sure is incorporated to the way that Albert Moeller is
responding to Andy's statements.
I think what Al wants is he wants a unity of belief within in the church.
Not necessarily a unity of teaching. Yeah.
He wants a unity of like, no, everyone must believe this way.
Right. Making it clear that if you do not believe that way, you are in some way not,
welcome, or you are some way not in.
Or you have departed.
Right. From biblical Christianity. Right. It's an in, it's an out. It's that statement. Andy is seeking,
very possibly because of the nature of his ministry, like, and its necessity for that,
is seeking to figure out how to draw a line—draw circles rather than lines, which is a whole
statement in itself that they go back and forth over. But—and I don't know, like, I don't have—I
I continue to wrestle with, we're not pastors of a massive megachurch, and so our philosophy
of ministry hasn't had to accommodate some of the complexities of size.
And I do still wonder if there comes a point at which, you know, my philosophy of ministry
would not allow me to pastor a church of a certain size because of the compromises I
I would potentially have to make on how I think ministry should be conducted.
And so I don't know that I necessarily agree with some of the conclusions that Andy draws with,
but I do respect and understand them, I think.
Yes, yeah, agree. Yeah. I agree with that. So I didn't mean to completely derail
where you were going with that, but I thought that was a really key thing.
Sure.
So, yeah, I, um, anyway, in that section of that message, he does outline, at least in
some general terms, one of the, one of the points that Albert Mueller makes throughout
all of his responses that Andy just doesn't go far enough in the clarity of his belief
or what he teaches.
Right. And.
And partially, Andy responds to that actually in his message where he says,
my first responsibility of communication and clarity is to my local church. Yes.
So I like, it's really not unclear where we stand here in North Point.
Right. Because everyone who's here, Shears the teaching and knows, right?
So maybe I'm like being a little unfair with this really brief explanation about what they teach
because I'm sure, because I'm a pastor and I know that someone could soundbite,
grab something that I say in a sermon and say, this is all that they believe on a topic
where they haven't listened to the last nine years of preaching that I've done here. Right.
So how could they grab it out of one thing? So with that understanding.
I do think that there is some, there could have been more room for clarity,
and going further in Andy's response about what do we believe about a New Testament sexual ethic.
You know, and he does, we affirm what scripture says about marriage.
We affirm what scripture says about homosexual practice.
We agree with Paul. We agree with Jesus.
We agree with the scripture.
But then you look at the conference and you're like,
How, where does the theology impact the practice?
Right, and what, like what is the discernment process.
That happens when you say on one side of the coin, we affirm what, for instance,
First Corinthians chapter six, verse nine,
or essentially we affirm what the scripture says about marriage between one man and one woman,
for life, all this, we affirm all that.
And then on the other side, now we're holding a conference.
And if I had to guess, I would say that the conference speakers are actually
the sticking point for Al Mohler.
Probably I think that they are the thing that was like spotlight Mm-hmm that they're the thing that ultimately,
Brought the attention if Andy Stanley would have been the one just teaching the lessons. Mm-hmm,
I think it wouldn't have been a thing right but some of the speakers,
That they brought to the conference. Mm-hmm We're troubled.
It's troublesome. And I...
Thank you.
I get it. I get where Al Mueller is coming from. Yeah. That this is, this is troubling. Yes.
For instance, in his first, um, uh, first article, he said, schedule speakers for the
event included two men who are married to other men, at least according to current civil law,
um, biographical background on speakers, Justin Lee and Brian needs will indicate that both men are in what is now described as same sex marriages. Um,
Lee is well-known as a platform speaker who argues for the legitimacy of monogamous same-sex relationships.
Nietzsche presents seminars on restoring LGBTQ plus faith.
Just to be clear, I do not believe that this is the quieter middle space.
And then he quotes David Gushie, who is a doctor, a scholar,
who says, essentially,
I grant that the historical claim that the Christian church has believed over the time that same-sex acts
in relationships are always wrong,
but the book traces his change over time to a position in which it clearly asserts
that the Christian church has been historically wrong on the issue.
And then he quotes Gushie one more time saying, this is one of the speakers, Gushie,
I am, I am instead asking whether a devout gay and lesbian Christian might be able to
participate in the covenantal marital sexual ethical standard, one person for life, faithful
and exclusive in a loving, non-exploitive, non-coercive reciprocal relationship.
That is the highest expression of Christian sexual ethics, which in fact, a goodly number are already doing.
I can find a compelling reason. I can't find a compelling reason to say no anymore.
Right. So he says you can be gay and in a homosexual relationship and be a Christian. Yes.
Those are the speakers. Those are the speakers that that's their personal views their personal
view set written books about done other speaking events about they were invited to speak at the
conference on I don't think I don't get the sense that they were given a blank platform.
But it's also like, I don't really know. So I don't know the content of what they said or what
exactly they were invited for and he did give some context in his response of saying like,
wanted them to share their stories and wanted them to provide kind of um greater level of like,
wanted to I guess his stated reason for having them there was to provide uh the parents with
greater levels of understanding of what potentially their children are experiencing, or what they feel. And that was the main reason why he brought them there. That seems to be what Andy was intending to communicate when he responded.
Right. Yeah. So that was, I think if I had to guess that that's probably one of the main issues is like, yeah. And I get it. I really get it because I don't agree with gushy. Right. I don't.
I don't, especially when he says that that is the highest expression of Christian sexual ethics.
For me, that ends the conversation, because you can't have a conversation about the highest
expression of Christian sexual ethics without talking about the rightness or wrongness of
homosexual practice. That is within a Christian sexual ethic.
Right? Or, or the calling of singleness. Celibacy. Celibacy. Yes. And, and its place in Christian
practice. Yes. So, which is a very obvious principle in the script of scripture. Yeah.
A call to celibacy as being better if you're able. Jesus and Paul both talked about it. Right. So,
So, um, so I don't agree and, uh, with Kashi.
And so I think the question then is, huh.
To what level of agreement must a pastor have?
In order to allow someone to, for lack of a better term, speak behind their pulpit.
Like what ends up being the litmus test of belief in order to like give permit, like, okay, Okay.
Mm-hmm. Teach the people. Yeah.
I will challenge that a little bit, just because it is a conference.
It's not a Sunday morning. It's not to the general audience.
I don't know. Tell me what you think about this. I'll just kind of make forth what I'm thinking.
I don't know if I agree with this or not.
So in my degree program when I was studying at Moody, loved my program there, benefited a lot from it.
One of the critiques, I have a couple of critiques, but one of the critiques, particularly of
my degree program, was that a lot of times my professors would hand us books by authors
that we were meant to essentially wholesale agree with.
So we would be handed a book, and we might agree or disagree with them a little bit,
but very rarely did a professor inside of my pastoral degree program hand me a book
and say, this is kind of a controversial take, but I want you to wrestle with the ideas that.
Are in here.
I did have professors who did that, but they were outside of my degree program.
They were either in the philosophy department, theology department, or in a different department.
Weren't dedicated to the pastoral department. A lot of the pastoral department was just kind of
like, this is what I think is right. You should agree with most of what this book says, because
I agree with it. And that was kind of the understood tenor. And in academia, I very much appreciate...
Reading and hearing all sides. Mm-hmm. Like I'm an Enneagram nine. I Love like reading and understanding all of the all of the sides. So and there's something,
particularly enlightening to reading somebody and understanding Their thought process and learning from someone who you disagree with on significant points,
There's significant learning there I think if you if you are unable to learn from people who you.
Don't agree with 100% then I think you're going to miss out on a lot of things and.
I think at least my conceptualization my if I was to guess like if I were to put myself in Andy's shoes and say
What reasoning would I have?
Potentially to make the decisions that he made is I would say that there are, you know, a... what do these parents need to learn to grow, and do they
need to be exposed to people who maybe they do not agree with, but have something that they can learn from?
And is there room inviting them to say, hey, I'm not asking you to come here and bring
your conviction, maybe, on theological—again, I'm making an assumption, but I'm not asking you to
come and give your argument for your biblical interpretation of the Bible. I just want you to
share your church experience. I want you to share what happened to you growing up, how that impacted
you, and how that's made it difficult for you to maintain faith as you've grown up, or things like
that, which could be really informative. So, I could kind of see an argument there for that,
and it's being directed not at a general congregation, but at people who are very
much facing that reality as it was. And so, I don't know, what do you think about that? Does that...
Um, does that begin to approach what you were saying about what level of agreement do you
need to have to share, uh, to let someone preach behind your pulpit or do you feel like
I'm making too many concessions?
Um, I think that the practice of exposing yourself to people that you don't agree with
Um, is, um, is can be helpful.
Mm.
Um, I don't think it's a particularly wise thing to do in the, um, when we're
dealing with issues that are,
I would say, fairly settled in scripture.
And while I would be fine with that happening fine with that happening in like a conference in a hotel or in a hotel or
something like that. Yeah. My my position on the ministry of the word is that I,
don't I'm not going to intentionally expose the people that I am pastorally responsible.
For To things that I believe are firmly established as sin in Scripture just for the sake of their.
Broadening the horizon's flexibility, right? Because which is the difference between church and academia, right? Because I think if you'd say okay, does that,
Hold water. Would you say the same thing? Mm-hmm for,
Something else that is Like what I bring an Aryan would you bring someone who who says that they do not believe?
Adultery is Or like I'm a Christian swinger,
Want you to come and just hear my right position or a Christian polygamist or
polyamory, right We wouldn't do that. No What I wouldn't yeah, we wouldn't that's not intellectual honesty, right?
And so And so no, I I wouldn't I wouldn't do that And in particular with this guy like this guy Duffy. I don't know him,
Duffy's that his name gushy gushy.
He was there not representing his personal story He was there representing what the, the, the, um, his
assertions in his book, which a goodly number are, and I can,
I can't find a compelling, compelling reason to say no.
Right.
Anymore. So he's making his case, you know?
Um, and we, we, you know, we, we have dealt with similar with similar issues on a smaller scale here, which is like...
What level, like, when does friendship.
Or relationship or even participation in ministry equal affirmation of their belief?
Yes.
So, how deeply can I be in relationship with a person, maybe even inside of my own church?
How much leadership can I give them, how involved in ministry can they be while maintaining a separation
from the affirmation of what they believe,
or maybe even what they practice, how their life is lived.
And I think that there does become a tipping point.
Even scripturally speaking, where we're not, you know,
that we're not to associate with certain people,
that bad company corrupts good character, that there is a system even for expelling.
The immoral brother, as the scripture says, or even in Matthew chapter 18,
Jesus is like, they can be put out of community
because of a, a willfulness towards unrepentance for sin. And so there, and this, this said, this,
speaks to a main theological value of Andy. One of the first things that he said was that,
Listen Jesus didn't draw lines,
He drew Jesus drew circles. Yeah,
Which is really pithy. Oh, it's great. Um, everyone loves it. Everyone wants to be in the circle Donald preach,
Right if you've ever if you've ever seen meet the parents, you know, yeah, Robert De Niro talks about the Burns family circle of trust,
Either in it or you're out of it right here. We have the Jesus circle
Yeah of inclusivity, right? Is it true in the Gospels that Jesus drew a,
very wide circle,
To include people that the religious community of the day.
Ostracized. Yes, absolutely. 100%. 100%. He drew the circle wider than anyone ever had.
Yeah. He's had down with tax collectors and sinners, prostitutes, right? Samaritans. And,
you know, to Albert Mueller's point, yes. His podcast response to that, which was a very good
point. Very good point. Jesus drew circles. Absolutely. He drew circles, but he also drew
lines. He drew hard lines. Yeah, he did. He drew hard lines up into the point of eternal damnation. Depart from me for I
did not know you. Yes, right. The sheep and the goats. Yeah,
as an example, right? Or the ritual young ruler. What what what do I need to do? sell all of your possessions? Went away
sad, right? Right. Didn't say oh, it's fine.
Yeah. Come in the circle, right? So like the narrow door, right?
Or the narrow gate. Yes. Like the, you know, the narrow path, narrow path that leads to life, but if you find it,
right. But why does the road that leads to destruction and many follow it?
Yes.
So those are lines. They're both right. They're both correct.
Yes. circles, but Jesus draws just as many lines and the lines are always with sin, repentance,
a willingness to follow him. And so when it comes back to these, the speakers of the conference,
are they in the circle or is there a line? And it's clear that Andy's willing to draw larger
circles than maybe I would. Maybe Albert Mueller would. Maybe you would. I don't know.
He may have a different perspective on the sharing of his pulpit than I do. I don't know.
I think that the pulpit as an analogy for the ministry of the word is a sacred trust.
And I think Andy is responsible for everything, ultimately.
For the teaching, doctrine, faith and life of the congregation.
Yeah, that comes out of North Point.
I don't know how you get around that, Andy. Like, you might not be the person
that says the words all the time, but you're still responsible,
even if you're unaware of what's being said. Ultimately, you're responsible.
You are the leader. So...
So, yeah, I think that there's a I think that there's a significant issue there for me. Mm-hmm, and I think that I think probably,
It'd be stupid to To think that Andy didn't calculate that He obviously did. Yeah, and.
And obviously he calculated, you know, it was a calculated a risk that he was willing to take. Mm-hmm,
Right. Because I like, if you listen to his talk, his primarily I like, I, you
know, I see things from both perspectives. And but one of the things that I think is, you know, powerful about Andy's position, is he's like, what
we've been doing has not been working, right? He is like, he gave some very
compelling statistics up front, which I know statistics are, you know, 95% of
statistics are just made up. But, you know, if those, if, you know, I imagine, I don't imagine
he made those up. I don't mean to say that, but statistics can be convenient. So he said something
along the lines of like, what, 70% of gays have left their faith or something like that. Like,
there was a large number. The numbers are staggering. The numbers are staggering. The
amount of people who now live in an alternative sexual lifestyle, who at one point had Christian
faith and have now left it because of that sexual lifestyle. And he's like, this isn't good. What's
happening isn't... he sees it as a problem. And he's like, what do we need to do to fix it?
And I think he has, I do think that like in one regard.
Because it's it's the if I think if I try and put myself in the frame that he's in and he's operating in this frame
of parents and he makes it very clear that like and it's I agree with them it's a.
Wisdom that you Ultimately, you cannot control what other adults do right?
And that's where he I think a lot of the ministry that to the parents of people who are LGBT,
Comes in and he's like you cannot convince control coerce. I think he you know some sort of,
Alliteration that he had there,
He's like you ultimately cannot control what your adult child chooses to do with their sexuality.
It's ultimately their choice. And so, some of the language he uses is that of kind of boundary drawing,
clear self-differentiation, saying like, I'm not responsible for what they do.
I'm responsible for what I do. And he's saying, let me do things that maintain relationship,
rather than destroy relationship.
And so, and I don't think he ever leaves that framework.
I think he stays in that framework for pretty much his entire talk.
And I think that's one of the things that's kind of tricky about Andy's talk
is because Albert Moeller is talking about...
He's talking in a large philosophical, sociological context.
I think Andy, even if you listen to his talk, aside for a handful of comments, it's almost
entirely directed towards his local church, and his publishing of it is mostly just letting
people listen into it.
There wasn't very often that he turned and he talked, metaphorically I mean this, not
very often that he metaphorically talked to the larger audience that wasn't in the room.
I don't think Andy would have done that response if people in his church had not been affected
by the public outcry.
He largely frames it like, the reason I'm giving this talk is because you, my congregation,
not Albert Moeller, not the news pundits, whatever, I'm giving this because you are
confused, you're calling the office, some of you are leaving, some of you are angry,
of you are shocked, and he didn't quite explicitly ask for forgiveness or apologize, but he seemed
to make an admission, at least implied, that there was some misstep or oversight in the
fact that they had not clearly communicated that this was a ministry that existed.
Already. Already. For 10 years. For 10 years.
So it was something that was at the church, but they hadn't made it very publicly known.
It seems that they kind of connected people to the ministry quietly, and so a large amount
of people didn't know this was going on, and then they felt shocked and confused and weren't
sure what to do about it.
And he perhaps... He doesn't quite explicitly admit guilt or responsibility there, but it's kind of implied
that there was a misstep in not having that public.
But so there's that question, and this is where, and we will probably have to turn this
into a part two if we want to dive, really dive down into this rabbit hole. But anyway. Bye. Bye.
Do you, like, where does that principle, because I agree, generally, with that principle of like,
I cannot control what other people do, they're responsible for what they do, if they,
I have my sexual ethic, I've told them about it, I've taught it, but it's ultimately their
responsibility for what they will do with the truth. Right? That is a good thing. Good. It's
a good thing to have in mind as a pastor, as a preacher, as a parent. It's great. At what point,
does that become permissive and deny church discipline, accountability, and so forth?
And Andy seems very, again, seems, from my perspective, seems to be willing to allow
a wide variety of choice, despite explicit teaching, yeah. And some of
that is potentially the dynamic of having such a large church.
Thank you.
But is that a negligence to Paul's command, do not associate with such a one?
Right.
That's where, for me, as much as I can empathize with Andy and some of the things that he says,
and the framework that I think he's operating from, I get to that point, I'm like, I don't,
know, at what point, you know, is someone coming to the church, listening to the teaching, and
and saying, yeah, he disagrees with me.
And like, yeah, I'm hearing the truth, but there's zero teeth, zero enforcement of it.
They're powerless to do anything to not coerce, but hold accountability, to speak prophetically,
to call forward into obedience.
They have zero power to do that in my life. I'm just going to occasionally hear
an uncomfortable message once in a while.
And is that, that's a line that has been, I think, crossed or not drawn.
Yeah, I have an agree is probably it's the fodder for part two.
Yeah. Cause yeah, I think I have a note here to talk about the difference between,
the progression that someone goes through in their discipleship,
And how, what is the expectation of the speed at which.
They move from point A to point B. Or even point A to point Z. Yeah.
In order to be in our church communities.
What do we expect of them? Like you walk through the door and three steps in,
you better be repenting of every sin.
You better be walking away from every decision that you've made, no matter the consequences.
Or you cannot be a part of this community. Yeah. I, you know, and like, you know what I'm saying?
Yeah, no, I know exactly what you have. So you have a, you know, a homosexual couple that walks
in to your church and they have two kids they've adopted, right. Legally adopted, legally married,
legally married because according to the state, whatever, and your response to them immediately
is you must repent. You must get divorced. I don't know what's going to happen with the kids,
but that's not our problem, you know? Or you can't be here to listen about the message of Jesus.
Right.
Like, I don't know what you expect us to do. That's just what the Bible says. Yeah.
You know, so like, what are we asking of people? Right. What are we asking? There was a, I was, because I was curious, I was looking,
I was trying to find, because church discipline is something that's rather vague in modern church.
At least like...
Or just, it just like, it's not readily practiced. Not readily practiced. I did find people who readily practiced it. I was listening to their
podcast about it and their description of how they practice it. One church, they...
It's a freaking mess, let's just say that.
Yeah, they get up and they read a list of people who are not allowed to come forward
and take communion every time they do communion.
And they list the sin. They list the sin that they are being held accountable for and why they cannot come to
comedian.
So, I'm like, huh, um, I don't know, but, you know, what are you, like, I don't think
that's, uh, don't think that's what Jesus meant.
Um, I, you know, I don't think that that is clearly marked in scripture. Um, I don't know.
And then I've got like an interesting question around like Jesus, because Jesus' statement
in Matthew 18, where he talks about, he says, treat them as tax collectors and unbelievers, or...
I don't remember the exact... Can't remember exactly. But the thing that I was thinking
as I was reflecting on that text, I was like, well, wait, how did Jesus teach, treat those people?
He had dinner with them. And so I was curious about the interpretation
of that passage and applying what seems to be
the immediate context of what Jesus seems to be saying, treat them as not one of you,
but then Jesus' behavior was constantly to bring them closer into community.
So, yes.
To bring them closer to himself. Himself. That's where transformation happens.
Right, yes. Right, so. Anyways, those are all things I wanna talk about.
Yeah, well, one of the things that Andy says is like, hey, if your theology does not allow you to be in ministry
to someone else, you might want to reconsider that theology.
Yeah, right.
So this is a complicated. That's a complicated thing. Right.
But I think it's important to talk about. Mm-hmm.
So maybe that's where we'll start next week. Yeah. Start with this idea of like,
to what level of discipleship or sanctification must a person attain to in order to maintain.
Membership in your, in your religious community. Yeah.
And when, when, when is there exclusion from community? Right.
At what point, at what point is there exclusion to community?
And what are the consequences of that?
What is the hope of that? What are the consequences of that?
Yeah. Cause I think those two, there is a biblically described hope.
Um, my contention is that people are never actually rooted in community.
When that church discipline comes forward.
So because they're not actually rooted, they just leave. Yes.
And the hope is never realized because community hasn't been established in their life first.
I see what you're saying.
Yeah. Yep. I can see that train of thought.
Well, thanks for listening. If you haven't heard about all this that's going on
and you want to be a part of the conversation, you can go and we'll link all of this in the,
all of this is linked in the show notes.
It'll all be linked in the show notes. Yeah. You can read it in the description.
Yep, the Unconditional Conference website, Andy's response, Al Mohler's response,
Al Mohler's re-response.
Yeah. And you can join the conversation with us. As always, if you have any questions or comments, please leave them.
You can leave them in the show, in the comment section of the YouTube video
if that's what you're watching, or you can always text us at 716-201-0507.
And that's our The Uncut Podcast text line. And we'll try and deal with those questions accordingly.
Like, rate, subscribe, share, all those things if you would, that'd be really helpful for us.
Thanks for listening, catch you on the next one. We'll see you then.
