The Speak Life Podcast, sharing Jesus in everyday life. Forty years ago this year, John Cleese faced down religious groups who were outraged by his work. In 1979, it was the Bishop of Southwark and Malcolm Muggeridge who were outraged by the blasphemy of the film Life of Brian. Personally, I think Life of Brian is one of the funniest films ever made, and I've used clips of it in sermons before. Clips like this.
SPEAKER_04He has given us a sign! He has given us a shoe! A shoe is a sign. Let us follow his example. Let us like him. For this is his sign that all who follow him shall do likewise!
SPEAKER_03No, no, no, the shoe is a sign! That we must gather shoes together in abundance.
SPEAKER_04No, let us gather shoes together!
SPEAKER_08I don't think it's a bad thing to make fun of religious people. Jesus made fun of religious people a lot. So did the prophets in the Old Testament, so did the apostles in the New Testament. The Bible is religion's mocker in chief. Religion here used in the negative sense of self-righteousness. So I sympathized a lot with John Cleese and Michael Palin as they were berated by the religious. Let me point to five ways the religious unfairly critiqued Cleese and Palin. These are five signs that you are dealing with someone possessed by an unhealthy religious spirit. Number one, assumed superiority. Just listen to the tone of the bishop.
SPEAKER_11Without a hope in any way, sort of being pompous. I mean I have been bishop of South London now for over 20 years.
SPEAKER_08The clerical garb, the tone, the self-credentialing, if this is the bishop not trying to be pompous, his attempts at pomposity would be worthy of Python itself. The second way Cleese and Palin were unfairly attacked by the religious is derision. The Bishop and Muggeridge just attacked the filmmakers personally, and in such inflated terms, they seem laughable at a distance of four decades.
SPEAKER_11I wasn't vicar of the university church for nothing. I am I mean I'm familiar with undergraduate humour. And I also have a governor of a mentally deficient school.
SPEAKER_12But anybody in the future who might dredge up this miserable film, and it's quite possible they might, it's a piece of social history, uh, they would certainly not uh wish to relate it to the thing, say Shart Cathedral, which is which is built to the glory of to the glory of Christ. Not a funny building, actually.
SPEAKER_08By the way, not a funny building has to be in Cleese's top ten lines of all time. Sensational. But the nastiness of the Bishop and Muggeridge is born of religious outrage. These men feel deeply hurt and they lash out in personal terms. The name calling is a sign that they have no arguments to offer. Instead, the dispute lies at a deeper level. They feel the unbelievers have crossed a line. They're out of bounds culturally, spiritually, religiously. They are beyond the pale and must be held up for scorn. The third way these religious men attacked Cleese and Palin was by impugning their motives. Constantly, Cleese and Palin say they are lampooning the unquestioning adherents of religion, or indeed of any dogmatic ideology. They continually say they are not motivated by any desire to lampoon Christ himself.
SPEAKER_02The problem we that we have got is that you think that we're ridiculing Jesus, and we say, um, sort of sincerely and truthfully, that that is certainly not what we intended to do, and I believe that we're not. You keep making the basic assumption that we are ridiculing Christ and Christ's teaching, and I say that we are not.
SPEAKER_08Now, at that point there's an argument to be made that they haven't intended to mock Christ, but they have, and here's why. But these religious men don't deal with the evidence. They claim to know the motivations. Mugridge just says, that's humbug. Of course they meant to mock Christ and his crucifixion. When the host of the show points this out, we see the fourth aspect of the religious approach. Blindness to other perspectives. In this clip, notice the way an alternative viewpoint is put to the bishop, and then listen, you can almost hear the hatches of his mind being batten down.
SPEAKER_05I thought when I saw the film, and I saw it in a cinema in New York with a very um appreciative audience, did you not feel that in fact the people being lampooned were the followers rather than Jesus himself?
SPEAKER_11I mean I thought that very strongly. No, no, I I don't think so. It was I rarely felt, I mean, the the crucifixions above all else, which are things that I felt sad about because I mean I'm quite sure, as all of us will one day, and this is not trying to attack your vulnerabilities, but life is very short, all of us will be on our deathbeds in a comparatively short time. And when I when we are, and that'll be no laughing matter, the uh that it is much that Christ which I should like to be held up in front of me than the Christ I saw just as often.
SPEAKER_08This is blindness to the other perspective. When an alternative view is raised, it's not really considered. The bishop just retreats to his strongest, most religious rhetoric. You're all gonna die, you're gonna need Jesus, I wouldn't mock him if I were you. None of this answers the point that was raised. It is a retreat into dogma, a retreat into the religious bubble. And then finally, we see the excommunication of the heretic. The final words of the interview belong to the Huffy Bishop.
SPEAKER_11You'll get your thirty pieces of silver, but I'm quite sure.
SPEAKER_08Thirty pieces of silver was the fee Judas was paid for betraying Jesus. So here Monty Python is consigned to the outer darkness in the company of Judas, the betrayer of Christ. And that is a particularly religious move to excommunicate the heretic, to exclude them from society. They don't need to be debated anymore. They are beyond the pale, they are outside our tightly guarded religious safe space. And so there we have five marks that you are dealing with someone religious. They assume superiority, they deride you personally, they impugn your motives, they are blind to other perspectives, and they excommunicate you as a heretic. Those were the religious objections John Cleese contended with forty years ago, and this last week he encountered some new detractors. It all began when John Cleese tweeted this. Some years ago I opined that London was not really an English city anymore. Since then, virtually all my friends from abroad have confirmed my observation, so there must be some truth in it. I note also that London was the UK city that voted most strongly to remain in the EU. What could possibly be objectionable here, you might ask? Very famously people say of New York, that it's a country unto itself and not exactly American. I've heard countless people say that of New York, I've heard a number of people say the same, of London. It's very different to the rest of the country. Is there anything controversial here? John Cleese seems to be doing something like what David Goodhart says in his book The Road to Somewhere. He says the political divide we face today is not so much between right and left, but between somewheres and anywheres. Here he outlines the paradigm.
SPEAKER_06Our country is now split into two rival value blocks. The anywhere versus the somewheres. Anywares tend to be educated and mobile. They value autonomy, openness and fluidity. They see the world from, well, anywhere. Somewares tend to be more rooted and less well educated. They value group attachments, familiarity and security. They see the world from particular places, from somewhere. We anywheres are mainly graduates and affluent. We're less than a quarter of the population, but we dominate politics and society, regardless of which party is in power.
SPEAKER_08Goodhart predicted Brexit because he said the majority of Britons do not identify as anywheres. Most Britons are somewheres, and so we're skeptical of the arguments to remain in the supranational EU. Now, personally, I am a classic anywhere. I've spent 10 years of my life in London as an Australian and love the city. I've been half my life in the Northern Hemisphere, half my life in the Southern Hemisphere. I am a classic anywhere. I'm not saying you should be a somewhere. I'm not saying you should be an anywhere. In the Bible, we're called to be both. The Apostle Paul wrote to churches that were in Rome and in Christ. That was the way he addressed them. In Rome and in Christ, in Ephesus and in Christ, in Colossae and in Christ. They were local and they were universal. There should be an element of somewhere and anywhere thinking for the Christian. But Cleese here is making what seems to me to be a perfectly obvious point that London is, understandably, as a global capital, full of anywheres rather than somewheres, full of people like me. So no wonder London voted remained. Seems perfectly understandable. Unless you're religious. Unless you believe in the holy trinity of gender, sexuality, and race, unless you are itching to be offended by a contrary view and your tweeting thumbs hover expectantly on a bigotry hair trigger. If you are such a person, then you read Cleese's tweet and all you can see is racism. Racism everywhere. So Cleese's tweet was retweeted very often in outrage over 10,000 times and drew responses like this from Dom Jolly, a man famous for yelling loudly into outsized comedy phones. He said, John Cleese is one of my comedy heroes, suddenly this thing came out of nowhere and it's so depressing on so many levels. He is clearly a really smart, funny man, but it is basically a very racist tweet. Secondly, it's a racist tweet by a man who lives on a Caribbean island. The irony of that is insane. Even the language is insane. Who uses the word opine? It is insanity, it's very racist to say that London is not very English. Now it would be racist to say the problem with London is it's not very white, but that would be an unlikely thing for Cleese to say, given he's making his home in the Caribbean. Nonetheless, those are the motives people are trying to impute to him. People claim the ability to discern his motives and then to convict him of his assumed thought crime, without any evidence of him actually thinking the wrong thing. They don't need evidence. They have dog whistles. Yes, Cleese was employing a dog whistle, don't you know? So said Caspar Salman of The Independent. In an article headlined John Cleese's latest xenophobic comments reveal a sad truth about aging comedians, Salman writes this The dog whistle racism of the word English as a stand-in for a culture untouched by multiculturalism is surely beneath the wits of Cleese. It's the idea that Cleese is calling to his racist followers in a way undetectable to the right-thinking public, but somehow discernible to the ever-vigilant Casper, whose racy sense is tingling. My spider senses are starting to tingle. This sentiment showed up in spades on Twitter, so one of the replies said, I wonder what he really means by not English. Well, let's let's build a window into John Cleese's soul and let's suspect the worst. The next reply asks, Not white by any chance? Cleese responds, No. Why do you try to discredit me for criticizing things I have not said? Keep your projections to yourself. Cleese consistently said that he's making a point about cultures, not races. David Lamy, MP though, weighed in. John Cleese says London isn't really an English city anymore. I challenge John Cleese to not define Englishness by DNA. People keep making the claim that John Cleese is obsessed with genetics. He keeps claiming he's talking about cultures. Is this really such a hard distinction to grasp? Well, Cleese responded. A very likable Labour MP called David Lamy wants to tell me that Englishness is not defined by DNA. I do know that, David. I've known it a very long time. That's why I make a clear distinction between race and culture. Race is defined by DNA, culture isn't. Are we agreed? It's a distinction that should be easy to grasp, but it's not. And then the replies pile into that tweet. And here come the assertions of authority. Every blue-checked geneticist on Twitter showed up in the replies to this tweet. Here's one representative from Adam Rutherford. John, I'm a geneticist. There is no definition of race that corresponds with variations in DNA. Race is not defined by DNA. Rutherford's bio simply says this. Back off, man, I'm a scientist. Now I will bow completely to his scientific knowledge, but scientists aren't going to help us with the political philosophy that we're dealing with here. Are cultures different to races in a morally significant sense? That's not a question that scientists can answer. It's not a question that they need to answer. It should be obvious that yes, cultures and races are different, but that does not stop the assertions of authority. I'm a scientist. Back off, man. So what do we have here? We have assumed superiority through the assertion of authority. We have personal derision, we have impugned motives, we have blindness to other perspectives, and we have the excommunication of the heretic. So many are bidding farewell to John Cleese and wishing him good riddance. And what do you call this? I call it inquisitorial.
SPEAKER_03Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.
SPEAKER_08Yeah, but we should expect inquisitions. Actually, human nature being what it is, we should expect this religious impulse. Religious in the basest, most self-righteous sense. We are always wanting to decry, denounce, and exclude the heretics. And just because the Western Church is on the wane in our small part of the world does not mean that Westerners have stopped being religious. You cannot stop being religious in this in-group-out-group kind of sense. You see, that's one thing that Kleese got wrong. He said in 1979.
SPEAKER_02400 years ago we would have been burnt for this film. Now, I'm suggesting that we've made an advance.
SPEAKER_08Well, I'm suggesting it's true that flaming people online is better than burning them on pyres, but the same impulse is there. It was there 400 years ago, it was there 40 years ago, it's here today. But the Inquisitors would be shocked to discover who they are. The new Malcolm Muggeridge is the savvy London journalist piling on in the discrediting of Cleese. The new bishop is the blue-checked tweeter pronouncing Cleese beyond the pale, and beyond the pale for the perfectly acceptable view that he has held, and that is also held by a great number of people of goodwill. Now, I'm not saying that John Cleese is the Messiah.
SPEAKER_04He's not the Messiah! He's a very naughty boy!
SPEAKER_08Had to be done. But there is another JC who called out the religious of his day and ended up more than excommunicated for his troubles. Jesus decried hypocrisy wherever he saw it. In fact, our obsession with religious hypocrisy traces back to his teaching. Yet he provides a way out from this inquisitorial spirit. He took the slander and the blame, that's the cross, and he answers with acceptance and love, that's the resurrection. He calls us to give up our self-righteousness, whether it's the self-righteousness of bishops in flowing robes or the self-righteousness of woke activists. Lay down your own self-righteousness. Admit you're wrong, and let him be your standing in the world. Then maybe we can extract ourselves from this war between in-groups and outgroups. With this, JC, maybe there's a chance that we Don't mention the war. It's the fourth of June, I'm Glenn Scrivener, and you're watching the live cast. Oh, we need to sink down in our chairs. Oh, there we go. All we need to do. No, don't adjust the camera because then it'll fall over. It'll fall over.
SPEAKER_10Alright, we're gonna slouch. Alright. I'm feeling a little bit edged out. Take it easy. Welcome everybody. As you can see, our studios are not yet in use. No. Yeah. It's looking good. It's it's it's all big and dark and you know, windows are blocked out and the sound insulation has gone on well, on the windows, but not we've got no carpet and the walls, anything on the walls is in terms of insulation, so it's very echoey at the moment.
SPEAKER_09Yep.
SPEAKER_10So it's not really usable as yet.
SPEAKER_08Yes, but we're gonna fix the acoustics uh in the next month and uh and then it will be uh an amazing space. Build sets. I don't know what the sets should be. Do people have a view on what the live cast sets? Yeah, where should we be? Should we be in front of a fire? Should there be phones?
SPEAKER_10Should there be I don't know, what should it look like? Some kind of beach setting, you know, it should be different, different every week. The green screen.
SPEAKER_08Running away from dinosaurs. Who knows? So if you have comments on uh yeah, what in your mind's eye, what does the live cast uh uh set look like? And we'll build it. We'll just yeah if you build it, they will come back. They will click. Um that's the idea. Um so if we haven't met before, I'm Glenn Scrivener. I'm Paul Feasy. And together Glenn and Paul. Uh we're gleasy. And uh uh Yeah, so we began the show with uh John Cleese uh getting into a bit of trouble by saying that London is not particularly English.
SPEAKER_10Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I you know, I was thinking when I was putting that video together, it would be really helpful to have someone on here who disagrees with us. Because obviously you've said all that stuff and I just watch it and I go, yeah, basically. You know, like has the world lost its mind? Clearly you didn't say what people are saying, he said.
SPEAKER_08Can we just We should have on standby for next week, we should have on standby that clip from American Beauty. You know, where the Chris uh Cornell is the the the actor. Yes. I think it's Chris. Anyway, he's also he's also the bad FBI dude in the Jason Bourne films. Um anyway. He's the father figure, and he just he's reading the newspaper and he just says, This whole country's going to hell. We should just have that. I think Chris Cornell is the one else. It is Chris Cornell.
SPEAKER_10It's definitely Chris. I'm gonna look it up. Um you've completely thrown me now. I was gonna say something.
SPEAKER_09You should teach me inside with me.
SPEAKER_10Yeah. Well, so when I saw the John Cleese thing come out on the on the news or on social media, I mean I I reached a stage where I don't I I don't engage with it that much because I just think the whole thing is so ridiculous. Like, how on earth can people be getting worked up about these things and there's no point getting involved, but it reminded me actually it made me think uh it was probably it's definitely since our last live cast the stuff that came up with um Danny Baker. Danny Baker getting fired for tweeting or I think it was tweet a tweet of a picture of a chimp as the royal baby. And and and and what struck me was so people were saying like so so I saw Dar o green green. He made a comment about it saying like, oh, I don't think he should have lost his job, like etc. etc. And a lot of people piled onto him. And I kind of disagree with Dara in the in the sense that I think even if you stuff up and it's a genuine mistake, you still stuffed up, and there there's gonna be consequences, you know, and it maybe you lose your job, you know. But the thing that I thought was interesting, and we just don't know, everybody just went, it's because he's deeply, deeply racist. Right. And I was just thinking, there are loads of times in my life, and I mean, well, I maybe not loads of times, but there were definitely occasions in my life where I've said something or posted something or whatever, and someone else has seen it or heard it, and they've heard it they they've seen something else in it, which I never intended at all, and it hadn't even crossed my mind that that's what I was saying or it implied or whatever. And you know when someone calls you on that and you go, Oh my goodness, I'm just sorry, I didn't even realise at all, you know, I wasn't that's not what I meant. So you could you could be entirely innocent in it.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_10Um but yet everyone jumped on their motif on his motives and just said clearly that you know, we know his heart. He is the evil one, the antichrist has come.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_10You know. Um and and it may well have been, and I don't know, I'm not commenting on that specific example necessarily, but it it may well have been that he he posted it, and so when you do realize what that could imply. And he could have gone, Oh my goodness, what have I done? And yes, you lose you yeah, maybe he still writes and he's his job. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08That's fine, if you zap me for this. It was a massive cut up. It's not just happy.
SPEAKER_10Yeah. And that's that's kind of accepting. you know, even if you even if it was done in innocence, you've still stuffed it up, you've still had a massive stuff up. Yeah. You know. Yeah. Um but it's the fact that there's no there's no opportunity. It was we're talking on there about impugning motives. You know, the assumption is no it must have been this. It must have been a deep-seated racism that's finally crept out. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08And you just don't remember the dog whistle that brings all the racist out. And like he would have to be incredibly racist. Like and this must this it's not just a dog whistle like to do the chimp like though.
SPEAKER_10No, that's if he intended it. I mean that's if he intended it's incredibly flagrantly I mean the only thing he could have done would have been to black up. That would have that would have been the only more flagrant thing you could do.
SPEAKER_08So it's it's either one or the other like it's it's either just a cock up for which perhaps he should get fired anyway because people get fired for cock-ups. Yeah. Or he he is just like been under the radar as this massive racist for like sixty years and then suddenly kind of comes out. But I think I think it's because it does transgress the the Holy Trinity of race, gender, sexuality and and so people are on a h on a hair trigger on the race issue. And and y you could think okay let's let's be more sensitive to the race issue because we haven't for so long and this is a corrective and let's let's be you know sensitive on the race issue. But then there are there are so many other kind of protected categories that you could care about. You know for instance what about what about age? Because you know I I saw a whole bunch of people piling in on John Cleese saying well what do you expect? He's 79 years old and like people saying incredibly age things about him. Nobody cares about ageism though. Sure. Nobody particularly cares about ableism right about disabilities and that sort of thing. But if it's if it's gender, sexuality or race it's a hair trigger and you're gone down.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_08Yeah. And it's incredibly religious. This is this is my thing. The whole call-out culture thinks of itself as incredibly enlightened and you know we're not like the the middle ages anymore. Except we put people in stocks and we still pelt them with rotten tomatoes.
SPEAKER_10Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_08And destroy their careers and destroy their lives for saying the wrong thing.
SPEAKER_10And people do I mean people use the phrase still don't they about things being like a witch hunt.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_10And and and we all know of course there were plenty of examples of you know people just being accused of something as you know it's a wit you know they're a witch and you know well you dump them. And uh you know if they float afloat they're a witch they're a witch or that's you know but it's it it's exactly the same mentality isn't it but done from behind a screen yeah um yeah and and and and again maybe there's a sense I just think like it would be very different wouldn't it like like if if if I had like if I said something amongst a group of friends and someone went hang on a second you know right yeah it goes even further. Exactly I might go oh yeah sorry I didn't I either I can say well I didn't mean that or I have said something terrible and I'm being called on it but you know you don't tend to just tear people apart in your own friendship group. You might say you know oh that's not cool or are you sure?
SPEAKER_08Remember that thing Feezy said in October wouldn't dredg that up no no um yeah but online yeah people just do you know they they just completely destroy everything and it's career ending even for someone famous and like like fame is just this massive value in our culture like to be famous is is almost the best thing in the world but even fame even the kind of fame that John Cleese has had does not protect you from saying the wrong thing.
SPEAKER_10Or he didn't even say the wrong thing it's it's the idea people heard something else didn't they within when he because he said it's not a very English yeah city anymore you mean it's not white and exactly and and that and that and you're just reading in your own stuff there you know um and and you know he said he didn't mean that. Now we just don't know what what he really meant you know I mean he's come out and he said no that's not what I meant.
SPEAKER_08Yeah. But we he might he might massively Siri's talking to me. He might massively hate people of colour which is why he's moved to the Caribbean. That that might be okay maybe that's the narrative you want to spin but it's a it's a bit of a stretch and then to just pile on in this way. Anyway, anyway it did but it does it does occur to me that an explanation for this is that we are not the rational people we think we are. We're incre incredibly religious in this negative fleshly sense, in this self-righteous sense, always wanting to identify and outgroup and to scapegoat them and to burn the heretic and excommunicate and you know that's human nature. And you don't eradicate human nature just because you think that you're post-religious. Just because you think you're you know you're not a Christian and we've grown up in the world now. That doesn't stop you from being religious. And the Malcolm Mugges and the and the Bishop of Southex of this world are the blue checked tweeters who just pile on. They are the the media savvy London journalists who think that John Cleese is beyond the pale they have just participated in the Inquisition and it's religious. That's what I reckon. And if and if we as Christians and another thing if we as Christians get it round our get it into our thick skulls that actually the secular space is religious and profoundly religious I think that helps in our interactions with with non-Christians because it's not as though the non-Christian world is is in a a neutral space that is non-religious and we just need to like use stepping stones to bring them into the Christian fold. I think it really helps to see there is a new religion out there. There is a new holy trinity of you know race, gender and sexuality there there aren't new blasphemy laws. You know there are things that you absolutely cannot say and you've committed the unforgivable sin if you said them. And we need to we need to see if you've not said them if we can only impute to you even a thought we think you might be thinking about it. Even then you are beyond the pale and so you yeah so we are we are evangelizing another religion. We're not dealing with neutrals. And I think that has all sorts of implications but that's just another another thought to throw into the mix. Let's move on from John Cleese we want to talk about two other things um before signing off and and and one of them is uh uh last night I uh released a video of an interview that I did with Esther O'Reilly perhaps you've come across Esther O'Reilly she blogs as uh the young fogey uh it's a good title isn't it's good yeah and it does fit her really well she is a young phogie um so she uh she writes for Pathios she has a blog there she writes for the Federalist she writes for Quillette um she's been on the best a man can get um which is kind of the publication of the intellectual dark web and she herself Esther is is called the uh the kid sister of the intellectual dark web and um and the reason I spoke to her it's very patronizing isn't it it is kid sister it is um she's been called the Velma of of the Scooby Doo I saw that yeah yeah yeah yeah that's a that's good you see you get down with that yeah I do you like that Esther do you like being called Velma? Probably not Esther's fine Esther's fine with that um but she wrote this article that responds um to uh just a a little clip uh that Jordan Peterson made uh in an interview with uh Dennis Prager and I thought we could have a look at the clip and then uh we'll see how Esther responded and then if you like uh what Esther says there you can check out the whole hour long interview that we uh released last night.
SPEAKER_00Who would have the audacity to claim that they believed in God if they examined the way they lived who would dare say that to to believe you think to believe in the Christian sense to actually this is why Nietzsche said there was only ever one Christian and that was Christ to have the audacity to claim that means that you live it out fully and that's an that's an unbearable task in some sense I just debated Laboid media about a week ago although it wasn't really much of a debate it was a it was a strange event. But he said something very brilliant and to me that justified the entire event at least from my perspective he talked about Christ moment of crisis on the cross when he cried out to God that he had been forsaken and what was that what that meant was that the conditions of human existence are so tragic that even God himself in human form lost faith for a moment in the goodness of being and I thought that was a remarkable observation because well if God himself would lose faith under such conditions what would you expect from normal human beings confronted with what we're confronted by?
SPEAKER_08But that that is Jordan Peterson kind of on the on the brink of tears and very very emotional about it. Like who who would say that they believe in God? Because to say that you believe in God is actually from Peterson's point of view um an incredible burden because it is the it is to act as though God exists and and it is to be really it's to be Christ you know and so he considers Christian faith to be an incredible burden that has to be carried. And I I got the same feeling that Esther got when she watched this this same clip and and she just wrote this this beautiful kind of response to that and Jordan Peterson actually picked up this article and retweeted it and said I really like this which is very suggestive I do think like if Jordan Peterson was ever to convert this is the kind of way that he would signal it he would just he would just link to a a you know a Christian um article like this and said I I believe this. But here's how Esther responded to Peterson's view of faith. She said what is the unbearable burden of being the unbearable burden? Is it the pain we carry or is it the pain we force others to carry? Is it our suffering or our malevolence? And if it is our malevolence how then shall this burden be lifted? How shall the damned spot be wiped out? How if we try very hard as hard as we can to tear off the dragon skin and find more dragon skin beneath? I will pay, you say, I have paid, I am paying and I will pay except you can't I have except you can't, says Esther, because someone else already paid your sorrowing parents and grandparents already paid, your wife already paid, your brother and sister already paid the unborn child who is not here already paid. Our hand has rent the fabric of reality a hand not ours must mend it. Our hand has stained the foundations of the earth a hand not ours must wash it clean. So this is the law she's doing the law to us she's convicting us of our sin but then she says here is the great good news not that we can pretend that we can undo the deed not that we can pretend we can forget even as we are forgiven but still we are forgiven. Beneath this cross how can we dare to stand beneath before this throne how can we dare to come? Shall we tarry till we're better? Shall we ever come at all? I believe, says Esther, I believe I cannot manage I cannot manage the unbearable task. I cannot bear the unbearable burden I can only bear the burden that is left when the hand not mine has lifted it and I believe that is enough. Boom just awesome stuff saying faith is not a burden that you bear. Faith is trusting that the burden is borne by somebody else and I just thought when I saw Jordan Peterson kind of in tears saying it's it's a burden too heavy to carry, I just wanted somebody to be able to tell him that the burden has been carried.
SPEAKER_10Yeah. And Esther said it. It was it's a fascinating insight into where he's where he is given that he's been so cagey about it in the past. Yeah because effectively if I've understood him correctly it seems that he he's someone who very much is convicted of their own sinfulness but but sees no way out of it. Right. You know he he feels the burden is on him to you know if you're gonna say you believe in God then you need to be good. You need to act like you actually believe in God but yet he finds he can't yeah and whereas you know you and I go well duh like you know that's why we need a saviour ironically for someone like him who spends a lot of time talking about Christ in the Bible he seems to have missed that really one key thing.
SPEAKER_09Yeah.
SPEAKER_10That actually it's not about just being an imitator of Jesus and you know making yourself being your own saviour. Yeah. Yeah. It's about relying on a saviour.
SPEAKER_08Actually who he needs.
SPEAKER_10So it's it's something you know I've been praying for for for Peterson for a while that he would know that Christ is not just the archetype, he's the saviour isn't it fascinating that someone like him, you know, like that that it boils down to that that's all it is. Yeah really at the root of it is he I mean that it's obvious isn't it really he just does not it's not that he doesn't see his need for a saviour it's just that he doesn't really know who the saviour he's looking in the wrong place. Yeah. You know which is just like anyway, you know the there were teenagers in the youth group like that and here's this guy who's this world renowned speaker kind of you know it's just the gospel ish.
SPEAKER_08So it's exactly the same stuff. Will you try to save yourself or will you allow Jesus to save you? That's that's the question for everyone whether you're a you know a professor or a street sweeper you know whoever you are out there in the world will you save yourself? Will you allow Jesus to save you? It's one or the other. And uh yeah how how brilliant though that he he did read this article he did say he really liked it and he retweeted it out there. What this means who knows but uh yeah I just thought it was I thought it was really cool. And if you want to check out more um uh Esther O'Reilly has some brilliant thoughts about uh Jordan Peterson and what his phenomenon says about the church, about the culture about Jordan himself uh and we get into a uh a lot of interesting territory so uh we released that uh last night on YouTube and we will release it tonight on Facebook. Yep. Um just the final thing uh I wanted to have a look at was just uh an exemplary piece of evangelism. Um so we we want to equip Christians to be everyday evangelists in everyday life and uh I just came across this 90 second video uh that I thought was exemplary uh evangelism something that we can all learn from and uh it came from Jürgen Klopp uh who was sending a video of um support uh for a guy called Dave Evans who is a Liverpool supporter. Jürgen Klopp if you don't know is the uh the manager of uh Liverpool who just won uh European Championship uh in Madrid and um just before they flew to Madrid uh Jürgen Klopp recorded this video for Dave Evans who wanted to be in Madrid to see it uh but he has terminal cancer he has days left to live what do you say uh well let's uh have a look at what Jürgen Klopp says hi Dave um Jürgen Klopp here from Liverpool in a moment like an hour before we leave to Madrid I heard about I've heard about your story and um of course it's um something really very difficult um to take in for me but of course everybody but I heard you are uh an unbelievable fighter and what I the only thing what I can tell you is um we think of you and we are you are really with us that's um the only message I want to give to you and that you fought so hard I could not make comparisons to what the team did over the year but it's um it's more than football it's uh it's about life and the only thing what we what we try to do the whole year is to give people um some hope some joy um good moments to remember and um we share these moments this season or let's say for three and a half years since I mean we share these experiences it makes us actually friends.
SPEAKER_01I wish you from the bottom of my heart all the best and um yeah I'm Christian so good to see you.
SPEAKER_08Wow wow wow wow yeah love those last five words I'm Christian so see you see you which is it it came in the light of so Dave Evans was sent other videos by other Liverpool um leading lights like Jamie Rednapp and and others and um and they were all more upbeat and just you know stay the course buddy and and you can do it and you're in a fight against cancer and um we're with you. Jurgen Klopp though comes and and gives a profoundly Christian kind of view. See you. You know there's actually hope in the face of in the face of terminal cancer. And it gave the it gave the whole video just a a different sense and I I just thought I I identified kind of four pairs um in this um that Jurgen Klopp kind of demonstrates in in his evangelism if you want to call this evangelism it's uh it's it's good witness Christian witness anyway um and I just thought we could just kind of go through them. I I thought uh Jürgen here displays both excellence and perspective so the there's excellence in that everybody knows that Jürgen Klopp is a wonderful football manager. Um he's just lifted the trophy um he's fantastic and he's he's acknowledged um as as excellent in his workplace so there's something for an evangelist to be to be excellent in your workplace but also he has perspective so it's excellence and perspective because he he says look football is not life there are much bigger battles and it's not about kicking a a football around so he he has that excellence but he also doesn't take himself too seriously and he and he has a bigger vision for life and I just thought that's that's an interesting thing to aspire to um as a Christian witness let's let's be excellent in the sphere that we're sort of working at but also have the perspective that that life is bigger than that. And then there's this other thing joy and death Jurgen uh Klopp is kind of known for for for laughing and he's he's laughter and he is uh he is he's known for for uh not taking himself too seriously and in even in the heat of battle and even on the eve of uh big games um he has a relaxed sort of smiling nature but there's also the depth that he can really speak down the barrel to Dave Evans who is looking down the barrel of cancer and there's a real profound humanity there. There's a real um yeah uh a gravity to him and and I just thought that's an interesting combination too joy and depth um which is something that we can aspire to as well be be the person um who knows how to laugh and the person who knows how to deal with the cancer diagnosis. And then there's this this mixture of of patience and boldness in what he says because actually the the the the explicitly Christian content is only the last five words of that of that um video. So he's he's very patient and and Jogan Klopp is not continually in interviews saying you know all glory to Jesus, all glory to Jesus. He is clear about who he is and he's and he boldly proclaims that he is a Christian and he names the name of Christ and he owns that for himself. So he is bold and that's something we need to be doing and and you know I'm clearly a Christian but he's also patient with it and he he's not constantly ramming it down people's throats. So there's the patience and the boldness together some people are very patient some people are very bold how do we put those two things together? And then finally there's there's kind of there's empathy and there's hope in what Jurgen Klopp does here. Most of the video is is empathy saying look you are my friends and we are with you in this suffering and um that that's profound. But it's not just um I empathize with you as you're walking through the valley of the shadow of death it's it's there is an answer to death I'm Christian so see you. There is a doctrine of resurrection as well. And again some people are very good at um mourning with those who mourn but Jurgen Klopp is kind of modeling yearning with those who mourning with those who mourn and rejoicing with those who rejoice having both that empathy and that hope. I just thought um a really heartwarming video but also a a great example for us all as we we seek to sort of witness to Christ out there in the world. So we've got through our three things. Yeah record time in record time record time today so yeah if you do want to check out uh the interview with Esther O'Reilly uh we'll drop that on Facebook uh tonight uh we might do uh just a John Cleese monologue that can go out at some point this week do you reckon?
SPEAKER_10Oh yeah yeah that will go out individually relatively soon hopefully um and uh and yeah so that's kind of it is that all we have uh yeah Chris Cooper by the way Chris Cooper is the main of that actor is soundgarden Soundgarden and um did he die recently he died last year.
SPEAKER_08Okay yeah I think I think it was last year yeah there we go the Mandela of the comments again different yeah brilliant so that's all we've got time for and uh yeah do keep uh keep the comments coming uh sorry I uh wasn't able to see the comments just for a second for some reason and if you know what our set should look like if you've got it in your mind send it in it'll be beautiful let us know brilliant well thanks so much for joining us and we'll see you again soon. Take care. See ya people