Hope for Tomorrow | The Other 6 Days | Episode 70

In this episode of The Other 6 Days, CJ sits down once again with pastor, author, and cultural bridge-builder Caleb Kaltenbach for a refreshing, hope-filled conversation about fear, faith, and trusting God with tomorrow. From cultural anxiety to personal worry, Caleb helps us unpack what we’re really afraid of—and why hope isn’t wishful thinking, but a disciplined decision rooted in who God is.
With humor, honesty, and plenty of practical wisdom, this episode reminds us that while culture keeps changing, God doesn’t—and that changes everything.
If you’ve ever felt anxious scrolling the news, overwhelmed by cultural tension, or unsure how to move forward with hope instead of fear… this conversation is for you.

INFORMATION & RESOURCES
- God of Tomorrow: How to Overcome the Fears of Today and Renew Your Hope for the Future – Caleb Kaltenbach
- 🔗 https://a.co/d/azRM54c
- Caleb Kaltenbach.com 
- JD Greear - Gospel: Recovering the Power that Made Christianity Revolutionary (https://a.co/d/05LNyQDn)

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Transcript

Welcome Back & Lighthearted Fears

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Other Six Days Podcast, where we chat about life outside of Sundays and what it means to live from our gatherings, not just for them. I'm your host, CJ McFadden, and today we're joined once again by one of our favorite returning guests, pastor and author Caleb Kaltenbach. Caleb has this rare gift of bringing grace, clarity, and a calm presence with a healthy touch of humor to some of the most complicated cultural conversations around. And today we're talking about something we're all dealing with fear, uncertainty, and how to hold on to hope when tomorrow feels a little shaky. Caleb, thanks for being back with us. Hey, thanks for having me. It's great to be here. Yeah, excited to have you again on the podcast. Um, last time we kicked off our podcast with some hilarious thoughts on superpowers, if you remember.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

I I do.

SPEAKER_00 0:46

So today I thought we might go another direction. What uh what would you say are the top three things that you're most afraid of in life? Rational or irrational? Go.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

Oh man.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

Yeah. Um no particular order.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

Okay. Um I let's see, what am I what am I afraid of? Um I'm gonna go a little bit more lighthearted with these because there are things we're all afraid of. They're kind of like deeper. Yeah. I want to throw a wet blanket on the beginning of the wait for the middle. Yeah, wait for the middle. Wait for the middle. So um I am uh I I'm terrified of feeling the the you know how cotton balls feel? I hate that feeling in my ears. I just it it makes me just want to smack my head against the table. It's just awful. Like a Q tip? Yeah, oh my gosh, that's awful. Yeah. So that's one. Okay, that's good. Um I'm texture, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:49

Is that the that's the issue?

SPEAKER_02 1:51

Yeah, texture. Texture, okay. I'm terrified of um my dog pooping in the house or I'm terrified of throwing up. I just I hate throwing up. Like I don't know anybody that enjoys that.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Yeah.

Childhood Trauma, Humor & Coping

SPEAKER_02 2:04

Like, you know, well that that's what I do for a fun time. But but probably the number one thing I'm afraid of, and it's I think it is borders on being just an honest phobia, is peacocks. I am I am like if a peacock walked in here, I think I would pee my pants and pass out. Just probably at the same time. I might have an aneurysm. Yeah. Um I just think they're evil. I think each one is branded with 666. I just I I can't stand peacocks. Is I'm assuming this is derived from some encounter. Oh, yeah. When I was when I was young, like toddler, uh uh after I guess preschool or whatever, I can't remember too much back then, but I remember the peacocks. We would go to my babysitter's house and she'd watch a bunch of us kids, and her next door neighbor had um, I guess, a peacock farm, and our babysitter would send us out back and we would have lunch and play in the backyard, and then the peacocks would see us and start squawking at all of us toddlers and chasing us around and wouldn't stop chasing us until we threw down our food. Yeah. And so ever since then, I've just had this ridiculous fear of peacocks. Um and it hasn't gone away. And people are like, Oh, but they're so beautiful, they're so beautiful, Kayla. You don't understand, they're so beautiful. It's like, well, I mean, the Bible says that Satan comes as an angel like yeah. Yeah, yeah. I mean, there are some venomous snakes that are beautiful when you look at them, but do you go near them? No, that's why I don't go near peacocks. I don't go near evil.

SPEAKER_01 3:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:48

I wouldn't build a summer house in North Korea and I wouldn't go near a peacock. I like that. Those are the same.

SPEAKER_00 3:56

Drawing those in parallel. The um the peacock thing, that's uh yeah, definitely a trauma experience for sure.

SPEAKER_02 4:02

Oh yeah, my wife is a therapist, Christian counselor. She's like, you know, we can EMDR that or we can, you know, we can deal with that. I'm like, why are you gaslighting me? I it's not my fault, it's the peacock's fault. Why why is it not to be my problem? They're the ones that that inflicted me. I don't want to deal with it. Yeah. I stay away from them and they stay away from me. Like I said earlier, that's how I handle sharks. I don't go near them. Yeah, they don't go near me. I don't go near rattlesnakes.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:32

I don't go near like alligators or Florida. I stay where I'm at and I'm good. Anything with teeth or pretty feathers? Yeah.

unknown 4:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:45

I don't go to I don't go to any of that. No.

SPEAKER_00 4:47

It's a and we like we said, it's not that's not a me problem. That's the peacock problem.

SPEAKER_02 4:52

It's the bird's fault. It's evil's fault. Exactly. It's a devil.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

I you know, I actually feel better that you said that about the peacock because I was a little worried. I wrote mine down and I said, you know, of course, deep dark ocean water. You're like, what touched my foot, you know, which is typically is there a shark there, right? So same kind of thing. But dark water has just got an eerie. I don't know what's down there. It's out of my control. That's probably another deep-seated issue that I need to work through.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

I think that's I don't know if that's deep-seated. I think it sounds rational. Rational. Okay. I think if any of us were in deep, dark ocean water, yeah. What's down?

SPEAKER_00 5:26

We wouldn't be happy. Yeah. It's not, it's not pleasant. Yeah. No. Okay. And then uh earthquakes for me. Um, only because I don't mind the earthquake as much as the rumbling, it's the idea. I'm claustrophobic. Uh. So the idea of being trapped through the cause of the earthquake is very like overwhelming to me. So I kind of panic and I need to get out of the building first. Um, everyone jokes. They said women and babies watch out because like I'll pivot off of somebody and I'm out the door.

SPEAKER_02 5:52

So I mean, again, I think that's kind of a rational fear. Okay. I mean, my wife was in the my wife was in the Northridge quake, like four miles from the epicenter when it happened. She got thrown out of bed. So she thought Jesus was coming back. So yeah, those rational. I'm not trying to minimize. I'm just saying yours so far.

SPEAKER_00 6:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

Deep ocean water earthquakes. Fine. Like for me, another one would be tornadoes. Like, yeah. Rational. Yeah. What's your what's the other one?

SPEAKER_00 6:20

Uh Black Widows. Okay. Yeah. They're like biomechanical and shifty and weird. And like I just, they're so gross. They're just simple. They're awful. Like and they and when you hit a web and they kind of jostle, you're like, you don't know what what they're gonna juke you or something and then bite you.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

No, I know. No, they they do that on purpose. They're they're predators. So yeah. They're the devil also. Yeah. So they're part of the peacock. So you don't have yeah, they're part of yeah, they're baby peacocks. So you don't do you have any like like any like where you can't step on a crack or where like you have to sit in a certain kind of chair?

SPEAKER_00 6:56

Or I'm sure I have some of those that I just haven't come to mind. But I mean, I don't know but where this one lands, but when my kids were young, if they came in screaming, I went full panic mode. Because that like to me, I don't know what's happening. I can't figure it out, but I wasn't really a consoling presence in their life in that moment. I was full panic. But I again I I get that. Still in the rational?

SPEAKER_02 7:19

I think so.

SPEAKER_00 7:20

Okay, my kids came in screaming. I might not land in, I think mine.

SPEAKER_02 7:23

Well, I mean, it would also depend on which one. Oh there's how do you how what your response differs? Yeah, yeah. There's one I might expect it more than the other.

SPEAKER_00 7:36

So mine was the same across the board. I just wouldn't, it'd strike fear in me. And so I didn't respond well in those moments. What do you want? Yeah, you know, what's happening? And they're just starting crying. I'm crying, it's not good.

SPEAKER_02 7:46

Yeah. Yeah. I had I had one friend who was afraid that he would, and this was like all the way back in college. He was afraid that he would curse somebody with bad luck if he did not pet them on the shoulder three times when he was around them. And I'm like, you need to stop touching people.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

That's uh that definitely is not nobody needs that.

SPEAKER_02 8:05

I don't need that. That's that was I'm willing to accept whatever consequences happen to me from you not petting me on the shoulder three times.

SPEAKER_00 8:13

Yeah, that's a touching a door handle a couple times or doing the you know, boxing.

SPEAKER_02 8:16

Yeah, but you're doing it with people, and then that becomes creepy. It's creepy. It's weird with the door handle, but then it gets creepy with people. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:25

All right. Well, that's good. I think we worked through worked through some stuff there, hopefully. No, we solved it. If not, we just scared our listeners. No, we solved it.

SPEAKER_02 8:32

Okay. They're better for it.

Naming Rational Fears

SPEAKER_00 8:34

Well, Caleb, today I'd love to talk a little bit about um uh finding hope when the future looks so heavy. So you wrote a book back in 2018, I believe, right? Called God of Tomorrow that talks about overcoming fears of today and finding hope in tomorrow. Um, and that seems to almost be prophetic now. We're in what feels like a pretty anxious moment culturally, you name a topic, politics, identity, technology, family, whatever, it feels like there's deep concern or contentious conversation surrounding it. So I quite guess the question is, is this something new, or do you think the future-oriented conversations uh that are making people more anxious now than they did even 10 or 20 years ago?

SPEAKER_02 9:11

I think that I think that people have always been uh somewhat afraid of the future and obviously of uh ambiguous situations and circumstances in the present. Um the future in and of itself is ambiguous. We can have an idea of what we think it's gonna be like, um, but then it doesn't always turn out that way. So I think that we've always kind of had this both excitement and fear of the future. You know, it's kind of like when you're afraid of something, you can kind of be drawn to it a little bit where you want to learn more about it. It's like I'm not really afraid of snakes, but I don't like snakes. But whenever I'm at the San Diego Zoo, I always walk through like the venomous snake area, and I'm like, I don't like the venomous snakes, but I gotta get near and look at them. Yeah. You know, they're intrigued kind of yeah, you're intrigued with whatever it is that scares you. Why are they so scary? Exactly. I think it's kind of maybe our mind's way of trying to rationalize that fear and solve it because our mind makes, I think, 30,000 decisions every single day. Most of them are on um autopilot. That's why empathy is so difficult for us. That's why once we get an image or an idea about somebody in our head, it's so hard to change it because our mind has it on autopilot. And that's why, you know, our mind hates uncertain situations where it doesn't know what's going to happen because it's used to solving everything. And it's almost like us telling our mind to slow down. I think one of the reasons why it's so it feels so much different now, and it is different, and probably is more difficult, is because through the use of uh uh internet, TV, so on and so forth, we have more information now than we ever have before. I mean, how many times have we been sitting in an audience and all of a sudden Amber Alert goes off on our phone? And all of us know there's another abduction, or there's this, or there's that. We get breaking news on our phone. Um, one of the best decisions I made in a while was deleting news apps from my phone. Yeah, it's like my life has purpose again and peace, you know. So I think that it's really that information that's made it so difficult.

SPEAKER_00 11:38

So that would be that makes sense for the 10 to 20 years because it's the speed and volume. There's not more bad news, it's just the speed and volume of access to the bad news, then, right? I think so.

Why The Future Feels Heavier Now

SPEAKER_02 11:47

Yeah, I know the Bible says that in the last days things will get worse, and so that is true. There's definitely a measure of that. There are uh ways in which the world is worse, but you also look at the way um people lived in the first century, like in Rome, and some of the morals that they had, and it's like it puts Vegas to shame. Yeah, you know, so it's gotten worse in some ways, but it's not worse than others, yeah. You know, so it's it kind of goes back and forth. And some of it is depending on where you live. Like if you live in North Korea or you're a Christian in the Middle East or even many parts in India now, yeah, it can feel the ultimate worst. Yeah, you know. Um, but that's where I think it it it it helps us to be able to you know look to God.

SPEAKER_00 12:38

Yeah. Well, and I think too, I approached it probably from the fear-based component at first, but there's seems to be two prevailing postures or dominant postures. It's either anxiety or optimism, right? Those are kind of is that is that right? Like there's just you're either anxious about the future and for all the reasons we'll talk about, or some people are optimistic about it, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:58

I think some of the times you can kind of have a mixture of both. Both, yeah. But I think that it's usually for most people one or the other.

SPEAKER_00 13:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:07

Um, and you know, we have I think as believers, we have to learn to, and maybe this will segue into what we're talking about here in a second, but I think as believers, we have to learn to be somewhat comfortable with ambiguity because even Jesus says you gotta embrace it. Nobody knows the day or the hour. Yeah, you know, and so we don't know when Jesus is coming back. I mean, there's always somebody that thinks they know, yeah, but they don't, yeah, but they say they do, and then it doesn't happen.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:36

And so, like to that degree, we have to learn how to be comfortable with ambiguity, and and you know, a lot of that calls for trust, even in seasons of you know, feeling like you're in that deep dark ocean water, those are the seasons where God is saying, lean into your relationship with me, trust me. Yeah, you know, look to me.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

Yeah, yeah, finding peace in those. Well, when we're fearful or afraid of what's ahead, um, like what are some of the symptoms? And what do you what do you think are some of the underlying issues that really are actually beneath the surface at that time? You know?

SPEAKER_02 14:12

Yeah. I think when we're fearful, um when you think about it, you know, fear in and of itself is not a bad thing. Like it's not if fear, like I've been to leadership seminars or conferences, people are like, no, fear is bad. Yeah. And that's just not true. Fear, God gave us the capacity to feel fear for a reason. Like, if you and I were going hiking, which by the way, I don't hike. Okay, I don't run. You're like, if you ever see me running, you need to run. You're running from something. Whatever's behind me is really bad. Just don't even ask. Just turn around and you start running. You have a right to be fearful in that moment. Yeah, in that moment, when you see me running, yeah, it's time for you to run. Okay. Well, let's say that we were hiking and we saw a mountain lion. Would you get some catnip and go, come here? Yeah. If you see a rattlesnake, you're gonna pick it up and say, Your name's Betsy, and I'm gonna snuggle with you and sleep with you, and you're gonna be dead, and you're gonna go up and you're gonna see God, and he's gonna look at you and do a face palm.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:19

I mean, you're gonna get in heaven, but first he's gonna do a face palm. He's gonna say, You had one job to walk around the snake. You didn't have to make the snake a pet. You didn't have to give the mountain lion. Like a star. Right. You didn't have to go to a Raiders game. Yeah.

unknown 15:33

What?

Ambiguity, Faith & Trusting God

SPEAKER_02 15:34

You know, but you chose to do that and look where you are now. So again, it it's it's kind of like it's like fear, you know, God gave us that capacity to warn us. Like, have you ever been in a situation where you met somebody and you're not being judgy, but there's just something off, and you can't put your finger on it, but you're just kind of there's just something off. Or you've been in a situation or been in a location, you're like, I just got a weird feeling. Yeah, I just I don't even know what it is, but your antenna goes off a little bit. I think God gives us that capacity, but fear becomes toxic whenever it starts controlling the direction of our lives or determining our relationships. That's when it becomes toxic. And so what is fear? Fear is um uh us not feeling in control, us feeling threatened, and us feeling out of control. Yeah, us feeling threatened, us not knowing what's going on. Yeah, you know. Uh, one of my favorite definitions of fear is by Agatha Christie, the uh you know, renowned uh British mystery author. And she said that fear is incomplete knowledge. And that's what I think fear is. Fear is incomplete knowledge. Because you think about it, when we're afraid of something is because we don't know. Uncertainty. Yeah. Yeah. Uncertainty about a threat, uncertainty about a situation. We're just uncertain. So what do we do? We need to lean into our relationship with God who has all the power and has all the knowledge. And leaning into our relationship with God allows us to kind of go back to a point where we're not being controlled uh primarily by our our emotions, because our emotions, they are they are tremendous companions, but they are horrible leaders.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

Oh gosh, that's great.

SPEAKER_02 17:31

Like logic is a better leader than our emotions. Our emotions are great companions. Companions, yeah. And so when you see somebody who's being controlled by fear, you're gonna see their emotions leading first and foremost out front. And you're gonna see logic taking a back seat. Um, you know, some people might call that uh emotionally volatile or being uh impulsive or emotionally reactive. Um, but that's what you're gonna see a lot of the times, and that can take shape in different ways. There are some people, you know, I mean, uh fight or flight, I mean, you know, there's a reason why it's uh it's a saying because there are some people that you know automatically fight. Yeah. Um automatically panic when the kids come running in the door, which I do too. Yeah, you know, I would too. All joking aside, I would. There are some people that are just gonna remove themselves because they just can't take it. Yeah, but there are some people that fight it just by being indifferent, acting like it doesn't happen. Oh, kind of apathetic to the apathetic, indifferent, like what what do you mean? Oh, there's no problem. Yeah, nothing's going on. There are some people act like that. And you know, the best the best thing to do is to lean into your relationship with God and then you know, to face whatever it is you're afraid of, um, because you know God is with you.

SPEAKER_00 18:57

And our like our and our natural tendency, like I mean, there's a natural inclination to try to assert in some way control, right? Then it gets counterintuitive, right?

SPEAKER_02 19:07

To lean in to trust God in that situation and to yeah, because we're so emotionally reactive, we're so living in the moment. We want to do something right now to solve this. We can't see God, yeah. We can't hear him. Yeah, we can't even smell God, you know. I mean, you know, he is beyond our five senses, even though he can easily influence those and step into our reality. That that is not the case. But in that moment, we're like, well, I have to take ownership over this, get this taken care of now. And that's us trying to stabilize our own emotions, and in many cases, I think stabilizing it in a unhealthy and even toxic manner.

SPEAKER_00 19:47

I love the point that you made about the uh um, you know, the indifference or the apathy that we talked about, because like I was thinking about this, like, you know, putting it into two camps, you know, and it's always more nuanced than that, but of the, you know, kind of fight or flight or anxiety or um uh what was the other one that used anxiety or um indifference. Indifference. But that that whole point is that I I was thinking about from comfort kills, I think uh when we're comfortable, uh you can become indifferent because that kills curious uh curiosity in a lot of cases. And so because we're pleasure seekers and kind of comfort keepers, our natural inclination sometimes is just to like status quo, don't let anything impact it. I don't actually don't want to deal with either of those two extremes.

What Fear Is And How It Misleads

SPEAKER_02 20:26

I just want to cruise, right? Absolutely, absolutely, because you know, um we we many of us know this. We may not know it in the moment, we may forget in the moment, but um emotion clouds our clarity. Emotions are good, but emotions cloud clarity, especially when they lead forward. And so, you know, when when we do feel this fear, um, the best thing to do is to really slow down for a moment. The best thing to do um is to remember. This is one of the reasons why I call this book God of Tomorrow, because we don't have to be afraid of tomorrow. We don't have to be afraid of today because God has already been to tomorrow, he's already prepared it, he's already here with us, and he's gonna walk with us into whatever tomorrow holds. And he already has all this knowledge and sovereignty and so on. And so that's why I think Peter, Paul, the disciples, all these different individuals were able to have faith despite being persecuted, and all of them except for John, tradition says, were martyred and died, you know, horrible deaths because of their faith in Christ. But the reason why they were able to faith face those deaths is because they knew the one who created tomorrow. They knew the author of tomorrow. Yeah. And, you know, during times of fear, that's when we need to lean into the God of tomorrow. Because when we are fearful, we will not be loving towards people.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:50

We will not be empathetic, we will be extremely selfish, and we will become the worst um versions of ourselves. I'll never forget what um. Yoda, you know, one of my wise Yoda. Yeah. In uh I think it was uh Star Wars One Phantom Menace when he said fear is a path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering. And it all goes back to fear.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Wow. Wise one. Well, you point out that every cultural issue that we face today existed in Jesus' time, just packaged differently. So what is Jesus' model for us when it comes to engaging and shifting culture with confidence instead of fear?

SPEAKER_02 22:29

I think his model is love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. I think it's what the apostle Paul writes in Galatians 5.14 and Romans 13, 8 through 10, when he basically says that um that uh keep that loving your neighbor fulfills the law. Yeah. Now I've had people ask me, you know, how in the why didn't Paul write loving God and loving your neighbor? My thing is, uh, what do you think one of the main ways is that you love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength? You do that by loving your neighbor as yourself.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

You know? And so I think one of the main ways that we combat this uh fearful attitude and the way that we react to one another and what we see happening in our nation today, and even what we see happening in our nation uh previously and just in any any animal of world history, yeah, it goes back to loving your neighbor. You know, I mean, Jesus is the one who said, um, you know, if somebody forced to go one mile, go with them too.

SPEAKER_01 23:40

Yeah.

Jesus’ Model: Love Your Neighbor

SPEAKER_02 23:40

And a lot of people don't realize that when Jesus said that, he was talking to a first century Jewish audience, primarily Jewish audience, and he was talking to them about Roman soldiers who the soldiers could force uh the people around Israel to carry their heavy pack for one mile, and they had to do it by law. And so Jesus is saying, you know, the people are forcing you to carry that pack one mile, go two miles with it. And I think that was problematic, probably, for the Jewish people in the first century, because the Roman soldiers were the ones in their eyes who uh illegally occupied their land, who were being led by a brutal dictator who believed that he was divine, literally, who thought that he was God. Uh Jesus wanted them to carry the pack of individuals who killed their friends and family many times through crucifixion, who imprisoned them, who were brutal to their friends and family. These are the people, the non-Jewish people, add that on to everything else. These are the people you want us to serve by going the extra mile. And Jesus says, somebody force you to go one mile, go with them too. Now, I don't think for a second Jesus meant, you know, if you carry their pack for a mile, just agree with what they're saying. Yeah. Agree with what they did. Yeah, agree with their values, agree with their morals, agree with whatever it is. Just just agree with them. No, he's saying, even within this hostile environment, you serve people. That's another way of saying love your enemy. Yeah. What Jesus said in Matthew 5, 38 through 48. And here's the thing: um, we can't walk a mile in somebody's shoes, but Jesus is asking us to walk miles next to people. Yeah. And that's what we can do. And that does not mean rejecting somebody or agreeing with somebody, it means acknowledging their perception of reality. Yeah. And again, we just have it, it is so easy. It feels like it's easier than ever to dehumanize people nowadays. And um, you know, when you look at somebody that you disagree with, when you look at somebody in your eyes that is politically opposite of you, voted for the other, voted for the other candidate. Or did this or that, we tend to look, if we're not careful, of that person as the end-all be all of just how wicked and evil. And it's like, no, that is not who they are. They are just made in the image and the likeness of our God. Yeah. Still, they bear that image, just like you and me. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 26:23

Man, that's so good. And you know, Jesus was so present and so patient uh in the way that he modeled his ministry and his life to the disciples. Um, you know, I mean, he never seemed to be rushed or reactive. Um, you know, he was uh every even when everything around him was volatile.

SPEAKER_02 26:39

And we're a lot like them. Yeah. I mean, you and I were talking earlier today how we're a lot like the Pharisees, and we end up giving them a hard time, which some of that is well earned. But you know what? We're a whole lot like the disciples. And if there hadn't been a uh, you know, like a weird James a zealot, there would have been a Caleb.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:58

As a matter of fact, I I tell my kids, I'm like, look, if there was no Satan, there would still be Caleb.

SPEAKER_01 27:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:04

You know, I said, nobody has sabotaged my life more than the person in the mirror. Yeah, yeah. Wow. And a lot of, you know, maybe some of my fear comes down to not owning that. And I need to own that more. Yep. You know?

SPEAKER_00 27:17

Yeah. Insert name of shortcoming here.

unknown 27:20

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Well, let's get practical. Um, we hear phrases like faith over fear all the time, but you know, what does that actually mean? Um you know, is it just believing harder or pretending we're not afraid, or does you know biblical faith really call us to something more embodied and active?

SPEAKER_02 27:35

Yeah. Well, you know, first of all, I wanna I want to say this that you know, it might be some listeners or viewers or whoever who are engaging this, and they might be afraid of some people. And even though we shouldn't be fearful in a negative way, there are some people that have really been hurt by others, even physically. And there are some people that are honestly very dangerous. Even from writing my book, Messi Grace. I don't know if I ever told you this. That book was written over 10 years. I still get at least two or three death threats a year. I got my first one handwritten, mailed to my house last year, somebody threatening to break in my house in the middle of the night and cut out my family. Whoa. And me. Um and so, you know, there are people out there that we need to be cautious of, you know?

SPEAKER_01 28:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:33

And there are people that you can forgive, but you shouldn't trust again because of how badly they've hurt you. You know? Um, so I I just want to acknowledge that real quick because I know that there are some people that they might be fearful of somebody right now. They might be fearful of they might even be living with somebody they're afraid of, and they're like, I don't know how to get away. So I I just I just want to say that, you know, in in those moments, God always understands our fear, but especially in those moments, God definitely understands. And I I I know this sounds cliche, um, but God is with you. Um, you know, and and it is never a mistake to call here at Wellspring Church and talk to a pastor. It's it's never a mistake to reach out to somebody you can trust and try to get help. So I just want to say that real quick.

SPEAKER_00 29:26

But um sorry, I just real, rational, and practical, and I think that's really helpful actually. And I yeah, I couldn't have said it better.

SPEAKER_02 29:33

Yeah. But um outside of of those all too often common but extreme cases, I would also, you know, we're talking more about you know, the other kind of fear on the other side, yeah, where uh we have uh political fears uh that drive us to anger. We have relational fears that drive us to anger and and that kind of thing. So what can what can we do? Um first of all, these are just some Caleb ideas. Um I think some of them are found in scripture, some of them may not. Let's find out. Yeah, let's find out which one is which, okay? So here's an idea, CJ, and you can tell me if this is a bad idea or a good idea. Okay. There's some of our listeners who should stop listening to the news.

SPEAKER_01 30:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:16

There there really are. There are some of you, you listen to CNN, you get worked up, you listen to Fox News, you get worked up. You need to stop listening to the news. Yeah. Okay. You're like, how will I know when things happen? Oh, you'll know.

SPEAKER_01 30:29

Yeah.

Moving From Dehumanizing To Empathy

SPEAKER_02 30:29

Okay. You'll know. You get text, you get other things. I mean, do you remember a few years ago when um everybody thought a hurricane was coming to Southern California? Yeah. I thought it was hilarious. Yeah. Because people are like, oh, it's gonna be bad. It is not gonna be Florida people. Yeah, it's not gonna be Katrina. Okay, it's it's that, but people have this idea, and you know what it turned out? Bad rainstorm. Yeah. A lot of rain. Yeah. Yeah. Actually, I it's funny. I picked up my boss, Dudley, from the airport that night, and uh, it was really, really rainy. It took me forever to get to LAX, and so I picked him up late at night. He had been gone on a study trip, and he gets in the car, and I'm wondering, what is the what is it, you know, are we gonna talk about the rain or what? And he said the most random thing that I never thought I would hear that night. He got in, it's like 10 30 at night. Everybody thinks it's a hurricane, but no, it's a rainstorm. He's like, You feel like a pastrami sandwich. I didn't even know what to do. I couldn't even answer the question. I'm like, what? Yeah. What's funny about that rainstorm that rainstorm, quote unquote hurricane.

unknown 31:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:40

What was funny about it is that man, I didn't really look at the news at it, but dude, I got a text about it. I knew it was coming. Yeah. Like some of us need to either delete our news app, stop watching the news, or we need to tone it down. I think it's a real problem, CJ, if we are spending more time engaging news content and media and politics and media than we are reading the Bible. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:04

An unhealthy obsession with the wrong thing, right? Like, it should be switched.

SPEAKER_02 32:08

Like we should read the Bible more than news. We should pray. We should spend more time serving a church more than engaging news media, but yet, you know, it's outrage porn. They love to do clickbait and to get you going. Right. So for some of us, I think we need to stop watching the news. For others of us in here. And I kind of hinted at this before, and and these are I think just ways to put into practice this loving neighbor as yourself. Um, we need to stop. We need to try to sit down and really have a reflective moment. Who are we tempted to dehumanize? What what people in our lives or what kind of people out there in society? And for the person that says, Well, for me, I'm not nobody. And I would say, Well, I mean, you just lied, and God's put that in the top 10 out of 613 commands. So just tell the truth, shame the devil. You know, who is it, you know, in your life? It could be a specific person, it could be a group of people, it could be certain types of people with certain personality traits or whatever. You're tempted to dehumanize whoever that is, we need to start praying for those people. We need to start trying to figure out ways to humanize them. Another thing, if there are specific people in your life that you're afraid of, you know, in not in a very, very dangerous way, but if you're afraid of or you're fearful of or you're angry at all the time, here's what I would recommend. If you don't, if you want that to go away, pray for that person every day for 30 days in a row.

SPEAKER_00 33:48

See if that doesn't do something for you.

SPEAKER_02 33:50

Every single person that I've had a problem forgiving or been angry at, when I start doing that, dude, by day 10, I'm not nearly as mad.

SPEAKER_01 34:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:01

Um this is gonna sound really weird, this next one, but I'm gonna throw it in there, okay? It fits with her. I think it does, but it might not. Let's find out. Okay. Um I have found that I'm more fearful and angry when I am not really exercising the spiritual discipline of repentance.

SPEAKER_01 34:26

Oh.

SPEAKER_02 34:26

When I am not focusing on what I need to own in my life, it is so much easier to highlight the sins of others and to highlight the shortcomings and to get mad at those shortcomings. And little do I know that I'm getting upset and mad at probably the things that I struggle with.

SPEAKER_01 34:46

Yeah.

Practical Steps: News Diet, Prayer, Repentance

SPEAKER_02 34:47

And so I found that um a lot of fear and that kind of anger comes from bitterness and a refusal to forgive. And I think that really good repenters are really good forgivers. Because I mean, it's Jesus who said, forgive us our sins, you know, as as we forgive those who sin against us. Yeah. I mean, Jesus paired other she's he said on a regular basis, we need to repent and we need to forgive. And he paired those two together. And so I found that it is easier for me to forgive and to easier and it's easier for me to love my neighbor when I actually repent. It makes me a better forgiver. Like one of the best books I try to read every single year is by Dr. Martin Luther King called Strength to Love. And it's either chapter four or five, it's loving your enemies. And one of the points that Dr. Martin Luther King makes in this chapter is he says, and he's talking about how he learned how to love white supremacists. Um, he said, we have to learn how to, we have to forgive our enemies before we can love them because you cannot love someone you have not forgiven. And I think one of the reasons why we see so much discord in our in society today and just in general, is because we have a lot of people who are giving into fear and anger, and that fear and anger exist because we have not crossed that threshold of forgiveness.

SPEAKER_01 36:15

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 36:16

I love that you said that about repentance. I mean, that's so profound because the repentance strips away our pride, which opens us up to receive uh to have a humble spirit and then to engage in forgiveness. I mean, because there's no way for us when you have that wallop and you have that prideful, you know, I'm thinking about the things that someone else is doing and not the things that I've done in my, you know, you can go through all the scriptures that point to that, the log in my own eye and things like that. It just sets us up to not be others focused. There's no way, there's it's it's almost it's so counterintuitive.

SPEAKER_02 36:47

100%. I mean, I don't understand how we pick up our cross daily and follow Jesus without repenting because it does strip away our pride and leaves us with our ego. And with when I am consistently confronting and owning my shortcomings, how am I going to give into that when it comes to other people's shortcomings and give in to fear and treat them horribly and so on and so forth?

SPEAKER_00 37:14

You said the prayer practice is so cool because, like, especially for enemies and other people, if you do that on a regular basis, you'll notice that, you know, I mean, if your heart's in the right posture, that that opens you up to empathy that we don't naturally have as you start to like I find myself actually praying for the welfare of someone else that I was previously frustrated with. Yeah. And at first it's tough. Yeah. You're like, how could I, how could I?

SPEAKER_02 37:35

You know what I've started doing recently that's really tough? And I hate it. I've started doing 50 push-ups a day and I hate it. Yeah, that's I I'm on day two. I hate it for you. And it's awful. Like, I would rather um throw up. No. Well, okay, sorry. I threw maybe hold up. Maybe hold a snake. Definitely not confront a peacock. Yeah, Pentecostal. Should about a hundred. Um no, I I I don't like it.

SPEAKER_00 38:03

Like, but what's it doing for you? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:07

Yeah. Supposedly it helps you every single day, and by day 30, it's supposed to really help you. But it I think it's the same thing with repentance, and the same thing praying for people we don't like and praying for people that don't like us. That's difficult.

SPEAKER_01 38:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:23

And but you know what? The more we do it, it's not necessarily the easier it gets. Because I don't think it's ever easy. But um the more open we will be to it, to doing it, and the more we understand that as God has forgiven us, so we must forgive others.

SPEAKER_00 38:44

Oh man, you just reminded when you get in those reps, it's like muscle memory, and now we're reminded quicker, like more often and frequently and faster. Yeah. So you might not actually necessarily feel that you're stronger in it, but you're quicker to that response.

SPEAKER_02 38:57

Absolutely. And when those feelings of fear or those strong negative emotive, you know, feelings come up, they're volatile, then we are our muscle memory is like, well, remember your prayer this morning and you were struggling with this, and you're like, oh, yeah. All right. Just like Paul, I'm the chief of sinners. Yeah. Those are the words of somebody that practice that on a regular basis.

SPEAKER_00 39:21

Absolutely. I saw this bub Bob Goff quote that said, um, the opposite of hope isn't despair, it's distraction. I thought that was an interesting quote. Um, and I was like, oh, what do you mean by that? And I was like, wow, it is true. Man, if if I think we can lose sight of the hope that we have in the future by being distracted by the things that are going on. I love what you and I was thinking about that when you said shut the news off, shut these other things off. Sometimes God just wants to get us alone so that he can speak to us and heal us and do all the things that he wants to do with us, um, but we're too distracted.

SPEAKER_02 39:51

Yeah, I love that quote. You're gonna have to text that to me afterwards because like that that hope or email it to me, that hope, like it is distraction, but that hope, hope is very narrow, laser focused. Like when when we say that we believe in the blessed hope, which is the return of Christ, the second coming, we have the hope of heaven, we have the hope of salvation. It is not wishful thinking. Yep. It is, man, no, I I believe it's going to happen. Yeah, I'm just excited for when it will happen. Come Jesus. Yeah, come, you know, and um yeah, that's that's why, you know, I told my wife, I'm like, you know, I need to start out uh, you know, some kind of get fit video called, you know, I don't know what people think about the rapture if it's gonna happen, but maybe rapture ready. So like whenever I go up to heaven, I've got the bot for it. I'm not gonna scare people when I go up.

SPEAKER_00 40:47

Pre pre-glorified.

SPEAKER_02 40:49

Yep. Rapture ready. Rapture ready.

Hope Versus Distraction

SPEAKER_00 40:51

Rapture fit. That's it. Rapture fit. Oh, I like that. That's good. If it if it happened. I mean, but or CrossFit and you just cross between neither mind. Well, there's that. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. Didn't. Um well, as always, we hope that our conversations are engaging and helpful. Um, I was gonna ask you if there's any books, podcasts, or other resources that you'd like to point people to, but first I want to point people to obviously yours, which is The God of Tomorrow, How to Overcome the Fears of Today and Renew Your Hope for the Future. Book by Caleb Kaltenbach. You can find it. We'll put a uh link in the show notes, but it's on Amazon. Um any other things out there that you kind of want to point people to? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:25

Um uh my website, Caleb uh excuse me. Excuse me, sorry. My website, Caleb Coltonbach, has more. Uh Caleb Coltonbach.com has more uh information about these things. Um uh there are a lot of uh fantastic books out there. I've referenced a couple of them, you know, like um Dr. Martin Luther King's book, which I think is uh fantastic. Um Well, if anything else comes to mind, we'll throw it in the show notes. There's one more. Um, Gospel by J. D. Greer. Oh, yeah. G-R-E-E-A-R. J D is great. Yeah. And I just think he does such a great job of explaining the hope of salvation and how God is moving, how the gospel is moving in our lives, and it lends itself to the fact that you do not have to be afraid when you know that God has your back. No matter what happened, because death is not the worst thing that can happen to us. That has already been taken away.

SPEAKER_00 42:21

Yep. Oh, amen. I love that. Well, Caleb, as we wrap up, uh, what word of encouragement would you offer to someone who feels anxious about the future but genuinely wants to trust God more deeply with what's ahead?

SPEAKER_02 42:34

Stop right now when you feel that way, or right now, or whatever you're doing, and just say a quick prayer, even if it's five seconds, ten seconds. Just say, Lord, remind me that you are with me. I think I there are so many times when I've held on to Jesus' words in Matthew 28-20, after he gives a great commission, he says, And surely I am with you always, even till the very end of the age. There are a lot of people that are in and out of our lives, you know, they're short-term friends, they're lifelong friends. Um, they're friends, seasonal friends, and then there are lifelong friends. And we need both, but Jesus is not a seasonal friend. He's an eternal friend. And Jesus is not somebody that will ever walk away. He's never gonna say you're too much. He's never gonna say, How many times have I told you that? He's never gonna say, I've had it. I've had it. You might say, Don't sass me, but he's not gonna say, I've had it. Um He's always there. Yeah, he never leaves. And so you need to pray, Lord, remind me that you are with me. Yeah. Remind make that real to me in this moment.

SPEAKER_00 43:46

That's a good word. Well, Caleb, thank you always for the last, but thank you most for your pastoral care and uh yet practical and accessible approach to deep and difficult topics. Um, we're just so thankful for you for your ministry uh to the world and to us. So thank you for being here. Thanks for having me. Well, there you have it, guys. Thanks for joining us on another episode of the Other Six Days Podcast. Be sure to hit that subscribe, follow, share, and like, spread the word. And as always, take what you've heard and turn it into something you can do to further the gospel and the world around you. Until next time.