Ideas Have Consequences
Everything that we see around us is the product of ideas, of ideologies, of worldviews. That's where everything starts. Worldviews are not all the same, and the differences matter a lot. How do you judge a tree? By its fruits. How do you judge a worldview? By its physical, tangible, observable fruit. The things it produces. Ideas that are noble and true produce beauty, abundance, and human flourishing. Poisonous ideas produce ugliness. They destroy and dehumanize. It really is that simple. Welcome to Ideas Have Consequences, the podcast of Disciple Nations Alliance, where we prepare followers of Christ to better understand the true ideas that lead to human flourishing while fighting against poisonous ideas that destroy nations. Join us, and prepare your minds for action!
Ideas Have Consequences
Postmodernism Didn’t Work. What’s Next? | Dr. Bob Osburn
A secular worldview shaped the West since the Enlightenment–but it’s beginning to unravel. Dr. Bob Osburn talks with us about why postmodern ideologies are collapsing—and how Christianity offers a compelling return to reality. This is a timely conversation for anyone wondering how the church can rise to meet our cultural moment with clarity, courage, and hope.
Main Topics:
- The Decline of Secular Ideologies – Why movements like DEI and “wokeism” are fading and what it reveals about our cultural foundations
- Christianity as a Return to Reality – How biblical truth offers a framework for human dignity, freedom, and flourishing
- The Church’s Opportunity – Why now is the time for Christians to engage culture with a holistic, Scripture-rooted worldview
- View the transcript, leave comments, and check out recommended resources on the Episode Landing Page!
- Learn More about the 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World Bible Study
We're dealing with fantasy land, and so what it seems to me is that Christ is calling us to invite people into a genuine encounter with reality, and this return to reality is the, I think going to become one of the great appeals of the gospel. Is the, I think, going to become one of the great appeals of the gospel, and the other appeal of the gospel that I think goes right along with it is the restoration of our humanity.
Luke Allen:Yes, Hi friends, welcome to. Ideas have Consequences. The podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. Here on this show we examine how our mission as Christians is to not only spread the gospel around the world, to all the nations, but our mission also includes to be the hands and feet of God, to transform the nations to increasingly reflect the truth, goodness and beauty of God's kingdom. Tragically, the church has largely neglected this second part of her mission and today most Christians have little influence on their surrounding cultures. Join us on this podcast as we rediscover what it means for each of us to disciple the nations and to create Christ-honoring cultures that reflect the character of the living God.
Scott Allen:Well, welcome again to another episode of Ideas have Consequences. This is the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. I'm Scott Allen and I'm joined today by DNA co-founder Darrell Miller and Luke Allen, my son and the producer of the podcast, and we are thrilled to have with us today another I would say co-founder of the DNA, really in many ways Dr Bob Osborne, a longtime friend and a person of great wisdom that we respect so much. We haven't had you on for a while, bob, so we thought, gosh, there's so much going on in the world, in the culture. We wanted to just sit around the water cooler with you for a little while and catch up and hear what you're thinking about, kind of what's passing and what it means for the church and our ministry, the mission that God's called us to. So thanks for joining us, bob.
Dr. Bob Osburn:It's my pleasure. I'm delighted to be here.
Scott Allen:Yeah, that's great, and for many of you you may not, since it's been a while, and I'm sorry about that, bob, love to have you on more, but let me introduce you briefly and feel free to fill in any gaps that you would like.
Scott Allen:Dr Osborne has a PhD in international education from the University of Minnesota and he also earned his Master of Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary, and that was after earning his bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan. He has spent most of his career 35 years or more I'm sure it's more than that serving in international students, with international students and basically teaching very similar kinds of messages that we teach around the world, with the DNA, but focusing primarily on international students in the United States, a highly strategic group and with the idea that these young people coming here to the United States to our elite universities, many of them Christians but without a biblical worldview, the idea is to train and equip them with a biblical worldview so that they can go back and provide godly leadership in their home countries to disciple their nations. Bob, you have since passed the baton, and I know, to Dr Kevin Clooney, who is leading the Wilberforce Institute that you founded. You want to catch us up a little bit on what's been happening of late, since that time, bob.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Certainly yes, it was a delight to have Dr Kevin Cooney, who was himself for many years active in Christian academic circles and is someone who's had a very large and significant global travel pattern, as well as interaction with students and other cultures, and taught for many years at a Japanese university as well. So what we've been really trying to do since he joined us in 2020 as our new president, we're trying to expand the opportunities for more students to engage with us. So now we have, for the first time whereas you have, many Latins involved with DNA. Really for the first time, we're getting more and more Latins who are engaging with us. But we're also getting people from a completely opposite end of the spectrum, for example, in Papua province, which is the extreme eastern part of the country, of Indonesia, which is, as you know, a vast archipelago.
Dr. Bob Osburn:But as we've not only expanded to many more students, most of whom are grad students here and at other universities around the world, we're also doubling down on my key course, which is comparative worldviews. In fact, I'm just now teaching it through an affiliated and friendly university to us, and I have students again from around the world. And on top of that, in the last few years, we've begun to zero in as well on the topic of corruption, and I know that there's a lot that could be said about corruption in the American context, no question about that but we're really thinking about corruption as our students and the scholars we deal with have to face it on a daily basis in countries all around the world, where you have national leaders, for example, who are absolutely committed to one objective, which is to enrich themselves as much as possible and as fast as possible. So we're teaching a Christian course on anti-corruption, and that's been very, very well received, again around the world, and now it's being taught, for example, in Malawi through an extension that we have there.
Dr. Bob Osburn:So God is opening up new doors, new opportunities to bring the kind of DNA message in our particular branding to people around the world.
Scott Allen:That's awesome, bob, that's great.
Scott Allen:So you're still actively involved, then it sounds like with Wilberforce I am half-time, absolutely Okay, well wonderful and again for those of you who don't know the history, at the very beginning of the DNA, bob was present, along with Bob Moffitt and Vishal Mangalwadi.
Scott Allen:This is going back more than 30 years now and really the set of ideas and the teachings that we have been faithfully kind of sharing with churches all over the world, helping them to understand their faith, not just as a message of spiritual salvation but as an all-encompassing worldview, and that their mission is really to bring that entire worldview to replace whatever the false ideologies and worldviews of the nations are. That's what it means to disciple nations. Bob was there present helping to shape that and has been an advocate in so many ways. And Bob, for me, most recently, you were just an inspiration and an encourager on the writing of why Social Justice is Not Biblical Justice, which was, you know, for me personally, a really important book. I know that a lot of the people that have read it have been helped by it, so I want to thank you again for that too.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Well, that was just such a timely book, and I don't think any of us realized how incredibly timely it would be until what happened right here in my home city of Minneapolis in 2020, which, you know, rocked the entire world. Yeah, no, that's for sure.
Scott Allen:Well, part of what we want to talk with you about today, bob, is just, it seems to me there's just real rocking that's happening, especially in Western culture. I do think the social justice movement, the woke ideology, is wrapped up in it, kind of the fallout from that. I just want to put forward a few of my observations and then for both you and Darrell and Luke I just love your reactions and just have a discussion what are you seeing? And I'd really like it to kind of come down to towards the end. What does this mean? What does it mean for the church and for us as the DNA in terms of how we work to really help and support and equip the church to be what she needs to be at this moment? So let me just lay out a few observations and I'll say I'm going to, and I'll say I'm going to speak very broadly, historically, I'm going to go all the way back to the Enlightenment. So I'm going to put forward some thoughts quite broadly, because I do feel like we're kind of at a bookend. This is my thesis anyways. It seems like we're at a bookend.
Scott Allen:Something significant happened at the Enlightenment where, with the rise of science, modern science, which was birthed out of a biblical worldview. But very quickly there's this human pride that kind of arose right in Europe and with the great thinkers and philosophers that said, hey, through human reason and science we can know everything. We no longer need to appeal to God or to the Bible. That was seen as superstitious, something that people believed in during the Dark Ages, and that basic set of ideas that's been so influential in shaping the West over the last, you know, hundred years. Several hundred years really got its start there. Several hundred years really got its start there.
Scott Allen:And I've been reading a book by Os Guinness called this Civilizational Moment. It's a terrific book. I recommend everyone read it. He's basically saying the same thing we're at a civilizational moment. What he means by that is that at the Enlightenment that the West which was birthed and all the good fruit that we've enjoyed in the West in terms of democracy and freedom and economic prosperity and respect for human dignity so many things you could go on and on they were uniquely birthed out of a biblical, judeo-christian or biblical worldview, but that soil, if you will, was cut off during the Enlightenment. In other words, we purposely turned away from God. We made science and reason, human reason, a God and we, in Os Guinness's word, we became a cut flower. So the soil that gave us birth, we cut ourselves off from it. But, as Os Guinness correctly says, flowers, when they're cut, they don't, you know, immediately wither and you know and turn into dust and blow away. They still look beautiful for some time because the nutrients remain themselves in the flower.
Scott Allen:And I feel like he's saying the West, for these several hundred years in some ways, has been that cut flower. It's slowly dying, it's slowly wilting and I mean I think in some ways that's probably an understatement. When you look at the fruits of the in the 20th century, for example just the bloodiest century, right, you know, the rise of Nazism, the rise of communism, I mean these are not small things at all. But bringing it to the present moment, I think what Oz is saying is that we're completely cut now. In other words, you've got a generation that there's no nutrients left, there's nothing from the Bible that's passing through to this flower.
Scott Allen:It's now completely dead and what's come up in its place has been this woke worldview, this neo-marxist, postmodern worldview. There is no truth, there's no God, there's no truth. You can be anything you want to be. That's the transgender idea. There's no respect for human individuality, human dignity. We're shaped by our groups. There's no respect for you as an individual. Everything I need to know about you I can tell by your skin color, your sex. There's no place for freedom, right? There is no freedom in this worldview, and that's why we're seeing the loss of all sorts of freedoms freedom of speech, the censorship, industrial complex, the rise of these tyrannies, these people that are trying to kind of manipulate power and get control over things.
Scott Allen:The other thing that strikes me is that, when you look at the woke worldview that I wrote about and why social justice is not biblical justice, there's no gratitude, there's no thankfulness, there's no love, there's no forgiveness. Everything that makes human relationships possible or human flourishing possible is gone, and that is, to me, the cut flower, like it's cut off. These people are operating from a worldview that has nothing from the scriptures coming into it and consequently, it's demonic, it's destructive and it can't last. It'll literally destroy us, and I think that's what I was writing about. That's what I was seeing.
Scott Allen:Darrell, you and I wrote the book the Toxic New Religion. We were saying, hey, there's a toxic new religion that's emerging now that has no, there's nothing in it that's coming from the Bible or the biblical worldview and it's highly destructive. So we wrote about that 2020, you know, at the height of the woke revolution. But then there's been such an interesting kind of period of time since then. In reaction to it, there's been a major, major pushback against it in a way that I didn't fully expect. And just one indicator of that last week I just read an article well, two articles I mean.
Scott Allen:I could go on and on, but these I thought were indicative of a broader thing. Number one was in Washington DC. At the height of the woke revolution, the city council painted a block-long mural of Black Lives Matter on the city street. That was taken down last week and it's just indicative of that organization that was very involved in spreading the movement has also been completely discredited. So, again, this is just one simple illustration of something that's going on that's much bigger. The other thing I'll just put on the table just as an anecdote is.
Scott Allen:I read this in USA Today. It was a woman named Jennifer Say. She really inspired me. She is a native of San Francisco, a Democrat, had always voted Democratic, voted for Trump in the last election, but she told her story about how, during COVID, oh, she was the global brand manager for Levi's. So she had this very prominent position in a major corporation there in San Francisco, levi's, which we all know. She was the global brand manager very progressive, very liberal, just like you would expect somebody in San Francisco to be. But during COVID she started speaking out because she saw the damage that the lockdowns were doing to children and that put her at odds with city government and also her own business, levi's. And, long story short, she was fired for that.
Scott Allen:Taking that stand the next thing that she found, now that she was on the outside, she started speaking out on other things and the next thing for her was this whole there is no distinction between men and women and especially men and women's sports. That, to her, was an abomination and she just wasn't going to allow that to continue. So she began quite forcefully speaking out. That put her at odds with everyone that she knew. She literally lost all of her base of support. But in the interview in the USA Today article and she never comes across here as a Christian at all I don't know if she is, I don't believe she is. She may be, but that's certainly not her background she speaks up. The interviewer asks why are you doing this? Why are you paying such a high personal cost to speak out against these things, especially the you know, the women and men issue now in the culture? And she said something that just really touched me. She said because it's true and we have to speak for the truth.
Scott Allen:Anyways, it was something that I thought that's what Christians should be saying and doing, but very often we don't. That's a whole other story, and what you've seen is you've seen this whole slew of people like Jennifer, say you could think of Jordan Peterson or so many others that really picked up the ball and said we can't lose freedom, we can't lose love, we can't lose these, basically these fruits of the Christian worldview. These aren't Christians, but they see the loss of the fruit, the loss of truth, the loss of what it means to be a male or female you name it and they're courageous enough to speak out and they're kind of leading the pushback. I wish I could say it was evangelical church. It's not. I mean not to say that we haven't had any role to play, but it's been small.
Scott Allen:These have been the leaders, in my view, bob. So I've laid out a lot of stuff. I put several theses on the table. I would love your reactions to just anything I've said or where you see us at now, what's going on, and then again we can move towards. How do we? What does this mean for the church? And, darrell, I want to bring you in too. We've been talking, but it's been a while. So let's start the discussion, bob or Darrell, either one.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Yeah, I have to say that where you're headed is exactly where I'm thinking right now. But the question and you alluded to this in your very final comments just a second ago is the question where is the evangelical church? I mean, I know there are some that are talking about this, but it seems to me and I made this assertion, uh, in the last just over a year, at a recent library conference where I was speaking, and I said that and I really believe this even more so today that what Christianity should become known for is a return to reality. You got to leave, we're inviting you to leave, the fantasy lands that only impoverish you, the fantasy lands of ideology, the fantasy lands of pretending that you can change the biological nature of who you are and somehow change the essence of who you are. And you, we're dealing with fantasy land, and so what it seems to me is that christ is calling us to invite people into a genuine encounter with reality, and this return to reality is, I think, going to become one of the great appeals of the gospel, and the other appeal of the gospel that I think goes right along with it is the restoration of our humanity. Yes, now, daryl, you remember from your days back at LaBrie, well over 60 years ago that you were or at least 50 years ago, I should say 55, maybe 60, that that thing was beginning to really emerge in Schaeffer's apologetic, but it seems to me that he was only pointing in the direction of where we need to really focus and where we need to be very intense, and that is we welcome you to reality and we welcome you to a rediscovery of what it means to be human. And so, welcome you to a rediscovery of what it means to be human.
Dr. Bob Osburn:And so I expect that in my remaining years that I will put my energies, especially with Westerners, but also with the foreign students that I engage, to increasingly making this point that the gospel brings us back to reality, and it brings us back to what it means to be human.
Dr. Bob Osburn:And, of course, to get there, it means we have to acknowledge that there's a god who's made us in his image, uh, and a god against whom we have rebelled, but a god who also gave and made possible the entirety of redemption, and that redemption includes not only the spiritual dimension of us, but it actually means the redemption of the entirety of our humanity, and it also means the redemption of what we would call epistemic faculties, and what I mean when I use that big term is simply the ability to know reality as it really is. So the gospel redeems our capacities to know, our capacities to know and, if anything, that question of epistemology that is, how we know what we know is a very big issue today, along with all the other implicit issues that I've, and you've, referred to. So I think I'll start with that, because it seems to me that's part of the core of the gospel.
Dwight Vogt:Let me pick up right there, bob. I haven't read the article you were referring to, scott, by this woman, but there's so many people who are non-Christians, who are are non-Christians, who are rebelling against woke, rebelling against the idiocy of fantasy land, and these tend to be the old liberals. They still believe there's truth, they still believe there's reality, and so they're raising their voices. They're not necessarily christians most of them are not christians but they're putting, they're connecting the dots that where did western civilization come from? It came from the bible. And they are calling themselves cultural Christians and they are recognizing the incredible importance of the scripture to create Western civilization. And as they see Western civilization dying the cut flower is now dying they're appalled and they say we don't want to go there we can't live in that world.
Dwight Vogt:What created the world that we love and we want to live in? Oh, it was the bible and they've never, I think there, if I could just say we've never seen that.
Scott Allen:They just again that's the cut flower. They just took it for granted. The flower was always there.
Dwight Vogt:That's right, They've never seen it. But the problem is the church doesn't see it. That's the problem we have. This is our legacy.
Scott Allen:Yes.
Dwight Vogt:And we are not articulating the legacy. And this is what you were saying a few minutes ago, Bob. We are the ones who should be doing this. Well, why is the church not doing it? Because, they're in a fantasy land.
Dr. Bob Osburn:And it's the kind of super spirituality that she was reacting against. It's a super spirituality.
Dwight Vogt:It's the sacred secular dichotomy. What is true, what's important, is the spiritual realm. We're all going to die and go to heaven. If we're christians, we don't need to be concerned about this world. That's a fantasy land because it's not dealing with reality, and that's why the church, we, should be leading this movement, but we're not, because we are living in a fantasy land as well.
Luke Allen:If you're a Christian who wants to make a difference in healing your culture, then this book is for you. It's called 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World Restoring the True Meaning of Our Most Important Words by my dad, scott Allen. And if you're wondering why words, let me explain. There's a strategy that has been used throughout history by those who want to change cultures, and it goes as follows To change a culture, you begin by changing the meanings of its words.
Luke Allen:In other words, step one in culture change is to change the meanings or definitions of that culture's most important words to mean something that aligns with your narrative. For example, the word marriage used to mean a God-ordained union between one man and one woman, but today it has been changed to mean a legal union between two people. So, as you can see, someone has changed this word to mean something completely different from its biblical definition. And marriage is not the only word that has been changed to shift our culture away from God. In this book, 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World, you'll learn the true biblical definitions of 10 of our culture's most important words. You'll learn how to defend them, and not only that, but how to build your life on their firm foundations. This is possibly the most important step that you can take if you want to make a difference in your culture as a Christian. Again, the book is called 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World, and if you'd like to learn more about it, you can just head over to 10wordsbookorg to 10wordsbookorg.
Scott Allen:Can I jump in on that Because I'd like to continue with? I want to react to what you said and continue with my thesis because I think this is really a potentially exciting moment for the church. But I just want to kind of underscore. When I looked at the church the evangelical church, let's say, in the wake of the woke revolution, the first thing that I saw was I saw a lot of our leaders, let's say our elites, talking about the Tim Kellers people that I respect, groups that I respect, intervarsity I have great respect for even Campus Crusader crew, our publishing companies Christianity Today, you name it and what I was seeing largely was a capitulation and they wouldn't have said that, but they would have said something like we don't want to be political, you know, we don't want to rock the boat, we want to kind of be nice, winsome, whatever it is. You know, we want to have an openness to the gospel and whatever it is, you know, we want to have an openness to the gospel and you know. So there was that whole approach. They weren't able to see the evil and the damage of the ideology, so they kind of accommodated it and brought it in and had you know, black Lives Matter speak from the platform at InterVarsity. You know you name it. They did all these things.
Scott Allen:So I saw that. On one side, an accommodation, Of course. If you're accommodating this with some kind of a Christian veneer over the top, what good are you? It's kind of like I don't know, this is probably too dramatic, but when the Nazis were gaining momentum in the 1930s, you had a lot of churches put the swastika up, similar right on the pulpit, right, they didn't want to rock the boat, get along, keep an openness for the gospel, whatever their reasoning was. So I saw that that was really discouraging. I also saw a lot of the people in the pews rejecting that, by the way. They said well, you know, and Megham Basham just wrote a book that really calls out a lot of the people in the pews rejecting that, by the way. They said well, you know, and Megham Basham just wrote a book that really calls out a lot of our leaders saying you guys have really sold us out. Instead of really shepherding the flock and kind of guarding us against these wolves, these really dangerous wolves, you've just kind of accommodated yourself to the wolves. I think it's an important book.
Scott Allen:On the other side, I see the evangelical church still stuck in a sacred-secular divide. So it doesn't think in terms of how has the Bible given rise to a culture? How has it given rise to freedom? How has it given rise to truth? Bob, you know your point, reality, a true sense of, you know, objective truth. How has it given rise to human dignity?
Scott Allen:They don't think in those terms because what the message is and the mission of the church is is just spiritual salvation. We just got to preach the gospel. Preach the gospel, and that, you know, what people need is they need to know the gospel of salvation. I keep hearing that over and over again. And yet people like Jennifer say just to give her as an example, that's not where they're at. They're not saying what must I do to be saved? They're saying, hey, men are not women and men should not be in women's sports. That's a lie and I'm going to speak out for that. And then she's going in where did that truth come from? Oh, that kind of came from the Bible, maybe. I don't know if she's there yet, but many are. Jordan Peterson is there. Like, those truths came from the Bible. And yet there's this big disconnect between the people that are rediscovering these truths that came from the Bible and built the West, and we're-truth culture has infected the church.
Dwight Vogt:We live in a post-moral culture and that post-moral culture has infected the church. And it's that old thing that I've been saying for years if the church doesn't disciple the culture, the the, the culture will disciple the church. The church today has been discipled by a post-truth, post-moral fantasy land and they're operating from that. And that's why these cultural Christians, they are recognizing oh hey, there's a relationship between the things that we value and the scriptures, but the church is still blind to that. Schaeffer used to say if you want to know where the church is going to be in seven years, look at where the world is today. And the church is behind, where these cultural Christians are saying we need to be, christians are saying we need to be. And how do you shake the church and say hey, we should be leading the parade, not following the parade.
Dr. Bob Osburn:You know when I think about it, darrell, I'm 100% with you. And then I try to put myself in the shoes of pastors. I think one of the responses of many pastors will be look, I'm overwhelmed with a pestilence, struggles that I'm facing, with families breaking apart, marriages exploding, I have people with serious addictions, I'm dealing with a church board. That's on my throat all the time and I actually, at that level, I have a lot of sympathy, a lot of sympathy for where pastors are at. But I think this also brings us back to some of the formative influences. Our seminaries, for example, it seems to to me have not been clear enough, not nearly clear enough, about the issue of worldview.
Dr. Bob Osburn:so we come back to our founding propositions, that it's the, the fundamental assumptions that you bring into life that will result in the kind of either disabling or enabling cultural fruit that will either set you on a path that toward reality and toward the restoration of your humanity, or will set you on a different path that will be frustrating. So I acknowledge that our pastors are struggling with very real pastoral shepherding needs, many of which, by the way, many of those problems they're dealing with are a direct result Exactly when the culture's gone. Yes.
Dwight Vogt:And a direct result of we're not functioning from a biblical worldview and pastors are not teaching sound biblical theology and principles. A few years ago, seminaries moved from theology being the core of what they did to psychology and counseling being the core of what they did, to try and prepare pastors to deal with all this brokenness. Well, why don't we stop the brokenness at the heart? We used to have a guy named Rufi Macaba, a doctor who worked for Food for the Hungry, and he used this illustration. He said he was working in a hospital and there was all this water coming out from the utility room and the doctors went and got mops and we're we're getting the water off the hallway. And the janitor came up, opened the utility door and turned the water off. And that is so where we are today, the pastors. They're overwhelmed because they're mopping the floor and what they need to do is go back and turn the water off. That's where they need to be.
Dwight Vogt:And how do we get? How do we Schaefer? That's what they need to be and how you know? How do we get, how do we Schaefer? That's what he did for me those 50 years ago. Uh, I was an evangelical Christian who'd been to seminary, dropped out because I didn't see the relevancy of what I was learning there. And I went to LaBrie and pow, yeah, it's worldview. And I'd never heard the word worldview before. I'd been a Christian for years and I'd been to seminary Never heard it. And it's the key.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Absolutely. I couldn't agree more, darrell, with you. So we have a mighty challenge. At the same time, I do see real evidence and I think you would agree and you alluded, I think, to this, scott that because we are at this great civilizational moment, as Osginus calls it, moment as Osginus calls it there are many Christians who are simply beginning to wake up to the messages, like ours, and are saying I will place my stand there. And so we thank places like the Colson Center and scholars like Nancy Peercy and cetera for what they've been doing to try to help us. But we're really lacking this movement from the larger evangelical church at a moment when we could be really capturing the willingness and the openness that's obviously there. Tom Holland's book Dominion, as you all know about it's been a marvelous text, one of many, that is, you know, being offered up at a time when people are saying what are we going to do? Well, I mean, I think.
Scott Allen:Tom Holland is such a prime example of what I'm talking about. In that same line as Jennifer Say. You know a non-believer who you know has just been hit upside the head with the fact that I think in his case it was the word love, like this word and what we understand love to be, especially love is sacrificial service, agape love. That did not come out of the Greek or the Roman civilization, as he kind of assumed it did. That had one source, and one source only the Bible, and he became a Christian when he saw that as a historian. So I see, yeah, I see, bob, just there's this.
Scott Allen:There's some amazing kind of I wouldn't have foreseen it in 2020, at the height of the woke revolution how quickly the ideas would be discredited and start coming down. Now they're deeply embedded still in our universities and systems of education government. It's not going to come out like overnight. I have no qualm or whatever. This is going to be a long, long thing to get this rooted out. What I didn't foresee is that people like Tom Hall and Jennifer Say Jordan Peterson. I didn't foresee them speaking for truth, for freedom, for love, whatever it was. They started defending the Bible and the biblical worldview as it shapes a culture.
Scott Allen:Crazy crazy and many of them accepted Christ. There's evidence of a revival happening, and I'm sure it's not just limited to them so, and they're having success. The woke worldview is being discredited, so that, I think, is something to celebrate. It comes back and you're right, bob, I think the average person in the pew really is ready and primed. You know they are ready. But again, the leadershipally, I feel like we need the people like Nancy Peercy, darrell Miller, bob Osborne, other people. We need that message in the leadership right now. But it's not. It's still not there yet. It doesn't seem to me it's not.
Dr. Bob Osburn:I will say this that there is a movement among the Christian study centers that are adjacent to our big public universities. There's no question that something's happening there. For example, I was at the local Christian study center now called Anselm House, once called McLaurin Institute, here at the University of Minnesota. A couple weeks ago they brought in Dr Rosalind Picard. A couple weeks ago they brought in dr rosalind picard. She is a mit scientist who's working on ai uh and she was talking about ai, but as she talked about it she naturally uh just transformed her talk into what was the kind of discussion that we're having right now and she pointed right to the gospel and she then began to talk about how she had been an atheist and now she become a follower of jesus christ. We have a. We have one of our top professors at the university of minnesota, recently retired, but one of the best known professors because of his particular work. At age 76, he became a follower of Christ just several years ago.
Scott Allen:Amazing, it's so exciting.
Dr. Bob Osburn:It's so exciting because he had been a Unitarian for 50 years and he said to me, Bob, he said after George Floyd in 2020,. He said there was no difference between the Unitarian Church and the radical people who are arching in the streets. And this is not a guy who votes Republican, I will assure you.
Scott Allen:Yeah.
Dr. Bob Osburn:But he said. The backstory, without giving his name right now, is that he quietly began to read 10 volumes by a local Christian author, a thinker, and at the end of it he said this is far more true than the kind of stuff I've been engaged with for 50 years in the Unitarian Church, which has no constitution. And look at these evangelical churches churches at least they have a Bible. So the Word of God is still this tremendous.
Dr. Bob Osburn:It is worthy, and if we could only lean into its, its vastly greater Resources than most of us are ever taught to discover in seminary and that's mean to take seminaries down, but it's just a need to change.
Luke Allen:And now is the time to change.
Scott Allen:I mean this is what I really am, kind of coming to is that this is such a unique, powerful opportunity for change.
Scott Allen:That may be the change that we've been hoping for and praying for and working for since the beginning of our ministry. I think a person like Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who we know, you know not personally, I wish we did, but she became a Christian, and why? Because she you know, I think, if you ask her, she was looking. She came out of that fanatical Muslim background. Then she became a secular atheist and she sees the danger of these ideologies, whether it's Islam or communist China or the woke revolution. She says you cannot live with these. They are destructive. And then she said the only one you can live with is the one that was built from the Bible up. And that's what it was. It was a civilizational kind of culture thing that brought her to faith. And this is really my hope right now for the church is that it doesn't again. It doesn't think in terms of faith. The bible are, you know, in terms of building cultures, discipling nations. It's very individualistic, it's very pietistic, it thinks in terms of people getting saved, but it doesn't have a concept of these things. We're being reminded of it, ironically, by ayan hirsi ali, jordan peterson. Are these people that said, no, you've built a culture and we need concept of these things. We're being reminded of it, ironically, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, jordan Peterson, or these people that said, no, you've built a culture and we need that culture back.
Scott Allen:But the church has got to kind of wake up and go. You're right, we lost that somewhere along the line and, by the way, I think it's all in the church lost in reaction to the Enlightenment that was such a huge displacement of the church. No, you are no longer the center of things Now. You're marginalized, you don't? You know, harvard University is no longer Christian, it's secular. You've been displaced and ever since those big shocks, the church has been in a reactionary mode, just reacting, reacting, reacting. And now I feel like it's time to stop reacting. Stop, the enlightenment's over. It's played itself out. We don't have to react to it anymore.
Dwight Vogt:Go ahead, daryl. We've had a couple of major donors to World Vision come to visit us because they've been impacted by the DNA Wow. And one of the things they said was you have given us the DNA Wow. And one of the things they said was you have given us the language. You've given us the words and you've given me some language today, and I think this is part of the key of what we need to do. You've given me the language of fantasy land and then you've given me the language of lean into Scripture, and part of what we need to do is highlight the language that can startle people. Oh, lean into, yeah. What do you mean by that? And for for people sitting in the pews, what do you mean by that? For past, what do you mean by that? What does it mean to lean into scripture? Because scripture is the key to truth and truth is the key to freedom yes, yes and it's that simple.
Dwight Vogt:So how do we lean into scripture? How do we help people see even christians? Your mindset is living in a fantasy land. How do we begin to take these? We use the, the phrase Monday church all the time, and I think that's something that people are. Oh, what do you mean by Monday church? And we've been using the language Genesis 1 Christians. Oh, what do you mean by Genesis 1 Christians? Genesis 1 Christians? Well, you start reading the Bible with Genesis 1, not Genesis 3. Those phrases or words grab people's attention. What do you mean? And whether they're Christians or not, you can then begin to unpack that language. So thank you, bob, for these two new hooks for me to use.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Well, we all have to thank you so much. I'll never forget in 95 when we all got together there in East Texas for that well-documented meeting in Garden Valley Fellowship, you were working on discipling the nations. You were working on Discipling the Nations, you were working on the first draft of it there, and I've used that book so much with my students. But you know, I want to pick up with something you said there and extend this conversation now. This idea of leading in the scripture, let's talk about economics, for example. Idea of leading in the scripture, let's talk about economics, for example.
Dr. Bob Osburn:It seems to me that for far too long we have allowed the world of economics and business, which is a very prominent world, uh, it's a very dominant in shaping our imaginations. It's, it's had a lot to do with the shaping of America especially. But we have allowed the language of the Enlightenment to dominate that entire discussion. And so along has come the social justice people, who are really neo-Marxist, as we know, trying to offer some sort of response to that, and just as futile a response as the kind of language and concepts that the Enlightenment offered us. But let me ask you this why can't we talk about economics as a productive enterprise centered in the very core of our humanity, which is a God core of our humanity, which is a God-given humanity, and be able to take people right to Genesis 1 and unfold all the productive capacities that are built right into human beings and, by the way, into all of creation by a God who sees productivity as one of the very key points of the creation that he's developed and he's designed. And then why can't we talk about business not as the pursuit of one's self-interest or trying to become rich, which is the language that we all know, we hear it all the time. Why can't we talk about it instead as loving your neighbor?
Dr. Bob Osburn:When I develop a product or service that other people need and they're willing to pay for sure I may get rich doing that, but let me ask you a prior question what have I done by doing that? I have loved my neighbor, the people who designed these computers, for example, and the internet, the millions of people in the world of IT. They would never imagine this way of thinking about their work, but they love their neighbor. And look how we can do what we're doing because they love their neighbor. Sure, a lot of them got rich and I don't begrudge them one bit.
Dr. Bob Osburn:But the key point is they love their neighbor, and I can take you as I know Daryl, you and Scott can do the same thing. I can take you as I know daryl, you and scott can do the same thing. I can take you to nation after nation after nation around the world where people spend most of their time not loving their neighbors but waiting for the foreign remittance to come from their rich, their rich relative who's working in a rich western or middle eastern country. People who are one way or another never have been taught in their churches that one of the key ways you love your neighbors you find out what their needs are. You design a product or service that they're willing to pay for, and in the the process you create new wealth and you add value to their lives, and then they begin to do likewise for you. So why are we using that kind of language?
Dwight Vogt:I introduced this particular subject by asking where does the word economics come from? It comes from the greek word okonomia. And what does okonomia mean? Stewardship of the house that's right and you steward the house for long-term impact economically. That benefits the community and Oconomia is in contrast to Chromaticus, which is short-term trading for personal benefit. That's how we see economy today. That's what our president is promoting. That's right. Is chromaticus, not the biblical concept of oconomia.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Exactly.
Dwight Vogt:That's our word, but do we know where it came from?
Dr. Bob Osburn:That's right, so we ought to be trumpeting this for the people who love our neighbors, and that's what we're trying to do in this podcast, of course, but I think Bob, it's you know.
Scott Allen:back to Darrow's point about Genesis 3 and Genesis 1, for way too long our evangelical theology has been the starting point is you're a sinner, you are lost, and your number one need, the greatest need in your life, has nothing to do with economics or nothing to do with business or anything like that. All of that doesn't really matter. It's all going to burn. You know you're going to die and then you're going to leave this world, and so none of that will matter at the end of the day. The only thing that really matters is your personal spiritual salvation. So again, listen. I always need to say I am an evangelist. People need to be saved, they need to hear the good news of Jesus.
Dwight Vogt:Christ. But it's the good news that the kingdom of God not merely the good news of salvation, they also need to hear the good news that they're a sinner and they can be saved and have eternal life with Jesus Christ.
Scott Allen:So I am in no way, in no way diminishing that as something that's vital and even central. But the problem is you limit it, and you limit it by saying that's all that matters. And so you start with genesis 3. You have to go back to genesis 1 to get principles of here's god. He created us, he put us in this garden, he gave us this task to have dominion, to steward, to be stewards right. That's, you know, darrow's concept of okonomiyah. The word stewardship is at the heart of it to and then to do something, to work with it, right to, to, to make it better. You know, as dare you often say, to take the grapes and make wine and then, yes, sell the wine and bless your neighbor or whatever. It is right. I mean, all of that gets laid out in genesis one and two. It's completely neglected. That's like just people don't have a concept for what the bible would even say, or if that's important for us. In my experience anyways, it's just neglected.
Luke Allen:And, by the way, it didn't used to be neglected.
Scott Allen:I always go back to the Reformation. One of the things that amazes me about the Reformers is, when the Scriptures were opened, they mined them for these principles and they found these biblical principles and they built schools, education, economics. They built things on biblical principles in a way we don't do anymore, seems to me.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Exactly and, for example, another illustration again thinking in international context, I can understand when, in a culture like America, in a society like America, in a society like America, the real pressing issues, for example going back to the 19th century, were issues of public drunkenness. Vast amounts of men, especially, were drunk. They were drinking away the welfare of their children and their wives, just like, you know, we happens in certain other parts of the world today. So the gospel had to address those issues. The gospel of being saved from those kinds of addictions had tremendous power to enable your children and your wives to thrive. And and uh, we can thank god.
Dr. Bob Osburn:But but if you look around the world today, what are the most pressing central issues?
Dr. Bob Osburn:One of the chief ones is the issue of integrity or the lack thereof, in other words, corruption.
Dr. Bob Osburn:And so I'm trying to say to some of our students that in bringing the gospel into your societies in many cases societies that are still in a place where they don't want to be, they're struggling to make any progress the discipling message ought to be be a man or woman of full integrity who is able to demonstrate to your neighbor that you can be trusted to produce a product or service that they will need and they will value and it won't fail them when they need it.
Dr. Bob Osburn:So again, this comes back to the issue you've been hitting on, scott. We need to make the gospel. First of all, we need to ground it in these fundamental scriptural realities, starting with Genesis 1. We need to ground people in thinking worldviewishly, as we would say. And, number three, we need to face the fact that the gospel needs to have some sort of contextual framework that fits people's context. The issue today is not public drunkenness in most of the world. The primary issue in most of the world is corruption, and that's where the gospel should be driven home time after time after time. And it's not, it's not.
Dwight Vogt:This goes back to what we learned from Schaefer. Yes, he talked about each person is an island and there's a beach to make your landing on that island, but the island is surrounded by cliffs, and so you probably remember this from him, bob. No, I don't. As your ship is coming in and you discover this island and you want to explore it, you have to sail around it first to find the beach to land on, and that's what you're saying right here. What is the beach to land on? Right, the gospel, and land it on the beach of integrity, exactly.
Scott Allen:In other words, if I hear both of you guys speaking you know what is?
Scott Allen:yeah, what's the driving issue? Again, it comes back to Jennifer Say. For her it was men and women's sports, or just. Is there such a thing as men and women, bob? For you it comes back to Jennifer Say. For her it was men and women's sports, or just. Is there such a thing as men and women, bob? For you it's corruption. I don't disagree with that Boy. It seems like we're just uncovering just layer upon layer of corruption, especially in the early years of this Trump administration with Doge. We knew it was bad, but, boy, it's like it's being exposed and it's like, wow, we are deeply corrupt in the united states. You know? So, yeah, and, and then, yeah, the principles from the scripture. What principles give rise to relatively cultures that are relatively uncorrupt? Um, you know, and and there are many, aren't there? There are many, and just again, helping christians to Christians to think that this has to become a culture.
Dr. Bob Osburn:And I think I heard from you, scott, kind of what are some of the biblical themes that we can encourage our brothers and sisters to land on?
Dr. Bob Osburn:And so I think one of those has to be that there is a great God who's made us in his image, not to satisfy ourselves, but to actually bring great glory to him and to have a clear purpose for our lives, which I think is twofold to be productive and to be people who protect his world.
Dr. Bob Osburn:To be people who protect his world. And he's built into us three functional capacities to be creative, productive and responsible. And that, by virtue of the Imago Dei, we have four intrinsic capacities to be social, moral, rational and spiritual. And taking these together, I call this the 1234 model we can develop, I think, a way of talking to children as well as to adults, what it means to be human, because Christianity is an invitation into reality and away from fantasy land. It's an invitation to be truly human in a world that wants to make us increasingly as machines, and it's it's an invitation to, uh, what others would call the greatest adventure that anyone could ever imagine, and that is the kingdom of a led by a God who is greater than we could have ever hoped for, and certainly better than we could ever deserve.
Scott Allen:Amen, bob, amen. Well, yeah, I think, the beachhead ideas. I've been saying the same thing.
Scott Allen:To the degree I haven't used that analogy, but I like it to the degree that our message is you're a sinner, you need to be saved. It's a vital message. Everyone needs to hear it and respond to it and we need to be stewards of that message. But you start where people are at, and that's not right now. It doesn't seem to be the pressing question, it doesn't seem to be the beachhead, and I think one of them is what is truth? You know, is there truth? You know what is truth? Is there truth? Is there a truth about what it means to be male and female, for example?
Scott Allen:Or can we just be anything we want and people are saying no, we know deep down in our bones that that's not correct, that we can't just be anything we want. And if you're a man, you can just suddenly flip a switch and say you're a female and end up on a sports team or in a locker room. That's just not livable, that's evil you know people are—but then you have to go. But who defines that right? I mean, if that's a lie, let's say what is the truth. That's what moves people towards the Bible, towards God, because he's at the end of that road, and that's where you start, that's the beachhead right.
Scott Allen:In that case, that's where you start, but you have to be ready to talk about that. Let's talk about truth. Let's talk about reality. You know, I think a lot of Christians don't think of their faith in those terms. This is what. I believe They've kind of bought the postmodern thing. This is what I. It's good, you know it's personal for me whatever it is, yeah, I believe yeah, right, exactly in fact.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Uh, when I teach the comparative worldviews course, one of my key assertions that I think all the students pick up is a key idea in the entire course is that christianity really is the only um worldview that that absolutely makes a central claim to be the truth. That's right, and actually says that if we are not the truth, you shouldn't believe us. Yes, there's no other worldview that is willing to dare to make such an audacious claim.
Scott Allen:Yeah, Jesus didn't rise from the dead. We're foolish to believe it exactly. It had to historically happen as a reality, Right? Yep, you're right, Bob.
Dr. Bob Osburn:So to lean in on the idea that this is all truth and it's about truth, it's a struggle for truth, is to lean into, I think, a strength inherent in Christianity and to really advance human welfare through the gospel.
Scott Allen:Absolutely, I've been thinking about this in terms of. You know, I think Jordan Peterson said when he started studying the scriptures that belief in God is kind of the prerequisite for belief in truth. In other words, without God defining things as kind of the anchor for truth, then we're just left with individual interpretations. Or, as Nietzsche said, there are no. What did he say? There are no facts, only interpretations. I think is what he said. You know, that's what we're left with, your truth my truth.
Scott Allen:That is what you're left with. And then, as Orwell said, that doesn't last. You're going to have the party step in and define truth for everyone, using power. You know, and we're going to make you say a man as a woman, or we're going to make you, you know, we're going to make you say whatever the party wants you to say. That, I think, is the clarity that these people are coming to. So you have to say there is a real world and there's an anchor for it, because it was created by god. Truth ends with him, you know it ends with him. It has no basis in any other way. So I do think that's a clear beachhead, bob. That's where you started. This return to reality, I think, is just so important right now luke.
Dwight Vogt:Yeah, go ahead bob and I want to.
Scott Allen:I want want to bring Luke in here because he's been quiet. I know he's got things going on in his head, so, but go ahead, bob. Yeah.
Dr. Bob Osburn:I'm just going to make the comment that, as Christianity brings us into encounter with reality, one of the dilemmas in paradise, one of the dilemmas that human beings face, is that reality can be very brutal, it can be very harsh, it can be very harsh, it can be terrifying.
Dr. Bob Osburn:And so if that was all that Christianity was, is this introduction to reality without a savior, without someone who can help us to redeem and enable us to see that, for those who love God, all things that happen to us work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose, to be able to see that there's a sovereign God at work? Without that knowledge, to only get half of it, it would be devastating, and I think probably part of what's happened is that the world has been getting one half or the other of the message and hasn't seen how those two things connect, that the introduction to reality is not only to face reality and all of its harshness and tragedy but also to have a Savior that gives us the grace and the hope and the ability to actually be redemptive change agents in a world that looks otherwise hopeless.
Scott Allen:When I did my deep dive into the woke, as I call it, the toxic new religion, one of the things I saw was that they see a world where people act selfishly and they act tribally and they're trying to kind of put others under their heel for their own personal selfish advantage. And what they've done is they, and that's true. Like you said, that's a harsh reality. That's the harsh reality of a fallen world and they see that clearly. But the problem with their worldview is that they've totalized, that, they've said that's all there is, there's nothing more and it's so.
Scott Allen:It took me a while to understand that If something looks good, like freedom or democracy or hard work, all of that isn't really good. That's just a tool by somebody who's kind of weaponizing it to use it for their personal advantage. That's the critical thought We've got to criticize or think critically about these so-called good things, because that's all there is. At the end of the day in this worldview. It's just pure power, and it's power negatively, for advantage. And I thought you know, what they don't see is the reality of a God who is love, who's compassionate and gracious, as it says, and you know God says on Mount Sinai to Moses you know and steps in and forgives and dies you know, to redeem people and then people that have tried to follow his example since then. I don't know why they don't see that, they don't see any of that redemptive aspect. But what you're left with is just a really dark worldview.
Scott Allen:Again nobody can live with that. And as Christopher Rufus noted, and this is what you're saying- a critical theory can show you all the problems, but it gives you no answers whatsoever. No answer other than you need to flip the tables and get on top. Exactly that's it.
Dr. Bob Osburn:You need to put your heel on somebody else's neck, exactly, and that's why it only tears down.
Scott Allen:It's got to deconstruct, tear down. We've got to tear. It's got to deconstruct, tear down whatever it is right it. Then you know, once you're on top, there's no building. You know, yeah, it's, it's just destructive. Sorry, luke, I was going to bring you in and we got going off on something. What are you hearing, luke? What, what, what, what's your, what are your thoughts?
Luke Allen:oh man, um, I've really enjoyed this. This is exactly what I was hoping for today with this discussion. It's been really fun to listen to and just soak in what you guys are saying, take notes. I don't know if I have anything to add. I can do my best to summarize what I've heard so far. This is an exciting discussion for me as a young guy. I this is. This is an exciting discussion for me as a young guy, I think.
Luke Allen:I think everything is pointing at the fact that we are at one of these kind of chapter, a new chapter of history. Potentially. The way people think the chapter we are in right now, which I would say is coming to a close and a collapse of the close at that, is at a point of just. It's just untenable. Where we're at right now, post-modernism, this idea of hyper-criticalness of everything you know, this worship of skepticism for the sake of skepticism, it seems, without landing on anything, is absolutely untenable.
Luke Allen:With the, you know, the freedom that we see around us, the democracy we see around us, that kind of came out of the Enlightenment, you could say Postmodernism is tearing that all down, and it's tearing it down where, nowhere, because it's a rejection of truth. So now what? So this chapter? I think it's coming to a real close. When you reject truth, you reject reality and your worldview is just going to fall with that. So, yeah, I think we are at a new chapter, which is crazy to think about, because these chapters sometimes take hundreds of years to play out. You know, you think of the postmodern era or the modern era or the pre-modern era, and it's exciting as a Christian Christian because we could be a part. We have the potential right now if we rise to the occasion to write the thesis of the next chapter, if we seize the moment.
Luke Allen:And that's exciting, that's really exciting. So I love what you guys are saying about at this point, especially recognizing this moment of coming off the heels of post-modernism, this rejection of truth which is leaving people in, I see, three large directions, that's leaving people in Hopelessness, despair. We see that all around us, this lack of meaning. I also see it in just an interest in spirituality, which is good but not always great. I heard someone recently say witchcraft is the fastest growing religion in America right now. Islam's growing like crazy in America right now. So there's this. Let's look into spirituality, because it doesn't seem like this, uh, this, this, uh enlightenment lie is working for me anymore. I need, I need something different. Or it's leading people to Christ and it's leading him to the firm foundation that is Christ. So, yeah, again, there's a real potential here to lean into this and the point that we have an answer. This answer is based in reality and this is the only answer that actually works in this world.
Scott Allen:It's the only one that's livable.
Luke Allen:The only one that's livable. And it's exciting too, because as Christians, if we understand that and we firmly believe that, then it's very easy to defend the truth. You don't have to do much, you just kind of have to let it out. The truth can defend itself, and you don't need to know all the right arguments, you don't need to know all the right apologetics. Truth can win just by questioning what is not true. Through questioning, you can pretty much tear down any lie and point to its absence of reality, essentially because as humans we are prone to seek the truth, which is great because we have the law written on our heart, because we're created in the image of God. So a lot of the defending of truth just comes down to questioning what is not true, and I think you can do a lot of good just there and that doesn't take too much.
Scott Allen:That's not too difficult. You remind me of that famous Rod Dreher, you know made me aware of this and it was the actor.
Luke Allen:Oh, yes, yes, I knew you, baclav Havel.
Scott Allen:Yeah, live in truth, you know. And he tells the story of the green grocer who had to always put up the sign out of fear, you know, the Workers of the World Unite sign in his grocery store window or else the powers that be were going to put him out of business and put him in prison. But he knew it was a lie. And then one day he said I was a lie. And then one day he said I'm not going to put the sign up. I refused to put the sign up and hobble said that was the key that brought down the soviet union. It was just that was the first break in the day, that was the break in the dike and he lost his business.
Scott Allen:Likely that green grocer did, but he, what hobble said, was so powerful. He said he gained his humanity and it took me a while to understand what that meant. He gained his humanity. We are. It took me a while to understand what that meant he gained his humanity. We are made in the image of God, and God is true, he is truth, he never lies. To be a human being is to be a truth teller, a true human being, it's not to be. To lie is to diminish who you are as a human being. You are most fully human the closer you get to being a person of integrity who tells the truth and doesn't lie, even if it costs you your life. And that was the power of the green grocer there. So that's what I hear.
Dr. Bob Osburn:You say I appreciate, luke, what you said about the importance of asking questions and just to put an underline under that, it's just so evident that in Jesusesus's ministry, most of what he did was just ask questions, and if he spent most of his time asking questions, um, that's a good direction for all of us. Is right now we've been giving answers. We love to do that, but, um, in reality, most people who are skeptical, we can get them farther down the road towards reality, the reality of a God who created them and came to redeem them by asking questions.
Scott Allen:Bob, we probably need to wrap up here, as much as I would love to keep talking. This has just been so fun, but you hinted at some things you're working on. Do you want to just tell us a little bit more about the current project that you're working on and where people can go to learn more about it?
Dr. Bob Osburn:Well, first of all, we welcome people to come to, of course, our website, wilberforceiiorg and named for the very famous William Wilberforce, who we all honor as a great Christian social reformer and redemptive change agent of several hundred years ago. Right now we're working on a project to understand the Bible's teaching about leadership and that's a research project that we're on the front end of. We have an international research team that has has done some significant research on that and we're hoping this year to compile the results and and then to write a text that hopefully will be published within a couple years exciting. So that's a key part of our work. But there's so many other opportunities coming with others around the world who are asking us, particularly in the area of anti-corruption.
Dr. Bob Osburn:We have, essentially, an extension center that's developing in Malawi at least in part it's developing there, and that's one of the key themes themes along with teaching pastors about how to do business because, as I think you're aware and much of the world um, pastors or people who go into the pastorate to be honest, are going into it as a way to make money because there's no other real avenue for getting a job, but we're trying to teach them that they can be a pastor but at the same time they can create a good or service that others need and genuinely serve their neighbors with those words and services, as well as the gospel of jesus christ.
Dr. Bob Osburn:So we're hoping more and more pastors will move to the bivocational model and show their members how to do just exactly what I talked about.
Scott Allen:Wow, Bob, that's so exciting. I'm so grateful for you and for the way you've been so faithfully working to strengthen the church, and particularly in the global south of the developing world, and just really getting after practical issues. So I just want to encourage all of our listeners to yeah, to go to the Wilberforce Academy website, Wilberforce.
Dr. Bob Osburn:II.
Scott Allen:Yeah, Wilberforce International Institute. Wilberforce International Institute Forgive me for that, Bob yeah.
Dr. Bob Osburn:Wilberforceiiorg.
Scott Allen:Wilberforceiiorg, wilberforceiiorg. Yep, let's all go there and check it out and see what we can do to support Bob and his important work. Bob, thanks for just the time you've given us today, just the depth of wisdom, your insights, your camaraderie. You've meant so much to me and to all of us, so I just want to thank you for that you all a treasure to us and we thank God for you just as much All right, well, listen everybody.
Scott Allen:thanks for listening to another episode of Ideas have Consequences. This is the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance.
Luke Allen:Hey everyone, thank you so much for listening to this episode with our amazing guest today, dr Bob Osborne. If you'd like to learn more about him, his writings and his ministry, the Wilberforce International Institute, then make sure to head over to this episode's page, which you'll see linked in the show notes, and on that episode page you can also learn more about our newest book and Bible study here at the Disciple Nations Alliance that share the title 10 Words to Heal Our Broken World, and both of those are by Scott Allen, as you'll remember me mentioning during the break today. So, again, if you'd like to learn more about those, you can head over to 10wordsbookorg or you can head over to Amazon, search the title and find your copy or copies today. That's it for today.
Luke Allen:Thank you so much for joining us for this episode of Ideas have Consequences. We hope that you'll be able to join us next week and, in the meantime, if you'd like to follow this show on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever else you're listening, then I hope that you will be able to do so today and, as always, if you'd like to share your favorite episode with a friend, that, of course, really helps us continue to grow and expand this show. So thank you so much in advance for that.
