Sidewalk Conversations
"Let the one who thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall..." (1 Corinthians 10:12)
Standing strong and remaining true to your calling is no easy task. No one sets out to crash and burn. In fact, it's actually the opposite, most people want to stand strong, remain effective, and be true to their values all the way through to the end. But, it is really hard to do.
In these interviews, Piet Van Waarde (a 40 year veteran of pastoral ministry) has heart-to-heart conversations with ordinary people about what it takes to stay faithful and effective in the things that matter most.
Sidewalk Conversations
Everyone Has Theology—Is Yours Biblical? with Art Powell
Exploring why our understanding of God is the most important thought process believers must embrace, this conversation delves into how theology shapes our entire Christian journey.
• Everybody already has a theology—the question is whether it's biblical
• Theology is like a map that helps you from getting lost, but isn't the actual journey itself
• Understanding the Bible as a whole provides the best defense against theological error
• The primary place to start theological exploration is reading Scripture from front to back
• Jesus performed the same miracles seen in the Old Testament to demonstrate His divinity
• Politics has unfortunately influenced theology rather than theology influencing politics
• As Christians mature, they often become more comfortable with theological mystery
• Learning to hear from Jesus and the Holy Spirit directly through Scripture study is essential
• Theological humility is crucial—the most important question is whether someone knows Jesus
• Recommended resources include C.S. Lewis, Michael Heiser, and Tim Mackey of The Bible Project
Join us at Shoreline Church on Sundays at 10am for Art's "Firm Foundations" class, where he provides practical tools for reading and understanding your Bible.
Support for this show comes from the Van Waarde Foundation. You can donate today on Patreon.
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Hello and welcome to another Sidewalk Conversation. So glad that you're here. In fact, I want to start with a question, and I hope that you'll take a moment to consider it, and the question is this what do you think is the most important thought process that a believer must embrace? Now, my guess is that some of you might say well, that's easy, you know, I need to be thinking about love, or I need to be thinking about faithfulness or service, and as important as all those things are, I want to argue for a slightly different point of view.
Piet Van Waarde:And that is that the primary or most important thought process we need to consider is our understanding about the nature of God. That's where it all starts. Then everything else flows from that. Now, a lot of times when I mention the word theology, people kind of imagine something very dry and boring and dusty, that's basically reserved for theologians and seminary professors and not really something that rank and file believers need to be thinking about. But if you think about it, it really is one of the most important dimensions of our faith. In fact, everything flows out of our theology. In fact, one of the things we're going to talk about today is that everybody already has a theology. Like, if you think about it, when you start imagining how you're going to process suffering or how you're going to deal with temptation or how you relate to the world around you, all of those things are a product of your theology. In fact, aw Tozer said famously the thing that comes to mind when we think about God is the most important thing about us, and so what we're going to do in our podcast today is we're going to kind of unwrap that and talk a little bit about why it's so important to have a robust biblical theology, that it doesn't have to be a boring journey. In fact, to take theology seriously is part of what makes our Christian journey an adventure, and I am excited about the person that I have here today who's going to help us navigate this conversation our local kind of preeminent theologian that I'm bringing back from season one, and I can't wait to introduce them to you again Today.
Piet Van Waarde:I want to say a special thanks to the Van Ward Foundation. This is supported by our Patreon members, so we have a group of people who understand and value what we're doing in this ministry that has various points of view and various channels that we produce. So we have a newsletter, we have a podcast, we have pocket prayers, we have various productions from my authoring, and so all of that is supported through the Van Ward Foundation and that is supported through Patreon members, and you can find all of that if you're interested in being a part at Patreon, at Pete Van Ward, and you can become a monthly subscriber. You can become a supporter as a one-time gift, but all of those resources fund the various initiatives that we have going on through the Van Ward Foundation and if you're already a part, thank you for doing so. All right, well, let's turn our attention to the guest today, my good friend Art Powell.
Art Powell:Thank you. I'm surprised you had me back after the first one, but thank you.
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah, so we had you all the way back in season one. Thank you for making a return visit.
Art Powell:Really appreciate it. Yeah, glad to be back.
Piet Van Waarde:So that's been a couple of years, so why don't? You just like start with giving us a little update on what you've been doing, where you've been kind of focusing your attention.
Art Powell:Yeah, the last couple of years have been interesting, so I am also. I have a day job, so I'm the. Ceo of a company I founded 20 years ago this year Wow, congratulations, 20 years I think yes Anyway, so I do love it. I mean, it can be a challenge at times, but I do love it.
Piet Van Waarde:And what kind of company is it for those who-.
Art Powell:Yeah, it's just a technology services company, so we've got about 30 employees, between 30 and 35 employees, and it presents me the day-to-day challenges. But I do love it because I think it's important to live out one's theology and this gives me an opportunity to do that and all the challenges, to be in the middle of situations. And I want to let out a string of expletives sometimes I can't do it. I'm like no, what would Jesus do? Okay, no, you can't do that.
Art Powell:Uh, but so it is good. It keeps me healthy and keeps me in check. Uh, wife and I are doing extremely well. We just hit 34 years of marriage been there for 38 years. Yes, she was Hispanic. I still have on my limbs so I do consider that an accomplishment.
Piet Van Waarde:So she hopefully she's not watching this. Yeah, yeah, she will be but that's okay, she's a.
Art Powell:she's a sweetheart. Most of the time she's a sweetheart. I love her, um, and I can't imagine being without her. And uh, uh, I did. I was able to reconcile with my son fully. So there was that was.
Piet Van Waarde:There was something, yeah, that was a real gift.
Art Powell:Uh, and we've, and, uh, I did have a health scare. Um, I had, uh, I had a defib. Uh, you know where you, your heart is beating out of sync. And about the, they say it's the closest thing to having a heart attack without having a heart attack. Okay, and then, immediately after I went for my checkup and my doc was like you know what he goes. You have two choices here you need to get your health in shape or you're going on medicine. My cholesterol I don't mind sharing, it was like 198. I was, I was, I was a pre-diabetic and I'm very happy to report in three and a half months I lost 36 pounds, I dropped my cholesterol a hundred points and I'm no longer pre-diabetic. In fact, he was so impressed he was like you can just see me in May and I was, so I'm going to keep it up.
Piet Van Waarde:I feel a lot better.
Art Powell:So you know, and seeing you go through your, your health stuff, it was just you really inspired me that I could do it.
Piet Van Waarde:I really didn't have any excuses.
Art Powell:I needed to stop shoving all that food in my mouth that I didn't need. So, yeah, so that's been good. So you know, I've also acquired a bit of a following on Twitter theologically on my theological Twitter and enjoying that.
Piet Van Waarde:What's the handle?
Art Powell:It's Saved by J, s-a-v-e-b-y-j Saved by Jesus, and I've been enjoying that, still teaching firm foundations at Shoreline. And so yeah, just the last two years.
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah, firm foundations at Shoreline, and so yeah, just the last two years. Yeah, because theology is not just like a little side interest for you.
Art Powell:No, no, yeah, dr Dickey said it best, I think, at our church. He said he goes, art, you got born again. You just kept digging. And I've been digging for over 30 years and I went into apologetics, and part of it was when I got born again. I was agnostic, atheist, and so my heart and mind weren't synced, and so I went into agnostics, which was the next natural step, and then I just kept going and then I taught Christian philosophy professionally to Christian kids.
Art Powell:That was interesting, I could tell you some horror stories there, and then I went into and then I started teaching you some horror stories there, and then I started teaching men theology at Shoreline and now I teach the church to men and women, I teach the staff and I really, really enjoy it. Yeah, you're right, it's a passion of mine and if I ever do retire from work then there'll probably be a full-time passion. I love it.
Piet Van Waarde:So I think one of the and I kind of mentioned this in the introduction I think one of the things that becomes an intimidating factor for believers is they kind of get scared off even by the word like theology. I don't know, can I really really understand this stuff? So let me just start with, like what would be your pitch for why theology should matter for the quote, unquote rank and file Christian.
Art Powell:Yeah, and that's a great question. And I, first of all, I am not. I do not have a degree, so that I always tell people that, so they have, they can hopefully feel a little less threatened. Like I don't have a PhD or a master's or even a degree in theology and it's something I self-taught. But I do think theology is important.
Art Powell:I like CS Lewis's analogy. He said that it's like a map, right, and maps are important. They help you from getting lost, they help you from you know you don't want to, from getting out of bounds, so you can't discard a map. Now the reverse is true. The map is not the actual trip, right, and so you can't, really you can't, you can't separate the two.
Art Powell:And I see a lot of people trying to separate the two. They were like, oh, we just follow Jesus. Well, jesus had theology, had theology in the New Testament, right. And then there's the. You know we don't need all that theological stuff, we can just follow Jesus. Well, no, that doesn't cut it.
Art Powell:And then you know, because Jesus says a lot of things, that if you don't have some basic understanding of the Old Testament, you will miss it, and some very important things. The other side of the fence is. You have these and I don't want to offend anybody, so I'm not saying they're all like this but you have these really stuffy PhDs who are like well, you must believe in this doctrine, you must believe in that doctrine. And Jesus went after some of those and he said you search the scriptures for life, so you won't come to me, right, but you won't come to me. And so I think it's very important that we can't separate the two, right. So the gospel is truth that needs to be experienced, and it's also an experience in truth. So the truth, the theology, is what helps us stay on the map and not go off into the farm and get weird, and so you can't ignore theology. It's important.
Piet Van Waarde:All right. So I love the way you described that, and CS Lewis is one of my faves as well and so let's say, somebody said all right, I've come to a conclusion that I need this. I need to give attention to this in my daily life. Where would you encourage people to begin?
Art Powell:Yeah, and what I'm going to tell you is probably not the expected answer, but I would say begin, read the Bible from front to back, because I think one of the even I see this, unfortunately, even with very highly educated people is that you can miss certain things if you don't have an overarching view of the Bible. There are people who try to disassociate the God of the Old Testament from Jesus and you can't do that and they're like, well, he's violent. I was like, yeah, because that's kind of like why the gospel is good news right.
Art Powell:Because I've met both. And the way I got saved is I met the God of the Old Testament first, and then I met Jesus. And let me tell you like, when I read the Old Testament for the first time, I had no trouble believing who that God, like that God was real, because I'd met him. He's a holy, righteous God who demands holiness and righteousness. But you know, and then I got to meet the love of Jesus and the grace of Jesus. Right, so he's both. You can't separate the two.
Piet Van Waarde:I love how you said that. I just want to hit an exclamation point there, because you can't fully appreciate grace in the gospel without that understanding of the law and what his nature is as a core as well. So he's not just grace, he is truth.
Art Powell:Yeah, jesus didn't say, oh, I came and removed the law. He said I did not come to remove the law, I came to fulfill it. And unless you really grasp what that means, what he's saying is, paul says the law was put there to reveal our sin. It wasn't there. It was there to show us our sin. It wasn't to the law, never perfected anybody.
Art Powell:And if you don't understand that, then you sometimes will walk into Christianity thinking, oh, you know, be good, do better, be good, be better right. No, that's not what Christianity is. Christianity is you could never be good Like on your best day. You're not good Like if you don't get born again. If you don't allow Jesus to do something inside of you, you cannot be good.
Art Powell:And so I think it's very important. That's why theology is so important. But that's why it's so important to read the Bible as a whole, and you can't take pieces out of it. And I think one of the best defenses against bad theology is understanding the Bible as a whole, from front to back. You don't have to go to the extreme I've gone to, but I read the Bible front to back every year. I've been doing that for 20 plus years, maybe a little longer, and so the more you do that and I recommend everybody do it at least once or twice. And I recommend everybody do it at least once or twice because you see this arc that you will never unsee again, and then you begin to understand some things that make more sense, like when Jesus taught.
Art Powell:Because, like most people don't realize, like all the literally every miracle that Jesus did was already had been done in the Old Testament, he's doing them again to show like, hey, I'm the guy who did those miracles in the Old Testament. Right, and you'll miss that if you don't. You know, a lot of people act like the miracles of Jesus were new. They weren't. They were in the Bible, they were just less frequent and spread over a long. You know, eons as opposed to. But Jesus is saying, hey, I'm the guy who did those miracles, see, because I'm proving it. And that's what he meant when he said believe in me because of the miracles I perform. Now in the Western culture we think, oh, yeah, he's doing some pretty crazy stuff, so he must be God. But what he's telling his Jewish audience, which was his primary audience in the beginning, is believe in me because I'm doing the same miracles that God did in the Old Testament.
Piet Van Waarde:Which they were obviously very familiar with.
Art Powell:They were very familiar with.
Art Powell:And so having this gives a deeper understanding, and this is why you can't. This is why I think the very primary thing is to understand where you, to understand the Bible as a whole. One of the things I've learned over the years because when I teach people to read the Bible for themselves, I get a lot of criticism, particularly online, where people say, well, that's dangerous. And I'm like, not really. Because, first of all, jesus said call no man your teacher, I will teach you. Jesus and the Holy Spirit want to teach us scripture.
Art Powell:But the second thing is my personal experience has been over the years is when I hear somebody say something that's like off and left field, you know, way off the ranch, just crazy. You know what? The first thing I ask them is it's not. Where is that in the Bible? Because I know they didn't get it from the Bible. The very first thing I asked them is who told you that? And so if you know your Bible you're not you're going to be much more resistant to these people who are saying some really weird things, because you will know like this doesn't align with what the Bible says. And so I say start with biblical knowledge.
Piet Van Waarde:I love that perspective. I had a seminary professor who kind of said it this way. He said when you learn about scripture and theology, it's not necessarily going to make you a great Christian, but it will probably keep you from being a bad heretic. That is really good.
Art Powell:And it also keeps you from error right.
Art Powell:Error is important. So, and that's we use heretic too much outside the church anyway, because it's defined in the Bible, it's simply as someone who does not believe that Jesus was God in the flesh. Right, but more importantly, it keeps from error, and that's the key right. Because people say, well, you just need to love your neighbor as yourself. Well, no, that's not what Jesus said. Jesus said love God and then love your neighbor. The two are linked. You can't unlink them, right? And so it's these little things that when you know, I love it. When people tell me, they're always like oh well, if I met the Jesus of the Bible, you know I like him. I don't like the Christians. I'm like well, you just told me you don't know the Jesus of the Bible, because if you really read what he said he would have, he's going to offend you multiple times. He still offends me to this day. He called a woman a dog. I'm still dealing with that.
Art Powell:So this is why it's important that we know the Bible ourselves, because that is the best of it. And I'm not saying you don't listen to other people, and I'm not saying you don't listen to, but even they can make Even. You know, I've gone back and I've been revisiting the fathers of the faith, the ones who came right after the apostles, and you know, even they can get a little flaky sometimes. Right, it's important that we know the word of God.
Piet Van Waarde:So when a person thinks about theology, I think one of the things is and I love your suggestion to start with scripture, because we've related a long time I've noticed how you continue to come back to your chronological Bible every year and all of that, which I respect a ton.
Piet Van Waarde:And in addition to that, are there some things that you say like are a priority, theological points, like where you say you really like, if you're going to, of all the things you could be learning and thinking about, these are the like A, b, c top priorities.
Art Powell:Yeah, I think it's real. So first of all, one of the things I miss going to a non-denominational church or interdenominational church, the thing that I think you know, the Westmiser Confession and things. There are good reasons to have, like, certain creeds in the body of Christ that are important and, and I think that that's one thing being in a non-denominational I miss a little bit like those creeds you know, and I always say go find a creed that really you know, really uh, sings to you and work on that Cause.
Art Powell:in those creeds are some very basic, fundamental non-negotiables and they typically go something like this that that Jesus was, that was was prophesied, uh, in the old Testament, that he was God in the flesh, that he was in existence with God since the beginning. He's never not been in existence. That he's eternal. That he became man right, that he died for our sins the appropriation of sins, I mean there's a whole theological argument on that but he died for our sins and that he rose from the grave and that he, whoever believes in him, shall not perish Like. And so there's some, there's a real basic, fundamental line there that you, that I think people need to grasp and understand that these are non-negotiables, even if people debate, maybe, how it was implemented or how you implement it. Is it water, baptism, is it sprinkle, the?
Piet Van Waarde:head.
Art Powell:You're missing the point. The point is get baptized, right? That's an outward sign of our inward faith, right? And so, even though there may be disputes on these non-negotiables, they're still non-negotiables, and I think it's important that people understand what those non-negotiables are.
Piet Van Waarde:That's awesome.
Art Powell:Yeah.
Piet Van Waarde:Do you see anything happening in the Christian world that gives you concern about, like over-emphasis on certain things things that you want a list or a weekly publication.
Art Powell:No, I think that my biggest concern right now is the way that politics has influenced the church.
Art Powell:And so one of the big, I tell people online all the time the goal of the church is, or the goal of the saints, which is the believers in Christ. The goal of the saints is that they, the believers in Christ. The goal of the saints is that they need to bring Jesus to their politics. We don't need to bring politics into the church, right, and the problem is because I see people twisting theology to try to match their favorite political party, and we really need to stop doing that. Politics is a system of the world. It's like all other systems of the world.
Art Powell:You know, I'm the CEO of a company and corporations, and capitalism is a system of the world. Now, I'm glad I live in a capitalist republic society, like I don't, I think you know, constitutional republic society. I personally think it's probably the wisest way to live in a sin-fallen world, but that doesn't mean those systems themselves don't have trouble. Capitalism lends itself to greed and we're seeing this in play right now, and I think that we as Christians you know. So my goals as a capitalist CEO who runs a company is not to go make all the money in the world for myself. I need to set a better example and show that there's a better way.
Art Powell:How would Jesus run this corporation? How would he treat his employees Right? And so I think it's. I do. I do think it's the same with politics, like I think, when I'm convinced, I'll be convinced that politics isn't affecting Christianity, but Christianity is affecting politics. When I see true believers across the aisle reaching out and working together, irregardless of what their party says, right, they're saying like no, I can't support my party may support this. I can't support it and I'll work with you to stop it, whether that be corporate greed or sexual identity or some of the other things that are going on. And I don't see that, and we should be seeing that.
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah, I love that. I pray for that with you because on the surface it just feels like that, and I'm going to say something really controversial here.
Art Powell:If you're a Christian who follows Jesus, right and you're online and you're having a political debate, and if you find yourself pulling down towards demonizing your opponent who's also a Christian, shut up, like, stop talking, like, stop tweeting, Stop, like at the bare minimum right. That is just not allowed. We cannot allow anything to divide the body of Christ, least of all politics, like it should not be divided. There are Republicans and there are Democrats who are Christians, and that's great, but they need to be working for the kingdom of God and they do not need to be demonizing each other.
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah, well.
Art Powell:I'll catch a lot of flack for that, I'm sure. No, I mean, I agree with you.
Piet Van Waarde:I'm just not very optimistic that that's possible. During the election cycle, I tried to post some things about like try to find a way to talk about principles and values as opposed to parties and candidates, and it was just I gave up. I mean, it just didn't work. It was hard.
Art Powell:And here's the thing Paul calls us. So people don't understand the context of Paul in Romans. What he's talking about when he says you need to obey the government. So what happened was is that the Romans had got tired of the Christian and Jews and had kicked them out of Rome because they felt that they were being too rebellious. And then they got invited back in, but they were under what they call magistrate. And so what was happening is you had literally a Roman-like equivalent of a judge they didn't call him judge, but judge and a garrison of troops who lived in. They had a curfew. They had to do whatever they were told by the Romans, and it is that group of people that Paul's saying you need to obey the law and authority and do what they tell you to do, so long as it doesn't go directly against what God is saying. Now, like, can you imagine Christians in the United States dealing with that?
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah, yeah.
Art Powell:And that is really we need to. We just have got to. Paul says you need to pray for those leaders. So my challenge to Christians out there is were you praying for Biden and are you praying for Trump? Regardless of your view of either one of them, you are called to pray.
Piet Van Waarde:Thoughts and prayers. It's under a lot of conflict even in itself these days. Anyway, we won't go down that road.
Art Powell:Yeah, let's not go down. That would be our day.
Piet Van Waarde:So let's say somebody is saying, okay, I understand that my primary concern needs to be, like, an understanding of scripture, but are there some other resources that you find helpful, that you tend to turn people to and say, hey, here are some things you might?
Art Powell:This was such an important question, I wrote it down just so I'd be careful, and this list is not extensive. There are other people, voices I listen to, and these people may not be on people's list and they may even have ones that they like better. That's fine. My whole point is, you'll notice, this list is not very long, and I think people need to be very careful about what voice they allow inside of their head when it comes to the Word of God.
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah.
Art Powell:Right and my first influence I put is Jesus and the Holy Spirit. That is to me like the most important thing, because you need to learn to listen to God and listen for His voice when you're reading Scripture.
Piet Van Waarde:But doesn't that like don't you get a little scared about that like where some people will say some really wacky things?
Art Powell:Again. But when they say the wacky things nine times out of ten, it's like someone told them that my experience is people who read their Bible on the regular basis, and particularly those who read it front to back, but just those who read it on a regular basis. They rarely come to me. They may come to me and ask me questions or they may say, but most of those people have humility, they're very quick to point out they don't understand everything and most of them just don't say crazy things. I'm not saying that's always the case but I would say I love that.
Piet Van Waarde:Yeah, but I would say I love that.
Art Powell:Yeah, I would say 99% of the time it's not. I have most of the people that I have problems with. When they come to me and they're saying just crazy things, it's because they heard it from someone and they themselves don't know their Bible well. So I would say number one is Jesus and the Holy Spirit, and I know that makes people it's like I'm like I don't know. God was able to wash my sins away through the act of what Christ did on the cross, but he can't reveal his word to people and what they need to know. Come on, that's a little inconsistent there, you know what.
Piet Van Waarde:That reminds me of a statement I heard one time that God like we should trust God's capacity to get through to us more than our capacity to hear from him. So like if we're really genuinely open and we're worried, we won't hear. God knows how to get through. God does know how to speak.
Art Powell:Yes, if he got through to an agnostic atheist who was an a-hole. I don't think he's having trouble with anybody else.
Art Powell:And look at the end of the day. At the end of the day, people's, your view of God and your theology is going to change as you grow in Christ. Because I look at God. So salvation is not a snapshot of somebody's life. If my now oh my gosh, soon-to be 58-year-old self goes back to my 21-year-old self who just got born again, boy dude, are you even saved? Turns out he was. He had to work that salvation out.
Art Powell:So one is when I hear people say things I don't necessarily agree with, my first thing is I don't correct them. I start asking them questions. So I think we can do a lot of damage. A lot of times people need to work these things out and we don't give them that freedom to do it Now. If it's heretical, if it's something out there, you know, yeah, we're going to have a conversation, but 95, you know more than that. 98, 99% of the time that's not what I'm hearing. I may be hearing something I disagree with, but that's different and their view is going to change as I keep walking it out.
Art Powell:I think the second one is Paul Paul's, under a lot of attack these days, which is shocking to me. But you know, he just God ordained him to write two-thirds of the New Testament, you know. But Paul, I think. Paul is, I think, between Paul and Jesus, because Paul does a great job of expounding on what Jesus already said and Paul never really says anything, minus a few incidences, anything outside what Jesus said, like Paul's, in agreement with Jesus. So he's my number two. My number three is CS Lewis. Cs Lewis was so impactful to me because people like to classify him as apologetic, but his Mere Christianity, I think, is one of the most beautiful books on theology that were ever written because it gets to a baseline theology. And one of the most beautiful books on theology that were ever written because it gets to a baseline theology.
Art Powell:And one of the things I struggle with is that we try scientism is the irrational belief that science can explain everything right, and science can't. It didn't even know what gravity is. It can't reconcile quantum mechanics with Newtonian physics. I love science, I've been studying, I read science papers right, but science is just a tool and it can't explain everything. But what's happened is that bled into the church and what we do in the church is we think we have to explain everything. And what CS Lewis was showing is that there's a baseline theology, that there's also a baseline mystery.
Art Powell:You know it's like I'm rereading Origins and Origins got in trouble because he was born around 185 AD, His father was martyred in the faith and he got in trouble with the Catholic Church because now he lived before the Council on the Sia. But he got in trouble with the Church because he was saying that like we shouldn't use the word Trinity, because we're trying to use a word to explain something that's inexplicable, which is the Trinity of God and the multiplicity of a singular God. Those are my words, not his, but I do believe he was right. Now he was. Later they took away his heretical mark and they reestablished. Later the church reestablished his teachings because some of it was political, somebody wanted his seat, but he was right.
Art Powell:There's a knee-jerk reaction within the church to try to explain some of these mysteries. I'm a sinful human being and I ask people. Jesus says he lives inside of me, but how can something holy and righteous live inside something that's not righteous and holy? And how does he make me righteous and holy? And if Jesus is inside of me when I do something good, is it Jesus or is it me? Look, these are mysteries, even salvation itself and the walking out of our salvation is a mystery and I think we need to try to stop explaining some of that away, and I think CS Lewis is brilliant at showing where that line is, where the mystery is and where something solid we can stand on.
Piet Van Waarde:Let me just camp out at that point with you. I find for myself that the older I get, the more I appreciate mystery. I thought it would be the opposite. When I was younger, I felt very confident about so many things you know, yes, Like.
Art Powell:I know I went to seminary. Well, I do everything, that's right. I went to seminary, I got a degree.
Piet Van Waarde:And then, you know, and we find us kind of shied away from mystery, exactly like what you said, because we felt the need, compulsion, to explain everything. But now that I've been a believer for more than 40 years, I've realized there's so much I don't understand fully and I only have a small grasp on things. And I'm okay with mystery. I don't have to solve it all.
Art Powell:Yes, and the Bible's not there to solve it all for us. The Bible doesn't give us all the answers. It gives us the answers we need. It tells a fallen world how they can be saved. It doesn't tell answers we need. It tells a fallen world how they can be saved. It doesn't tell us quantum mechanics. It doesn't tell us what women think I'll have a discussion with God when I'm meeting with that the point is why men do the things they do Like.
Art Powell:The point is is that it tells us what we need to know and we try to treat it like a comprehensive. This is like all the arguments over Genesis, like God did not reveal this stuff to Moses so that Moses could give a scientific treatise on how God formed the world. The whole point is he created it and we got to stop treating the Bible for more than you know. We don't take it seriously in the areas we should, and then we try to push it into arenas that it really shouldn't be pushed into. Yeah, I think. I think the other one is Michael Heisler. He I solely miss him. He was the. He's passed away. He was, uh. He's probably my most controversial one on the list, but he was uh, had a PhD in Hebrew, was the head of of Logos Software for many years and his Unseen Realms book is just. I cannot recommend the. Unseen Realms book is just. I cannot recommend it enough.
Art Powell:He brought back spirituality back into a church in the West that was walking away from the spiritual side of the gospel and I can tell you for me it hit home when I had been reading his stuff and they declassified some of the UFOs and all these Christian podcasts. All they were talking about, even though physicists have said physicists, secular physicists, said these things come from different dimensions. They're not visitors from space, because the way they can pop in and out of existence, and even though physicists said this, there was not one podcast. I listened to about eight or 10 podcasts, christian podcasts about these UFOs. Not one of them talked about how these could be spiritual beings. That's how far removed we've removed our front, we've moved our mind from supernatural stuff. And so Michael has a really reestablished that and I was. I'm very grateful for him on that. And then Tim Mackey of the Bible Project I love his, yeah, he is solid, solid, solid, right and again, I really treat.
Art Powell:I think he's like the CS Lewis of his time. He gets to that baseline Christianity. That's important. He doesn't expound his own personal opinions or get into areas where it's not solid and you can really stand on his work and I really think he's really good.
Piet Van Waarde:Now, where can you find the Bible Project? Because I know we can.
Art Powell:You can look like Tim Mackey is on YouTube. The Bible Project is on YouTube. They've got those great animations. But if you like to hear him speak, just go to YouTube and if you Google his name, tim Mackey M-A-CI-E, he will come up and he's given some great sermons and stuff.
Piet Van Waarde:Their animated stuff is just top shelf.
Art Powell:It's top shelf, yeah, the other one is, and then my other two favorite, and again, these are not in order, minus the first three. But the other two is Pastor Rob and Yuri Creel. I think they hit home run every night. For someone who reads his Bible who cannot stand to listen to most pastors, I'm sorry.
Piet Van Waarde:I'm just going to say it.
Art Powell:They will say things that in almost 90% of the time, make me cringe. Pastor Rob hits a home run almost every single time. Now I don't recommend you go back and listen to his old tapes, but he'll tell you that he is just so spot on, and Uri too, I think Uri on this last Wednesday in communion he just hit a home run. They are just so because the way they explain the application and a gospel, that is both the natural application of it but at a supernatural level, and the only way you can do that, I think, is through anointing. But that's my short list.
Piet Van Waarde:I love it. Oh, thanks, that's going to be really helpful to people. I appreciate you taking time to do that. So what are you excited about? I know that you have always got a number of different projects that you're working on.
Art Powell:My daughter has challenged me. She challenged me on reading this. Last year I was, you know, I was going down to about two or three books a month and she's really which I know that some people will say that, like art, I don't read a book a month. Right, but you know I'm, I consider myself, somewhat of a scholar, so she got me really challenged. I've been back up to about six, seven books a month, you know. So that meant some TV shows of suffering and some video games of suffering.
Art Powell:And she laid down the gauntlet on me and she's 28. And she's like I'm going to write my first book and I want you to write, I want you to finish how to Read your Bible, and so I'm working with her on that. So she's holding me accountable and that's been awesome been. So yeah, I'm hoping to have that done, uh, here pretty soon. I've had a rough draft. Of course, this is the don't ever go back and look at your first draft when you have not touched it for several years. I'm like, no, this is it, we're rewriting this thing. So my daughter kind of taught me off that legend I'm, I'm redoing it a bit and, uh, I'm going to redo it, I am going to redo it. There's some, some things and views of mine that have changed over the last five years, and so I'm going to finish that and I hope to have that done by first quarter of next year, ready to go self-publish. And then the first book of my.
Art Powell:I'm going to do a whole firm foundation series, which is the class I teach at Shoreline, and that's starting this Sunday, if you are interested. We're going to be this Sunday. We're going to do what is the Bible Like? What, this Sunday we're going to do. What is the Bible? Is there this secret Bible running around that no one knows about? Did they cancel them to see it? Did they exclude all this? No, no, no, no yeah. So if people are interested, I recommend they come to that class. It's at 10 am at Shoreline, but if you just go to Shoreline and look at groups, it's there.
Art Powell:So I'll be starting my firm foundations'm. I want to write a short book for each class to kind of go more and delve more into the class itself. And I'm going to start with how to read your Bible, which is the most popular one I have. That is where I give people practical tools on how to read your Bible, not just some pie in the sky, theology stuff, but like how can I sit down and read my Bible and actually get something out of it? And people have taken that class. The biggest compliment I get is they say they read their Bible almost every day now and they get something out of it.
Piet Van Waarde:So that's great, that's awesome, I love it. You know, you've reminded me of another question I wanted to ask, which is that one of the things that can happen when people get interested in theology, so they start reading somebody's work even like credible people, yeah and they get like on this hobby horse of like, oh, this is the new thing I got to be, you know and they get so dogmatic about stuff. And how do you like, how do you help people remain like humble? And you know, the scripture says we see in part. You know Right, and the scripture says we see in part. So how do you help people become not too dogmatic on what we might call debatable matters?
Art Powell:Yeah, that's a great question. I think social media has done us no service.
Piet Van Waarde:In that regard? Yeah, In this regard.
Art Powell:Yeah, it's been horrible actually. I think wait. So first, I think humility is important. I think I think humility is important. Right, I think humility is important. I think the second thing is is like I will not create correct anyone, even a small minor issue If, if I, if I don't know them well enough to do it Right, know them well enough to do it right. In other words, you know, I may have some theological debates online, but I keep it. You know, I keep it honest and loving and mature.
Art Powell:But I think the way we need to approach this is you know, is it heresy? And there's a very narrow definition of heresy in the Bible. You know, is it significant? It's probably not. Then it's okay, you can debate about it, but don't take it. Paul says endless argument. He says don't get into these endless arguments. Right, and I think that's the way to approach it. Like the gospel is meant to be lived, it's not meant to be argued, right, and if you actually go out and live the gospel, you're going to actually have more open-minded views about some of these secondary and tertiary issues than if you don't. And I find that people are more narrow-minded.
Art Powell:I'm always suspicious in the back of my mind it's like are you really following Jesus? Are you living this out? Because if you're living it out, the most important thing is like does this person know Jesus? Are they following Jesus? Everything else falls second. You know, I meet people all the time like Catholics aren't saved. I'm like, really, like I know Protestants, I question their salvation. So what does being Catholic have to do about it? And so I think we need, you know, I think we need to be really careful about that, and I think part of the problem is the word belief.
Art Powell:In the Greek and I forget the exact, I'm probably going to misquote it, so I don't want to do that but in the word, the word Greek does not mean the Western word belief. It doesn't. In Greek, it means you put your trust into it at the point of like your life. So Socrates was believed to be true. Why Not? Because they thought he was right with the Greeks. They thought he believed he was true because he was willing to die for it. Yeah, and that's the Greek word for belief. Is you're willing to put your whole life into it and believe it, right? Not some mental ascension, right? It's not enough just to say, oh, I believe. Because when people say I believe in Jesus, I'm thinking in the West.
Art Powell:First thing in my head is do you mean the Greek word belief, where you're willing to die for it, or do you mean a mental ascension?
Art Powell:And I think if you're willing to die for Jesus and follow him and do whatever he tells you to do, then all these other issues kind of become.
Art Powell:They get washed out, because you're going to approach everything with love to start with and you're called to love your enemies and you're called to do good to those who do evil to you and you're called not to live according to the way the world lives. And I always tell people when you master those things, come back and tell me and then you can tell me where I'm wrong on baptism, where I'm wrong on some of this other stuff, right? So humility needs to be what we do, and I know Catholics who know Jesus and I know Protestants who know Jesus and I think we need to kind of get off our little high horse and stop thinking we know all this stuff, because I have a friend of mine. There's this point in Revelations where it's like there's silence for 30 minutes, and I'm always like I asked this friend of mine. I was like why in Revelation it's not Revelation, revelation? I always ask him.
Piet Van Waarde:I was like why do you think there's silence?
Art Powell:in there.
Piet Van Waarde:He goes art, because that is what he's going to correct all of our theology, all right. Well, this has been a really great conversation. Where can people find your stuff?
Art Powell:Yeah, Twitter, Saved by Jay, is my handle. My Facebook same thing Saved by Jay. I have a page called Firm Foundations. If you just look up Firm Foundations and you see me on there my AI-generated younger-looking self then you will. He does have the fedora, so then you will see that I'm also. I do have an Instagram account that's about to go active. I'm going to be doing some shorts on theology on Instagram, so Jennifer Ornstein and a couple others have been encouraging me and my wife to do that, so I'm beginning to follow up on that.
Piet Van Waarde:Yep Well, thank you, Art. It's been great having this conversation. I appreciate you taking the time. I know you're a really busy guy, but it means so much to me and I'm sure that our audience got a lot out of what you had to share.
Art Powell:I hope so, and glad you had me.
Piet Van Waarde:So thank you for joining us. We are so grateful that you are part of our conversation and we hope that you join us again next week for another Sidewalk Conversation.
