What's The Point Anyway?

What's The Point Anyway - Jen Fishburne's Transition from Christianity to Atheism

• Luke McInnes

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In this conversation, Jen Fishburne shares her journey from a Christian upbringing to her eventual deconversion and exploration of what Luke described as existentialism.
Jen returned to the Church in her 30's, then as she studied the Bible more she came to a preterist understanding and eventually an 'Israel Only' position, which is the idea that the Bible is a story that was ultimately about Ancient Israel and its relevance ceased in the first century.
Following that, Jen ultimately became an atheist and in this process created the YouTube channel Answers From Jenesis where she shares more of her journey and her current worldview.
Luke and Jen disagree on a lot and they discussed how they both saw eschatological fulfilment in the Biblical narrative and yet landed at completely different conclusions on the meaning of it.
Jen ultimately believes that Jesus never existed as a historical person and that the New Testamant was a Roman psyop, which has led to her current views on creation, energy, and the nature of existence, ultimately framing her beliefs within what she describes as a scientific context.

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Welcome back to What's The Point Anyway. Joining me today from Omaha, Nebraska is Jen Fishburne. Jen runs the very popular channel, Answers From Genesis, which essentially tells her story of growing up Christian and then deconverting from her Christian faith into, I think initially atheism, but potentially now some... more advanced views on that. I thought you'd be a great guest to bring on to bring a really unique perspective and different perspective. Obviously someone I disagree with, but I also think there's plenty of common ground. So Jen, thanks so much for joining me. What's the point anyway? What's the point anyway? So in America, I think that we say, you know, what's the meaning of life? And so that's that's what we're talking about, What are we what are we doing here? Right? Why? podcast title was taken, I think. So what's the point anyway? I've come up with a novel way to ask the same question that everyone asks. All right, all right. So I do think it's a good question. When I was a believer, of course, love God and love others. That's what we were told. And yet during that time, when I look back now, I actually lived a different way. And what I lived was that life is what you make it. And I actually have a Facebook page, I think. that is life is what you make it. And so that is something that I have carried forward. It has not changed at all in that way, whether I was a believer or not a believer anymore. So for me, really, I do think that the question, and I know this is kind of veers a little bit away from what you're doing here, but I think that we have to ask ourselves, why are we asking that question? Is it a necessary question? Or is it something that we have been taught to ask that life must have a meaning, it must have a purpose, there must be a point, right? And so I have really come down to life is what you make it. And so for some people, it's going to be they have no plan and they just coast. And whatever happens to them, that's their life, right? And that's a majority of people actually. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then there are other people that they have a really, really focused goal in life, whether that is their career or it's their family or it's service oriented or it's politics or religion or whatever it is. There's all kinds of things that people really, really fixate on. And that becomes their purpose, their why. Simon Sinek has a book, What is Your Why? Yeah. And so I'm an entrepreneur and for entrepreneurs, that book is like our Bible, basically, right? What is your why? I've done plenty of whiteboard sessions on the finding your way. Yeah, so you know, so I think that it is different for everyone I think the answer to that question is going to be different for every Person that some people are never going to actually contemplate it and they're not going to do anything about it and Life is just gonna happen to them but for people like us like you and me who we are looking at this, right? I don't think it's gonna stay the same for our whole life and I listened to one of your other episodes and I saw that you've had a recent conversion. I've had a recent conversion going opposite ways, right? But we have different whys. We have different what is the point. So it's changed and that's growth. When we change in our life, that is growth. So when I see someone who does the same thing their whole life, they stay in the same job, the same neighborhood, they do the same schedule their whole life, then do they really have, what is the point of their life? Are they actually even looking at it? I would say they're not even looking at it, they're not considering this question. Yeah, yeah, I think a lot of people are just on the, you know, they're hamsters on the wheel a little bit. Their point is based on what the forces of other people acting on them determine it to be. Yeah. So would you describe your view? Cause I mean, as you know, before I was, I mean, I was atheist, but I don't even know whether I would have, I wouldn't have really called myself anything. Cause I was very much in the mindset that you were that. It is just sort of nothingness and muddledness and we create whatever it is. I later found out that sort of had the philosophy of existentialism and then I really sort of dug into that theory. Would you call yourself an existentialist? I haven't actually looked at what the definition of that term is. So without knowing the definition, I can't answer that question. Well, I say existentialism essentially is the view that I think it's an ancient Greek sort of philosophy, but it's the view that basically the everything is, I think that is the word absurd, that everything is just randomness. and not so much randomness, but there is no meaning apart from the meaning that we create ourselves. And so, I mean, they take it They take it pretty far to the point where even a human relationship is meaningless, but we create meaning around that. Well, I understand that concept. And I guess I would say to a degree, with just the definition you gave me there, I would say to a degree, it is still what we create. But I do think that there are some people who are happy to just let life happen to them. And I have seen, so just for a little background, I've moved 47 times in life. Yeah, right. I've had, I don't know, 20 different jobs. I have, over the course of the different types of work that I've done, I have had the chance to interview thousands and thousands and thousands of people. Many of them short interviews, some of them longer. But I have met so many people from so many walks of life. And so I've been able to see this kind of on a bigger picture and not just looking at, you know, what does this mean for me? Yeah. I do see people who are happy just allowing life to happen to them. They follow the pattern and our pattern is in today's world, right? Or at least when I was growing up, after school, you go to college, you get married, you have kids, you get a job. And then depending on if you're the man or the woman, depends on which way you go from there. And then the kids grow up and then you're the grandparents and you just, you know, your life revolves around taking the kids to the kids things. And then, you know, once you retire, then you go do a little bit of traveling, but mostly you take care of your grandkids. And many of these people that I have interviewed, a shocking number have never even left their hometown, never. And these people are hap- some of them, right, many of them are actually happy with allowing life to happen to them. Yeah. So I don't think that it's necessarily, you know, that there's no meaning if you don't look for it, right? I don't think these people have found it. Now, that's not me. I don't have that personality at all. Definitely not me, right? What is your personality Jen and what do do with yourself now? cause I think we've got similar traits. My, a lot of my friends call me, they call me a phase man. Yeah. Cause I'll go all in on something and, yeah, absolutely love it. And then six months later, I'm doing something else. Yeah. I've done four or five changes in the time that people have even comprehended the first one. I'm guessing you're pretty similar. It is, it is. When I went through my divorce, I found a audio book, a conference back in the back when we had cassette tapes, right? They had made this cassette tape of the weekend conference for men are from Mars, women are from Venus. And it was it was one dollar for 25 hours of this conference. And I thought, you know what, I've got a cassette tape player in my truck. I'm going to drive across the United States alone as a female. People thought it was crazy just for doing that. I've done it so many times. But anyway, so for $1, I'm like, can't, I can't miss. But what I thought was, okay, I've gone through this divorce. I was married for 23 years. I went through this divorce. I wonder if I did something that I need to change, right? What can I change about myself? What can I learn about me that, you know, maybe I need to do different if there is a next time. And one of the things that really, really stood out to me, it was really good by the way, but one of the things that stood out to me was that Dr. Gray, John Gray, he talked about how in life we go through periods on average, it's not exact science, but on average of seven years. So it's pretty easy when we look at the early years of our life. So up till age seven, we're pretty much glued to our mother, right? And then from seven to 14, Well, you you're just really coming into making friends at school and learning all about that environment from 14 to 21 is the rebellion stage. You know, now your parents are, you know, they don't know anything, all that kind of stuff. From 21 to 28, you're just starting some kind of a career. Or if you're not, you're really getting into a lot of trouble in the law. You're doing drugs, you're doing crimes, you're, you know, checking out the gangs, you know, whatever it is, that kind of stuff. Right. And then the next stage is usually having kids. So there's all these kinds of stages that those are kind of similar for most people. But if we look in our own life, we will see that we have interests in stages as well. And so I see that I was really super interested in this thing, like, preterism for seven years. You know, was almost exactly seven years. And then when I went on and I studied more things and I kind of left preterism behind, like literally I had zero interest in preterism. It's like, you know what? I'm done. I studied it. I know almost everything there is to know about it. And I'm ready to go on and move on to the next thing. So sometimes. still Christian when you moved on? That was part of my moving on. That was one of the things that moved me out of the story, for sure. So sometimes it's careers, sometimes it's moving, sometimes it's hobbies, sometimes it's what we study, what we research, that kind of stuff. You might have a seven year, this channel might last seven years, and you're ready. You're like, no, I want to do something else in my life, right? So it is very, very interesting. And the only reason that I brought that up with men are from Mars, women are from Venus is that that is actually the number one reason why people get divorced is because the men and the women, when they first meet, they have everything in common. But then it becomes like a V. In seven years, you've got a little bit less. In 14 years, a little bit less. In 21 years, you guys are going in completely opposite directions. And between 20 and 30 years is when most people are getting divorced. And it's because they don't have anything in common anymore because everybody has a different direction in life. Yeah. And so, and so what are you doing with yourself now? You say you say you're an entrepreneur. You just moved new town for what's that the 44th, 42nd time was it? Yeah. yeah. Well, it's the same business, but because of my business, I can move wherever I want to. But I'm a retirement income professional. So I just help people either get ready for retirement or help them to not lose any money in retirement. Yeah. And how long have you been doing that for? Yeah, okay. Well, you must be new. You'd be due for a change then, aren't you? Well, I was concerned about that when I first started, but one thing interesting about my field is that there are so many different avenues in finance, personal finance, that I can do. And so I have just recently added new things into that, what I'm doing. So that keeps it fresh for me. Awesome. Jen, I'd love to switch from that conversation and maybe I think probably a crucial part of you and who you are and what your worldview is, is determined by what your background was. Can you talk a little bit about growing up, growing up Christian and then sort of the journey you took out of it? so I, I did grow up in a Christian home. My, my father was a Baptist, pastor. And then when I was four, he wanted to, get his PhD in theology. So we moved to Scotland and he went to the University of Edinburgh to, to get his PhD. And at that time he decided that he liked fooling around with women more than he liked his family. So. My parents got a divorce as soon as I turned five and we went, we came back to the States. So half of that story is when my dad got his PhD in theology, he had to require, he had to study all of the religions of the world. And when he was done, he said, well, how do I know that Christianity's God is the one true God? So he became an atheist. So now he's an atheist with a PhD in theology. He did. Yeah. So, anyway, that didn't really influence my life. I had no contact with him from the time I turned five until I graduated from high school. And that was kind of their agreement. I think that was a horrible thing for them to do personally. It harmed us a lot, but that was their agreement. So, my mom, she was very much a Christian. Mm-hmm. And she was a school teacher, but we grew up knowing that we were not wanted. That she had three kids by accident, basically. And so I never had a conversation with my mom. So there was just nothing there. We weren't allowed to ask her questions. We weren't allowed to talk to her or anything. And so we just grew up in the... playing out in the woods and riding bikes all over town and she had no idea where we are and what we were doing and didn't care. But as long as we showed up at church every time the doors were open. So that was the basic thing and that was just a part of our life. I went to Christian school in high school and so, you know, and I was on quiz team, which is where I would memorize a book of the Bible. like Romans or Corinthians or something, each year, and then compete in international contests to see who could remember the particular verse the quickest, right? So, you know, there was a heavy, heavy, heavy influence of Christianity in my life. And that's probably the only thing I could say that I remember from growing up as far as having an influence, because everything else was I literally was left to life is what you make it. Yeah. Yeah. And then when did, so as you become an adult, then obviously you mentioned you got back in touch with your dad, but as you started then to, you know, go through that seven year phase, you spoke about, know, 21 to 28, where you're starting to then carve out your own existence and live sort of apart from your parents. Where did you, where did your life go then? Um, both career wise and as well, and in terms of your fate. So I started working young. I started working when I was 10. by the time I was 16, I had a full-time job with the government. And yet I still didn't have enough money to go to college, and I wanted to. So when I was 20, I joined the army and I went to Germany. Ended up living there for about 10 years, a couple of different times. So altogether, 10 years in Germany. And I was a nuclear biological chemical specialist in Germany. So that's basically I helped soldiers prepare for a nuclear war, biological war, chemical war, so that they could continue to do their jobs and they could survive through those kind of things. That's what I did. So when I left home, right after I turned 18, I left home. And that was kind of interesting because I took a sleeping bag and a very small suitcase with just a couple of clothes in it. That's all I had. And I just told my mom, bye, I'm moving out. And I never really had a conversation with her at this point. And so she said, but you can't do that. The Bible says you have to stay at home until you get married. And I just looked at her and I'm just like, well, that's a little. Little too late for that now. You never told me that. So bye. And I did not go to church again for a very long time. didn't think about God. I didn't think about Jesus. I didn't open a Bible. Nothing. You know, I just walked away and it wasn't it wasn't rebellion. It was just. Yeah, it was just that was a habit of growing up and now I had a new life and I did new things and, know, there were all kinds of things out there to do. Yeah. in the world that I didn't know about before. Yeah. What brought you back? So some people would say it was sin, but it's always going to be a crisis. This is what I've noticed. It's almost always, I don't want say always, but almost always it's some kind of crisis, right? So the crisis in my life was I was in a very, very, very bad marriage. And so I started sleeping around and I got pregnant with somebody else's child. And so, you know, it was during that time of like, what am I going to do type of thing that I was like, well, I remember the church. remember the Bible. I actually went out and bought a Bible. I didn't even have one this whole time. I went out and bought a Bible and was like, well, this will probably this will probably fix my problems. Thirty. Okay, so about 10 years had passed. Yeah. it was around 29 or 30. Yeah. And so did it fix your problems? No, it did not. It did not. There were some things that changed. I remember at that point first praying, basically, that I wanted, let's see, wanted patience and I knew what I was praying for when I asked for patience. I wanted joy and I wanted wisdom. And those were the three things that I wanted in my life. Now, you could say, according to your show right here, what's the point anyway? For me, that was the point. Those were the things that I really, really, really wanted. Why? Because I didn't have those things in my life. And so I did go through a lot of really hard things in life. And now I would say that was just the law of attraction. I wanted patience. So I attracted things in my life that would force me to learn patience. Yeah. I had no joy growing up. All emotions were forbidden in our home growing up. So even joy, I mean, was just my mother never once got angry with us, but she never laughed either. It was just, yeah, it was all, yeah. So that was something that I really, really wanted in my life. I could see other people having it, but I didn't have that, right? And even though I was very intelligent, I always got straight A's, maxed every test I've ever taken, but I did not feel like I had wisdom. And so that was something that I prayed for and I actively sought out. And so in that way, my life changed in those three ways, right? But now I would say, looking back, I would say that was a lot of attraction because I wanted those things, I went after those things, and I learned those things, I attracted those things into my life. So. Was that God doing those things in my life? Dan, at that point I would say yes. Now I would say no, that was not really what was happening. Yeah. Did you say, did the marriage go on much longer after that point? And did you end up having the child? Yeah, so we were married for a total of 23 years. So and that was very early in the marriage, like maybe two years when that happened. but I say we had one good year and 22 years of hell. So what happened was that as I as I became a Christian, then it was very much a sin. to get a divorce. So I prayed and prayed and prayed. did everything I possibly could to be the best wife I possibly could to see what in the world I could do to make this marriage not just work, but I wanted a really, really, really good marriage. That's what I wanted. It wasn't, you I don't care about just making it work. That's, you know, I hear people say that that's not a goal ever to me, you know, and, and so. I can't talk a whole lot about it because it's just part of our divorce decree. can't talk a whole lot about it. But it was really that we stayed married only because we thought the Bible said we had to. Yeah. So he was, he a Christian the whole time or he became Christian as far. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, my most recent guest, is Christian. He spent, he spent 10 years as a, he had a, he had a bit of a break. I won't say it's a break like you, cause I'm not, I'm not suggesting you'll become Christian again. You'll, you'll do whatever your life takes you on. But, he, he was a atheist apologist. And then he became Christian again, but he got divorced four times He's been divorced four times and we actually discussed that I mean you still know your Bible Do you think? Do you think it teaches that you can't get divorced? No, think, well, there's a couple of different things in that. So one, and one of the things that was instrumental in me leaving Christianity was understanding audience relevance. And that's, you know, basically who is the chapter in the verse, right, the story, the section, right? Who is either saying it or writing it? Who are they saying it or writing it to? Right? And so what's the context of that? particular time. Are they saying it to me in the United States in 2025? No, there's nothing in the Bible that's being said to me, right? So when I learned that, that was really, really helpful. So first of all, none of those, all of the laws and the rules and the commandments and all of that kind of stuff in the Bible were only given to Israel. And that's a whole nother But anyway, once I came to understand that, then a whole lot more made sense to me about the Bible itself. But then if I were to look even within just the context of, okay, so what does the Bible say about divorce to the people that it was talking to who had these rules that were given to them? And there are different rules in the Old Testament than there are in the New Testament. Okay, so they're just are, right? And you have to understand there's different audiences there as well. So when the Bible says put away, that had to do, and it's been many years since I've looked at this, but that had to do not with our modern day divorce, but that was when they were married to more than one woman. And if a man put away a woman, that was when she just went to live in her tent, or her probably tent, because they didn't have houses at the time that they use this terminology. Yeah. he was married to, let's just say he was married to 10 and he chose to have sex with nine of them, but not one of them. Well, that's what that was actually talking about. It wasn't a true divorce. was like, hey, if you're going to have sex with your wives, you need to make sure that that's somewhat equal, that you're not, you know, just not having sex with one of them, because it all had to do with childbearing. everything was the woman's value was found only in the children that she could give him. And so if he wasn't having sex with her. She couldn't bear him any children. And then she was looked down upon and could be actually kicked out for that. But the problem was that he was not having sex with her. So that's all the verses that say put away. That's what those are talking about. so that's one whole section. There are some that talk specifically about divorce. It wasn't forbidden. but it was much different than it is in today's world. I don't know how it is in Australia, but I'm sure it's somewhat similar to what we have here. it's an average of a year to go through a divorce in the United States, especially if you have kids, right? It takes like a year and thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars to pay to attorneys. and counselors and psychiatrists and legal this and legal that. you know, it's just it's crazy. And and and in in Israel, it was no, the man just wrote on a piece of paper. I want a divorce. You know, and so it had to be just, you know, make sure you write it down and then she's free to go kind of thing. You know. did your venture into preterism lead to your divorce as you started to break from these sort of, no. no, no, no, I was already divorced before I looked at that. And do your listeners know what pruderism is? OK, all right. OK, all right. it's funny. Most of my, can't get, I struggle to get a futurist Christian to come on the show. I can get a Satanist. I can get an ex Christian like yourself. I can get a stoic. I can get anyone. So most of my Christian guests are preterist. My wife. My wife laughs all the time. She's like, you got another preterist guest on. I'm like, I keep putting the call out for futurists and they refuse to come on. It's, it's really weird. so yeah, my, my guests are a mix. have a lot of Christians. Most of those Christians are preterists or people that are at least open-minded looking at things. But a lot of the guests, I mean, I've had a lot of new ages come on the show too. So a lot of the guests are sort of their audience. So yeah, I think everyone knows what most would have some idea of what preterism is. Okay. I'd love therefore to talk about your venture into preterism and how that change happens. Yeah, so for many Christians, preterism is the first domino to fall. And it's the first really big thing where they make a change in their thinking, their doctrine, their theology, right? And whatever the first one is to fall is the hardest one, because you take it personally, it hurts. You lose friends, right? You can't talk to people who don't have that same belief, all that kind of stuff. For me, it was not the first domino to fall. So it was a little bit easier for me. for me, was in 2005, January 2005, I was excommunicated from a church for voting for a particular person for president, literally. And so. that was before both sides hated each other too, wasn't it? was my pastor, his father was the head of the constitutional party, which is a third party, and there was zero chance he would win because it's a third party. And so I wasn't going to waste my vote. And so he excommunicated me. And so I really, really fought hard to work things out. And he just absolutely refused. And so I went online, and this is the first time I'd ever turned on the computer, basically. I went and I set up a WordPress blog, and I told my story. And this was in end of 2006, so really in 2007. So it's hard to even think that WordPress was such a baby back then. But I have the number four blog in the whole world for 2007. from telling this story, all right, about, in all topics. In all topics. So it was a big story, and so that's how I learned how to come online and do things, But during that time, there was a pastor. He was also a seminary professor at Dallas Theological Seminary. Mm-hmm. And he came online and he was kind of challenging me with some of the theological things that I was saying. And at the time I was saying that the Bible condones slavery and it actually does. right. And so he was, so he was actually, he was saying that we are not under the law of Moses. Well, the church that I got excommunicated from, they very much preached that we were under the law of Moses. And so for five years I had done nothing but just really learn that we were under the law of Moses. That was my whole focus. no shellfish, no cotton and linen, like to that degree, yeah. right. In fact, we never even opened the New Testament. Just, that's all we did was study the law of Moses. For five years, I'd been steeped in that, right? So the seminary professor I'm guessing you went traveling to Jerusalem for the Feast every year though. Yeah. Yeah. And we had them in my home. I would make a big feast for about 250 people. And we put on a big production. Every feast was different. yeah, dancing all night long. And it was a lot of fun. It really was a lot of fun. But it was crazy. And so I did a Bible study with the seminary professor. And I studied for about eight to 12 hours every day. I was really focused, right? This was my why at this time. This was my whole purpose in life was to figure out am I under the law of Moses or not? That was my whole purpose in life. So about eight to 12 hours a day, I'm studying, studying, studying. And for about 90 days, in the back of my mind, I knew he was right, but I had to have it. I need to know exactly why before I was gonna change my mind, right? I'm not gonna change my mind just because somebody says so. Yeah. So finally I got it and after 90 days of studying, right, I woke up at three o'clock in the morning and was like, my goodness, I'm not under their jurisdiction because they never had any authority over me. It was only to Old Testament Israel. And I got it, right? So I came back and I asked him, well, Matthew 5, 17, 18 says the law, Jesus came to fulfill the law and the prophets. the profits, yeah. If he fulfilled the law, did he also fulfill the prophets? And he says, I don't know. And I said, well, Hebrews 8 says that the New Covenant is for the house of Israel and the house of Judah. If Old Testament is, the Old Covenant was for Israel, how is the New Covenant for us when it plainly says it's for Israel and Judah? And he says, I don't know. And he said, that's what he told me, he said, You are the first person in my life, and this is just before I was the last person that I that he taught before he died. He said, you are the first person in my life who asked who asked me questions that I could not answer. And he says, I predict that you will know twice as much as I know in 10 years. And at that time, I thought he walked on water. mean, I just thought that he knew so much. And he taught me he taught me how to Hebrew, how to tell me how to read Greek. He taught me how to interpret from all of the different languages in. He taught me how to understand all of these things. But he taught me everything that he taught in seminary, not cemetery, in seminary, he privately tutored me on. And so I had that level of training and it really, really just made me see the Bible in a completely different light. And that's... So, so, so you got straight to, so you were trying to solve the law of Moses issue and you got straight to essentially the preterist understanding, which is a bit, you know, most people are trying to work out new heaven. And so, so did you, did you implicit implicitly then at that point realize while we must therefore be in that the old heaven and earth must have passed then, or were you still trying to work out how on earth this all worked and fit together? Well, that was like my first question because I was so focused on the law, right, that it wasn't even looking at anything else. And then once that clicked, was just like everything else, just click, click, click, click, click, click, click, right? And they all kind of fell into place. And I'd never heard of preterism. So I didn't know. I thought, well, if I'm the only person who's seeing this, I must be wrong because that's what we're taught in Christianity, right? If you're the only one, you're the one who's wrong, right? Yeah. I really thought, I must be wrong. And I was talking on the phone to a friend from my homeschooling days, because I home-schooled my kids as well. And I told him, I said, I don't know. don't know anybody who believes this. Am I crazy or what? And he's like, well, that's called full preterism. And I said, that's a heresy. I can't believe that. So anyway. He told me to look up Don Preston and David Curtis, and then he told me about audience relevance. So I looked up audience relevance. I'm like, okay, I've got that. That clicked and everything. Everything, I saw the whole Bible in different light, right? And then I watched one video from Don Preston. I only watched one Don Preston video. One video where he talked about it was all Old Covenant Israel. And that was like, okay. Everything, it was like changing the lenses on my glasses. The whole Bible I suddenly saw, because I've been studying it so much already, right? All I had to do was have a new key, a new legend. And once I saw that, it was like, it just all fell into place for me. Yeah, because I think a lot of people, mean, as you know, most, most of the Christian world are futurists. ever, and you've been a futurist before as of I, not for that long. but, but all of them know that they've got a whole bunch of passages that make no sense to them. Well, they tried to make sense out of them. yeah, yeah. And I mean, you'd hear some of the, you know, like Matthew five, 17, 18, you know, the, the come to fill, fulfill the law and the prophets and, know, until heaven and earth passes, not one job or two to pass from the law. Some of the explanations on how that works are like laughable. but, but, but people are intent on sort of keeping their presuppositions. so once. once you start to come into full preterism. And as I said to you at the start, I've got sort of no interest in debating you, but I think you're a really interest, you're really valuable insight. Like I'm really interested in picking your brain because you've experienced things and you've gone in directions that are different to a lot of directions, you know, that I've taken then the other Christians have taken. Why did you go? Cause A lot of full predators, I don't, I don't see the Israel only. and there'll be people listening to this saying, had ward family on recently, he talked about Israel only an IO. I think a lot of people will have no idea what IO means, but it's, it's. I don't even know whether I'd say it's a branch within full predators. And, a few, if a lot of people that do see fulfillment, then move into this sort of IO interpretation of it that actually the whole Bible was written. It's the story of. Israel and therefore it's Israel only. It's a 2000 year old story that's not relevant for us. Now I don't see it. I've seen the best arguments for it and they don't hold up for me, but they run rings around a lot of other theories. mean, you know, they can absolutely tear to shreds a futurist Christian, but I'm interested in working out why did you go, what were the main things that led you into Israel only? So when I first became a preterist is right about the time when I got on Facebook and so Let's see, I can't remember how must have been my friend somebody said that there was a conference on full preterism in Kansas City and it was in Let's see. I'm trying to think now I think it was like the next week after I became, not after I realized that I was a full predestined. It wasn't like after I became, it was like after I realized who I really was, right? It was like a week later. preterism sort of baptism or ceremony. So I got in my truck and I drove to Kansas City for this and you know, I met a bunch of people and so I friended them on Facebook, right? So now these are my new friends on on Facebook and in one of the first things that you're taught in preterism is audience relevance, right? And so when the preterist would any preterist was posting a verse, you don't have people on Facebook. They just post a random verse. They just post it, right? yeah. And when they did that, I would say, I'm brand new, I'm the newest kid on the block, like newest, newest, newest. And I would say, who was speaking and who were they speaking to? And they would get so mad at me just for asking that question. I thought, isn't that what preterism is all about? And you can literally do that with every single passage in the Bible. Who is speaking and who are they speaking to? Yeah. So for example, at one point I was a five point Calvinist, maybe four and a half point, four point. But you know, just the idea that Jesus or God has chosen you, right? This is Ward family. Ward family is a hardcore Calvinist, right? God chose you, you don't have anything to do with it, that kind of stuff. Well, what is that passage about? I have chosen you. You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you. Who was speaking? Jesus. Do you know, do you remember who he was speaking to? He's apostles. Yeah. his disciples. So this is early on, right at the very beginning. so was it, did it have anything to do with us? Did it have anything to do with salvation? Did it have anything to do with being a Christian? No, he's like, I chose you 12, that's it. You didn't apply for this job, right? You didn't give me your resume, your CV, whatever you call it there. You didn't give me that. I came out, I saw you fishing and I chose you. That's it, it had nothing to do with. God choosing us for salvation today, nothing to do with it. And so you just go passage by passage by passage by passage and you will see it never has anything to do with us. And so as I began to see this pattern, then I said, okay, well then where is salvation for us today? Now I've learned all of these tools, both from K. Arthur and Precepts and from the guy who, the seminary professor, Mike was his name. I learned all of these tools about studying, doing word studies in the Bible. so I look at salvation and in the Old Testament, do you know what salvation was in the Old Testament? why don't you tell me? Deliverance from war. Yeah, yeah. All right, so in the New Testament, suddenly there is this new salvation and it was being saved from the judgment that was coming for the sins against the Old Covenant law of Moses. Completely different, right? Two completely different. So there was actually no salvation in the Old Testament of the kind that we think of in the New Testament, right? All right, so now it's narrowed down to salvation there. All right. So when I come to salvation in the New Testament and I look at each passage in context, it always showed me the pattern. And the pattern was, it was salvation from the judgment that was coming, the wrath that was coming on Old Covenant, on the wicked judgment. The whole New Testament is that story of the 40 years of grace from that judgment. That's the whole story. That is the whole story. And so those don't apply to me. What do you think the story was telling about what would be on the other side of that? I don't know that it was necessarily. There are several ideas. So it depends on, you know, if you're asking me where I'm at now. So just so. Do you still, because you can still, you know, mean, Bart Ehrman's a great example of it. You can still be a Bible scholar. You can still read the Bible and have a view on what it's saying without believing it to be the revelation from God. And that's obviously where you're at now. So what's, I think I remember you saying this in a video, you, you went into Israel only, but am I correct in saying you no longer necessarily hold the Israel only view? Now, I've always held my own version of the Israel Only View. In fact, I was the very first person to write about Israel Only. And I'll send you the article if you want. I wasn't the first person to come up with the idea, but I was the first person to write anything about it. Because the two guys that were talking about it at the time were both afraid to write about it. And they had their reasons why. And so I wrote what I saw at the time. And then people started really coming out and looking at it. Yeah. version has always been a little bit different. so in some day I'll write a book on it because I do think the difference, well, there's not enough written about, there's only one book written about Israel anyway, but I do think that the difference is key. So I usually give the example of the US Constitution and that's because I live here, that's the example I give, right? But I think you guys can kind of get the idea, the gist of it. So if we were to write a book, comprehensive about our story of the United States, we would talk about leaving England and the reasons why the people left England, how they got here. That's going to be a little bit about the people in England. It's going to involve the people in England a little bit in our story. But they're not United States citizens. When we set up this country and we set up a constitution, that's our laws, and we set up our boundaries and we now have United States citizens, well, we also have immigration, right? Every country does. Some of it's legal, some of it's not, right? But we've got people coming to the country. But when we talk about the story of the United States of America in general, people are thinking United States citizens. We are not thinking, that one guy who came over and raped that poor girl and she died. Yeah. not the main thing we're thinking. Yes, that happened, but it is not the main thing. So when we talk about people becoming a citizen of the United States, then they are agreeing to be bound by the constitution and the laws of the United States, and then of course the city, county, and state of where they live, right? We're agreeing to be bound by those laws. So I look at Israel, the Bible. as something very, very similar. So if we were to talk about, if we're writing this story about the United States, we would talk about the Revolutionary War, we would talk about Civil War, World War I and World War II. Now those aren't all just US citizens, right? We're gonna talk about the Germans, because we had war with them. We're gonna talk about the Japanese, because we had war with them. We're gonna talk about Canada and Mexico, because they're on our borders. So all of these things are happening. But still the book is about the United States of America. So that's what I think is happening with the Bible. The book is about Israel, right? There are people, they interact with somebody in Rome and then some people and some of the Israelites, they were captured. They went out to other countries, right? And then they were scattered in other countries. And that's what we see all of the epistles of Paul being written to and James and Peter, and they talking to. all of these scattered tribes of Israel, right? So they were scattered around, but still they're still talking to the tribes of Israel. They're still talking to the citizens. If we were to use today's language, we're talking to the citizens of Israel at that time. And they're concerned about the issues of Israel at that time. And yeah, there were people who came from other countries who came and interacted with them, or they had war with other countries and they interacted with them. And there might be... there might be people who immigrated to Israel and said, hey, I like what you're doing over here. I want to become a citizen. Can I become a citizen too? And if we were to use modern day language, that's how we would look at it today. And they did not separate state and religion. They did not have that. I don't know what you guys do in Australia, but in the US, it's they're very separate, right? They didn't separate them. They were absolutely together. So if you like their religion, then you also joined their state. Yeah. the one and the same. wasn't like you could just go to their church, but you didn't really like their country. No, you had to take both. It was a package deal, right? So that's kind of how I look at the Bible. It's Israel-centric, right? It's the story of Israel. It's Israel's story. No matter how much of it is true or not true, it's still Israel's story and how they interacted with those around them. Yeah. I mean, as you describe it that way, I'm not sure I would disagree. I would say it in a really similar way. I mean, if we're talking about the United States Constitution, let's swap that out and say we're talking about the establishment of the new covenant kingdom that had its documents and set of rules, just like the United States. Today, what, 250 years later, someone from the UK or from Japan or any of these places that were previously at war can come into the United States through that agreement that was set up and become a citizen of the new United States. So I'd sort of see the Bible the same. I wonder whether, is your view controversial in the Israel only crowd? Because they would say that it's got no relevance for the modern day person who's not an Israelite. And I think you'd say that as well, the United States, unless I've missed a point, but the United States constitution that was written 250 years ago has relevance for everyone today, does it not? for everyone, it has relevance for you? You tell me, does it have relevance for you? Yeah, I would say so. think the United States is probably the global hegemon and what hap- do we have any jurisdiction over you? more or less. I mean, the Australian government, I mean, it's an imperfect example. It's an imperfect example, yeah. I'll give you an example here, all right? So in Great Britain right now, right? They are putting people in jail for writing something on Facebook. That's crazy, right? Now, people in the United States are railing against that. I mean, we are all up in arms about what is happening over there in England. That's our First Amendment, right? Yeah. And yet we have no jurisdiction over them over there. Even though they're begging us for help, we have no jurisdiction, no authority. There's nothing that we can do like that. So in general, well, they like the concept. They like it. But our laws have no authority over them whatsoever. Yeah. So, cause I would, I would still think of the new covenant kingdom in the same way in that outside of the city. mean, again, we're using it's a, it's an imperfect analogy, but I'm just trying to work through it outside of the city. outside of the United States, there are still jurisdictions that operate on their own. The United States still has influence, but certainly not jurisdiction. And I, and I think a full Preterist Christian would say the same that the new covenant kingdom has influence everywhere. But this is why I hate Christians railing on what non-believers are doing, who they're getting married to and how they're living. We have no jurisdiction over them. They're outside of the city. But if a UK citizen who hates the laws that are in place and wants to move to a better city, they can move into the United States and enter into that agreement with United States Constitution. Right now it'd be hard, it should be, yes. Right now it would be very hard for both countries because we're kind of putting the squash on immigration right now and England's not letting people leave for that kind of stuff. So it should be, but yeah. which is why I would say, I mean, which is why, again, not to argue, just why I would say the new covenant kingdom is a better version than any of these worldly kingdoms that have all sorts of issues with them. So with the new covenant then, and I ask every single person this, which tribe do you belong to, the house of Judah or the house of Israel? Yeah, I would say it was for me, it needed to be established for Israel. You know, like that constitution example, it Israel was divided and needed to become united the house of David and the house of Judah, the north and south were divided, they needed to the hope of Israel needed to be fulfilled before this kingdom could be established, which which is still the Israel only position. The Israel only position then is that that then has no relevance afterwards. Is there a passage that says it does? Is there a passage that ever puts anybody other than the 12 tribes of Israel into the New Covenant? into the new covenant. Yeah, for me, that's the whole that was the whole point of it. That was an end. I don't like getting into the passage, pointing at passages verse because I would agree that audience relevance we're reading. We're reading letters that are written in that first century that are relevant for those people. But but I'm trying to work out why they What were they trying to do? Were they trying to save everyone? And that's why I asked that question. Were they trying to give everyone salvation from this war that was coming so that on the other side of it, there would be nothing. I mean, Israel ceased to exist after 70 AD. So who, who do you think, who do you think composed the New Testament? Was it, was it, was it an Israel story? Like, who was doing- who was- whose story was it? think or do you want the Bible's version? I because I think Rome did it. You think, yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause I've heard you say that. So I'd love to, I think a lot of people, think a lot of non-believers sort of think this without ever having studied it. That it's essentially a Psi-op. Yeah. yeah. is the world's greatest PSYOP. And I think if we look at what happened during COVID, we can make very, very clear parallels to what was happening back then. Yeah. So why would the Romans, I might get you just to really outline your, your view on the site. Cause I think it's a really interesting position. and I know you're not going to, I know your position is not going to be blasé. I know you've thought it through, but why would, why would they create an Israel only story? If it, if it's a side, why wouldn't they make it? Why wouldn't they give some clear passages that talk about it being for us in the 21st century. Oh, because I don't think that they ever intended it to be long term. So my thought on this is that Rome had jurisdiction over Israel. So there we've got our jurisdiction type of thing. But Israel didn't like that. The Israelites, the Jews basically at that time, the Israelites were mostly the northern scattered tribe of Israel. The Jews were the two southern, two and a half southern tribes. So Judah and Benjamin. And so they didn't like that. And so they revolted over and over and over again. And it didn't seem to matter what the Jews did. I mean, what the Romans did. The Jews would still come up and they couldn't they couldn't control them. And so for that, have to, you know, however much of that is is true for that. have to like give them credit because it's like, you know, I don't like people who just sit back and do nothing. but anyway, so we don't have all the we don't have all the answers, but we can kind of piece together what seems to be what happened. So then if you look at all the passages in the Bible that are actually talking about Rome or Roman soldiers or, you know, be at peace with Rome and you must submit to the Roman government and they're pacifist, they're all pacifist positions. And so then they create this messianic character. So the Old Testament Israel, right, they've been looking for the Messiah to come. And so now if Rome tells this story, and nobody knows it's Rome, but if there is a story that the Messiah has come and that he has actually fulfilled all of the Old Testament prophecy that they were looking for. So then they have, they have, they make up stories about Jesus actually doing all the things that were written in Old Testament prophecy, right? And so he does all these things. He matches all up pretty nice there, right? So when you say, sorry, just to jump in, when you say makeup stories, yeah, do you believe in the historical Jesus existing? No, okay, so it's all stories. Yeah. yeah, all stories, all stories. Well, I'll get to that in a minute. There's layers and layers and layers and layers. Whoever did this was brilliant, absolutely brilliant, all right? So one of them was, all right, you take all these stories and you put an ending to it. This Jesus guy, he wrote the end of the story. This is no different from a good TV show. where you've got episode after episode after episode and you know that there's this theme throughout the whole thing, right? And then you get to the very end and they wrap it all up, right? All the pieces are tied up with a little bow and you know, that's how it ends and it all makes sense now. And in your mind, you go back to the beginning, that's why they did that, right? But that's just a good writer. A good writer can do that, right? And that happens in every movie and every TV show. That's good, right? So this is exactly the same thing that was happening. We're just good Hollywood. Hollywood writers at that time, all right? So that's one layer. Another layer was to take all of these Old Testament heroes, so Adam, Moses, David, Abraham, all of these, have Elijah, Jesus look like that he was doing the same kind of things. So now they're connecting back to all of these kind of things. He's continuing the story of the Passover, he's continuing... the things that David says in his Psalms. They just wrote that into these stories. Now these stories were not just written randomly though. There are at least two stories that we can make really, really clear ties to like hundreds of points in these stories. And one is Homer and the other one is the general Titus. So a lot of the things that are attributed to Jesus actually Titus did. Yeah. So these, some of them were true stories. So if you want to say, was Jesus a historical character? If you look at Titus, that's the closest you're going to get, you know? And then there's a whole bunch of other ones like Raglan myth heroes. And I learned a lot of these from Dr. Richard Carrier. But if you look at the Raglan myth heroes, these were the heroes from, that had been coming from all of history. And they all have certain characteristics that they're all looking at, that they all have. And Jesus had all, I think there's like 13 of these characteristics. And I can't remember any of them right now, but. then there were just the rising dying savior god mythologies, right? And there are tons of rising dying savior gods. Well, none of them are a one-to-one match. But if you look at all of the rising dying savior gods in mythology and you put them all together, they all match up to Jesus, right? They all have some kind of a one-to-one correlation with Jesus. So, and then there were other stories, other gods from Egypt and other gods from Babylon and Assyria, you know, all these kinds of things. And so they brought all these aspects in and they wrote Mark. All right, they just started with Mark. Mark doesn't even have a resurrection. did this? Before the fall of Jerusalem or after it? You know, it was somewhere right around there. I'm not sure if it was before after. The first one in Mark, and I haven't looked at these dates. I'm not a person who's really, you know, researching the dates, you know. and I think we can only know so much on the dates too. Yeah. But I do find it interesting that Mark didn't have the resurrection in the first one, right? And then Matthew and Luke copied Mark, and then they added more, right? And so now we've got a whole lot about the fall of Jerusalem. Those were written after AD 70 because they were the exact things that happened. Now, it was kind of funny because when I look at it, at the time, I remember as a futurist, Christian thinking, know, there's going to be earthquakes and wars and rumors of wars. And I think, you know what, in the last 2000 years, every single year we've had earthquakes and we've had wars and we've had rumors of wars, right? Every single year. So that had to be written right at that specific time period. It's like the next time you hear this, right, this is what's going to happen. That's kind of what was really going on right there. So. And when some in Rome destroyed Jerusalem in 78, and that's really, I mean, I would say it's the end of the Jewish story, but as we know, they continue to exist to this day, but, the, the kingdom of the kingdom of Israel really finished then as far as the sort of overt thing. 73 would have been really the ending. And full preterus just kind of gloss over that one. But yeah, I mean, there was a big one in 70, but there was also a big one in 73. Yeah. What was that? Why would have Rome needed to construct this up after it? Given that given that they. Yeah. were claiming to be the Messiah at that time? It was very common, very, very common. And they were all called Jesus, right? It's not true, but a lot of them, right? It was very, very, very, very common. And so they're like, okay, we've got to squash this. It's just like, do you guys have like fact checkers in Australia like we do in the US? yeah, even more so. Okay, so if there's a story they don't want to get out on Facebook, for example, then they'll put a fact check. Now, they're not doing it anymore. Yay, thank you, Mark Zuckerberg. But when there were certain stories, like the Hunter Biden laptop story was really big here when that first came out, they didn't want that story to get out. So they either put a fact check on it or they just blocked it from happening. Well, when you've got that many people getting, if you can imagine, people thinking the Messiah is their God, is their King, right? And that King is going to overrule Rome. That's why Israel didn't obey Rome, because they were gonna have their own King who was gonna come and just crush Rome. So Rome had to come up with this different narrative and they had to rewrite the narrative and they had to reframe it. And their frame was, hey, your Messiah already came. He came back as a servant. He came back as a pacifist. And he came back and he told you guys you better obey Rome. Now, it takes a while for that story to get, you know, it doesn't, it wouldn't have taken as long then probably as it will today because, you know, we have social media, everything's fast, right? But, you know, people didn't have any reason, I don't think that they had any reason to question things like that back then. But Rome had to think, how are we going to put an end to this? Yeah. the Jewish revolts just kept coming up over and over and over. If you can imagine. All right. So I went to California a couple of months ago and we're at the beach and all of a sudden there was a parade at the beach, hundreds and hundreds of vehicles. It took several hours and they were all carrying Mexican flags. This is the US. They were playing the Mexican anthem. They were carrying Mexican flags. They were honking their horns. They were laughing at us in our own country. I was sick to my stomach, just sick to my stomach. And we allowed it, right? And Rome was like, we're not putting up with this anymore. Because that's basically what was going on. It's like, we've got a leader who's coming to overthrow you any day now, right? It's this guy. Nope, it's this guy. Nope, it's this guy. And Rome's like, no, we're done with it. We're not going to put up with this anymore. So I don't think that they intended for this to last 2,000 years. Yeah. I don't think that was their long-term goal. I think it was just a short-term goal. Let's just put it down and take care of this Israel situation. Yeah. Why do you think it worked given that? I mean, why would that stop a revolt? Because a Jew who wants to overthrow Rome. I mean, whether you believe the, the New Testament tells story of real events or not. I mean, I mean, even, even if I say hypothetically that it didn't, if, that Jew who wants to overthrow Rome. Why isn't there enough of them afterwards that are just like, no, this is a nonsense story. This isn't what the scriptures tell us. And we're just, we're going to deny this Messiah like all the other messiahs that have come along and been denied in the past. Why don't they keep revolting? I think that there were several reasons. One was the temple was destroyed and the temple was the earthly picture of God and God's authority and that this was God's chosen people. And when that was destroyed for them, that literally was just taken away. And it was like, OK, you know, God has removed his hand from us. You know, that's basically how they felt. think that that was, you know, definitely one thing. Another was I don't think that they thought the way that we do today. And their reasoning wasn't, I'm going to revolt because I don't like it. I you. I hear you kids in the background. Are they OK? They'll be fine, it's whether my wife is, but she'll be fine for a little bit more. Okay. And then I had one other reason. because the stories were written so much later after Jesus, it was written at least a generation after Jesus. That means that the people who were alive at the time that they would have seen Jesus were probably dead. Most of them were dead by the time the very first stories started coming out. And Rome started burning all of the other books. stories, epistles, of that other kind of stuff, Gospels, they started burning everything that didn't have this particular storyline in it. So was censorship to the max, right? And so remember, most people didn't read or write at that time anyway, but when you were told these stories, And so it would be like just the next generation. If you just tell the kids this story, by the time they grow up, that's all they know. And then they're telling their kids their kids. So it only takes one generation. to undo all of that. And we, and you would, you would therefore have to agree it's the most successful Psyop in all of human history. Yeah. Yeah. I'm worried of your time, Jen, and I appreciate how open and honest you've been. I'd love to ask just one final question, really around where it's led you in terms of your view of the bigger picture. So you got, you answered the first question and I'm totally fine with the answer that your life is what you make it. And I think that can be really productive for a lot of people. What's the bigger picture? I know you did a really popular video Christian to atheists. You've correct me if I'm wrong, moved on from being atheist. What is your overall view around creation and intelligent design? Is there a God, whatever we want to call that God? Where have you landed on that now? Yeah, so I actually have landed on being an atheist. So when I first left Christianity, I made a big deal out of not being an atheist. But as I kept going and kept, I thought I was just going to stop there. That was it, you know, but people kept asking me all these kinds of questions and I thought, there's a whole lot more to learn. So the more I studied, it was funny because the more Christians pushed me to study, the more I ended up in the atheist camp because I studied. I never wanted to be here. This is not my intention at all. But this is just a result of my studies. So as far as creation goes, I think that's a religious construct. So if someone had not told you that we were created, it would not be something that you would come up with on your own. All right? So I do think that the more I study science, the more I learn about all the different things of how old. we are as a human species, how old the universe is, how the Earth has changed and grown, more about evolution, all of that kind of stuff. I think one thing I like about science is that they are just searching for truth. And so they change their minds every time. I remember thinking I didn't. I heard you comment on COVID. mean, I... that's a paid science, right? That's a different kind of science, right? I wonder, wonder how much, I mean, I love science, but what, what is, what calls itself science now is very different and scientism. who are paid to give you their opinion, right, or they make money off of whatever it is they're doing, versus scientists who, that's their whole life, is just a study, right? There's a difference, right? ones that have been cancelled, aren't Right. So I remember, I remember not even wanting to look at the age of the earth when I was a Christian, because they kept saying, I remember they said is 18 billion years old. then the next year it was 20 billion years old. And then it was 23 and 26 and 46 and 80. And now we're up to 120, whatever the number is. Right. And, now that I understand that the reason that that keeps changing is because they keep learning new things. Mm-hmm. and they can explain every change. And so because they can explain, it's not just a random number. It was a very precise number at the time with the information that they had, right? So the more I understand that. So one concept I think is very interesting, it's Dr. Brian Cox kind of has this view in England that the universe has always been. So instead of taking this big bang theory type of approach, it's that it's always been. It's not like it wasn't created, it didn't have a start, there's not a first cause, there's not a first mover, there's not intelligence, none of that. It's just, it's always been and it's changed. And so there's only one thing without saying, without artificially putting God into this, there's only one thing that we can say. can, doesn't have a beginning or an end. And do you know what that is? Are you gonna say energy? Energy, that's right. Energy can be neither created nor destroyed. It doesn't have a beginning or an end. What's first law of physics? The first law. I don't know. The first law. without a force being acted on it. Yes, the so energy, right, is not just like, how do I explain this? So it's not like one thing. Energy is the is the whole of everything. Everything is energy, energy. So in and Paul said it was written in Galatians. What was I'm trying to think what was written on one of their one of the temples? in the place that he went. can't remember if it was Galatia or where it was, but in him we live and move and have our being. I might be forgetting my story. It's in Acts, but it was what city? I thought it was... Yeah, I can't remember what city it was, but anyway, Athens. Is it Athens? I don't know. It's been a while since I've read that passage, but anyway, when we look at that... These are the kinds of things that I think of. Okay, if I just substitute that. So this is what people have always thought, right? In Him we live and move and have our being. This is one of my favorite verses when I was a Christian. Now I just say, well, what if I say in energy we live. Is that true? Yes. In energy we move. In energy we have our being. And so I have gone through the whole Bible and I can take every attribute of God, the omnies, for example, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, right? All-knowing, all-powerful, all present, present everywhere, right? Those are what we use to describe God, but is it really just energy that they didn't understand and so they called it God? Energy is everywhere. Energy is all powerful and energy is all knowing and by when I say that I think that energy and consciousness are intertwined. They cannot be separated. And I think that's where everything is about energy and consciousness. I don't think there's a creation. I don't think there's a beginning and an end. And I don't think that there's intelligent design. I do believe in natural selection and evolution and maybe not the exact same way that they describe evolution but Not necessarily, but I can see, if I just look back 100 years ago at the pictures we have of people who lived 100 years ago, they look way different from what we do and not just the clothes we wear, but even their facial features, the way they stand, their body is different. We have changed in 100 years. We are watching things happen. And you just look at the kids today versus when we were kids, it's night and day difference, the things that they can do and say. Night and day really is, right? And so we're watching it with our very own eyes. So that's kind of where I come down. on most things, I'll have a similar position, but not an exact position to maybe a mainstream view. Yeah, makes sense. Well, Jen, thanks so much for coming on. I really appreciate it. Really appreciate the manner in which you've presented your views and the way in which we've been able to converse. So hopefully it's a message for a futurist Christian that can one day join me too. All right, well, very nice meeting you, Luke. And thank you for letting me be here today. U-turn. All the best with the settling in Omaha, Nebraska. Thank you.