The Case for Christianity | What Skeptics Can’t Ignore

In this episode of the Wellspring Podcast, Pastor Randy Lynn and Justin Lynn tackle one of the biggest questions of our generation: Is there a logical case for Christianity? Responding to comments from skeptics, atheists, and those deconstructing their faith, they examine Christianity through reason, evidence, morality, personal experience, and the impact biblical principles have on individuals and society.

Together, they discuss:
• Why Christians should never fear hard questions
• The difference between true Christianity and religion
• Can objective morality exist without God?
• Why biblical principles consistently produce healthier lives and stronger communities
• Faith deconstruction and church hurt
• Personal testimonies of God’s intervention and healing
• Why a relationship with Jesus is different from religious tradition
• What happens if Christianity is true?

Whether you’re a believer, skeptic, atheist, or someone searching for answers, this conversation challenges you to honestly ask: What if Jesus is real?

📖 “You will seek Me and find Me when you seek Me with all your heart.” – Jeremiah 29:13

👍 Follow for more biblical discussions, faith-based conversations, and practical Christian living content.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

That's very dangerous to be a Christian and not know the foundations of your faith.

SPEAKER_00 0:06

True Christians should never be afraid of questions. What if Christianity isn't blind faith, but it's the most reasonable conclusion? And what if it's not? Hello and welcome back to the Wellspring Podcast. I'm here with my dad, Pastor Randy Lynn, and we are revisiting the subject of deconstructing the faith, and where we are laying out a case for Christianity. And Dad, I want to ask you this opening question. How do Christians respond when the culture says that God isn't real and faith is outdated?

SPEAKER_02 0:50

Well, unfortunately, too many of us in the past have gotten mad or angry and combative.

SPEAKER_01 0:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 0:58

And I want to do completely the opposite today. I want to lay out pure logic and just examine the fact of either they're right or we are. Yeah. And each one of us have a 50% chance of being correct.

SPEAKER_00 1:20

What if Christianity isn't blind faith, but it's the most reasonable conclusion? And what if it's not?

SPEAKER_02 1:28

Yeah. And so that's what I want to do.

SPEAKER_00 1:31

And and oftentimes, you know, son, in our culture, Christians get uh we get maligned for not thinking, not having uh logic analytical boxed society, yeah, and not being able to think outside the box.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

Exactly. Just gullibly lapping up what we've quote quote been trained to think. Yeah. And so I want to look at it. I'm not even going to the Bible to start today.

SPEAKER_00 2:04

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 2:04

I'm going with pure human logic. A opposed to B, apples opposed to bananas.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

You want me to read the comment that kind of spurred this podcast on? Please do. Says uh responding to uh talking about faith deconstructing and uh the word of God being true. This comment says, that's some nonsense you were taught. Your God ain't up there, he ain't real, and you're just mad that people are finally figuring it out. First off, before you comment to this, I want to say we're not mad. No. And I responded to this comment saying we're not mad, we're not angry.

SPEAKER_02 2:46

Never.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

We are just saddened that people can't experience the full joy and love that Jesus brings to their life.

SPEAKER_02 2:54

So true. And really, and that's that's what's in my heart today, too, to just through pure logic, human analyzation, mental analyzing. Is this real?

SPEAKER_00 3:09

Is it something that makes us better?

SPEAKER_02 3:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 3:12

Or worse. Or worse. You were talking about how they a lot of people think that Christians have closed minds, and this was another comment that we got. Fundamentalism stops a thinking mind.

SPEAKER_02 3:25

Yeah. That's what a lot of people think. Yeah. And you know, in their defense, I will say there are different sections or sects of Christianity where that is true.

SPEAKER_01 3:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:39

Where there is nothing but a a brainwashing from the top that is forced compulsion. That's a cult to us.

SPEAKER_00 3:48

Those are not true biblical um Christian organizations. Not at all. Those usually stem from a man-made rewritten version of the Word of God with his points to follow.

SPEAKER_02 4:05

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 4:05

And that is what a lot of people see Christianity as is they see these different denominations or religious cults that say you can only do this, you can't do this, and that is the in the box thinking that they're looking at.

SPEAKER_02 4:22

And and again, coming from our side to really show a person who's saying these things, I want to show you if our Christianity is real, and we believe it is 100%.

SPEAKER_01 4:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:36

And if there is a devil, if there's a God, then there is a devil.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 4:41

If he exists, would he not want Christianity splintered into a million different flavors and revisions so that it would be really, really hard to find the true? That's exactly what the enemy would want. And that's exactly what we're looking at. We've got everything from an absolute tyrannical cult down to such watered down versions of Christianity, they're no Christianity at all.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

Yeah, Christian by name only. Live exactly how you were living before you found out who Jesus was. Exactly. Just call his name.

SPEAKER_02 5:20

Yeah. Just call this name praise.

SPEAKER_00 5:23

Say that you are a Christian, but live in the same way.

SPEAKER_02 5:26

Pray a little premeditated prayer, assign a church membership role, and boom, you're a Christian. Well, see, that's that's no more true than any other cult. And so in in your defense, we want I want to say that to you. If I were the devil, that's exactly what I would do to true Christianity. I would mask it, I would revise it, I would bust it into a thousand different splinters. Cause confusion. To cause utter confusion, to make it hard to find the real biblical Christianity. And so actually, to kind of answer one guy's question or uh the the statement that uh we're taught not to think, really, true Christians are taught quite the opposite. As a matter of fact, a true Christian should be very skeptical of just about everything they see within the faith.

SPEAKER_00 6:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:24

And check it with the faith's main book.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

Yeah, God calls us to be analytical.

SPEAKER_02 6:29

Analytical. Analyze it. Discern the Bible tells us Christians don't believe every spirit that you hear. Test them to see if they're of God. Test them to see if they say the right things.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

That just remember it reminds me to the podcast we had when you brought up the Bereans. Right. When signs and wonders were going on, but they were still told to analyze that. That's right. Be skeptical, analyze it, and see if it lines up.

SPEAKER_02 7:00

I'm glad you brought that up because here's Paul teaching every day. Paul, the apostle, signs, wonders, and miracles, as you said. But these people weren't going to say, I believe that, until daily, the Bible said the Bereans, was it Acts 17? They daily check the scriptures to see if what Paul, the miracle worker, was saying was correct.

SPEAKER_00 7:23

Yeah, and you brought up the fact that Paul said, if I come preaching a different message than I've preached before.

SPEAKER_02 7:30

That's right. Or even an angel.

SPEAKER_00 7:32

Yeah, or even a spiritual angel or anything. Don't listen to it if it doesn't line up with what was originally taught in the Word of God.

SPEAKER_02 7:40

So I have to tell you, true Christians are extremely thoughtful, even skeptical in a good way, and very much uh analytical. And we should be, we must be.

SPEAKER_01 7:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:54

Because there's so much deception. Our Lord warned us there's going to be so much deception, you've got to seek out the truth.

SPEAKER_01 8:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:04

So, I mean, this is where we are. And you know, a lot of people don't understand, they'll say those things, uh, Justin, to just, you know, provoke a uh a response. And you know what? I'll be honest with you today. If you if you are one of those people that say those things, and I can see really beyond sometimes, I think you're really trying to punch our buttons to see if we are real.

SPEAKER_01 8:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:29

And I don't blame you for that. Because I wouldn't want to follow anything with my life I thought to be fake or phony.

SPEAKER_00 8:36

Yeah, I want to say true Christians should never be afraid of questions or rebuttals. Never.

SPEAKER_02 8:44

Well, if they are, it's because they haven't searched the scriptures to know what they believe. And oh man, it's a whole nother topic. But that's very dangerous to be a Christian and not know the foundations of your faith.

SPEAKER_00 8:59

Yeah, because the minute you encounter somebody that comes to you with a comment like that, yeah, you're just gonna crumble and fall on your faith and have to walk away in defeat.

SPEAKER_02 9:09

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 9:10

Because you haven't done the study and to back up.

SPEAKER_02 9:14

And and you haven't it hasn't become real to you.

SPEAKER_00 9:17

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

It's just that's it.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

It has to become real to you for you to speak of it out of your heart.

SPEAKER_02 9:25

Yeah. Yeah. Or else it's just something your grandma told you, your mom told you, your Sunday school teacher told you. It it is just something you were conditioned to believe if it doesn't become personal. So so today I just want you to know we are going to entertain your question. You know, what if? Yeah. What if God doesn't exist?

SPEAKER_00 9:50

Yeah, point number one, something versus nothing.

SPEAKER_02 9:53

Something versus nothing. And you know, it it it is a genuine, it's an honest question. Yeah. That all of us should ask. Is it real? You know, and every true Christian has asked themselves that question.

SPEAKER_00 10:09

I've asked that question before as well.

SPEAKER_02 10:11

Absolutely. And you were raised in my house, you raised to know God.

SPEAKER_00 10:15

I feel like that's one of the main reasons I asked the question. Yeah. I came to a point uh a couple years ago where I was like driving in my car. I was like, God, I've lived my whole life for you. Yeah. Are you real? Yeah. Like I see so many things going around, like causing me to have all these questions. And I'm like, Lord, are you real? And the main reason I think that I asked that question is because I grew up in it my whole life. And then I start to see the outside and the way that other people think, which I want to encourage Christians to do.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 10:52

See the way that people think. Yeah, put them in the world. And then line that up with your experience with Jesus and the Word of God so that you can know how to talk to people that have these questions that haven't been raised the way that you've been raised.

SPEAKER_02 11:06

That's right. Put ourselves in their shoes and give me good reasons why I should believe in your Jesus. Why I should believe in your God. Now, that's apart from you can look up in the sky and and be you know honest before yourself. It all didn't just bang and happen. I mean, God has left his signature on this universe from from the little beetle that spits fire out its backside to the very human, the intricacies of the human eye did not just happen. And there's more there's more uh evidence for design than there is evolution. Yeah. But put ourselves in their shoes and say, you know, I want to know, give me a real reason to believe that your Christ is the only way and all of these things.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Hello, everyone. We're gonna take a quick break from this video because I want to thank you for watching this, and I want to encourage you to subscribe to this YouTube channel. We are trying every single week to ask the Lord what topics he wants us to cover and to get these podcasts recorded so that they can be on YouTube for you every Friday at 12 p.m. I want to remind you that the Wellspring Podcast is an extension of Praise Center Ministries, my home church in Sepulpa, Oklahoma, in the Tulsa area. If these videos here at the Wellspring Podcast have been blessing you and encouraging you, we want to give you an opportunity. If you would like to sew into this ministry, in the link below, you can click tithely and it will take you to a page where you can click the drop down and click Wellspring Podcast and you can donate there. Anytime you leave a comment or like this video, it helps these videos to be pushed out by YouTube so more people can encounter the love of Christ. Now let's get back to the video.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

The case for Christianity through pure logic, I'm not going to give you the scripture, I'm just going to have you with me analyze this. Is there a possibility that all of that doesn't exist? Well, that's the great chasm of faith. I choose to believe there is. But what if there's not? So if you are an atheist or a person who doesn't believe in God, I'm a Christian who does, there's a 50-50 chance that one of us is wrong. Yeah. You have to look at it that way. And you have to say to yourself, What if I'm wrong? I've said that to myself. What if I'm wrong? What if I'm doing all of this and loving and serving this God I believe, and I'm wrong? Well, if we take all spiritual aspects out, the Bible out, and we draw this conclusion, if the atheist is right, son, when we die, we will wind up in the same realm or in the same non-existence as the atheist, wouldn't we?

SPEAKER_01 14:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:18

I mean, it just stands to reason that if we are wrong, we absolutely are all going back to dirt.

SPEAKER_01 14:26

There's no hope.

SPEAKER_02 14:27

There's no hope. So in building this case for Christianity, what would I do if I knew that the atheist was right and that we've just been conditioned to believe all this? How would life be if I chose not to believe in Christ?

SPEAKER_00 14:48

I feel like there wouldn't be uh anything to live for. I mean, I feel like you wouldn't feel like you had a purpose.

SPEAKER_02 14:56

You wouldn't. And that is one thing that I want to bring up. So I just went on the internet, grabbed some statistics. What would life look like in a person who wanted to serve God that he believes is there, and just even without the promise of eternity, I looked at this in just a pure logical form. The peaceful moral code that's adhered to by the Bible-believing Christians, I believe, speaks for itself. While many true Christians do sin and break laws, the percentage is astronomically lower with the Christian across the board. And this is a direct quote from AI. Church attendance and high levels of personal faith are consistently associated with lower rates of youth delinquency, drug use, and violent crime. So just in a pure analytical fashion, which life would be better? The life that believes that there's a moral code, that there's a God to answer to. We already have statistics. Here's another one incarceration or prison data. While Christians are represented in prison populations across the world, the highest risk for delinquency is often found among those who are neither spiritual nor religious, or those who are merely spiritual rather than religious. Yeah. That is a factual statistic. Here's another one. International trends of nations that do or don't believe in God. Research suggests that more religious countries often experience lower rates of property crimes, likely due to the social control mechanisms within religious communities. So let's say the atheist is right. There's nothing out there, we all die the same. But whose life's gonna be better while we're on this earth?

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:09

Obviously, the Christians gonna live. Listen to this studies show that communities with higher proportions of religious uh residents, such as evangelicals, can have lower overall rates of certain types of violent crime. Yeah. So we see across the board what's right and wrong to the atheist. Well, it that vet that varies, but there's a knowing in every human being, it it would seem, that killing your neighbor is not right. Yeah. That stealing his property is not right. Yeah. And so we have hard cold statistics that say people who believe in a God and a and a Christ, like we do, they don't kill as many people, they don't steal as much stuff. And then then you've got another one I thought was very interesting, being a married man. Married versus married men versus single. This is again, this is a direct Google AI quote. Married men often have better health, lower mortality rates from diseases, and a lower risk of early death than never married, divorced, or widowed men. The survival benefit often increases the longer a man stays married. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

I love that these secular studies are showing the social benefits of faith in communities. They are. So the moral codes. The moral codes.

SPEAKER_02 18:39

Even if there was no God, my friend, and I'm gonna end this podcast by letting you know we both will that we believe. But even without this being a reality, life while we're breathing is better. Yeah. It's better. And then you've got, you know.

SPEAKER_00 19:03

Christianity is not just a claimed truth. It produces visible fruit. It produces something And that's what we're seeing in these secular studies.

SPEAKER_02 19:13

That's what we're seeing. These are statistics that you can go on Google and read. Then you've got things like, you know, uh we we are not Seventh-day Adventists, we don't agree with their basic doctrines at all.

SPEAKER_01 19:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:26

But because of their faith, you can Google this, they live seven to ten years longer than the average person in the population because they believe that they must eat a certain way because of the Bible. And it says their longevity is heavily influenced by a faith-based and healthy lifestyle, including a largely plant-based diet, abstinence from alcohol, tobacco, and coupled with exercise, and strong social connections. They live seven to ten years longer. We live in a day, and I know you'll agree with this, son. We hear a lot about self-love, yeah, self-care. So I'm just talking basically from a purely logical standpoint, who takes better care of themselves? Yeah. People who believe there's a God, people who believe that we will answer to God commit less crimes.

SPEAKER_00 20:31

I feel like there's two levels or there's two sides to the self-love, self-care.

SPEAKER_02 20:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

So as Christians, we are created by God, our body is a temple, and we are taught to care for that temple.

SPEAKER_02 20:49

Right.

SPEAKER_00 20:49

And because we were created by God. But then I see a lot of things on social media. Uh, the self-love and self-care is not necessarily caring for yourself as of to take care of yourself.

SPEAKER_02 21:03

True.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

It's just a word that they put on being okay with the situation that they're in.

SPEAKER_02 21:09

Exactly, exactly. And to even, you know, abuse their body in ways that are not uh proven not to be uh healthy.

SPEAKER_01 21:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:20

And so you're you're right about that. There is two sides to this self-care. But you know, again, secular humanism, as we have defined it, it's been defined in the world, which is the quote unquote religion of the atheist, humanism, uh, is based on this the positive side of self love. I I love myself, I want to do what I want that makes me feel good. And so, really, if you look at the positives of being a Christian and following the moral code we believe from Jesus Christ, you're gonna love yourself. A whole lot more than if you don't believe in God at all.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:05

Like you said, we believe that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit. He lives there. So we we shouldn't kill it with alcohol, drugs.

SPEAKER_01 22:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:14

We shouldn't, you know, kill it with promiscuity and all of these things that are proven to be, whether you're an atheist or a Christian, those behaviors are self-destructive.

SPEAKER_00 22:25

Yeah. I see that a lot of um these people that are coming at Christianity saying that it's fake or false. Um are they rejecting God intellectually or is it because it's personal?

SPEAKER_02 22:45

Well again, the human nature is designed to whatever feels good, do it.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

Christianity has taboos and things you can't do. So in their mind, they're rejecting the restraints.

SPEAKER_01 23:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:02

They're rejecting the rules because they feel like if I love myself, I can just do whatever I want. Without, and we accused of not think we're accused of not thinking.

SPEAKER_01 23:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:12

But the person who's into self-gratification without thinking is really the person who's not thinking.

SPEAKER_01 23:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:22

Because if you just gratify yourself, uh you might want your neighbor's wife, you want might want your neighbor's things, and that will get you shot or put in prison. And that's just common sense. That's just common sense.

SPEAKER_01 23:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:36

Without any moral code whatsoever. That's just common sense.

SPEAKER_00 23:40

Choices have consequences. So I have a question. Yeah. Why do biblical principles consistently help societies flourish?

SPEAKER_02 23:48

And it's obvious that they do.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:52

Agree with the Christianity, agree with the Bible or not. We came out of the dark ages into what we call the Renaissance when the Bible was printed in everyday, every man's language.

SPEAKER_01 24:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:08

We had explosions of art, explosions of music. All the composers, all the famous artists came out of the Renaissance period. And the Renaissance happened because the Bible began to be printed in the language of every man.

SPEAKER_01 24:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:28

So it birthed something. That moral code. Just look at the moral code in the Bible birthed the greatest civilizations that have ever existed.

SPEAKER_01 24:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:41

That have laws for fellow man, the good of mankind. It all came out of that explosion of the moral code from the Bible.

SPEAKER_00 24:53

Yeah, these days feel like Christianity is oppressive.

SPEAKER_02 24:58

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 24:59

But I want to argue that it's not oppressive, it's protective. It's protective. Very protective.

SPEAKER_02 25:05

Very protect. It protects you from uh, you know, I'm 65 years old, son. I've never had an encounter, a bad encounter with law enforcement.

SPEAKER_01 25:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:15

Okay. Just like everybody else, I've been caught speeding.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

Well, I I did have an encounter with law enforcement. But it was completely we can do a funny podcast on that. We need to do that. You got uh tripped up. Don't forget to pay a speeding ticket. Okay. And then drive through uh Muscogee County.

SPEAKER_02 25:38

It was your own negligence that got that coming on, but but it was it was a terrible day, but a funny story right before your wedding.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

Yes. But that was the only only time that I had that kind of encounter. Absolutely and that was a uh misunderstanding.

SPEAKER_02 25:55

Total, complete misunderstanding. You got thrown in jail.

SPEAKER_00 25:58

But like you were saying, like I've never been thrown on the ground and handcuffed because I was stealing in a store and exactly I was armed, or exactly uh something like that. Or I've never uh had to sit on the sidewalk um drunk out of my mind because and just realizing I ran into an oncoming car. Exactly. I've never had to have that.

SPEAKER_02 26:20

You've never killed somebody driving drunk. Yeah. I've never been busted for drugs, yeah. I've never been busted for prostitution or anything else like that.

SPEAKER_00 26:33

And that's not to say that we've never been tempted by these things in times of our life, but the moral code that the Bible and that God brings into the Christian life, yeah, it causes you to realize what you're doing in the situation and not go farther than you want to go. Exactly. Because what was that uh thing? I I don't know if it was Pastor Lewis that used to say it or the devil takes you farther than you want to go. Yes. Sin.

SPEAKER_02 27:04

Yes, sin takes you farther than you want to go, uh keeps you longer than you want to stay, and costs you more than you want to pay. Yeah. And that is a fact. So we want you to just just just A B apples to apples. Whose life turns out better the person who thinks all Christianity and religion is a cult, or the person who believes it with all of their heart and does their very best to live according to that moral code, just pick two lives.

SPEAKER_00 27:38

And not just uh Christianity as a whole. No. I a relation I want to preface this a relationship with Jesus. Because many, many denominations, many groups and organizations go under the name Christianity.

SPEAKER_02 27:57

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 27:57

And what we're prefacing is living a life outside of Jesus and living a life in a relationship with Jesus. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 28:07

I'm glad you brought that up because there are cults that call themselves Christians and they control, and and we've seen cult leaders be busted for uh underage girls and all that. So so everything that calls itself is a Christian is not a Christian.

SPEAKER_01 28:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:21

We're the first to say that. And so, but we're talking about true, Bible-believing, Jesus Christ following Christians that do their very best to live it out on a daily basis. Yes. That's the life you can look at that's much less uh traumatic.

SPEAKER_00 28:40

Yeah, it just made me think of uh there's a guy, I'll have to show you his video after this. There's a guy, his name's Josh Benson. He's a he's a comedian on uh TikTok, and he did this clip, and uh he posted all of these clips together of these Christian influencers. Uh-huh. And one of them said, uh, get ready with me as I'm going to church to lead worship. And the opening clip is he's pulling his pants on. Oh he starts on his and then he's putting his shirt on over his abs and all that stuff. And it's like that's what a lot of young kids are seeing as Christian influencers. And that is just a complete opposite of what it means to really be a Christian. Be in a relationship with Jesus. That's right. That is a perfect uh example of Christian by name only.

SPEAKER_02 29:36

Perfect example. And we will be the first to admit to you there are millions of Christians in name only.

SPEAKER_01 29:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:43

And we apologize to you for that. But we also have to tell you that's the reality. If you've got real $20 bills, you've got fake ones.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Yeah. And whenever you go to work in a bank, yeah, they don't show you the fake bills.

SPEAKER_02 29:58

No, they do not.

SPEAKER_00 29:59

They show you only the authentic bills. Yeah. Because if you know what is authentic, you will immediately see what's fake when it comes through your hands.

SPEAKER_02 30:09

Fake immediately. And I will promise you, if you'll be honest in your heart, if you want to find a real Christian, you'll you'll know when they're real. You'll know them by their fruits, as our Lord Jesus Christ said. They do what they say. And Christians who don't live according to the teachings of Christ are not true Christians. They have just taken a mental conditioning, maybe because grandma believed, and and those are the people you're talking about who've just been taught they have to believe that. That is not a relationship he's talking about.

SPEAKER_00 30:46

Yeah, and as many humans, they don't like to be subject to an authority. Exactly. I mean, I people that have jobs all the time. Yeah, nine times out of ten, they're complaining about their manager, they're complaining about their boss. Yeah. Uh sometimes there's good environments where they have a good boss or a good manager, but there's a lot of times um where people just don't like to be subject to authority, and many reject God because they don't want an authority in their lives.

SPEAKER_02 31:15

And that's true. And and that is the reason many, well, let's go back to Malt Karl Marx and all of those people who brought in socialism and communism, uh, they would call Christianity this the opiate of the masses. And when they really got down to what they were being honest about, the very reason that socialism and communism was embraced and thought up by those people is because and it's in print, you can read it. They did not want sexual boundaries in their lives.

SPEAKER_01 31:51

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 31:51

And one of the first uh com one of the first few commandments is thou shalt not commit adultery. And so God's moral code concerning our the sexuality of our beings is one of the things that He protects us in with marriage. And so they've admitted it. Yeah, the reason they rejected God, the Bible, is because they did not want any of the don'ts.

SPEAKER_00 32:16

They wanted to feed their own selfish desires. Exactly. And I wanted to bring this up. Uh, when Jesus was walking on the earth, he challenged the religious people of his time.

SPEAKER_02 32:31

He was harder on them than anybody else.

SPEAKER_00 32:34

He was. Yeah. He challenged their hypocrisy and their worldly rebellion.

SPEAKER_01 32:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:41

And that is goes hand in hand with the false Christianity by name only today.

SPEAKER_02 32:47

It does. It absolutely does. If Jesus was an imposter, he would not have rebuked his own. Yeah. See, he was a Jew, and the Jewish religion is uh Orthodox Judaism, but he was rebuking the very leaders, the hierarchy of Orthodox Judaism.

SPEAKER_01 33:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:08

So if he was a phony, he would have tried to keep everything looking good with good PR, he wouldn't have come against those guys, but he rebuked their hypocrisy and their quote quote religion because it wasn't real. Yeah. It wasn't real.

SPEAKER_00 33:23

Well, I have a cr question for uh the listener here. If God is real, what would need to change in your life?

SPEAKER_02 33:31

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 33:31

If he is real.

SPEAKER_02 33:32

If he's real.

SPEAKER_00 33:33

And I believe 100% because he showed up in my life, that he's real.

SPEAKER_01 33:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:39

That's just the thing that I want to I I pray for when people comment things um about saying that we're just taught this or God's not real. Exactly. The response that I have is not one of hate, not one at all. Of just demeaning. My first initial response is I want to love this person.

SPEAKER_01 34:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:05

Because I wonder where they're coming from. What is how can there be so much hate in three or four sentences? What happened in their life that caused them to have that much hatred?

SPEAKER_02 34:20

You have hit on something that is so powerful. And this has been one of we do believe in God and we believe there is a devil. This is one of the devil's biggest tools to take a home where they go to church and they say they're Christians, but then the dad goes home and beats the children, abuses the wife. And then people see that and say, You're just a hypocrite. Even the kid sees it. Yes. Well, the kid who grows up in that, seeing their dad go to church.

SPEAKER_00 34:50

Rejects Christianity. Rejects I just like to say rejects Jesus because they never were shown the true Jesus.

SPEAKER_02 35:00

That's exactly right. And that's the reason a lot of you are hurting today because you were gr you might have been raised in a an abusive home and they called themselves Christian. Well, guess what? I don't care what they called themselves, they did not follow Jesus.

SPEAKER_00 35:14

I feel like that's where a lot of this faith deconstruction movement has come out of is the kids that have grown up seeing parents go to church and in front of all their parents' friends, they have everything together. But the the kids, it never gets past them. No. They see everything happening at church and in the family life. Right. And so then they grow up to where they're old enough to get out of the house and they say, I don't want to be, I don't want any part of it.

SPEAKER_02 35:45

Anything to do with that. And you know what? To be honest with you, if I'd been raised in that environment, there'd been a possibility I would have said that very same thing. If that's Christianity, I don't want anything to do with it.

SPEAKER_00 35:56

That's why when I um I see these comments, I want to respond with I just pray that God would reveal Himself to you. To you and give you your own personal experience. Yes. You're not going to find Jesus in somebody else's experience. No, you're not. You're not going to find the true Jesus by just religiously following a minister or some big name speaker. You're going to find Jesus on your own with your own personal experience.

SPEAKER_02 36:28

Exactly. And that's the only way you can find Jesus. And so you know what? We welcome your arguments, we welcome your debates because if we can't answer them with the truth of God's word, then we're not real Christians.

SPEAKER_01 36:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:42

But we love Christ. And we, and and here's what a real Christian does. We spend our lives trying to save others.

SPEAKER_00 36:50

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 36:51

We spend our lives trying to show you there is a real Jesus who is.

SPEAKER_00 36:55

And this world is all about I'm saving myself.

SPEAKER_02 36:58

Exactly. But none of us can save ourselves. No. Because if we could, again, here we go back to the original argument. We're all gonna die. If God isn't there, we're all gonna die and turn into the same dust.

SPEAKER_01 37:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:10

So here's the big question you have to ask yourself who is right? And it's a sad reality, but if you believe there's nothing, you've you better be right because here's the problem. If you're wrong, then everything Jesus said is true. Yeah. And Jesus talked about a hell which he wants no one to go there. So let's let's just be purely logical. My grandfather used to tell me, son, always be better safe than sorry. You know, carry an extra pair of socks instead of wishing you had some.

SPEAKER_00 37:42

I had an extra quart of transmission for my truck yesterday. You did. And I got a code that said it was low, and I was better safe than sorry. I pulled out of the box and I was good to go.

SPEAKER_02 37:54

That is what we're coming from today. Just the pure logic. If God is not real and we're all just playing a game, we're all gonna wind up in the same spot. Yeah. No difference.

SPEAKER_00 38:06

Can objective morality even exist without God?

SPEAKER_02 38:09

Not really, because there has to be someone to answer to. Yeah. Or then truth becomes what we have today, subjective. Yes subject to what my emotions are right now or just how I'm feeling, you know, that's truth to me. Well, you can live that way for a while, but when you disobey the speed limit like I've done, you'll find out real soon that objective truth is the only one out there. They're gonna fine you for going over the speed limit.

SPEAKER_00 38:36

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 38:36

So we're just saying if the atheist is wrong, there's nothing to gain. There's nothing to gain. If we serve and live for Christ in a relationship with him, even if we're believing a fairy tale, we have much better lives. But in the end, if we're right, we're fine. We have eternity with Christ forever.

SPEAKER_01 39:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:02

So I want to just ask you to just pure logic analyze this question. Ask yourself, what if if those people are right? What's gonna happen to me?

SPEAKER_01 39:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:15

You know, and so we have decided to be better safe than sorry. Now that's on a very low level.

SPEAKER_00 39:21

That's the very beginning level. But once you uh encounter Christ, your life begins to continue to get better.

SPEAKER_02 39:31

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 39:32

You have you find yourself in moments where people would be broken down and give up. You in moments that you should have those feelings, yeah, you find Jesus swooping in and giving you a joy that's unexplainable.

SPEAKER_02 39:51

And that's what we can tell you. Let's move out of pure logic for a minute into our own experiences. We have actually encountered Christ.

SPEAKER_01 40:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:02

I have been healed. You know your father had a heart attack at 30. I would not be here on this podcast today if Christ had not supernaturally healed me.

SPEAKER_01 40:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:18

So no matter what you say, no one can take that away from me. I know I was dying and I now live. Yeah. And beyond that, you and I have had uh encounters with the Lord, like you mentioned when you were uh on the last podcast on the last podcast, whenever I had pneumonia, pneumonia, and I was hallucinating.

SPEAKER_00 40:41

I couldn't even walk to the mailbox without wanting to just collapse and fall asleep back on the porch. Yeah. I think uh to one of the biggest detrimental times of my life, um, when I went off, sowed some wild oats, and made mistakes, and I was trying to take my life because of the weight of everything that had happened, I just didn't want to live with it. That was a hard time. And I tried to throw the car off the side of the road, and an angel is the only thing I can say. Pushed it back into the lines, and there's no way that I wouldn't have rolled. I mean, who's to say I would have survived that crash? But the car was kept on the road, and I had the steering wheel all the way to the right going over a hundred miles an hour. That's a moment in my life that how can I say that God isn't real?

SPEAKER_02 41:44

There's no way, son. And see, you can't convince him ever that God did not intervene and save his life. I wouldn't have a son today.

SPEAKER_00 41:55

There's there's many more times in my life that if I can sit and think about it, God intervened in my life in a way that nothing else could have. I could not conjure up anything like that. No person could show up and create moments where God had to intervene.

SPEAKER_02 42:15

Yeah. Because your parents loved you very much and were praying. And and we didn't even know. But see, these are reasons we will go to our death proc proclaiming the name of Jesus Christ because it's happened to us. And the problem with just going on a pure intellectual level is no relationship like Justin was saying. There's no relationship there. You've never had a true encounter. We've got the Apostle Paul, and I know we're getting close to having to wrap this up, but we we've got the Apostle Paul, hated Christians.

SPEAKER_00 42:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:52

His name was Saul of Tarsus. He was a schooled in the Jewish religion by the best trainers, told what to think, told what to believe. He's just riding on a horse. It says Paul Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest, and he was gonna murder more Christians. See, that's not a relationship with God. God literally That's a religion. That's a religion. You're not my we have that going on today. Unfortunately, with Islam. If you're not ours, we're gonna kill you. Yeah. We don't want you to be able to live and let live.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:27

So see, that's religion, but that's not truth. That's not Christ. And so Paul's knocked off his horse. I mean, he's not even looking to for faith in a in a Christ. Yeah. He's going to kill Christians.

SPEAKER_00 43:41

God had to supernaturally show up.

SPEAKER_02 43:44

Supernaturally showed up. And so you it'd be hard to deconstruct for Paul to deconstruct his faith because he didn't construct it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:58

And so it's a good idea.

SPEAKER_00 44:00

It's funny in that story that when he got knocked off the horse, he immediately said, Who are you? Who are you, Lord? Who are you, Lord? He said, Who his flesh said, Who are you? But his his spirit, his heart knew it was the Lord.

SPEAKER_02 44:15

You knocked me off a horse in blinding light.

SPEAKER_01 44:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:18

You gotta be Lord. I love that. Who are you, Lord? And his next question was, What do you want me to do? I love that. Who are you, and what do you want me to do? And so I hope that you have just caused yourself to ask yourself the honest question. If we're right, where are you gonna end up? If you're right, we're all gonna end up the same. No difference. But our lives have been tremendously blessed. I'm I'll end it out with my testimony. Not only was I healed of that heart attack and got to go ahead and have the rest of my family complete my ministry, I've had wonderful encounters with with God touching people. I've had no regrets in my life. I mean, I don't I mean, there's a few things I wish I'd done differently, of course, but generally speaking, having come to Christ at nine years old, I didn't go, I didn't commit any crimes, I didn't spend any time in jail. I wasn't again, I wasn't blessed with drugs, I didn't have to encounter and run from law enforcement. I've had a really peaceful life. And I'm just like, which is better? Yeah, which is better. And then to know that if you're wrong you miss eternity with Christ and that there is a place of torment, you know, just ask just just logically size it up, which is better, which is better.

SPEAKER_01 45:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:50

And we know that there's a Christ, and if you'll just be honest with yourself and just give him a chance to have your heart. If you're if you're playing games, you're gonna try God, that's not gonna work. He won't be tried.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:03

But if you'll just come to him in all sincerity and say something as simple as this, God, if you're real, would you please reveal yourself to me?

SPEAKER_00 46:11

Yes, he says in Jeremiah 29, 13, you will seek me and find me when you seek me with your whole heart. With your whole heart. And that's our prayer for you today. Yes, it is. That you've asked yourself these questions, and you just begin to have that curiosity to want to seek the Lord. And I pray that in that moment, yes, that Jesus would let you find him, as he said in this verse. If you seek him with his with your whole heart, he will be there.

SPEAKER_02 46:47

He will, and he said, He'll come to you. And he said, Hin anybody that comes to me with that kind of heart, I'll there's no way I'll cast them out or cast them away. And so he's calling you today. He's calling you. And I think we presented a pretty good argument.

SPEAKER_01 47:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:04

Even if he wasn't real for living for him, but we know he is.

SPEAKER_01 47:08

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 47:09

Because we have encountered him. He saved his life, he saved my life numerous times, and he's done so much for us and our families and put us on a path of purpose in our life. And we're here today because we love you, and because we know that God has the same purposes and plans for you. So we encourage you, seek Jesus with your whole heart. He'll He'll show up. Yeah. He'll show up.

SPEAKER_00 47:37

Jesus loves you. He has a purpose for you. He does. You may have gone through your life not knowing what you were going to accomplish, or seeking things and desires that you didn't know was going to be in your life. But God has a purpose and a plan for you, and He loves you. And I want to, I feel like we should end this podcast with just a simple prayer of salvation.

SPEAKER_02 48:05

Amen. And if you're asking God to reveal Himself, just bow your head right where you are. Just open your heart, that's so important. And just be honest before God and say this with me. Father God, I ask you to reveal yourself to me. If you're real and I believe you are, let me feel your presence right now. Let me know that you love me. I'm gonna take you at your word. I'm gonna believe what these men are saying, that you love me, and that you are waiting to forgive me. And so I'm gonna say these words in faith, believing that you're gonna come to me and you're gonna prove yourself to me. So pray this prayer with me right now and mean it with all of your heart. Say, Father, in the name of Jesus, I come to you. I've been a sinner, I've rebelled, I've done wrong, but God, I believe you are God. I believe you sent your only Son Jesus Christ to die on the cross for me, and I believe He is the Savior of the world. Say this with me, Lord Jesus Christ, I believe in you. Come into my heart, wash me from my sins, make me the person you created me to be. I give you my old life, I give you my heart, I give you my future, and I confess with my mouth that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, and that He is the living Savior who's coming to me right now. Come in, Lord Jesus, and say this with me. I give you my past, I give you my present, and I give you my future. Have your way in my life from this point on. I'll serve you till the day I die and see you in heaven. In Jesus' name. I pray. Amen.

SPEAKER_00 50:23

Amen.

SPEAKER_02 50:24

I believe they're feeling what we're feeling right here, right now. I do.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

I believe wherever you are in your car, maybe you're at your office at work, maybe you're in your living room or your kitchen, I believe that you're feeling the presence of God and that his love is just surrounding you right now. A love that you cannot explain, that you have not yet felt until this very moment.

SPEAKER_02 50:47

Yeah, and a peace, in a peace that passes your intellectual.

SPEAKER_00 50:51

Yes, if you've been in a moment of sadness or a season of despair, I pray that the joy of the Lord is overtaking you right now. Yes, Lord. I pray that if you've been in a bondage or you are on an addiction that you've not been able to shake on your own, that God is freeing you from that right now in the mighty name of Jesus.

SPEAKER_02 51:13

We agree. Yes. We agree.

SPEAKER_00 51:16

Well, I pray that this podcast has been a blessing to you, that this has maybe opened your eyes to see Jesus in a new light and a new perspective. And we want to encourage you to take every day and just look at the things around you and think of the creator that created it all. That's right. And we want to charge you walk every day in the love and the joy of Jesus. Right.