NXR Podcast - THE INTERVIEW - How One Household Can Rival A King with David Reece
Aired: 2024-02-19
Duration: 01:09:23


=== God's Law and Prosperity (15:11) ===

[00:00:00]  All right, welcome back to another episode of Theology Applied.
[00:00:02]  I am your host, Pastor Joe Webman with Right Response Ministries.
[00:00:05]  In this episode, I'm welcoming back to the show a friend of mine, a friend of yours, probably.
[00:00:09]  You've seen the first show that we had with him.
[00:00:11]  It's Mr. David Reese.
[00:00:13]  He is the CEO of Armored Republic.
[00:00:14]  He's also a local pastor.
[00:00:17]  And the guy knows a lot when it comes to the law of God, its applications, covenant theology.
[00:00:24]  And I've been blessed by him, learning a lot from him and with him.
[00:00:28]  And so today, we're going to be talking about the law of God, particularly as it pertains to the household and how the household Is the sphere that God has sovereignly instituted, not only for welfare and training up children, but ultimately to be productive.
[00:00:42]  The household is where you have business, where you have production, where wealth is generated.
[00:00:47]  And so those are the things that we're talking about today how to be productive, how to generate wealth by applying the law of God.
[00:00:54]  And for anybody who would charge us of it being, oh, well, that sounds like the prosperity gospel, obedience to God, you should listen to the episode because you're absolutely wrong.
[00:01:02]  So tune in now.
[00:01:04]  Applying God's word to every aspect of life.
[00:01:07]  This is Theology Applied.
[00:01:15]  All right, welcome to another episode of Theology Applied.
[00:01:18]  I am your host, as always, Pastor Joel Webbin with Right Response Ministries.
[00:01:22]  And today I'm privileged to welcome back for the second time to our show.
[00:01:25]  We have Mr. David Reese.
[00:01:26]  He's the CEO of Armored Republic and a number of other businesses.
[00:01:29]  He's also a local Presbyterian, covenantal, post millennial pastor.
[00:01:34]  And the cool thing is, the two of us, we've just hit it off.
[00:01:37]  We're developing a friendship.
[00:01:39]  And so, David is actually going to be coming on our show.
[00:01:42]  Sometimes we, you know, we sporadically have guests all over, but I'm doing an ongoing series with Mr. Reese, probably about once every six weeks, returning guests to our show.
[00:01:53]  So, get used to him.
[00:01:55]  He's a friend of ours, friend of yours, Mr. Reese.
[00:01:58]  Welcome back.
[00:01:59]  Thank you.
[00:02:00]  I'm really excited to be here.
[00:02:01]  We found that we basically agree on like everything except for giants and baptism, right?
[00:02:05]  This is like, which is, I would like to say that one of those is really important.
[00:02:09]  Giants.
[00:02:12]  And the other one doesn't really matter.
[00:02:15]  I'm just kidding.
[00:02:17]  No, thanks for having me on.
[00:02:18]  I'm excited to be here.
[00:02:19]  I'm looking forward to continuing to talk about Christian power.
[00:02:21]  And I think that a lot of the men that you and I talk to are trying to figure out hey, how do we pick up the ruins of society that we're in and deal with the fact that our forefathers built up a glorious Western civilization based upon the Protestant religion revealed in the Bible and then.
[00:02:40]  Our more recent forefathers inherited that thing and squandered the whole thing and started eating food that was meant for pigs.
[00:02:47]  And now we're going, how do we fix this?
[00:02:49]  Yep.
[00:02:50]  Amen.
[00:02:50]  So, why don't you do this, Mr. Reese, if you would?
[00:02:53]  Let's begin by you giving our listeners just a brief recap of last time we talked.
[00:02:58]  Absolutely.
[00:02:58]  So, last time we talked about the law of God.
[00:03:00]  And we started with the law of God because the law of God is the instruction manual for how to exercise dominion, right?
[00:03:07]  So, the law of God teaches us what we're supposed to do.
[00:03:10]  And it also teaches us because it talks about blessings and curses that are attached.
[00:03:14]  And so it teaches us the blessings show us the nature of reality and the way that God providentially blesses in his creation.
[00:03:23]  And the curses show us about the nature of reality and the way in which he providentially brings harm to the misuse.
[00:03:30]  And so we talked about the law of God and we had all sorts of kind of these key things that are sort of like things like the three uses or the three parts or the levels of the law.
[00:03:40]  And so we talked about all of that together.
[00:03:43]  And so the law of God gives us instruction and there's all sorts of useful organization of the law.
[00:03:48]  But in short, we have the idea that there's the two great commandments love God, love neighbor.
[00:03:53]  That the ten commandments are organized in two tables.
[00:03:56]  So there's the first table, the first four commandments teach us how to love God.
[00:03:59]  And then the last six teach us how to love our neighbor.
[00:04:02]  And then we've got all the case laws that you organize underneath there.
[00:04:06]  And then you've got like approved examples and disapproved examples.
[00:04:09]  And those give us all the detail.
[00:04:11]  So between all of that, we have this full spectrum view of the good life being taught to us by the law of God.
[00:04:18]  And so in seeing that, we can see how dominion is supposed to be exercised.
[00:04:24]  Can I comment on that just real quick?
[00:04:25]  I think that's so important because.
[00:04:27]  What you're saying, and I want to give you a chance to address this also.
[00:04:31]  One of the regular objections that I'll get with a few of the professional trolls on Twitter and YouTube that come in the comments is that.
[00:04:39]  They must pay well.
[00:04:40]  I mean, there's a lot of them.
[00:04:41]  There are a lot of them.
[00:04:42]  You're right.
[00:04:43]  But a lot of times, one of the things they'll say is they'll try to, and sadly, this comes from evangelicals, and many of them I'm sure are legitimate brothers and sisters in Christ who mean well, but they have no theological category to separate what you and I are talking about from the prosperity gospel.
[00:04:58]  Which really is a heresy that really does damn millions of souls to hell.
[00:05:02]  It really is a big deal.
[00:05:03]  But I feel like what we're trying to say when we say the law, like one of the first statements you made that I think is so good, you said the law of God, it's fruit or one of its purposes is giving us a roadmap for exercising dominion in the created world.
[00:05:19]  And right there, they would have a problem with that because they would read that as obedience means you get stuff.
[00:05:24]  If I obey, then God will give me a Ferrari.
[00:05:27]  And I just want to say first, the prosperity gospel is not obedience.
[00:05:32]  Bearing fruit.
[00:05:32]  The prosperity gospel is actually in the absence of obedience.
[00:05:36]  You can simply have wishful thinking and faith, faith not even in Christ as the object of your faith, but faith in your own faith, the strength of your faith rather than the object of your faith, a power of positivity, a manifesting, a person who doesn't, they're not a doer of the word, but a mere hearer and then speaker, trying to speak things into existence, ex nihilo.
[00:05:58]  That's a damnable heresy.
[00:06:00]  But if we're training our sons and daughters and our children's children, saying that if you obey God, Yes, he's sovereign, and sometimes you obey God and you get hit by a truck.
[00:06:10]  That happens.
[00:06:11]  That's tragic, but that's real.
[00:06:12]  And let God be true, and every man a liar.
[00:06:14]  He's still just.
[00:06:15]  He's good.
[00:06:15]  All of his purposes are holy and good.
[00:06:18]  But ordinarily, so not as a guarantee, but ordinarily, when you live by God's rules, things go well in God's world.
[00:06:27]  What we're doing is we're not advocating for the prosperity gospel.
[00:06:31]  We're actually pushing back against some well meaning evangelicals who would render the law of God as arbitrary and capricious.
[00:06:38]  Would you add anything to that?
[00:06:40]  Absolutely.
[00:06:41]  And I think what you just said was just so.
[00:06:43]  Absolutely.
[00:06:44]  And I think, but in addition to that, even when we don't get the blessings in this life, every time you seek to glorify God in faith by doing what he commands, there is always a reward on the day of judgment.
[00:06:59]  Yep.
[00:06:59]  Right.
[00:06:59]  So all of the elect who do, you know, every small, Christ won't forget a single one of the small good works that he causes us to do by his Holy Spirit through the use of his word in our hearts.
[00:07:10]  Right.
[00:07:11]  None of those are going to be forgotten.
[00:07:12]  They're all going to be rewarded, not as a covenant of works.
[00:07:15]  Right?
[00:07:15]  But graciously, those works are going to be accepted through the mediation of Christ and be rewarded.
[00:07:20]  Amen.
[00:07:21]  So, that idea that, like you said, the idea that there's a providential blessing that God generally brings, but there's also a providential blessing that he always brings.
[00:07:31]  Amen.
[00:07:31]  At the day of judgment.
[00:07:32]  Amen.
[00:07:32]  All right.
[00:07:33]  So, go ahead and just take us into our conversation for today.
[00:07:37]  Sure.
[00:07:37]  So, just to finalize on this idea of law, I want to emphasize this again for people who didn't hear the last time.
[00:07:42]  You know, the three uses of the law are very important.
[00:07:43]  We need to remember the law is not for justification.
[00:07:46]  We don't.
[00:07:46]  That's an illegal use of the law.
[00:07:48]  We don't say our good works make it so that we are righteous before God.
[00:07:51]  We are guilty in Adam.
[00:07:52]  We're guilty because of the corruption of our nature from conception, and we are breakers of the law in all sorts of particular points.
[00:07:57]  So that being the case, what we realize is that the law, first of all, shows us our need of a savior.
[00:08:03]  It's a mirror.
[00:08:04]  Secondly, it's a chain that binds and restrains the wickedness of men.
[00:08:08]  And then thirdly, it's a lamp unto our feet.
[00:08:11]  So we're going to be talking about the lamp unto our feet portion, the usage of the law.
[00:08:15]  And that's going to have an effect on the rest of the culture, the unbelieving elements of the culture, to restrain the evil there and to cause them to consider their mortality.
[00:08:24]  And their need for salvation.
[00:08:25]  And so, those first two uses there.
[00:08:27]  But as Christians, if we're saved, what we need to do now is we need to figure out how do we live?
[00:08:31]  How now shall we live?
[00:08:32]  That's Schaefer's famous question.
[00:08:36]  So, as we go into this, the first thing is we need to be careful to not forget the goal.
[00:08:43]  The law of God doesn't just tell us how to use power in sort of a like, here's a bunch of instructions for different machines, and then that's it.
[00:08:50]  It tells us the goal we're supposed to use the machines for.
[00:08:53]  So, we use life, we use all the stuff here, we use all the things.
[00:08:57]  And all the institutions for a goal.
[00:08:59]  And so the goal is the glory of God.
[00:09:02]  God is the definer of good.
[00:09:03]  God is the good.
[00:09:04]  We're trying to fill the earth with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea.
[00:09:07]  We do that by knowing God and we do that by showing the knowledge of God to other people, both with our words and with our actions, the double witness of words and actions.
[00:09:15]  So as we do that, we're filling the earth with the knowledge of God.
[00:09:19]  And that happens by the church being increased by people coming to faith, them increasing in their faith, and then the projection out with the cultural things that are made there.
[00:09:29]  So there's an external filling.
[00:09:31]  And there's also this internal filling of individuals as they know God.
[00:09:35]  So the goal there is to fill the earth with the knowledge of God.
[00:09:38]  So that's that that accords with human nature.
[00:09:42]  God designed us to be rational creatures and we're designed to know God.
[00:09:47]  We are the image of God.
[00:09:49]  And the image of God is also perfectly present in Christ incarnate.
[00:09:54]  And so we are to be renewed after the image of God.
[00:09:57]  And in being renewed after the image of God, we increase in wisdom, which is.
[00:10:01]  Knowledge of God, knowledge of the good and of his law, right?
[00:10:05]  Wisdom is the knowledge of what's good and how to get it, right?
[00:10:08]  So, God is the good.
[00:10:09]  His law teaches us how to live in such a way as to encourage an increase of the knowledge of God, both for ourselves and others, right?
[00:10:15]  And then, on top of that, there's this idea that, okay, fine, our purposes, our affections, our loyalties are going to be rightly built out.
[00:10:23]  So, we're going to become more holy, that holiness aspect.
[00:10:26]  And then we are going to make better choices, righteousness.
[00:10:29]  So, that idea of rationality being designed so that when it's properly used, What we're doing is we're having wisdom, holiness, and righteousness increased.
[00:10:38]  And we've been given this command, this mandate to go out to fill the earth and to subdue the earth.
[00:10:44]  And so that work, that work of the positive construction and then the preserving of what has been advanced, what has been made, is the two sides of that the working and keeping.
[00:10:56]  And we have, as individuals, we're all given the offices of prophet, priest, and king, which is prophets are using their wisdom to teach and correct.
[00:11:05]  We have priests who are seeking to be holy, and they're doing that in praying down blessing to get, and they are sacrificing to preserve.
[00:11:17]  And kings provide and they protect.
[00:11:20]  They provide a sphere where good work can be done in, and they protect that so that the good work that others do is preserved there.
[00:11:27]  So the individual, on a basic level, is supposed to use those offices to do the work of glorifying God by knowing Him and showing Him.
[00:11:36]  And that's sort of the goal.
[00:11:37]  And that results in the filling of the earth with the knowledge of God.
[00:11:40]  That goal, that's what we're really striving for.
[00:11:43]  That's awesome.
[00:11:44]  Great recap.
[00:11:44]  All right.
[00:11:45]  So today, power, Christian power.
[00:11:50]  So, the individual is given power, right?
[00:11:53]  And you don't have any power.
[00:11:54]  You're a slave unless you know the truth, unless you know the gospel.
[00:11:58]  So, you know, the response that we find when Jesus says that to the Jews, they go, We weren't, we were never born slaves.
[00:12:03]  You know, we're children of Abraham and all that.
[00:12:05]  Well, you know, I'll tell you what, I don't care how great your church is.
[00:12:08]  I don't care how Christian your family is.
[00:12:09]  If you do not believe the gospel, you're a slave to sin and to Satan and to the world.
[00:12:15]  And so, the knowledge of the gospel, the knowledge of the fact that Jesus Christ paid for the sins of his elect and provided a perfect righteousness for them, Is necessary for you to be free.
[00:12:25]  So the knowledge of Christ is that which sets a man free.
[00:12:29]  And if he's free, now he has liberty.
[00:12:32]  And that liberty is for the purpose of exercising power to do what's good.
[00:12:37]  Augustine defined liberty as the ability to do what's good.
[00:12:40]  And so that idea that we are not just free to do whatever we want, but we are free to do what's good.
[00:12:46]  So that's the empowerment of the individual.
[00:12:48]  And as the individual is given that power by God, there's a grant of authority in the dominion mandate.
[00:12:54]  And in being given the knowledge of the gospel, There's an empowering of the soul so that you can now make your body into an instrument, a weapon of righteousness.
[00:13:05]  And so, what we want to do as individuals is to exercise power so that our bodies are tools, they're instruments, they're weapons of righteousness.
[00:13:14]  And so, we are swords and trowels, and we use the word of God to construct, to build, and to guard.
[00:13:20]  Now, if that's the case as an individual, and we think about that and we work together, the individual can work, but the working together with others is far more powerful.
[00:13:30]  There's a division of labor principle.
[00:13:31]  The church itself is even made for that, but the household is made for that, and friendship is for that.
[00:13:36]  And so this idea of, we just talked about, you know, the knowledge of God being the good and the law being the instruction manual of how to get what's good.
[00:13:44]  And so a friend is somebody who's committed to what's good, and he's committed to your good, and he knows the means to use.
[00:13:52]  So you can't walk together unless you're agreed.
[00:13:55]  So this idea of true friendship.
[00:13:57]  So, you know, the idea that a friend is somebody who has this mutual commitment to what's good means you can't be friends with anybody unless they're a Christian.
[00:14:05]  It's just not possible.
[00:14:07]  I'm not saying you're not authorized.
[00:14:08]  I mean, frankly, you're not authorized.
[00:14:09]  But in addition to that, you can't.
[00:14:12]  Like, you can pretend like you're friends, but if they're not committed to your good, then really they're your enemies.
[00:14:18]  Right.
[00:14:19]  You can be friendly.
[00:14:20]  You can be cordial.
[00:14:21]  You can be respectful.
[00:14:22]  But yeah.
[00:14:24]  Absolutely.
[00:14:24]  You're absolutely right.
[00:14:26]  I used to, that was not as much anymore because our church, you know, that I'm pastoring here in Texas now is more mature.
[00:14:34]  And also, I'm just getting older.
[00:14:36]  But when I first started out, When I was in California and pastoring, and before I should have even.
[00:14:42]  But even when I was doing it fairly well, I still was younger and attracting younger people, and there was more immaturity in the church and in myself.
[00:14:51]  And so, one of the frequent FAQs, the questions that I would get is asking for counsel with how do I do this friendship with this non Christian?
[00:15:01]  I have this non Christian friend that I'm really close to, and we were disagreeing, they're gay, or they're gay affirming, or there's this, or there's that, and the other end.

=== Mercy and Worthiness of Christ (15:22) ===

[00:15:11]  And what I would always tell them is, I would say, Jesus is the friend of sinners, but Jesus was never friends with an unrepentant sinner for a prolonged period of time.
[00:15:18]  He was the friend of people who, so he's the friend of, you know, because that's always used out of context.
[00:15:22]  They'll say, well, he was the friend of tax collectors.
[00:15:24]  You mean the tax collector who says he'll give four times back what he's defrauded, that tax collector, you know, or, you know, the friend of a prostitute, you know, like the one who's, you know, weeping and drying his feet, you know, with her hair.
[00:15:37]  And so Jesus is absolutely the friend of sinners.
[00:15:39]  That's the only reason he's my friend, you know, but he's the friend of repentant sinners.
[00:15:44]  And so I just always encourage them to, you know, not to be rude or, but, but to, but to be forthright in your allegiance, your loyalty, fidelity to Christ, not the friend, but to Christ.
[00:15:55]  And then, and then you don't even have to make the decision.
[00:15:57]  You do that, and one of two things will happen.
[00:16:00]  Your friend will get converted, or they will reject you.
[00:16:04]  You won't have to reject them.
[00:16:05]  They will, they'll just, they, they really, like, they'll say, you're mean, even when you're not being mean, and by an objective standard.
[00:16:12]  You're, you're being hateful when you're not being hateful.
[00:16:14]  You're actually being loving, right?
[00:16:16]  And so it, You just be faithful to Christ, and the person will make the decision.
[00:16:21]  God will either make the decision in his sovereign grace through regeneration by the Spirit, or the person will make the decision by saying, I don't want to be your friend because you actually sound like Jesus and I hate him.
[00:16:34]  The danger of centralized power is often represented by the word king.
[00:16:39]  As Americans, we hate the word king.
[00:16:42]  Civilian ownership of body armor is about helping people to have increased power.
[00:16:47]  to resist tyrants and criminals.
[00:16:50]  And so Armored Republic is about helping you to preserve your God-given rights to the honor of the Lord Jesus Christ because he is the King of Kings and he governs kings and he will judge them.
[00:17:03]  This is Armored Republic and in a republic there is no king but Christ.
[00:17:09]  We are free craftsmen and we are honored to be your armor spread of choice.
[00:17:27]  Right.
[00:17:28]  And I think that right there, if we're actually being friends to these people or trying to be friendly, like you said, right, the result is as we try to seek their good and tell them what is good and how to get it, they're going to hate us or they're going to get converted.
[00:17:42]  Right.
[00:17:42]  Yeah.
[00:17:43]  Those are the only two options that I could think of.
[00:17:46]  Yeah.
[00:17:46]  Right.
[00:17:47]  Okay.
[00:17:47]  So go on.
[00:17:48]  I'm sorry.
[00:17:49]  I wanted to throw that in there.
[00:17:51]  Yeah.
[00:17:52]  I think to slightly expand on that, just we're commanded, we're not commanded to hate our enemies.
[00:17:58]  We're commanded to love our enemies.
[00:18:00]  So when you have somebody that you spend time with and they're not a Christian, that doesn't mean, okay, great, hate them because they can't be your friend.
[00:18:07]  That means you love them.
[00:18:08]  You apply the law of God to them, right?
[00:18:11]  What is love?
[00:18:12]  Love is the desire for the good of the object, right?
[00:18:14]  And so if you love a person, you're seeking their good.
[00:18:17]  And the way you know how to seek their good is by the law of God, right?
[00:18:21]  You can try to make stuff up all you want, but you don't know how to seek somebody's good unless God tells you because he's the designer.
[00:18:26]  He tells us what we are, what we're designed for, and he tells us how to seek each other's good.
[00:18:30]  So the law of God is how we seek each other's good.
[00:18:33]  And so, if you have an enemy, somebody who's seeking your destruction, that's what they're doing.
[00:18:36]  Because if they don't know God, then whatever thing they're trying to encourage you to spend your time on and to give your affections to, they want to destroy you.
[00:18:45]  If somebody is worshiping their own belly and they want you to come worship your belly with them, then they're seeking your destruction.
[00:18:52]  So, whatever the thing is that they're worshiping that's not the God of the Bible, when they are trying to spend time with you, they're trying to corrupt and destroy you.
[00:19:00]  And they might not even know that.
[00:19:02]  They go, Well, I think this is good.
[00:19:04]  This is what the good life is.
[00:19:05]  We should go do this together.
[00:19:06]  And their self deception makes it so they're seeking your destruction.
[00:19:10]  So they're your enemy, and you should love them.
[00:19:12]  And you should love them by applying the law and by teaching them truth.
[00:19:15]  Amen.
[00:19:16]  Like we said before, that's going to result in them either coming to love the same God that you do, or they're going to hate you.
[00:19:21]  Amen.
[00:19:22]  That's so helpful.
[00:19:23]  And it's relevant even with things that are going on right now in our world and in our nation.
[00:19:27]  And in my case, in my state of Texas, I mean, you constantly are hearing it's the usual suspects, the Beth Moore types, the Russell Moore, anymore.
[00:19:38]  Right.
[00:19:39]  Michael Moore, Russ Moore, Beth Moore, all three, you know, three peas in a pot.
[00:19:44]  Not much difference these days between them.
[00:19:45]  But one of the things that you hear is that the rhetoric of constant, you know, it's just constantly punching down on blue collar, salt of the earth Christians, evangelical Christians, you know.
[00:19:56]  And one of the things you'll hear as it pertains to politics and as it pertains to our border, right?
[00:20:01]  So some of the things right now taking place is, you know, how could you claim to be a Christian?
[00:20:07]  Aren't you ashamed of yourself, Christian?
[00:20:09]  How could you claim to be a Christian and not love your neighbor?
[00:20:13]  Your immigrant neighbor who's trying to better themselves and just provide a future for their child and is getting cut up and razor wire.
[00:20:24]  You're slashing mothers and babies.
[00:20:29]  And it's just, I mean, it's such a wrong, perverse, twisted framing of what's going on.
[00:20:34]  But the point is that it's saying love your neighbor, love your neighbor.
[00:20:39]  But what becomes so quickly obvious and apparent is love is completely.
[00:20:47]  Malleable.
[00:20:48]  It's whatever the person wants to define love at any given moment.
[00:20:51]  And so if love is breaking the law, if love is, they can just shape it any way they want.
[00:20:58]  And also, what I was going to say is, I think it's helpful, one, to like, what is love?
[00:21:02]  By what standard?
[00:21:03]  But then also, to be able to speak in categories, right?
[00:21:07]  Like when I'm reading the Beatitudes in Matthew 5, you know, blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.
[00:21:12]  Does that mean that in the civil realm, that every judicial judge, Should pardon every single time an individual is found guilty of a crime.
[00:21:21]  You know, that there's somebody who's guilty of rape, and all right, we found you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law, and all charges have been dropped.
[00:21:31]  You're free to go.
[00:21:32]  Like, if he's a Christian judge, does that because he's trying to obey the words of Christ in Matthew 5?
[00:21:38]  You know, blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.
[00:21:41]  Or are there actual, you know, hermeneutical categories?
[00:21:46]  I feel like that's something that Christians can't think in categories anymore.
[00:21:50]  Do you have anything to add about that?
[00:21:52]  Yeah, I think the two examples you just laid side by side are actually great.
[00:21:55]  When you think about immigration and the idea of the love of the immigrant, everybody's thinking about welfare programs, right?
[00:22:00]  And it's like, let's use the state to coercively extract money from people and then let's give that to somebody else.
[00:22:06]  How generous, right?
[00:22:08]  It's like walking up to somebody with a gun, telling them to give you their wallet, and then you give their wallet to somebody else.
[00:22:13]  And you're like, see how generous I am?
[00:22:16]  Am I not merciful?
[00:22:17]  And so, this sort of ridiculous idea that you can be merciful with somebody else's rights, you can be merciful with somebody else's.
[00:22:25]  Property.
[00:22:26]  And it's a joke.
[00:22:27]  It's a disgusting thing.
[00:22:28]  And so the example of giving welfare money to people who are immigrants, who are arriving illegally through the course of extraction by taxation is one thing.
[00:22:41]  But on the other side, a judge also, it's not merciful for the judge to fail to punish.
[00:22:46]  It's merciful if the victim chooses to not give the maximum penalty.
[00:22:51]  And so in the Bible, in the law, in the principles of general equity, you have this idea of there's a maximum penalty that the victim has a right to extract.
[00:23:00]  And it's the job of the civil magistrate to make sure to get that right for the victim.
[00:23:06]  At the other side, the victim can choose to take less or to take nothing.
[00:23:12]  But there are some crimes that there's an obligation for the state to administer a minimum penalty for, for example, murder.
[00:23:18]  And so the idea that the victim has a right to choose a lesser penalty, that is mercy on their part.
[00:23:26]  But it's not always a requirement to give people mercy.
[00:23:29]  God is not one who gives mercy to everybody.
[00:23:31]  He has zero mercy to the demons.
[00:23:35]  Zero.
[00:23:36]  And it was totally just, righteous, glorious, and holy for the Lord God Almighty to give zero mercy to the demons.
[00:23:45]  And so when we think about the reality that God has the right to do that, and He also doesn't command us to give mercy in every instance.
[00:23:54]  And instead, in fact, some people don't have a right to grant mercy.
[00:23:57]  I think that's the important thing.
[00:23:58]  So those are the categories I would want to be helpful.
[00:24:01]  Yeah, so are you in the position to grant the mercy?
[00:24:04]  Do you have a right?
[00:24:04]  Is it your mercy to give?
[00:24:06]  But, and super helpful categories, and whether you're mandated to show mercy or whether it's an option that the Lord is leaving to you to show mercy.
[00:24:14]  And then, one other category that I'd like to add is just thinking in terms of who is the object of mercy, not just who has the right to administer it, but who is the object of receiving that mercy.
[00:24:26]  And sometimes we're just too narrow in our thinking.
[00:24:28]  So, I'm going to have mercy on a murderer.
[00:24:31]  But is that, if he's an unrepentant murderer, is that merciful?
[00:24:36]  To society, to let this murderer loose, who very likely is going to murder again.
[00:24:42]  You could argue that it's actually, I'm showing mercy to one person, but at the cost of cruelty to many others.
[00:24:48]  And so, keeping, you know, there's just a lot of moving pieces.
[00:24:52]  That's brilliant.
[00:24:53]  And I think sometimes it's wicked to show mercy, right?
[00:24:56]  Exactly.
[00:24:56]  So, this idea of, you know, if you have a child who is in rebellion against a parent and the parent says, I'm just going to show them mercy and not discipline for this thing when I explicitly told them and they didn't hear.
[00:25:07]  If you don't swat that kid, you hate them, right?
[00:25:09]  Like the mercy of not disciplining a child when you have a responsibility to discipline them, that's an act of hatred.
[00:25:17]  And so we have to understand that there are times when there's a duty to do it.
[00:25:20]  So, a worthy recipient of the mercy and the category that we typically like, we typically are like worthy recipients of mercy.
[00:25:27]  Isn't the whole point of mercy that nobody's worthy?
[00:25:29]  Right.
[00:25:29]  And so.
[00:25:30]  But the reality is that there are different categories of mercy, right?
[00:25:33]  So the mercy of God in saving us, of course, nobody's worthy.
[00:25:35]  But we have it on the basis of the worthiness of Christ.
[00:25:38]  And then the idea that, for example, in the church, you have the mercy ministry, the diaconal ministry.
[00:25:46]  And that diaconal ministry involves giving cash money to people sometimes, right?
[00:25:50]  And so if you just give money to anybody who wants it, you're going to squander it.
[00:25:54]  And there might be people who, but for a little bit of cash, they can't get their house in order.
[00:26:00]  They can't reform.
[00:26:01]  And if they had a little bit, they might be able to see things properly put into order.
[00:26:04]  And so.
[00:26:05]  This idea of a worthy recipient, where there's a person who is desirous of doing good, they do not have the means to do it, and so they are of character such that you believe it's not going to be a waste of the money.
[00:26:15]  That's one example.
[00:26:16]  There's a similar type of thing for the worthy recipients of pardons or of mercy or clemency in the civil sphere or in the household.
[00:26:24]  And so we need to realize that there are things, there are biblical criteria and thoughts to be considered for the extension of mercy by those different authorities in those different spheres.
[00:26:35]  So the object of mercy, absolutely.
[00:26:36]  That's good.
[00:26:38]  I'm thinking, you know, some people, without trying to be disrespectful, I'm just, I think it's a helpful description, but some people are, because of sin and because of the rebellion against God, they're a black hole.
[00:26:50]  You can, you know, and that's how welfare has been for, you know, decades now.
[00:26:55]  You know, it's just, oh, well, maybe if we throw more money at it.
[00:27:00]  And that's how the public education system has been for decades.
[00:27:02]  You know, maybe if we just, and it's just, it doesn't matter how many billions.
[00:27:06]  It's just, It's just a black hole.
[00:27:08]  Whereas, you know, what it makes me think of is when Jesus says, You'll always have the poor.
[00:27:14]  And I remember thinking about that years ago, You'll always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me, you know, as he's talking to, you know, Judas, who's like, Oh, we could use this for the poor, which of course, you know, he took charge of the money bag and he wanted to be able to skim from the top and take it for himself.
[00:27:28]  So he didn't care about Jesus or the poor.
[00:27:30]  But Jesus says, You always have the poor.
[00:27:32]  And I thought about, like, why?
[00:27:34]  Why are we always going to have the poor?
[00:27:37]  And the reason why is until Christ's final return, we'll always have the poor with us because we'll always have sin.
[00:27:42]  And that's not to say that every poor person is directly due to their individual sin, but often it is.
[00:27:50]  So, an individual person is poor because of their sinful choices.
[00:27:55]  Or, in some cases, like North Korea, there's probably a lot of people who are poor, and it's not because of their individual choices, but it's still because of sin.
[00:28:04]  Somebody else's sin is depriving them of opportunity.
[00:28:08]  But there is no scenario.
[00:28:10]  Where someone is poor and it's not directly correlated to someone's sin.
[00:28:15]  And to believe anything else, and I know that some people say, oh, that's oversimplified or that's too, you know, they don't like it.
[00:28:23]  But the reason why I think it matters is because to say anything otherwise is still saying that poverty is because of someone's sin, but namely God's.
[00:28:35]  It's to indict God.
[00:28:37]  It's to say that God created a zero sum game.
[00:28:41]  God is capricious, He's cruel.
[00:28:44]  The very commandment that he gave us, he knew would ultimately be our very demise, be fruitful and multiply.
[00:28:51]  But he put us in a context where multiplication, overpopulation would ultimately, and he's sitting in the heavens, look at those obedient creatures, you know, sealing their own.
[00:29:02]  I mean, what kind of view of God do you have to have to think that?
[00:29:06]  No, I just reject that entirely.
[00:29:08]  I think that the world that God has created has more than enough, not only that everybody could have what they need, but that everybody could be wealthy.
[00:29:17]  And have a great deal of dominion.
[00:29:20]  There would still be hierarchy, even in a prelapse area without a fall, still hierarchy.
[00:29:24]  But one of the things that you know when God is Israel's God, one of the things that shows off Yahweh and his infinite wisdom, the Queen of Sheba comes to Solomon's kingdom.
[00:29:33]  And what does she say?
[00:29:34]  Even the servants here are blessed, happy.
[00:29:37]  Right.
[00:29:37]  Right.
[00:29:37]  So, like when you see a kingdom where even on the lowest rung of the ladder of hierarchy, even they're doing really, really well, where the servants are richer than, you know, than some of the, you know, the, the, Completely free, you know, CEOs of another society.
[00:29:54]  And so I believe that in terms of God's law and God's creation, what he's provided, there's plenty.
[00:30:00]  And so I have to believe when Jesus says the poor, you always have the poor with you.
[00:30:04]  It's not because of some pessimistic, nihilistic view of the way God made the earth and that things just are going to get worse and worse and worse until Jesus comes back.
[00:30:12]  No, the poor we're always going to have with us in some capacity because we will always have sin with us in some capacity.
[00:30:18]  However, as a post millennial, I do believe that the trajectory, overall trajectory, is up.
[00:30:22]  And that when Christ does return, I think poverty will be mostly abolished.
[00:30:28]  But even then, I think the poor will still be with us in a lesser capacity because sin.

=== Power in the Household (06:48) ===

[00:30:33]  I think there's a direct link.
[00:30:35]  Any thoughts on that?
[00:30:36]  Absolutely.
[00:30:37]  And I think what you just said is backed up by when Proverbs says, for example, that there's much grain in the fallow ground of the poor, for example, right?
[00:30:44]  This idea that why?
[00:30:45]  Because of injustice, right?
[00:30:46]  So the tyranny, communism, envy, covetousness, exalted and put into law.
[00:30:53]  Restrains the poor from working because you go, if I work, somebody's going to take it.
[00:30:56]  Like, why would I do this?
[00:30:57]  So whether it's a bandit or a bandit with badge, right?
[00:31:00]  You, in either case, the concern is that the fruit of my labor is worthless.
[00:31:04]  So there's this not applying of work to the capital goods that are available because of the injustice.
[00:31:11]  And so in addition to that, you know, I agree with you that the idea of the poverty is ultimately a relative poverty in the sense that, you know, the doorman in heaven is poor in comparison to the guy who gets to govern 10 cities, right?
[00:31:21]  But, but, you know, the streets are made of gold.
[00:31:23]  So I mean, you know, so that's doing pretty well.
[00:31:25]  And the resurrection, in the new heavens and new earth.
[00:31:27]  Sorry.
[00:31:28]  That's my old dispensationalism coming out.
[00:31:31]  And then the last thing is this idea that if you also look across time, the poor today live better than the kings of yore.
[00:31:44]  We can't call up a minstrel to come and talk to us and entertain us whenever we want.
[00:31:48]  Instead, we have 175 channels and YouTube and Google and blah, and all the podcasts that have ever been done.
[00:31:56]  So we have.
[00:31:57]  We have more wealth even when we're poor than the kings of previous days.
[00:32:02]  Yep.
[00:32:03]  So, building off then from there, if we think about this idea of work, and we talk about the division of labor, God has given institutions for the division of labor and the organization of labor.
[00:32:12]  And so, the institution that goes next is the household.
[00:32:15]  And the household is a covenant institution.
[00:32:18]  And one thing I want to mention briefly here is this category that exists in scripture, but is not really the same sort of ongoing institution of authority as much as there is a certain degree of obligation.
[00:32:30]  And the thing that's connected to the household is this sort of idea of the clan or the connection of not the immediate family, but the broader family.
[00:32:38]  And so you think about, for example, the scriptures talk about how if a man won't care for his own, doesn't provide for his own, he's worse than an unbeliever.
[00:32:46]  And that applies out to widows.
[00:32:48]  And you go, okay, what widows are these?
[00:32:50]  Are these widows that are part of the immediate family?
[00:32:52]  So, like a daughter who becomes a widow, you care for her?
[00:32:54]  Okay, sure.
[00:32:55]  But then it's also talking about things like you think about grandmothers and aunts and stuff like that.
[00:33:01]  And so these are the widows that are connected.
[00:33:02]  They're not a part of the immediate family, they're not a part of the household, but they are part of sort of the clan.
[00:33:07]  And so that category, of the extended family in the Bible.
[00:33:11]  There's, there's an obligation there.
[00:33:12]  So there are certain covenant duties there.
[00:33:13]  And the double portion inheritance that you read about in the Old Testament is about the idea of the continued passing on of the obligations to the clan.
[00:33:22]  And so one son gets a double portion of inheritance in order to care for, you know, the, the women and potential orphans and, you know, widows or whatever that could come out of a household, but also sort of the connected ones in terms of the, the broader family.
[00:33:36]  So the household is the, is the institution that's, that, that I want to emphasize here.
[00:33:41]  The individual in the household We think they're too small, right?
[00:33:46]  We do not understand the grant of authority given to the individual and to the household.
[00:33:52]  The magnitude of power that God has given and concentrated into the individual and to the household is something that we don't get.
[00:34:00]  We all think if I could be king, if I were the Christian prince, then what I would do is I would make sure that everything was great.
[00:34:07]  Well, you know, your goal would be you'd see justice done in the land, and your goal would then be to see.
[00:34:13]  Patriarchs leading their families well, having good businesses and estates put into good order, and individuals governing themselves well.
[00:34:20]  And you want the church to be preaching the gospel.
[00:34:22]  And so, if there's good doctrine, right worship, good government in the church, and there's civil administration that's just restraining evil, if individuals and households aren't governed well, there's no wealth produced in the land.
[00:34:36]  There's nothing good accomplished.
[00:34:37]  The children will be awful.
[00:34:38]  The next generation will be corrupt.
[00:34:40]  There will be no good men to lead in the church or in the state.
[00:34:43]  So, the work gets done, the stuff gets Built the things get made in the household and by individuals, and so I want to emphasize this extraordinary power that you have.
[00:34:54]  You have a fiefdom in your household where you can govern with the law of God.
[00:34:59]  And you know, whatever government agency with whatever you know, three letters in their name, if they can tell you whatever they want, and your household you can laugh, disobey, stomp on the order, and do the opposite and say, God is king here, not you know, whatever, whatever the agency is.
[00:35:16]  And so, this.
[00:35:17]  This idea of the individual in the household getting the work done.
[00:35:21]  So, I want to emphasize we think these things are too small.
[00:35:24]  They are far bigger than we think they are.
[00:35:27]  And so, one of the things that I've talked to men about in the past is this idea of what is Amazon except for House Bezos?
[00:35:34]  What is Facebook but House Zuckerberg?
[00:35:37]  And so, we all know about House Elon.
[00:35:40]  It's big, these things are big.
[00:35:42]  So, House Musk is huge.
[00:35:44]  So, if we're going to think about this, you can make a household that's a trillion dollar household or a $3 trillion household.
[00:35:51]  You can have thousands of servants.
[00:35:53]  You can do all sorts of stuff.
[00:35:54]  You can partner with others to build things.
[00:35:56]  And we fail to understand the magnitude of what can be accomplished with the household.
[00:36:02]  And what's weird is that the godless have figured it out.
[00:36:06]  And so they have tried to reorganize society with the corporations, with DEI and ESG and all this nonsense.
[00:36:15]  And so this junk, which is the methodology of spewing out this satanic nonsense, Is the mechanism by which they've replaced the chaplaincy of great households with the HR department.
[00:36:27]  And so we don't realize the extent to which Christian men built great estates and had households and trained their sons and daughters to be able to rule and to be able to accomplish things.
[00:36:39]  There is power in the individual and there's power in the household.
[00:36:42]  And I want men to realize the power that God has given to them and the capability that they can exercise and to realize also that a small number of people in the beginning turns into great numbers across a few generations.
[00:36:54]  We saw 70 heads of household in the end of Genesis going into Exodus.
[00:37:00]  And when they're in Egypt, Right.
[00:37:02]  By the time you're 215 years later, there's a, there's a 600 and something thousand men leaving Egypt.
[00:37:09]  Right.
[00:37:09]  So there is an enormous capacity to increase the number of people that are godly and that know God from the household.
[00:37:16]  So we think about child rearing and we think about these things and we think about, oh, yeah, we need to do, you know, family worship.

=== Biblical Patriarchy Panels (04:31) ===

[00:37:21]  Absolutely you do.
[00:37:22]  And you need to, you know, lead your household and make sure that your, your family is applying, you know, the principles of the Lord's day and doing all these things.
[00:37:29]  But you also have six days a week to build wealth and to figure out how to exercise dominion with your family.
[00:37:35]  And so, you know, the household is the ministry of welfare, health care, and education.
[00:37:42]  I stole that from Pastor Phil Kaiser.
[00:37:43]  If you guys haven't listened to Pastor Phil Kaiser at all, like you're missing out, just turn this show off.
[00:37:47]  Just go listen to Pastor Phil Kaiser right now.
[00:37:49]  He's a good one.
[00:37:50]  So, but just this idea of welfare, health care, and education.
[00:37:55]  And so then you're the master of your home, and your wife is queen, right?
[00:37:58]  She's the mistress of the home.
[00:38:00]  So you rule together.
[00:38:02]  And that means that it's your job to make sure that everybody has a proper assignment, they've got work to do.
[00:38:09]  That is worth doing.
[00:38:11]  You know, one of the reasons why daughters want to be feminists and go off to college is because their dads are so bad at managing them that they're bored.
[00:38:19]  So, what work can you give her to do?
[00:38:22]  What noble calling and good work can you give her to do?
[00:38:27]  And to make it so that she, as a princess in the home, as a woman, as a maiden of honor, as a shield maiden in your house, what can she do that is good work?
[00:38:39]  What are you assigning her to do?
[00:38:41]  Helping her to do things?
[00:38:42]  What are you asking her to read?
[00:38:44]  What instruction do you want her to do?
[00:38:46]  She is the image of God and she should have excellent work to do, and hospitality should be a part of it.
[00:38:52]  If you're not hospitable, what do you think the glory of your women is going to be shown off in?
[00:38:57]  Hospitality is one of those places where your wife and your daughters get to gloriously display the beauty that's created by the gospel and where the resources you generate get to be used in such a way that you can offer things.
[00:39:10]  You talked about the Queen of Sheba coming to Solomon and the hospitality.
[00:39:14]  Her mind is blown by his answers, and her mind is blown by the beauty of the hospitality that's offered there.
[00:39:19]  And so, you know, involve your women in helping to do that and to have the great conversations where they can, you know, Titus 2 disciple other women.
[00:39:28]  And so, this work, there's so much to do there.
[00:39:31]  But, you know, brother, I'd be curious, you know, have you seen any, you know, powerful examples of where you've seen hospitality used in some sort of great way that the Lord has powerfully used in some home?
[00:39:44]  All right.
[00:39:44]  Everybody's been asking, can I live stream?
[00:39:47]  Your conference?
[00:39:48]  And the answer is a resounding no.
[00:39:50]  You will be there in person or you will not be there at all.
[00:39:54]  I'm just kidding.
[00:39:54]  You actually can live stream the conference.
[00:39:56]  We're excited to announce we're making it available to anybody and everybody who wants to watch this conference right as it's happening, which is March 1st and 2nd.
[00:40:05]  That's a Friday and Saturday of 2024.
[00:40:08]  What conference am I even talking about?
[00:40:10]  It's called Blueprints for Christendom 2.0.
[00:40:13]  We've got Pastor Douglas Wilson, we've got Dr. Joe Boot, we've got Brian Sauvay, we've got Eric Kahn, and then, of course, yours truly, Joel Webbin.
[00:40:21]  We've got seven primary sessions in the conference, each one being probably 50 to 60 minute long sessions, lectures, sermons, whatever you want to call them, and then two live panels, each being an hour and a half long.
[00:40:34]  Now, one of the panels is on biblical patriarchy.
[00:40:37]  We're going to have Pastor Douglas Wilson available for that panel, and we decided to get Eric Kahn because Eric Kahn, biblical patriarchy, let's just be honest, it's a sensitive topic.
[00:40:47]  But Eric Kahn, I think, is known as one of the most nuanced, careful, and sensitive individuals.
[00:40:52]  Especially on the Twitter streets.
[00:40:54]  So, we're going to have him as a part of that panel.
[00:40:56]  It'll go really well.
[00:40:57]  Then, the second panel is Haunted Cosmos live show.
[00:41:00]  You've got Brian Sauvay and Ben Garrett talking about the most unhinged things imaginable.
[00:41:06]  Hopefully, some things that are actually truthful.
[00:41:08]  Now, there will be some truthful things.
[00:41:10]  They're going to stick to scripture, and when they speculate, and you know they will, they'll at least let you know that it's speculation and they won't pass it off as though it's in the infallible word of God.
[00:41:19]  So, live stream this conference.
[00:41:20]  How do you do it?
[00:41:21]  Go to patreon.com forward slash Right Response Ministries.
[00:41:26]  Again, that's patreon.com forward slash right response ministries.
[00:41:32]  A lot of guys charge $50, $60, $80.
[00:41:35]  We are asking that you would simply partner with us for $10 a month.
[00:41:39]  And let's be real, you could do it one month, live stream all the content, and then cancel your subscription.
[00:41:45]  And if you do, no harm, no foul.
[00:41:47]  If you want to stick with us and support this ministry, what God's doing through Right Response, then praise God.
[00:41:52]  That's great.

=== Hospitality Sets the Foundation (03:52) ===

[00:41:53]  And we thank you.
[00:41:53]  Either way, Technically, it's only 10 bucks.
[00:41:57]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:41:57]  In my own home, by the grace of God, my wife is extremely hospitable.
[00:42:01]  And it's something that I have to be looking for opportunities to exercise hospitality because I'm an elder in Christ's church.
[00:42:10]  And that's one of the qualifications that an elder must be hospitable.
[00:42:15]  But I like what, you know, just some of the ways you word things are really helpful.
[00:42:19]  They're concepts that I'm familiar with and that I practice in my own life, in my home, in my church.
[00:42:25]  But But I like you said, I can't even remember exactly how you said it, but just it was quick in passing.
[00:42:30]  But that the husband is providing the resources, not even the resources, but just the capital.
[00:42:39]  But it's the women in the home, the wife is queen of the home, and then these daughters as princesses or shield maids.
[00:42:47]  Is that what you said?
[00:42:48]  Shield maids?
[00:42:48]  Shield maidens, yeah.
[00:42:49]  Shield maidens who are going to then translate.
[00:42:52]  I mean, they're taking money.
[00:42:56]  That is not hospitable, but then making it flowers and food and candles and all these kinds of things.
[00:43:05]  But I remember being convicted to my shame.
[00:43:08]  I'm a little bit of a neat Nick, and I remember in my selfishness and sin not wanting necessarily to exercise hospitality because hospitality makes a mess.
[00:43:21]  And I was able to do all these other things in my vocation, in my mission, in my ministry.
[00:43:28]  And I did not realize, and my wife, the Lord used my wife to help me see more clearly.
[00:43:32]  And she did it respectfully.
[00:43:34]  And, you know, but she came to me, she said, Joel, you're not allowing me to have a ministry.
[00:43:41]  I love our kids.
[00:43:43]  And that's my chief ministry, is your helpmate with the kids.
[00:43:46]  But also, like, the home is my domain.
[00:43:49]  And if nobody's in it except for our family, then I can only minister to our family and no one else.
[00:43:55]  You know, and, you know, this was years ago, but it challenged me.
[00:43:58]  And then, you know, I remember when we moved to Texas.
[00:44:01]  You know, for the first year and a half, every single Saturday, we had everyone in the church over.
[00:44:05]  Now, granted, the church was small at the time, but still, I mean, we'd have 40, sometimes 50 people in our home on Saturdays.
[00:44:10]  And I would be, you know, I'd take it.
[00:44:13]  My job was the meat, but my wife was everything else, food wise, you know, but also decor and just making the house warm and inviting.
[00:44:23]  And yeah, and I would say for a year and a half, by the grace of God and his grace through the agency, primarily, predominantly of my wife and my children, they're little, but helping mama as much as they can, that there's a sense in which I can say that our church today exists because of that.
[00:44:42]  foundation for the first year and a half as a church, eating and breaking bread with one another.
[00:44:49]  And then we would do some extended, we called it extended family worship, you know, with everybody and, you know, a Bible story for the kids and singing a psalm, you know, and spending some time in prayer and ending with the doxology and preparing ourselves for the Lord's Day going into the Sabbath.
[00:45:05]  And I mean, that was really like cult.
[00:45:08]  It set the culture, it set the tone, it set some of the doctrine, the philosophy of ministry, The foundation in many ways for our local church.
[00:45:16]  So you can say, in a real way, I was this church planter, but my wife, with the gift of hospitality in our home, in many ways was setting the foundation for our local church that's thriving today.
[00:45:28]  That's beautiful.
[00:45:29]  My experience was the same in terms of the building out of Puritan Reformed Church in Phoenix, that the hospitality largely was able to do that.
[00:45:37]  And I think that's where ministry, like you said, that's where the women get to do the ministry.
[00:45:41]  It's where they get to speak, it's where they get to teach, it's where they get to have doctrine that they get to talk about.

=== Commands from a Husband (06:26) ===

[00:45:45]  And so we deprive them of that.
[00:45:47]  I think oftentimes, Women want to become ministers because they had dads and husbands that didn't want to be hospitable.
[00:45:52]  Wow.
[00:45:52]  That's good.
[00:45:53]  And I think so, feminism is often a weed that comes out of that garden that we didn't fill with anything worth growing.
[00:45:58]  And so, that's one of the dangers there.
[00:46:00]  But you also said the idea that hospitality is messy.
[00:46:03]  And I think that is true.
[00:46:05]  And we can't deny that, right?
[00:46:07]  Like, stuff gets broken, chairs get spilled on, the white furniture becomes not white anymore because coffee was spilled on it.
[00:46:14]  And so, all that stuff happens.
[00:46:15]  And it's just like with the ox, right?
[00:46:18]  Oxen cause a mess in the barn.
[00:46:20]  But much grain comes by the strength of an ox.
[00:46:23]  A lot of mess comes from hospitality, but so much glorious fruit comes from hospitality.
[00:46:29]  And so you just gave a beautiful explanation of that proverb, honestly, as you were explaining what you did with your wife there.
[00:46:36]  But I think this idea the household, the household has work to be done, productivity to be made, capital to be done, give work to your children.
[00:46:45]  When children are small, you were just talking about this, right?
[00:46:47]  This idea that the small children, you don't really save time initially.
[00:46:52]  By giving them work to do.
[00:46:54]  Supervising them is more work to do.
[00:46:55]  It takes them longer by involving them.
[00:46:58]  Right.
[00:46:59]  But it's good for their soul.
[00:47:01]  It's good for your soul.
[00:47:03]  And they become competent.
[00:47:05]  Right.
[00:47:05]  And so that, and it accustoms you to delegate.
[00:47:10]  I've met a lot of really competent men who do not have the presence of command because they haven't practiced command with their wife and children.
[00:47:19]  We feel awkward in commanding our wives to do anything.
[00:47:22]  And so, husbands, if you haven't commanded your wife to do anything, are you exercising authority?
[00:47:27]  And so, this idea that there's work to be done, and then there's the same with the children.
[00:47:32]  And so, a lot of that training should be done by the wife.
[00:47:34]  So, if you haven't given your wife any commands that you can remember recently, here, men, I would encourage you to command your wife to help to train your children to do some sort of chore, even if it's a waste of time, apparently, because it will turn them into useful.
[00:47:47]  And it will also help you, men, to become accustomed to command.
[00:47:51]  And I hold the line on that.
[00:47:52]  Right.
[00:47:53]  And if you're used to the idea of giving commands when people don't want to receive commands, even if your wife pushes back.
[00:47:57]  Right.
[00:47:57]  And if you're cringing as you're listening to this, first, you're probably the feminism runs deep in you.
[00:48:04]  The feminism is strong with that one.
[00:48:06]  But then, two, right, it's your suppressed feminism that you're not aware of, you know, but it's there.
[00:48:11]  But then, two, you're imputing something that Mr. Reese did not say.
[00:48:16]  He did not say rudely, command your wife.
[00:48:19]  Command, the word command does not necessarily dictate that it's rude or that it's harsh or any of that, but it is a command.
[00:48:29]  It can be the most kindly spoken word you can imagine, but it is a command not because it's mean instead of kind.
[00:48:37]  But because it's a command instead of a suggestion.
[00:48:40]  It comes not from meanness, but it does come from very real authority.
[00:48:43]  And I'll use this kind of language and I'll go viral on YouTube and everybody will hate me, mostly Christians.
[00:48:49]  Mostly Christians will be the offended ones.
[00:48:51]  It's sad.
[00:48:52]  You feel like you're on the same team, but they're the ones that can't believe that I would say X, Y, and Z.
[00:48:58]  But that should not only are some men not giving commands, issuing commands in their household to their wife and to their children, but that's so foreign to them.
[00:49:09]  Just even listening to you.
[00:49:12]  Tell them to do that is making them cringe.
[00:49:15]  You know, anything that you would say to a guy like that, or even perhaps a woman who's listening is like.
[00:49:20]  So, to the people that are cringing, my goal in every time I speak is to make you cringe.
[00:49:25]  Now, what I want to say is, yeah, Joel, I think what you said is fantastic that that's feminism there, right?
[00:49:34]  If you believe in biblical patriarchy, or you want to call it complementarianism, or whatever soft word you want to use that means the husband has authority over the wife, if you believe what the Bible says about that, Then, guess what authority includes?
[00:49:47]  The authority includes the ability to give a command to the person under authority.
[00:49:51]  If you cannot give a command to somebody, if there are no commands that are lawful for you to give, and that person's obligated to obey you, you have zero authority.
[00:49:57]  That's right.
[00:49:58]  So either you're a feminist or you believe in the biblical order of the husband being the one in authority in the marriage.
[00:50:06]  And if you do believe that, then a part of the way a husband loves his wife is by giving her work worth doing and helping to coordinate the division of labor.
[00:50:15]  Lazy husbands don't command anything and they expect their wife to do everything.
[00:50:21]  Hard working husbands that seek to love their wives distribute the work.
[00:50:26]  They divide it.
[00:50:26]  You can do it by discussion, but you also give commands here's how I want to lead to glorify God, and I need you to do this thing.
[00:50:35]  And you listen.
[00:50:35]  If your wife says that would be hard because of this, that, the other thing, I'm going to have an extra week to do it.
[00:50:40]  Can we do this instead?
[00:50:41]  You can go, sure.
[00:50:42]  But your approval of that, you're listening carefully, you're caring for her, you're loving her, and your approval of that is still your exercise of authority.
[00:50:51]  You're making the call.
[00:50:53]  And so, listening to wise counselors is a part of how you wage war well.
[00:50:56]  And we're in spiritual warfare and we're trying to take over the world.
[00:50:59]  So, listen to your counselor.
[00:51:00]  Your wife should be your principal counselor.
[00:51:02]  When you're at the table of war, if you don't listen to your queen, you're an idiot.
[00:51:05]  And so, you should listen to her.
[00:51:07]  You should talk to her.
[00:51:08]  And then sometimes you have to disagree with her and give her commands, even that she might disagree with.
[00:51:13]  But you show your respect for her by talking to her about these things and having her be your principal counselor.
[00:51:19]  Doesn't mean you talk to her about everything and lay all of the burdens on her, but she should be your principal counselor, your best friend.
[00:51:25]  Classic example of that, I mean, Trumpkin, right?
[00:51:28]  I think, you know, Prince Caspian, it's like he's not for the plan.
[00:51:32]  He's, you know, speaking his objections and all those kinds of things.
[00:51:35]  But then finally it comes down to it and he's like, I'll go, I'll go on this mission, you know, to see if this worked, you know, whatever, the Narnian magic of Aslan.
[00:51:43]  And the whole narrative up to this point is very clear that he thinks it's all folklore.
[00:51:48]  He doesn't believe that there's any Narnian magic of Aslan and doesn't even necessarily believe that Aslan is real.
[00:51:54]  And, you know, and so he's responded to and said, like, I thought you didn't even believe this stuff.
[00:51:58]  He said, It doesn't matter if I believe it.
[00:52:00]  Well, you've been disagreeing the whole time.
[00:52:02]  He's like, yeah, you've had my counsel.
[00:52:04]  You've heard my advice, I think is the word he uses advice.
[00:52:08]  You've heard my advice, but now's not the time for advice anymore.

=== Responsibility and Mutual Support (15:26) ===

[00:52:11]  Now's the time for orders.
[00:52:12]  And I know how to take an order.
[00:52:14]  And he goes and does the very thing he doesn't even believe, but he understands.
[00:52:18]  And I think of the centurion, with Jesus, like, I'm a man.
[00:52:23]  You don't even have to come to my house.
[00:52:24]  You can just give the command.
[00:52:25]  But that's a real good verse to perfectly illustrate what you're saying because he says, I understand God's authority, Christ.
[00:52:32]  I understand your authority.
[00:52:33]  Authority because I'm a man in authority.
[00:52:35]  And then what does he immediately cite as the example for what it's like to be in authority?
[00:52:39]  I give a command to someone to go here and he goes, you know.
[00:52:42]  So he like, he naturally can't even speak of authority without the implicit description of authority being issuing a command.
[00:52:52]  If there is no issue of command, you don't have authority.
[00:52:55]  And so just stop saying, I'm soft complimentarian.
[00:52:58]  Just say, I'm a feminist who hates the word of God.
[00:53:00]  Like, just be honest.
[00:53:01]  So, so, so yeah.
[00:53:04]  So that's what we would say to you.
[00:53:06]  Who cringed about this?
[00:53:07]  Yeah, there you go.
[00:53:08]  Tell us how you really feel.
[00:53:10]  That's great.
[00:53:11]  So, I know we're getting close to the end of our time here, so I wanted to make sure we're doing this flyover, right?
[00:53:18]  We're talking about the house, and I wanted to emphasize the individual in the house.
[00:53:22]  The individual is a prophet, priest, king, and you need to do the work of working, building stuff up, and keeping it, preserving what's been attained to.
[00:53:30]  And we have the goal of glorifying God, filling the earth with the knowledge of God as the waters cover the sea.
[00:53:34]  We have the household where there's a division of labor, and you build an estate, right?
[00:53:38]  The man is a master of the house.
[00:53:41]  He is also a husband to his wife, and he exercises authority over her.
[00:53:45]  It's distinct from the authority and the relationship that he might have over servants.
[00:53:49]  And then there's also the father relationship, which is different and distinct from the authority and relationship with servants or with a wife.
[00:53:56]  And so, those three offices of master, husband, and father are three offices of authority.
[00:54:03]  And you need to be a prophet, priest, king, and all of them.
[00:54:05]  And so, you disciple servants, you put the word of God on your property.
[00:54:09]  That's how you manage the estate as a master.
[00:54:11]  As a husband, you wash your wife with the word.
[00:54:14]  And you care for her, you're leading her, you be a prophet, priest, king, right?
[00:54:17]  With your children, you disciple them, you raise them up in the fear and admonition of the Lord, you give them the Padilla of God, right?
[00:54:23]  And this idea of caring for them as a prophet, but there's also the priestly work, the relational, and then there's the kingly work, right?
[00:54:31]  There's provision and protection.
[00:54:32]  And so you work through all of that, and the household, you're building an estate, you're passing on wealth and wisdom to your children, and you need them to work with you.
[00:54:41]  You need them to take responsibility for things.
[00:54:44]  You give them jurisdictions, you give them resources.
[00:54:46]  And you help them manage their time and the money that's put at their disposal.
[00:54:49]  And you need to give them money that they can waste.
[00:54:53]  They can fail to do stuff.
[00:54:54]  They steward badly.
[00:54:56]  And then you can teach them how to steward better.
[00:54:59]  And this idea that it takes risk, right?
[00:55:01]  The entrepreneurial spirit starts at home and giving jurisdiction and resources to children and to a wife.
[00:55:07]  And so that idea, I want to encourage that.
[00:55:10]  And we are all accountants and we take a tenth and give it to the Lord in the tithe.
[00:55:14]  And we're all project managers and we take a seventh of our time and give it to the Lord on the Sabbath.
[00:55:18]  And he makes us account for time and makes us account for money with those things.
[00:55:22]  So the household is the principal place where that stuff happens.
[00:55:25]  The church is a place where there's authority and there's covenant relationship and there's cooperation.
[00:55:31]  You have right worship, right doctrine, right worship, right government.
[00:55:34]  And a part of that government is the mercy ministry of the diaconal care, like we talked about.
[00:55:38]  And in the state, right, what we have is the exercise of the sword, the praising of what's good, but then there's also the use of the sword to punish criminals, to stop ongoing criminal activity as the night watchman, so to speak, and then the waging of just warfare.
[00:55:53]  And so these exercises of authority, when you think about the mandate of these various institutions, which are the ones that build the most culture?
[00:56:01]  It's the household.
[00:56:02]  The individual does it in friendship, in covenanted relationship, in the household.
[00:56:07]  And the church creates a place where the truth is taught so that can be manifested in terms of the beauty of the household.
[00:56:14]  And then the state is helping to hack off the worst cancerous elements of society and to use the sword.
[00:56:21]  But it's not constructive, it's destructive.
[00:56:23]  And the church is giving this wisdom and caring for people and helping to prevent the loss of orphans and widows and the worthy poor with the mercy ministry.
[00:56:33]  But they don't generate any, it's not the church owned industry, it's not the church owned farm, it's not that the church has a limited, you know, proof of you, and the household is where all those resources come from.
[00:56:44]  Yeah, I love what you're saying because it's in terms of the scope of individual people that you're in authority over, the household is the smallest.
[00:56:52]  Whereas, you know, a Christian prince, you know, if you're Constantine, you're over a lot of people.
[00:56:58]  And, you know, and then within the church, you know, you could be over a few hundred people depending on the size of your church.
[00:57:03]  And then, if you, you know, depending what church polity you would prescribe to, whether it's You know, regional presbyteries or even at a national level, if you know, like depending on different positions, or if you happen to be, I would disagree with the polity, but have an episcopal polity, you know, with bishops and things like that.
[00:57:19]  So, but my point is in both the state and the church realm, those spheres, you can have a very, very broad scope in terms of numbers of people that are under your authority.
[00:57:31]  But in terms of not people, but in terms of realms, I don't know exactly what word or just, Subject matter, topics, or super narrow.
[00:57:42]  The depth of the influence.
[00:57:43]  Exactly.
[00:57:44]  The state is get bad guys, you know, and the church, it's word, sacrament.
[00:57:49]  But in both cases, it's fairly narrow in terms of the subject matter, but could be broad in terms of the number of people under your command.
[00:57:57]  And the household, you may only be over five people, right?
[00:58:00]  You may have a wife and four kids.
[00:58:02]  But in terms of the breadth of what you're doing, you're talking about schools, education, marketing.
[00:58:11]  The economy, like building roads and houses, like construction.
[00:58:16]  And I mean, it's art.
[00:58:18]  And I mean, it's like that's all that little household is building the world.
[00:58:25]  So that's absolutely right.
[00:58:26]  And that idea that there's so much that can be done and the law of God commands all that stuff to be done.
[00:58:33]  Anybody who's bored, you know, they don't understand what we're commanded to do.
[00:58:38]  And, you know, you can go try to amuse yourself to death and you can try to go study.
[00:58:43]  You know, stupid or worthless things, or find worthless work.
[00:58:47]  But if you go, okay, the law of God gives me a list of good works to do, and you're never going to run out of worthy work.
[00:58:55]  And you're going to find you're so overwhelmed with worthy work to do that you have to delegate to your wife and children.
[00:59:01]  And you're going to find that if you're productive, you're going to generate capital.
[00:59:04]  And if you have capital, you can start to buy other people's time.
[00:59:07]  And if you can start to buy other people's time, you can start to direct it to do more.
[00:59:10]  And you give them money, which gives them capital.
[00:59:12]  And as they're productive, you reward them with more that they're stewarding.
[00:59:15]  And you reward them with more rewards as they steward those things well.
[00:59:19]  And so, the amount, the way in which, and you can disciple those people, you decide, you know, Abraham had his 318 catechized servants.
[00:59:25]  Right.
[00:59:26]  Right.
[00:59:26]  How many servants have you catechized?
[00:59:28]  Right.
[00:59:28]  That's what I would encourage people to think about is if you're in management, if you're under, if you have authority, do that.
[00:59:34]  Like, just teach people the word of God and get fired for it.
[00:59:39]  Like, just, you know, just do that.
[00:59:41]  The Lord will provide, He'll help you to do other stuff.
[00:59:44]  Find Christian employers.
[00:59:45]  If somebody gets fired because they were teaching somebody the Bible, Or the Westminster Short of Catechism, or something like that.
[00:59:50]  They were talking to people about the law of God.
[00:59:52]  Give me a call.
[00:59:52]  Reach out to me.
[00:59:54]  Real David Reese at Real David Reese on Twitter.
[00:59:57]  You DM me, whatever.
[00:59:58]  Let's talk.
[00:59:59]  Like, I'd love to know you and I'd love to see if we can find a place for you.
[01:00:02]  Like, that idea, there are, we have a duty to speak the word of God and to disciple in all of those places.
[01:00:09]  And as we increase property, we can apply the word of God to it.
[01:00:12]  So I want people to realize that is where the power is.
[01:00:16]  And even the king relies upon the grain from the field of the person who's managing the farm.
[01:00:22]  Right.
[01:00:23]  Amen.
[01:00:23]  That's good.
[01:00:24]  Any final thoughts or things that you really want to hit in this episode as we land the plane?
[01:00:30]  I think that that idea of dominion.
[01:00:32]  That dominion is for the glory of God, and it's so that you can put the word of God on the doorpost, right?
[01:00:37]  Deuteronomy 6 teaches us that we should put the word of God on the doorpost of our house.
[01:00:42]  So the household is to be ruled by it.
[01:00:44]  And then we have the gate as well, right?
[01:00:46]  The idea of the public institution is supposed to be ruled by the word of God.
[01:00:49]  But when it goes into the household, it talks about the idea of putting the word on your forehead, which symbolizes your thoughts being governed, on your right hand.
[01:00:59]  And think about the mark of the beast, right?
[01:01:01]  The forehead and the hand.
[01:01:02]  Well, this is the mark of God when the law of God governs your thoughts and governs your actions.
[01:01:06]  And so, this idea of the Word of God governing yourself, and then you teach your children, everybody under your authority, the Word of God at the set times of morning and evening, and you teach them as you walk by the way and as you're just kind of going about the day.
[01:01:19]  And those things, that idea that you're looking for opportunity, whether it's in the handbook for your company or whether it's while you're going through whatever and you're meeting and you start the meeting with prayer and maybe go through a little bit of the scriptures and proverb or whatever.
[01:01:30]  By the way, Proverbs is a great book.
[01:01:33]  If you're trying to figure out how to teach your employees the Word of God at all, the book of Proverbs is just going to be amazing for you.
[01:01:37]  The Law of God also.
[01:01:38]  Everybody's afraid of, you know, like, You're like, well, am I going to get up and just tell them the gospel over time?
[01:01:42]  Like, no, the law of God is part of discipleship.
[01:01:44]  That's what you do.
[01:01:45]  This is all the applications.
[01:01:46]  So I want people to realize Deuteronomy 6 with that, the Shema, the famous text about Hero Israel.
[01:01:54]  It's telling us to apply the word of God in all of these things.
[01:01:57]  And when we're told to teach our children these things, remember the fifth commandment honor your father and mother.
[01:02:02]  It doesn't just apply to your literal father and mother, it also applies to people in authority in all the covenant spheres.
[01:02:08]  And children, commands that apply to children, when you think about this idea of teaching, They apply to everybody in all the covenant spheres that are under authority.
[01:02:15]  With that, real quick, that's so good.
[01:02:17]  I would just, as a practical resource recommendation beyond this episode, I would recommend Thomas Watson, the Ten Commandments.
[01:02:23]  And I think he lists a few different categories, but he says, you know, there's familial fathers, there's ancient fathers, so guys who aren't just the generation immediately preceding, but, you know, looking back to Athanasius as a father, you know, but then there's also, of course, spiritual fathers, you know, ecclesiastical fathers within the realm of the church, and then civil fathers.
[01:02:44]  And this shows you how much our revisionist history of moderns and soft evangelicalism has just absolutely castrated us.
[01:02:54]  But Thomas Watson, who is not that long ago chronologically in terms of time, he cites Constantine as his example of a raving endorsement of him as a civil, good example of a civil father.
[01:03:08]  He says, and Constantine was a nurturing father.
[01:03:11]  And he says, as such a nurturing father that he, with great vigilance, He attacked those who attacked the church.
[01:03:20]  And so he's just like talking about how wonderful Constantine is.
[01:03:23]  And I'm like, yeah, I like Constantine.
[01:03:26]  And so, anyways, but I just say that to echo what you're saying that the Puritans certainly thought in those terms, and Thomas Watson being one of them.
[01:03:33]  And that book is so helpful because he goes through the Ten Commandments, exegeting the commandments themselves.
[01:03:38]  But then what the Puritans did so well that so many modern, even within the Reformed camp, modern theologians will not do today.
[01:03:45]  And I don't think it's because they just can't.
[01:03:47]  I think part of it is a lack of courage, to be frank.
[01:03:50]  But they won't provide application.
[01:03:53]  But the Puritans, they'll give the exegesis.
[01:03:56]  But then they'll say, and now to application.
[01:03:58]  And so, what does it mean to honor your father on a Tuesday afternoon at 3 23 p.m.?
[01:04:04]  And that's what people hate about the Puritans.
[01:04:05]  They're like, that's where they're puritanical.
[01:04:08]  But today, and maybe some of their applications were a little bit off, they're fallible.
[01:04:13]  But today, guys, they don't have the courage to offer any practical application at all.
[01:04:18]  They'll give you the theory here's God's law, here's a theory of what it might look like in a very general, very vague sense to be obedient to God's law.
[01:04:28]  And then you say, okay, and then what would it look like to issue a command from a place of authority in your home to your wife?
[01:04:34]  They'll be like, no comment.
[01:04:37]  Because they don't want to, you know.
[01:04:39]  But the Puritans, that was a generation where they weren't so dominated by the spirit of the age and feminism.
[01:04:47]  And they actually, the men had not yet been castrated and had the courage to actually answer questions like that.
[01:04:54]  So, all that being said, the Ten Commandments by Thomas Watson absolutely says exactly what David's saying in terms of many different kinds of fathers.
[01:05:02]  Not just your biological father and mother, and that honor is a lifelong command, and not just when you're in the house of your biological father and mother, and really, really helpful.
[01:05:12]  And that comes straight from scripture.
[01:05:14]  His description of Constantine as a nurturing father, that's just a paraphrase of Isaiah when it talks about kings and queens being nursing fathers.
[01:05:20]  And this idea of being ancient and being a father, you can find texts of scripture in that and in the church and in the state.
[01:05:27]  And then you also find this idea of people who were particularly gifted in something, somebody who is the father of the metalworkers or whatever, right?
[01:05:34]  When you look at like Tubal Cain or whoever.
[01:05:35]  You find that language applied to all that kind of stuff.
[01:05:38]  So the scriptures use the language in that way.
[01:05:40]  And so I appreciate that.
[01:05:41]  And I think that Thomas Watson is fantastic there.
[01:05:46]  William Perkins has amazing stuff on the household.
[01:05:49]  William Perkins has amazing stuff on the household.
[01:05:51]  So I want to give one application to people to close on before you take us out.
[01:05:57]  And that is just to make sure that I can frustrate some more people and give some ruffled feathers since you were talking about nobody willing to give applications.
[01:06:04]  If you teach your children to say, yes, sir, yes, ma'am, or yes, dad, yes, mom, Give some sort of honoring address that really helps them to be able to accept commands.
[01:06:12]  It makes it so that they become accustomed to receiving.
[01:06:15]  And fathers, if you want to see honor come to you, focus on making sure your children honor your wife.
[01:06:22]  Make sure that they are giving respect to her and give her this job of defending your honor.
[01:06:27]  One of the kids disrespects you, you want her to come to the defense of your honor.
[01:06:31]  And if one of the kids disrespects her, you want to come to the defense of her honor.
[01:06:33]  There's a mutual support there.
[01:06:35]  And you don't want her to have to fight all your battles for you for disrespect from the kids.
[01:06:38]  But this idea that you both come to each other's aid to defend each other's honor.
[01:06:42]  And you're encouraging that.
[01:06:44]  So, the way you honor your wife is going to help people in terms of the children, in terms of understanding that she is honorable and should be honored.
[01:06:52]  You don't honor her as your superior, but you honor her and her station as your queen.
[01:06:56]  And then, wives, any wives that are listening, your children are not going to respect you unless you respect your husband.
[01:07:02]  And so, the way you respect your husband is going to make them understand the way that they should respect you.
[01:07:08]  And so, honoring titles, this is something everybody hates.
[01:07:11]  Sarah called her husband Lord.
[01:07:13]  If you happen to call your husband husband or sir or say yes affirmatively or do any of that kind of stuff, it will be a startling thing to everybody around you.
[01:07:22]  And if you do honoring references and if your husband gives you an affectionate reference, that's a way of him honoring you as a special person in his life as his queen.
[01:07:32]  And so we all expect husbands to be affectionate to wives and to say things like, you know, beloved, come here or honey or whatever.

=== Honoring Your Husband (01:45) ===

[01:07:38]  There's all that.
[01:07:39]  But what if a wife gives an honoring title to her husband, everybody freaks out.
[01:07:44]  So, Try it.
[01:07:45]  It's a really powerful witness.
[01:07:46]  You know, you've hit the right target when everybody freaks out.
[01:07:48]  Yep.
[01:07:49]  Yes, sir.
[01:07:50]  All right.
[01:07:50]  Well, thank you so much for coming back on the show.
[01:07:52]  And I look forward to part three as we continue this series on God's law and sphere sovereignty and all these different things.
[01:08:00]  How can people follow you if they want to?
[01:08:02]  And feel free to plug, because I know we have mutual friends and there are other shows that you're a part of.
[01:08:07]  You're a guest with other ministries.
[01:08:09]  Plug whatever you want to plug real quick for guys to keep up with what you're doing.
[01:08:13]  Thanks, brother.
[01:08:14]  So, at RealDavidReese on Twitter is a place that I try to post.
[01:08:19]  My church is Puritan Reformed Church, so PuritanPHX.com.
[01:08:23]  You can find sermons there and stuff.
[01:08:25]  My business, armoredrepublic.com.
[01:08:27]  But I've also done some really great shows with Chocolate Knox.
[01:08:33]  He has Knox Unleashed, and he and I have done some really neat stuff talking through some of the things on the spheres and some in depth things there, too.
[01:08:41]  And I'm trying to give some higher level stuff here as we're talking about things.
[01:08:46]  And you and I are going to be talking about Christian power in a more focused way.
[01:08:49]  But we've talked about some of the institutions and some of the ways of kind of thinking about nurturing.
[01:08:54]  And things like that.
[01:08:56]  And we've also talked about civil covenanting to some extent there.
[01:08:59]  So you and I are covering things from a different perspective and going over stuff.
[01:09:02]  And I've had a chance with Chris Arnzen to have some really neat conversations about doctrine, including the Trinity and stuff like that on Iron Sharpens Iron.
[01:09:09]  So those are places where people can find more of that material.
[01:09:12]  But I think my sermons are some of the easiest places to get a lot of systematic stuff there.
[01:09:16]  So thanks for the opportunity to point those things out.
[01:09:18]  Appreciate it, brother.
[01:09:19]  You're welcome.
[01:09:20]  All right.
[01:09:20]  Well, thanks for coming on the show.
[01:09:21]  And to the listener, we'll see you next time.
[01:09:23]  God bless.