Blurry Creatures - EP: 369 Mars Hill and The Council of Gods with Dr. Joel Muddamalle

Episode Date: October 28, 2025

"In him we live and move and have our being." When Paul quoted the Greek poet Epimenides at Mars Hill in Acts 17, the Athenian philosophers weren't confused—they knew exactly what he was referencing. Their council of gods. In this LIVE from Blurry Con preview, Dr. Joel Muddamalle explains that Greek philosophy included a divine hierarchy ruling over nations and territories, strikingly similar to what Scripture describes in Deuteronomy 32:8. When God judged humanity at Babel, He didn't just scatter the nations—He disinherited them, assigning each to divine beings called "sons of God." These weren't decorative angels; they were governing authorities with real power over territories. The Greeks called them gods. The Hebrews understood them as rebellious divine council members. Paul, standing in the intellectual epicenter of the ancient world, used their own theology against them: "That council you worship? They're defeated rebels. The 'Unknown God' you acknowledge but don't know? That's Yahweh—and His Son Jesus Christ has authority over every power you've been serving." Joel walks through how Paul's Mars Hill sermon connects to the entire biblical narrative of spiritual warfare: the serpent's Eden rebellion, Babel's cosmic judgment, Mount Hermon where divine beings (Watchers) descended and corrupted the nations they were supposed to steward, and ultimately Christ's victory reclaiming all territory and authority. This is why Paul could confidently quote Greek poets—he wasn't compromising truth, he was revealing it through a framework the Greeks already understood. Joel explains what the divine council is, why geography matters in spiritual warfare, where demons originate (not fallen angels—Scripture doesn't teach that), how territorial spirits function, and why missions and prayer look different when you understand cosmic geography. The Greeks believed in a council of gods ruling over territories. Paul said: You're right about the structure, but wrong about who's in charge. Christ has defeated them all and reclaimed His rightful dominion. This conversation bridges ancient philosophy, Hebrew theology, and practical spiritual warfare—showing they're not contradictory but complementary when understood correctly. Whether you're trying to make sense of Ephesians 6, understand missions strategy, or grasp what Christ actually accomplished, Joel provides the framework Scripture assumes but Western rationalism has stripped away. Blurry Con 3 might be sold out, but you can still join us virtually on our Livestream. Get tickets here: www.blurrycreatures.com for half the cost of last year! Dr. Joel’s brand new book, The Unseen Battle, equips Christians to make sense of evil powers, spiritual warfare, what God is doing in the world today, and the part we play in it. https://amzn.to/49lhzVD This episode is sponsored by:https://zocdoc.com/blurry — Find and instantly book top-rated doctors today! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Luke so often people email us and they have this story. They're out in their woods and they're looking in the bushes and they go, what's that? And when you are pouring your dog food and your dog's bowl, that's the last thing you want to say. What is that? What is this stuff coming out of this bag? You know, I don't think a lot of us think about maybe what we feed our dogs. And that's why we partner with rough greens.

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That's RUFFF Greens.com discount code blurry. Rough Greens makes any dog food better. Listen, Luke, we know that we live in a world where everything is fake, fake food, fake clouds, fake news, everything's fake. And you know what? You get tired of it. And you're just like, if I want to buy a shirt or something nice, can I just, please give me something real. Quinn's is an amazing company that does high quality everyday essentials. So we're moving in.

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You want the goods. You can get it now. Go to Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash blurry for free shipping and 365-day returns. Quins.com slash blurry. Once again, it's BlurieCon week. BlurieCon is this week right now. If you want to join us for the live stream,

head over Blurricutches.com, hit the banner. Come in. It's bigger, crazier, and more production. Every year we kind of up the annies. So Goonies themed. We got tons of guests coming in into the Blurray Cave. You're not going to want to miss this one. Yeah. And as a preview, if you're not familiar with BlurieCon, we are releasing an episode by our friend, Theologian, Dr. Joel Matamale, from last year's blurry con. So you can get a taste of what to expect, what to see, and what you're going to see in here. And he's got a fantastic episode here on Mars Hill,

the Council of God, the Unknown God, and the supernatural worldview of Paul in the New Testament. So this is a fascinating discussion with one of our good friends, who is a protege of Dr. Michael Heiser, who is one of the impetus reasons that we started this show. Yeah. So totally fun.

Check out this preview. of Blurriecon. As Nate said, BlurieCon 3 this week, you can join us virtually from your couch, from your 80s basement from wherever you are. Go check it out. Prices this year are half the prices of last year. So grab your friends, grab some 80s snacks, maybe a baby Ruth. That's right. And this isn't just a typical live stream. We're going to have like multiple cams and you can be right up there, right up front, checking it out. It's not just like a camera sitting in the back room somewhere so grandma can watch. This is like up front, live in action the best you can and it quality. a live stream. So we'll see you guys there. BlurryCon week. I'm excited, Lou. It's going to be fun.

Yeah, you dress me up, man, and we're doing it again, pal. Blurrogreatures.com, click the banner. See you guys there. The history of our earth is so different from what we can imagine. The Smithsonian that if they found out about a large skeleton somewhere was to go get it. I'm going to assume at least one person is right, because if one person's right at bust the paradigm. It all goes back to the fallen church. And the problem with the modern day church, they have a very truncated view of the supernatural. This backdrop that's just pregnant with all kinds of meaning associated with this Mount Herman event. And this guy defects from the kingdom. That's a big deal.

Joe, are we still friends? Oh, whoa. Hey there. That was, family show. There's a family show. There's a You like to get right to the line. Sometimes we go over. You're making Uranus jokes at the beginning of this whole thing. I know it's your love language. Joel, your ride coming in was pretty sweet. That was awesome.

Do you guys know what that is? We got no mic here. But you also know why we did that? Because we posted our episode with you. One of my favorite comments said, I had no idea Joel was a Mexican. And in that rumor here right now. I need to...

That's right, I screenshoted that comment. I screenshoted it and we've got a group chat that it's called like blurry theology boys or something like that, which like, good homies always have the boys thread. You know what I'm saying? And I sent it on them and I said, guys, I've seen everything. Like, under the face of this planet, I've never seen this. And if you were there and you made that comment and you're here right now, just so you know, I am actually Indian. I'm actually Indian. So there we go.

Well, I think everyone knows now. No secrets around here. You know, there's a fine line there, but we appreciate the friendship. And I think that's, you know, that's a big part of what we do here is try to bring out a different part of some of these guests to come on our show, is that we try to have different kind of conversations

and be more vulnerable, be more honest, be more humble and genuine. And I think that's a big part of podcasting is you've got to kind of tell the truth. And if you start to not tell the truth, you get into the massaged message, people stop listening because they don't want that. They're looking for someone to be raw, honest, and real. And I think part of our, how we do that is just like showing love for our guests. Like genuinely we're friends and I appreciate that. Yeah. Big time.

Yeah, we were talking backstage, Joel. I mean, the story has probably been told, but like Joel and I met at a conference that we were both at. And I randomly get called up on stage to talk about, oh, this weird podcast you have. You had seven minutes. And I was like, basically just said like a little high. or overview and then Joel was in the back and just which I had no context for the blurry creatures up until that point I still don't have any context for the blurry creatures after what I just saw but you said earlier this might be the

time you actually get canceled so praise Jesus now we you know we we met the back of the room and you're like hey man I signed her mic like he was he chaired my Old Testament doctorate and and we had a had a cigar and chatted and and we were fast friends and that's kind of how this whole thing happened and you know here we are and I love how God works in those ways um and as they said it's just it's fun like it's what's so fun about this is literally everybody who's been on stage in the last two days is like become dear friends um aside from there being an amazing macro community I think there's a really cool element of us making lifelong friendships with the folks

that that have graced us with their their life's work really I mean I just ask questions right That's why it's so funny people talk about, oh, what's your eschatology or your theology? And it's like, we just ask the questions. Like, so if you're mad at somebody else's eschatology, I'm sorry. Yeah. I haven't ever talked about mine. I don't even if I have one, you know? Yeah, we have this ability to ask serious questions while wearing Stormtrooper costs.

So I need you to put your hats back on. No, not yet. No. We got, we got a, they're hard to see it. All right. Yeah, we got a plan. What's your plan? What is your plan?

What is your plan? What is your plan? What is your plan? What is your plan? Can I start with something, though? Yeah. Do you guys trust me? Of course.

Yeah. I mean, maybe after the tuck-took. Yeah, I'm not sure. I do, I do want to start with this. I want to thank the both of you. You two have modeled for me from afar the potential of what it could be if people were honest, curious, vulnerable, but then also committed, first and foremost to Jesus. And I just want to thank you guys and honor the both of you.

Thanks, man. And, you know, just on behalf of them, like, it comes at a cost, right? Like all of this, it comes at a cost. It comes at a cost personally. It comes at a cost. Familiarly, it comes at a cost. Theologically, it comes. There is a cost to be paid, and I just want to say thank you for being that.

And I'm a comic nerd, and the two of you are kind of like Professor X to me. One of you is the younger Professor X. One of you is the older one. I'm not going to say which one is which. Wow. But I'm just going to say, and Professor X had the uniting power. That was his special power. Yeah, he was brilliant, but his special power was being able to bring all of these folks, these figures, these superheroes together.

And at BlurieCon too, I mean, my goodness, look what y'all did. Like, ninjas and butterflies were just here? You guys did it. You guys did it. Yeah, it's been a lot of work and I appreciate that. I mean, I think that, you know, I mean, talking about Bigfoot and putting, you know, starting there and then talking about biblical concepts, I thought, this is going to be either crazy to a lot of people or a lot of fun.

And I think we try to make it fun and accessible. I think that's something that I learned in music is that there was. sometimes just this energy of when a band or an artist or somebody could create sort of this community and make people feel like they're a part of the show and i think that's that's bigger than the band you know and i think there was different artists that was it was all about them it was all about their image their persona their music and then they quickly left and then you just sort of i don't know i just didn't like that i felt like yeah they're good and technically it's executed but there's just something missing like are they real people like what what what

what do they think and feel about that. So I think creating a community is something that just naturally happens when you try to invite everyone into the conversation. So I'm glad that it comes across and thank you for that. Speaking of conversations. Yeah, where are we going? Well, I was going to say, like we,

because we tend to live in the Old Testament a lot, just with the Nathfam space and territorial spirits, and we talked about the Bones of Moses, which is New Testament, but Old Testament. We're going New Testament today. Yeah. And I think that's a fun place to go with. This is, you know, our blurry theologian. So let's go there. Let's talk about some of the things in the blurry space and the theological space when it comes to the New Testament. Yeah. And take us there, Joel.

Yeah, so I want to camp out in Acts 17 today. So we're going to look at what is probably a first. famous passage for many of us, Acts Chapter 17, Paul ends up at this place called the Ariopagus, and there is the showdown. I like to think of it as a showdown, almost like an old Western, like it feels like that, or it was a Stormtrooper Showdown is probably more culturally relevant, right? But I want to start with this before we get into Acts Chapter 17. I want to talk maybe just for a second about one of the challenges that I think that we have as modern readers of the Bible. Sometimes it feels like when you get that phone bill, it's like the crash site document. You can't read it.

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And so this is one of the challenges, in my view. One of the challenges that we have is that we live in a 21st century modern context that has values, that has desires, that has a heightened level of intellectual capacity. And what we at times want to do is we want to take that thing and we want to impose it into ancient text. And yet, God and His sovereignty, in his providence,

determined that it would be not just better but good, that the biblical text would be written in time and in space, in an actual cultural context. And I think it would behoove us to, for a moment, maybe just for the next 45, 50 minutes that we have here today, to take our 21st century mind and not forever, so don't panic with me, y'all. Like, you can go back to your Teslas and your cars

and all your things later. Not forever, but just for a moment, put it aside and try to enter into the mind of an ancient Greco-Roman person or an ancient Near Eastern person of the Old Testament. And if you're like, this is so hard, how am I going to do this? Let me just go ahead and give you an example. You do this every day all the time. So Nate, Luke, if I were to ask you, and I am asking you this, who's the goat, MJ or LeBron?

Your answer is. MJ. Be very careful, Nate. Be very careful, dude. No, thank you. We talked about splitting the podcast yesterday and how the enemy is trying to do that. That was one chance. He passed.

Okay, good. Good. We joke about this, though. This is a joke, but hey, I have a question. And we can ask out here. When I say who's the goat, what did I mean? Anybody, goat? What?

What? What? But how did you know that I did not mean a furry four-legged creature? What was that? Context. And when I said MJ, who am I talking about? Wait a minute. How did you know I wasn't talking about Michael Jackson?

Or your daughter. Or my daughter. You have to get personal there, didn't she? I miss my little... Or Mary Jane. Yeah. Or the Spider-Man girlfriend, Mary Jane. Yes.

Look at you. See? I don't think that's what you meant. I thought you meant last dance with Mary Jane. I thought you were going some... I worked at a camp in Santa Cruz, okay? We knew what that meant. Called Mount Herman.

So that was a little weird, too. This is a funny example, but it's a, I think, powerful example to show that actually we exercise this all the time. We're actually trying to make sense of culture and context and how to relate to words and thoughts and ideas and the same should honestly be true of the biblical text. And so one of the things I want to try to, as we step into Acts chapter 17 and have a discussion around a Mars Hill and the Council of the Gods. That's what's happening in Acts 17, by the way. It's actually the Council of the Gods. When the ancient peoples of the Near East of the Old

or the Greco-Roman context of the New Testament, when they looked at mountains or hilltops, they thought of something very specific. Like today, you and I might think of a place that we might want to do a hike. Not me, you guys might want to do that. Some of you are some other of you're like, I want to get to the top so I can take the best IG filtered

picture of all time. I'll just steal your pictures and post them as if they were mine, right? So we have this view of a mom must be nice, but the ancients, they had a very, very particular context of the mountains. The mountains were the place where God and humanity met. The mountains were the place where you went to get revelation. The mountains were a place of judgment. The mountains were actually the meeting spot of the earthly and the cosmic that were always intended to be intertwined, never divided and separate. So side note, my view is that at the fall,

one of the great tragedies that takes place is actually the separation of the earthly and the cosmic. Eden was God's cosmic mountain, his household, and I think Doug yesterday talked about it brilliantly. G.K. Beale is probably the leading scholar, kind of proving that the Garden of Eden was the first temple of God. The temple is the place where God walked and talked and he lived, and his royal priests lived in Eden, a royal mountain. They were priests there. They had vocation, responsibility, the dominion command. They were to guard the Hebrew word that is Shamar. It's the same word that's used of the Levittical priests who were to protect the temple.

Exact same word that's used of the watchman in Nehemiah to militristically look out and guard. And we think of like, oh, there's to like guard Eden as if they were glorified gardeners. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, but that's just not, that's imprecise. that's not the fullest expression of it. They were to guard not just to protect what was inside, but to prevent something like, dun dun, from the outside of trying to get in to corrupt God's Holy Creation.

Now we could like speed roll this, you know? It's like, oh, what happens on mountains? Epic things happen on mountains. Eden is a mountain top. Mount Hermon is a mountain top. The inverse of God's good happens on Mount Hermann. Mount Sinai is a pretty significant mountaintop experience. Mount Carmel where the showdown with Bail happen,

that's a pretty significant moment. The Mount of Transfiguration is a significant moment. Oh wait, the cross of Christ on the Mount Golgotha is a significant moment. What is taking place on these mountains? I think often what's happening on these mountains is supposed to be a reminder to you and I that there is much more than what we see with our earthly eyes,

that there is actually a cosmic world. And God has always intended for those two things to kind of come together. And that's what's taking place in Acts Chapter 17 on Mars Hill. I like it. Take us to the mountaintop. Are you sure you want to go there? Yeah. Okay.

So in Act 17, I think we've got some pictures here. I actually was in Greece just a couple months ago, and I was standing on top of Mars Hill. don't have the pictures, it's okay. I texted it to the group threat, so if y'all don't have it, then it's my fault. When you get to the top on Mars Hill, it's a big rocky kind of precipice when you get up there. And when you get up there, one of the things that you learn when you're actually in Athens, which is where this takes place, is that there's actually a mythological story that takes place behind it. So by the time of the Athenians and the Romans when they come in,

on top of Mars Hill, this was kind of like the place of judgment. Like if there were trials that had to be dealt with, trials would take place there. If there were issues of a civic matter that had to be established, well, you would go to Mars Hill and you would address it. But there's actually a reason why these humans went to Mars Hill to do it. It's pretty fascinating. It's because the Greek god by the name of Ares, the pantheon of the Greek god, gods, there was a moment in time where he was actually on trial.

And the place where he is on trial is, guess what? Mars Hill. Why was he on trial? He was on trial because he allegedly murdered the son of Poseidon. The Roman name is Neptune. And the reason why he murders the son of Poseidon or Neptune is because the son tried to violate his daughter alchapy. And so the 12 gods of the Pantheon,

and I just want you to point out, there is nothing random when it comes to the biblical text, or even I'm gonna argue in mythological stories elsewhere. Where do they get these numbers from? Where do they get these ideas from? How are they conceptualizing all of this? So you have 12 gods who come down onto Mars Hill, And as they come down onto Mars Hill, they put Mars or Ares on a judgment seat in order to deal with something that had taken place.

Huh? Where else do we see the number 12? The 12 tribes of Israel. The told disciples of Jesus. I mean, you see this kind of taking place all over throughout the biblical text. 12 is really important. So what I actually think is happening here is when Paul goes up, Paul is first, he's accused of being, depending on your Bible translations, it might say a babbler.

In CSB, it says a show-off. These are very tame translations for it. Do you guys want to know the Greek word for this? Nate, I'm looking at you. I'm going to say the Greek word, but I need you to remain some like adultness. Me? Yeah, you. I'm just saying. I'm going to say the word. I was debating whether I should say the word or not, okay? And after the ninjas and butterflies, I'm a little worried. Okay. Transport your senses with Sol de Janado's limited edition perfume mist collection. At Sephora, spritz on lush notes of rainforest orchid and crisp sea breeze with he fresco paraizzo.

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Maximum range based on EPA estimated combined fuel economy and a full tank of fuel. Actual mileage and range may vary. All right, so the Greek word is spermologous. See? Told you. Ah. Uh, almost crazy. Listen, you got 30 seconds.

Just go for it, whatever you want to say. I thought you were going to some of the phallus thing. That'll be in a text thread later. Okay. So the literal translation of this is a s. You know it's, yeah, you know. If you did this on purpose, you put me a 4 o'clock on purpose. Yeah, I did.

The literal translation of this is a seed picker. That's where seeds, I'm sorry, you got it, okay. But there's something behind in the literature that's important, and that is the idea that this babbler, the seed picker, what he's actually done is he's taken different pieces of trash, and it's kind of put them together to try to convey a story, and this is the accusation that Paul has.

And what's fascinating is that the very thing that they're accusing him of is actually true, but they're missing the fact fact that what Paul is masterfully doing is he's actually grabbing the most important parts of the story of the people of God and the people of the nations and he's actually bringing them all together so they're calling him a babler and he's actually pointing out their babbling you know what I'm saying and so it goes on from there and then again what he does is he starts with this um with this accusation and he flips it on them.

And they're like, you're a babbler, you don't know what you're talking about, come and explain this. And what they think is happening is that Paul is presenting two deities, right? Oh, there you go, I see it right up on my screen, but I don't see it up there. Mars Hill in Athens.

There it is. There you go. So that's kind of a visual representation. Paul's little. That's not the real Paul. Short people are, is that AI? Paul. Only a model.

That's only a model. Yeah. So, I mean, so this is just a spatial recognition. So one of the things is, again, spatial helps us a little bit. One of the ways that he would have defended himself is the council would have probably sat at the very top. So the council sits at the top and he sits at the foot. And he's trying to yell up to the top and trying to give his case. It's like you're being set up for a letdown.

You know what I mean? Like he's got the odds stacked against him. I think I've got the next picture of the steps here, the modern day steps. This is actually at the very top just a month ago. These are the actual steps. That's steps in the infographic. This is what the steps actually look like. He would have had to walk up there.

They tell you not to walk up now because you could slip and fall. This is true. I did that. I don't listen to instructions very well. I climbed before they changed the rules. Yeah, right? Were you there? I've been there.

Dude, it's wild, right? It is. There's like a little plaque that talks about all. Look. one next next picture I got there you go there it is there is the sermon the Paul preaches in Greek except for 17 there it is entire thing that's right there and so this is like one of the things I love about this is it points out the historicity of the Bible you know and it points out that these things I think

actually really did take place can you read that huh yeah I mean wow that's all right so I love it back to back to Paul why do I think this is important. It's kind of surprising that they put that there, don't you think? Yeah, I think it's surprising, but I also think that it's evidence that there's still in the same context that we're in today. It's a pantheon of the gods. Oh, this is just one of the gods of the many. Right? And the same issue that Paul is dealing with then is the very same issue you and I are dealing with right now. So Paul goes up and this is why I think this is important and why I call it the counsel of the gods, where do the Greeks get or the Pantheon idea?

Where are they getting this from? Divine counsel. And the divine counsel is not unique just to the Greeks. This divine counsel idea is true of the Acadians, of the Mesopotamians. I mean, this idea of a council of the gods was present everywhere. Now, the people that have come up here before me, that's not like we all sat and looked at notes together and like, oh, yeah, here's how we're going to thread it together.

I'm just letting you know, this is the power of the Holy Spirit. This is what the Holy Spirit does. Holy Spirit's like, oh, I'm going to take your talk. I'm going to take your talk. I'm going to take your talk. And you all never even met in your whole lives before. And we're just going to knit this thing together. And so how is it that we get,

a divine counsel scene in Acts chapter 17. Here's my view. I think the way that we get this Acts 17 divine counsel scene is because you have the fallen sons of God that are ripping off the one true story. In the book of Job, we're told that the sons of God were there at the very beginning of creation. Right? And so if they're there from the very beginning of creation and they see the governmental, the social structure that Yahweh himself puts together, why would they create a new wheel when they already see the power and the potency and the proficiency of the existing wheel

that's already there? So the best thing to do is just create a counterfeit. To create a counterfeit. I was hanging out at an event a couple weeks ago and a guy walked in and he had these Travis Scott's on. Y'all know what the Travis Scott shoes are. They're like, I'm a shoe head. They're like these dunks that are like very expensive. And I looked and I was like, whoa, you got, you got Travis Scott. Those are amazing. He looked at me, he was like, they're knockoffs.

Now here's the thing. I kind of know shoes, right? And I'm staring at those bad boys. And I was like, I cannot figure out how they're a knockoff. So you know what he told me to do? He said, go and find a picture of an actual legit pair. And I took a picture of his pair and then I went and I did this. That's how much of a nerd I am.

And after staring at the original one, for like an hour, I could then look at the knockoff and be like, oh, y'all are tricky. That's what you did. What the enemy has done is mocked the counterfeit so well, the original so well, and created a counterfeit. And the problem that you and I have that I'm worried about for myself

is that I have stopped gazing upon the true. Because when I'm gazing upon the true, now when the counterfeit is presented, I'm like, ah, miss me with that. You can't get me. I don't know. I see the true son of God. I'm not going to be conned by these false sons of God that have gone into rebellion. And so in Acts 17, I think you actually have a judgment scene. And the judgment scene is actually Paul, who, the irony of this entire thing is they think they're putting Paul on trial. They ain't pulling Paul on trial. Paul flips the entire thing. And instead, he puts them on trial. And not only does he put them on trial, this is just kind of my view,

this was the place where the gods had descended and again, mountaintops, the meeting place of the gods, of the cosmic and the earthly, then I think it's very possible that while Paul is right there proclaiming young Gellion, the Greek word is proclaiming it's a militaristic term of the victory of the risen Christ, I think it's very possible that you had malevolent evil spirits that are right there that are being judged in that moment. That's cosmic. Nate, go ahead. I know. I can always tell when you're thinking, because you've got like

these little things that go on. Doesn't happen very often. What things? These things. You see things? I see things. I know what it looks like. What does it look like? I don't see it much, but I know. I know it when I see it, pal. No, I'm just, I guess the, I'm just, I'm always impressed that people understand this narrative and how far we've gone from the worldview that they had to now, to where this stuff is all conspiracy, or even the modern church doesn't know about these things. So it's like, this was a battle of a dualistic kind of thinking, your gods or this God.

And now it's like, everyone's so skeptical or a little more agnostic or atheist, and they don't even believe any of these things. So I'm just wondering, how did it go from that, that time, to where we are now and now we're, it seems like we're coming back. I mean, obviously a lot of people are hungry for this, like learning about these things again. And that's just, that's always the interesting part of it is that, Christians are sometimes the hardest people to convince that this is, this is the world view. This is how they saw things.

This is why he's going here. This is why he's saying what he's saying. And we've turned it into more of like a moral preaching thing. Like, you know, I don't know. I think it's an uncomfortability. I think that's part of it. I think I was talking to Kevin back in the back. This is a Bose moment.

You've been there before. Somebody's apartment, small talk that's going nowhere, plastic cup that's almost empty. It's not great. Then someone hits play on a Bose speaker. Heads nod, feet tap, one person dances than everyone does. Awkward becomes electric. When Bose sound fills the room, you don't just hear the music. You feel it. Your life deserves music. Your music deserves Bose. Find your perfect product at Bose.com. And one of the things that I think is a real tragedy is something that I refer to this theological dishonesty. Theological dishonesty is simply a presentation

of a theological topic or principle or idea and presenting that idea, not as a idea, but as the idea. Right? Now, we've got to do a little bit of theological triage here. There's a difference between the primary, secondary, and tertiary theological things. They're the primary things, which I'm gonna die on the hill for.

Jesus is the Son of God, the resurrection, death burial resurrection and ascension. Like, there are things that are non-negotiables, right? There are secondary things that throughout the church history for 2,000 years, 4,000 years. Like, we have wrestled and grappled with it. And good, godly brothers and sisters in Christ have seen things differently. And still, they were unified under King Jesus while still holding to their personal convictions. And then you have tertiary things, things like, what color should the carpet be?

Or, you know, should you have, like, coffee from Folgers or, like, good coffee. Like, from a good... There's only one answer for that, okay? It's the good coffee. You wrapped it all up. Right there. There you go. There you go.

And what we end up doing is we take those third things and we make them primary things. And then all of a sudden we stop gazing on the primary things and that goes to the side and that actually creates a disunity and dysfunction inside of the local church. And here's the church. We're supposed to be the winsome witness to a world. of the power and possibility of the resurrected Christ bringing the nations back together, and yet we ourselves are divided? This is a tragedy, right?

And so I think one of the things that we need to do is regain a posture of humility and rightly locate the conversation of the supernatural cosmic world where it belongs. I'm going to say something that's going to sound a little bit like, whoa, really, Joel, are you going to say that? I am. I really do believe it belongs in category one. Now here's why. I want, I'm going to do a thought experiment with you guys. Can I do it? Yeah. I want somebody, whoever is out there, or the two of you, I want you to identify the thing that I say that is not supernatural or cosmic in nature. I'm going to make a statement,

okay? And I want you to identify the thing that is not supernatural, cosmic in nature, that we as Christians believe that Jesus is the son of God in the incarnation, he took on all of humanity without losing a ounce of divinity. He lived a perfect human life. He died physically, really on a Roman cross. He defeated death through death. And on the third day, he rose again. And after a period of 40 days, he ascended to the right hand of the father. And he sits now, king of the cosmos. Can anybody name one thing? So if the core of what we believe, is a cosmic supernatural Christ, why do we want to strip out the supernatural elements of the scriptures everywhere else?

Tchay. You kind of said it before, I'm, it is somewhat amazing. We had a recent conversation if you watched the studio about sacred spaces. Doug talked about sacred spaces. Ali talked about territorial entities and the Prince of Persia. And so there's this thread that Nader I didn't plan or couldn't plan that also exists in our show. But at the same time, this is the thing. It really is.

We talked earlier about what is the show and how has it changed the things? It's like understanding that there is so much more significance and depth to the scriptures as far as actionable. things like the movements of Christ or the intentionality of Paul. If we don't take off our 21st century hats, as you said before, and put ourselves in the ancient Near East Greco-Roman space, this is just Paul talking to authorities at Mars Hill and preaching. But the significance of the location, the cultural context, and the cosmic, if you will, or supernatural significance spatially to what's happening is such a rich tapestry to

what's happening here, what's shifting in this, in that realm. We can make even more connections to this. I don't think that it's random that this is happening in Athens. Yeah. That there's another story that is a myth story. So you know, there's the one story about Ares, but there's another one, there's Arrestes, who's charged with the murder of his mother.

There's this whole thing that happens. And the individual, like basically, basically goes in and tries to do a plea bargain. You know, this is like one of the mythic gods. And the plea bargain kind of works, kind of doesn't, because basically goes in and tries to corrupt the system, the voting system. So at the very end, Athena, the patron goddess of Athens,

is the one who has to be the tiebreaker, right? And she basically steps in and votes and basically says, hey, he's not guilty. And so you have this sense that Why is Paul here in Athens in Mars Hill at this specific location? Once again, I think this is because this is cosmic warfare. This is a direct affront and a direct cosmic assault against the gods of the nations. Because here you are, Athena, you think that you're the patron god of the city, right?

And you're the one who's going to make all the... the decisions that take place here and we're submitting ourselves to you great Athena Athena you were judged on the cross along with every other fallen malevolent evil spiritual being that's out there you are not exempt from your judgment the irony that you think you can be the judge nah miss me with that What do you think that location was like before Paul rolled on the scene, like in history? I think it was, like, what do you mean in terms of geographically? Yeah, because, I mean, he sort of arrives a little bit later under the scene.

You know, if you think about it, because some of these places there was like sort of the rise and fall of many different types of defiled eras that have been in this one location. Yeah. same side. I just wondering if there's a prehistory even there that we there yeah this one is an interesting one and I think it goes to and I don't remember who it was that was talking about it I was live streaming yesterday's I was going by oldest son driving to a basketball in the AAU tournament and so I can't remember if it was from last night or from something I heard today but this idea of what is the relationship between the gods of the nations with each other you know and I and my view is they are they're

kind of like, you guys ever watch that movie Step Brothers? Remember the movie Step Brothers? Yeah. Right? We quote it. I should know it by heart. Yeah, I think it's kind of like that. Like, I think they just can't get out of their own way. They're kind of knuckleheads, you know? And it just chaos is wherever they go. But one of the interesting things about Athens, particularly, is that it was like the flagship Greek city. And when the Romans come in, they kind of take over that. And so you have a name change that happens with these deities of the pantheon. I'm torn on what actually happens.

Is it that deities are replaced, right? And they just kind of plagiarize the name and the idea, or is it just a mask that is being shifted from different civilization to civilization? I think there's compelling argumentation for both ideas. but the shift from the Greek to the Roman is pretty significant because I think it's showing territorial powers that are taking precedence over the other and it you just have this you know this small group of people the followers of Jesus in this parchment in the ancient Mesopotamian land that seem to be at the very center of each of these things and so I think that what you end up having happening over there is a battle between the gods of the nations themselves.

They can't get out of their own way. I think they're just as guilty of pride and arrogance as they're trying to entice you and I into. And so sometimes I worry that we give them a little bit too much credit than we should. That's like the empire is battling, right? You have the princes of Persia, Prince of Greece, and you have these epic battles of Alexander the Great

and these civilizations that war and then take precedence, become the next. Yeah, I'm reading an incredible history right now. So it's like, hey, Joel, what do you read for fun? This is what I read for fun. The 800-year war between Persia and Rome. 800 years! It's a long book.

It actually is. It's taken me a second. It's like, hey, there's some pictures. The good thing about those history books is at the very same of there's some pictures. Year 435. But consistently, to your point, there is a conflict. is a conflict that's happening between Persia and Rome and Rome gets the upper hand, but then every now and then Persia gets the upper hand, and then you have Darius who comes in

and in the ancient belief system, obviously the gods are behind it, you know, and they're playing a role inside of it. Joel, I have a question for you. Obviously, you know. LinkedIn is pretty amazing at helping you grow your small business. We cannot make your email response time faster. can help you sell, market, and hire in one place. We cannot help you find space for your three desk drinks. Why do you have three? And while we can't help you find the perfect volume for your presentation video,

LinkedIn can help you find the perfect audience for your business. Grow your small business on LinkedIn. Learn more at LinkedIn.com slash small business. We get a lot of pushback from, I guess, traditional deologians about our podcasts and what they think, what we do. How would you interpret him at Morris Hill before, like just in seminary and then now? I'm curious what you thought was happening there then,

like when you were just going to school, maybe you hadn't really consider some of these blurry ideas and the Heiser sort of view of the world, and then now. I'm just kind of curious, like, your own journey into how you would interpret this story, just like a traditional sermon versus how you preach it now. Yeah, I mean, that's exactly how I would do it.

I think the technical term is called demythologizing. There's an attempt, especially in academia, to demythologize the biblical text. We're trying to strip out the supernatural element. We'll keep the things that we like in there, like, you know, everything about Jesus. But everything else, like, no, we don't, like, miss me. Like, we don't want that. And so I would have typically looked at Acts Chapter 17 and looked at, looked at what Paul said and would have come up with a nice five-point or three-point sermon

on how to apply that to our own life today and move on and call it a day. And in so doing, I think what we end up doing is we are blinding ourselves to what's actually happening. So actually here like a couple things. And we can kind of work just really quickly, exegetically. You got time. I got time, right? So look at Acts chapter 17, verse 24. So like Paul gets in here, which by the way, I think Paul is epically passive-aggressive, which I love. I love it about him. It's true.

I'm just saying it's what the text says. Okay, so here's Paul. He stands up in the middle of the Ariopagus and he said, you guys also know I'm getting old. You know how you know I'm getting old? I've started to have to do this thing with the body. Anybody else doing that with their phones? And yeah? Yeah.

you sin for ruining everything. Paul stood in the middle of the Ariopagus and said, People of Athens, I see that you're extremely religious in every respect. He's setting up the passive-aggressive jab, just so you know. For as I was passing through you and observing the objects of your worship, I even found an altar on which there was inscribed to an unknown God. Therefore, on light of this unknown God, therefore, what you worship in ignorance, first jab. This I proclaim my Eongelion to you.

Again, militaristic, victorious term. So here's the first point. He says, the God who made the world and everything in it, he is the Lord of Heaven and Earth, and does not live in shrines made by human hands. So here's the first indictment to the people. This is like a lesson in logic. It's wrong for you and I to try to locate

the creator of all things in building. fashioned by humans. It is ridiculous to think that the God of all of creation could actually be contained in some kind of temple shrine, right? Even the ancient Hebrew conception of the temple itself. Sometimes we miss this. The temple wasn't the place where the whole presence of God was contained. The way the ancient Hebrews understood it was like the temple was the footstool. And you have the cosmic king of heaven who sitting on a chair and as he reclines nicely back, he's got his feet on the footstool and he's just like chilling. Right? He cannot be contained. And now look at how the religions of the world

from the Mesopotamian, Acadian, like all of these, it's like build temples for the gods. They need a place to live. Let's make sure they're fed. Let's make sure they're clothed. Let's find the best gold and silver and all this stuff and let's let's give it to them because they need all these things and here Paul's like like no Yahweh doesn't need any of that right so here's the here's the next thing it says neither is he served by human hands as though he needed anything since he himself gives everyone life and breath and all things ultimately he is the source of all of life so why Why would the source of all of life require anything for he himself to live? There's a great kind of narration about the Greek myths,

which is the greatest thing that the Greeks and the gods feared is ceasing to be remembered. Because if you cease to be remembered, that's how the gods would die. So do whatever you can to be remembered. I have a question, have we ever in human history, feared Yahweh from being remembered. There's not been a time. His story is the only true story throughout 6,000 years of human existence, depending on where you land on the dating of the earth. We don't need to get there. You guys already tackled flat earth. I'm so proud of you yesterday. Thank you. Thank you. I'm glad that happened yesterday, not today. How'd you get the

Tuk-Took through the firmament? How did you do that? Through the pyramid. Through the pyramid. Let's go. Douchy, tush. Oh, dude, that's... Yeah. We have fun. Here's a couple things that I... I want to tie this kind of all back together. John chapter one, in the beginning was the word, the word was with God, the word was God.

The word was God. Through him, all things were made. Without him, nothing was made that has been made. And in him was life. And that life was the light of man. It's a good job. Like, that's who we turn to. That's who we look to.

Let's just keep going here. says this. Verse 26 from one man. He has made every nationality to live over the whole earth, and he's determined their appointed times and the boundaries of where they live. He did this so they might seek God, perhaps they might reach out and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. For in him we live and move and have one being, as even as some of your own poets, this is a guy named Erratus, who said, for we also, for we are also his offspring. Like, just think about that for a second. Like, y'all realize that you could live in any. time in human history and yet you breathe the breath of life in this time this is not

random and this is not a divine role of the dice you could live in any geographical area and yet you live in the geographical areas in the neighborhoods and the cities and in the workplace that you live this is not random or by chance this is not some divine role of the dice there is a purpose for your actual existence now this begs the question what is the purpose of your existence and he goes and says he says he says So that you might reach out. The Greek word here to reach out. It's used famously by Homer in the Odyssey and the Iliad.

And it refers to a person who's trapped in darkness. Can you imagine being trapped in darkness and there's an, and you got to find a way out. Like you've got to get to the light where you can do. You're going to start reaching out and trying to find your way out. And then Paul says, oh, actually, it's in this posture of weakness and vulnerability. While you're reaching out and trying to find your own way out, that all of a sudden you reach out and you feel the first.

firm, faithful, nail-pierced hands of Jesus himself. You're like, oh my gosh, you've never been far the entire time. You've been there the whole time. Now, here's why I think all of this is actually really important and why I think the backdrop actually of Genesis 6 and the Mont Hermon event is actually the best backdrop for us understanding this moment. You see, the gods of the nations are consistently trying to lead you into dependence on them, not God.

And here's the deceit, the ultimate deceit of how the gods and nations are doing this. They're actually doing it by conning you and to believe that you can do it by yourself. It's the unholy trinity of me, myself, and I. Right? The TikTok anthem goes like this. You do you, boo. But you can't. And think about the Anacic tradition, the background to Genesis 6, right? But what do they do? They give amulets for enchantments, so magic. They teach the cutting of roots. So it's like the hallucinative kind of mental faculty altering. They give weapons, right? By the way, a sword has one singular focus and purpose. What is a sword singular designed to do? It's kill human. Kill. To take life. This is the most, you know, the most of the way. incredible thing devastating thing that happens with Genesis 6 read with the

Anachic tradition in the background that what the false gods of the nations have done is they've actually prompted us into thinking that we need to go to them for education so we can learn more so we can be more superior so we can be the best humans that we can possibly be but in the end we do not become more human we become more animalistic and this is what sin does to us. Sin actually robs us of our humanity. Now look what Jesus does.

Jesus restores our true humanity. And Jesus does this not because he needs something from us. Oh, go build me this. Go do that. Like go do the no, like the things that we give unto him is rightfully his because he's the creator of the universe. Worship is just rightly attributing

what is worthy unto that person. It's not that person demanding something because they need something. Why did God create humanity? Anybody have an answer to that? One of the family. It actually super simple because he wanted to. I got that from Mike. I miss him.

Sometimes the simplest answers are like the easiest answers. Why did God create a divine counsel? Because he wanted to. That's how in his wisdom he determined that it'd be the best way to, show his love that comes out of himself onto humanity into his family. And a God who loves wants to invite his family to be a part of all the things that he is doing. At the very end of this, the judgment that Paul gives on Mars Hill is a judgment that actually identifies Jesus. in Acts chapter 17, verse 31, and then it's actually echoed also in 1st Thessalonians 1.10.

This is what Paul says in Acts 1731. He says, are starting in verse 30, therefore, so in light of all the stuff I just said, that therefore is always there for a reason. Therefore, having overlooked the times of ignorance, God now commands all people everywhere to repent. Why? Because he has set. a day when he, not Athena, not Ares, not Zeus, not Ishtar, not Moloch, not Baal, no, when He, Yahweh is going to judge the world in righteousness. How is he, Yahweh, going to judge the rule in righteousness by the man he has appointed? And he has provided proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead. In fact, I think this is a hyperlink all the way back to Psalm 82. It's like the very end of that scene, right? Like my favorite part, I think, you know, we've talked about this.

It's like the very end. It's like, arise, O Elohim, for the nations are your inheritance. And here's Paul, and I think he's just being like, by the way, I'm not saying anything brand new to you. I'm just letting you know what God promised. He did and he is doing. And he's going to see that thing to completion. So you all just buckle in and wait. That's great.

I'm sitting here thinking about the mindset of those people at that time and some of the maybe the pushback that we've received kind of putting out the book of Enoch is that I think that during that time people read everything. They didn't have a knowledge problem. They just interpreted it poorly. And now we sort of have more of an ignorance problem. We don't really know. We don't have enough, we haven't read enough things.

So it's kind of what we see coming back sort of an ancient alien. space is they're reading a bunch of stuff and it's all kind of this pantheon of the gods thing kind of reimagined in the you know in the modern era oh aliens came down and created us and we're a part of but it's like but they're interpreting it poorly and so you know you can see how they didn't have a they didn't have a problem with information back then and I think sometimes the church it's hard you got to wake them up like hey check out the book of Enoch no I can't read that I'm so afraid why just read it. We're not saying anything about it. Just read it. And I think that something about this podcast is kind of trying to push that information into the space and normalize it in a sense. But I think that you can see kind of how there would be a lot more debating going on versus who read this, who read that, you know, and they we're just kind of ignorant.

I have a question. Do we think that Jesus read or knew about Enoch? For sure. Do you think Paul did? So it's like the Enoch one is kind of hilarious to me sometimes. because it's kind of like saying, hey, you have free access to the very insights that would have framed the mind of the risen King Jesus himself. And it's just waiting for you to just read it. No, I can't do that. My bad. It's like, of course we'd want to read it. And it's like, you know, I'm a nerd, you guys, on so many levels.

I'm right now trying to figure out. Have you guys read The Wheel of Time? Yeah. One person is so excited about the Wheel of Time. The author is here. Right? Well, that would be crazy because the author died. Well, he's back.

He's back. He's back. He's back from the future. He's back from the future. He came from. No, like, I want to read all of the background. the same thing with Lewis actually with the Lord of the Rings like Lewis had um Tolkien sorry Tolkien had um you this is what she happened when you put me at four o'clock by the way yeah yeah

I'm tired um um Tolkien so by the way it is kind of hilarious uh Lewis and Tolkien didn't even even like each other's writings so if you guys are ever like man can this thing last they're like the best of friends like you guys could you know even if you don't like each other sometimes just remember Tolkien was there when Lewis was dying on his deathbed and he still thought that Chronicles of Narnia was trash. It's true, it's true. It's a lesser work. Tolkien, Tolkien was like coming to lead us.

He was like, oh, the language building wasn't very good, you know? Like you didn't build your own elfish language. I'm like, Tolkien, you're such a nerd, dude. I think that'll be you and me, Luke, but they'll just be memes. Your memes versus my memes. But a couple of those memes flopped. Those were not mine.

Yeah, exactly. But like we, if you're a Tolkien fan and you know, and it's true, the Tolkien estate has thousands, thousands of his unfinished work that are just like available for us to read and be like, oh, what was he going to do with the Silmarillion and what was he going to do here? It's like you could go to those places and you might actually want to read and pay attention to the conversations that were taking place with the inklings because Tolkien was spending a lot of time trying to develop his thoughts with these conversations with his friends and

it's like, oh, you can learn more about the framework and the mentality and the and and, and It's like, you guys, we have that. We have that with Enoch. We have that with other Second Temple literature. What we need to be careful of is that we don't elevate these things to the place of inerrancy of scripture. It's about wisdom. It's about discernment. There are parts of Enoch that are super helpful.

There are parts that are super wild and whack. Like, you know, just categorize the whack stuff is whack. And then move on. And there are scholars who, I don't know. know if you guys know this there are scholars who have written commentaries on enoch in fact i heard of some friends who came up with a translation of enoch oh you guys good i'm proud of you and tim and mike and mike wrote a commentary on the two books so anyways i think it's kind of sometimes it's silly i mean paul quotes a poet in this in this passage he's quoting who's a cretan of all people

and he's all i think if i'm remembering correctly he's also the same one who said all cretons are liars So Cretan says all Cretans are liars, so who's the liar? Ah, you see what I'm saying? That is a problem. It's hilarious. It's a mind bender. It's a mind bender. So you're lying.

Yeah. But you're a creedon. Are you though? Is this stepbrothers? Are you quoting stepbrothers and I'm not aware? No. Okay. Good.

So this is a basic question. This is a dumb question, maybe. Is Paul just trying to argue who the top of the Pantheon is? It's just, you got to, You got it kind of figured out? Yeah, no, if you read the text completely, he's not arguing who's the top of the pantheon. He's, okay, this is the difference

between somebody who's like, you know what, I'm a, I can play checkers, I'm a checkers master. You're a checkers master. That's a low bar. And you're like, man, you know what? I'm a chess master, right? And then I come in and I'm like, guess what? I invented both chess and checkers.

Y'all suck. I think this is what Paul. Paul's like, no, no, no, no. No, no, no. Yeah, and I'm going to quote a Mike statement. Yahweh is species unique, right? He is the uncreated creator. He's not just simply the head of the pantheon,

as if he is one amongst the pantheon. He is species unique. And he of himself decides to create a pantheon that is subversive that is that submits to him. And so this isn't Paul being like, I'm just arguing for Yahweh to be the new Zeus. no he's saying that Yahweh created all things including the rebellious sons of God that you have named as the pantheon of the gods their judgment is coming in fact it's already come it happened at

the cross at the resurrection let's go so now we're looking forward this is what paul talks about in in Ephesians you know that's this concept of the already but not yet the already of the breaking in of the kingdom of god right now and the not yet of the final consummation of when he will come in full glory. A wild thought, 2 Corinthians chapter 5, that Paul says that you and I are ambassadors of Christ. What does that mean? An ambassador in the Greco-Roman world

was a person who carried the power, the authority, and the presence of the one that he proclaimed. So for Paul to say that you and I are ambassadors of Christ, that means where you and I go, we carry the power, the authority, and the presence of the risen Christ himself. This is one in Ephesians too. It talks about the Holy Spirit being the inheritance, our deposit that lives inside of us until he comes back. Like the kingdom of God is actively breaking into Earth right now.

And I think C.S. Lewis in the last battle has the best image of how everything, all the things that have been corrupted by sin are going to fade away. And all the things that are always intended to be beautiful will flourish into what they were always intended to be. And this will be a return to Eden. where the earthly and the cosmic collide beautifully. My man. Yeah, I mean, I think this conversation makes me think of our last one we did with Tom Doyle about how, you know, Jesus is appearing to Muslims and dreams. Sometimes, Nate, I think you're unimpressed with me. I got, I got Luke's like, my man, Nate's like, hmm.

No, I'm just thinking. Next question about dreams and Tom Doyle. I was thinking, how do you spot fake tennis shoes? I want to know this. I want to have this Jedi skill here. Who has sold me fake tennis shoes? It's more ADD that's happening here in my head. Trust me.

You're way smarter than me. I know that. And you know what? Your book is great. I don't want to be smarter than you. I just want you to be impressed by me. That's true. Okay. All right.

Did she write a book on humility? Yeah. Hey, hey. And I read, you know, and in spirit of your book, In the spirit of your book, it was Luke's joke about the tucktuck going through the firmament. Thank you. So there's a humility.

Nate stole it. I did that backstage. I was like, this would be funny. I saw it. But your book helped inspired me to be more humble and give him the credit. So give it up for look. Hey, all right, all right, all right.

Hey. Dreams, Doyle, divine dreams. Yeah. You're talking about you. Yeah, oh, see, no, not. I'm not. I'm totally forgot. Um, that they can be able to be.

wake up and instantly have it all figured out, right? And that there's a framework there, but it's all twisted up. But as soon as Jesus shows up, they get it. And then boom, turns on. You think that's like a lot of what Paul is trying to do. It's like there's kind of a framework here. We've got to rethink all of these pieces. Because I think some of what we do is try to construct the framework, then tell them, you know, it's like we're trying to re, I don't know, to the church. I really understand. this Genesis 6 narrative was always a part of it until it just kind of faded away for a while. Yeah, I mean, so to speak.

Yeah, I think it's Romans 1213. I can't remember rough the top of my head, but Paul talks about that you and I are to live in harmony. He uses that kind of musical terminology, a la Dr. Laura Sanger. So there's just like harmony thing. And the question is, well, how do you and I live in harmony? You live in harmony when you're oriented by a specific key. So it's like, you know, we could bring the Nidars and Butterflies guys out here. I'm not sure what key they were playing in.

Whatever key they were playing in, it brought order, like they're also, right? Okay, so it's like there's a key. The key of great. Yeah, yeah. So you bring that in, that's great. The key of Wookie, I don't know, of Sasquatch. It doesn't matter, but there's a key and it brings order. And then if you bring somebody else in and they try to play outside of that key,

well, it'll create disorder. But the fascinating thing that will happen is if everybody from the first key shifts over to the other key, It's going to sound harmonious, but it's not the right harmony. It's deceptive. And what Yahweh has done for us, he's given us a key that we're supposed to live in and breathe in and act in. And that key is the key of Christ. And if we can orient ourselves in the key of Christ, I think it's going to bring that harmony that we so desperately need so that we can live this thing out in a way that will show unity to the world.

Joel, I think that, you know, a lot of us here was inspired. This podcast was inspired by Dr. Michael Heiser, and I thought it would be a cool moment to maybe share, like, one of your favorite stories with Dr. Michael Heiser that you had interacting with him, because that was a big part of your story, too, and ours. And so, and we shared that, you know, already at the conference of what Mike meant to us. But I'd love to give you just a minute to talk about that. Oh, gosh. What do I talk about?

I think Ryan, my publisher is still here. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to share this with you guys. Can I, are we live streaming this? Yeah. We are. Yeah, we are. What are you about to tell us? We'll indulge you.

We indulge Tim a lot yesterday. I could get in a lot of trouble right now. It's all right. So I'm really excited because I've got an academic book that's going to be coming out here in I think early 2026. And the working title is roughly gods of the nations, Cosmic War on the Household of God. And I want to read my, the first words

that I penned for this book are this. I said, dedicated to my friend, mentor, and Dr. Vater, Dr. Michael Heiser. Mike, you always said your biblical worldview shifted when you encountered Psalm 82. Well, mine shifted when I met you. This book stands on the shoulders of your lifetime of research. Praying this one makes you proud,

and I apologize ahead of time for my bibliography, not being beefy enough for you. See you in the Divine Counsel, my friend. Mike, some of my favorite memories of Mike, we both worked at Logos Bible Software together, and I was this punk kid that was just finishing up seminary and took like two or three years of Greek and Hebrew and thought that I could ruin, like, rule the world. I almost had ruined the world, but ruled the world. I'm tired.

Rule the world. And I really did not have a supernatural, like I was a byproduct of demythologizing, you know, or being in that underneath kind of that teaching. And I used to really debate. Can you imagine a punk kid walking into Dr. Michael Eiser's office? And he had the coolest office. He was on the, I think it was the third floor in this iron, building and it was like where all the games were we worked in this tech company and it's like all these games and library and he had like this little office in the corner and so like we just walk in and i just sit there and i would i would debate with mike that he didn't get elohem right arrogance um and the thing about mike was he never was like you are a punk arrogant kid get out of

here he'd be like so why do you believe that and why do you believe that and where did you come to that conclusion? Can you point me to the primary sources for that? What about these verses? Go check those out. And that was the beginning of a really incredible relationship of him humbly leading me to not his conclusions, but him inviting me into what the text actually said

on its own terms. And to this day, Mike and I, you know, we disagree on certain things. We disagree on the nature of the accuser in Job. We disagree on the nature of will and all this other stuff. But we united around the risen Christ, King Jesus. And that was the most important thing. Here's another funny thing, story about Mike.

Mike invited me when I worked at Logos to play in his fantasy football league. Yeah, avid, he was an avid fantasy football player. And I'm an avid fantasy football. I'm a nerd all the way through. I actually listen to podcasts. When I'm not listening to the blurry creatures, I'm listening to the fantasy footballers podcast. Like I am deep in it and I thought that I was going to come in and just crush, crush this fantasy football league, you know?

And I got in and I realized that Mike, when God created his brain, he shifted some things in Mike's brain. He's a weird man. I've never been in a fantasy football league where you had to pick not just a regular defense, but the actual defensive players for the defense. So you actually had all the defensive players and then you had to know this. sacks and the yards lost. I mean, this was the most... I got destroyed daily, like weekly. Finally, at the very end of it, he reached out and he said, hey, buddy, I don't think this league's for you. So I got kicked out of Mike's league, and I've been trying to deal with my

insecurities ever since. Well, I guess you've got to play fantasy football for a Panthers fan. Sorry about that. You had to go there, did you? Yeah, it was just. That was an easy one. That was a layout. Yeah, you know what, I'm from Chicago, so did you see the Bears, the Commander's Bears game? Yeah, that was rough for you too there. Yeah, thanks. We can talk about this later. No one really cares out here. Humility, it's catching me everywhere.

Dr. Joel Mudamale, everyone. Thank you, bro.