Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 222 | How Do I Tell Someone They’re Wrong?

Episode Date: March 9, 2020

Today we answer a range of political and theological questions, including, “How do I tell my friend who believes in the prosperity gospel that she’s wrong?” “Should we be stocking up on supplies because of coronavirus?” and “Can grandparents watch over us in heaven?” Today"s Sponsor: ExpressVPN: Protect yourself with ExpressVPN and get an extra 3 months free at https://www.expressvpn.com/allie

Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort.

We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this D-Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us. Hey, guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Monday. I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. So as promised, I am going to answer some of the questions that you guys have sent me.

And this is going to be a fun episode because you guys sent me a lot of good questions. I can't possibly get to all of them. So I asked this on Instagram and I get. get a lot of you sending me the questions in a little question box, and there are literally thousands of them. So I can't get to all of them or else this would be like a week-long podcast, but I will try to get to as many as I possibly can and make sure that all the answers that I give are relevant to you whether you actually ask the question or not. So this is going to be a fun and substantive podcast episode. Hey, this is Steve Deast. If you're listening to Allie,

you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, and reality itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos.

If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about where we are or where we're headed, you can watch the Steve Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us. Okay, some questions. Some of them just make me laugh. And some of them are, um, some of them are very profound.

Some of them are too complicated for the time that we have today. But a lot of you ask really good questions and this is a really good question. How do you tell someone you don't agree with their theology? And then she goes on to say that this person believes in the prosperity gospel. So we did an episode on the prosperity gospel, uh, titled Plans to Prosper. So a lot of you ask me, hey, have you talked about this? So typically you can just Google like prosperity gospel Alli Stucky Relatable or whatever subjects you want to hear me talk on and it will pop up.

It should. But this particular I need to, I will come up. So I'm getting a new website and I'm going to be able to categorize the podcast episodes I have by particular topics. And I'll make sure that we can do that on YouTube too because a lot of you guys ask me, hey, have you talked about this? and we have. Another complaint that I've gotten, I know I'm not answering this question right away. Another complaint that I've gotten is that it's sometimes hard. Like if you want to hear me talk

about capital punishment, for example, and I happen to talk about that at an end of a podcast talking about feminism, for example, the title doesn't show, doesn't demonstrate or reflect that I talked about capital punishment at the end of it. So it can be harder for you to find it. It's harder for me to even remember. But I can't necessarily change that because the title isn't going to include every single thing that I talked about. The description typically well, so sometimes you can Google it, but I understand that's hard to find. I will try to start tagging those things better, categorizing the episodes better so you can easily navigate and say, hey, has Ali talked about this and you'll be able to find an episode? So all of that to say, I did an episode on the

Prosperity Gospel titled Plans to Prosper. If you listen to this on Apple or even on Spotify, you can type in plans to prosper question mark relatable. Ali Stucky and it will pop up. So this particular person is asking me, how do you tell someone that you don't agree with their theology? This person that she is talking about believes in the prosperity gospel. Prosperity gospel meaning you can name it and claim it. You can say, you know, by faith,

I believe that God is going to give me this promotion. I claim that promotion. I'm manifesting that promotion. That is not biblical at all. that is not Christianity. That is some form of weird new age manifestation self-empowerment gospel that doesn't align with scripture. Anytime we are asked to ask God of something, which we are told to ask God. And God commands us to pray.

And we hear that the prayer of a righteous person has great power. God listens to our prayers. And when he chooses, he responds to our prayers. He always responds as he sees fit. for example like there's another example of this like delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart the precursor to that the understanding to all of those commands to all of those promises is that we are praying according to God's will and that God being sovereign is always going to do his will no matter what like we can't push him off his throne we can't manipulate him we can't

bargain with him. We can't manifest something enough or believe something enough to change what God has planned to do. Now, we pray because God commands us to pray and graciously he has ordained prayer to be a vessel by which he moves. That is why we pray. If you've got a question about why do we pray if God is sovereign. Well, God in his sovereignty, ordained prayer to be a means by which we communicate with him and ask for things and a means by which he actually accomplishes things. And that is awesome. That's awesome for us. That's awesome for our relationship with God.

But that does not mean, as the prosperity gospel says, that we can just say, hey, I believe I'm giving this promotion. I believe this is going to happen. And that somehow moves the needle and makes God more likely to change his mind. That, again, that's a me-centered theology in which you are an earning thing. You are, you really have the power and you are the one who is in control rather than the God of the universe. And that is just not biblically correct. But people like to believe in prosperity gospel because we like control.

We like to be our own gods. We like to believe that God is just like this genie in a bottle. And then if we rub it the right way that he will come out and grant us our three wishes. We like to think that he's just a long for the ride. Like we like to think that he's just the fulfiller of our dreams to help us. reach our goals that he is just here to tell us that we're awesome and to cheerlead and to make sure that we get the things that we want. But that is not who God is. We don't see that kind of God throughout the Bible. We do see a God that blesses people, even blesses people monetarily,

blesses people materially, blesses people with health and wealth and wealth and long life. But he doesn't guarantee those things. And actually he guarantees for Christians persecution. He guarantees for Christians hardship, tribulation, even sorrow and sadness, even though there is a surpassing joy through all of those things. And there is a spirit, a spirit-fueled perseverance through all of those things. We are actually promised trials and tribulations. We are not promised in easy life. We are promised God's presence. We are promised that Jesus will be with us. We are promised the presence and the guarantee of our inheritance. The Holy Spirit is what the Bible says. but we are not guaranteed in easy life.

That's not why we follow Jesus. We don't follow Jesus for his stuff. We follow Jesus because he is Lord. Like we follow Jesus because the love of Christ compels us to follow Jesus. We love because he first loved us. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. We follow him because his love, his sacrifice compels us to do so because he is worthy of our following,

no matter what we get or what we don't get. What is so important to remember when people tell you, tell you the benefits of the prosperity gospel that even if we had nothing in this life, even if we had no monetary blessing, no material blessing, we were all alone, we didn't have a house, we didn't have any kind of material blessing to speak of. What God did through Christ on the cross is enough. It's enough for us to declare him good. It's enough for us to praise him. It's enough for us to follow him. Like in that act, by sending his only son to die for us that we might be reconciled to him

and have eternal life with him, that alone is far more than we ever deserved, far more than we ever deserved. And that alone is reason to praise him. We praise him for other gifts too. We thank him for other gifts. I don't think it's bad to even pray for certain things in accordance to his will. Now, I do think that if your prayers are filled with personal, emotion and a personal accumulation of wealth that there is probably a posturing there in your heart

that needs to be checked and that you need to, you know, be in the word and pray for wisdom and pray for the power and the ability and God's mercy to be able to repent from that and to make sure that all of us, whether you say that you ascribe to the prosperity gospel or not, to make sure that all of us are following God for who he is because he is worth that following and not for the things that we think that we deserve, the gifts that we think that we deserve and the stuff that he can give us. God is not a genie. The Bible says that God will not be mocked. He desires a right worship. He desires a contrite heart. He desires our humility. He desires our following. And he does not promise health and wealth, name it and claim it type things that the prosperity

gospel says that he promises. So for this person who asked me, how do you tell someone who, that you don't agree with their theology specifically the prosperity gospel? I think that you just say a lot of what I just said, that you stand on the truth of God's word without apologizing and that you always, you are going to be in a safe place. Like you are going to be in good territory when your theology is centered on the glory of God and not on your deservidness. When your theology is centered on how God can most be glorified rather than how you can most be glorified, like you are going to be heading in the right direction, no matter what theological issue that we're talking about. And so as you think through this,

how your theology most glorifies God, I think that you'll be able to learn how to have a with your friend. I don't know who your friend is and I don't know how she communicates and like what the best context is for you to have this conversation. But stand on the truth, stand on God's glory. Don't apologize for those things. Don't apologize for the truth. The Bible says what it says. Don't apologize for the Bible. Don't apologize for the gospel. Don't apologize for the things that Jesus says. Yes, we should speak the truth in love. That means we speak the truth in gentleness. That means that there are certain ways and maybe a certain context in which we say certain things that are true about the Bible. But if you want to have a heart to heart with your friend and just lay it all out there

so that you can say, you know, I did everything I can. And only the Holy Spirit can change hearts. Only God can plant the seed and give growth to the faith in her heart. That's all you can do. All you can do is be a faithful steward of the truth, not be apologetic for it, not make caveats, not make concessions. And I think that's what you do. You love her. That is why you are telling her the truth. That is the only reason you're telling her the truth because if you didn't love her, then you wouldn't. So great question and I love the desire for I pray that all of us have that same desire to speak the truth in love to the people around us. Another question I got, is it okay to prep slash store food for times like this, coronavirus? Of course, I think so. If you read Proverbs 31, the Proverbs 31 woman.

And who she was and what she did on a day-to-day basis, one of the verses says that she laughs at the time to come. Why does she laugh at the time to come? Because she is prepared. That doesn't mean that trouble won't come. It doesn't mean that we won't get sick. That doesn't mean bad things won't happen. But I think that we should use whatever resources we can to protect ourselves, to protect our families and to protect our homes. Understanding that God is still on his throne, that God is still sovereign, that his will is going to be done, whether we are completely protected from the sickness or not.

And so we understand that we're not ultimately in control. And the best thing that we can do is pray. We still should go about our day-to-day lives in being obedient to him and thanking him for all the good things that he has done and thanking him for whatever provision he has allowed your family to have. But I absolutely, we went to the grocery store and made sure that we had frozen food and canned food and an extra water and things like that. I don't think there's anything wrong with that at all. I have to remember as a natural warrior, as someone who, likes to be in control that I don't have ultimate control and that there is only so much that I can do. Like I want a guarantee that I can protect my family.

And I just, I don't have that guarantee and I have to be okay with that. That I serve a suffering God who is good, who is on her throne. What? I almost said her who is on his throne and knows and knows what's best and is foresaw this and is not surprised by this. is not thrown off by this. By the way, we also did an episode on the idea that God is a woman and how ridiculous and stupid, that is, and why God is, why he is depicted as father as king and Jesus' Prince of Peace and Lord of Lords and all of those masculine sounding names.

So you can go back and listen to that. I forget what it's called. God is a woman question mark, maybe, but you can go back and listen to that. So anyway, no, I don't think that it's wrong to prep or store food. for this time. I just, I don't think that's bad at all. So someone said the let dairy die movement and why are they cray cray? Well, let dairy die movement. It's just a vegan movement. I've talked about veganism before. I think you can totally be a vegan and be a Christian. I don't, I don't think there's anything wrong with being a vegan. The difference between just being a

vegan and being these let dairy die people. So the let dairy die people, they try to, they try to interrupt a Bernie Sanders rally a few weeks. ago after Joe Biden had a good night on Super Tuesday last week they they tried to go across stage with their signs I mean they just look crazy this is a huge disservice if you are trying to build some kind of movement that says you know we need to stop eating we just stop eating dairy or stop eating meat or whatever because we care about the animals because some people believe that the dairy industry is corrupt and I'm sure there are some dairy manufacturers that do really bad things but that's not

of all dairy farms, but I guess if you believe that killing animals for food, period, is bad thing. You probably think all dairy farms are bad. But this just does a huge diservice to that. Like I think that people can be vegan and that's totally fine, whether it's for health reasons, whether it's for compassion for animals, you just, whatever it is for the environment. That's fine. It's when it becomes militants, not just like this, but people who say that you can't be pro-life and not be vegan, that you can't be a good person, that it's hypocritical of you to say that you're a Christian or pro-life or whatever and not be a vegan. That's crazy. Like we've talked about this before. If you're a Christian from a biblical perspective, human beings are unique. We are

uniquely made in the image of God. We uniquely have souls. We uniquely live forever. We uniquely are in need of a savior, a need of salvation. We are uniquely involved in God's amazing plan in a way that animals, that plants are not. And so human beings, because of that, because we're made in the image of God, we have precedence. We have a far more and inexplicably more, inexplicably higher significance than any other species does. That's just the way it is from a Christian perspective, from a biblical perspective.

Our significance as human beings is not based on capacity, it's not based on ability, it's not based on age. It's not based on size. It's not based on contribution to society. It is innate by nature of having human DNA. That is part of why we are pro-life from the womb to the tomb. Now, I could get into a whole other conversation about capital punishment, which I have always, I've also talked about on this podcast before, why there is a biblical case for believing in capital punishment. And that does not make you a hypocrite for believing that murderous criminals should be executed, but babies in the womb should not be executed. But I won't get into that right the second. Maybe I'll get into that later in the podcast. But of course, so all of that said,

no, it's not hypocritical to not be vegan, to believe that it's okay to kill any animals and to be pro-life, to be anti-abortion because human beings are not animals. Human beings are different than animals. They're inherently more significant than animals. Do I think that we should steward the world? steward the world. Well, yes, we were created as stewards of creation. We should value God's creation. We can be compassionate. We can try to kill animals for meat as compassionately as possible. But it is not a requirement for you to be a moral person, for you to be a biblical Christian, for you to be pro-life, to be a vegan. I've talked about that a few times, but I just wants to reiterate. How do we explain to someone that biblically grandparents can't watch over us from

heaven? So I don't know that necessarily biblically that that people in heaven can't see us or can't watch over us technically. I'm not sure if there is a biblical support for saying that people who are in heaven don't or can't do that. I definitely want to hear it. But there is a lot of bad theology that comes out when tragedies happen. And it's just so sad, I never take that opportunity right then to correct people's theology when they are talking about their child that they lost becoming an angel or visiting them or things like that. Like, I'm not going to take that time to say, hey, that's not true. Maybe if they're my friend, later I will, and I'll try to comfort them with all the truth of the gospel that I possibly can and I will pray for them. But I'm not going to take that opportunity to rest.

reprimand them or chastised. Then the same thing if someone lost a grandparent. I just don't think that's the time. I think it's hard to speak the truth in love by saying, hey, you're wrong. Theologically, here's a Bible verse. No, your child that just died is not an angel. I just don't think that's the time for that. Now, it is true that we do not become angels when we die, that we don't become a guardian angel, that we don't intercede. Like, the dead doesn't intercede for people who are alive. They're, um, we don't like, dead people don't have like acts of power, uh, on our behalf, or they don't do anything for us. I don't think that they, I don't think it's possible for them to like leave little signs or things like that. This is why theology is so important. It's not just

this heady stuff. It's also very, uh, practical, uh, that really the reality is so much better that we don't need the dead interceding for us. We don't need. We don't need. need the dead to be here with us because Jesus Christ has interceded for us and the Holy Spirit is here with us and is alive within us, all of us who are Christians, and that's so much better than a fallible human being, um, you know, being in our stead or doing things for us or leaving a science. Unfortunately, that is just superstition that ends up disappointing people. It ends up disappointing people and burdening people beyond how they should be burdened because they're always looking out for signs. They're always afraid that they're disappointing that grandparent or whoever

has died or that they haven't noticed them enough. And it just leads to all of these superstitious thoughts and superstitious behaviors that I think ends up in fear and insecurity rather than in comfort and in strength. But the reality is that we have an ever living God who as Christians is here with us, who heals our broken heart, who binds our wounds. The people who have died, who have gone to heaven, they can't do that for us, but our living God can do that. We have a Savior, the Bible says, that sympathizes with our weaknesses, who in every way has been tempted as we have and yet is without sin. That is the Jesus that we have.

That's the Jesus who intercedes for us. We have a Holy Spirit. Jesus says that he is our helper, that he is with us, that he comforts us, that he reveals to us truth that is found in God's word, that he gives us wisdom. So we have something so much better than the idea of our grandparents that we love becoming our guardian angels. I don't know whether they can see us. I'm just not sure about that. But this idea of the dead becoming these agents in our life is superstitious and not based on the Bible.

And like I said, ends up leading more to hurt than to comfort. And we have a God of comfort already. Like we have a God of peace already who is infinite and who is so much better. than any of our kind of superstitious ideas that we can contrive can. Someone else asks, are you Baptist or Presbyterian? I am Baptist. I was raised Baptist. I did go to a Presbyterian church for a little bit in college, and I really liked it.

Pastor was great, and there's a little bit more formality, a little bit more ritual and routine at Presbyterian churches. They obviously are Pado Baptist, and for the most part, they believe in infant baptism. I don't believe in infant baptism. I believe in believers baptism. There is the idea in pedobaptism that it is like the new covenant in the way that the Old Testament, the old covenant was circumcision that set Israel apart. It was a lot of Pato Baptists believe that that means infant baptism advocates.

They believe that the new covenant is represented by infant baptism. I just don't see that represented in the new text. Testament. Belief always precedes baptism in the New Testament. Now, there are, there are instances, for example, of the Centurion who believed, and he was baptized in his entire household. But again, that doesn't say that his entire household didn't believe. I think that's a secondary issue. There are a lot of people that I love, that I respect, that I follow, that are theologically solid, that I learn so much from that know so much more than I do, that are Pato Baptist, that are great.

Like we can get along on that. That's not a salvation issue. That's just a theological disagreement. And I'm happy. I've actually talked to some of you about that disagreement before. And I'm happy to talk about it some more. Is it okay for a woman to be a pastor? No.

I've talked about this as well. Women in the church is what it's titled. It's on YouTube. It's anywhere you get your podcast. And so I will let you just listen to that. And you can let me know what you think. Oh, two questions right in a row on Harry Potter. So I did not grow up reading Harry Potter.

I wasn't allowed to read Harry Potter. I had friends who read Harry Potter, but my parents didn't let me. My husband did and loved Harry Potter. But now recently, he's kind of like not as, he used to defend it a lot. Like whenever I would say Chronicles of Narnia are so much better than Harry Potter, which they just are, even though I've never actually read Harry Potter. I've seen some of the movies. and Narnia, Lord of the Rings, all way better.

Now, I just so I don't know enough about Harry Potter to be able to like give you a good theological answer. I know there's magic involved, but I wouldn't say that would be the sole reason, maybe because it's witchcraft that people see. But there's witchcraft technically like in the Chronicles of Narnia as well. And I would highly recommend you reading the Chronicles of Narnia to your kids. I mean, I am the biggest C.S. Lewis stand, I think, on the face of the planet, even though I disagree with him on some things, theoretically. I love Chronicles of Narnia. Like, I think it's important. I think fiction is wildly important for not just children. I actually think it's important through no matter how old you are. But fiction is so good for the imagination. It's so good for creativity. It's so good for becoming better thinkers, more critical thinkers, for becoming. better writers, becoming better readers, having just a better understanding of our worldview. I think

fiction is so vital. And if you cut out everything that is imaginative or everything that is make believe, well, then you don't have anything fun to read to your kids. Now, I'm not promoting Harry Potter at all. Like I said, I wasn't allowed to read that growing up, but I don't think we're going to allow our kids to either. However, I don't think that we can draw the line. and say everything that is make-believe or involves a witch of any kind like chronicles of narnia or a lord of the rings i know they don't have a witch but um should be cut out i i don't think i don't think i'm on board with that um difference in protestants and evangelicals so evangelicals are protestants um why are there so many different religions there always has been a lot of different

religions. Keep all things trending narcissism coming. We'll do. We'll do. Let's see. Most embarrassing moment of your life. Ooh. Most embarrassing moment of my life. Well, so there was a time. This is gross. So if you don't like gross stories, then you might just want to fast forward. It has to do with vomiting. So if you don't want to hear that, then you should probably just fast forward. So when I was like 15, I was on a date with someone in high school, way too young to be dating. By the way, of course, I didn't think that then. And I would have pitched a huge fit if my parents hadn't let me go out on dates when I was a teenager. So I'm already trying to figure out how we're going to prevent our kids from doing that when they're high schoolers. My parents are laughing, listening to this. But I went on the date. When I was 15, it was like a Valentine's Day Day. It was probably like one of my first dates ever.

and we went to a restaurant and then we went back to his house, you know, his parents' house. We're in high school here. And I just did not feel good at all. And I knew I didn't feel good. But I was on a date. Like that's 15 years old, nervous, all that stuff. I was like going to leave him. I don't want to ask him to go home before my curfew, which was like 1030 or something like that.

And so I was just like, oh, I do not feel good. I feel like I'm going to throw up. This is what I'm thinking in my head, but I'm not going to tell him. So I did not tell him. I was like, I'm going to make it home. So we go to leave. We go to his car and I get to his car. I just couldn't hold it anymore.

So I turned around. I threw up all over his parents' front porch and in their entryway and in their bathroom. I can't believe I'm like cringing. I might even be getting red thinking about this. Oh my gosh. So embarrassing. I got over it. And we actually ended up dating for a few months.

which is amazing. Maybe he says something about him. You go, dude. That's really nice of you. Oh my gosh. So disgusting, so embarrassing. I'm sure I've had super embarrassing moments since then, too. I can't remember, but that just sticks out of my mind. It's one of the most embarrassing things that has ever happened to me. It's college for everyone. Thoughts on taking a gap year. No, college is not for everyone. Charlie Kirk is a great example of someone who didn't go to college and has become wildly successful. You don't have to go to college for everything and I think that's increasingly true that you don't have to college isn't necessary for everything that you want to do what is your favorite book of the Bible love genesis and love effusions um let's see how to be content in singleness that is a difficult thing to do especially

depending you know like on who you are if you are someone who really desires to be married some people just don't, but I would say surround yourself with good friends, surround yourself, try to surround yourself with people who are in your same life stage. I know it can be hard when you feel like all your friends are getting picked off, like all of your friends are getting engaged and getting married and having babies and you want all that, but you're not there yet. It's totally normal to feel like you're missing out. But the reality is that the Bible says that singleness is a gift and can be a gift because

you don't have the distractions that married people do and that people with kids do. and I know you might be thinking, but I want those distractions, but the Bible says that it can be a gift to be single. You can draw close to Christ. And if you do get married and have kids, you will be married and have kids far longer than you were single. So you can take advantage of this time to build friendships, to do acts of service,

to spend time in the word, uh, and do things that you just wouldn't have the ability and the freedom to do if you were married or if you had kids. And ask God for contentment and for peace in this time. They're going to be days when you do feel peace. You feel totally content. like, I'm great. And this is wonderful. And there are going to be days when you feel anxious and you

feel really sad about it. And that's normal. But Christ is with you and he is steadfast even when we are not. So just a couple, couple more questions. A lot of you guys, a lot of you guys ask me about birth control. And I have talked about birth control before. And I don't remember which podcast episode. I think it was probably another Q&A. but so I think the heart behind it is what I am most concerned with now there are birth control pills and I just don't know enough about every single birth control pill brand there are birth control pills that make the uterus basically inhospitable for a baby to be able to grow so for an egg to attach to the uterine wall so it depends on if you think conception starts at fertilization when the sperm meets the egg or implantation when the fertilized egg actually

implants itself into the uterine wall. So there are birth control pills that even if you have a fertilized egg makes the uterus inhospitable so it can't implant itself into the uterine wall, but the egg is fertilized. Same thing with an IUD. That's what happens with an IUD as well. It doesn't always prevent ovulation. It doesn't always prevent, I don't think. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong someone on this. It doesn't always prevent the egg from being first. fertilized, but it does prevent it from actually implanting itself into the wall. Now, there are some people that that doesn't work. You do get pregnant on birth control.

You do get pregnant with an IUD. And if you get pregnant with an IUD, that can be big trouble, which is another reason why a lot of people don't like it. But so it depends on your stance on when conception or when life actually starts. Does it start at fertilization? Does it start at implantation? And that also affects your view of something like Plan B as well. I think that the mentality behind things matter. So I've heard John Piper talk about this before,

that there might be a period of time and a marriage in which it may be appropriate not to have children. And his reasoning, which I generally agree with, his reasoning for that is if you are doing that for the sake of ministry. So for the focus of ministry, if there is a period of time in which you need to focus all of your energies and efforts onto a particular mission. Now, people have babies all the time in the midst of mission, and it's great and it's beautiful and it's a blessing.

But that is his one time that he says, you know, that's when you, you know, when there might be a biblical basis for not having kids. For the reasons of travel, for the reasons of just personal enjoyment, for the reasons of personal freedom and convenience, those are not biblical reasons not to have kids. now for my husband and me we didn't have kids for the first three years and we were actively trying not to and i don't know if that was biblical or not yes we were in a lot of transition like we were moving places we were moving jobs we were financially not fully stable and so we just weren't in a place of really thinking about that and then when we became stable and our jobs and financially and all of that we did and we got pregnant and it was great uh i can't tell you i can't defend

necessarily that that was the right thing to do, that that was the biblical thing to do. And now looking back, I wonder if I had a faulty, if we had a faulty mentality of this kind of worldly thought about kids, that kids are a burden, that kids are a hindrance, that kids inhibit you for doing the things that you want to do. I do not think that's a godly or a biblical mentality of kids. I think that there can, there is flexibility and there is space for wisdom to be exercised when it comes to certain situations. which bringing a child into it wouldn't be the most, you know, judicious thing to do. Sure,

I'm definitely willing to have that conversation here about some of those circumstances. But in general, if we are viewing kids as a burden and as a hindrance, it is something that we just think are icky or that, oh, we're not going to be able to go to Europe. If we have a kid, like I don't see the basis for that and the support for that in the Bible. And yes, there are other problems with birth control hormonally, just what it does to your body. I was on birth control for acne at one point. And then it was like for regulation. I don't even remember.

I wasn't using it to actually control conception when I was in high school and college. Trust me. But I was using it because a lot of people were like a lot of young women were just on it to regulate themselves through acne, whatever it was. And it wasn't good. Like I never felt good. My skin was not good when I was in college. They were constantly changing my hormones.

were up and down. It was moody. It was just, it wasn't good. It's not, I don't think it's good for most women. Now, maybe some women with PCOS, maybe it's helped you, but it just doesn't seem to be, it doesn't seem to be usually very healthy and how God, uh, intended things. I can't go into every single form of birth control and say, this is good. This is not in this circumstance, this might be okay. In this circumstance, this might be okay. I think that in general, the heart, behind birth control and why you as a married person are not having kids is the most important thing. Oh goodness. There are so many, so many good questions to have. I saw a really funny one and I can't find it anymore. Someone asked me whether I would rather have Miley Cyrus or I think

it was Ilhan Omar as my personal assistant. Oh man. That's really, really hard. I don't know. I don't know. I don't think that I can. I don't even know if it was Miley Cyrus or someone. I don't even know if I can answer that. I can't trust either of them for very different reasons. I love would you rather. If you follow me on Instagram, sometimes I do like Q&A on Instagram and I give y'all good would you rather. I'll have to do that one episode. I'll have to come up with a really good would you rather and you guys can discuss. I'm really good at coming up with absurd, ridiculous. Would you rather? I don't know. God just gave me. God just gave me a gift in nuts. When he was making me, he was like, this is just one thing I'm going to be able to put in your brain. Also really good at Madlibs. I'm really good at

like stupid things that don't contribute anything good to society. Hopefully I'm good at some other things too, but I'm also good at like really ridiculous things like Mad Libs and Would You Rather? So if we ever are all relatable listeners, if we all get together and have a MadLibs party, that would be the time of my life. Okay, that's all I have time for today. Thank you guys so much for listening. I will be back here on Wednesday. Hey, this is Steve Day. If you're listening to Allie, you already understand that the biggest issues facing our country aren't just political. They're moral, spiritual, and rooted in what we believe is true about God, humanity, and reality

itself. On the Steve Day show, we take the news of the day and tested against first principles, faith, truth, and objective reality. We don't just chase narratives and we don't offer false comfort. We ask the hard questions and follow the answers wherever they leave, even when it's unpopular. This is a show for people who want honesty over hype and clarity over chaos. If you're looking for commentary grounded in conviction and unwilling to lie to you about

where we are or where we're headed, you can watch this D-Day show right here on Blaze TV or listen wherever you get podcasts. I hope you'll join us.