Theology in the Raw - 800: The Trinity, the Book of Hebrews, and Women in Evangelical Education: Dr. Madison Pierce

Episode Date: July 9, 2020

Madison Pierce is a New Testament scholar and professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. She did her Ph.D. on the book of Hebrews under Francis Watson at Durham University. In this conversation, we talk about various things related to her specialty in the book of Hebrews, specifically how the author (and we don't know who it is, by the way) weaves together Trinitarian thought throughout his quotations of Scripture. We also discuss what it's like being a female in Evangelical academia. Connect with Madison Twitter | @madisonpierce Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Youtube | Preston Sprinkle Check out his website prestonsprinkle.com If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review.

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. If you would like to support the show, you can go to patreon.com forward slash Theology in the Raw. A massive shout out to all of you who are supporting this show. Every month I get a new group of supporters. So thank you so much for keeping this podcast, this show, this ministry really going. It is a listener-supported podcast, so if you have benefited from Theology in the Raw and you would like to become part of our community, then go to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. Really appreciate your support. Thank you so much for those of you who are investing in this ministry. My guest on today's show is a rising star in Christian academia. is a rising star in Christian academia. I think most of you probably haven't heard of Madison Pierce, but Dr. Pierce is a brilliant New Testament scholar. She got her PhD in 1917.

She's really old, dude. In 2017, she got her PhD from Durham University under Francis Watson, who is just a top-notch New Testament scholar. I studied not under him, but kind of alongside him when I was at Aberdeen University. Francis is amazing. Madison is amazing. Her forthcoming, well, her dissertation is forthcoming in to be published. forthcoming in, uh, to be published. Her dissertation is going to be published by Cambridge university press in what is the most prestigious, um, monograph, uh, series. Um, I can't even, I forgot the actual name of it, but it's, it's put out by university,

Cambridge university press. And it's like, they only publish like one or two dissertations a year. And one of those dissertations in 2020 is going to be Madison's dissertation on the book of Hebrews. That's her specialty. The title of her dissertation is Divine Discourse and the Epistle to the Hebrews. In this podcast, we talk a lot about Hebrews. As you'll see, she is just, I mean, incredibly sharp when it comes to, I mean, biblical studies in general, but Hebrews in particular. I had such a wonderful time digging into the text with Madison. Just, I guess, just sort of like a warning. This is maybe a deeper podcast than I typically do on Theology in Raw. I mean, sometimes I dig really deep into scholarly issues. Most of the time I kind of address more cultural issues or theological issues from a more popular

standpoint. But this podcast, we're going to go deep. We're going to go deep into Trinitarian thought in the book of Hebrews. We're going to look at Hebrews 6. We're going to look at Melchizedek and other things that people think about when they read the book of Hebrews. We also talk about what it's like to be a female in Christian evangelical academia. I really, really, really appreciated Madison's thoughts on that. So without further ado, please welcome to Theology in Raw, the one and only Dr. Madison Pierce. Okay, I'm here with my friend, Madison Pierce, who is a professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, which is, I mean, you know, one of the top evangelical seminaries.

And we, I mean, Madison, we met through my best friend, Joey Dodson. You were a student of Joey's, is that right? my best friend, Joey Dodson. You were a student of Joey's, is that right? Yeah, Joey was my professor at Washtenaw. And I mean, really, I owe so much to Joey. He was the very first person who said, you can make it in biblical studies, you should take this seriously. He also, I mean, I work on Hebrews, I'm sure we'll talk about that. But, you know, he was the professor for my Hebrews and general epistles class. And so he is the one who introduced me to Hebrews. So I'm forever in his debt. No way. I didn't. Okay. I didn't know he, he read the book of Hebrews.

He's such a Paul guy. He takes a break from Paul. Yeah. Every now and then. So who, okay. So let's just get, get it out of the way then. Uh, who, who wrote Hebrews? Beats me Preston. The, uh, the longer answer, if you want it, is which will be no more satisfying. You know, now we talk about like an author profile. So we talk about the author is probably Alexandrian. He's well-educated Jewish. He's a Pauline associate in some way, you know, these various things. And so when I teach it to my students, um, in, in various classes,

I talk about the fact that we have people who kind of fit the profile that we know and who are, sorry, whose writings we know. And then we have people who fit the profile, whose writings we don't know. And so those are two really different things. So we can say, you know, the text has affinities with Paul or the language or the kind of theology has affinities with Paul. The language has affinities with Luke, but it doesn't exactly look right. But then when we talk about somebody like Apollos or Barnabas or others, I mean, how in the world could we possibly know if this is, you know, a reasonable composition from those people? So I told you offline that I think this is one of the most uninteresting questions in New Testament

theology. But, you know, I have opinions about uninteresting. Well, I don't have any kind of informed opinion about this. But when I wrestled with this for about five minutes in seminary 20 years ago, I remember thinking like, you know, doesn't Hebrews have a lot of like, whoever wrote or was it originally like a sermon or a speech? Is there evidence that still like, is there a lot of evidence that this has kind of reflects kind of the rhetoric of first century Alexandrian, whatever? I don't know. Is that? Yeah, that's still a live conversation. I mean, it certainly seems like the text is intended or that it is intended for oral or aural delivery. But of course, we know that letters were being read in the first century as well. And so that could just be that it was encountered in an aural setting, but wasn't necessarily a sermon, because it doesn't have

an epistolary opening. You know, nobody's, obviously nobody says, you know, so and so servant of Christ Jesus, but it does have a really clear epistolary ending, where, you know, it does seem to address some more concrete situations within the community. Those from Italy send their greetings. There's the mention of Timothy at the end, which is why we think that it's a Pauline associate. So the genre question, like the authorship question and the date question and the Providence question, are just, they're kind of open. I get the setting of the book. I guess that could matter.

But as far as the author, I think it just doesn't. Well, okay, if it was Paul, if all of a sudden we discovered it was Paul, then now we have 13 other letters or seven other letters at least that we can kind of bounce it off of, which might help us understand the letter better but i i always heard you know the best candidate i thought was apollos because he's alexandrian he's a good rhetorician you know but why so why does it have to be somebody that we have a name for what if it was you know i don't know making up some you know henry from you know like what would it does it have to be be a known figure that we know about from the text? Clearly there was probably

lots of other Christians that aren't mentioned in the New Testament. So that's why I'm like, it's not like we only have four or five candidates. We have thousands of different people that could have, well, I don't know how many were literate Christians in first century Alexandria, but I don't know. Anyway, let's move on. Let's see. This is, yeah, so not interesting. We're starting off the podcast with a non-interesting question. Tell us about your academic journey. So you went to Ouachita University in Arkansas. I'm not going to try and spell Ouachita, but so you went there, biblical studies. And what was it? I mean, was it there in undergrad when you were like, I want to be a Bible scholar? Or did that kind of tell us about your journey?

It starts a little bit earlier. So I'm a mega nerd. And this may be something that you might not quite know yet. But I actually, I felt a vocational call to teach, um, and even would have articulated that I wanted to be a theologian at like 14. Um, and so I, um, I was a very serious child. I mean, also like very weird and goofy, but, uh, you know, I had my, my parents really, um, encouraged me to take my vocation seriously. Um, you know, to think about think about what I kind of had on the horizon for myself and all of that. And so at some point when I became a believer, which was around 13 or 14, I started thinking, okay, now that I'm a Christian, you know, what does life look like from here? What am I going to do? And I was like, I was leading some small groups and stuff. And I

just realized, I love to help people understand things. I love to explain stuff. I think I actually am able to, you know, to say, say things in a different way to help them come to terms with it and everything. And so that that's what I want to do. And I started reading a lot of theology. I was reading R.C. Sproul and John Piper and all that at the time and some like very strong Reformed theology. And so I thought, yeah, I want to do this. So the interesting John Piper and R.C. Sproul at 14. Wow. Yeah. I mean, Lord knows if I understood it. I'm sure that, I mean, there's some of it that I may not even understand tomorrow. So then you went to Ouachita.

Are you from Arkansas? Why Ouachita? I'm from Texarkana, which is on the Texas-Arkansas border. So about an hour from from Arkadelphia. But there there wasn't a straight line from 14 to to Washtenaw. I actually so at some point, my youth pastor and his wife got word that this young woman in the Southern Baptist Church wanted to be a theologian when she grew up or to be some kind of minister or something like that. Because at the time, I didn't really under, I didn't have categories for all

these things. I didn't know like being a theologian means you're a professor or being a theologian means this. I thought people who are theologically informed are pastors. And so that's what I'm going to do. And so they kind of sat me down and said, I'm sorry, the Bible teaches that you cannot be a teacher. You can marry a teacher, but you cannot be one. And I was really new in my journey. And my parents had told me, you can do whatever you want. But then again, my parents were, you know, they were not necessarily attending church and all of that. So I just assumed that that message of freedom for me as a young woman was their secular, you know, worldview and everything. And so I just kind of said, okay, I've got to figure out something else. You know, I have to figure out how I can teach and fulfill this calling on my life and be faithful to scripture. how I can teach and fulfill this calling on my life and be faithful to scripture. And, um, so I started pursuing music. Um, I think they, in hindsight, I think they steered me towards music. Um, I can sing. Okay. Um, and so start, I start, so I started Ouachita, which is where my youth pastor's wife had attended as a music major and, um, and was absolutely miserable and not very good. So a couple of

years in, um, I, I got really sick. Uh, this is a kind of a long story, but I got really ill and I could not make any more noise. Uh, like no, no, uh, notes could come out of my mouth. And, um, and so I thought, okay, I'm, you know what, I'm still going to do music, but I'm just gonna, I'm gonna have to switch my major because there's no way I can be successful. And as a music major, if I can't sing and, um, I sat down in a class, um, with Marvin Pate and, uh, it was theology of Paul and we were reading theology, Paul, the apostle by Jimmy Dunn. And within a day, I knew this is exactly where I'm supposed to be.

No way. That was your freshman year or sophomore year? It was my sophomore year. Yeah. So I was three semesters as a music major and then switched over. To biblical or ministry. What's it called there? Christian ministry or?

Christian studies. Yeah, Christian studies. And then so after there, you went to TEDS, is that right? I think I first met you, I think you had started seminary. I think you were in seminary. It was a while ago. Yeah. Maybe you were even a student.

Were you even a student? No, I didn't meet you as a student. Did I watch that? When did you graduate there? I don't, I think I graduated in 10. When did you graduate there? I don't, I think I graduated in 10. Um, and I think that if I, I don't exactly remember when we met, but I feel like I bumped into you at an annual meeting, you know, probably ETS. Yeah.

And I don't even think Joey was there. I think I just said, Hey, I'm one of Joey Johnson's students and said hi or something like that. And so I get that a lot i get wherever i go in these theological conferences i feel like joey's got this whole like slew of all his like disciples that he's spreading around the globe so funny um okay so then you went to trinity and this whole time are you like i want to be a bible scholar i want to be a theologian i don't know what that's going to look like but i just want to to keep, I want to go all the way. Like,

did you know you're going to go on and do a PhD after your seminary? Yeah, I think from, like I said, from that kind of, I mean, I don't know how quickly it was. It feels like now in hindsight, it felt really quick that I was like in that class on Paul. And I was like, yep, this is what I'm doing. Theology is what I love. Like, I mean, we were, like I said, it felt really quick that I was like in that class on Paul. And I was like, yeah, this is what I'm doing. Theology is what I love. Like, I mean, we were like I said, we were reading a pretty thick tome by Jimmy Dunn. And I was like, this is I have to do this forever. And so I think that maybe a semester later. So at the start of my junior year, I think is when Joey came. And that was the first semester where like I had full pick of my classes and everything because I switched a little like a

few weeks into the semester because of my illness and stuff. And and then started talking to Joey. I actually I think you'll find this humorous given your work. I told Joey when I first met him that I wanted to work on Paul and the Law whenever I grew up. And he was like, good luck with that. So, yeah, were you into like the new perspective stuff or wrestling with all that? Is that? A bit. I mean, I wasn't given the most sympathetic initial presentation of it.

And so, you know, I was so I was reading done. And so, of course, you know, being a proponent, I was hearing both sides of the conversation. But our professor was certainly teaching a more more traditional viewpoint. certainly teaching a more traditional viewpoint. But I think I always just have this strange desire to understand how the Old Testament and the New Testament fit together. And that's exactly what drew me to Hebrews. I think my upbringing to that point had really talked about the Old Testament, the law in more negative terms. had really talked about the Old Testament, the law in more negative terms.

And then when I got to Hebrews and saw this presentation of Christ as one who the Old Testament was speaking about or, you know, was kind of foretelling and him still doing sacrifices and being a priest and all of that, it just, I don't know. I felt like I've got to fit these things together better. So was it towards the end of your seminary, you said, I want to do a PhD in Hebrews? Like, was it pretty, you're pretty, it came together at that point or? It was actually in undergrad that I decided I was doing my PhD on Hebrews.

Oh my gosh. I didn't know on what. I'm a very decisive person. Yeah, very planned out. I didn't know on what I'm a very decisive person. Very planned out. I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't, it was like my first year into my PhD program when I actually decided what to do it on.

So my, my gosh. Yeah. Um, wow. And then what was it? Was it, did you study under John Barkley,

uh, Durham? I worked with Francis actually. Oh? I worked with Francis, actually. Oh, you worked with Francis. Okay. Not Francis Chan for my audience. In scholarly circles, when we just say Francis, it means Francis Watson, who's one of the more, gosh, intelligent, I would say creative in a really good way.

Just a really fascinating New Testament scholar. I was at Aberdeen when he was there, actually. When I graduated, graduated Aberdeen in 07, I think was right when he was taking that job at Durham, or maybe he took it the year before or something. But yeah, he's a brilliant, brilliant guy. What was it like studying under him? He's very British. Yeah, he is. Um, but I loved it. I mean, I actually, I first applied to work with John Barclay and, um, and then in, in the midst of my application, um, Francis came, you know, um, Francis, we were sorry, John and I were talking about Francis being my second reader. And I guess Francis told John, I love Hebrews. I want to

supervise this. And so when I got to Durham to do my interview, I sat down with the two of them and had no idea this was coming. But Francis said, I've loved Hebrews since I was an undergrad graduate, and I would love to supervise your project. And I had just read Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith and was really excited about that option. And the neat thing is that our personalities are much, much more similar than mine and John's. Like Francis and I, you know, get along pretty well and just had a good rapport and similar ways of doing things and stuff. And he's a very thoughtful supervisor. And I feel like I never speak to a Francis student and hear that they've been supervised in the same way.

Like, I feel like he is very individualistic in the way that he cares for us. Like, you know, if you're really deadline oriented, great. Then we'll set deadlines and, you know, he'll kind of press you to see if you're on track or whatever. But if you're more free flowing, and that isn't helpful for you, then you may not hear from Francis for four or five months. And if that works for you, then it works for him. And so I really appreciated it a lot. And yeah, I love Francis very much. All of his students that studied under him said they just had a wonderful experience. And you know, And he sees from an outsider, if you don't know him, like if you're at a conference and you hear him kind of go after somebody, he can be really intimidating, especially for, you know, I don't know, I felt like the village idiot in my PhD program. I'm like, how did I even get in here? And there's always really intelligent people. And then,

you know, I just feel like if you have a british accent you sound just 10 times smarter than an american and i you know i don't know i just felt so stupid in the end and he had he's such a proper just like careful and i was so whenever i'd present a paper oh my gosh i would kind of look over and be so scared but he's he's um so gracious to his especially to his own like his own students but then he'll go after something like another scholar like to see him in barclay or other people just go head to head i'm like oh man he would shred people it's crazy he can he can certainly be be tough yeah yeah yeah he's opinionated. Yeah. So for my audience, because I imagine most of people listening probably don't know him. He's well known for his first book, his dissertation was

basically a massive advocate for the new perspective. And this is kind of in the early days when, you know, James is probably like maybe, I think it came out in 83 85 or something like that it was it was basically in the first kind of 10 years when the new perspective was kind of taken off and he was one of the early um advocates of it wrote a brilliant book and i'm reading it and saying man this is this is it was one of the books i was like i think i think this thing's right you know but then 15 20 years later and then he went off to do all kinds of stuff on gender. And then he came back and became one of the main critics of it. He did a complete 180. And that book, Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith shaped my understanding.

It made me more of a, and some people aren't going to like this phrase, but almost like a, I feel like I was, it's almost like a bardian kind of understanding of paul and i really oh yeah grew so attracted to that way of understanding paul and and what i don't know just that radical christocentric emphasis on divine agency not in kind of a classic reform sense but in a different like in a bardian reform sense and and yeah that book shaped my understanding of paul more than anything I read during my dissertation. It blew me. I had to read, I read it once early on, then I read it again. It's almost like I read it with such fresh eyes. Anyway, you're conjuring up these old memories, these great memories of my PhD days.

So tell us about your work in Hebrews then. Let's just dive into Hebrews. Tell us what your PhD and then I might ask you some other questions about this book that I know hardly anything about. That's quite right. It doesn't exist yet. It's on its way into the world. So very few people know about it. But, you know, maybe this will build some hype. So I started my PhD wanting to work on the Holy Spirit in Hebrews, again, indebted to Joey Donson, because he just said, hey, what does Hebrew say about the spirit?

And again, kind of said, beats me. And so I started looking into it and thought, wow, this is really an area that needs further exploration. I don't know if you know, Dave Allen is David M. Allen. I think that's right. And there's two David Allens that work on Hebrews, which is kind of funny. So David M. Allen is British. And he has done some stuff on pneumatology and Hebrews. But that was just kind of coming out as I was getting started. And I thought, man, there's something here. And so I did an MA into a PhD at Durham. And so in my first year, I was able to pick out one kind of thing to study first to kind of lay some groundwork and decided to work on Hebrews 3 and 4, which is a place where this never happens anywhere else in the New Testament.

The Holy Spirit quotes scripture. And so the author says, just as the Holy Spirit says today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts. And quote Psalm 95. And it's the third longest quotation in the New Testament. So lots of fun facts here. But what's interesting is the author continues this kind of, I mean, some people call it midrash or this kind of exposition of Psalm 95. And he quotes pieces of this section of text over and over again. And in our English translations, after that first quotation, it inserts the word God.

But in the Greek text, there's no qualified agent. And so what I was kind of wondering is, is it not possible that the Holy Spirit is actually the speaker all throughout Hebrews 3 and 4, that this is this extended reflection on something that the Spirit is saying to the community? And so, and I started looking into intertextual connections, because if that's the case, then the very end of that quotation is, as I swore in my wrath, you shall never enter my rest. And so the Holy Spirit is the one that offers rest. And so I started looking into these texts, like in Wisdom of Solomon and Sirach, and these places where this, not the spirit, but Sophia is envisioned as giving rest. And just different things like that.

Isaiah 63, where they outrage the spirit or test him. And so started to build a connection. Well, anyways, in service of that, wrote a little section on speech in Hebrews. And talked about the fact that in Hebrews, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit speak. And they do that in the first section of Hebrews. They do that in the second section of Hebrews, Father, Son, Spirit, Father, Son, Spirit. And, you know, thought these are the only people who speak in Hebrews. They speak in a kind of timeless recontextualized way. Um, maybe there's something there. And, um, it's a, it's a funny kind of, um, thing that, that Francis students

notice is that when you work with a lot of times, when you start a PhD, your topic is refined and it gets smaller. Um, well, if you go to work with Francis, your topic usually gets a lot bigger. Well, if you go to work with Francis, your topic usually gets a lot bigger. And so I went from working on the spirit or this one kind of passage to working on all of the quotations in Hebrews and working on the speech of three divine persons, Father, Son and Spirit. And so I end up ultimately working on every major quotation in Hebrews before all is said and done. So just kind of looking at patterns and the way that these spoken quotations, because all, again, Father, Son, and Spirit speak scripture in Hebrews, how these spoken quotations change what we know about God. So you're saying there's a Trinitarian pattern.

We talked offline a little bit, and I would love for you to go into that. There's a Trinitarian pattern throughout Hebrews that you would say is very deliberate and not just kind of, oh, it happens to be all three. There's actually a pattern going on here. Of course, anytime we use the T word, the question is, you know, what do we mean by Trinitarian? You know, do we mean like pro-Nicene or do we mean, you know, something else? So what I mean is that, again, there are only three figures that speak in this way in Hebrews. Moses speaks at one time, but it says, you know, at this particular moment in history, Moses speaks. And but when God speaks, it's for today.

And so they're the only ones. So three that are like one another, that the that the author of Hebrews implies that they are God and Lord, either, you know, calls them that or implies based on the quotations that they're using. either calls them that or implies based on the quotations that they're using. They have Kurios in them or something like that, or Lord, or the divine name. So they're the same, but they're also different because they each have a distinct conversation partner. The father speaks to the son primarily, the son speaks back to the father and the holy spirit speaks to the community and each of them has a kind of tone or mission in their speech the father his primary mission in hebrews with his speech is to commend the son for them to understand um who he is you know so

in the first quotations in hebrews one um you're my. I've begotten you. You're from the beginning, O God. And what is that in the beginning? Or sorry, I'm forgetting the quotation in verse 10, but he calls him Lord. You know, the foundations are the works of your hand or the heavens are the works of your hand. And so the son, he presents himself as faithful to the father and the spirit says, hey, the stuff that they've been saying and all the rest of it, you need to take it seriously. So, you know, today, if you hear that voice, his voice, do not harden your hearts. So I think there's a I think Kevin Rowe talks about it as a Trinitarian grammar. I think Kevin Rowe talks about it as a Trinitarian grammar. And so this kind of three persons, one essence, I think we see something towards that in Hebrews at least. Oh, that's a good way of framing it. Yeah, because I'm really careful.

I don't want to read back into the biblical author's minds a kind of Nicene um you know nice scene view of the trinity or whatever necessarily i don't want to say that can't be but i don't want to assume that it is but it does sound like the author um as cautious as we can be based on what you're saying clearly saw plurality within the god and that there are three equal yet distinct persons would that be fair i mean even if i was a not even trinitarian like like that just from an or an atheist okay i'm just reading this text based on what you're saying it seemed like this author who apollos um saw three divine beings yet we we he would um is there evidence in Hebrews that he was also a monotheist though, that he didn't see three different divine beings, but these are still part of the one God? Can we

say that from the book or? Well, so yeah, the exact relationship among the persons is difficult to discern. But what we see again is that at certain points, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are all referred to as God, as theos, and they're all referred to with what we would say is the divine name, kurios, either explicitly or, again, implicitly based on the quotation that's being used. So if it's something that's attributed to Adonai or to the Lord in the Old Testament, but now suddenly the spirit is speaking it. Well, that seems to imply that the author thinks that that's appropriate for the spirit to say that he can speak on behalf of God, if that makes sense. Yeah, yeah. Or speak as God.

But I mean, you know, whether that is the clear distinction that we need is another thing. We see interactions among the persons. But is it clear that these aren't like Lagos and Sophia, that there are, you know, three separate persons or distinct, sorry, distinct persons? I mean, that that's where there's a more difficult argument. And so here I'm kind of appealing to things like, you know, Richard Bauckham's work on, you know, on divine identity and others who have gone before me. But I think Hebrews fits with this kind of classic treatments. Yeah. Sorry, I was looking around because you mentioned Bauckham.

I just his book, God Crucified, is just absolutely brilliant. Oh, yeah. So, OK, that makes because for me and I think for most people um if we really just let's just take an honest look at the trinity okay so like from my mind you know father we have first century judaism you have already as bachem has showed out really clearly you know books like one enoch and others where you have um plurality within god is is a is a category right at home in Judaism in the first century. Not necessarily Trinity yet, you know, but like it creates space for a Christian Trinitarian understanding. So father, son, to me, that's kind of a slam dunk.

Okay. And I'm trying to be self-critical and look at these passages and um the spirit's a little harder you know the famous you know acts 5 you know it's there's certain passages where the spirit does seem to have a distinct personality um but there doesn't seem a there's not nearly as much evidence for this spirit as there is for the son and the father but now this would be hebrews based on what you're saying it isn't again if this is all we had we would be Hebrews, based on what you're saying, it isn't, again, if this is all we had, we would be totally Trinitarian necessarily. But like, it does seem to provide evidence that the Spirit is a distinct person, not just kind of a power emanating from the Father or something. Yeah, I agree.

I mean, if Hebrews 3 and 4 is all about the Spirit, then, I mean, maybe save the paraclete discourse in John 14 to 16. I mean, this is the most extended reflection on the agency of the Spirit in the New Testament. I mean, that's huge. And the Spirit is warning them on behalf of God. I mean, there are other texts in Hebrews that point in this direction as well. So one of the kind of classic warning passages is in Hebrews 10, but it's there that those who continue sinning deliberately or go on sinning or however you want to translate that, they profane the blood of the covenant, they trample the Son of God underfoot, and they outrage the Spirit of grace. And so, and I think that's similar to what we maybe see like in Acts 5, where, you know, lying to the Spirit or even grieving the Holy Spirit.

I mean, the Spirit is affected by our disobedience in a way that we maybe don't see as much of from the Son and the Father in the New Testament, at least. Right, right, right, right. Okay, a couple more things on Hebrews, and then we'll take a turn somewhere else. I'm not sure where we're at. Hebrews 6, can you lose your salvation? Oh my goodness. I don't think that's the right question for Hebrews six.

I think this isn't completely in a different direction to others who have argued before me, but I think that Hebrews is portraying a journey. So we kind of talk about this as like a cliche or like a, you know, some kind of trite presentation of the Christian walk. But I actually think that Hebrews does present Christians on a journey in the wilderness, that they are, they're the same group of people in some way as those who left Egypt with Moses, that he envisions us kind of being in the same lineage of people and that we are in progress. And where we're ending up is in Hebrews 12, where we end up at the holy mountain,

the heavenly city, you know, another name for that would be rest coming back to Hebrews 3 and 4. And so in Hebrews 6, you know, yeah, if you don't make it all the way to the mountain, then no, you cannot be restored to repentance. That's at that point, you're done. And but at, you know, this moment or 10 minutes from now, if you, you know, take some kind of turn away, then I'm not sure that that's when your Christian walk is being measured. So I think that that's a distinctive difference between a lot of how we read Paul and whether this is true of all of Paul and how we read Paul as being really focused on becoming Christian. Hebrews is about staying a Christian, about persevering, about finishing.

And I think that reading some of those other New Testament texts into Hebrews, read some of the same passages really badly. That's good. That's good. Does that make sense? Yeah. You can press me on that. Nice dodge.

No, just kidding. No, I totally, I mean, I do think that whenever we ask the question in that way, it's often like it's cuts against the grain of kind of the point or flow of the passages that we go to to answer that question, if that makes sense so like yeah i mean i you know um as i read hebrews six and other passages it's it's like yeah if you're part of the christian community and you end up falling away and denying jesus then yeah you're not you're not that shows that you didn't persevere i mean i go back to the parable the the parable of sower as told by in luke where it's like how do you know which ground is a good ground? The one that perseveres and bears fruit. Like that's, you have to look at the total life lived.

And I'm not saying, you know, so most passages I don't think are answering the question, can a one who has truly been regenerated, born again, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, fall away? I think there are some passages that are very relevant there, but I think most passages are asking more of the persevering. This Christian, even Christian, you know, somebody who's part of the Christian community. You know, if they fall away, what happens to that person without answering the question? Would they really regenerate? Were they in? Were they out? Like, I just, I don't know. Right. Does that make sense?

Oh, I totally agree. You agree with that? Am I on something here? Absolutely. Okay. Yeah, we're on the same page. I'm glad. So what's up with Melchizedek in Hebrews 7? These are all these old school kind of questions people raise, but people are interested in these things, you know? Old school kind of questions people raise. But people are interested in these things, you know?

Yeah. The way that I think about Melchizedek is that, so there are obviously a lot of different ways of explaining him that it's a Christophany. So that was actually like Jesus before the incarnation. Some people will talk about it as being a type of Christ. That's a pretty common explanation for Melchizedek. I'm going to push a little bit in and to say that that's not exactly the full picture. So to understand Melchizedek, we have to understand what text he's drawing on. what the, what text he's drawing on and the important ones. So we have Genesis 14 and that's where Abraham meets this, uh, who, you know, someone we might call a historical figure, like a human person, Melchizedek, or at least he in the text is portrayed as a human person.

He gives him bread and wine, Abraham pays them in tithes. Um, so there's something interesting going on. He's priest, he's king of Salem, but he's also priest of the Lord Most High. Well, then we get to Psalm 110. And at least in the Greek tradition, this is interpreted as righteous king, which is what Melchizedek means, righteous king, or Melchizedek. That righteous king is the same guy, rather than just being like a general righteous king who may or may not in the Hebrew tradition be a more general kind of person. Now in the Greek, it's Melchizedek. So you're a priest forever in the order or in the likeness of Melchizedek.

So that's a weird text. It's a proper name in the Greek, but in the Hebrew it could just be a righteous king? Yeah, same thing in Qumran literature. It doesn't have to be a proper name in Qumran literature either. And because Melchizedek appears there. And that's actually the third group of sources. So in Psalm 110 we have this weird thing about a priest like Melchizedek, and that doesn't fit anything because we talk about Levitical priests. But, you know, and especially if this is about David or David's descendant or something like that, well, David is not from the line of Levi. He's from the line of Judah. And then that brings us to those Qumran texts where all of a sudden Melchizedek is this angelic figure who is releasing them from the debt of their iniquities.

He is, you know, fighting these other entities. He's actually identified as God at some point. You're yeah. And I think it's an 11 Q. Melchizedek says your God is Melchizedek. And so some weird stuff is going on. And so after the Qumran literature was found, people were thinking, OK, that explains Hebrews. But I'm not sure that's entirely true. Because I think what Hebrews is doing is it's drawing on the lore of Melchizedek. So the silly analogy that I give to my students is that there was a historical Melchizedek. So the silly analogy that I give to my students is that there was a historical Melchizedek. We'll call him St. Nicholas. And this figure somehow through these different

interpretive traditions becomes larger than life. And he becomes identified as this person who never dies, who's, He Hebrews says, is without beginning and without mother, father, without genealogy, without beginning of days and of life. He is a priest forever. We'll call that Melchizedek's Santa Claus. There is some kind of correlation between the one and the other, the two connect. But what Hebrews is doing is drawing on that kind of mythical figure to say, Jesus is like him, but Jesus is better. And so Jesus is the high priest in the order of Melchizedek. Melchizedek is just a priest. And so whoever Melchizedek is, he serves one and he serves in one, or sorry, he resembles the son of God. They resemble

each other. Um, and this is one of the reasons that I'm not sure the typology language totally works because there's this, um, kind of give and take where, um, Christ is in the likeness of Melchizedek, but also Melchizedek resembles the son of man or son of God. Sorry. And so, um, yeah. So I, I'm not sure if that's the clearest explanation no that's that's where i'm at well just i mean that's i can only speak from a pauline perspective but it's it's common for paul to be interacting not just with scripture but with current interpretations of scripture so this whole idea of kind of drawing on lore or some kind of myths that surround certain ideas, you know, that's right at home and how I know Paul to interact.

I mean, that's part of my dissertation. You talked about, you know, trying to narrow your dissertation and Francis, you know, broadens it out. I went the exact opposite direction. did the exact opposite direction. They did three and a half year study on Leviticus 18.5b and how that verse was understood in first century Judaism. But it's very much like when Paul's quoting that verse, he's not so much going straight back to Leviticus, but more interacting with how that verse developed into kind of like a John 3.16 of first century Judaism. into kind of like a John 316 of first century Judaism. All right, let's leave Hebrews.

Thank you for all that. It's, gosh, it's so fun, like, just to have somebody that has really saturated themselves in a book like this. I mean, it's, yeah, I feel like, yeah, I've got a bunch of other questions I'd love to throw at you. But I want to ask a more broader question. It may be a personal question. But what's it, you talked about your journey early on being raised Southern Baptist, being told you can't go into, you know, ministry. So have you shifted your view on that?

Or I guess I've never even, I don't even know. How do you understand First Timothy 2 or whatever? Yeah, I, yeah got my view did shift. I mean, one of the important things for me was being in classes at Washtenaw. Probably, you know, I was saying earlier that for me, it feels like it was a quick shift. But there was still a point in time where I had to understand, OK, yeah, this is totally where I'm supposed to be. What does that mean? Because I still need to figure out if I can be faithful to Scripture and fulfill this calling that I feel like is on my life. um, progressive or, you know, or different, uh, perspectives on, uh, how those scriptures like first Timothy two and others could be interpreted, um, in a more, you know, so-called egalitarian

way. And, um, and it really was a progression for me. So I think I left Ouachita with an understanding of something like, um, women can, um, can teach, um, but maybe not be a senior pastor. Women can teach, but maybe not be a senior pastor. They can. But I actually had a pretty complementarian understanding of marriage still. But then, you know, I got to TEDS and I think it was my so I started in January and then in the summer took a class with Eckhart Schnabel, who's now at Gordon Conwell. And I remember him teaching the household codes in first Peter. And he was talking about the presentation of, you know, yes, women are called to submit to their husbands. But at the same time, we are called to honor everyone. And husbands are called

to, you know, in other places to love their wives. And so I think what you see in the household codes is, it's not only the kind of general exhortations to the mutual submission, but you actually see that one party is called to put themselves below, and one party is called to put the others above. And so really, if both parties, and, you know, especially in a marriage, are doing that well, then you actually end up equal. And you're always putting the other person's needs ahead of you. And whether you're egalitarian, complementarian, we know that that's how we should care for our spouses. And really, I think that the New Testament presents this kind of radical call for all of us to treat everyone that way. We obviously have these practical limitations on, you know, just kind of like burning ourselves out or, you know, really like killing ourselves, not thinking, you know, of our own well-being.

But most of us think pretty well of ourselves. We're like, we do okay taking care of ourselves and can do better the other direction. well of ourselves or like we do okay taking care of ourselves and can do do better the other direction so so so what's it what's it been like though being a female in evangelical academia has it been a good journey or did you do you feel like in some context maybe feel less than for being a female or yeah um i mean i certainly you know some of it when I early on when I was still kind of getting my footing and trying to, I mean, first of all, trying to decide, you know, yeah, is this what God has called me to do? Am I being faithful? And thankfully, God has always, you know, put people in my life who were in my corner, who were helping me to read scripture well and to to wrestle with these things. But also, I mean, people who didn't know what I felt called to do were suddenly, you know, speaking into my life and saying, hey, have you thought about getting a Ph.D.?

Hey, you're really bright. Your writing is great, blah, blah, blah. And again, you know, just had no idea where I was at in terms of processing these things. And I just, I thought of that as a confirmation of the gifts that God had given me. You know, certainly gifts that are still in progress and needing to be developed, but at the same time, like recognition of where I was at and the journey that I could continue to be on. But yeah, it's been, it's been hard. I mean, one of the harder things that's just kind of, you know, that's never going to go away is just the fact that we are a significant minority. And so, I mean, at TEDS, I think we've done a really good

job of adding female faculty. I mean, two of our three most recent hires were women. And so we've got five and five now. And but I mean, those are the five women with almost 40 faculty. And so, I mean, if you think about it, my male colleagues, they have, you know, 35 male options for for, you know, best buds. And, and so if my male colleagues have a more traditional understanding of male female relationships, you know, they don't feel comfortable being in a, you know, a more intentional friendship with a woman, especially a young woman, then, you know, that would be a really isolating environment for me. So I'm really thankful. And it has been at various places. Thankfully, there I mean, Texas and there there are scholars on both sides of this issue. And even those who are on the other side of the issue, though, I don't mean to be like so polemical in the way that I present that have been really charitable and generous and all of that. But I mean, I have, you know, my dearest friends are male and female at TEDS. And I'm really

thankful for that. Yeah, so that's I've heard that about TEDS that I mean, you have people and that Talbot as well. Talbot would probably be even more conservative than TEDS, I think. But I mean, I've heard that like, there is this, you know, kind of agree to disagree, um, on this issue, but maintaining collegiality. I mean, I've been in some contexts where that just would not be like, you would be disobeying God's word, you know, flat out, like you're, you're living in ongoing sin. So how can I teach alongside some, you know, would be the posture. So that's, yeah, that's great. That is interesting with the male-female. This is something that guys in academia just don't realize.

I mean, for years I never even thought about, you know, just what you said about, I mean, and you have five or four other female colleagues that, you know, you can go grab drinks with one-on-one or whatever. It's not a big deal. But if you, you know, after a late night teaching, went and grabbed drinks with another male faculty member, that might not be, I don't know. What do you think about that? So, I mean, I've really been wrestling with this. I mean, and I've talked about this before in the podcast. I've kind of had a very Billy Graham rule-ish kind of way of going about male-female relations and evangelicalism. And I see both, and I know that's being criticized a lot today.

But then you have all of these Christian leaders coming out with affairs and this and that. And it's like, well well i don't know okay we can't have it both ways too like if we're like you know it's dehumanizing to women to be too careful and then like well you should have been more careful as a leader it's just it's it's i don't know what the balance is like is it okay for you to go grab a bite with another male married colleague um do you have any thoughts on that i mean you don't need to speak specifically but for you to go grab a bite with another male married colleague. Do you have any thoughts on that? I mean, you don't need to speak specifically, but help me out here.

I mean, I hope so, because my career would be a lot different if men, you know, had kept me completely at arm's length. I mean, my experience in my PhD would have been really different if Francis weren't willing to, you know, go out to the pub after a supervisory meeting or to be even be one on one in his study. I mean, which technically would be, you know, a significant violation of Billy Graham role. And so, you know, I am I have benefited from male colleagues being willing not to think of me as a threat. Not that that's always the way that that those kinds of kind of parameters or rules come into place. But, yeah, I wouldn't be here if people hadn't broken those rules, as I guess what I'm saying. So, um, I mean, I think that the way that I encourage people that are thinking through this issue is that, um, one, you know, there, there's a range of situations. So, I mean,

there's, it's a, it's different, you know, you, um, you know, maybe taking an hour car ride with somebody you barely know who's, you know, whoever that might be to you having lunch with someone in a crowded restaurant or, you know, sitting in the cafeteria together if there's somebody that you don't know well or there is a kind of interesting power differential or something like that, then, yeah, maybe you want to be more careful. But I think that the kind of male female boundary for that is an unfortunate one, because, I mean, that assumes that attraction is only between men and women. And and it also. Yeah. And so that I mean, that just leads to to its own kind of kind of set of issues. But, you know, we women, y'all, y'all. Sorry, I don't mean to say like you, Preston. Um, men can not include women and get along just fine because they're the majority and they're in power. Um, but we cannot survive if men don't include us. So, wow. No, that's, that's powerful and helpful. Um, so what you made a kind of passing comment about the Billy Graham rule. It almost makes you feel like you're a threat or like all you are is a walking stumbling block. Or how does it feel, the Billy Graham rule from a female perspective?

That's part of it. Yeah, I mean, I think that there's two sides of the coin. There's one, the fact that, you know, there's a perceived possible temptation that, you know, men and women, you know, at some point, maybe they might develop some kind of attraction of some sort, whether it's emotional or physical or sexual or whatever. But so there's that. But then there's also I mean mean, now, um, I mean, I so often hear the me too movement just kind of thrown around like now in these days of me too, I can't be alone with anybody. Well, that implies that, um, that women are just running around

making stuff up. Like, you know, if you don't want to be accused of sexual harassment, then one be above reproach and two don't sexually harass women. And, and, you know, it's possible that some woman somewhere, um, or, or man, you know, someone might accuse you of something wrongly, but I mean, let us hope that that justice is served in that situation. Um, and, and let's not disadvantage all the other, uh, women who won't do that to you. I know it's, it's hard. It's yeah. It's super hard. Cause yeah. And I don't, yeah. I mean, like I could see both sides of it, but I, I, I could, I could completely, it's taken me a long time, but now I, but now I was completely blind to how that kind of Billy Graham rule can make women feel, just reduce them to all you are is your sexuality or whatever. And that's – I can only imagine how dehumanizing. Either way, it's like you said, we put women in a really tough spot when there's, in most evangelical settings, where there's leadership, teaching, whatever, you know, typically women are in, you know, a minority position.

How do we get over that? Yeah, how do we get around that? I guess there's two arguments. One is like, well, we need 50-50. We need half women, know a half met male colleagues but i i do i don't know i i do agree with the you know ink i think just the the biological fact yet the uh increasing political incorrectness of the possibility that men and women generally might have different interests so that forcing you know

making sure that every single you know tech field or whatever has 50 women 50 men when maybe more men than women might be more interested in certain things that women aren't so could it be that i don't know i'm talking out loud and I'm hoping you finish my sentence. I would say we probably, aside from the complementarity egalitarian, we probably need more female representation in theological educational settings. And yet it may never be 50-50 and that might not be a bad thing. Is that okay to say, would you say? Or how does that make you feel when I say that, when I fumble around on my own podcast?

Yeah, I think I'm with you. I mean, ideally then like all of our spaces would be representative of the whole, you know, of all the people of God and not just in terms of gender, but in terms of ethnicity and culture and all these different, you know, sexuality or sexual preference of all these different things. Maybe. So that's one thing. But whether that's a reality or whether that's possible. Yeah, that's a completely different thing. But being intentional and really, I mean, just saying, I value the voice of women or I value the voice of X, you know, minoritized group is a step in the right direction.

And not just saying that, but actually, you know, making moves in that direction. Yeah. It's also hard, too, because you can also fall into tokenism, you know, or like, yeah, oh, we hired a woman faculty because she's a female primarily. And it's like I could only imagine for you say, well, I hope I got hired because I'm qualified. Like that you want me for my mind and my abilities and my gifts, not just that I'm a female and you needed more female on faculty. That's always a hard balance so for instance a year a

year and a half ago i'll just be totally honest i don't know if i've said this on the podcast yet um i think it was a year and a half ago somebody pointed out that like 90 plus percent of my guests were men and i was like dang that sucks gosh like that's and i look back and i was like i was all defensive in my heart and i was like oh you wanted identity politics whatever then as i look back and i was like i was all defensive in my heart and i was like identity politics whatever then as i look back i'm like oh my gosh they were right and i was like so i was like i'm gonna make a concerted effort to have a lot more women on and you know people different ethnic ethnicities and so on to have more you know creational representation on my podcast but then it falls into like like yeah i mean i i didn't i ask if you if i didn't respect your theological abilities your your

academic um you know giftedness i wouldn't have had you on just because you're a woman but at the same time i'm like well i'm super excited to have one of the few female academics, you know, in evangelicalism on. So it's just a hard to not make it feel like you're a token. And at the same time, yeah, I'm excited that you are female because I have had lots of male guests in the last several months. What's that? How does that work? Am I – help me out here.

Am I on the right track? Am I, you know, a secret misogynist? No, no, it's not. I mean, honestly, the way that you've articulated that, that you thought, wow, she's really bright. I'm going to have her on or whatever. Yeah, I don't want to put words in your mouth. But, you know, I'm interested in hearing from her. And oh, and it's a her like, you know, great bonus. I mean, I always talk about my I hope that my gender is portrayed as value added or, yeah, kind of a bonus that that is not the starting point. I mean, you asked what my experience in evangelicalism or really not just in evangelicalism, but in scholarship more broadly.

I mean, I frequently have people say you got that opportunity because you're a woman. That's one thing. Oh yeah. I mean, I've like gotten jobs or, or people saying, well, you won't have any trouble getting a job because you're a woman or something like that. And, you know, and yeah, I have a job. I'm thankful for it. I know that, that I should, like, I know that that's something to be very grateful about in this, I'm thankful for it. I know that that I should like I know that that's something to be very grateful about in this in this climate. But I've also I mean, within a couple of months, I actually had an email from somebody that said, hi, we're putting together papers for this annual meeting. We are inviting you because you're a woman. And I immediately wrote back and said, no, like not even if you were more subtle about this, I actually, I don't accept. And this is, this is one of my like crazy rules. Like I do

not accept any invitations anymore that refer to my gender, like not a single one. And that's because I know so many women who have been hurt by that. Um, whether it's just like, Hey, you're really smart. Um, and we're like, we're really committed to diversity or whatever. It just, the adding that in there, I know that they're not saying that to the men that are being invited, you know, like we, we, as women should never have to wonder if we're, if we are token or if we're only being included because of our gender. And so as kind of like solidarity for my sisters who come probably after me, I just tell them like, nope. Like I encourage you to word this a different way when you invite the next woman.

I might come to you offline and get help with some of the. Because I'm actually working on a project right now. I won't say publicly exactly what it is. But I'm basically in charge of putting together a team of scholars and writers and stuff. And one of my top priorities, obviously, I want them to be qualified. But I do want 50% men, 50% women. I want no ethnicity to be more than, you know, 30% or whatever. Like I want it to be truly

reflect God's beauty of creation. But I always battle with how to even express that to people that I'm asking, you know. Yeah. It's tough, you know. No, it's helpful. I think's tough, you know, I would encourage you not to say this in this way. And, um, and he wrote me back and said, I actually, most of that, except the one line that you flagged is in the email to everybody.

I'm telling everybody that I write to that we value hearing from diverse voices, voices from, you know, across these different lines. And so for me, that was like, good, because that shouldn't be something that, you know, I don't think this is what you're doing, Preston. But when you only say that to the women, you only say that to the minorities, it almost, or ethnic minorities, it makes it sound like you want to pat on the back. You know what I mean? Like, tell me I'm doing a good job by inviting you as a diverse person. Well, there's so much. Yeah. And there's there is a lot of especially with Christians like this almost like virtue signaling hyper w just people who don't want to be that old school kind of conservative anymore or whatever. So no, this is super helpful.

I love that. State it to everybody. This is a value in this project, in this conference or whatever that I want everybody to be on board with, whether you're just a boring, white, straight, cisgender male or, you know, or whatever. Okay. One more question. What do you, so what are you working on now? You finished your dissertation. Are you going to stand Hebrews or do you have a new project that you're embarking on? Or I'm sure you got a few things up your sleeve yeah mostly hebrews um hebrews catholic epistles and um and use of scripture those are kind of the big um umbrellas for me right now so i'm working on a book for baker on messianism or messiah

language in hebrews um and i mean it's way the way, but that's something that I'm really excited about. Um, and then a commentary on first Peter. Um, and so that I'm really excited about turning that direction. So yeah. First Peter three is so tough for me because it links, it like connects like women and then slaves and then children. And I guess Paul does it too. But, and I, and I i like i when i looked into the household codes exactly what you said it's almost like you take this social really oppressive

structure and paul at least paul works within the general household code but man he's he's gutting it from the inside out without blowing apart the whole category, you know, but it still does feel like, really, you went from women to slaves and masters and stuff. And there's this kind of higher, but yeah, you know, you've already addressed that well, I think. But it's still tough, especially first Peter three, I think it's even harder than Ephesians. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Because of the link with the suffering of Christ, because I mean, that passage has been used to justify the abuse of women. because I mean, that passage has been used to justify the abuse of women. And I mean, and obviously the institution of slavery and stuff that, you know,

slaves endure hardship from your masters and women do likewise. And if you understand that do likewise poorly, then you might understand that endure hardship from your husbands and suffer like Christ. No problem. Yeah. I have such a hard time being colloquial. No. Yeah. I, I read that the other day and I just have such a hard time with it.

I really do because I, you know, I've done a lot of work in first century sexuality and I know that many slaves were being sexually abused by their masters. So I just, I read that verse and I don't know what the, I don't, I just, I want to throw it, throw it out. Honestly. I'll just admit that on, you know, I mean, I'm hoping it doesn't mean. Yeah. It's a hard, it's a really hard text. Yeah. I agree. I mean, I think, go ahead. Sorry. No, no, you go. Yeah. I mean, I think that the portrait for slaves and masters in the New Testament is much more radical than we allow. I mean, gosh, this could be a whole other couple of hours or whatever.

But, you know, the teaching from Paul is for masters, treat your slaves well. It actually, I think in Ephesians says, submit to your slaves in some way because it does say they kind of do likewise. And so treat them in the same way, submit to them in this, you know, as brothers in Christ. And so the teaching for slaves is endure what you have to endure. The teaching for masters is probably free your slaves, but Paul can't say that. But I mean, we have Philemon, and I think it gestures in that direction. But if you can't free your slaves, if that's not the right thing to do, or if it's not possible yet, then at least treat them well and be radically generous with them.

And so, I mean, that doesn't completely eliminate all the difficulty that we have in 1 Peter at all. I mean, that's a hard text, especially for our brothers and sisters who are from populations who have been enslaved at some point or are enslaved presently. I mean, I have a student from Nepal who was telling me about slavery in his country today. Um, and just in asking about how that lines up. And that was such a hard, you know, that was a hard thing to hear about. Um, you have a student from Nepal. Can I, I do. Yeah. Cause I go over there all the time. Well, I used to a lot more, but, a hard you know that was a hard thing to hear about um you have a student from nepal can i

i do yeah because i go over there all the time well i used to a lot more but um yeah where's he from is he from katmandu or um i know uh i think he might be yeah he's um he's he's jiwan rai he's amazing he's actually i since i don't know if all my students will listen to this but he's one of my very favorites i do i do have some favorites there's a few um um younger people we met that i've met over there that are just brilliant theologians and just you've been asking you how can i you know come over and go to seminary and stuff. So that's, that's awesome. Gosh. Well, tell, tell them I said hi, I guess. We probably know a lot of the same people. It's a small Christian community.

So, oh, that's so cool. I was going to ask you one more thing, but I got to go. I got another meeting to get to. So wait, shoot. We'll have to, uh, shoot. We'll have to, yeah. Sorry. Yeah. Well, thank you so much, um, Madison for being on and, uh, yeah, many blessings on your work and I really appreciate, yeah. Um, yeah.

Appreciate your voice and evangelicalism. Thank you, Preston. It's my pleasure. This has actually been like one of my things. Like I really hope someday I can be on Preston's podcast so this is a goal for me um my husband Curtis is a big fan too so yeah well I've got names that always they're always floating around in my head and then if I don't write it down then another name comes but your name has popped in my head for like last year I'm like I need to have Madison on. So this is a long time coming. So thank you so much. And yeah, many blessings

in life and ministry. Thank you.