Theology in the Raw - Bonus Q&A: How Can American Masculinity Benefit From Diverse Cultural Perspectives, and More!

Episode Date: January 8, 2025

0:00 Introduction 1:53 Will we be naked in heaven?   8:42 Are there any ways that you observe American masculinity norms would benefit from a more diverse cultural perspective? 12:47 Who do you think wrote Hebrews? 14:20 What is your view of David and Bathsheba--rape rather than consensual? Couldn't she have resisted? 16:52 I am happy and flourishing in our church. My spouse is not. What do we do? 19:20 John 15:3...we're not called to be like Christ in this way right? What are your thoughts? 23:22 Do you have suggestions for how to talk to a spouse who gets hostile with key topics when genuine curiousity increases tension and elicits confrontational responses? 27:55 Old earth or young earth? 30:11 Thoughts on Luigi Mangione and the national response? Babylon seems like they want to free him. Is motive important? 33:13 Solomon's great wisdom didn't help him in the end. Shouldn't we read it through the lense that Solomon wandered from God? 36:51 Leviticus 17 prohibits eating blood. Jesus tells us to drink his blood. Can you reconcile this? 38:16 How did Christ's incarnation, death and resurrection change anything besides the need for the sacrifice? There's still so much injustice and suffering in the world. 42:08 "Leadership" has different secular and biblical meanings. Does the word "authority" differ in the Bible as well? 45:43 The new church I attended had a kids service with raffle and door prizes--it felt "icky." What are your thoughts? -- If you've enjoyed this content, please subscribe to my channel! Support Theology in the Raw through Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/theologyintheraw Or you can support me directly through Venmo: @Preston-Sprinkle-1 Visit my personal website: https://www.prestonsprinkle.com For questions about faith, sexuality & gender: https://www.centerforfaith.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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who are already using Logos. And okay, so they just released a new version and it's more affordable than ever. And here's the thing, you can try it for free for 30 days. And if you go to Logos.com forward slash theology, you can take advantage of an exclusive theology in the raw extended two month free trial. So go try it, try it out. It's risk-free. Go check it out. Lagos.com forward slash theology. Will we be naked in heaven? Are there different ways that American masculinity could benefit from a more diverse cultural perspective? Did David rape Bathsheba? How should you talk to a

spouse who can get hostile about key topics? Who do I think wrote Hebrews and many, many other questions like these that I'm going to address on this bonus Q&A episode. What happens every month is I get a bunch of questions from my Patreon supporters, and I address them in not one, but two bonus Q&A episodes that we're doing now per month. If you want to become a Patreon supporter,

you can go to patreon.com forward slash theologyandraw and get access to many perks like the ability to ask questions. I also want to remind you that the exiles conference is really filling up. In fact, we already sold out of our early bird special. We had 300 early bird tickets available. Those are gone. We do have a next tier of early bird tickets.

They're a little bit more than the previous early bird special. So I think that special runs out, I want to say February 15th. So if you are planning on coming and you want to take advantage of that price, then go to theology in the raw dot com and you get all the information there. Again, excels conferences is going to be in Minneapolis, Minnesota this year, April 3rd to 5th. We have a stacked lineup. And I, I mean, I say this every year, so I'd almost want to say it like this one's going to be a lot of I, I mean, I say this every year, so I'd almost want to say it like this one's going to be the best one ever, but I think it is actually really dive it into some really, really, really important

topics talking about the gospel and race after George Floyd, we're talking about social justice and the gospel we're talking about is the evangelical church even good for this country? We're talking about transgender people in the church. We have a drum roll, please. A special pre-conference that is going to be an event hosted by the holy post. Oh my word. We've been working on this behind the scenes and I think I could still, I could finally announce it that the holy post is going to be at the at the Exiles Conference and just many, many other cool things happening at the conference. Again, theelgenrod.com. All right, let's dive into our questions. Okay, first question is from Tim. He says, my nine-year-old daughter wants to know, and by the way, these questions are voted on by the other patrons. So this was the most highly

voted on question, which I thought was really interesting. Tim's nine-year-old daughter wants to know, will we be naked in heaven? First of all, I always like to make a distinction between heaven and the new creation. Quick 30 second overview of the afterlife. When individuals die, they go to, if they're in good favor with God, they go to a place called heaven. And if they are not in good favor, if they're not currently believing in Jesus, then they go to a place called Hades. These are temporary and I think disembodied states of existence. This is one of the rare times when humans can have a kind of a body, soul separation. Now we know very little about these temporary, uh, intermediate states. Uh,

we give a kind of a window into Hades and that parable and Luke 16, but it's a parable. So we gotta be careful reading too much into it. There's a couple of passages that kind of mention this temporary state in heaven. You know, Philippians one, Paul says, if I die, I'll be with Christ. And that's all we kind of hear about his existence immediately after death. So there's not much to go on there. You have second Corinthians five, one to 10, which is a little tricky of a passage. Is it talking about the resurrection? Is it talking about the intermediate state? I think it's probably in intermediate state. You have the souls crying out from the altar in the book of Revelation chapter six, I think. But beyond that, we don't really know much about

our temporary existence in heaven. We know a lot more about our eternal, or our everlasting existence in the new creation. Christ returns, raises the dead. That's where we all are given resurrected bodies. John chapter 5, both, whether you're in Hades or in heaven, you'll get a resurrected body to face judgment. And then you will go to either into the new creation or into Gehenna is one term used to describe hell or the lake of fire or outer darkness. There's lots of different metaphors and images that the New Testament uses to describe that everlasting state of existence on the other side of resurrection. Okay. So technically, will we be naked in heaven? The answer is, well, we're not going to have bodies in heaven according to the majority view, which I do hold to. So the category of being naked is doesn't know you're not going to have a body saying I can be naked.

Now I think what your daughter's actually wanting to know is more like, um, in the resurrection, uh, will we be naked? I mean, we don't have a lot to go on, okay? What we do have to go on is our resurrected bodies will be like Jesus. I think, you know, Jesus, His resurrection is the first fruits of more to come. And when Jesus was resurrected in the few passages that we see Him in His resurrected state, Luke 24 is probably the most extensive one, John 21 actually more. Mark says almost nothing and Mark's shorter ending about Jesus' resurrected state. And Matthew says a little bit, but really Luke 24 and John 21 give us the most insight into that. And we don't get the impression that Jesus is naked. Like in his conversation with the two disciples in Luke 24, he kind of shows up and he's walking with them and they don't even know it's Jesus for a while

until he breaks bread and you know, um, real reveals himself to him in the breaking of bread, which is really interesting. If he was naked, they'd be like, well, dude, like put on some clothes. Like they, they, we don't, we don't get the impression. He was, you know, walking around buck naked in, in, in his, in his. And John 21, same thing. So, I don't want to read too much into that, but that might suggest that we won't, we too won't be naked, or maybe that was just his earthly resurrected state, but his, you know, kind of everlasting resurrected state, maybe he won't be clothed. I don't know. I, all, if all we have to go on is Jesus's resurrection in the few passages that are referred to

in the Bible, we assume He has clothes on. There are other New Creation passages, namely Isaiah 65 to 66, especially Isaiah 65. I want to say verse... Oh, I don't know. Just go read both those chapters. And that kind of gives an old Testament, more vague picture of our life and the new creation. And it's very, it's very earthy revelation, 21 to 22, lots of metaphors going on there, but that also kind of gives a window into the new creation.

And it doesn't explicitly say whether we will be naked or not, but you, you, again, you get the impression that this is a very earthy existence. Like, picture your life on earth now only without sin. And if we do that, you know, clothing is actually such a big part of our creational existence. So, I do wonder if that might suggest that we will be clothed in the new creation. Now, the best argument for nakedness or for from the south nakedness is well in Eden, people were naked. So isn't the resurrection a return to Eden? Yes and no, it's not simply a return to the original pristine existence. It is, it's like, I mean, given the flow of the biblical narrative, it is, it is more

than that. It's like more than Eden. It takes into account the progression of the unfolding story of, of God. So I don't think we can simply say because we're naked and Eden, therefore we will be naked in, in the re in our future everlasting resurrected state. That would be, I guess, the best argument for nakedness in the new creation, but I don't, yeah, I think we have to take into account the unfolding biblical narrative. So, I'm going to lean towards, I'm going to lean towards no, although no, we will not be naked in our resurrected state, but I want to hold that very loosely because we just don't have a lot to go on. Okay, next question comes from Micah. Given my international travels, are there any specific ways that I've observed American

masculinity norms would benefit from a more diverse cultural perspective? So just to give context, I think I've been to at least 30 different countries. I've been to the majority of European countries, Spain, Germany, France, Italy, Greece. I've been to Turkey, been to all of the countries in the United Kingdom, three countries in Africa, Kenya, Uganda, and Zambia. I've been to Nepal, the South Pacific, Mexico, Costa Rica, Australia. So, but that's, I feel like man, that's a lot of countries, but it's actually still

a small sampling. So I actually can't say, like I've never been to South America. The farther South I've been to is Costa Rica. Never really been to Asia. I've been to Singapore a couple of times for like a couple of days. Never been to China, Japan, Korea, Philippines. So I can't really speak to an Asian context.

Nepal is right smack dab in middle Asia. So I can speak to that. But so I don't have a ton to go on, but the biggest thing that stands out when I've gone to countries outside of European countries is that it is more, how do I say it? It feels a lot more male centered, male dominant than countries in the West that America can't, you know, North America or Europe. So in that sense, yeah. I, if you're, I don't want to always spin it back, you know, turn it back into a complimentary egalitarian debate. But if, if you're complimentary and you're going

to find a lot more support for that position, if you travel to countries outside of the West, you're going to see a lot more an assumption of quote unquote, male headship, male leadership, male men sort of in control or looked upon as being the leaders in your community, in your church, and so on and so forth. Although you do have, I mean, it's interesting. I've never been to Iran, but, you know, Iran is very what people might call patriarchal as a culture. But the church in Iran is spreading like wildfire. It's spreading a lot. Like the growth of Christianity in Iran is pretty impressive. And it's largely carried on by women leaders in the house church movement that's going

on in Iran. That's something that's just fascinating. In a very male dominated patriarchal kind of culture, the church is extending through female leadership. You also see, from what I hear in a lot of the church movements in Asia, especially like China, same thing, like it might be very male dominant, but the church is, is growing largely through female leadership. So, so I don't know. I want to always assume that American anything can benefit from learning from a more cross-cultural perspective. But if we take all that into account, I think the egalitarianism that is much, I would say egalitarianism is much more pervasive in a, in Western context, much more than non-Western context. So take it for what it is. That doesn't

mean it's right. It just means that just it is what it is. That doesn't mean it's right. It just means that, um, uh, just it, it is what it is. Who do I think wrote Hebrews? Uh, I don't know. And you don't know, um, if you had a gun to my head and you, and you had to say, pick one biblical character that is the best candidate for writing Hebrews or actually speaking Hebrews, which was later written down. I would say Apollos. I think that, I think he is of all the named people in the New Testament. He would be my top candidate for two reasons. Number one, most people would say Hebrews is Alexandrian in origin. I won't get into all the details there because I don't think I can repeat. I mean, you just go to a commentary and look it up and people show why it's Alexander in

an origin. And also most people say that the book of Hebrews was originally a sermon. It has a lot of rhetorical qualities. And again, there are scholars who have shown why that is. And we also know, I guess, thirdly, that Apollos is from Alexandria and he is a great rhetorician. We see this in, oh, what is it? Acts 18, right? That he was a great orator from Alexandria. So, given all those assumptions, I think are pretty valid. We know Apollos is a great orator. We know Hebrews is from Alexandria. We know Hebrews was originally a originally sermon. So the best candidate, if you add all that up is a policy. But again, uh, we just simply don't know. Next question is from Philip. What is my view of what David did to Bathsheba as rape rather than like a consensual, um, a, a consensual relationship. Um, couldn't

Bathsheba have resisted this affair like Joseph did with Potiphar's wife. Well, my, my quick answer is I don't know. Uh, but I, I have recently come across the work of Carmen Iames, who has done a lot of work on this. She wrote an article for CT. If you just Google it, you might, you might have to have a subscription, but she wrote a really fascinating, uh, easy to read short article on why, um, the whole off the author of second Samuel, where this event occurs, portrays the event more as rape than a consensual adulterous affair. Now it was adultery because both David and Basheba were married, but that's different than saying that the like non-consensual adultery, but we're with all the blame would be put on David. She, she made some really good arguments. In fact, I am having Carmen I'ms on the podcast very soon to talk about this very thing. I'm really

excited about this because apparently she has gotten a lot of heat over her view. She told me that, yeah, she's, she's gotten kind of blasted by certain people by suggesting that it was rape and not a consensual affair. So, um, most of my life, I, I was assumed like probably almost all everybody growing up that this was a consensual fair, you know, Basiba is out on her, you know, bathing naked for David to see, and she kind of lured him in and Carmen shows that at least from her perspective, that that the text I talk to Carmen about this. So right now I just, I just, uh, I have a lot more study to do on this, uh, before I come down strong on it, but I will say in reading Carmen's article, um, that, uh, she makes a pretty compelling point. I think she's a pretty good, uh, a good, uh, a good, uh, a good, uh, a good

person. I think she's a good person. I think down strong on it. But I will say in reading Carmen's article that she makes a pretty compelling case. So we'll see in a couple of weeks where I land. Next question from anonymous patron. I am happy and flourishing in our church. My spouse is not. What do we do? Should we find a new church? This is one of those questions

that I just can't speak confidently. I can't give a really confident answer here because I would need to know much, much more about who you are. The person who asked the question, who your wife is, your relationship. I would need to like really hang out with you for a while to get to know both of you, to understand your relationship better. And then I would also need to probably need to get to know your church situation a bit better too. So I just don't have enough information here to go on, uh, to give a definitive answer. I would almost want to focus more on the, the, your deeper, the deeper relational issues that might be going on that would lead to

one spouse finding a church community awesome. And the other spouse not finding it awesome. Like, like what's between you two? Like what's, what's, what's going on there? I would almost want to focus on that before I dissect the church and evaluate the church. Is this a good church? You know, should, should your spouse get it together and flourish in this church? Or is it the church's problem or is it something within you and your spouse's view of the church that is more the problem? But yeah, I mean, ideally, again, not knowing your specific situation, if I was in a situation, so if I could speak to my relationship, if I was in a situation. Hey friends, I hope you enjoyed this portion of the Patreon Only Q&A podcast. If you'd like to

listen to the full-length episode and receive other bonus content like monthly podcasts, opportunities to ask questions, access to first drafts of my research and monthly Zoom chats and more, then please head over to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw to join theology in the raw's Patreon community. That's patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network. Hey, so I'm launching a new season on the podcast, The Doctor and the Nurse. World renowned brain coach, Dr. Daniel Lehmann joins me as a co-host as we dive deep into the mind and the brain of everything high performance. I've been fascinated for years as I've worked with top athletes, high-powered CEOs, Hollywood actors, and all high performers in all types of

different fields of how they break through pressure, ignite drive, how they overcome distractions, how they put fear on the bench, how they tap into flow state, and just dominate all these different areas of high performance. So on this season my good friend Dr. Daniel Lehmann will break down what is actually going on in the brain in these different areas, and I will give actionable tools to be able to use and apply in your life. So buckle up, the doctor and the nurse

on the David Nurse Show coming at you. Hi, I'm Haven, and as long as I can remember, I have had different curiosities and thoughts and ideas that I like to explore, usually with a girlfriend over a matcha latte. But then when I had kids, I just didn't have the same time that I did before for the one-on-ones that I crave. So I started Haven the Podcast. It's a safe space for curiosity and conversation. And we talk about everything from relationships to parenting to friendships to even your view

of yourself. And we don't have answers or solutions. But I think the power is actually in the questions. So I'd love for you to join me, Haven the Podcast.