Theology in the Raw - Can You Really Learn the Bible on Social Media? Colby F. Maier

Episode Date: April 16, 2026

Colby F. Maier is a pastor, speaker, and founder of Academy of the Bible, a global online discipleship platform that brings together world-class instructors to help Christians grow in biblical literacy, spiritual formation, and real-world application of Scripture. With a combined following of over 4 million across his platforms, Colby is known for communicating biblical teaching in a way that’s both deeply relatable and powerfully relevant to everyday life. This interview was recorded in person in Portland Oregon, so if you’re listening to this podcast, you might want to pop over to the YouTube version so he can see us hanging out in person.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Social media, it's a net negative for society. Should we have a presence there? Absolutely. Right? Like, that's the new marketplace. So it's like we got to have a presence there. Because if we don't, that's a vacuum and who's going to fill it? But the question is how do we engage it in a way that is going to help people in their spiritual formation journey?

Hey, friends, welcome back to another episode of Theology Round. My guest today is Colby Meyer, who is a pastor speaker and founder of Academy of the Bible, a global online discipleship platform that brings together world-class instructors to help Christians grow in biblical literacy, spiritual formation, and real-world application of scripture. He has a combined following over 4 million people across his platforms. That's how he came across Colby. Saw him online. It was kind of everywhere.

I'm like, man, who is this guy? He's got just like massive following on social media. He found out he pastors like a pretty small church. And unlike, well, unlike some people with mass. of online followings. Colby is incredibly humble and genuine and down to earth and just loves Jesus, knows his Bible like crazy, super thoughtful. And I just absolutely love this conversation. This interview with Colby was recorded in person in Portland, Oregon in Colby's awesome studio. So thank you to Colby for letting us use your studio. So if you're listening to the podcast,

you might want to pop over to the YouTube version so you can see us hanging out in person. Okay, please welcome to the show for the first time, the one and only, Colby Meyer. Colby, welcome to your studio. Exactly. Welcome to Portland. Thank you, man. You are doing fantastic work in a space that I think there's probably a lot of noise out there, but your stuff is so thoughtful. Take us back. Where did you grow up?

What's your Christian journey? How did you get into wanting to study and teach? to Bible on a really thoughtful, in-depth way. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, I first came to faith when I was 17 years old. So basketball was my life. Like I was a diehard basketball player, loved Kobe Bryant in the Los Angeles Lakers, like Kobe Shaq, D. Fish, like I was just enthralled with the game of basketball.

And then I had a bad injury when I was 17 just before I was about to go off to university. Okay. And as a Canadian, I'm from British Columbia. So we don't get a lot of, we didn't get a lot of exposure south of the border. So this was like before social media was a thing, really. This was before like all that, you know, wherever you live, you can kind of have the same exposure. This was before all of that. So I remember me and my mom, we would, she'd film every game that I played and we would send tapes to all the NCAA Division I university.

So she was their original influencer. She was the original. She was captured every moment. And she was incredible. Parents, both my parents are amazing. they're still living Canada, but so supportive. And they just, we sent out tapes after tapes. And then right before we had some major interest from, you know,

we had some Brown, Cornell, some Ivy League schools, some schools like Portland State actually was one of them, Portland University. So a bunch of them were like, hey, man, we're excited to meet you in, you know, we had some AAU games south of the border. And we only get this like, so it's called Team British Columbia or the British Columbia Provincial Basketball Team. Basically, they curate the top 12.

of high school basketball players in the province of BC, and then you go play AAU tournaments south of the border during the summertime. So we had a big tournament my senior year in Las Vegas called the main event. And I remember the week before that tournament, all these, I remember all these division one schools were, hey, man, we're so excited to meet you in Las Vegas. And I'm like, this is my moment. I got to show up, got to play well, had a really bad ankle injury, the practice before Vegas. And so I remember feeling so defeated, just feeling like I lost my identity, not sure who I was or what I was doing or what the meaning of my life was apart from basketball. So it was really like an almost an existential crisis when I was 17 years old. You know, everything was in the game of basketball.

And I remember coming back from that practice and just feeling so defeated, had my ankle wrapped in ice. And I was flicking through the TV channels. and I came across the DreamWorks animation just by chance, Joseph King of Dreams. And I don't know if you've seen, have you seen Prince of Egypt? Prince of Egypt, yeah, yeah. Prince of Egypt. So it's akin to that. It's the dream works presentation of Joseph's story.

And so just looking at how Joseph, you know, born into a special family, then he was, you know, betrayed by his brothers, sold, you know, thrown into a pit, sold into slavery in a foreign country. thrown into prison and his story gets worse and worse and worse. And then when the things seems like nothing can get worse in his story, God redeems him from the pit. He redeems him from the prison and puts him into second in command in all of Egypt next to Pharaoh. And I remember thinking, like, wow. Like if God can redeem Joseph's story like that,

certainly he's got my story covered too. Like my little ankle injury. Like what's that to God? you know. And so that summer, I read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. In a matter of summer. In one summer? Three months. Three and a half months. I was in the text every day for hours. Wow. And for the first time, like in my life, the words of the Bible weren't simply a ancient artifact. It was like, man, these are living words. You know? So that for me was the birthplace of my, of my, of my, of my, my, my, my, uh, my, my, my, giving my, my, uh, my, my, my, my, my, uh, my, my, my, my, my, uh, my, my, my, my, heart to Jesus and turning to him. And I remember that summer at the end of that summer, I was baptized, started attending a local Bible-believing church with my grandparents in rural Canada.

Everybody was over the age of 75. So I was the youth of the church. You were the youth group. I was the youth group, yeah. And yeah, I got baptized, received the Holy Spirit, and I have been never the same sense. Wow. Did you immediately want to go into some? kind of like teaching, pastoring Christian ministry at all? Or did that come later? Man, honestly, I was never in my, I wanted to, if, you know, if I wasn't going to play professionally overseas, play basketball overseas, like some of my former teammates, they're playing in the NBA, they're playing in Europe, playing in Turkey. And so I said, if that doesn't work out for me, my plan B is I want to be, I want to get into sports medicine. Okay. I want to work with athletes.

I want to, you know, be hands on with athletes, be able to walk them through their injuries and whatever. And so that was like the plan B. I had never in a billion years had any desire to enter ministry or anything like that. Not even close. Okay. Yeah. So you did end up going to a Bible college or seminary, right? Okay.

So what sparked that? Just a desire to want to study more and grow more? Yeah. Yeah. So the pastor of that rural church in Canada, he really brought me under his wing. And I remember like this guy was the most authentic. transparent. Like there was, I mean, he's pastoring a church, 35 people.

Everyone's over 75, except for me. I'm like thinking like, man, this guy doesn't have a large platform. You know, he's preaching to people who have been in that church for years. But there was something so sincere about his faith that was so attractive to me as a young guy. Like I was like, man, there's something, there's something to this. Like beyond simply the scripture speaking to me, I'm like, look at this guy's life. You know, I want that. Like, whatever that is, like, I want that.

and he really took me under his wing and he he brought me under his wing he mentored me he taught me the scriptures I would just spend hours with him in the scriptures and he for the first time he's like hey do you want to you want to teach bible study sometime you know this is like after like six months of me going to the church you know I'm just coming to faith and he's like how would you like to how would you like to to teach the Bible, you know, do Bible study with the 70, 80 year olds. How would you like that? I was like, okay, like, I'm interested. So he just, he kind of just sat alongside me and he equipped me.

Like, he wasn't trying to entertain me. And I thought that was really, looking back in retrospect, like, he wasn't trying to keep me in the church through entertainment or through, you know, the fog machine, so to speak, right? It was like, we didn't have any of that. And so he was like, you know, he really brought me under and he really just, I just gave me a passion for service and for ministry. I ran the PA board in the back of the church for the first year

while I was doing Bible studies. And that for me was like my first taste of ministry. And then he, oddly enough, connected me to a pastor who was also a basketball coach in Alberta, Canada. And the pastor said, man, this guy, he's a basketball player. He can play the game. and he's actively involved in ministry. So he recruited me.

So I got a full ride scholarship to this small Bible college in central Alberta to play basketball and they had a theology program. So I was like, man, I want to study theology and play basketball. I can't imagine myself doing anything else right now. I'm going to test it out. And I, dude, I fell in love with the program there. Fell in love with the, you know, I did my intro to Old Testament. was my first class with an old Harvard university professor used to teach at Harvard

archaeology, Dr. Larry Hur. He's pretty well known in the archaeological community. And I took an intro to OT with him and, man, blew my mind, dude. I want to be in this. I want to learn the word. I want to be in more involved in ministry. And yeah, that was kind of the launching path for that. But still not wanting to be a pastor? Not, I mean, unknown at that point. I was like, you know what? Like, do I just want to study theology or, you know.

Yeah. But I think it became kind of the clearest route to be able to teach the Bible for me, to be able to teach the Bible. Not that that's the only route today, but it seemed to be like an easy route to be able to teach the word, to be able to be in ministry, and to be able to serve people. And that was really my heart for it.

So, yeah. So you're a pastor now and you help found and run the Catholic me of the Bible, we'll talk about that a little bit. So when did, like, I want to talk about both of those, maybe first the, you're, you're pastoring right now. Like, did you, did you, did you start the church? When did you actually want to become a pastor? Maybe you didn't want to, and you just became one.

Yeah, yeah. I think, you know, I really was excited about church planting. Okay. So I was, you know, when I was 17 years old, one of the churches, I'm from British Columbia, as I mentioned, so one of the churches in the Pacific Northwest that was really popular in the 2000s, late 2000s was Mars Hill Church. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So this, I used to drive down as a 17-year-old, new to faith, like didn't, you know, pretty new, didn't know much. And I'm going down to Mars Hill. You went to church in a different country? Not every weekend, of course. But I popped in periodically because I was like, I was interesting. Like, what's going on?

Like, this is a church plant. You know, this is interesting. It's innovative. So there was something to me about the innovation of ministry. in a context as very post-Christian. There's a lot of, at times, antagonism towards church or the idea of church, right, in these kind of context. So I thought, man, this is kind of interesting,

like what this guy's doing, what this church is doing, to connect with people. And, you know, in all honesty, as a 17-year-old who was doing a lot of stuff I shouldn't have been doing, it was kind of like some of that met me where I was. Sure. Like, I think the Lord used that in that season to really meet me in that season.

But that kind of gave me an idea like, man, like I wonder what church planning would look like one day. I think that was a seed that was kind of planted for innovative ministry in very post-Christian context for me. Okay. Yeah, yeah. So after I graduated with my theology degree, I got a youth internship at a church in Portland. Okay. Just a small, medium-sized church in southeast Portland and working with the youth there. and they said it's for one year, you know, so would you be interested?

And I said, well, it's close to home, you know, not too far from British Columbia. I'm like a five-hour drive from the border from here. So close to family. And it's also this type of climate that I want to be intentional about reaching people in. I don't want to speak to the choir. I don't want to preach to the choir. I want to try to reach people that maybe have presuppositions about the faith, maybe have ideas that, you know, simply aren't accurate.

or maybe it's, you know, popular Christian culture has given them these ideas that simply aren't biblical. Like, I want to reach those people and represent the faith in a way that's biblical, that's honest with the text. So that was my heart. So I moved out here in 2018 after I just graduated with my master's degree in New Testament. And I came out here and we started what would be a Bible study in this, actually in this room. Oh, really? In this room. Yeah, yeah. I've been here in this in this place for seven years. So it's been like a ministry context slash studio for me. And so we got to be able to do Bible studies here. We got to be able to just invite people from the community. A lot of table fellowship, a lot of breaking bread together. And so that was kind of the birthplace for what would be Bloom Church. Many years later. So we launched in the middle of the pandemic, which is a whole, Different story, but yeah.

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Is that part of a denomination? What's the age group? Yeah. Theological makeup. Yeah. So we were, we started off trying to, when we started the church with the, with the core team, we wanted to work with ARC. And now that ARC, if you're not familiar with that, it's a launch, it's kind of a launch large approach to starting churches. And you know what?

After like further thought, I was like, maybe this is not the best way to reach Portland is through this kind of this branded kind of launched large approach. And so the pandemic happened in 2020. And I remember thinking, man, like we got a, like, Arc was not in the launching large mode anymore. Like you can't do that, right? During the pandemic. Yeah, yeah. So they're trying to figure out their thing.

And we're like, what are we going to do? So we just started to like meet in homes really small. We started to meet outside in, in, in, in parks and different outdoor garages. and we had our soft launch service on a rooftop parking garage downtown Portland. Yeah. Yeah, it was like we had like we had to divide people out. We had 30 people for one service. Everyone was masked up.

This is like at the peak of the pandemic. I think this was like October of 20, of 20, yeah, 2020. So we had everyone masked up, everyone six feet apart. And we had two different services of like 30, 40 people each downtown Portland on a rooftop parking garage. We're just trying to make it work. Right? So, you know, we weren't connected to any church planning network or organization at the time. We were just doing our own thing. And the Lord brought us a lot of different traditions. People in our community, I mean, we got Anglicans, we got Methodists, we got some reform people. As a whole, I would say, it's more contemplative. So there's a lot of focus on spiritual disciplines, on prayer and fasting. And, and, and, and, and communion, table fellowship.

We really want to get into the cracks in crevices of Portland and do life together with people. Yeah, yeah. What is the biggest challenge doing ministry in Portland? From an outsider's perspective, it's like, you just hear super progressive, people are hostile to the faith, the city's burning down, you know, at least during the pandemic, you know, you see these videos and stuff.

Like, is it as intense as some people might think, or is it kind of more diverse? than that. That's a good question. I think, you know, the media often blast it, you know, for whatever reason they could find to blast it. And it's simply, you know, misrepresentation. I think there's a lot of, I think that the numbers, the data says about 94%, 905% of the city's unchurched. Okay. That's what the data says. But what, in my opinion, there is, even though people aren't attending church per se, there is a heavy focus on, on the spiritual life. Okay. And I mean, that looks a lot different for a lot of people here.

You know, there's a, there's a lot of the occult here in the city. There's a lot of, you know, sorcery and witchcraft and all this different other stuff that people are into. But it's, it's a misguided worship. It's a misguided spirituality. And so I think there's a longing. Like, I think people have a longing to connect with the transcendent. They have a longing to connect with something outside of themselves. And it's just a bit misguided.

They're looking for it. So I would say there is a bit of a maybe an animosity towards institutional religion as a whole. Or even like I would imagine the reputation that Christianity might have. Right. Not necessarily individual Christian churches necessarily. Correct. Correct. Yeah, exactly right.

I think that what they hear in the media about what Christianity looks like is like, well, if that's what they believe, I don't want anything to do with that. Maybe it says they don't have as much exposure on one hand. And on the other hand, a lot of people that come here had religious upbringings that were very toxic and very harmful. And so this is where they escape to this like oasis where you can be whatever you want to be. You can, you know, you can live your truth and I can live my truth. And postmodernism is very, very clear, you know, ubiquitous here. So I think that.

It's a lot more de-churched than just completely unchurched. Exactly. people that have had some experience in the background. Exactly. Exactly. That makes a big difference. Yeah, it is. So when you're trying to reconnect with people in that context to kind of show them like,

oh, actually, that's what you've been taught. Like, that's really not biblical. Like, that's a very common Christian caricature of the faith versus what the text actually reads, which makes it pretty interesting. I was having a conversation actually just this morning at the coffee shop just down here. and someone was saying, you know, what are you up to today? I was doing a podcast, you know, doing a podcast and, in conversation, I'm going to have a conversation with Dr. Preston Sprinkle.

And they're like, what are you talking about, you know? And I'm talking about, well, we can talk about a few things, but, you know, he's a great scholar. It talks about, you know, what does the Bible say about homosexuality? What does the Bible say about? Oh, yeah, I went right there. And they were like, no way. Like, I've always, I've always wondered that. Like, I'm not, they're like, I'm not religious or I'm not, like, that's not for me,

but my dad is, you know, he's coming to faith. And I'm like seeing the transformation in his life, she says. And she's like, I'm curious. Like, I'm genuinely curious. And I don't know really where to direct him. He's getting his theology from TikTok. And I don't really, I don't really, yeah. So she said, I don't really know where to direct him.

And I said, well, you should check out this podcast. I mean, we're going to. And, you know, so we just went after it. So it's pretty cool to see in the city. There is a, there is a receptivity. There is a curiosity. There's an openness, even though. there's not like an acceptance of like we're not just going to embrace it because it's a cultural thing

right it's got to be something that we you know uncover for ourselves like is this true um so yeah it's a bit it's a bit of a nuanced new on nuanced city for sure interesting all right the academy of the bible i i i would love for you to talk about how you even thought of this i mean um for those who don't know i mean this is a yeah really amazing platform for understanding and learning the Bible. Colby's not paying me to say this. This is an advertisement. This is all pure.

I mean, you have like amazing professors. I mean, I saw like you have Trump or Longman and E.J. Gupta and other like legit scholars that are that are teaching classes through it. Where did the idea come from? Well, tell us maybe what it is. And then where did the idea come from? Yeah. Yeah.

So the vision behind the academy was that like, well, we were reaching people online. And there's a, there's a strong bend towards this TikTok theology. And I'm like, man, this is not a pathway for discipleship. Like, if this is what we're going, we're in trouble. Because what works online is what's sensational, what's, you know, what's, you know, a smooth reading of theology does not get the viral hits that demonic possession, exorcism does. You know what I mean? So what I'm saying is like there's a caricature of the faith online that really is only

one-sided. It's a one-sided monopoly of it. And I'm like, man, we got to show people. We got to bring into people. we got to disciple them into something deeper into something richer than just simply a 60 to 90 second short form piece of content that's religious or Christian or whatever

we got to bring people into something a lot deeper where they can be disciples so to speak but they can have some of the best thought leaders in the Christian faith and learn from them do lives with them, Q&A's with them, courses by them to funnel people into something

that is going to be a holistic, hub for Christian discipleship. So we want to teach people about, you know, health and relationships. We want to teach people emotional healing. We want to teach people about like the principles that they can use of the Bible to apply to, you know, being a parent, being a better

a father, being a, you know, every kind of subject of everyday life. We want to walk people through that and equip them and empower them for that. So that's really the big vision behind it. When did you start it? So we started this last spring. Oh, he just started it. We're just

under it's been like maybe 10 months in. So you did a lot of pre-launch stuff because I feel like I've heard about it for a while. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's been, the beta program has been open for about 10, 10 months. Okay. Yeah. So we were kind of promoting the beta program for a while and still kind of working through, you know, who we're going to be our kind of our selection of scholars that we wanted to work with or different thought leaders and how many courses did we want? We were figuring all that stuff out the last eight to 10 months. How do you get the scholars you've gotten? I mean, you just reach out and see if they're interested in filming something? Some of them, honestly, I mean, even yourself.

Like I read your book, People to Be Loved. I think it was in 2021, 2021, I can't remember exact the year, but I remember being like, man, this guy, the way you approached it spoke more volumes than the conclusions that you arrived at. And it was done with such humility, with such honesty, Preston truly. Like, you're not paying me to say this. but like it seriously impacted me man and I was like you know what this is what we need this honest approach to scholarship that is like man what does the text say you know what's the extra biblical literature say like how can we how can we honestly arrive at a conclusion that's fair honest and and trustworthy and your book did that for me when I read it on such a

important topic right to dissect and I remember thinking like this is the type of you know the heart of a pastor, mind of a scholar. Like this is what the church needs. And so I just started to reach out to people that have impacted me in that way. Like Dr. Nijey Gupta. Yeah, he's awesome, right? Yeah, he's awesome, man. I mean, he's just down the street.

Like, it's Portland local. And so it's really, really cool just to see the people that are doing this. You know, Tremper Longman, another guy. He's got a heart of a pastor, mind of a scholar. And these are the people that I feel like we need to am amplify their voices, right? We need to amplify for this generation because I'm like, man, we are, we are going to be going down a wrong route if we don't course correct real quick.

And social media and all that has so much to do with it. I want to keep, I want to linger there for a bit because, yeah, I feel like we in the wake of, I mean, what, the internet, social media, and then even social media's changed, it's not social anymore. It's more just like dumpster fire, you know? And it's just, I don't know. I feel like it's weird like the eye of the storm of some pretty cataclysmic cultural changes. And I'm just trying to think through how much does a church resist adapting to that?

And how much does it missionally engage in the new cultural moment we're in? You know, do we just like not do anything online? You know, just like stay offline. I don't think that's the answer. It's like, okay, let's engage. Okay, well, do we replicate the kind of 90-minute TikTok theology with better content? Or is there something problematic with that form of theological education? It sounds, I mean, it seems like you have thought through this and you have a good kind of eye to like what works online, but also how can we foster depth and critical thinking and decisive?

in a way that doesn't play into some of the thinness of other forms of quote unquote theological education in 90 minute soundbikes. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's it's really a it's a tricky thing. I think as a whole what I'm seeing is that people are gravitating. I don't think this was always the case. I think people are gravitating number one to more long form content is making a resurgence. So podcast format longer YouTube video I mean there's that's that's research that's coming back to the four. But I think there's also a very, very strong interest in deep biblical theology. Like I think people are, there's a, there's a strong interest that's becoming more and more

central. People don't just want a shallow answer to their faith. Gen Z does not want a shallow answer to the faith. Pat answers to human suffering. They're not looking for that. They want their discipleship journey to be informed deeply by theology. And so I think people are looking for more, even online, people are looking for for content that is more informed, theologically. The way I've always viewed it is I want, I want the social media, the short form content to funnel into something deeper.

I think you reach people with a net as far and wide as you can, and then you let them know there's something, there's something more. So I try to do both and, but I think that it's like sometimes I'm like, man, am I feeding into the problem that I see? You know what I'm saying?

Yeah. Like am I feeding into that? Because I think it's social media, if I was going to stand back from a vantage point, it's a net negative for society. Right. In and of itself. In and of itself.

Sure. Net negative, for sure. Now, can the Christians occupy the town hall, the meeting hall, the place where everybody, all the voices interact, there's so much noise going on, chaos going on. Should we have a presence there? Like, absolutely, right? Like, that's the new marketplace of the ancient world.

Like, is social media, is the digital age. So it's like, we got to have a presence there. because if we don't, that's a vacuum and who's going to fill it? And so I think we have to be there. But the question is how do we engage it in a way that is going to help people become more and more in their spiritual formation journey? Why do you think people are getting more interested in long-form content? You said it's making a resurgence.

Nobody would have predicted that. But then the classic example is, you know, Joe Rogan, most popular podcast, you know, three, four hours of just bantering. I mean, but all the most popular ones, I think the Theo Vons, the, but Tim Dillon, I've been just, you know, they're all comedians, I guess, you know,

or Jason Bateman, what's that one? I think, I don't know, I've never listened to it, but. Yeah, I know, I understand. Anyway, like, it's like some of the most, and, like, podcasting is, and even YouTube is like, some of those popular channels

are far more popular than like CNN or even like Fox News, which is I think is the most popular, you know, but like these kind of other media outlets or whatever, it's like this new media, this new independent kind of outlet is, is massively influential. But it's going,

but the, it's going long form. Why is that? I think, I think there's a growing dissatisfaction with, with like, we want something deeper. It's encouraging.

I'm like, oh, yeah. I mean, yeah, it's, it's great. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's, if you,

I mean, I mean, if you're a theologian, this is like, this is it. I mean, this is great. This is like, we can't, like, we can't redact our theology into 60 second clips. Yeah. It's very difficult. You tried to. It's like, man, well, I got questions after you give me that, right?

It's like, so where are we going to break that down? Where are we going to dissect that? It has to happen in long form. It has to happen. And I think people want more honest takes about what people actually think. Okay. Like, I think people are, like, looking for a raw, genuine response to, like, hard questions. And you can't do that in 69 seconds, man.

Like you can't. And if you pretend like you can, I mean, it's probably going to be, you know, like that sensational type of to try to get the algorithm going. You know what I mean? So I just think that long form really brings that where people can like, what does Preston actually think? What does Colby actually think about this? Like I want to hear from them. I want to build that relationship, you know, relational equity with people and learn more about their heart, you know. And so I think people are longing for that. This episode is brought to you by Mosh, by go-to protein bar that not only tastes great, but also helps me live intentionally. Not only is Mosh a great-tasting snack. It's also packed with ingredients that support your brain and body like Oshuaganda, Lions' Maine, Omega-3s, and other ingredients that help support focus, memory, and mental clarity. They have nine delicious flavors, including plant-based options in chocolate chip cookie, hazelnut chocolate chip, and my personal favorite, peanut chocolate.

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Or is it like a single program? Is it a hodgepodge of classes people can pick and choose from? Yeah, exactly. It's just a catalog of classes across a plethora of different topics. And so, yeah, like I said, we got emotional healing. We got early church, early Christianity, early Christianity. We got apologetics. we got addiction and recovery.

Like we got all different. So practical and theological, like traditional like seminary type courses. Yeah. And then also some really practical things. Yeah. And it's go at your own pace. I mean, you can go as quickly as you want, as slow as you want. But we really focus on it.

We want you to, we want you to engage with the scholars too. We want you to have like some if you're Q&As and live events where you can ask your questions in real time. Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. So it's not all pre-recorded. Do you do some live events?

Yeah. With different scholars and different teachers. and so, you know, I host a couple two monthly, you know, Q&As and stuff like that as kind of a host facilitator. So I, yeah, we got a few different classes, but we're continuing to grow the catalog. I mean, right now we're in conversation with a few different publishing houses who, as you know, when you publish a book, you have rights to, they have rights to any course content that you might make for that book, around that book. So we're talking to Tyndale and to different publishing houses right now in conversation to be able to, hey, can we license some of these? Okay. Because we really value this person's voice.

So an author has a book and they could create a course out of the book. You do all the filming and everything. Yeah, yeah. Work out some kind of agreement. Yeah, yeah. Or we do, we film it like, so it's an Academy of the Bible original. We have a few of those. Okay.

And then we have some that we've licensed. So we have probably right now half and half of the ones that we have licensed from others. and then some that we have, or Academy of the Bible Originals. Here's my question. How does something like this on a business level succeed with so much like free content out there? Or you have, you know, in free content, some of it might be good, you know. Right, right. But then you have something like in your own backyard, the Bible project.

And then you have tons of other paid, you know, stuff out there. How do you wiggle into that environment? Or is it not saturated? Like when I look, I'm like, gosh, it seems kind of saturated. Right. You just recently started. It sounds like you're doing really well. And the content you're producing is so good.

And so aesthetically, that's one thing I also appreciate. Because I've seen some stuff with the content might be pretty good. Yeah. But it's like, dude, was this filming like 1984? Like, come on, man. Yeah. And yours is just, yeah, it's, I appreciate the time and care you put it into making it, make sure it, like, looks good, you know.

Yeah. Yeah. I think that there's a lot of, it is oversaturated. There's a big, big market for it. And there's free content. There's a lot of free content. But I think also that we want to be a spiritual, a place of spiritual formation. Okay.

Which is so much more, as you know, than just an intellectual assent to the faith. Like, we want to be a hub for, like, we want to be hands on as much as we can, you know. So we want to walk with people and help them experience life transformation, not simply, oh, I'm going to download this course. and know it here. We want people to actually change, we want them to change their lives in this area of their lives. So that's unique.

Yeah. With this kind of field, online theology content. Yeah, because I think a lot of it is information. I mean, we live in the age of AI. We don't have a shortage of information. Right. Information is everywhere.

It's accessible. It's free. It's whatever. But how can I take what I've learned and now apply it to this domain of my life? Like, I think that's something that will continue to be more increasingly important is the transformation formation component of our faith because you can't you can't

simply download that you can't simply ask AI that right so I think that's kind of what this next step looks like what are the challenges with a media platform in accomplishing that when it's not embodied because there's there's do not face-to-face people right well you know online Q&As to some extent like what yeah what I mean the challenges I guess are kind of obvious, what are you doing to try to overcome some of the two-dimensional challenges for discipleship? Yeah, I think something we want to continue to move towards. Well, number one, helping people find local churches, like in their area, because it's like, we're not, we're not your pastor. Right. Like, we're, we can't, I mean, there's a certain disconnect there,

right? We can try to walk through as a whole with a group setting, with a collective call, etc. through certain topics and issues that people are wrestling with. But like, we're not able to pray over your sins, right? We're not to pray with you and help you over, you know, that, we're not your pastor. So there is a bit of a, you know, we have to get people to know that, like, there's a local church for a reason where you live, and this cannot be a replacement. It can complement where you are in your local context with your local pastors, but we can't, we can't do that. So we emphasize that they've got to be plugged in. And we want to help also find good Bible believing churches in different areas that we can recognize.

recommend people to. Right now the issue is we have people from all over the world. I mean, half of our audiences from the U.S. The rest of it is from, it's from India, from, we get people from China. Really? Yeah, it's all over. And there's, it's crazy. Every time we get on those calls, where in the world people are coming from. You know, it blows my mind from South America, from Europe, from Australia, from Thailand. It blows my mind. So it's a beautiful thing, but we also don't have the resources to to send people in those areas. Like we don't know churches necessarily in those areas yet. Yeah.

So it's tough. It's a bit of a challenge. Yeah. How do you screen like if you're recommending churches, let's just say in the U.S., like how do you, do you have friends, no friends, no friends, like connections in the area? Yeah. Yeah. Connections in the area.

I mean, we look at, you know, what is the tenor of that church's theology? What is their path for discipleship? what is there, kind of look at some of those different aspects to what they're doing already, and then say, is this, is this a place that we feel like we would, it would be a good place to send our students to or recommend our students to? And that's always evolving. That's always changing, right? But yeah, friends of friends recommend good churches in different areas. Like California, we've had a few different recommendations for churches there and so on and so forth. So it's, it's a bit of a, that's why we're in beta mode. We're still figuring that stuff up.

I don't know if you're allowed to say this, so we can edit it out if you want. you're a pastor and you run the academy of the Bible. These are two different things, right? Yep. Which one do you love more? Or tell me about how these two interact. Do you just live like two different lives or do they intersect on some level? Where do you feel like you get the most life out of?

I mean, so I don't take a salary from our local church. Oh, okay. Yeah, I don't take a dime from our local church. I wanted to, we were reaching a younger demographic. So our debt to income ratio as a church was like unique. So our giving was substantially low for a number of years. And I just said, I don't want to take a penny from the local church. I would rather find, create another nonprofit, another ministry, do something separate outside of that so I can give my time fully to the church.

I would even if, you know, I would show up and teach every single Sunday regardless. Like, that's just a rhythm for me. I love doing that. I love, I love teaching the word. And the academy is also the online expression or the online platform for me to be able to build bridges between, you know, short form content, long form content, and then hopefully one day in person. Like we had a, we had a gal show up this morning from the academy from, from out of town.

She's just coming through. She's like, hey, I'm just in town. Like I'm a part of your academy. Awesome. Like we love, we love that. And so we're trying to connect these, these dogs. thoughts. Okay.

But it's, can I say one of the other? I don't know. I'm always going to believe in the local church. I'm always going to believe in it. I think the local church truly the hands and feet of Jesus on earth. Yeah. Like we got to, we can't replace that with anything.

Yeah. It just won't work. Well, it sounds like you're doing similar things for both. You're primarily doing teaching, right? At your church. You probably have other people around you that help to some of the day-to-day pastoral stuff. I mean, and then also obviously Academy of the Bible.

as a teaching in discipleship ministry. So, yeah, it wasn't a gotcha coach. I'm just curious. Getting called out by the parishioners. That's good. Yeah, you don't take a dime from the church. You never have. No, no.

I mean, years ago when I was a pastor's assistant in Canada, but yeah, when I, when I, when I, so is it more in principle? Or, I mean, I just, I like Bible. I like the idea of bivocationalism in a church context. Like, I love the idea of tent making. I love the idea of like, like we're pulling all our resources together to see the mission of God unfold in the city around us.

Right. So like what can how are we all making a sacrifice to that end? And I'm not saying that I don't, I'm not, I would never say that I don't think pastors should get paid. Right. Like I would never make that. Honestly, to some, to some extent, it's a disadvantage because your time is divided, right? So if there's, if there's pastors that are like, hey, like, you know, I just know my lane.

And so I like to, you know, I can't, you know, I can't, you know, shepherd every. everybody, be there for everybody. I can't. I teach and I do some pastoring, but I can't be at all, right? Well, if you're forced to, since you're not taking money, you have to earn an income elsewhere, which is going to cut into your hours in the week. So the pastor being paid is, right, going to have a lot more time to do to devote through the ministry. There is that, that, I do like the, at least the idea of your ministry at the church being disconnected from paycheck. There's something, I don't know, there's something freeing about that, I would imagine. There is, there is. I mean, you can talk about what you want. Like, you can talk about, you can talk

about whatever and you don't got to, sometimes, you know, that's in the back of your head. I mean, if we're going to be honest, right? Like, I think pastors are sometimes thinking, like, okay, like, hopefully you don't have your eyes on the checkbook or on the, right? But like close, high proximity donors, a lot of pastors, unfortunately, do know. And so there's always a temptation to, okay, like, I know they're bent, like they're leaning. Do I speak to that or do I avoid that? Right. Like, that's a lot of people think.

You don't have to avoid. I don't go. I don't even if you're like, man, I think half the church is not going to like this message. But I believe this passage is teaching it. You're like, yeah, you can't fire me. I don't, you know, I work for God. I think it's one of those things. It's freeing and liberating.

And it's also like, you know, I think that's. You know, hopefully you don't fall into that thing to begin with. If you take a salary from the church, hopefully you're disconnected. There's a barrier between you and counting. But, you know, there is a temptation, I think. And so to be free from that and just to speak to the issues, cultural moments, things that you see and just speak boldly into those things is a bit freeing, liberating. Yeah.

All right. Do you tell us one more plug about the Academy of the Bible? Where can people find it? What can they expect? What are you rolling out now with, so you're still in the beta process, like what's in the near future that you're going to keep rolling out with? Yeah, yeah. So they can go just do Academyof the Bible.org. Okay.

And they can sign up right there. We have a bunch of different plans that they can access. So we got our basics plan or foundations plan, which is access to the community, to the courses. Then we have the roundtable plan, which is something that they can jump on the live Q&As with different scholars, have a little bit more proximity and access to some of the instructors. So not just access to you, but access to other scholars. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I don't know how you had to twist their arms. The bill would be available. No, it's been, no, honestly, everyone that we've worked with has been phenomenal. And I think they kind of see the direction that we're trying to head in. And so, yeah, we got some big courses rolling out in the next few months here with, hopefully with Tyndale. Hopefully something's coming together with them. And so we should have a larger catalog pretty soon. But we also want to do, you know, a dream of mine is to be able to do a conference, like maybe in Portland, where we bring in, you know, a beautiful symphony orchestra.

And we do classical music, worship, like old hymns. I don't know, man, like this is just, I'm just forecasting. Like, this is a vision I have. And we bring in NT Wright and some just some heavy hitters, guys like yourself. And we just do a conference that's like a theology conference. But we have different elements of beauty. integrated into that. And I just think some of that, you know, people are longing for beauty, right?

And I think there's some of that that's coming back. So that's a big vision of mine. And I think, you know, God willing, we'll see it happen. You play classical music and you might build it, Tom Wright. That's right. Got the cellist. Why, this is quite good. That's right.

Dude, thanks so much for being against something else you're on. Thanks for opening up your awesome office or studio here for this episode, man. I really appreciated the conversation and getting to know you more. encourage people to check out the Academy of the Bible. It's just great, great stuff. So, yeah, thanks for the work. Appreciate you, man. Yeah, thanks for having me on.

This was fun. Yeah.