Theology in the Raw - The Researgence of Fundamentalism, the Normalization of Slander, and What it Means to Be Protestant: Dr. Gavin Ortlund

Episode Date: October 3, 2024

Dr. Gavin Ortlund is a writer, theologian, and Christian apologist. Gavin serves as President of Truth Unites, a ministry which seeks to promote gospel assurance through theological depth, and serves as a Theologian-in-Residence at Immanuel Nashville. Gavin holds a PhD from Fuller Theological Seminary and an MDiv from Covenant Theological Seminary. He’s written several books including his latest: What it Means to be Protestant: A Case for an Always-Reforming Church, which forms the basis of our conversation. But first, we talk extensively about his latest controversy over some false accusations that we made about his beliefs, how he responded, and the recent resurgence of fundamentalism in Christianity.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey friends, welcome back to another episode of theology. My guest today is Dr. Gavin Ortland, who serves as president of truth unites a ministry, which seeks to promote gospel assurance through theological depth. Gavin holds a PhD from fuller theological seminary and an MDiv from covenant theological seminary. He's also a theologian in residence at Emmanuel church in Nashville. I need to get one of those jobs, a theologian in residents. That's pretty awesome. He's, he's written several books, including his latest book, what it means to be Protestant, a case for an always reforming church. We do get to that book later on in the episode. That was the main reason why I wanted to have Gavin on

the podcast. But Gavin was, was kind of wrapped up in some recent controversy, which we talk extensively about, um, in this podcast. So I don't need to explain any of it to you. He'll get it in due time. Uh, but we, we lingered on that for a while and then also ended up talking about other things related to kind of the, the, the apparent resurgence of fundamentalism in the American Christian church. So that's where we spend most of our time, but I do want to highlight his book, what it means to be Protestant. And we do talk about a few things like solo scriptura towards the end of this podcast. So please welcome to the show for the first time, the Wonderly, Dr. Gavin Ortland, welcome to Theology in the Raw.

I've been looking forward to this conversation for a while. Me too. Glad to be here. Thanks for having me. Is this your first? I know I've been on your show. Have you been on my show? I don't even have.

You know, this is a testimony to how crazy my life is right now that I can't remember that right off the spot. That is so pathetic to me. I'm sorry. It's not you. It's me. It's like, I know we've talked, but I just can't remember that right off the spot. That is so pathetic to me. I'm sorry. It's not you. It's me. It's like, I know we've talked, but I just can't remember where all it went out. From an audience that doesn't know who you are, tell us just a snapshot. What is it? Who are you? And what is it that you do for the kingdom of God?

Sure. Yeah. I'm married with five kids, live in Tennessee, academic work in historical theology. I lead a ministry called Truth Unites, and the goal is to provide gospel assurance. Kind of apologetics slash theology slash church history slash some pastoral stuff. Basically just trying to meet needs right now in the craziness of the times in which we live.

I think there's a lot of instability. I'm trying to help people land upon Jesus and feel absolutely enchanted at being in relationship with Jesus amidst all the chaos. It's really that simple. Is it primarily a YouTube? Your ministry is on YouTube, right? Is that your primary? Primarily. Primarily goes out on podcasts as well. And then I do other things. There's a website, I write articles, I travel and speak and do various things. I'm also active at our local church. So so I'm teaching each Sunday,

actually just starting this Sunday for the whole school year a class on evangelism and apologetics and so forth. So that's a part of my ministry as well. So you're not in Ohio anymore? We have moved to the great state of Tennessee. Everybody is moving to Tennessee. I know, yeah. Yeah, lots, lots, lots that goes into that. Some, some of them are just great personal things. We live 15 minutes away from my parents, which is great. Both of our families are in this area and we actually have a lot of friends in this area as well. So it's kind of a great spot for us to land. Are you at the church that your dad is pastoring or used to pastor? I don't know if he's retired or semi-retired. Yeah, he's, he's passed on the baton by now

in terms of the senior pastor role, but yes, he planted it way back in like 2008 and we've kind of kept connections here over the years. A lot of our friends are here. It's just a fantastic church. So yeah, Emmanuel Nashville, if anyone's out there listening on in the Nashville area, come check us out on a Sunday. Pete Slauson And Sam Albury is there, right? Did he finally get his visa sorted out? Peter Tate Yep, Sam is here. Uh, he's an associate pastor. Okay. He's a dear friend. What wonderful, wonderful guy. Um, well, I, so you, uh, your, your book that just, I think it just came out, right? Or the, uh, the summer it came

out, right? Uh, what it means a couple of weeks ago, a couple of August of, of 2024. Okay. Um, I do want to get into this, but you know, we booked this podcast several weeks ago after we booked it, there was a pretty high profile back and forth you had with, with, with an author that, well, it's Meg Basham in her book, shepherds for sale. And you were kind of highlighted in that book. And then you, you released a couple of videos where you responded showing why you believe you were misrepresented. And it kind of highlighted in that book. And then you released a couple of videos where you responded showing why you believe you were misrepresented. And it kind of flared up a bit.

And here's why I don't want to rehash all that. You said your stuff online. We don't need to get into it. But I guess, can you summarize what all that was? And then I would love to talk about kind of some broader things with the evangelical fundamentalist divide discussion resurgence maybe that's happening in Christianity. So maybe, yeah, summarize what that controversy was.

Sure. And that's my interest in looking back on it is for the aim of looking ahead, you know, for the church and what can we learn, what can we do better, and just what's happening in the world right now and what's happening in the church. These are actually really interesting and strange days we're living in, it seems to me. I mean, it feels a little bit unprecedented on multiple levels. So it's interesting to try to think, I mean, that's where my heart is at. I want to serve especially young people right now.

And it's an interesting question to ask. What's going on in the church? How do we meet needs? How do we serve? Basically, what does faithfulness to Jesus look like in years like 2025 and 2026 and so forth. Yeah, so Megan had her book come out, Shepherds for Sale. She criticized me for six or seven pages toward the end of chapter one. And I put out a video explaining my concerns with her criticism, but also just with the whole sort of, I guess the whole sort of posture that's represented by her book and the way

she treats other people, the way she narrates about other people, various other things I went into. And then there was kind of a storm on Twitter against me after that. It was intense, you know. And then harassment, you know, to the point of I'm getting anonymous texts insulting my physical appearance. What? Are you serious?

It's bizarre stuff, I mean really, really strange. Kind of like, again, kind of like what types are we living in where this is how things go? Other things as well. How do they get your phone number? I imagine that's not like on your website or something. Don't know, they also infiltrated my private Discord server trying to dig up dirt, whatever they can find.

And when I say they, I don't know exactly who. I never want to lump all people that may have some similarities together. So I'm not attributing agency to any known person for those specific things I just mentioned. But yeah, I mean, it was intense. There's definitely a lot of animosity for that first video response. And I actually was very hesitant to just talk about it anymore after that. But I did put out a second video two days later, just because some of the things people

were spreading a rumor that I was directing my fans to review bomb her book. I saw that. Totally false. Yeah. That doesn't happen. Totally false. I swear on my honor. I didn't ask anybody to review it, but I haven't even read any reviews of the book in terms

of Amazon reviews. I've read other reviews, but I mean, I just completely fabricated out of thin air. But there was like an article on Not The Bee that was repeating that, saying it appears he's doing this, and then it was calling me a global warming hysteric COVID-vax enthusiast. Just these ridiculous claims. So anyway, all this is kind of building and building and building. So I put out a second video trying to push against some of the things that were just being said that are just not true. They're just, I mean, that actually is my biggest takeaway from all this is just the sadness of how slander is being normalized.

It really is, and it really is a problem. And I think it's okay to say that. That's part of the thing that happens in those circumstances, they gaslight you as though it's wrong for you to object to being slandered. And it's kind of a whirlwind experience. So anyway, so I put out that second video and then I just resolved, I'm just gonna move on and not address this anymore.

I definitely got to a point where I realized a lot of the people that are criticizing me, I'm very sure that no fruitful conversation or back and forth can be had. And so I think you can get to points where you realize you just have to move on and just ignore certain things and focus your ministry on what you think is going to bear the most fruit and so forth. So yeah, kind of a crazy experience.

I think, you know, now my big takeaway looking ahead that, you know, would be maybe redemptive and fruitful to talk through is just what's going on in the church right now in terms of how we conduct disagreements like this, in terms of how things come up. Why do these things come up? How do we walk through them? And then how do we help shepherd the sheep? I'm dismayed at the lack of discernment.

I kinda sometimes feel as though people, many good faith Christians, they buy into these lies and narratives and things that are said. And it's, um, there's a lack of critical thinking, a lack of discernment. And so that's a concern of just how do we help shepherd people in the times in which we live? And so, um, but yeah, that's a brief. So, so basically it's, we're recording this on September 3rd for about a month. I haven't really commented on it or done anything. I've just been trying to focus on, on things that are more productive. That's good

That's healthy and I'll just direct people to your YouTube channel You can they can go back a few weeks where you you know Maybe those responses and I as always always tell people don't critique your book. You haven't read yet Which is why I've never I've never critiqued her book. I haven't read it probably well, it's not my area of Let's just say area of interest I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going

to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going to be able to do that. I'm not going I remember I didn't see, you know, Twitter is just so entertaining and, and, you know, to see some of the responses I saw, one person's reference to your videos as Gavin's furious response. I mean, okay, if that is your understanding of furious, oh my word, please don't ever get married. How do you, you told me to take out the trash. Why are you so furious? Anyway, it, it, it, my point is, yes, it was entertaining. Yes. Some of these people are just Russian bots

to not real people. I, I get people, I have learned, I had to learn to give people grace when they respond online in such off the chart, seemingly inhumane ways. Like I don't, I don't know what mental health issues they're going through. I don't know if they just walked in on their wife who's having an affair with the pool, man. Like I don't, you know, their, their kids hate that. I don't, I don't know. There's to be so many things going on in life that just causes this just off the

chart weird reaction on social media. So I just assume the best or I assume the worst. And it's like, there's, there's probably so much these people are going through because a normal person that has a healthy life and a spiritual mature just doesn't talk like that. You know, so, um, so it's, it's, it's been easy to kind of ignore, but to your point though, like it does seem like I'm used to great phrase, the normalization of slander. It seems like that's increasing. And it seems like there is an increase of people believing just falsehoods about other people because they trust the person saying it. I've experienced this over the last, I would say it's increased a lot in the last couple

of years. Is it simply we're now more exposed to these things, Gavin, or do you feel like it's actually increasing or can we even know which of those two it is? And if it is increasing, then I want to dialogue about that a little bit. It's very tough for me to gauge with certainty, and I welcome your input on this as well. My very non-professional opinion is it sure seems like it's increasing, and it sure seems like the polarization in our culture and in politics feeds that, and then social media

feeds that. When you think about what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount about how we're going to give an account for all of our speech, it is really terrifying to think of how Twitter is serving to, I'll just be blunt, to heap up judgment for many of us or at least things we're going to have to apologize for in terms of how easy it makes it to participate in mistruths and in slander. So I don't know. It sure seems like that. It sure seems like there's more black and white thinking these days.

So one of the things I'm concerned about is people tend to have a the enemy of my enemy is my friend mentality. I think there's a quote from Dwight Schrute in the office. It's just coming to me now and I wish I could remember it. But it's like somebody's attacking the liberals, therefore they're on my team. And it's like, well, maybe, but actually, or the conservatives, and therefore they're on my team,

or the fundamentalists or whoever. It's like they're attacking that person and I don't like that person, but actually the way we go about in our public criticism is important. And so it's not just about who, but that gets kind of lost these days. And it's, I mean, my basic insight, I don't have a huge amount of expertise at like sociology, but my basic feeling, and I'm curious how you think about this. And I tried to put this out there

in a video on fundamentalism recently. I put out a video on my, on Truth Unites recently about fundamentalism a hundred years ago, so 20th century fundamentalism versus today, similarities, differences, do we see an uptick of this? My basic feeling is I think many people feel that the world is unstable right now. They feel the sense of there's quicksand all around.

They're looking for something solid. That actually relates to my book on Protestantism because I think sometimes people leave Protestantism searching for that sense of a solid foundation. Right now, there's a lot of liberalization. In the Republican Party, you see it's, you know, with all the changes about the issue of abortion recently, and just in general, I think a lot of people have the perception that there's this kind of slide to the left. And so in the wake of that, I think a lot of people are tempted toward a new kind of

fundamentalism, a posture that's more combative, that's more black and white, more, sometimes it can be kind of bellicose and just nasty too. And that feeds into that, you know, that gets to the issue of slander being more normalized. So, you know, my basic curiosity is in the face of the instability of the world that we feel maybe in some ways more now than we even did 10 years ago, is there a temptation that Christians can be drawn toward of a more fundamentalist posture? And as a response to that, you know, the world feels very unstable. So fundamentalism can be very attractive when that's what you're feeling. It's like this, go ahead, you want to jump in? No, I was just going to say, that seems to make a lot, that makes a lot of sense. Is

that, do you know if that's been verified by sociological data that in times of instability, fundamentalist, say black and white type thinking is escalated? And that does make sense. I mean, it just just intuitively. Yeah, I mainly go. Well, I can't recall if in the things I've read from Jonathan Haidt or things I've read from other social psychologists, if that's somewhere related to that back there. Right now, I'm just sort of reflecting myself,

not necessarily citing or referencing anything, but it certainly does seem to make sense, right? And it would explain a lot of facts. You know, it would explain the increase of extremism. Like here, here's an interesting little anecdotal fact that is just brought on the table. Flat Earthism is way more common now than five years ago. Is it really? Oh yeah. There's whole churches that now are flat Earth. In the year like, I don't know, let's say 1998, okay?

Flat Earthism is not as attractive. And so, but today it's bigger. Now it's still not huge, but it's bigger. And so you say, okay, why is that? What's going on? Because it's not like information has decreased. It's not like we're more ignorant in 2024. Well, maybe we are,

it's not like we have less access to information. It's like, it's the proliferation of complexity and too much information and tribalism. And so in other words, it seems like what leads to fundamentalism isn't just a lack of information being at our fingertips. It seems like there's other factors swirling in the world right now that can lead to this.

And I can I just say one thing upfront though, I wanna be clear is that I know that I've learned some people have a strong reaction to the word fundamentalist because they may, and maybe fairly so because They've been called a fundamentalist just because they're orthodox. Okay, and it's been used as a slur against them So I want to acknowledge that I've been called a fundamentalist unfairly So, you know, let's never use this term as just a way to attack somebody that's further to the right than us

That's one of the things I try to belabor in that video. And also I'm not, I recognize that, I guess, one of the things Megan tweeted out right after I put up my video is, she's attacking me more and she's saying that, you know, oh, if you think fundamentalism is a bigger problem than liberalism, then here's the problems with that and so forth. Of course, I didn't say that, I don't believe that.

One of the things I'm belaboring in my video is both liberalism, I didn't say that. I don't believe that. One of the things I'm belaboring in my video is both. Liberalism, I talk at length about how evangelicals and fundamentalists are equally concerned about liberalism. They are equally opposed to liberalism. Evangelicals are not liberal. They're opposed to that. I mean, I'm talking about 20th century evangelicals like Harold John Ockengay and Carl Hendry.

They were criticized from the left and from the right, and they were—so I'm totally acknowledging we don't need to rank these different enemies. They're both deviations from fidelity to Jesus. We can be unfaithful to Jesus by compromising to the spirit of the age, but all I'm trying to say is how we oppose the spirit of the age matters. We need to not lie. We need to not slander. We need we oppose the spirit of the age matters. We need to not lie. We need to not slander. We need to show the fruits of the spirit.

We need to do theological triage. That's one of the things I talk about a lot. That means ranking different doctrines. Not every hill's a hill to die on. We need to not be nasty. So I'm just saying these are both problems. I'm not comparing one versus the other, but unfortunately I've sort

of given up hope for a faithful or truthful narration of what I actually say in some of the reports from that tribe. And that's part of the problem. That's part of the problem. Hey friends, if you're a regular listener to the podcast, you know that I'm a huge fan of AG1. AG1 is a foundational nutritional supplement that gives me an energy boost and no caffeine crash like coffee does. In just 60 seconds, you can get your daily dose of vitamins, minerals, pre and probiotics, adaptogens, and much more.

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Try AG1 and get a free bottle of vitamin D3K2. I take that every other day as well. And five free AG1 travel packs with your first purchase at drinkag1.com forward slash TITR. Okay. So that's a $48 value for free. If you go to drinkag1.com forward slash TITR, check it out. The first of all, that's helpful. I love the way you describe fundamentalism.

You're not using it as a, as a derogatory term. It's just more of a descriptive term. I think that's helpful. And love the way you describe fundamentalism. You're not using it as a derogatory term. It's just more of a descriptive term. I think that's helpful. And while both of us would say we don't identify with that kind of brand of Christianity, I just don't like using any term as a slur, even if I disagree with the term that's being used to describe something. It does seem like there's a resurgence, a surprising resurgence of fundamentalism. And I would say I was a bit, you know, people heard me talk about this a gazillion times, I'm not going to bore you with the details, but I mean, I was raised in a, I would say a traditionally fundamentalist background. So I know exactly

the thinking. Anybody who is outside of our narrowly defined version of Christianity, you know, is on kind of a slippery slope towards liberalism. They're just kind of like us, and then everybody else is kind of on a slippery slope. So, like, people who believe in Mark and priority are liberals. People who don't believe in a pre-trib rapture are liberals. People don't believe in not only Young Earth, but that biblical, if you believe in biblical authority, that will lead to a Young earth theology. If you start talking about things like, let's just say climate change, I don't know, some random,

you know, you're probably a liberal. If you went to this seminary, you're probably a liberal. If you are reading this book, you're on the slippery, you know. I know that way of thinking. I guess where I'm shocked is I feel like that was dying out. Like I don't youth like, it doesn't seem like Gen Z is becoming more and more fundamentalist. It doesn't seem like youth groups are having a lot of turnover. It doesn't seem like fundamentalist churches have a lot of young people thriving ministries where they're just reaching all kinds of young people to pass on the baton of fundamentalism. And yet it seems like fundamentalism, it seems like it's growing. Maybe it's not, maybe it's just, and this is, you know, I think social media is such a distorted picture of reality

that something could seem really, really loud online and still represent a tiny percentage of actual people. Most of whom are not even on Twitter or active on Twitter, you know, or whatever. But so, yeah, is it making resurgence? Does it have the appearance of making resurgence? And if so, why? In your opinion? Yeah, it is so hard for me to gauge. You raise this important point about social media's distorting effect. And you know, it's so hard to tell when you're looking on social media versus, I say the

real world. You know, what's the difference? It looks to me like there is an uptick of fundamentalism, and that's part of the polarization. And in saying that, we're not saying that there's not also an uptick of liberalism. So it's both. That's what polarization means.

The moderate demographic is thinning out. And so I'm open to social media maybe making that seem bigger than it is, but it's out there because it's not just social media that I'm seeing the metrics for this. And I think part of it is they have a narrative, you know, the Book Shepherds for Sale is telling a narrative. And that narrative can be very powerful for people to latch onto. I sometimes, to critique our own tribe a little bit, you know, I sometimes think people who are a little bit more,

maybe we would see ourselves as more kind of in the moderate space of kind of historic evangelicalism or something like that. I'm just throwing out some basic categories to get us starting here. But I don't know that we've always got a great narrative. Sometimes, you know, people need to know what's happening and what do we do about it. That's what I'm trying to do with my YouTube channel. I'm trying to give basic answers to people who are wrestling with questions, deep questions like, should I still be Protestant? Or other questions, people deconstructing their faith altogether. There's a huge amount of that right now, disintegration of trust, disintegration of faith. And I want

to supply help. I really long to give my life to serve people who are in that. I know what that's like when you're in a really painful, confusing place, wrestling through doubts, struggles. I know what that feels like. That's really hard. I just long to be a friend to someone who's in that circumstance. But I think one of the things maybe we need to do in the bigger picture more is just think about how do we tell a narrative that helps people make sense of the world and what's happening in it and encourages faithfulness to Christ right now and us to think about that. And that's what I really want to give my life to.

That's basically why I'm on the planet. We did a thing at church recently of right out in one sentence, why you're alive, which I love as an exercise. And, you know, mine is basically three things. I want to just walk with Jesus. I want to take care of my family. And then I want to serve revival in the church today. And then that's, I think, you know, providing theological resources could be one way that I could try to make a contribution to that. But there's so much more to that. The biggest thing I think is prayer. And I'm really focused on the younger generation right now, especially when I'm thinking about how to pray and what to try to do and where to focus. But yeah, so that's a long thing. But that's the need

is for a narrative. I think, and since we are living in pretty polarized times, or again, at least we had the perception that it's particularly polarized. Maybe it is. I think people want to be on a team and they want to be on a winning team and they want to fight, you know? So to your point, like this moderate evangelical perspective could seem just like, well, where's your fight? Who's your enemy? What side are you on? It doesn't seem like it's a coherent team or as the far right or far left, both have a little more clarity maybe in this is a distinct team and this is our enemy and we are going to fight.

And you see it very, you know, the whole horseshoe theory where it wants to go so far to the far left and right, you end up with the same kind of fundamentalism, just a different, different content and different, different enemy you're fighting against. So it's just odd that like we live in, like, I just, you know, recently seen like someone like Tim Keller, who, who for the majority of my Christian life has been held up as like, this is kind of the overwhelming majority of Christians in America would say he's, he's hitting it. He's an A this is, this is the kind of Christian perspective that is healthy is what we should be striving for. Not that he's Jesus or anything, but like we would often say like up until two years ago, like, who doesn't like Tim Keller? Okay. Some fringe people, maybe, you know, whatever, but like

98% of Bible living Christians are like, I don't agree with everything he says, but he, he's, he's, you know, held up as kind of a model, but I've heard that he's like a target in this book. And like other people are like saying disparaging things about him or calling him a liberal or a milk toast, moderate stuff that I'm like, I haven't heard hardly anybody say they know about Tim Keller, you know, maybe like a John Piper. I could see, and I, I'm a fan, but I could see where he would be. You know, somebody would like not, not be on board with some, some of his more aggressive takes or whatever, but like, but Tim Keller, this is odd that now he's branded as like some liberal or something. But again, I just, but like, but Tim Keller, this is odd that now he's

branded as like some liberal or something. But again, I just, I just, I have to hope that that's not the majority of people that this is the perception of maybe some loud online voices. Tell me that's true, Gavin. Or who knows? I am sorry to say that I am asking the question, is this really just loud online voices that regard Tim Keller as a woke liberal who's fundamentally untrustworthy? And I don't know the answer to that question, but I'm asking the question because, again, we're sort of marveling at how the sea change of our times. And this would be an up, what I would regard as an uptick of fundamentalist tendencies,

trying to not, you know, it depends upon where a particular individual falls in terms of whether that they would even embrace that term fundamentalist. I'm not trying to use that as a derogative type term, but fundamentalist tendencies is how I would categorize that. And I guess I have to, I guess I'm somewhat ringing the alarm bell a little bit here in Fundamentalist tendencies is how I would categorize that. I guess I'm somewhat ringing the alarm bell a little bit here in terms of my video on fundamentalism and this whole thing with the other videos I did in response to Megan is trying to help people see this is really significant.

There is a huge demographic that now regards, yeah, Tim Keller and those in his tribe, they're woke liberals and they're untrustworthy. And that's huge. And that is big. That is like, not to be ignored. If we want to shepherd the sheep well, that's where my heart is at is I want to help someone who's a good faith onlooker who will buy into that and will conclude that that is true and try to help them be discerning about that and say, you know, go through the specific facts, first of all, but also just, I think, you know, you raised an interesting point about,

we wanna feel like we're on a winning team right now. And I think we can't even assume that our sheep know how to conceptualize that, I think, what it means to be on a winning team. What is a Christian way of winning right now? Because I hear, I don't know if you hear this, but I hear this a lot, this idea that that, I think, what it means to be on a winning team. What is a Christian way of winning right now? Because I hear, I don't know if you hear this, but I hear this a lot, this idea that like, you know, the fruits of the spirit,

that some people will say it like they're optional. Some people will say that, okay? Some people will just come out and say it. Other people just act like it. But that is a real thing right now. And I would just wanna say to everybody, we gotta go back to the very basics right now and remind our own hearts. And I would just want to say to everybody, we've got to go back to the very basics right now and remind our own hearts.

And I'm not above this myself. I could wake up on a day, start walking in the flesh rather than in the Holy Spirit, and fall into it myself in two seconds. But we have to remember the Beatitudes paint the model for us of success. The Sermon on the Mount paints the model of success. Galatians 5 paints the model, the fridge of the Spirit. So, you know,

we have to go back to church history and look at the Christians who brought the gospel into, I loved studying the people who brought the gospel into Scandinavia and the courage that they had to get their heads chopped off by the Vikings. And the early Christians who faced the lions and Richard Wormbrand and these other people, that's success. And I think we need, we cannot assume that our people are thinking like that. And I, you know, that's complicated. I'm not saying there's no place for Christians seeking to have cultural influence and so forth. Of course there is. I'm not saying all faithfulness will always mean martyrdom or something like that. But I'm just saying that the ultimate backstop is obedience to Jesus. That is success.

And then the cultural fruits of that, I see more as an outflow, and I don't think we can assume that right now. And I think we have to practice that. I think we have to practice that towards people in all directions from us. That means we need to be kind to those who we regard as having more fundamentalist tendencies.

And that's one of the things that's grieved me in this whole thing with Megan is people are acting like we're just really personally mad at each other, and that's really not it. It's more just a bigger concern of these different sort of trajectories within the church right now. And that's my originating concern with all this is wanting Christians to be discerning about the narratives that are being put forward for them. I've seen this happen so many times where people, they buy into a more, more, a particular narrative, and then over time they are disillusioned with it, and they,

sometimes they leave the faith altogether. Man, that happens a lot. So... Pete What's hard for me is when some of these narratives, especially the ones we're talking about, are just based on just I mean, I've, again, I've, I've encountered this more in the last year. I, I, you people, you know, I, I deal with a lot of controversial topics. I'm, I'm very outspoken with what I believe where I'm at. So of course I get, you know, critiques and whatever people will like what I believe, but I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm

not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm very outspoken with what I believe and where I'm at. So of course I get critiques and whatever people will like what I believe or whatever, but I've never seen so much just misrepresentation as in the last, I would say year and a half where I'm looking at people, like I'm looking at them and they're saying, you believe this. And I'm like, I have never believed that. I have never thought that, have never said that in writing. Right here, I have never believed that. I have never thought that. I have never said that in writing. I'm right here. I don't believe that. Like, I don't know. I have to go back and check. I'm like, I'm right here. Like, I'm telling you, maybe I was unclear. I could have

been like, oh, you're okay. You don't believe that. Cause you're literally telling me you don't believe that. But maybe it can be more clear. Okay. I got, that's fair. It's also possible you're inferring stuff that's not there, but whatever. Um, but to sit there and say, I don't know if I believe what you're saying. I'm like, I'm telling you, I don't believe I've never, I've not experienced that level of just blatant misrepresentation. And then you have like people buying into that. And then they're so determined. They don't want to hear anything, any sort of correction to that. And I do think it, because, you know, there is safety in the narrative, in any narrative. And especially you start having people you trust and this, you know, group think the tribalism, the hive mind is Jonathan Haidt calls it, you know, where if anything sort of interrupts that

hive, that hivish thinking, then that's destabilizing. So because the world's so destabilized right now in their perception, there's security in this narrative. And so in any sort of correction to that narrative, even if that narrative is just based on two plus two equals five kind of mistakes, there's no psychological ability to receive that. I'm sorry to say I can relate. And I know that feeling where you're just like, wow. It's been a new experience for me.

I've never been through something like this where literally people are, it's just like an objective misquote. Like words of yours are quoted and put toward X. And then you point at, you document that were said about Y and it's not really a matter of interpretation, you know? And yet from the other side, there isn't any concession and it becomes evident we're functioning not by logic right now, but by the sociology of this.

And something else is taken over and it's disconcerting. And I think, you know, it's like, what do we do? What's underneath that? I don't know all to do. I certainly know we gotta guard our own hearts along the way, right? We've gotta be careful that we don't become, I'm speaking to myself right now.

I gotta be careful that I don't, it's the Nietzsche quote. Well, I don't wanna, I won't go there, but it's that thing of when you're facing something, you don't want to get pulled into something bad. So, I want to have integrity along the way. And I think part of that is like, ultimately, how do we feel so secure in the gospel that we can admit we've made mistakes? Like, that's to me one of the things is if somebody is saying, having a good will towards someone, if someone is saying to me, this is what I believe in, we realize I accidentally misrepresented them.

Isn't it happier and good to just be able to say, okay, I'm not perfect. I made a mistake. You know, I miss, I miss cited it or whatever. And so I'm saying for me right now to be able to look back and say, I'm sure I haven't done everything perfectly. I'm sure I've made mistakes. And like, that's not this... I think when people experience concession as a threat to their identity, a threat somehow, we get in this very suspicious mode where we can't ever make progress.

And the gospel, I think, would call us to just be able to kind of repent a little more freely and then to give grace. And right now, we're not showing grace to each other at will. So, I don't know, I don't have solutions here, but it's just like, man, that's what you pray for is how can as a church we lower the temperature in some of our disagreements and create an environment where it's not so threatening to just admit if I made a mistake or something like that. And again, is whenever we see that in somebody else, we got to always shine it back on ourselves and say, are we doing this? Well, you know, and I'm asking that for myself. I have, so again, I haven't read the book, Megan's book, um, based on the online stuff that I have seen, it seems like there is a, and every book is going to have some factual mistakes,

probably at least one or two, right? So something, you know verified that I haven't read it, whatever, but like based on just stuff I've seen online where it's like, here's what she said. And then here's the actual thing that she's trying to, like what I saw is like, you know, she referenced West Hill is graduating from like a PCA seminary when he just, you know, he's just, he's just, he's just, he's just, he's just, he's just, he's just, he's just like, I'm not saying that as a person who, like what I saw is like, you know, she referenced West Hill is graduating from like a PCA seminary when he just like factually didn't. That's somebody wasn't PC, you know, it's a, it's a dumb thing.

Oh, who cares? Whatever. But it's like, if you can't trust somebody to get basic facts, right. Then, then it raises questions about, okay, when you're actually making an argument or something, then can I trust that? But it seemed like there was a disproportionate number of just blatant factual mistakes. Has that been, how has she dealt with that? Do you know, or do you know how that's gone with even like the publisher and stuff? I'd be a little bit like, where was the editor on this or I don't know.

Or do you not want to speak into that? Again, we don't need to go there if you don't want to. I don't know, man. I don't know. I guess I'll be honest, she's very aggressive and defending herself. And so to even get into that, raises the question of just a huge escalation of explosive fire back and forth and so forth.

In my videos about this, I've already laid out the things I'm really clear on and documented because they're about me. So I know exactly what I said. And it's like, this is what I said is not a responsible posture. But you took those words, not a responsible posture and said them about this.

And they're completely different things. One is about rejecting a scientific consensus and another is about shooting from the hip. It's like, you can't just quote my words, not a responsible posture and switch what they're talking about. But again, the struggle is when someone is not willing to concede such a basic sort of factual thing, then it's very hard to make progress. And at a certain point I just had to say, I just got to move on. I, you know, I just have to kind of say, okay, she, you know, that's up to her and, and that's

on her and I'm, I'm going to move on. But yeah, I mean, yeah, the, the concerns you're raising are, I think, reasonable. I just don't know if it's a damaged reputation of the book or is it just the people that are believing it would believe it no matter what? Like there's, again, they're so bought into they're needing, they already are predisposed to believe that evangelical pastors and leaders are going quote unquote woke or liberal, whatever., like they're all right. That's, that's already part of their narrative. So any book that confirms that they're just going to believe no matter what. So there's that crowd, but it's what about the

broader crowd that actually does have some level of good faith. Like once they start seeing so many factual mistakes, like, doesn't that, wouldn't that discredit, um, yeah, the, the credibility of the book. I just, I'm curious if that's happening. And again, maybe someone says, Nope, I can't, I haven't read it. So I don't, I'm just going off of kind of perception of what I see online. So yeah, I can't speak because I've sort of just moved forward. I haven't necessarily kind of followed so closely that I can kind of speak to like the demographics of the book. I mean, I think it's a, it's a,, I haven't necessarily kind of followed so closely that I can kind of speak to like the demographics of like how many people are taking this view

versus that view. I think there's certainly a crowd that's just gonna be committed no matter what. And so they'll take like a basic misquote about what I said is not a responsible posture versus what I was reported as saying is not a responsible posture versus what I was reported as saying is not a responsible posture and that's one representative example of her whole drive-by treatment of me but they'll take that and they'll say yeah

but the general gist of your video was still kind of implying that and so that's their way of trying to make up for that it's like okay but you can't use a quotation mark and say Ortlandland says, and then supply the general gist. Furthermore, that isn't the general gist. So it's just, you know, but that's what, they have to do that because they're committed, because that's how the sociology is played out. And we're not making decisions based upon logic, but based upon sociology right now. It's us versus them. And so we've got to batter down the hatches and fight, and we can't let, we can't concede anything. You know, now, now having said that, there are

some people in her tribe, tribe, I've read one review where there was a concession, but that was a mistake and it was minimized, but it was at least conceded. So that was good to see. Um, the broader sort of middle swath of kind of good faith onlookers. I don't know where everyone's at. Sometimes I'm dismayed at what I regard as a lack of discernment. Other times I've been kind of amazed at how many People will point out and just agree What actually the interesting thing that's interesting for me is how much it splits up differently on YouTube versus Twitter Twitter tends to be

Who just a mess, you know across, really, really like lightning strikes of energy. YouTube, I've been amazed at how many of the commenters get it and point it out and just relentless and relentless. And of course, that's all dismissed as, well, that's just my fans, my fans defending me because I probably directed them to it. I'm like, no, like three fourths of these comments are starting off saying, I don't agree with Portland about climate change, but, and then they give their take on it. So it's like, no, they're not my fan, but you can dismiss testimonies by putting it in that bucket, I guess.

How would you summarize it? So it was around climate change you created, I believe of the hundreds of videos you've created, you did one discussing climate change. And even then you weren't, I haven't watched your climate change videos, but just going on kind of your summary, you were just having the conversation about it. You weren't even really strongly advocating for a particular viewpoint, right? Or how would you describe your view of like,

where are you at with climate change? Yeah, yeah. So it's true that I believe in climate change myself. I think that it is, now here's where it gets tricky is people treat climate change as this kind of like you either affirm it or deny it, but there's a bunch of different options. So someone could be skeptical of whether the planet

is getting warmer at all. They could be, they could acknowledge that, but be skeptical of how much human activity is contributing to that. Or they could think, yeah, human activity is contributing to that, but then be skeptical of policies that are especially government policy to address it. So my video was basically laying out,

I think this is a real issue that we need to take seriously. It was responding to the concern, the genuine concern I have that a lot of Christians can respond to that issue sort of reactively based upon its political associations rather than studying it and looking at the science and looking at the evidence. And that's really sincerely my main concern I have. So I was definitely belaboring the point in that video of I think this is a really important issue to engage. But I consistently framed it in terms of engaging and studying.

And I totally acknowledge Christians come to different conclusions, especially when you look at these different options of where we can fall out. One of the funny things about this whole thing is that in Shepherds for Sale, Megan acknowledges that it's a total consensus that the planet is heating up and that human activity is contributing to it to some extent. So the only thing we actually disagree on is just how much human activity is contributing to it and then what to do about that. And I am on, one of the things I said clearly in that video is I'm not sure what policies are best. I suspect it'll be a broad swath of different initiatives to try to address it.

And I'm not sure about the details. And I'm saying throughout that video, I'm not an expert, but basically I'm just trying to say this looks really important and let's engage this. However, this is the main issue is that we have to be able, in my opinion, to talk about an issue like climate change as Christians while recognizing this is not like a first-rank issue that makes us friend versus foe. Christians can disagree about that, especially when you're getting into the details of what to do about it. I'm not even sure what to do about it, but even if I had an opinion about the exact policies that need to be rolled out, we have to be able to recognize our unity in Christ is greater than our convictions

about a political and scientific issue like that. That's a complicated issue. I actually have tremendous respect for people who study it and come out in different places. Christians can totally disagree on that. So, the irony is that the portrayal of me in Shepherds for Sale is that I'm sort of brow-bitting people about this and insisting people need to accept the scientific consensus. It's just a fundamental and complete pudding of words in my mouth. I mean, it really is. I mean, I remember reading those six pages and being really shocked. So yeah, it's, but I would just say for Christians

on that, you know, going forward, what do we do about that? Is I just, the same thing I said in my initial video is study it, look into it and just have an open mind, open heart. Um, that, that actually is the most important thing to me about that issue. I'm sorry. It just seems so silly. It just seems so like you're beginning with something that's so obviously politicized in American politics. It doesn't, not even, I don't, I don't want to get into it. I was still on time for that. But yeah, anyway, I appreciated your perspective on, on, on that. I just, the assumption that if you, even if you were on board with a viewpoint that happens to be embraced by most Democrats is like, who the heck cares? I don't, what does

that have to do with like a Christian world? You know, like we are called theologically to care for God's creation. And if this is an issue that we should be thinking through under that theological umbrella, then let's have the conversation. Who cares if Democrats also agree or something, you know, I just, I don't know. If I could just say one thing on that, I don't mean to jump in, but I think a great thing for Christians to do is be willing, studying issues personally,

and be willing to deviate from groupthink, either in terms of conservative or liberal politics, and be willing to stand against the crowd, and basically just seek the truth with all your heart. Follow your conscience and your reason to the best of your ability. And I think there can be pressure. Certainly, I think sometimes conservative Christians feel that pressure in the broader culture to the left and maybe are naive to how in certain subcultures there can be a kind of group think in a conservative direction. And actually, there can be a kind of group think in a conservative direction.

And actually, you can face a pretty intense backlash if you slightly deviate on one issue. So to your point, you know, if like me, I'm pro-life, I affirm a traditional view of marriage, one man and one woman, that's what marriage is. I'm pretty theologically classical and conservative, you know. I'm kind of in the mainstream of historic Christianity. I'm not a liberal guy. But the climate change stuff and science issues more generally, and this is where that,

if you fall out on one issue, then you get zapped. And that is not good. I think that the greater thing we need is more ability to triage different issues and just recognize, you know, okay, if someone comes to a different view on climate change, that doesn't necessarily mean they're illiberal or they're associated with this, like, these broader, like, financial pressures that she's trying to make a case for in the book. I mean, that's the other thing is like, what they try to say now is, oh, well, we didn't

explicitly say Gavin was one of the shepherds for sale in the book. It's like, okay, number one, I think based on how you defined a shepherd for sale and the introduction is you can be in that influence in a couple of different ways. I would be, but number two, even if you're just saying I'm in the broader influence, it's like, I don't really recognize any Democrat influence. Actually, I just go to the library and read books about this. That's it, I'm just trying to think.

I just want to think. I'm a total nerd, I go read books and I think about it. And I find it interesting. I watched some documentaries about climate change. I find them intellectually stimulating. I'm a theology nerd. I find this fascinating. So I just think about it.

There's no Democrat pressure. This is my wife and I have gotten some great jokes out about this because anytime either one of us forgets to do our household chores, now we accuse the other person of being funded by the Democrats. So, you know, if I, if I forget to unload the dishwasher, it's like, ah, the George Soros money is flowing in this morning. You know, it's like a great way to attack anything you don't like. And we laugh about it because it's kind of the same level of preposterousness of just like the way these things are trying to be weaved into a narrative here. That just is so inauthentic to who I am, but it is fun to laugh about.

It is fun. I'm glad you can laugh about it. Yeah. The good thing is, is the hot button news cycle is about 48 hours. So stuff that like was life or death one week is just not even, you know, we had a former president that got shot a couple of weeks ago, a few weeks ago. You know, it's like, nobody talks about that anymore. Then I mean, I mean, it's just the new cycles, both kind of in the Christian new world, but also in the broader world is just so fast. I'm like, I don't know what that means,

but it just, it should give us a little confidence that if something flares up about you and the media, whatever, just, I wouldn't, I wouldn't, it's not the end of the world. It's gonna pass. Let's talk about, okay, so that's introduction to your book, what it means to be Protestant, a case for always and always reforming church. That's one of my favorite quotes.

I don't know where it originated from. Somebody said it wasn't actually from the reformers, but that the church should be reformed and always reforming. Do you know where that originated from? Who coined that? Semper reformanda, forget the Latin, but. I can't remember. I looked that up one time and it's someone a little bit

after the Reformation, a non-famous person, but I can't recall off the top of my head. But that's spirit, reformed and always reforming, just constantly taking your preconceived view, your viewpoints and then bringing them back to scripture over and over again. What is the spirit of Protestantism?

Like, what would you say is kind of the heartbeat behind Protestantism? Is it solo scriptura? Is it priesthood of all believers? The autonomy of the local church or is it, yeah. I would say that, you know, the phrase we've gotten into here, always reforming, that's a great starting point because of course,

now there are friends in the non Protestant traditions will, will criticize that as kind of flimsy, you know, that, so they're saying, we live in a castle, we, a sturdy castle, Ecclesially speaking, you guys live in this ever changing house of cards. You know, it's here today. One day it's tomorrow. You guys live in this ever-changing house of cards. You know, it's here today, one day it's tomorrow, you know, you're splintering again, there's all these different denominations and so forth. But I would say the positive way of looking at always reforming and its intent is the way you might think of as an individual Christian. We're always trying

to be more like Christ. And so, we're trying to not be stagnant. And with regard to the Church as a whole, what it means is, we recognize that the Church is fallible. She does not have... So, what we're concerned about are claims of infallibility in the other traditions, whether in ecumenical councils or ex-cathedral statements from popes that we think actually are erroneous, but now you're stuck with them forever. And we just think it's a benefit to be able to go back, repent, reform in light of Scripture. Christianity is a revealed religion. God has spoken in Jesus Christ and through the prophets. We go back to where God has spoken and we reform ourselves accordingly. I think that is like windows opening during spring cleaning and you can just go back to church history and say not everything that happens is where you want to keep your flag planted.

Sometimes you need to go back and revisit it. But I would say so that slogan does capture the Protestant ethos, but I would say the doctrines of sola scriptura and sola fide, I see is kind of at the backbone. So sola scriptura means that the scriptures are only infallible rule. It's kind of involved a little bit in what we're saying so far. And sola fide meaning justification by faith alone. And that's more than a slogan. In the 16th century, that was a real recovery of an experience of the gospel and an assurance in the gospel during a time of incredible darkness where a lot of the laity just did not have that assurance. So I see those two things.

One is sort of the framework. This is Sola Scriptura. This is kind of like the general schema of how we conceptualize how Christianity works from the time of public divine revelation and then now in the church age. The other is kind of the content that we think was actually renewed and recovered and re-centered in the 16th century, and that's this fresh experience of the gospel. How would you reset? That's helpful. Um, and you're the castle analogy. It could go both ways. I mean, if you let a castle sit for a thousand years, it's going to start to crumble and the foundations are going to crack and like, you need to keep renovating that castle for

it to last. Right. So I value, yeah. Uh, that's just kind of where my mind went. But, um, how would you respond to the pushback? I mean, I think it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it. So I value, yeah, I, uh, that's just kind of where my mind went. But, um, how would you respond to the pushback? And I think this is actually really valid in many ways, um, that the, the division between the authority of scripture and authority of tradition or authority of human, say church

leaders, that that's, that's fuzzier than the Protestants make it out to be. After all, it was tradition that told us which books are going to belong in the Canon. Um, it was tradition, church leaders that determined which theological views would be Orthodox, which would be heretical. Um, even the idea of reading scripture apart from tradition is really naive. I mean, we are reading scripture through the lens of tradition so that there is this intertwining of the authority of scripture and authority of tradition. Am I representing that pushback well, first of all? And second of all, how would you respond to that? Great pushback and something Protestants need to learn from and learn our own history a

little bit. You know, one of my relentless appeals throughout this book and in my ministry on these topics in general is that Protestants have so drifted from historic Protestant theology today, especially like evangelicals today in the United States. Sometimes we just have lost a sense of connection with our own roots. And so this area is a great example of where we don't always necessarily even represent Protestant theology very well. And a lot of evangelicals, to your point, we will articulate this distinction between

scripture and tradition in this kind of black and white way as though tradition is bad. And that's not the idea. The claim is that scripture is the only infallible rule. And so, historically, Protestants have had a lot to say about sort of the chain of hierarchies, or the hierarchy of different authorities. You know, descending down, Scripture is the supreme north star at the top of the pyramid, but then you've got all these lesser authorities going downward, and tradition is not something to be utterly rejected. I had a video come out about the canon two days ago from our, or yesterday from our recording, so people can check that out

on the specific issue of the canon. I'm actually going to record another one on verses like 2 Thessalonians 2.15, obey the traditions that we delivered to you and talk about this. But yeah, basically we in no way are we saying that which falls out after the apostles die is all to be rejected. Rather, the intent is to measure everything in light of the superior authority of Scripture. So, Scripture is unique. It's God's inspired Word. It's God-breathed.

Second Peter 1, 20, 21, for example, talks about how the Holy Spirit is speaking through the prophets in Scripture, and 2 Timothy 3.16 and so forth. So that's the Supreme North Star. A good example of why that's necessary would be with the Pharisees. The Pharisees claimed an oral tradition for Moses, and they put it at the same level as the written law. And so they had all these traditions.

And Jesus does say, you nullify the Word of God by your traditions. But the answer there is not to act as though the Pharisees have no authority or something like that. Jesus himself says, you sit in the seat of Moses. But it's to regulate that under the superior authority of the written word because we do add on things over time sometimes. So, I mean, there is so much to say about this, but the heart of it is a proper definition of sola scriptura only infallible rule, not only valuable resource or something like that. Or even to take a step further, isn't it? I mean, correct me if I'm wrong. Doesn't sola scriptura, it doesn't mean only authority. It means ultimate authority. So it recognizes

other authorities that would just listen to what she said, constantly regulated by, by, by scripture. I guess I would, I would not necessarily me, but the, that may be me. I don't know. I truly wrestling with this. I don't know exactly where I'd land, but like, but even that scripture is the ultimate authority. But then, yeah, okay. But the whole concept of scripture is impossible to disentangle from tradition, is the more specific point that I'm wrestling with. So that as I read, like nobody just opens up the Bible and reads the Bible apart from tradition, whether it's their denominational tradition, the lenses, their ecclesiological lenses that they don't even know they have that they're reading scripture through their, uh, the,

the sweep of history that they're reading scripture through, you know, um, the, you know, if, if you're in oppressed, if you're a person living in Latin America and you've been oppressed by a fascist government, you know, um, you're going to read scripture and you're going to see themes of liberation. Just jump off the pages. But if you're living in a white middle-class neighborhood, um, in wherever, you know, Montana, like themes of liberation might not really jump out. And that's, that's kind of, I don't want to, that's a little bit of a distraction, but I mean, just the idea of just an individual being able to read and accurately interpret scripture apart from anything else, just them

and the Holy Spirit, that feels a little naive. But is that what solar scripture even means though? Right. Certainly the sort of this question of individualism, like someone on their own, that is not at all the intent. That's not, okay. individualism, like someone on their own, that is not at all the intent. The intent is kind of an ontological claim about what's out there. Like, is there another infallible rule parallel to Scripture? But then how we as individuals relative to the corporate church relate to that reality,

just a completely different question, and the Protestants, to your point, it's not the only authority. So, you know, historically Protestants, to your point, it's not the only authority. So, you know, historically Protestants like, I think it's Article 20 of the Anglican 39 articles talks about the church has authority in rights and controversies of the faith. The only question is what's the supreme infallible authority that can, that is irreformable. It can never be overturned. It's, it's stuck. You know, it's not gonna move.

So like an example of, but there's fallible authorities. I always use the category of the umpire at a baseball game to make the point that you can be authoritative and be fallible. The ump has the authority, but he can get it wrong. He could call the ball a strike or the strike a ball. So, you know, you don't have to be... So, we believe in fallible authorities.

Excommunication from a church is an authoritative act, but we just don't think that's an infallible act. And... That makes good sense, yeah. I find clarity comes when we conceptualize Sola Scriptura in relation to its alternatives. So, in the Roman Catholic tradition, you have sacred scripture and sacred tradition together, and they are separate norms, and they together constitute the deposit of faith. And then the magisterium interprets both and can do so in certain ways that are infallible. So it's like, that's what we're opposing.

This idea that tradition is this separate norm, but you are right that Scripture inhabits tradition. Tradition is the context in which it even comes into existence and then is recognized and is preserved during persecution and is translated and disseminated, and we discern the canon and all of that. So historic Protestants have had a lot to say about the role of the church and the role of tradition, but it's trying to... Yeah, so I think you're right to kind of bring this up because I think people fail to get

the boundaries right here. That distinction is really helpful. I would say this is what makes me one of the several things where I would say I'm Protestant. Even though we talked offline, I'm sympathetic with especially like Eastern, certain aspects of Eastern Christianity. But yeah, scripture has ontologically the ultimate authority against which we measure all other authorities, recognizing that there is a sociological, ecclesiological subject of nature of accessing this absolute truth. You know, even the—oh, I forget the name for it. Oh, it's NT Wright advocates for it. Critical realism, where

you recognize your social situatedness, but still recognize that the Bible is still absolute ultimate truth. Our access to it is colored with human fallibility, but that doesn't change the ontological nature of the infallible authority of the Word of God. It's what you're saying. I mean, that makes good sense, that distinction. I think sometimes Christians slash Protestants, I think misinterpret so the scripture to mean it's absolute truth and every individual Christian has direct access apart from any sort of other factors around. Like, well, let's not be naive about that.

Like, we do need to interpret the Bible in community and context, in conversation with history. And that's just inevitably how we read the Bible. Right. Yeah. Yeah, at the start of the section on Sola Scriptura, I think I try to go through two caricatures. One of them is the Bible is the only authority. That is a total caricature of Sola Scriptura. Nope, not the only authority. It's

just, as we pointed out, it's the only infallible authority. So other authorities are subordinate under it and reformable in light of it. And then the other one is that it's the explicit source of all theology. That's also not what we mean. We don't actually believe that. And, you know, there's the related doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture, which is cast out differently in different Protestant traditions. But in none of them does it mean everything is explicit in the Bible. There's always this recognition that we're actually working and some things come from good and necessary consequence from what's in the Bible, but there's all kinds of caricatures here.

It's actually...my summary is Sola Scriptura is a very modest doctrine. It actually isn't that ambitious. And it's...the way I like to summarize it is with our Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic friends, we agree that scripture has this kind of unique ontological status. These are the words of God. And, and they, you know, they would not say an ecumenical council is the words of God, even if they think it's infallible, they don't think it's that. So all we're saying is as it's unique in its authority, so as it's unique in its nature, so it's unique in its authority. And I think that's a very

modest claim. Yeah, that's good. Well, thank you, Gavin, for the conversation. And again, the book is what it means to be Protestant, the case for an always reforming church. What's your YouTube channel? Is it truth unites or is it Gavin Ortland? Truth unites. Truth unites. I would highly encourage people to check it out. It is very, very thoughtful. And especially I was, I, I, I'm glad you brought up kind of like your heart for, uh, younger Christians and people really rested with some complex stuff. You do a great job of not being so

black. Like the way you, the way you tackle these tough topics, I think really as a father of four Gen Z kids, it really does resonate with, uh, younger people because you go about it in a very humble, winsome way, admitting you don't have all the right answers. Here's where you're at. That humility is really, I think, attractive to especially younger people who just are turned off by kind of a top-down, heavy-handed, black-and-white approach to these complex questions.

So Truth Unites, invite people to check it out. Thanks, Gavin, so much for being on Theology in the Raw. Hey, enjoyed it. Thanks for having me, Preston. Rest in. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network. Greetings and God bless. This is Tyler Burns. And this is Dr. Jamar Tisby. And we want to invite you to check out our podcast, Pass the Mic, Dynamic Voices for a Diverse Church.

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