Theology in the Raw - Understanding the Nicene Creed for Ministry Today: Dr. Glenn Packiam

Episode Date: June 2, 2025

Dr. Glenn Packiam is a pastor, author and practical theologian who currently serves as the lead pastor of Rockharbor Church in Costa Mesa, California. He earned a PhD from Durham University, is an ordained priest with the Anglican Church of North America, and is the author of several books, including The Resilient Pastor, Blessed Broken Given, and the recently released: “What’s a Christian Anyway? Finding our Way in an Age of Confusion and Corruption,” which forms the topic of our conversation. Join the Theology in the Raw community for as little as $5/month to get access to premium content at patreon.com/theologyintheraw  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey friends, welcome back to another episode of theology in raw. My guest today is Dr. Glenn Pacquiam, who is a pastor, author, and practical theologian who currently serves as the lead pastor of Rock Harbor Church in Custa Mesa, California. He has a PhD from Durham University. He's an ordained priest with the Anglican Church of North America and is the author of several books, including the resilient pastor, Blessed Broken Given, and the recently released book, What's a Christian anyway, finding our way in an age of confusion and corruption, which forms the topic of our conversation really enjoyed having Glenn back on the show. So please welcome back to the show. The water

only Dr. Glenn Pacquium. I'm so excited. I'm so excited about your hat. I know we're both wearing LA Dodgers has serendipitously, providentially. I rarely for some reason, I don't know, because I don't want to maybe turn people that hate the Dodgers off. I rarely wear my Dodgers hat. I decided to wear it today.

I needed to. Same thing. Exactly. Yours looks a lot newer than mine. I guess that shows how long we've been a fan for. Well, that's what I was saying is you're a true fan. I'm a new fan, you know? I became a diehard Dodger fan in 1987, which if you know anything about the Dodgers, that's a big year because 88 was the miracle year. So I was a diehard fan going into the 88 season. And I cannot even tell you how memorable that year was to be. I mean, it was an iconic year in all of sport, The Dodgers and ADA, they were a above average

team that maybe not even above average. And they faced the A's in the playoffs and the A's were just just dominant. And the Dodgers beat them. We had that miraculous home run by Kurt Gibson in game one. Anyway, anyway, I'll stop. I'll stop. I'll stop. Yeah. Oh man. I know right where I was sitting, but he hit that home run when he had two injured legs. Anyway, I keep saying, I'm gonna stop and I keep going, but yeah, you started it. Hey, good to, good to see you again, man. How long have you been in Southern California now you're at rock Harbor, which is, yeah, almost, almost three

years. So we got here end of August of 2022. So coming up on three years now as we're recording this and yeah, it's been awesome, man. I've known about Rock Harbor for years. When I was in seminary, we'd hear about this. I mean, back then that it was like this newer kind of more creative, vibrant SoCal church. And it was on the beginning stages of kind of just engaging, just doing church in a different way while being passionate about orthodoxy, but also be more creative maybe in how you do ministry. That's what drew us to it.

I mean, I feel like Rock Harbor is like this, we try to live in this creative synthesis of holding together word and spirit. Like we want to go after the gifts and ministry of the spirit, but man, we're going to teach the Bible. And lots of churches are trying to do the same thing. I'm not trying to say we're unique, but I was drawn to that sort of approach. And definitely a lot of young people, some of those folks that would have been, you know, in their 20s in those years are now still around in the church, but they're kind of the anchors, the pillars, the elders, and then there's a new wave of 20-somethings, 30-somethings.

So it's special, man, and we're experiencing a new wave of 20-somethings, 30-somethings. So, it's special, man. And we're experiencing a church that's kind of reclaiming its identity and forging a new future. It's really, really fun, a fun season. But you're not from California, right? This isn't like a homecoming. No. It's a funny thing though, Preston. I feel like it's a homecoming. I'm from Malaysia. I grew up in Malaysia. That's where I'm from. When I was 10, we moved to the West Coast, my family, we lived in Portland, Oregon. My parents went to a Bible school there for three years. Then we moved back to Malaysia. And then I came back to the States to go to college in like the Midwest, like in Oklahoma. And then I lived in Colorado. I mean, that's where most of my adult life

has been is in Colorado Springs for like 20 years, 22 years. But I will say coming out here feels like so familiar to me. Maybe it's the West Coast thing. Maybe it's the multicultural thing. Maybe it's all the Asian culture bleed over. We love it here. I miss it so much, man. My family doesn't, they're not big.

They are not huge in the California. Um, but I, and you know, and there's pros and cons of housing and the traffic, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but you got perfect weather all year round. You got amazing food. You at the beach. I'm just, people are back on California. I'm just like, you don't understand. No, no, they don't know. They don't know, but it's okay. They don't need to know. Are you worried where you live? Are you, you're living right down there in Orange County? Yeah, we're in Orange County. We're in Costa Mesa. So Rock Harbor is in Costa Mesa and we rent in Costa Mesa as well. So it's a great, I mean, it's a great city. It's, you know, it's kind of this

gritty skater, creative artist, you know, and then you have, of course, you know, our church pulls from many of the cities in Orange County. And so, that's fun. You came out with another book. It's called, What's a Christian Anyway? Finding Our Way in an Age of Confusion and Corruption. It's kind of a bold title. So, why don't we start there? What is a Christian Anyway, Glenn? How do you answer that question? Well, so, the book is a line- line by line reflection on the oldest, most robust confession of Christian faith, the Nicene Creed. And the Creed is 1700 years old this year, actually, right around this time of year. The Easter tide season is when the Council of Nicea gathered to kind of write this down. But I'll tell you why I put confusion and corruption.

I think we're living in a cultural moment where these are the two crosswinds that we're facing. One crosswind is this wind of corruption. The church that I was at in Colorado Springs in the early 2000s, 2006, there was a major scandal by the founding senior pastor, a guy named Ted Haggard. And I remember trying to lead out of those years, I was primarily a worship leader, but then I was starting to become like, teaching, preaching. I took over, I started the Sunday night service. And I could feel people saying, okay, listen, we kind of like you,

but we also kind of like the other guy. Like, who do we trust? And so we actually, in those years, 2009, we started saying the Nicene Creed weekly in worship. We were this like charismatic evangelical, you know, like mega church, but people latched onto it because it was something bigger than them.

And then eventually we did like a series on the Creed and it really resonated. But then when I moved out to California, I really encountered that other crosswind, the crosswind of confusion. I mean, you know, folks who know this, this happens in lots of places in America, but you really feel it on the West Coast.

It's kind of a choose your own adventure spirituality. You know, like, oh yeah, I know I like Jesus, but I like Buddha, I like crystals. There was a person who got baptized and we were like trying to interview him to do a testimony after the fact. And she's like, yeah, well, I just want to tell you that I also have a magic candle that speaks to me at night.

And we're like, okay, we might need to do some better follow-up work here. So it we're like, okay, we might need to do some better follow up work. So it's just like there's a lot of confusion. And so we did a series on the Creed here at Rock Harbor my second year here. And it was like the lights came on for people because it helped answer the question, one, can I trust you? But then also, how do I even know what's true? And you've noted, is this in your pastoral career, which spans over two decades,

is this, are you facing like really fresh and new and different challenges than you have before? This isn't just a cyclical thing that you've been facing all along? No, I mean, okay, so the corruption part of it, I think we can all say, oh yeah, come on, this has been going for a long time. Maybe it gets more press nowadays

because of social media and all that. But I do think there's something unique about this cultural moment. So I do some work with Barna, I'm a whatever senior fellow there, which just means I have access to their research and partner with them on stuff. Well, they've come out with some stuff that shows

that Americans are very spiritually open right now, which is awesome. Like there's more than before. More than before, like there's not this, in is awesome. Like there's more than before. More than before. Like there's not this, in fact, it's a change since the pandemic. And you know, there's a lot of Americans who are saying, I'm more open now than I was prior to the pandemic.

So like, just real quick, like Preston, I think, you know, you and I are old enough to remember, after 9-11, the general attitude towards religions and in general in Christianity in particular was like, oh yeah, religion's dangerous because look, what happens when you, the more deeply you believe something the more dangerous you are to society, right? That was what, that was the narrative after Islamic terrorism. So I think of that as like, that was the era of militants kind of atheism. And then that sort of softened and that gave way to this kind of indifferent

agnosticism. It was like, you know, the economy was booming and people were like, I don't really care what you believe. You do you, I'll hang onto my truth. Just let's just make money and be nice. Well, after the pandemic, I think that, so that let's call that indifferent agnosticism, right? Now I think that has shifted now. We're in this age of curious skepticism

where people are open, but here's the twist. You said what's different about now. The twist is there's a really all time low We're in this age of curious skepticism, where people are open, but here's the twist. You said what's different about now. The twist is there's a really all time low in terms of our recent memory or our living memory of institutional trust. We don't trust political institutions, we don't trust educational institutions,

we don't trust healthcare institutions, and people certainly don't trust religious institutions. So when Americans were asked, this is a Barnistead, when Americans were asked, okay, so you're spiritually open, do you consider a pastor a trustworthy guide in spiritual things? Like six to 9% of Americans said yes. I mean, of non-Christians said yes.

So that's wild. And then of church going Christians, only 45% said yes. I feel that as a pastor, like I'm standing up there preaching, whatever, and I could feel like half the room is sort of looking at you going, maybe, you know, let me fact check that. That's not what I saw on Instagram or, you know. So, that part of it feels different. Is there... So, I could see an argument both ways for that. One would be that kind of sucks for pastors. It's like, gosh, people don't trust me, but you can see where I'm going to go. Yeah. It's

like, but it kind of keeps pastors on their toes too. I mean, prior to the internet and social media and when there was maybe too much trust pastors can kind of say whatever they want. And now it's like, wow, I need to like fact check my sermons because everybody else is going to be doing it. Like, is there some healthy, is the distrust, is there a healthy component to that? 1.5 I believe there is. I mean, I think you're absolutely right. You know, like, whereas before, you could kind of just get away with saying stuff because you're a pastor. And especially, there's certain regions of our country where the pastor was given too

much honor, where you're like, he's giving his opinions on whatever, on budgeting or on I mean, we saw this during the pandemic, pastors giving their opinions about healthcare. You're like, dude, you don't really know what you're saying. So yeah, some of that is like, it's a good corrective. We shouldn't speak outside of our lane of knowledge and learning and our lane of authority. I think the other part of it that's a really good challenge for us as pastors is to force us into interdisciplinary work.

I did my doctorate at Durham in the UK where my theological reflection had to be integrated with sociological analysis. I'm not saying we all have to be expert level, you know, research, whatever, but the ability to kind of accurately understand a situation, just like, man, learn something about what a counselor's perspective would be or what a, you know, sociologist perspective would be before we just go, oh, yeah, this is all that you need to know about anxiety. Don't be anxious for anything. Let's understand that a little bit more deeply. So, I think it is a good challenge for pastors. I think it boosts the need for corporate leaders or communal leadership too, because there's no one person can be a renaissance

man on every single issue, you know? I mean, it's hard, yeah, just mastering, quote unquote, mastering the Bible alone and not having a clue about anything else, like that, that's impossible. So like to say, now I need to be an expert in immunology and, you know, like, yeah, healthcare and politics and all these things, like all the more need, right, to have people with

multiple skill sets and knowledge on a pastoral team, it seems like. That's exactly it. I mean, so again, you know, like when I talk with pastors, some of the kind of pressure is off sort of moment, you know, is when we talk about how the era of the myth of the solitary genius leader, that's over. And there never really was a solitary genius leader, pastor. I think now we can at least be free to embrace, we need a team of people, we need a team of voices. Some of them may be on staff,

some of them may be part of your advisory council or your eldership. We have to reclaim that because yeah, life is complex and we don't want to come away offering these thin statements. So, we live in an age now, and it's not that it didn't exist before, it just wasn't as pervasive. Where people, congregants, non-pastors, they have many other authority figures, right? Like 20 years ago, 30 years ago, it might've been, you know, some books they're reading or maybe a conference they would attend or, you know, people outside the church.

But now it's like, golly, I mean, Glenn, you're competing with a myriad of podcasts. Joe Rogan. Yeah. Yeah. Joe Rogan, you know? I mean, or God forbid they might come to you and say, well, Glenn, you know, Preston disagrees with you on this. Good, good! Of course, of course. It happens all the time.

This is such a genuine question. I mean, I hope all my questions are genuine. But like, is that good, bad or neutral? You know, the people you're pastoring, that you are in a sense placed as a spiritual authority over, like that's kind of like your, that's your role, I think, right? But then people may not, they may say, oh yeah, Glenn's one of many. I mean, you know, but I've got all these other people out there I listen to all week long. I listen to Glenn, you know, 35 minutes a week, but I listened to Joe Rogan, you know, five hours a week and, you know, whoever else, you know,

more than they listen to you. Like, is that good, bad? Is it neutral? It just is the reality. I mean, I don't spend a lot of time appraising whether it's good or bad. I do think, you know, there are some of my friends who pastor more in the Bible belt

or more sort of Baptist oriented cultures where there's a little more tradition kind of embedded into the culture. They're not experiencing that to the same degree. You know, California, it's sort of anti-institutional in the best of ways. It's why California is so forward thinking. We're not trying to get stuck in anything. We're trying to keep innovating, right? And so because of that, there is sort of this lower regard to say, well, you're the sole authority figure. They are more apt to learn from a variety of voices. I think that's good. I think what my approach is, is not to say, no, listen to me above them. My approach is to say, can I give you a framework so that you can discern for yourself what to make of these

things that you're listening to? Which is why, even writing this book, What's a Christian Anyway, the metaphor that we use, I actually tied a rope to the back of the room and I acted out this kind of metaphor of the old farm days when a blizzard was rolling in, farmers would put a rope up between the house and the barn. And they did it because you're like, man, they're supposed to know that journey. Yeah, it's a familiar walk from the house to the barn.

But sometimes a blizzard can be so blinding and disorienting that you could get lost. You could walk around in circles and freeze in the cold. So you need a rope to help you find your way home. And to me, the creed is that. And it emerged at a time, the year 325, when Christianity was multiplying and spreading and there were false teachers, Arius and others.

And so these early Christians were like, you know what, we're going to give you a rope to help you find your way home, not to replace the Bible, but to help you as you read the Bible. You know, your listeners will know this, the same counsel that confirmed the books that belong in the canon were the same counsel that confirmed the books that belong in the canon were the same counsel that confirmed this confession. So to me, it's not about, hey, listen to me and don't listen to those guys on Instagram or the podcast world or whatever. It's more of as you're listening, here's a rope to guide you. Here's a rope to help you figure out what's true because we're in a moment where popularity has replaced credibility.

true because we're in a moment where popularity has replaced credibility. And so people go, well, I don't know, this guy has a million followers. Okay, but what's the credibility of what he's saying? And the creed can help you decide what's credible when it comes to claims about God and about Christianity. That is a live question now, I keep seeing it come up, like the role of expertise, you

know, like, you know, within the age was, where there's so many influencers that aren't experts, but they might, they might be smart and educated and well read, you know? And also you add to that, I would say, I think going through the whole pandemic kind of destroyed but seriously challenged people's trust in the experts because there's all the corruption that came out and just lies and all this stuff. And then the ongoing lies from the government. I could see where people would be skeptical of the quote unquote experts, but there still is a need for experts, right?

Well, that's one way to do it. But I think what the Creed offers us is not just an expert theologian that believed these words because one theologian said it. No, replace expert with global and historic community. And that's what I'm trying to say. So the creed is broken up into three stanzas, father, son, and Holy Spirit. And they all begin with the same three words,

we believe in. And just that first word alone, we is so important. I have seen both in my conversations individually with Christians, and as we've talked about it in our sermon series and all this stuff, there is such an amazing power in people going, oh, I don't have to validate and verify each one of these lines by myself.

There's a we here, there's a great company of people. So I'm not even believing this because you are an expert, Glenn, or some smart guy wrote these. No, I'm saying this is what has been passed on to us. There's a global and historic family community that has held on to these words and these words have held on to them. So, you know, the metaphor sometimes uses like out here on the back bay in Newport, you can see people in their stand-up paddleboard

or like a one-person kayak or whatever. And evangelicals, we love saying that faith is personal, and that's really good, but it can make us imagine that faith is like a one-person kayak or a stand-up paddleboard. And when you don't feel like you can believe anymore, then you're like, well, I guess I better set my paddle down. Maybe I need to get out of the boat, you know?

And actually faith is like this giant ship and everybody's got an oar and there's billions and billions of Christians. And so if you are in a season of disruption or disorientation and you need to set your oar down for a moment, it's okay. Just stay in the boat, stay in the community and let someone else's faith carry you for a little bit.

Can you take us back to the Creed a bit? Can you open up the historical background? For those who just don't know much, when was the Nicene Creed? What was the historical context? Why this Creed? Why is this one maybe more important than other Creeds of that era? Yeah. I mean, the one that people go back to, oh, isn't it, wasn't the Apostles' Creed earlier? Yeah, possibly. We just don't have a clear origin story of the Apostles' Creed, but possibly. It's also worth pointing out that there were shorter creedal statements in the New Testament. 1 Corinthians 15 opens with one, and Paul says, what I received I passed on to you. Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, you know, and he goes on. So, those little

formula statements exist. There's short versions of that that are found from the, you know, second century, the early 100s. But this council in 325, it was convened right on the heels of an intense season of persecution. And the Emperor Constantine had not yet made Christianity the official religion. This is where a lot of people like, oh, this is just the emperor doing Roman. No, no, no. It was not the official religion. All Constantine had done was to make it no longer illegal.

So for the first time, like these Christian communities had a little breathing room. And so they convened in the city in modern-day Turkey called Nicaea. And they wanted to settle down, settle two issues. What letters should be counted as Christian scripture? They already knew that. It was already very clear. And then, what's the core of our faith? So, when they wrote this confession, they actually pulled verses and phrases from the

New Testament. I should say verses, phrases and sentences from the New Testament. So anyone who reads the Nicene Creed, you go, oh, that sounds like John 1 or Colossians 1 or Hebrews 1. They go, yeah, they did that on purpose, you know. The other reason I like the Nicene Creed more than the apostles is it fills out a lot more about Jesus. So I said there's three sections, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The section on Jesus is far and away the longest section.

And what's a Christian if you get Jesus wrong? You know, like if you get Jesus wrong, you got the whole thing wrong. And so the Nicene Creed wants to make sure we don't get the Jesus stuff wrong. What was the goal? Was it to establish what is true Christian doctrine from what is false Christian doctrine?

Because they were battling, like you said, Arianism and narcissism, maybe a little earlier, or no, probably through that same time. Was that the goal, to distinguish true from false Christianity? I think in one part that was the goal. I think the other part of the goal was unity, to remind them that, these are over 300 leaders came from North Africa, East Asia, what we would call modern day sort of Southern Europe. I mean, they came from all these regions together

and maybe they'd never ever been in the same room before, which is pretty remarkable. So even for us as in 2025, I think, yeah, the creed functions in the same way. It's a purifier. It helps us know what things are not true, but then also what things belong on lower levels. I mean, Preston, this is one of the things

that was so confusing post pandemic is people talked about justice issues and is that a gospel issues? And we couldn't sort out what's a level one theological. Like if you don't believe this, you're not a Christian. Well, that's what the Creed's supposed to name. It's like these are level one issues. Some things may be level two, level three issues. Some things may be like, dude, if you don't believe that, you're not a Christian. So it's a purifier for them and for us. But secondly, it's a unifier

for them and for us. Recently there was a new pope named and you know, whatever people feel about Catholicism and Catholics and all this stuff, I think it's a great tragedy to forget that for Catholics who confess their faith with, you know, confess these words with faith in their hearts, we're actually connected. We're brothers and sisters. We quibble about some really significant things, but the creed is not one of those things we disagree on, you know? So, I think there's got to be a way of saying, man, remember what unites us over what divides us. Do you think there's a contextual nature to the creed? Like, on the one hand, it is this

foundational, this is what orthodoxy is. If you're not believing these things, you're probably not an orthodox Christian. But, you know, I've heard people bring it up, and I think I might have even bring it up. Like, well, they are still wording things in such a way and highlighting certain things and not others because of their cultural moment. Like, is there a case that, there be a case that the creed, this particular creed written 1700 years ago is actually not enough to define orthodoxy today? Cause we're dealing with different things that they weren't dealing with then. I mean, the classic example is his marriage, right? Is same sex marriage outside the bounds of orthodoxy. People say

like, well, it's not in the creed. They didn't talk about the creeds. But then the other side of the argument is, well, nobody was debating that back then. Even the Gnostics and Arianes and Heretics didn't question that. So they didn't need to. But the point is there was still a contextual reason why they said these things and not others. Should we add to the Creed what we, you know, what is actual orthodoxy in terms of what we're dealing with today? I love that question. I mean, there's no getting around that, yeah,

they had some particular questions, but the questions they were wrestling with were not questions of ethics, sort of how to live. They were wrestling with the questions of who is this God that we are claiming to belong to, you know? So that's why the Creed just restricts itself to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Well, certainly that's not all we need to know as Christians. I mean, reading the New Testament alone, you're like, well, Paul has a whole lot more to say than just the Trinity. Of course he

does, you know? So that's why I'm careful to say the Creed is not meant to replace the Bible, but the Creed is like bumper lanes for reading the Bible. When you go bowling, you put the bumper lanes up, you can't end up in the... You can't read the Bible and come up with some weird view that Jesus is not actually the incarnate son of God or that Jesus didn't exist before the incarnation. Some people maybe thought that. They're like, he was a human who got elevated to divine status. And the early Christians are like, nope, nope,

he was before, you know, there's the eternal son of God. So they're trying to make sure we get God right, make sure we get Jesus right. And then from there, all of our other theological thinking needs to flow. So let's take the issue of sexuality and marriage, which you've done such amazing work on. And Preston, part of the thing I appreciate so much about your work is how you ground it in the big biblical story, right? It's not just a verse here or a verse there. In a similar way, when you name the Father as the creator of all that is seen and unseen, okay, so that's the basis for appealing to creational design, right?

Of bodies, of gender, of marriage, right? And then when you say Jesus became man for us and for our salvation, you go, okay, so there's something there about the dignifying of our human body. And then at the very end of the creed, when it says we look for the resurrection of the dead, you go, oh, that's another way of saying our bodies matter. So theology of the body has the seeds of those ideas

in the creed by talking about creation, incarnation, and resurrection. They're all there. That's good. So the creed, I never thought about it like this. It's not meant to be a comprehensive orthopraxy or even orthodoxy comprehensively. it's really focused on the Trinity, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. And here are the beliefs we hold of the three and one, really. But that it's, it's really focused just on that, not intended to go beyond that. So, yeah. Yeah. Keep going. Well, I was going to say, so I'm just kind of thinking out loud. So the Nicene Creed is not sufficient, or is it not sufficient to define, here's all the Orthodox things we should believe about Christianity and ethics and all the, you know,

it really is more narrowly focused. Yeah. It's the, to put it in business terms, it's the minimum viable product. It's an irreducible minimum. Christianity cannot be less than this. And in another sense, it's not just the irreducible minimum, it's the essence. So you say, okay, if I had to define it,

okay, so what is a Christian anyway? Someone who belongs to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, someone who believes in this Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and someone who by the power of the Holy Spirit and the love of the Father is becoming like Jesus. So, it all kind of, you know, the belong, believe, become thing, it's all there, but it's shaped by our imagination of who God is. I mean, I think there's a lot of spiritual formation people, you know, people who do the theology of ethics stuff, who would say, you become

what you behold. And I think these early Christians knew if you're beholding a God that you could shape in your own image, a God who just wants you to be happy, a God, you know, then you're not going to become, you know, the fully alive being you're meant to be. And there's no statement on, wait, the Nicene Creed doesn't talk about which books are in the Bible and which books aren't. They assume… my understanding is years ago since I taught this, but the earliest statement we have of a New Testament that reflects our exact 27 books, no more, no less, was it Augustine's, no, Athanasius, I think, Festo letter 367 is ringing a bell for some reason.

Dude, I mean, you're pulling the eye. I don't know that off the top of my head, but I mean, obviously, there's, you know, Peter, 1 Peter, references Paul's letters and treats them as scriptures. We got that. I know at the Council of Nicaea, they came away from that council in 325 confirming it or affirming it. Okay. If there was documentation before that, that would not be surprising because they weren't,

that was not a contested decision. It was an easy decision to say, hey, here's some other letters from Clement and the shepherd of Hermione, whatever, that are good letters, but not Christian scripture in the way that Paul's and Peter's and James and the gospels. You also had, I mean, you kind of mentioned in passing that just prior to Nicaea, you had, I mean, heavy persecution. I mean, especially like the Diocletian. Diocletian, yep. Was that like late third century?

That's right. Late two hundreds, yeah, exactly. Late two hundreds. So, prior to that, even within, and we don't need to get all the way into canon stuff, but you had kind of three different families of manuscripts, right? The Caesarean, the Western text, the Alexander. So you had pockets of Christianity that were kind of had somewhat different textual traditions that, and they weren't even able to communicate. So people freak out that, well, we didn't have a fully closed canon until the fourth century. It's like, well, of course we didn't. You're not dealing with a printing press and shared emails going back and forth. You're dealing with so many walls to even

preventing people from talking to each other and being public and hashing these issues out. So it really wasn't until the fourth century when Christians could really hammer out, okay, let's really put closure on what books are in, what books are out. So I don't know. It seems to make sense that it would take a while for the canon to be fully decided upon. But people-

Yeah, I mean, I'm just trying to stay in my lane of authority. I don't know that off the top of my head, but I think that does sound right. I used to, it was honestly the most exciting class I ever taught was at Nottingham University. So like most of the class aren't even Christians. They're just taking like a Bible class. And a big chunk of that class was the formation of the canon. It was the first time I like

really dug into it. It was so exciting. And like I've put pictures of like papyri and everything. I was literally was able to get at least some, I mean, some people were falling asleep, but I got some non-Christians excited about canon formation. Like, oh, wow! Amazing, dude! Yeah, it was fun. It was fun, dude. But that was like 20 years ago. So, I'm digging way back into my... Yeah. So, what... Okay. So, Nicene Creed 325, there were several of the Creeds after that, right? And was it in response to the Creed of Nicene? There was a few things they wanted to clarify. There was a council to try to clarify in what

ways Jesus, both God and man, you know, so they were trying to put a bit more of an explanation to the proclamation that's in the Nicean creed, you know, so, and then they wanted to go, okay, so in what ways it's about the two natures of Jesus and then what does that then mean for Mary and, you know And so there's some things there and that's why I say those are less important because they're not adding any new statement. They're just adding more attempts to explain how, in what way these things are true.

How are these things true? I mean, it's sort of like the Creed doesn't give us an atonement theory. It just says for us and for our salvation, He came down from heaven, He was crucified. It kind of narrates the story. It's says, for us and for our salvation, He came down from heaven, He was crucified. Kind of narrates the story. It's later that we go, oh, well, okay, but how does atonement actually work?

Okay, well, you can wrestle with that. And that's why I say level one is we don't get around believing that Jesus died for us and for our salvation. You gotta believe that, right? How exactly the mechanics and the model of that atonement, okay, well, let's pursue the scriptures and dive into that. But choosing different atonement theories doesn't make you not a Christian until you reject that Christ's death was necessary for us and for our

salvation. You know? Okay. So you wouldn't put like, because some people would say like, unless you believe in, for instance, penal substitution, then you are denying the cross, you're denying like that, that, that, that you're outside the bounds of orthodoxy. Would you say that that's not true? No, but I will say there are some atonement theories that don't actually, they functionally deny that Christ's death was for us and for our salvation. They more kind of take it as like, well, it's just a model of nonviolent blah, blah, blah, you know. Right.

And you go, well, that doesn't actually do justice to even this bare confession in the creed about, no, we needed saving, he came for us, you know, so not just to show us an example, you know. So, yeah, I think there's a couple of models that you'd, so not just to show us an example, you know. So, yeah, I think there's a couple of models that you'd say, not enough. Like, Pelagius, didn't Pelagius advocate for like an example theory only or? I don't know if he got blamed for that for sure. It's funny, I just read this amazing book outlining the different kind of Atonement theories. I think Pelagius, maybe, I mean, this one scholar was arguing that Pelagius' actual argument was that compelled

by God's love, you would become different. So it was almost like a saved for good works kind of idea, but he definitely got it pinned to him that he was saying, you know, so anyway, yeah. Yeah, that's so funny. Yeah, stuff gets pinned to people all the time. You're like, did he really? I remember reading, you know, I was in seminary in college, you hear about Origen, you know, Origen, he didn't take the Bible seriously, allegorize everything, all this stuff. I had

a really like negative view of Origen. But then like years ago, I started reading Origen, and dude, this dude was like, one of those brilliant biblical scholars. And even the allegory thing, I didn't see that. It didn't leap off the... It's not like that's all he did is run around allegorizing everything. Nothing's actually historically... Like, it wasn't that at all, really. I mean, it was like, I was like, wow, this guy is a beast of a Bible scholar. And then he read about the... He has some hand in textual criticism, wasn't it? Or is that Tatian? Oh, well, once again, you're going beyond me.

You're going beyond me. I mean, I do know that... Yeah, go ahead. No, he did. I'm blanking on exactly what he did, but no, he was a major textual critic. Yeah. I forgot how. I mean, the thing that got him in trouble was his sort of universalist sort of hope, you know?

And I think that's the other thing. Again, the creed puts a boundary line there where it says, he will come again in glory, Jesus will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead. So we don't get around saying there's some kind of final judgment now. Does that mean you have to believe

in eternal conscious torment? I mean, you wrote the book on all that stuff, right? No, you don't have to believe in that. There's annihilationism, there's conditional immortality, blah, blah, blah. But you can't get around the fact that there is a final reckoning. So again, so the Creed's not trying to spell out

all the mechanics of how and what, but it's trying to give us the skeletal structure here to go, this is the scaffolding for belief. structure here to go, this is the scaffolding for belief. All right. Let's talk about contemporary church. What's the role of the creed, the Nicene Creed in the church today? Like, is this for you guys, is this your sole doctrinal statement or do you feel like you've got to add to other things to it? Again, going back to we live in a different cultural moment, different things need to be addressed. On our website, on Rock Harbor's website, when you click on the What We Believe tab, the first thing you'll see is the Nicene Creed.

And we're trying to highlight that as the core. But below it, you'll see Rock Harbor Convictions. And in that list, you'll find eight things there, including our specific belief about the Bible as the Word of God, the authority of scripture. You'll see a statement in there about marriage and sexuality, marriage and singleness and gender and sexuality. You'll see a statement on there about gifts of the spirit, about women in ministry. So, I think it's helpful when local churches say to people where they've arrived on these other issues. I think that is helpful. I'm not against our points of distinction. And I think as a pastor, it's important to do that.

At the same time, I don't want our points of distinction to become points of division. And that's what I'm concerned with as a follower of Jesus. You know, like, you know, so here's an image for your listeners, you're the old wagon wheel, you know, with the hub and the spokes. The further away the spokes move from the hub, the further away they move from each other. The closer they move to the hub, the closer they move to each other. And in a similar way, I wanted the Nicene Creed first to go, hey, we're actually connected with all Christians, all churches in Orange County,

beyond like, we're on the same team. We're on team Jesus, you know. And if you want to know what specific things we believe in, where we've landed on some interpretive issues at Rock Harbor, here you go. Here's our eight, you know, convictions. And so that part of it is helpful. It's important. I don't think those are insignificant, or we wouldn't list them. You know, we think those are really significant. And probably those eight things might be things worth dividing or finding a different gathering for. But at the end of the day, the creed is what we

are meant to hold to at the core and somehow Jesus will sort that out at the end. Yeah. Well, it makes sense that you can make a case that every church could start with the Nicene Creed and yet a church in New York or Malaysia or somewhere, they might have a different set of core convictions based on the unique challenges that this church might be facing internally or externally. Like, your core convictions may not necessarily need to be the core convictions of other churches in different, you know, socioeconomic or cultural places. You know? That's right. That's right. And that is the important work of you said earlier about

theology being contextual. I mean, yeah, in one sense, all theology is contextual. Now, sometimes academics say that as a way of getting out, wiggling out of any kind of fixed doctrine, you know? And we can't do that. So again, the creed is our boundary line. Those are our fixed doctrine. But there's other layers. Let's go layer three or layer four or whatever, where you go, yes, that is contextual. And we do need to work through what we mean by that. All right. The last part of your subtitle says, you know, we'll find it in a way in an age of confusion and corruption. We've got to focus a little bit heavier right now on confusion. Talk to me about corruption.

What is our age of corruption? I mean, I'm thinking yes of scandals. That's the obvious one, but I'm also thinking of corruption in the sense of being co-opted. I've been co-opted by political or social agendas. I address in the book very briefly, the corrupting or co-opting

tendency with Christian nationalism, you know, speaking of being contextual, you know, I mean, this is stuff of like, okay, so would a Christian in another nation read these verses and think America, you know, or would they read it and think of something else, you know? So I think those are the ways that we've allowed our faith to become so entangled with partisan ideology, economic preferences, you know, like, okay, great, you like capitalism. I do too. But that's not the same as enshrining it and saying Jesus established capitalism, free market economies. Yeah, no, don't say that. But unfortunately, there are Christian voices who do. And they are very vocal.

I mean, to be contextual, we have specific voices on one political end of the spectrum that are claiming to Jesus is Lord and happy Easter and he's risen. And also, if you don't believe in free market economics and you don't believe it, then you're an idiot. And those are the ways that Christianity is getting a bad name. When I say it's being corrupt, I mean, one of the leading reasons people are leaving the faith is because it's been associated with a particular brand of politics.

That's been my most common observation with people who have deconstructed, left the evangelical church, left Christianity. In many cases, this is anecdotal, I'm sure there's been studies done on it, in many cases, the thing that sparked their journey towards deconstruction was the marriage between right-wing political viewpoints and Christianity. Not just people who are Christians who also happen to be right-leaning, but the marriage between those two where if you to be a Christian is to vote Republican. Have you found that to be true as well? Absolutely. Anecdotally, in my own conversations with people, I mean, their disillusionment

is... I cannot imagine why so many Christians voted for, you know, and... But then, you know, again, there is some... It's out of the lens of pain and disbelief, but sometimes there's a little bit of sloppiness in their thinking as well. So, they've already decided that to vote a particular way means you're a racist, you know, chauvinist, you know, blah, blah, blah, misogynist. And so, therefore, then it's like incompatible that a Christian could vote for that person. You know, as a pastor, I always want to encourage people to lean in with a bit more curiosity and a bit more humility and to say, do you actually know all the reasons that all the people made the

choices they did, you know, to vote for whoever and whoever. And so that's the harder pastoral work of getting people to lean in. But you can't shake this. I mean, this was a Barna study from 2023, what causes people with no faith tradition to doubt Christianity. So this isn't deconstruction, but this is reluctance of people to even consider Christianity. The number one reason, 42% said it's the hypocrisy of religious people. And I think when they say hypocrisy, what they mean is you say you care for the poor, but then you're defunding NGOs and you're blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Or they say hypocrisy and they think you're supposed to love the marginalized, but I don't hear you talking about racial injustice.

So some of that stuff is like, yeah, mea culpa. Like it is our fault. Like, yes, that is fair critique that we need to take seriously. On the other hand, I've already mentioned, like I would want to ask people to maybe ask a few more questions, but honestly, the biggest thing I wanna do as a pastor

is I wanna ask people, and I often do, tell me about the faith you're leaving, because chances are it's not Christianity anyway. You know, chances are the faith you're leaving is one iteration of it from a very, very relatively small subset when you think about global Christianity and historic Christianity. That's good. Yeah, you brought up understanding why people might vote a certain direction. There's a stat that I hear quoted, I still hear it quoted all the time. I don't want to say it drives me crazy. I might be too strong. It's just, I wish we would open it up a little bit. It's

that 80% of white evangelicals voted for Trump. And I'm like, okay, hold on a second. First of all, that's not actually true. It's 80% of white evangelicals who voted, voted for Trump. It's like half of the, you know, like close to half, I think, didn't vote that year. Second of all, like, okay, why? I mean, there's a massive difference between somebody who said, okay, let's just go back to 2016 Trump and Hillary. All right. Right. Right. There were people like, I'm not, I don't like those choices. Yeah. I was, it took me, it's a coin toss, you know, it's like, so I mean, Hillary's in the democratic party that put her up there is almost as much to blame as like,

here's your other option. Okay, great. You know, as bill Burr says, you know, I have a choice between a racist and the devil, you know, these are, well, I mean, my word, the corruption with the clitons, you talk about not caring about the poor and just how many, how much blood is on their hands. If you go all the way down to Benghazi and other things, like, Oh my word. And then Trump, it's like, Oh my word. So it's like, yeah, okay. Yeah. Somebody who like held their nose, flip the coin, toss the coin 50% Trump, 90%. That's a massive difference between a mega hat wearing J six, whatever, like conspiracy theorists, pizza gate, all, you know, like,

right, they both vote over the same person. Those are very, very different people. So just to collapse it all in is get that stat. I think it's really unhelpful. And this is where stats are unhelpful. I mean, statistics, there are statistics and there are statistics, right? I mean, like, when I was trained at to do situational analysis research, you always value qualitative or empirical research more than you do this quantitative stuff because stats can give you a little bit of a nudge, but until you're going in deep with focus groups or just to put it in normal life, like just listening to people and talking to people, I learned a lot.

I learned that a lot of my assumptions were wrong about why people voted the way they did in 2016. And I would like to think I learned from it this time around in 2024, you know, of like, you know, people had different reasons. They were concerned about common sense stuff about boys and girls sports and that kind of thing. You know, so and I'm not here to comment on those reasons. I'm only here to say that reasons that people do certain things is very complex. And when you theologize your decisions, this is where we give our theology a bad name. So when you go, I'm voting this way

because I'm a Christian. You go, oh. That's what it gets you. Yeah, I would just rather you say, you know what, I'm voting this way because I'm sick and tired of X, Y, Z. Okay, cool. Like that's great, man.

But like when you've theologized your opinions, now we're all implicated in you and your choices. Yeah, yeah. I'm curious the makeup of Rock Harbor, if you're allowed to say, cause some people just say California, super liberal, what they don't realize is Orange County is very conservative.

Now Rock Harbor is a younger demographic, so maybe they don't match the 65 year old retired person in Orange County. So what is your political makeup pretty diverse and equally so, or is it? It is diverse. I don't know what that percentage would be. If I were to guess, I wouldn't say it's 50-50, but I don't know.

I mean, it could be 60-40. I will say that this election, I was here for the first election cycle I was at was the one in 2024, and I decided to write a prayer that we could pray together as a church on the Sunday before the election. But instead of praying for our country, I prayed for us as the church, which I think that's the focus, you know? So everybody says they want to be kingdom, like, okay, great, but that doesn't mean, Lord, we pray for America.

So, you know, the first part of the prayer, Almighty God, you're the sovereign over all nations. Kingdoms rise and kingdoms fall, but your name stands above them all. As we approach election day in America, help us keep our eyes on you. Help us to see what John saw in the book of Revelation. And then your throne is at the center.

Beside the throne stands the lamb who was slain. So I'm painting this picture of the sacrificial death. Your resurrection is the reason we have hope. A bunch of theology. Then we get to the actual petition part. We pray for your rule to arrive on earth as it is in heaven. We pray for your will to be done in the world. We pray for the church in America

to reflect the kingdom of God. And I think that's the key pivot is so many of the times you're like, we pray for America to be godly. I'm praying for the church. And so then help us to be salt, preserving what is good in the world around us and preventing the rots of sin and wickedness Help us to be light putting your goodness righteousness and justice on display in the world

Use our actions and our agency our votes and our voice for the good of our neighbors and for the glory of God And then it goes on to say, you know No matter what the outcome remind us of our mission in the world keep us faithful to you You know again focusing on the church. So that received a lot of wonderful feedback from people. And then on the Sunday after the election, I stood up and I said, hey, some of you are here today and you're overjoyed. You're jubilant, you're relieved. Others of you are here and you're anxious and you're nervous and you're worried. And I just want you to know that however you're coming in today, you are welcome here at Rock Harbor because this is not a church that chooses a party. This is a church that is centered on Jesus.

Huge applause, you know, and I'm no angry emails, no one's saying, come on, you sold out, you should have gone all in for, you know. And there are those churches in Orange County and Southern California, there are those churches that sell out all the way. It's a one party. And yeah, we just, I don't want to do that. I would imagine you're, from what I know about Rock Harbor's demographic, that that's not shocking that they would celebrate that prayer and that they wouldn't demand some kind of party allegiance. Again, there are other options from what I know. Yes. Yeah. I don't, yeah. I got a couple of names that I wouldn't say it, but yeah, because I can't say for sure, but I get a sense. Okay, last question. Favorite thing about ministry and least favorite thing

about ministry. Man, favorite thing about ministry is getting to be a witness to God at work in people's lives. I mean, that's just what a privilege. I have front row seats to people's lives and I do love preaching. And I do love getting to like see light bulb moments come on. I do love wrestling with the text and praying and asking the Holy Spirit to help me speak exactly what these people need on this Sunday. I love that.

I'm not just doing a Bible study. I'm getting to carry a word from the Lord to them, I love that. But I couldn't do that work without the other work of actually being embedded in this community. So I'm not wired to be a person that lives at a distance, inaccessible, I'm around my team, and I have appointments throughout the week

with folks in the church. That shouldn't be radical or revolutionary, sadly it is, churches of a certain size. But that's my favorite thing, And I have appointments throughout the week with folks in the church. That shouldn't be radical or revolutionary. Sadly, it is. Churches of a certain size. But that's my favorite thing is having front row seats to God at work in people's lives. And I'm constantly pressed in awe

at the faithfulness of people through cancer diagnosis, through like a business being, you know, having to be sold because it's closing, you know, and the ups and downs and then the good days and all of that stuff. That's my favorite thing. Least favorite thing, okay, I should probably have done the negative first. I think least favorite thing is probably some of the stuff you alluded to where because

people are listening to a lot of different voices, they carry in or they project on you different expectations that they have for their pastor. So they may not regard a pastor with the same sort of singular authority as bygone eras, but they will still project on their pastor their deepest hopes and dreams and sometimes their deepest pain, which is difficult and it's important for me to remember that if someone's coming real feisty about an issue to go, it's probably not just about the issue, it's about their stories, about their pain. So when I'm at my best, I do a really good job

of asking questions when I'm not at my best, I just kind of shut it down. So, but yeah, that would be the challenge. How often do you preach? Is it like 30, 40 times a year or? Yeah, close to 40, about 30, between 36, that, that would be the challenge. How often do you preach? Is it like a 30, 40 times a year or? Yeah, yeah. Close to 40, about 30, between 36 and 38. Yeah.

I take four straight Sundays off in the summer and then we have an amazing team here at the church that continues to rise and shine and grow. And so they, yeah, they, they probably get 12-ish times a year as well. Well, hey Glenn, thanks for coming on the podcast, man. Really appreciate it. And so, I remember when I saw you from a distance that you took that job at rock Harbor, I got excited, man. I don't know. I just want to see people moving

to California. So that's awesome. Preston. Well, you've been a big part of helping us around here over the years, man. So look forward to the next time that we can hang. This show is part of the Converge Podcast Network.