Unashamed with the Robertson Family - Ep 1218 | John Luke Drops Baby Bomb, Outs Willie’s Biggest Weakness & Christian Survives Killer Bees

Episode Date: November 28, 2025

John Luke drops his big baby news with a major twist, and the announcement leads into a candid conversation about family legacy as the guys share their thoughts on the greatest strengths and weaknesses of their fathers. Their study of 1 and 2 Samuel, along with the greater story of David, shows them why honesty about both sides matters when you’re raising kids, leading people, or passing on faith to the next generation. Christian weighs in with a few family insights of his own, including the time he was attacked by John Luke’s overly aggressive honey bees in his own yard. In this episode: Numbers 6, verses 1–21; Numbers 6, verses 24–26; Judges 13, verses 1–25; 1 Samuel 1, verses 1–28; 1 Samuel 2, verses 12–36; 1 Samuel 3, verses 1–21; 1 Samuel 4, verses 1–22; 1 Samuel 13, verse 14; Acts 2, verses 1–21; Acts 13, verse 22; Psalm 51, verses 1–19 Today's conversation is an overview of The David Story: Shepherd, Father, King taught by Hillsdale Professor Justin Jackson. Take the course with us at no cost to you! Sign up at ⁠http://unashamedforhillsdale.com/⁠ More about The David Story: Encounter the beauty of the Bible. The David Story: Shepherd, Father, King explores the lives of Israel's first two kings—Saul and David—to discover the Bible’s profound lessons about fatherhood, the nature of sin, and the consequences of sin on both a family and a nation. While David suffers great tragedies due to his own transgressions, he models a path to redemption through repentance. Join Professor Justin Jackson in a careful reading of First and Second Samuel to gain a deeper understanding of the meaning and beauty of this story that is not only fundamental to the Christian and Jewish faiths, but also a literary masterpiece. Join us today in this pursuit of a deeper understanding of the Bible in “The David Story.” Sign up at ⁠http://unashamedforhillsdale.com/ Check out At Home with Phil Robertson, nearly 800 episodes of Phil's unfiltered wisdom, humor, and biblical truth, available for free for the first time! Get it on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, and anywhere you listen to podcasts! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/at-home-with-phil-robertson/id1835224621 Listen to Not Yet Now with Zach Dasher on Apple, Spotify, iHeart, or anywhere you get podcasts. Chapters: 00:00-4:55 Christian, the inappropriate prankster 04:56-8:45 John Luke’s big baby announcement 08:56-15:15 Christian is attacked by bees 15:16-23:00 The strength & weaknesses of our fathers 23:01-30:34 Receiving God’s gifts & giving them back 30:35-41:07 God’s pattern is outside our understanding 41:08-50:57 Who loves you enough to confront you? — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I am unashamed. What about you? The other night, I guess it was two nights ago, we were flying in from Idaho, and we were running to Willie and Corey in the Admiral's Club, and so we're busied. Then we go out there, and here comes Bella and Jacob. They're in from someplace, and Jacob started telling a story about them getting a couple's massage. I laughed so hard. In fact, Lisa was laughing so loud. the entire like two gates where the people are looking,

we're over in a corner, because she's got that super loud laugh. It was, I mean, he's so dry when he's telling a story like that. But what really tickled me was that Bella's sitting there, and her face is glowing. She looks like Maddie,

her producer, and just read, like, because he's telling all this stuff, you know, that happened during this couples was a sudden. You just have to ask him about it. He told his last night.

Oh, you heard it. That was a wild story. Was that not hilarious? That was so funny. Oh, I don't know how much of it is true. I don't know how much Jacob and Bella.

It sounded like a J story to me. They went to a tight couple massage. Bella booked it. And apparently at one point during the massage, this lady was like straddling Jacob's head. Yeah. Which. And he said her knees were past his head.

I don't know how you would ever. His exact line was crotch on the neck. That was it, he said. And his fingers in the crowd. It never could get to that. It never could get to that. It never could get to that. to that point for me. He said, I've never been so lubed it on my life. So she had his,

her fingers in his crack. That's what he said. But then he said, but I do have a big crack. Well, that's what I said. Maybe she couldn't find where the back ended the crack again. That's right. When there's a crevasse, when you're doing with the Grand Canyon, what he's supposed to do? You got to watch out. I'm kind of with you, Christian. I'm not, you ain't getting that far. No, that's what I'm saying. That's, that was the confusing part to me. It was like, how did you end up? How did you end up there? Yeah. Because he kept saying lower. Lower, please.

And Bella's reaction was the funniest part to me. Because it had just happened that afternoon. So it was all still fresh. I said, I can see your hair looks a little greasy today. Welcome back to the Unashamed podcast. Actually, this is Unashamed for Hillsdale. This is our Hillsdale Friday episode. I'm piping in from North Carolina, guys.

How are you all? It's not the same without you here, Zach, which is we feel like there's a void. And we've all been talking about it. There's a void here, don't you? There's like an intellectual hole. Yeah, right. Intellectual hole that you can only feel smallly from North Carolina. Yeah, exactly.

Well, I'm here. I'm there in spirit and we have technology. This is how I normally come in, the Unashamed podcast. So, but you were sending me some really bizarre AI features. He just went ahead with there. Yeah, I'm not going to say what they were, but like I will say that Christian, And so I get on, and the Christians are prankster. I thought I was off camera when I was laughing.

I couldn't see myself in the little square. Now, you had your shirt over your mouth, and I'm like, at first, I said, why was he acting that way? And then I see, like, you're like jiggling, you're shaking, laughing. And I'm like, am I, is something wrong with me? So I'm not like looking at myself in the camera. He's getting all self-conscious. He's like, looking at himself.

Well, then I realized, like, he's waiting for me to pick up my cell phone because he sent me a text. And so I pick up myself. And he had already showed us the picture. And it's very funny. A picture of myself that had been A-I. Well, as, I don't know about you guys, but I have been the, I wouldn't call it a victim, but I guess, but a subject of many AI post, especially when Dad was sick and Mom.

And most of mine, I was in like a Catholic, you know, whatever they call that, with the white collar and all-black. and like doing all these blessings and moms on her deathbed, dad's on his deathbed, size already dead. You know, I'm doing last rights. And so all the pictures of me are in that. So once that like took off, that was the thing. But what was funny is none of them were me.

They were close, but they weren't actually me. And there'd be a picture of me somewhere in there. And you'd see me and you'd see the guy who's playing me. And it's just, I don't know, wasn't that close. But that happened like, I guess it's still happening. This one looked exactly like Zach. So it was. I thought it was real when I first saw it.

Yeah, I'm like, I heard that doesn't get out on the internet because then people think it's real. I'm not going to tell you what it was. You better delete it for your wife. It was high, I just say it's highly inappropriate. The pass is behind this. You have a chance to repent. You know, by the way, we're in a new story.

We're now in the story of David. This is, this has been really good. It's Unashamed for Hillsdale.com. You guys need to check it out. They offer a bunch of free courses. So now we've done Genesis. Exodus, and now we're into the story of David. And one of the incredible things that I've learned, I've not learned, but just, I guess, was reminded of, is the reason why David was a man that for God's on heart was simply because he had a repentant heart.

And that's a good opportunity for you to repent, Christian. You can be like David and repent for what you did, and then we can find. Are you my Nathan? I'm your Nathan. This is the conversation. I think Zach is David and Christian's a Goliath in this scenario. I think that's right.

So for the audience, you guys like, you just finished Exodus. And so for you, it's one week to the next. But for us, it's been a couple of months since we got together to record.

So it's kind of like getting the band back together today. So we've been kind of having some fun with that. But I thought since it is a little bit of a gap for us, John Luke, we hinted, I think,

during the Exodus study that you guys were going to have a child or more. Yes. But we didn't talk anything about it. So now that you guys are kind of out there, tell us what's going on with you and your life family. Now, since then, we knew we were pregnant then,

but now we found out we were having twins and twin girls. Oh, two girls. So big update, life update, twin girls. Twin girls. Three girls to two boys. Three girls. Yep, two boys. That's the crazy part.

Twins is like, okay, that's crazy, but we've done the baby, we've had babies, and we've raised them to not to toddlers. Now, but we're going from three kids to five kids. I feel like that's another level. So basically you're one exchange student from catching up with your mom and dad. I mean, you're right there in the neighborhood. And it'll have to be an exchange. With the twins. We don't have twins on the Robertson side that I know of.

So is that her side of the family that brought the twin team? That's her side, yeah. That's her side. her sister just had twins too. Oh, wow. Now, and so her parents are doubling up on grandkids too. You feel like you're like all the chicks you've been,

like, it's that going to help you with the twins, you think? Yeah, literal chicks, chickens that I have right now. Yeah, I was wondering where that was going.

You got to, all the chicks you've been picking up, helping you out with these things. He has baby chicks. Right. He has baby chicks. More than anything. Unashamed for his there.

But I just called me out. No, I'm saying, yeah, we filmed about it on the show. You have a dope chicken coop. Yes, I think. Oh, that's right. Yeah. And I just got 10 more chicks. Thank you.

Yeah. So I'm saying that's going to help you with all the, you know, having twins. It is. Well, having all of these animals that I'm feeding and taking care of. It's like muscle memory. Are you going to have eggs soon? Yeah. You have an egg out?

Oh, man. We need to talk when this is over. Because I can only eat fresh eggs now since I've been on this Ph.D. died on this high protein. And I cannot eat bald eggs. Oh, weird. Yeah, if I eat like eggs from the store, instant diarrhea. Really?

Yeah. But fresh eggs, perfect. Yeah. So let's talk later. What are you going to say is that? I don't know. You lost me at diarrhea. I don't know what I's going to say.

That's like, let's just get vulnerable. Let's get vulnerable. I'm a very impractical farmer. So my chicks that I just got are called saramas of the tiniest chickens. So the eggs are literally this big. Ooh. They're like, they're like,

I need a lot of eggs. So you're having, you can have some, but you're just have to. It's going to take about a dozen. It's cramble that up. Yeah. Well,

speaking of your farming, so we have two, like honeybee, whatever you would call that. Bees. Yeah. Hives. Yeah,

okay, sorry. So we have like two hives that are kind of on like the back part of our property. In a couple weeks ago, I was like, you know what? I'm going to just kind of prayer. walk around here and, you know, put some oil out on our boundary lines and do this whole thing.

So I'm doing this and I walk past the bees and I'm like, you know, the Lord is with me. I'm anointing my property. Almost like there's like a force, like a force field around me. And I walk past that beehive and I just get, I mean, annihilated. The oil spills everywhere. I got, I'm stung. I'm like, I was flamed. It hurts so bad.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, it quickly turned, went from spiritual to a quick satanic guitar. More repentus. That reminds of the story, my good friend Eddie down in Gulf Shores, he drives the golf cart for the Baptist Church down there. And, you know, Eddie's pretty salty guy. He's a fisherman, you know. So they were driving up the other day, and he had a full boat on this golf cart,

and he got two or three yellow jackets got him on the arm and hand. So he said a cuss word. And all the people are like, we'll just get off him all. I said, well, what happened, Eddie? He said, well, I'm on suspension. That's hilarious. So I guess you can't cuss on the golf cart. Jack, you ready to get into this?

Yeah, the story of David, this is really good. If you haven't signed up, I'm telling you, go take the courses with us. We're going to be doing lecture one and two today, which the first lecture is always intro from Dr. Arne. And so that's just the intro to the course. And then Dr. Jackson were with him again. And then we get into the story of David. And I love the fact that he didn't just jump in to David. He starts with kind of the precursor to the story of David.

Because I really understand David, you've got to back up a little bit. Yeah. I really like that, too. I thought that was awesome. I will say this, just inside baseball to Unashamed Nation. Dr. Jackson is watching all the podcasts because he, text me every Friday after they air and gives me a little summary of what we talked about, but he is loving what we're doing.

So just so you guys know, you're out there watching. And Lisa started watching, and so she watches the lecture and then goes and watches our podcast about it. And she said it's fantastic. And she doesn't give a lot of high compliments to our kind, you know. So anyway, it's working out pretty well. Yeah, I thought the same thing was great. I loved that he went back to do it.

calls it shepherd, father, and king is the arch. But I thought about it how difficult it is to put, David is such a larger than life, almost larger than Bible character, figure that, you know, because you think about all the things that we don't talk about. We'll get into it a little bit later in some of the lectures, but he's not just shepherd, father king, music, poet, warrior, strategist, he's flawed, he's forgiven. He, you know, he, you know, he's, you. He understands the page. He wrote most of the songs. So you just think about this guy.

I mean, what he accomplished in his life, but then everything that led it up to it. But Jackson's take, which I think is really good, is that there's an arch over this concept of father and son. And pressing for generational blessing, you know, and quite frankly, the lack of it that's here. But I was personally challenged by that just right off the bat with the whole study because I hadn't thought about it in those terms. And I thought, man, it makes you think about your children. And in my case now, my grandchildren. And am I doing what I can to make sure they follow God and follow exactly what the blueprint God has given me?

And so, I mean, it's been super challenging for me. Yeah, I thought it was so cool how we started with Hannah and Eli. Because there were so many things he talked about in that beginning section with the cloak and with all those things and tying it back to, you know, when Samuel dies and with Saul. and there were so many things that he had talked about that I've never thought about. But the thing that I thought was cool, so when he was here with us talking about Exodus, we were talking about what's your favorite portion of Scripture.

And he talked about First and Second Samuel, and he was talking about how, from a literary, you know, he's like a professional in literature. And he was talking about how, from a literary perspective, you know that it's divine inspiration when you just read First and Second Samuel. And whenever I read First and Second Samuel, I'm thinking about, you know, David and Goliath and all the things David did. But the way he was breaking it down with, you know, the way that it's written, it's such a beautiful piece of text.

And I've never heard anyone really honing on how impressive it is from a literary standpoint. And he was just saying it's the most impressive literary-wise in all of Scripture. Yeah, which is true. You get those first four chapters in First Samuel. And, you know, Dr. Jackson made the point, like, think about how much is packed into just. just those four chapters. And I, you know, I love his approach because it's not how I typically approach the reading of the scriptures.

I typically, he says at the beginning, hey, if you're looking for like an exegetical, like, pursuit here, that's not what this is. He is looking at it as a literary device. And I think that, but for me, that it's opening up other senses to the story that maybe I don't typically use. I found it very helpful. Yeah. And then when he made that point, these first four chapters, I mean, just

look at how much is in the first four chapters of first Samuel. I was like, yeah, that is pretty incredible that you can put that much meat in such a short span of text. It's very impressive. Well, and I think that to personalize it, like to your point, Zach, when you also, if you approach it that way, you kind of get out of the some of the chronological issues that you get with some of the ancient text, and he mentions that because we're going to hit that a couple of times in future. lectures where it seems seem repeated and you're not sure exactly how that broke down.

But I had a question for you all because I think part of this podcast is part of the appeal of what we're doing is taking something, a story and a narrative and not only just looking at the facts of it, but also the person of it and how it impacts you. And so I had a question for you. And I had an audience, I have not asked them this. So I'm asking them on the jump. But I couldn't have but think about my own father when thinking about this concept of fathers and sons. And because you see these men and they have so many great qualities.

And even the ones who have severe flaws in children, I mean, Eli had a lot of problems. But then he also had a lot of tremendous amazing abilities and all these things. So I want to ask you and let you tell the audience. Because I was thinking about three out of four of us, our fathers have been on this podcast. Your dad's the only one that have been here. but two questions, and I'll start since I'm throwing it to y'all, what is your father's greatest stream and what's his greatest weakness? Because either way, those two things are going to come out, and I'll start, because, you know,

obviously on this podcast, everybody knows dad, because this was his podcast originally, but my dad's obvious greatest strength is, his boldness was, his boldness, and his sense of neither left nor right. Like, and everything was this linear line with him. It was just, it was black and white. It was here's what it is. Here's what the Almighty says. Here's what I'm going to do.

Greatest strength. I mean, it was his, it was his North Star for most of his life. His greatest weakness, in my opinion, was his guilt from not being that person for the first 28 years of his life. And it, when we did the movie, I think it came out even stronger some, you know, him trying to wrestle with that. And then when Phyllis came along, he kind of went through another wave of it. And then right toward the end of his life, when the governor part of your brain begins to start breaking down with what he had, then that seeps out. And so there were these moments where he would look at me, especially, and just say, you know,

I just, I wasn't a good guy. I mean, I made a lot of mistakes. And it was interesting because here were his sons, you talk about father to sons, rallying to their dad and saying, but dad. And you're a great man. God did great things because of what Jesus did for you. You've preached a thousand. We were just like pumping in this idea that, you know.

But I think that weakness was always something you struggle with was the idea of the man he was. It was just hard for him to imagine. So that's my take. That's good. Who else? Yeah, I feel like for me, my dad's biggest strength is like being present. Like we, you know, don't live in the same place,

but either I'm calling him or he's calling me. So we talk every day. So I talked to both my parents probably multiple times a day. But president from the standpoint of he's always asked me, you know, how I'm doing or what do we have going on. So he's never out of the loop of, you know, things we're doing, which is really cool because, you know, not living in the same place and having a, you know, a father that still calls you and talking through those life things is great. I would say biggest weakness for my dad would probably be a lack of like a confession standpoint. Like there's been rare times where my dad's been like, hey, I'm really. really sorry that or hey when I was your age these are things I struggle with I want to kind of help you here so

probably that and that's probably from his dad you know and just the whole lineage thing so with me with my daughter says something I want to be better at of if I um you know lash out here or if I struggle in an area here being quick to be like hey I'm sorry that I did that and I don't want to be that person so that's good great strength would be presence and um he always is interested with what we're doing and then weakness would be that, you know, that, not the transparent part of it. Yeah, yeah, not the transparency.

That's good. You notice that, that Phil is gone, so Al has no repercussions for confessing his dad's greatest strength or weakness. It's, yeah, which is why I'm hard. Yeah. Yeah.

So, dad, if you listen to this podcast, yeah. I'll get a call in like three months and I'd be like, what are you talking about? Why have you never told me this, man? And we're like, we're on back as the house. Well, my, you know, I've always said this about like strengths. The your greatest strength is almost always your greatest weakness. And they, they have a weird relationship.

So the thing that you're really good at, it's like that gets an overdrive and it can become your weakness. So for my dad, I would say that's definitely true. That his, I would say his greatest strength is what you just said, his presence. He is very present and available for people. And he's always been that way. Like my dad will take time with anybody. I'm not like that. My mind is always like moving.

And so I have a hard time sometimes like being present in the moment and attentive. Jill tells me that all the time. So I mean, speaking of the confession, my dad's not like that. I mean, he is present, available. He's tune in. If you're talking to him, like he's talking to you and he's in that moment. I think his greatest weakness probably is just that, that he can be too attentive in the sense that he,

I have to like, he could be like an enabler. Yeah. I mean, he's just, he's going to take it to your word. He's going to always be there for you. And there's been times of my dad, you probably need to let that one go. You know what I mean? That's not good for you.

So, yeah, if that, dad, I hope that was, didn't offend you if you listened to the podcast. Now let's throw Willie under the bus. Yeah. He's probably not going to listen to this podcast. He's never going to hear about. You're saying to him. Yeah.

Even if this got clipped and sent to the group message, he still probably. He still wouldn't listen to it. Well, there was, hey, there was when we did Willie's 50th birthday party and we had the roast, I just remember everybody was afraid to roast him except for me and John Luke. John Luke's was a little stinging. I mean, it was like, he went there. So, well, the oldest son can do that. I know, I can't.

Yeah, well, I think that's one thing my dad taught me was you got to go all the way. Exactly. He'll go halfway. His greatest strength is probably that drive and passion about whatever he's doing in the moment. Like, if he has an idea for something, he's 100%, that's it.

And I think that kind of goes along with his weakness of if it's not whatever that thing is, he's interested in the moment. Like, he does not care about it. There's no, there's no having a conversation, like a, like a, like a critiquing what that thing is. Oh, yeah, no.

There's a problem, hey, have you thought about it from like a different, you know, it's like, no, this is what we're doing. This is what we're doing. This is it. Yeah. And then once his mind shifts from that, whatever that project is, totally done with it. Never bring it up again. Yeah. Don't talk about it. He didn't care about. Whatever it is, it's fine.

and he's on to the next thing. So he's very passionate about what he's interested in the moment. And obviously he's done, had a lot great success being all in on that. Yeah. No, that's good. So now that we've opened up three father wounds that have to be mended later. Well,

we find that sometimes some good counseling on the Unashamed podcast as well. I do think, I find it interesting that it's, that the whole context is about passing forward fathers to sons. It's kind of like what we just talked about. And I love what Christian said. You said, you articulated what I think we all try to do. And you see something, even a perceived weakness, and you say, I want to build on that

and be stronger and be better. Instead of what we're seeing in these contexts where there was something really good and holy in the sense of letting God be in control. And then, of course, the son's not adhering to that at all. But then turning something totally different and immoral in some cases and a lot of other stuff. But isn't it ironic that all this about fathers and sons and the story actually starts with a mother? Mm-hmm. It actually starts with the mom.

And, you know, it mentions the man that she's married to and she's one of two wives. The other wife has a several, a lot of children. She can't, Hannah can have children. But he dotes on her because of that and gives her a double portion of these sacrifices and everything is going forward. but it's her faithfulness that really starts to me the whole thread of this whole discussion that we're going to have all the way through David, this idea that faithfulness to God is the arch. That's what we're trying to get people to do. And we're trying to get our families to do it generationally.

But to do that, each level has to look at the ones that raised them and say, okay, I see your blessing and your faithfulness, and I'm going to raise that up this level. And that has to be what's there. And I think that's what the whole purpose of Hannah dedicating and basically giving Samuel over to God is exactly what that means. Because it was the thing she cherished most. And yet she was willing to give him to God. I mean, what did it say? Lent him to God, which was a great way of doing this.

I just thought it was fascinating that. Yes, she made that Nazarite vow. Right. What you see throughout scripture, I looked it up. It starts in Numbers, 6 is the chapter, and I won't read it, but the whole thing is about it. And there was basically three things for the Nazarite vow. There was no drinking. It was the wine, anything produced there was alcohol.

They couldn't drink. No haircuts, which a lot of people we know, they're good for that. But then there was the interesting one you don't read about much is no dead body. You couldn't be around any dead bodies. That was part of the Nazarite vow. If you did, you had to cut your hair and go through all these things. And then, of course, Samson, in Judges 13,

as well as John the Baptist in Luke 1, or I guess two of the more famous Nazarite vow people. But it doesn't really go into explanation in number six other than just making the vow that you were going to do this as to why those particular three things. I mean, it's kind of weird, isn't it?

I mean, like all the things you make a vow to, and that it would be these three things that would mark that bow. I think it's cool. The way we've actually done this whole study is we started in Genesis, you know, then we went to Exodus.

Now we're in the story of David. I don't think we planned like that at the beginning when we, and by the way, if you, if you haven't done those, I would say go back and do the Genesis one, then do the Exodus one, and then come into this one with us.

You can sign up at Unashamed for Hills. com. That's Unashamed for Hills. com. But what I love about, about the story is when you see what's happening here in 1st Samuel is she's asking the Lord for a gift. And Dr. Jackson brings this up, and I thought it was a really beautiful point, that she's asking God to give her a gift. And then when she receives the gift, what does she do

in return? She turns it back into a gift to God. And I thought, man, well, you see that in the garden. That was the original role of Adam, right? The priest was to, he originally was a priestly role. And so he was to take the blessings from God and then he poured them back into blessing back to God. So it's that song that we sing. Every blessing you pour out, we just take that and then we transform it. We turn it back into praise. And so you're seeing that here in this moment the way that Hannah views this gift from God.

She's not taking this gift and hoarding it up. She's taking this gift and then turning it back into praise and offering to God. I thought that was such a beautiful point. And also, Zai, it's interesting you just brought that up because in number six, which is this whole chapter about this Nazarite vow, you know the last three verses of number six is the very famous blessing text. Lord bless you, Lord keep you, Lord, make his face shine upon it. That's the way that chapter ends.

Oddly. I mean, it just, you know what I'm saying? It comes out with this great blessing. So it's just what you were talking about. That's what she turns around. It's the Eucharist. I mean, it's like a eucharistic view of the world. Yeah.

But he said something like a gift from God can only be gifted back to God. And I think it's in that that you actually see the role of humanity. Like this, what she's actually doing here is she's showing us, Hannah is actually showing us what is our role as humans. and it's to receive gift and then give that back to God as gift. There's a Paul Stevens, who's a guy that's been on a podcast a couple of times, and he was the first guy that dad ever led to Christ. He was a teenager. Dad had just was a brand new Christian teaching a Washington,

and Washington was a student. And so we've had a lifelong relationship. And when Paul has two boys, and his youngest one, Jake, had a pretty severe case of juvenile diabetes and found this out like in, I guess it was about middle school age. And so Paul and Kim were just, you know, distraught, not sure what's going to happen. Would he even survive? You know, how would this affect his life? And he said he was just wrestling with this idea.

And one night he couldn't sleep and he was just praying. And he said he just got up and he went down. It's the middle of the night. His family was asleep. And he got down on his knees next to him. to Jake's bed. And he just, in that moment, he just said, God, I'm just, I'm giving him to you. Totally.

Like, he's yours. I can't control this. I can't do anything about it. And so I'm just, I am giving him to you. And whatever you do, I'm going to accept and accept that as your will. And then he said, he was so overwhelmed by that feeling of like that there was a relief and a burden lifted off. He went over and knelt by Zach's bed in his room, his other son, and did the same thing.

And then when he went back to bed, he had the same prayer for his wife. And he just talked about the sort of cathartic nature of that, like to give his family to God. It came out of a situation where you're not sure what's going to happen. And so that story has always impacted me so deep because I thought, what an act of faith. In a moment where you're scared because this is your kids and your wife, the ones you love most on earth, that you would just say they're yours. I cannot. I know I cannot control the outcome of what happens. And I think that's what I see in this, is that sort of faith in what she does. And what's ironic is when she's having this moment of prayer, he thinks she's drunk, remember? I mean, Eli's like, and I wonder because his family

was such a mess. Maybe that's what he thought. Look at this drunk lady over here. And it reminded me of Zach of Acts too, whenever the first gift of tongues. And they were like, what are you drunk? It's nine o'clock in the morning. What do you do? What do people do? So it's like people miss a lot of times this beautiful act of faith just because they're so used to just worldly cardinal stuff, you know. Why do you think the Bible talks? Because, I mean, it talks about a pretty decent bit at the beginning of First Samuel, but like Eli's sons and talking about how wicked they were and kind of honing in on that. Why do you think the Bible? Because obviously there's a bunch of sons from, you know, from priests and people in the Bible that are never mentioned.

but, you know, with Hoffney and Phineas, I don't know why y'all thought maybe. They're single, I can't have a note on this. I thought it was interesting that whenever Hannah goes and then Eli says, oh, you're drunk, that Eli had no idea what God was doing in the world. Like, to me, it seemed like what God was doing with Hannah and Samuel was preparing the way for to raise up a new prophet.

it because obviously at this point, Eli should have known, oh, God's doing something here, but he didn't. He says, you're drunk, he totally passes off, which means even at this point, way earlier, even before the sons die and things go on, Eli is already not in line with God's will. Yeah, yeah.

No, and I think that's a great point, because that may be one of the answers to your question, Christian, is because if he can't, not only see that, because he's the prophet. He's the guy that's supposed to be seeing these days. But then he can't even see it in his own kids. What's happening? And he has to wait until someone comes and reports it to him.

But I think one of the reasons why it's mentioned here, to be honest with you, having been a pastor for many years myself, is because when people take advantage of a spiritual position, they're put in, because these are the sons, these are supposed to be the priest themselves. And when they're taking that position of authority and instead, Instead, using it for immoral, terrible things that are destroying families. I can promise you, just like it does in today's culture, when a pastor, when someone, a spiritual

leader, an elder in a church, or a leader has these sort of things going on in their lives, it destroys not just the people they're involved with, but many, many others who question their faith and everything else. So I think it's one of the greatest acts of disservice to God that you can do to take that position that he's put you in to lead people to something better and then to use it to your own sinful devices. I mean, what they were doing was really bad. I mean, it was not a good thing for sure. I was thinking, too, what the text is kind of showing here is that God will raise up someone outside of the line. Like, that's what we see with Saul and David later is you've got Saul

as king. Jonathan should be next in line, but whenever Saul's house is falling, God was raising up a new line. And that's what happened here with the prophets. Like in Israel's mind at this point, Hafti and Phineas were going to be next thing like, oh, they're getting set as the next prophet, but then they get killed and God's already got a plan to raise up someone new.

Yeah, because I thought it was cool because when the Dr. Jackson was talking about, you know, the literature part of it, when it's getting reported to Eli about what happened, I can't remember what the very first thing he said was, but then it's, you know, were routed against the Philistines.

He was honing in on the order of which this was relayed to Eli. It was something, can I remember what the first one was? But then we were routed. And then it was, your sons have been killed. And then it was, oh, and the art of the covenant has been stolen.

Yeah. It was actually for Israel fled before. Yeah. Then Israel was routed. Yeah. Then the two sons were killed. And then finally the art. But he was talking about that

from like, because I just would have just read that as. just the thing, but he was talking about the literary tools and how you know, it ended with the thing that was most important to Eli and those things. I thought that was cool. But yeah, that was a crazy

and then he just falls over and dies. It's kind of like, it said he was old and heavy. I was like, boy, I can relate to that. He's just kind of tumbled over. Well, it's interesting that when when I was reading this

and going through the text, It was interesting. You think, why bringing the Eli's sons into the, how do they play into the big story? I love what you said, John Luke, of that if God raises up outside the line or the lineage or whatever you're, whatever you think it's going to be. I mean, isn't that what he always did?

Yeah. I mean, if you just go through the Bible and you look at all the main characters, it's not the people it's supposed to be. It's not Esau that got the blessing. It was Jacob. It was Joseph who was the who ends up being the slave boy who ends up leading all of Egypt and Second Command. And even then, even in that story, it wasn't even Joseph through which the line of Jesus came. It didn't come through Joseph's lineage.

It didn't come through even Benjamin's. It came through Judah. It's always the, it's never the guy you think. And you're seeing it here. Well, you think, well, Eli's in this position where he's serving as high priest. He's the judge. I mean, he's the guy. His sons are wicked.

He's not a horrible guy. He felt to restrain his kids. That was bad. But I think the point of it is this. And you're going to see this continually, as you mentioned with Saul and David. It's that God doesn't need you. He doesn't need me to accomplish his will. So that's why the kingdom and the coming of course.

the Christ, it's always in this weird pattern of like, it's just coming in these, God's going to raise it up, no matter what happens. And even in the story of where this ends, where they stole the ark, which is kind of crazy to think about, we just got through Exodus, which the whole point of the book of Exodus was the building of the tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant sitting in the Holy of Holies that only the high priest could go into once a year on Yom Kippur. and when he made the atonement for the people and all that. So the centerpiece of their whole thing, the whole Exodus story,

which he brings up again here as well repeatedly throughout First and Second Samuel, but they steal that. The opposing powers steal this, and without any help from Israel, the Ark itself defeats these foreign armies, just God's presence being among them as we read later. I think that's the point. God's in control. He doesn't need us to make his story fit. The story's going to work whether we are involved in it or not. Well, and to your point about Samuel not understanding, him being dedicated. And we don't know when that was. She said she wanted to wean him. I don't know at what point he comes in and like he's in the temple. But you remember when he gets the first call from God and he does the Hanini, you know, here I am. But he thinks,

it's Eli calling him. So he's like, he goes in, he's like, here I am. He said, I didn't call you. Go back to bed. And so then it happens again. And then he comes back. Well, now Eli understands he's being called by God. And so he tells him when he calls you again, you say Henini to him.

And he'll tell you what to do. So it's like you see this teaching moment. And the reason why is because he's outside. He is an outsider. And so now he's having to learn this. So he gets that third call and he gets the hearing. am I. What's funny is, then he gets basically the bad news. His first prophetic message as a pretty young person apparently is, oh, by the way, go tell him. It's over. And like, the sons are dying.

I mean, it's like, oh, wow, what of my first sermon that I get to give is like the worst thing ever. And remember he was afraid. He didn't even know how he was going to tell him. But to the point of Eli, still having a good heart, even though he's a man of flaws, he said, no, you tell me what he said. because he said it to you for a reason and of purpose. And remember when he tells him, he's like, God's will be done. It's okay. He didn't back his way. Yeah.

So you say, well, what does it have to do with David? Because, I mean, if you're not familiar and you didn't listen to the lecture, you know, wow, I thought we were talking about David. Well, we're setting the stage for David because what's going to happen is, well, what happens here in the first four chapters is when the Ark of the Covenant gets stolen by the, by the Philistines. and then all the, well, we'll talk about that later, but when the news comes back to Eli, he's like, his kids are already dead. And he's more concerned, though, about the loss of the Ark of the Covenant.

And so he falls back and breaks his neck, which I'm like, man, it's such a horrible, like, tragic way to go. You know what I mean? But Samuel is going to take his place. And then Samuel later on will be the one that goes. and essentially facilitates Saul becoming the first king of Israel. And then David comes in to soothe Saul, but Samuel also picks him,

and then David becomes the second king. So we're just going to go through that lineage. But right now we're just in that first part. So if you're wondering what it has to do with David, it has everything to do with David. We're just setting the stage here. There was another thought that I wanted to bring out and get you guys to get your take on it,

was this idea about confrontation, because we just talked about, you know, young Samuel getting this message and then confronting Eli, who is his mentor now, and still is the judge over Israel. I mean, even though he's lost his capacity to do it, in name, at least he's still there. And even before that, remember, the elders come and they confront Eli about his kids. So there's a couple of different stories here where there's confrontation that takes place. And by the way, make sure and go to unashamed for Hillsdale.com to sign up for this course. It's no cost.

We're loving it. You're going to enjoy it. It goes right along with what we're talking about on the podcast. But so they come to him and they say, you know, your children are terrible. Here's what they're doing. There's this confrontation that happens. And I just wonder what you guys thought about that. Like so many times it's hard to have a hard conversation about truth and behavior or something that maybe you're,

you're falling shorty and, you know, who's going to love you enough to have that conversation? Because it's not easy when you have a confrontational conversation. Zach, I couldn't help but think about, I mean, my dad had that conversation with me when I was 16. It did not go well, you know, because I wasn't ready to listen. But it was interesting because Zach's mom had a similar conversation with a pastor in tow with dad that did not go well because he wasn't ready. You know, and you see that here. You see this idea of you've got to be ready to like say, okay, I'm going to go all in. And then Zach, you and Jep, there was a conversation I had with you guys when y'all were in college, you know, by Willie to first to Jeff and their family.

And then later Zach's family to him, same thing. But they were ready. And so it's just kind of interesting. Like, how do you know when to have that conversation? Like when you see somebody hadn't. Do you try to get in there early? before it gets bad, or you're trying to wait to see how it plays out? I mean, how do you determine when is the place where hopefully we can provide some fork in the road for somebody that says where you're heading is terrible?

You know, this is going to be a bad thing if you keep going on the course that you're own. And I just think it's part of our role in responsibility. It's not just for our kids, it's for anybody that we love and care about, right? I mean, Zach, it turned us around, right? Turn me around for sure. I think as a father, I think your role is, a father is to continue to push your kids and to confront them. I don't think it's a one-time thing. I think it's a spirit of confrontation in calling them to confession. I mean, Eli's sin

was that he did not restrain his own children. It's one of the arguments that, like this big fad right now with what's called gentle parenting. I don't know. I hope you guys don't do that. I might do it. If you do, I think you should do it. If you do it, then you just got confronted by Zach. Yeah, this is a confrontation right now. I mean, but you have to restrain your children because what you're doing is you're actually teaching them that there are boundaries that exist. And so what you're doing as a parent is you're doing that in an environment that's controlled, while you can still kind of control what's outside the boundary so that when they do go outside of it, it's not horrible. In this case, I mean, this got so bad with Eli's kids that they were just, they were in positions of power. and authority, and then they were using that to abuse God's kingdom and God's people and God's church,

you know, Israel. And so it got so bad that, I mean, the only answer was calamity in the end. And so I think that we, I think a father should lead in confrontation. Yeah, for sure. And I think most confrontations, too, you know, at least for me and even like, you know, with Phil talking to you when you're 16. I think confrontation laced with the humility and the transparency of, hey, I see where you're going. I've been in that position before. Yeah, that's good. And I think for me, when I was going down that path, I had people telling me not to do it, not to do it, rather than, hey, don't do this because I've been in your position. This is where it led me. So I never, my confrontation was never met with like a personal, this is why you don't want to go down this path.

it was, and that's why I didn't have the ears to hear it because it was, it was always, this is, this is not, this, you should not be doing this, you know, X, Y, and Z. So for you, with Phil, it was like, hey, I, I know where this leads. I know this is not what you want. And I think the confrontation, confrontation for the, for the sake of confrontation, it's, it's necessary, but I think if you can intertwine it with that humility and the transparency of, like, I've been in your position. So even for, for Eli, if he's talking to his son, of, hey, when I was your age, you know, I used to maybe want more power or I used to, you know, do these things, but this is not where you want to be. And kind of having that more figuratively role rather than just for the sake of confrontation.

Yeah, I just start quoting them, Leviticus, or, you know, giving us some book chapter 1st. Yeah, because it's, the realities are it ultimately led to their destruction. And, I mean, you guys got young kids. So everything you do is put guardrails up to try to make sure, you know, they don't get seriously hurt. They don't, you know, bad things don't happen to them. And so that continues on into their when they become adults, when they become Christians. I mean, you're still having that you're the guy and your wives or the gal that try to make sure that the guardrails are there that keep them from making catastrophic mistakes. That's what we're talking about here.

These guys wind up dead. Yeah. Because of this. That's what scared me about. I'll be honest, when I was reading this and listening to the lecture on it, it kind of was one of those moments

I was saying, ooh, this kind of scares me. Yeah. Because Eli was not a horrible villain. He wasn't. I mean, it wasn't a villain.

In fact, you think, when the verdict was cast down, and Samuel was like, this was going to happen. You know, he was like, all right,

I submit to it. And so you see his faithfulness, but you also see, so that was the scary part is like, man, I want to be faithful. But I think the encouraging part of this lecture for me, and I wanted to say this, is when he talked about David, which he doesn't really get into a whole lot about David in this particular lecture. But he says that what the main characteristic of David was that he was a man of repentance. He was a man of repentance. And I thought about that,

that framework and like basically it's like you're going to just it's like basically try hard try to try to do what's right and then when you don't repent and that was pretty much David I mean he just and and that and God said that's a man after my own heart and I think it was that that spirit of repentance that David continued to embody over and over and look he was he a great guy no he made a lot of mistakes but he was repentant and I think that's the key Yeah, I had to note on this, this reading through the Bible that we've been doing through Genesis and Exodus now,

the thing that's been hopeful to me or encouraging to me is how many times God warns them before he causes a destruction. Yeah. Or gives them the opportunity to repent. Because I think that that was one of my notes on Eli here is one of the discussion questions in our, from the classes,

what could Eli have done differently regarding his sons? And we've already said to have that conversation. But God actually told him, gave him an opportunity to do that in chapter 2, when the man of God or the elders came in and confronted him about the sons. I think that prophecy or that prompting from God was God telling Eli, look, I'm giving you a chance. Do something about your sons, make it happen. And then he doesn't.

And so in the next chapter, some time has passed, and then Samuel gives that prophecy. And I feel like that's God saying, not just talking to Eli, but talking to us and saying, specifically, I gave Eli a chance, he didn't hear the warning. Now this is what's going to happen. Right. Like the prophecy that what I told you was going to happen in chapter two is now happening right now because you did not heed my warning the first time. You know, and even for him, I thought the tragedy was.

here he was 98 years old. He's at the end of his life. And he has given his life in service to God. And he definitely has made mistakes. He definitely should have, you know, done more to restrain his children. But his death was directly caused by grief because of what happened. I mean, he fell out of that chair and he broke his neck because of the words he got hurt. And just think about how sad that is that the last word you would hear on earth is that you lost your sons and that the presence of God had now left.

your country and everything that you had spent your whole life leading and trying to do better. And so it is. It was a very tragic tale. But it's also hopeful in the sense that God was faithful and does give us an opportunity to do the right thing. And it's just really a question of whether we're going to step up and do it or not, which, again, I took it as a real, like, challenge for me. Because now I'm in a more patriarchal role than you guys are. But even at the beginning where you guys are, I mean, it's so important to, to, to, you know, provide that community for your kids,

you know, try to put as many things in their lives as you can do possible to make sure that they stay on a pathway, at least where they have an opportunity. They don't have to choose one day, but you just wanted to make the right choice. So remember, join us every Friday. Unashamed Academy powered by Hillsdale College. Unashamed for Hillsdale.com is where we are.

Zach, you want to say anything to wrap us up? It's free. You can take the course for free and take it with us. Leave it to Zach to recognize the free. I've truly learned so much from taking this course. It's really good. Yeah, I have too. Not only have I learned material, but even just helpful ways of reading the Bible

that I haven't, you know, thought about in the past. Yeah, I think you're going to love it. So we encourage you to do it. Thanks for joining us for the ride. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening to The Unashamed Podcast. Help us out by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcast. And don't miss an episode by subscribing on YouTube.

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