Unashamed with the Robertson Family - Ep 1236 | Jase Breaks His Silence on the Personal Mistake That Became THAT ‘Duck Dynasty’ Episode

Episode Date: December 29, 2025

Jase admits a big personal mistake that left him with a bellyful of regret and somehow also became that “Duck Dynasty” episode. Jase and Al reap the benefits of having their studio at the Duck Commander headquarters while Zach sadly looks on. The guys reflect on what it means to participate in God’s life, why the resurrection elevates the physical world, and how even mustard-seed faith can lead to real peace. In this episode: James 5, verses 14–16; 1 John 2, verses 18–27; John 14, verses 15–27; John 17, verses 1–26; 2 Peter 1, verses 3–4; Genesis 1, verses 26–28; 1 John 3, verses 1–3; Romans 8, verse 11; John 11, verses 14–16; John 20, verses 24–31 Chapters: 00:00-05:48 Reaping the benefits of working at Duck Commander 05:49-11:05 The perfect day, except for… 11:06-17:39 How “Duck Dynasty” got its episode ideas 17:40-27:25 God created us to be creators 27:26-37:40 We’re meant to be in a relationship with Jesus 37:41-45:42 Stop doubting & believe 45:43-56:34 What real peace looks like Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I am unashamed. What about you? So welcome back to Unashame. We just, Jason and I just had a wonderful treat. The duckmen slash buckmen guys came in with some sandhill crane fresh off the smoker. That was awesome. We do our podcast at a company called Duck Commander. And so sometimes that gets crossed over in that we're fixing to do a podcast.

and it's like, hold up. I mean, they just, luckily we hadn't started yet. It was like the Sand Hill Crane Commander now. I mean, that's. Well, they were filming for their stuff, and so they're filming us, filming our stuff. Well, I walked by and said, what's y'all cooking today?

He said, we got some Sand Hill Crane. I will admit, it's my first time to ever eat it. I'd heard a lot about it. It's delicious. It doesn't even hardly taste like fow. It's a little more coarse, as Chase pointed out, than a filet mignon, but it's very similar. When you say coarse, like chewy or just greeny?

A little tougher, a little tougher. A little tougher texture than like, uh, that's what makes it foul, you know, but still, very delicious. And you mean foul as an F-O-W-L? Yeah, not an F-O-U-A. There are, there is some foul that's foul, but we're not talking about. For you listeners out there who don't realize that God put us in charge of the animal world, a Sandhill crane is actually, when you think crane, you're like, you just,

say to crane, but this bird is, I think it's like five foot high and about four feet wide with its wings out. And it is a migratory, huntable bird. Yeah. Mostly in Texas is where they probably do the best with them. Yeah, West Texas is where they hang out. But I'm telling you, I'm a fan. They make an interesting sound. Have you ever heard them?

No. Kind of like Zach throwing up. You don't actually, yeah. I got more base note than that. That's a callback, Zach, to the last podcast. That was, yeah, Jill. It's actually the odds. I tell you what, your wife, Zach, is one of my favorite people on the planet.

Jesus, Spitfire. She'll throw a man under the bus. She will throw Zach under the bus so fast. It's not even funny. Yeah, well, we've documented already. Let me mention our good friends at Family Research Council. Earlier when we were talking, we seemed divided, but we're really united because we love doing this podcast together.

Unfortunately, our nation really is divided. And so the only thing that really works to pull people together is some good news. And our good friends at Family Research Council make sure that biblical truth still matters on Capitol Hill and in Washington, D.C. They defend faith, they protect families, they remind leaders that what we speak in truth and love matters. What they say is pray, vote, stam, which we love that. That's what we want to do to make a difference. We want you to help them out.

Our good friend Tony Perkins, been a friend for a long time. Help FRC keep defending what matters most. Visit FRC.org slash Unashamed to learn more. So we were off for a while, and we talked about in the last podcast on our Christmas episode, Zach was sick. So we missed a couple of episodes in there being sick. So Zach, we're glad that you're better. And Zach, we did. We kind of threw you under the bus too at first.

But at the end of our second one, we were talking about anointing, Jace had a tremendous rabbit hole that he had been holding in his back pocket that we decided since it was just he and I, we would do that. And at the end of that, because we were in James 5, we prayed for you, Zach. So just so you know, even though we give you a hard time, we prayed for you in earnest before the Almighty to get well. And you are, so we'll give God the credit.

Well, I really appreciate that. It was about a 28-hour buzz. that was brutal, but I appreciate the prayers, and I did feel better the next day. So I also made the connection in James 5 that sometimes when you're sick, he kind of connected it with some kind of sin in their life. We did throw that out. That needed to be exposed. So is there anything you need to confess as we start with you back?

You know why there is. I want to apologize to Jace for being very sarcastic with you. and before this podcast started, we got an argument. We won't get into the argument, but I got a little salty, and I got sarcastic, and I told you that I would agree with you, but I said I need a black magic marker that I named about eight verses. I needed to mark out of my Bible, and that was not, that was, I shouldn't act it that way. I'm sorry.

Well, no apology, need it. When you went on that little rant, I was rolling my eyes. You just couldn't see it. And I thought. Sometimes we have our. own internal private debates on this podcast, but not on air. And then Maddie had to come in and say, okay, I declare it a draw. Let's get started. But it does. And now called me a, what do you call me a benevolent overlord? A benevolent overlord. You missed that. You walked down. I'll leave it up to

you, our benevolent overlord. You know, you just, you decide you're a benevolent overlord. But it shows you all hard it is for people to get along. All you need to do to prove that point is just get together in a room and start talking. And look, we're willing to do a podcast with our wives. You're talking about bold. I mean, that's a bold move. Yeah, well, I asked my wife after the Christmas podcast that we just did, I said, what did you think, baby?

I thought it was good. And she went, eh. I don't think she liked the toilet paper and the U. BN.6 sound effects. She does not like. She doesn't like potty humor, which I knew I was taking a chance. by giving you, Jace, the giant toilet paper roll, because Missy's not a big fan of potty humor.

And we don't do it a lot on the podcast, but we do it enough to amuse our audience because it's not a big deal. Well, you talked about Christmas traditions on that. I was thinking, one is, I think the family as a whole that, that seems to be a reoccurring theme of, like, the potty humor. Yeah, well, sometimes the wives don't like it, but let's face it, it's a part of the, it's a part of the local system. Well, I purposefully left out a story that I told about me giving her a secret Christmas gift,

which was an experience at a music concert. Which I thought was a really good story, but it turned out to be just a really good worship time together. But I left out the end of this story because it just shows you how life is. We had a wonderful gathering with our family and we sang to the Lord and worshipped. and it was a secret and everybody was happy, but we had three little kids. And so time-wise, when we're coming back home, well, it's getting late.

They all went to sleep. And Reed, my son said, this has been a perfect day. And so, which meant a lot to my wife when he said that, because it was like, they're from Nashville. They came down here. We had this worship experience. And here we have my oldest son saying,

this was a perfect day. And we're the host, so I thought, yes. And so then he's like, you know what? There's a donut place on the south side of town that opens at 10 o'clock at night. I wonder when we're going to go through there. And so I looked it up on Google Maps, and we could arrive at 10 o'clock. And he's like, that's the way to end this day with these hot donuts, which they are good.

And you've spoken of hot donuts before on this pocket. That's where it all went wrong. Because when we got there in line, we were second in line. Well, they, it's in a pretty poor part of town. And guess what? They were late. And so time started ticking by. Even though they opened at 10, they didn't really open until 10.20.

The kids woke up, started screaming. And, you know, the women are like, let's just put this up. Let's just go home. I mean, because we're still 30 minutes from our house. Because they weren't eat donuts anyway. And so then it just shows you how life is. You can be on the top of the mountain. and then all of a sudden

kids start crying, things don't go right, businesses are not functioning, and so even even though those donuts were good because we eventually got them. So this is a new donut shop?

No, it's been there for a year. When my kids come in town, they all go over there. I'm like, you know, carry a gun and carry some security and it opens at 10. Yeah.

It's sort of like built on the idea. You know what's crazy? There were 20, 20 cars in line with us at 10 o'clock. It's the old idea is that remember over in Shreveport, the Southern Made that opens and they cook at night so that the donuts are fresh in the morning and then they can take them to places to sell. So that's kind of the idea.

But that's the place they cook them at? Yeah. That's where they cook them. Old Philling Station. It's actually molten lava. I mean, it's coming out of the grease. Is it the place? Is it Southern Made?

Is that what it is? No. I don't know what it is. I don't think so. Well, Monroe's got an interesting. Here's the thing with Monroe, and it's so funny, I want to open up a donut shop here in Asheville area because we don't have good donuts.

They have donuts that are really expensive and like cakey. Yeah, cake-like. Well, let me give you the two tips. They need to be light and they need to be hot. Yeah, light and hot. So there's one more, there's one more little fact toy that I've discovered. Based on the exact place that I think you're talking about, And here's the thing, potato flour.

That's what they use. It's different. And I mean, because you know, when they're hot and you put them in your mouth and they just like collapse. Yeah, they melt. Oh, it is one of the greatest. I agree. So, Jay's asked me earlier if the San Hill Crane we were eating was on my diet. And I was like, oh, yeah, that's straight protein.

What you boys are describing now is 100 miles away. from my Ph.D. You know what's sad is I ate two of those hot donuts and I thought, boy, this was the way at the end of the day. But about 30 minutes later, I thought... Not so much. I don't know what I feel kind of weird. You pay the price for it.

Yeah, you're good, but you pay the price for it. One night we were coming home from Tulsa Workshop and it was about midnight, Jays. And we stopped at the one, the one I was mentioning that someone I-20 in Shreveport, Southern May. and we got about, we bought about, it was a car full of people,

so we had a little donut eating contest. Yeah. And so we all bought a personal dozen to see how many we could eat. And I ate all 12 before we even cleared Bozier. Yeah. I mean, I ate them by the racetrack.

And it was like you said. At first it was like euphoria. And it was like, oh, they're so good. Then I admit, when I got to about nine or ten, it was like, okay. Then now I'm in like an eating. contest. By the time we hit, I'd say Minden, which is another 30 minutes past, then I realized I'd made a serious mistake. What's funny about this story? By the way, that's the way you get on

PhD. How'd you get fat again? No, ow. You're telling the story. That was like one experience that you remember. You just described a way of life for me for five years. We would go frog hunting and frog hunt all night. And then we would be first and at a Shipley's Donuts, and I had a thing with them. Everybody knew me on a first-name basis, and we pulled up there, and they didn't have to say, what are you doing here? They just handed you the box. They knew, and they would look and see how many people were in the vehicle, and it's a box for everybody.

We had all eat a dozen, and we would see who could eat on the fastest, which was really the background for, there was an episode in Duck Dynasty where we had a donut eating contest. That's where that came from. That's right. Because they were like, y'all go to donut places, wait until they cook them, and then see how many you can eat. I was like, yep, that's what we do. I tell people that all the time, Jason, about the storylines on that. I just say, what you see on the episode was birth out of something that happened from our lives at some point in the past.

Yeah. We just relived those. So that story happened because I showed up to the set, and I was not feeling with it. and they said, what's wrong? And I was like, well, I just ate 18 blazed donuts. They're like 18? I was like, well, they were hot because you can eat twice as many when they're hot.

You can. And they're like, that's a thing? And next thing you know, we're doing an episode on it. So there you go. I think on the episode, Si, I won, but in real life it would have been Jay. But Si can eat way more than you. He can. I saw him one day eat six or seven of Dad's Hamburgers.

Oh, yeah, yeah. Which was amazing. I don't know where it goes. So I want to mention this. I thought it was interesting since we were missing some podcasts in there because we've had a little gap in between podcast recordings. I was actually on someone else's podcast as a guest, and they were coming here to Monroe to record it, which is unusual.

Usually you just zoom in like a lot of our guests do. But they were coming here. I think they just kind of wanted to see the place. And so one of them is a sports guy that's on Fox Sports, Jays. his name is Chris Broussard. I've seen him before on a lot of shows. Then the other guy was a guy named Robin Johns, and he's kind of the money guy, investment guy from Boston.

And so they were going to come here where they had a film crew that came in because, you know, our crew, it's a Saturday, our crew is off. And so there were three people that had gotten here the night before from wherever they came from to set up. I came in. So I'm literally leaving my house to call on it. And when the production guy calls me, And he was like, hey, they're delayed two hours because of fog.

Because we had this serious fog last weekend. Because here, right before it gets really cold, it's usually pretty warm. And so we get, you know, dense fog. So these two people are flying in from the northeast. They make it to Atlanta. And then they can't get here. They're stuck. So they set all this up and flew to Atlanta.

So I get a call like two hours later. I thought, well, this thing will happen. And I get a call two hours later and said, on in, we're going to do it remote, which they could have done it remote to begin with, but they didn't. So I get here, show up right here at this table, and they're all setting it up, and they got to monitor where these guys are doing the podcast from the Atlanta airport. Oh, wow. Which I was like, so let me get this straight. You flew from New York and Boston to Atlanta

to do a podcast in an airport with me who's in Louisiana. Yep, that's pretty much it. That's crazy. It was the craziest thing I've ever been a part of But you know what? They pulled it off And I was like Only in America could that happen Would people attempt to fly cross-country

To get someplace to do something It didn't work out But instead of just saying Okay, it looked like this wasn't meant to be We pulled it off They were in some kind of room in the airport That they said you could rent I never even knew it was such a thing

I go through airports all the time I go through Atlanta all the time Do you know there's like a room you could rent I mean I figured They were there If you want to have a meeting. And if you have computers and nerds on the right end of the situation like Maddie and others, then you can pull it off.

Yeah. We did it. So we're going to, are we going to get back to John? I hope. All right. So we left off, Zat. We never got to John 20. We just stopped.

We did the anointing thing and we had Missy-owned. So we left off with the appearances in John 20. And we got to the second appearance to the disciples, which is in verse. verse 24, we hadn't read it yet. And sort of the feature person in this appearance is Thomas, one of the 12. And he wasn't present at the first one. You mean Jesus just shows up in the room, which I thought it's interesting, Jase, because he wasn't, we didn't talk about this, but whenever he breathed the Holy Spirit on him,

I guess he wasn't there yet to get that, huh? I hadn't thought about that until right now. I mean, I think this passage is difficult to represent. your head around this because I think the what the reason john framed it this way when it says he breezed on them the holy spirit in connection with the actual point out of the holy spirit that was going to happen in acts one and two yeah acts one and two i really feel like this is kind of like when jesus was baptized it was kind of a private moment where he that's why i'd say you'll have to go back and listen to the anointing

podcast, which I thought... Yeah, they kind of branched out of this text to do that. Yeah, it was fascinating, especially when you get to 1st John 2 and 3, which speaks of this. And it also brings up the anti-Christ, the anti-Jesus, not acknowledging Jesus as the Son of God. And he references what I think

is this prediction of the Holy Spirit being poured out. Think John 14, 15, and 16. And so I don't, I don't, just to make the point, just so to catch you up, Jay's rightly said a couple of questions came from nurseman. And one of them was in First Peter two. No, second Peter one, which which talked about how do we participate in the divine nature. And someone had asked him this in a Bible class that he was teaching. And he wasn't really sure what the answer was. And I thought Jay's correctly said, that's exactly what we're.

We participate in the divine nature because the divine lives in us, which goes back to this idol. And I went to John 14, 15, 16, and then 17 in his prayer, talking about Jesus when he prayed to what he would pass on to his disciples and the believers that they could share in this love that he and the father had before the beginning of the creation of the world. And of course, he brings up love, which is usually the first attribute mentioned as a fruit of the Spirit. And so that's what I think the anointing is. You're designated the chosen people of God through the work of Jesus and the Holy Spirit that's indwelling us, which makes you children of God, which gets to 1st John 3. So that's kind of what we did. But this passage is, it's kind of like what I was comparing it to Jesus' baptism.

You know, he receives that spirit as the Anointed One, Jesus Christ. And we talked about, Zach, that's not his name. That's his name with a title. Jesus, the Anointed One. And in the Hebrew, it's the Messiah, Jesus, the Anointed One. That's what the Hebrew means, right. Yeah. And we traced it all the way back to the garden, which is this whole idea of,

anointing with oil when you look in Exodus and like the recipe for the oil that would be used to the anointing that's all these uh the what did we call it the liquid life that was representative of you know the garden scene where you have this water flowing through given life to the plants and the trees and so and all these things that make that uh even when it comes to seasoning and in different things these crushed plants right with all these smells and that of life itself right being used as kind of a symbol of god's divine breath combined with earth or dirt to bring life and so that's kind of where we went with that right which is symbolically that's a that's a great discussion i mean that that that question is at the

core of really what i think we we've been teaching at least up here at our church and and really on this podcast, what does it mean to be a partaker or a participant in the very nature of God? It's why I always start with God as triune as the beginning of the framework, because what you just said, I'd love that you ended up in John 17 because I would have gone to the exact same place for two reasons. One, because John 17 gives us a really beautiful understanding of the diversity and the unity within the Godhead. So we get to see that God is this eternal fountain of love. We get to see, you know, father, eternally loving son and vice versa, and then the love between them and, and the nature of who God is, it is, he is love, 1st John 4.8, 1 John 410. God is love. Like, this is his being.

And then also the second part of that is the way that Jesus defines eternal life in John 173, when he defines it not merely as some kind of moral ascension or some mystical experience, he defines it as knowing and relational knowing. The eternal life is this to know the one true God and Jesus Christ's son whom he sent. This is what eternal life is. And so when we talk about how do we actually partake or participate in the divine nature, the way I understand it is how do, what are the words? ways that we live that reflect God's inner life.

Like we're doing stuff that reflects who his inner life is. Our sexuality should reflect the inner life of God. Family reflects the inner life of God. How we work reflects the inner life of God. How? Well, you go back to Genesis. That's Genesis 126 and Genesis 128. It's God made man in his image.

He said, be fruitful, multiplies, to do the earth and have dominion over. that's reflective of the inner life of God. That's what God does. So the way that would look is God creates the world, and then he tells us, I want you to now go take the world I created, and then you go create stuff out of it. God births life into the world,

and then God says, now I want you to get together, and y'all now birth new life into the world. God has dominion over everything, and he says, now I want you as vice-reaching. to have dominion. So we're like, we're like, little like vice regents is the way I would understand it. We're vice regents that were not God. We don't create exactly like God does because he creates out of nothing, but we do create stuff. We create art and culture and music and all kind of things. So to me, that's how we actually participate in the inner life of God.

Which is interesting, is that because the podcast I was telling you about her that I was on is about investment. Obviously, and they'd asked me a question about our family going generation and generation is that how to, how do you motivate the next generation to be builders of success or wealth? You know, you're thinking about from a business perspective, because we were talking about a duck commander, our family business. And because a lot of times what happens is, you know, a company will be very successful, passed on with the children, but they already have wealth, so they just stop. They just become takers instead of builders and givers.

And so we talked about that. That's how you stunt that and stop that. But we talked about what you just said, Zay, that God had created us to build and to create. That's the idea. And when the Holy Spirit lives in you, you have the pathway to create anything and everything, which is what he does. That's why the passage, to me, the most profound, you mentioned all those where God is loved. But when he gets to the end of 1 John 3 and says, this is his command to believe in the name of his son, Jesus Christ,

and to love one another as he commanded us, which is echoing John 17 in the prayer. Those who obey his commands live in him. And he and them, also an echo of John 17. I'll be in them, they'll be in us. And this is how we know that he lives in us. We know it by the spirit he gave us. Then it's interesting that when he gets into the next chapter,

it's like, don't believe every spirit. Make sure that it's the one that is highlighting Jesus as the Son of God. Right. Which is why we went that an annoying route. Have you ever heard this, it's an argument or like a line of reasoning called, it's called the one and the many. and the idea of it is that your view of God is going to matter because how you view God is how you are going to participate in his inner life,

how you're going to partake in his divine nature, as Peter would say. And so if you look at a religion like Islam, their view of God is mono. He's one person. And so the way that flows out into participation in that Godhead, They don't have a godhead. It's just one. It's one. It's very authoritarian, abusive.

Like you see it, you see it in the actual religion itself. It's extreme order, but it's like order to the point of absolute control and just domination. And you see that flow out in the entire religion. Where on the other side, that would be something like, maybe like an eastern religion of the many. Or God's, Jesus, anybody. Look on the shelf, there's a million gods. And they're all sitting on the shelf. You could just pick all of and pick one of it, it's all, it's everything.

And that, and it's a partake in that kind of divine nature is utter chaos. And it just leads to just anarchy. And so you can see this play out in politics. It could be where if you look at the one, and that's what your focus is, and that's the God you're going to image, well, that's going to end up in tyranny. On the other side, if it's the many, that's going to end up in anarchy. And so it's only within the framework of God being triune. that we can have an understanding of something that we can actually partake in that's real.

And I think the core of that, that realness, it is that God is love. That you can only a triune God can be a God of love. You can't say that about any other God. You can't say God is love about any of the other gods. But you can say that about this God, the God of the Bible. And I've asked the question before, well, why does he have to be three? Why can't he just be two and they could just love each other? Why does it have to be three?

And the reason why is because the way that God loves in his very nature, it's not an exclusive love that excludes others. It's a love that actually spills out into more love. And so when you think about that couple in high school that's in love with each other and they're so obsessed with each other that they exclude everybody else around them, it's like the most annoying couple in the world, right? That's right. Nobody likes that. That's not it. That's not God. God's love is not an exclusive between two persons.

God's love actually flows out, and it's a communal love. And so when we're partaking in His nature, what we're actually partaking in is in a communal relationship. And that is why we have, Jay says this quite a bit, that the story the Bible is a story about how God gets his family back. Well, why would God want his family back? because family reflects the very nature of who he is. Which is why the disciples didn't come, didn't say they came to build a monastery instead to build a kingdom. Because kingdoms grow, right?

We actually brought that up for the one, for the many member. We talked about it not as eloquently as you just did, but we use that concept where you see him raising up one person at a person in our time in history for the men. any, which kept failing until Jesus is basically. Well, and I haven't thought about it until we just began this study. I did not think about this ahead of time, but now that I think about it, this is probably why John includes this story of Thomas in this context where he did.

Because remember, he wasn't there when Jesus shows up the first time. Remember Thomas was missing? So here Jesus comes in, peace be with you, surprised everybody. They think he's a ghost. We talked about that from another one of the Gospels. I'm not a ghost. We're here. Reach and grab me.

They do. Then he breathes the Holy Spirit on them. So now they have this greater understanding what it's all about. Well, then he comes back because he comes back the next time because one of them was missing. Well, right. And so this kind of becomes the first outreach post-holy Spirit is Thomas. Yeah. And it's, I mean, I have thought about it before.

I haven't ever thought about that. Well, I just thought about it because I was like, well, he didn't get the memo. And I think it, you see also, even with Mary, like grabbing a hold of him, because people don't really have an idea on what's going on here. Why is he saying, wait? Because I think you got to remember, they had seen Lazarus rise from the dead. But this was different. Because think about the differences in that. That was more what the scholars call a resuscitation, only to die again.

Right. Which I think it reflects our modern culture. I mean, I've had, I don't know how many Bible studies I've had where I'm like, you know, what is your, what's your story with Jesus or what's your relationship with the Lord? And then people will tell me where they had a near-death experience. And they're like, but God saved me. And so then I asked the question again, well, what's I got to do with the Lord? I mean, what is that? Because when they said that, too, did it make you want to reach out and grab and see if they were like real flesh?

Well, yeah, I'm thinking, I asked you what your relationship with God is, and you're like, well, he saved me one time when I thought I was going to die. Because I'm thinking, like Lazarus, well, let's say he did. You're going to die again. You're still going to die unless it comes back. You're going to die for real. And I think that shows you the difference in Jesus' resurrection. There's a reason contrasted to Lazarus that his grave clothes were still there. Remember, they had to take Lazarus as all.

They had to unwrap him. They had to unwrap. He was a mummy. There was an odor. There's a lot of differences here. And I think this new launch of creation and death being not a part of it, he, Jesus was raised never to die again. He received his new body, or his new mode of being, I guess, would be a better way to frame it. whatever that is, that we will receive, 1 John 3, 1 through 3, echoes that.

Because it's like, we don't know what we'll be, but we know when Jesus appears, we'll be like him. Well, what's he talking about? We're going to be like this, this mode of being. We get that new body because we have the Holy Spirit, which I think you read Romans 8-11, the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead if it's living in you will also give life to your mortal body. Well, this is the mode of being that we're all looking forward to, and it's not a Lazarus mode of being. This is Jesus mode of being, which is eternal. And so I think that's why he's like, I'm going back to the Father, which then makes the presence to the Father available for all humans, because he's now died for our sins.

And I think that's kind of the, I may be on an island here, I brought this up before, but I think that was the end of the Atonement process, which him being presented. I think Hebrews where it says he entered heaven itself on our behalf as the atoning sacrifice, which then places us with him in the heavenly realms. That's Ephesians 2.6. I mean, it makes all those verses that are hard to wrap your head around make sense to me. Well, and even Zach pointing out in a previous podcast, which I never thought about, that scene where they looked in and you see that table where they had his body laid, the rock table. and then there's the two angels on either end,

literally be in the atonement seat. It's a picture of what all the Jews had seen their whole lives when they saw the Ark of the Covenant, right? I mean, you're looking at it. Well, that was my point about Thomas. And I've said that in Bible studies when people share this near-death experience. I'm like, well, you had a Lazarus experience.

Great. But that's not complete. It's one of the travesties or tragedies that's happened to the American evangelicals. Church is that we stop the gospel at that. Like that's it. It's just, I got saved. Yeah.

I got converted, whatever your language is. Or even in a near death, they're just saying, God saved me from physical death. So I must be saved or he wouldn't have done that. And I'm like, that's about you, really, and you just getting a few more years. Which is the story of Hezekiah, right? Remember he's like, I'd like to get a few more. years and say, okay, I'm going to give you a few more years. Yeah, this is bigger because in Jesus'

resurrection, death itself has been destroyed. You don't even have to worry about it. But it's even more than that, though. It's the big picture of what you said at the beginning. It's the participation. That's the prize. The prize is that you participate in the life of Christ, in the life of Christ, and by so you participate in the life of God himself.

Because Christ takes you into, to dance with the Father through the Spirit. And so you see that we are partakers and participants based on the Atonement and the finished work of Christ, that we get to be a part of this. And that's the life. And so what happens with that is if you think, man, you want to neuter the gospel of its power, then what you can do is you can just simply reduce it to only, well, what you said is even that's not even the gospel. Like I got saved from a near-death experience, but then I think you can reduce it even

man, I got saved. I literally from hell and death itself. I got saved from that. But if you don't see that you're saved into the life of God, then you're actually neutering the gospel of its power because you're not understanding that he is the prize. And if you want to have true victory over sin and temptation, then what you're going to have to begin to understand

progressively in greater measure is that the things that are called sinful or actually the things that are horrible and that lead to death work and that aren't, that it's not what you want, it's hell, right? And it's not going to satisfy you. But Christ alone will satisfy us, that God himself will satisfy us, so we're drawn into his life. That's the John 17. That really is the teaching of Jesus and John 17.

I just think we got it wrong in our modern day religion, because most people think, well, when you're baptized, that's like, and whatever they say, it's like a public declaration. It's actually like a private declaration that's going to affect your public being everywhere you go. Yeah. And I think that's the connection I'm making. It's kind of like Jesus. Well, he was baptized in an obscure ceremony where God declares, you're my son with him.

You know, I'm well pleased, whom I love. And then all of a sudden he launches his ministry. and the public is affected everywhere he goes. Well, it's just like here. This little interaction that he's having with his disciples, where he's breathed on them, the Holy Spirit, it seems to be like a little private ceremony of launching the new creation.

Well, then how did it affect them publicly from the rest of the Bible from this moment? In Acts, I mean, they take off like a whirlwind out there. And I really think it changed my perspective on how we use these phraseologies of just thinking, oh, salvation is just like a one-time little moment where I went public. And then I live a private life

supposedly and dwell by the Holy Spirit that doesn't affect my surroundings. And I think it's just the opposite should be occurring. Plus, I love it that it's a little caveat too that even though like the 10 who were in the room who now have received the Holy Spirit, they saw Jesus, they believe. The first person that they're,

if you want to use Zach's word, he used earlier that we call today convert, the one you're wanting to lead to believe is the one who wasn't there. Look what his response is. Let me go ahead and read it in this last segment. Now Thomas called Didymus, verse 24, one of the 12,

was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So he wasn't there in what we just read, and the Holy Spirit being breathed, he wasn't there. So the other disciples told him, we have seen the Lord. Now, you'd think he'd been with these guys for these last three years that that would have been enough. And he just said, oh, okay, he's back.

But he doesn't say that. He says to them, unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were and put my hand into his side, meaning, remember they ran that spear in his side, I will not believe it. So that's pretty hardcore. Is that? We talk about, you know, agnostic. We talk about all the different ideas of unbelief.

Here's a guy that was with the other 10 for three years who said, oh, no, he's back. He just came back. He breathed the Holy Spirit. He says, I won't believe it. So a whole week goes by. A week later, his disciples, and Thomas is still not believing, apparently. A week later, his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with him this time, though the doors were locked, same as before.

Jesus came and stood among them. And he said just what he said before, peace be with you. Then he says to Thomas, remember Thomas wasn't there and to this point, put your finger here. See my hands? Reach out your hand and put it in my side.

Stop doubting and believe. Which is, first of all, somehow Jesus in this new state is able to recreate it his structure in a way that he bought the scars back and all that. I mean, I'm assuming if you're in a resurrected glorified body, you weren't still having

the scars from the, oh, he recreated that. Well, I guess you could. And you could also eat fish and hug people. Exactly. So I'm saying this is one more amazing thing about the body. But you know, you got to look at this and think, well, I mean, I kind of understand Thomas's perspective. I would probably be the same way. Like, yeah, and we still have trouble. I think people still have trouble believing that Christ rose from the dead. And what I love about, that story though is that how it elevates how Jesus himself elevates the physical world. I mean, think about this. Like we want to teach that the world's going to hell in a handbasket and you just grind it out, boys, this doesn't matter, nothing matters here. Well, Jesus incarnated,

first of all, in a physical body, too, when that physical body was murdered, he didn't just abandoned it to the grave, right? I mean, it was resurrected. Three, now he, with the doubters, like Thomas, he's like, physical body, like, touch this thing. Like, this is a God that says, touch me. This is a God that says, put your, you know, put your hand on the wound. Look at, look at the physical manifestation of death being beaten here. And so it elevates our understanding and it elevates the importance of the physical universe. And what's interesting about how that works now is I've actually had this same exact experience, not same exact, but a new version of this experience in walking with people leading them to Christ. And a lot of times a big objection at

the beginning is how do you guys really believe that this guy rose from the dead? I mean, that is a crazy thing that we're claiming. I mean, we have to admit that. And what's interesting about that is what I have seen convince people of the validity of the resurrection of Christ is the physical manifestation of Christ in his church and in his kingdom. They see it. They touch it. They eat the food that God's people make around the table, and they take that physical expression of, or they see us taking it of the communion. It's very tangible, very tangible things that lead people to understand and believe. They really believe that Christ,

so let me prove your point. Let me prove your point because you're exactly right, by reading the last three verses. So Thomas's response to this, after he says, stop down and believe, my Lord and my God, which... Well, we have to stop right there. Yeah.

Because Thomas gets a bad rap, because he doubted. Yeah. But he wasn't part of the breathing, the spirit ceremony. Correct. He's the first person on record. That's right.

to realize not only is he Lord. Because they've been calling him Lord all along. He's God. He's God. Which is why John started off. In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God. The Word was God. The Word became flesh.

But now you see this realized in Thomas's mind and heart. Which is true faith. And then here's, Zach, here's your point. Then Jesus told him, because you have seen me, you have believed. blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed, which that's kind of what you're talking about, that. Not only the ones there, but also then everybody after that. And then verse 30 says, Jesus did many other miraculous signs in the presence of his disciples,

which are not recorded in this book, but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name, which I think that was probably the original end of the book. and then this chapter comes in later, which we'll talk about next podcast. Which to me gives credibility to this story, because you have Mary, who wasn't even mentioned in the rest of the book,

all of a sudden being the first person, a woman in their culture, which is the last thing you would try to get to convince people of that this really happened. Her testifying that the Lord had risen, despite her tears. Now you have the one who doubted, at least all the rest of them were there. But then he makes this declaration.

He puts it all together in a powerful way saying, this fellow's God in human form. He's Lord and God. Right. Now, granted, he saw it, which you would think, well, how could you not believe? But it makes me believe, even though I didn't see it, because of the way this story is told. I'm like, there's no way you would make this up starting off with a woman saying he's raised as your evidence.

And then you take the one that doubted, but he saw it. And then you look at their lives. You can even read in historical documents that all these people went to their death rather than deny Jesus as Lord and God. Yeah. No, it's an amazing statement. And you're right. The fact he did it is sort of this second touch. Zach is almost like, remember when he touched the guy twice

and says sometimes you have to be touched twice to believe? So let me at least read the other two verses before we lead the thought of Thomas to Jesus' point, because Thomas does get a bad rap. But actually, he had some good statements because he's mentioned two other times in the book of John. John 11, and remember this is right after Lazarus has died. Jesus said Lazarus is dead, and for your sake,

I'm glad I was not there, so that you may be. believe, but let us go to him. So in the same context of belief, talking about Lazarus, Jesus, in John 11, 14, he says this about going to Lazarus. And then Thomas, here he is, called Didimus, said to the rest of the disciples, let us also go that we may die with him. He wasn't scared to die. He wasn't scared. Yeah. Or the Lord. But when you start talking about a guy coming back in a different mode of being, he had to work that out. He had to work that out. And to prove your point, John 14-5, when Jesus says, I'm going to prepare a place where memory, he told him, he said, don't let your hearts be trouble. Here's Thomas again, 14-5.

Thomas said to him, Lord, we don't know where you're going. So how can we know the way? Because he says, you know, if you follow me, if you, you know, trust me, you're going to know the way. And he says, how do we know the way? We don't know where you're going. And you see at the end of that chapter, what Thomas probably didn't digest is he brings up in verse 26. of chapter 14. He said, all this I've spoken while still with you, but the counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and remind you

of everything I have said to you, which Thomas needed this reminder in connection with the Spirit. But then watch what he says in verse 27 of 14. Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give to you the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. And that's the same thing he told Thomas when they had this encounter. Remember what he said, peace? Yeah. He said, peace be with you. And I don't think that's by accident. True peace is understanding that Jesus came on the planet and that he destroyed death itself. Yeah. And he nailed our sins to a cross and redeemed us and will give us this participation with the actual trinity of God via the Holy Spirit. And so I think that's what he was offering.

And I think Thomas figured it out, which is why he said, my Lord and my God. He figured out how all that worked together, Jesus being a human, the Holy Spirit being offered, God sending Jesus, and how that relationship worked through love. And it resulted in peace. And he found his peace on that day. Yeah. And I do think it's interesting that. he said peace, meaning like peace in the moment, but then also, obviously, he was talking about

a much greater peace. Well, exactly. And then he throws in everybody who would believe, which is all of us. It's all of us. Even though we haven't seen it, we believe it, and you can have that experience of love and peace through his spirit. And it's the same story. And I want to say this to those listening that, like, you know, there's that verse in the

Bible that says, Lord, help me in my unbelief. So when the Bible says believe in this, this is not simply a cognitive thing that you acquire like I would. Like I believe this is right here. This is a trust. This is, I'm leaning into this. And the Bible says that you have faith the size of a mustard seed. You can move a mountain. The crisis doesn't require us to be 100% convinced of who he says he is.

We're going to have doubts. we're going to have at times when we struggle with that. What he is saying is to trust me, to lean into this. And you may make a move on that, and that move may, it may be a sliver, just a mustard seed size of faith that says, you know what, I got my doubts, but I want to believe God help me in my unbelief, and I'm going to follow you, and I'm going to move on this, just on this sliver, like a microscopic mustard seed.

seed size, faith. I'm going to move on that. And Christ says, yep, that right there will move a mountain. So it doesn't, he doesn't require much. So don't think of this as being, I have to be 100% intellectually satisfied with this. That's not the requirement. The requirement is to move in faith the size of a mustard seed. Yeah, we never read about Thomas again, but I'm assuming he probably did great things for God over the course of his life. So we're out of time. We come back on the next Unashamed. There are a couple of more of appearances that aren't mentioned in John, which we'll talk about before we get into that last chapter, which is a doozy in chapter 21. So we'll get into that next time on Unashamed. Thanks for listening to the Unashamed

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