Unashamed with the Robertson Family - Ep 1369 | The Hard Truth I Needed to Hear from Someone I Trusted

Episode Date: July 3, 2026

Al, Zach, Christian, and John Luke wrap up Ancient Christianity with stories about sermon critiques, mispronounced words, and the kind of mentorship that only works when trust has been earned. Al shares how a gift from his granddaughter brought Phil’s larger-than-life legacy to mind, while John Luke explains how he turned the Roman Empire into a summer camp lesson about Jesus, persecution, and the kingdom of God. The guys dig into Augustine’s impact on the Trinity, the incarnation of Christ, and why God must reveal himself before we can truly know him.  In this episode: John 1:1; Genesis 1:28; John 17:3; John 14:6; Ephesians 3:10; Luke 15; Psalm 48:1-8; 1 John 4:8-10; Romans 1-2; Romans 7:24-25 Today’s conversation is a recap of Ancient Christianity taught by visiting Hillsdale Professor of History Kenneth Calvert. Take the course with us at no cost to you! Sign up at http://unashamedforhillsdale.com/. More about Ancient Christianity: Christ entered the world during the reign of Caesar Augustus. The tensions between Christianity and the Roman Empire shaped the daily practice of the Christian faith and led many Romans to distrust and persecute the early Christians. But Christianity also benefitted from the Roman world. And when Rome collapsed in the West, Christianity provided the hope for preserving civilization. In this free, eleven-lecture course, Professor Kenneth Calvert will explore: How the Jewish, Greek, and Roman cultures all contributed to preparing the world to hear the Gospel. Why many Romans distrusted and persecuted the early Christians. The inspiring stories of Christ, His apostles, and faithful ones throughout the first four centuries of Christianity. The arguments of key early Christian apologists—Ignatius, Irenaeus, Justin, Athanasius, and more—who defended and defined the Christian faith amidst the animosity of the Roman world. The conversion of Constantine and how he brought stability to Rome, and how the rivalry between his sons almost returned Rome to paganism. How Augustine’s writings helped preserve the message of Christianity during the collapse of the Roman Empire in the West. You will discover the uncertainties, trials, and triumphs of the earliest Christians as they confronted controversies within the faith and persecutions from outside it. Join us today to discover the improbable and miraculous story of Christianity. Sign up at ⁠http://unashamedforhillsdale.com/ Listen to Not Yet Now with Zach Dasher on Apple, Spotify, iHeart, or anywhere you get podcasts. 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 Chapters 00:00 Pap’s Shuttle Service 04:38 Getting Called Out for Mispronunciation 10:11 Learning to Land the Plane 16:28 John Luke Brings the Roman Empire to Camp 20:48 Knowing the God We Can’t Fully Grasp 26:53 Why the Incarnation Reveals Who God Is 30:20 Who Was Jesus in the Old Testament? 36:35 The City of God Still Reigns 43:02 Augustine’s Wounds & the Power of Surrender — Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I am unashamed. What about you? So welcome back to Unashamed for Hillsdale. We've been loving this study. And you mentioned in the last podcast, Zach, that David Nassar was on the podcast. We recorded it yesterday. But he's been listening to this one. And I didn't realize he was your old boss at Liberty until he brought it up on the podcast. I forgot this where I met him. But he's been loving. He said the Roman podcast is what he called it. Yeah. But he's talking about ancient Christianity, which I thought was really neat. So we're glad you guys are joining us as well. We've been talking about John Lute. We talked in the last podcast about his summer.

So this is my summer. If you can see this, if you're watching it, my daughter made this for me yesterday. It's Papp's shuttle service. I'm Papp to my grandkids. And I guess this is AI generated, but it's a skinny picture of me holding a salad. because that brought up my weight loss in the last podcast. And my truck, which goes back and forth to Gulf Shores weekly now, because I come back to do podcasts,

but also to ferry different grandchildren because some are going to Campsioca this summer, some are going to horse camp, you know, so they all, some are basketball camps. So they all have their camps, but they love their Mam and Pap time at the beach. So that's kind of become my existence. So I spent a lot of time in Mississippi getting down there to where you are, a Christian down on the coast. And I wanted to share because you want to be good to your grandkids because you realize in that second run at things, when you're older, you appreciate life.

You know, when you're young like John Luke and Christian, you're trying to get them raised. I mean, you love them, but at the same time, you're trying to make sure they survive their childhood, right, and everything that goes on, especially for snake handlers like Luke. And so, but your grandkids is changes. And Zach's kind of doing this because he adopted his child, but he's almost in grandparent age because he also has married kids now. And so you realize something unique about that. Jay's talks about it all the time. He's going through this renaissance because of their little, the little man he calls him.

And because all of a sudden he just recognizes things different from a prism. And so my 18-year-old granddaughter got me this. This Four Father's Day, she gave it to me last night. And it's the book of Big Fish. Because I talk about one of my all-time favorite movies, top ten, all-time is Big Fish. I don't know if you've ever seen it. I've never seen that. Oh, it's so good.

It's very good. It's so good. And I also saw the musical, but I never read the book. And I just mentioned this somewhere in passing that I need it. One of these days I need to read the book first and then see the movie or musical or whatever. But the reason I brought it up today is because I cry every time I watch the movie because it's about a son who's sort of distant from his father who was a larger than life character. And so the whole thing, it's a Tim Burton movie. So it's kind of weird and quirky.

But the book, I guess, is as well. So I'm very looking forward to reading it this week. But it's, and it reminds it's fishing. So, you know, we grew up fishing. But it reminds me a dad every time I watch it. And I'm sure I will probably cry again when I read the book because like larger than life things sometimes don't always translate down to the next generation because you don't understand. And so every time I see the movie, Albert Finney's in the movie and Billy Crotup is the son. He's a journalist, very cynical.

And he just, he doesn't, you know, he's angry at his dad. And I experienced all that because my dad's like larger than life. But, you know, and I was there for a lot of his life. But I so appreciate that he's a generational change agent person. And it took me a while to really appreciate that. And so I made peace with that. And that's kind of what the book is about in a weird way. And the movie, I'm sure, relays that very well.

But I just, I thought I'd share that with you guys. Because to lead us back into our discussion about Augustine, because he was that he kind of, it was a larger-than-life- figure he was like a person who's set standards that we still talk about you know and the very first city in our own our you know where we are in the united states was named after him i mean which is just one of those things so uh he is a big fish and so i think he's worthy of more than just discussion on one podcast i want to talk about him a little bit more and christian you noticed something about zach's pronunciation in the last yeah well well you know zach says he's from florida which he is

but you have St. Augustine. So you can either call Augustine, Augustine, or Augustine. And Zach, last podcast, you kept calling him Augustine. So you were kind of, you were crossbreeding the two names, which it was funny when I was listening to the lecture, and they kept talking about Augustine, Augustine, Augustine. And then whenever we showed up to do that podcast, I did not know that Augustine was Augustine.

So I was very perplexed learning that, say, in Augustine, the town that I grew up going to all the time to play baseball was about Augustine, the guy that we were learning about on the last lecture. But I just thought it was funny how you kept calling him. Or as they say in Rome, it's Augustine. I'm kidding. I don't know. Yeah. Well, I'm trying, because I grew up saying Augustine. And so I'm trying to train myself to say Augustine, but sometimes when I get eaten and kind of get in.

passionate about it, then the pronunciation goes out the window, which I used to be insecure about that. I was like, I never wanted to do a podcast because you might mispronunciate a word or mispronounce a word or you might get something wrong or not say it right. But after as many episodes as we've done now, Al, it's like, yeah. It's funny you talk about that about because, you know, you're always, when you're public speaking, you try to, you know, do things the right way. You don't to sound ignorant. And I used to have a fray, I would say, had went instead of had gone, you know, which was improper. You know, and I was pretty good English student. Dad was actually taught English. And so, you know, I have a pretty good vocabulary. But it just would come

out because it was an idiom as kind of a southern idiom to say it that way. And so, you know, and there's a lot of those. But, Zach, you mentioned one time about preaching a sermon. And our old pal, Mac Owen met you because you had just knocked it out of the park and said time to just let that one go, you know, and just crushed you because it was like Zach was so proud of himself and wanting to get that affirmation. And Mac was like, no, no. That's just, you know, nice job. No affirmation would be given today. None would be given today. And so, and I mentioned when you told that story about Bill Smith coming up to me and I'd done the same thing I had preached. And I knew it was like good. I mean, like the audience reacted in the right places. And I was so proud.

proud of it in the moment. And Bill Smith comes up and I thought, oh, man, here's my mentor. He's fixing the light, say it. Boy, ow, you got it. And he said, it's had gone, not had went. And he looked down on his thing where he, like, I thought he was taking notes. He wrote every time I said that idiom the wrong way. And I was like just, it was like that beach ball you mentioned the last five

except someone had opened up the bottom and I just depleted it. But, you know, did you ever say that? But did you quit saying it after that? I did. I do not say it. I, you were, the reason I thought about as you were talking about trying to train yourself to say it a different way. I mean, every time I would, my mouth would want to say it, I would just have to lock the governor on it and say it's had gone. Well, maybe the public, maybe the public shaming that I've received today from Christian, maybe I won't say it incorrectly. Exactly. Well, I'm actually, who's your big hater again? what's his name? Oh, what was that guy? Do you remember his name? Don't act like you don't.

I want to say Tom. It's Frank. It's Frank. Frank. Frank's probably already like, yes, guys. Frank's already, I mean. Frank's already commented. He's been to say these podcasts now.

He's moved on. I think Frank moved on. Frank would probably be like, Zach's a heretic because he can't pronounce Augustine correct. We'll check the comments for Frank's comments after this. I used this phrase today, and I typed it.

I typed it. I thought it doesn't look right, but I went with it. I said, y'allv, Y-A-L-L-L-E. Y'all have. I said y'all've got it. That is a new word. Y'all've got it. But it sounds right, so I went with it.

Oh, y'all. Speaking of idiot, I'm sorry, what were you saying? Speaking of idiots, go ahead and talk. No, I was saying idioms. Oh. No, but would you, is for sure one word or two words? Two words. Two words.

Maddie says two words. She was quick to say two words, too. When I think of like, oh, for sure, I'll go get it for sure. For some reason I put it as one word. Yeah. You're hybrid. Wait, I've got a little, just short story, and we'll do this little transition this in. The one time I was like crushed after I did a servant, I was probably like 21.

And I gave this talk at camp, and at the end, I knew I was like going long, okay? but I like finished it up and I thought man like I really crushed that. And now I walked off one of the directors. It was that same thing. I thought I was going to get like a word of affirmation. Like this is like you crushed that. He said, man, you need to learn to land the plane. And I thought, I think about that every time I give a server like,

land the plane, John Luke, just end it, wrap it up. This may be a hot take, but I don't think you should give any negative advice right after somebody gets done speaking. Well, so I actually have learned from that, and despite my Robertson nature, have become more empathetic to people. And this year, I've got this counselor, he's not young, he's one of our doing kind of all our spiritual program stuff,

and he's preaching, and he's awesome on stage, like great, great preacher. And he's probably 22-ish, maybe. And he's been going long. He's been, in the other night, he did the sermon, He was like 20 minutes off notes. I knew he was off notes. I was like, man, he's got to learn the plane.

He's landed. You got to land that plane. And I waited. I did not say it to him right after he got off. I was like, that was a great, great servant. But I told him that nicer the next day. Part of the point that Zach and I were making in those stories,

and it could be with you too, is that's a mentor relationship. I mean, those men earned the right to do that. But you do have it. Like just last week, we went to Jersey Joe went with me to prison to speak to some people there. It was a captive audience, Christian. And these guys are there. They've been waiting on us, you know, and, man, it was a packed house. And so Joe, you know, I said, Joe, you're going to, you just, you know, go about 20 minutes and lead up and then I'm going to go.

And he's like, well, you know, you go first. And then I'll go. I said, no, Joe, this, first thing you don't understand is. Like, I say this humbly, but I'm the headliner here. The posters, you know, are up because I'm coming to speak here. And you're leading in to me. So I want you to do your story, but I want you to condense it down to 20 minutes. This is not your class.

And he said, okay, okay, I got it. So because I'm mentoring, Joe, because he's just getting into speaking. So he gets up there and he goes about, he's 20, and he's doing great. He's really funny. He's laying his stuff out there. He kind of got in a sing song because he's getting a lot of, reaction from the guys there they're they're loving it and uh he goes around 20 minutes and he looks over at me and it's been about it's right it's the right time and he says he's so there's no clock up here

you know will you give me a signal and i held up this but if you're watching it's two fingers mad he just did a minute ago and that that that's not the peace sign that what would you say that meant christian wonder if i held up this what would you think that meant i would assume either you're at 20 or you have two minutes left two minutes left there you go that's what i was telling wrap it up because I realize you got to like land the plane right he thought you were giving him a peace sign no but he goes 10 more minutes uh-huh and by now the people that have organized it the warden sitting here and the and the swiney sisters I call them the the maclemore sisters are sitting here they're all squirming like because he's gone he's already drawn attention to now you're overtime

and and like they realize we're going to run out of time and I'm supposed to speak I'm the speaker today And so I'm just sitting there very calm and just looking and I'm waiting for him to look back over because I know at some point he will. And so he looks over at me and I give him the universal cut sign now. It's like, yeah, we're done here. Yeah. So he introduces me. So now he's 10 minutes into my time, of course. And so I do the right thing and only went 20 minutes, which is what he should have done.

Did you acknowledge it? So I didn't say anything at the moment. So we do our thing. We meet people, meet and greed. all that. So we're driving home because we have about an hour and a half drive. And Joe brings it. I hadn't say anything yet. I was going to address it. But he says, well, that was my first time, you know, to speak in the prison. What do y'all think? I'm open to constructive criticism. I mean, he welcomed it. So the girls were like, yeah, it was good. But they had already told me,

like, why didn't Joe do what he was supposed to do? So I said, well, Joe, when I hold up two fingers, I wasn't giving you the peace sign. What did you think that meant? When I said, two because you had already gone 20 minutes. And he said, well, I thought that meant you would let me know the next signal. I was like, did you think it was scissors? What? I mean, he was going to get two to one. Like, this is your first signal and there's going to be another signal?

Maybe he thought this was like an 11. Yeah. You got 11. You had told your story and then you went back in. You were telling him. He thought this meant victory. Victory. You're slaying it now.

He saw it two men, run it back. Again. Run it back. I said, remember we said that point about you were setting me up to go, you know? But he was like, oh, okay, I got it. I got it now. I didn't understand. So it was a moment. We all laughed about it.

It was okay. But it was a mentor moment because, like, he wanted me to just say, and he did, excellent. But like, until he did that. It's hard to wrap it up sometimes. It is. It is. I found that after we started doing this podcast and when I preach, I mean, I've, I've been working on this, like condensing it down.

because my bits, you know, 50 minutes. That's what we're doing. So I'm always, you know, and I preached a sermon that was 53 minutes, which was the record at our church. It was the record. That's what's sad. Somebody topped it? Oh, yeah.

We got some Tommy Toppers. That's too long. That's too long. Be our keeping track. Yeah. But, I mean, it's all good teaching. But, I mean, I've tried to get mine down. I'm working to get sub 40 is what we're trying to do.

Now, when our church is geared, that's part of our cultural, you know, the steathing. I think the sweet spot for me is about 35. But that's everything. That's like if I decide to do stuff in the intro. But I feel like, and look, when we do Lisa and I speak in front of audiences and do testimonies and all that, and we can talk an hour and never lose them. But it's a different, it's a different atmosphere there. A sermon setting, yeah, you're right, Zach.

You need to whittle that just a bit. Because the thing about it is you want them wanting more. I mean, we first came with the first podcast, and Dad said, so about 30 minutes is what we're doing? I said, no, they want like 48, 50 minutes. And he's like, well, we got to wrap it up for that. I mean, he's thinking sermon, but a podcast is different. Yeah. And you can do more.

You know, and people are listening to this on a certain. For me, for high schoolers, it's like 20 minutes is like actually too long. Yeah, that's right. It's really like eight minutes is like the sweet spot. That's right. You just want to give them like one point. Yes, right. And this year, so this is, this will bring us into this.

This year for camp, our theme is the word. And our theme verse is John 1-1. In the beginning it was the word. And now I'm like, you know, it was the word. In the beginning, it was the word. In the beginning. Yeah. With God in the beginning.

And so we're doing the, our whole like lesson plan is on, like, the life of Jesus and like the words of God and or the words of Christ. Yeah. And so we're kind of like walking through the life of Christ and one of our big like fun theme night days is Roman Empire. And I did that. I actually did that before we were even taking this ancient Christianity course. And I did it because I wanted to give them some like context of like what the Roman Empire

was in Jesus' day. And so we did this like huge game. Everyone wears like togas and loosely dressed on, you know, Empire and we do all of our like big game activities like based on the Roman Empire. We did like chariot races with these like, you know, these like wagon things. We did like we did Tuggle War. We did some like Olympic style games and stuff and it was super fun. And at the end, I was originally my sermon was going to be on like specifically like Pontius

Paul and the Romans in his day. But as I was thinking about it and we were taking this course, I was like, oh, I need to do like the whole Roman Empire, like, from the, the terribleness of it in Jesus' day, but then, like, the redemption of it through, like, Augustine and Constantine, like, later. And so I quoted in this, like, I quoted Turchy, I quote origin, I quoted Augustine, and I, like, wrapped it up with Constantine, like, talking about, like, the redemption and, like, how, no matter what kind of persecution

Christians go through, like, God is working in those small spaces and, like, apply to them. It's like through these games, like you've had hard times and tough times through life. Life's just going to keep beating you down, but like Christ is enough and he will win these battles for you. And like everyone, you know, it was like this awesome, like huge moment. And I was like, man, thank you Hillsdale. Unashamed that Hillsdale like gave me this, the scholarly literature I needed to like give the servant to these kids this summer. It's awesome. And it worked. And it worked. And it landed. That's awesome. You can check the course with us for free at Unashamed for Hillsdale.com. Go ahead, Zed.

This is our last episode on ancient Christianity. We're kind of recapping the whole course and then finishing of some discussion around Augustine. Was that good for you guys? Was that good? Was that good? That was good. I think I just said Auguste.

You did. Well, we're going to do it. But, you know, I thought about Augustine. Let's talk about him. Yeah, I think one of the things we didn't mention the last episode that I find interesting is the way that he framed up even the doctrine of the Trinity, you know, there's been a lot around this. This is kind of where it diverges a little bit, depending on which, you know, are you from the east or western part of the church, meaning are you, you know, are you Eastern

Orthodox, which, you know, the Eastern Church and the Western Church split. And I think 10, I want to say 1036, the great schism over this doctrine of the Trinity, but particularly how the spirit proceeds. But the way that Augustine would have framed this up, because you try to think about like something like the Trinity, it's a very hard concept to even get your mind around a little bit. And I think that's probably because we're talking about the God of the universe, right? And so we're probably not going to get our minds around him. And I'll say that like sarcastically, we're not. we can only really understand anything about him only if he reveals it to us. And I think he has revealed some of these things in his nature.

But I don't know, have you guys had over the years, if you had a difficult time, maybe struggling with? What does that even mean? Like the God's Trinity? What does that even mean? I think any time, that was so well said, because anytime you try to put yourself in the perspective of God and understanding, being the created beings is very difficult, even though we're made in his image. So we do aspire to understand things beyond us,

just the physical world. But it is hard. I mean, and there's certainly a faith element to that of understanding. And when you try to, I mean, like we, it's, I get the idea of becoming one of us, you know, in the incarnation, which is the heart of it, but in terms of how the spirit works,

I mean, even Jesus himself said, it's like trying to explain where the wind comes from and where it goes. I mean, do you know? I mean, Christians down there, you're feeling a Gulf breeze today. Where does that start and where is it in? That's a hard question. You know, even in a philosophical sense.

So, yes, I think it's difficult on purpose because I think God is above us. And so that is part of this whole concept, you know, of us trying to aspire to there. And I do think it's going to take our glorified bodies, minds and spirits that to fully understand it. And most of the schisms you see throughout time, whether it be the Calvinism or different things that people look at things, it usually comes from having a hard time seeing things from God's perspective. And it is difficult for us. And so, but I think, like I said, that's by design. When Jesus came, you know, we read his writings. You guys are doing this study in the life of Jesus. And they didn't understand hardly any

of it. No, none of it. I mean, they were all listening. And they were like, oh what and so like and you know so that lets you know that we're not the only ones i mean the ones who actually were three years with him every single day had a very hard time understand what he's well if he's exhaustible then he's probably not much of a god right i mean if we can exhaust our understanding of him that doesn't mean that he's not understandable at all doesn't mean that he's irrational or uh are unknowable it just means that he's not exhausted we can't exhaust our knowledge of him. And it hit me this week because on this idea of the Trinity, we had one of the guys at our church

gave his testimony, and it was so powerful. We did it at our house church. And so this guy's a, I would say like a newer Christian, had a very rough life and done a lot, just started kind of getting into church and the Bible over the last several years, not a sophisticated man in this theology, very sharp. yeah, I mean, he's a country boy, but he is sharp and like, you know, he's very just intelligent in a way that like just, I mean, he's one of the smartest guys I know. He's just not, he doesn't have like the vernacular. He might say Augustine.

He probably wouldn't say Augustine. And so he was giving his testimony that was so powerful. And then the guy sitting next to him on the other side of the couch is a legit scholar. He's a scholarly guy. He may even have a doctorate. He's got a master's of divinity. And if anybody in our church understands the doctrine of the Trinity, it would be this guy. And so my buddy's given his testimony, and he's trying to share his understanding of the Trinity.

And the whole time I'm thinking, that's probably not correct. And I'm looking at my buddy Joe, and he's why, and I'm wondering at first, I wonder how Joe's interpreting this, because I know Joe's probably in his mind. I was thinking he's probably just butchering everything this guy's saying, like, that's not right. and pulling up all the creeds and confessions and church fathers and all that. But I was watching Joe's face, and it was very clear to me that Joe was unconcerned with his lack of understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity and was actually captivated by his testimony of giving his life to Christ and having his affections and his heart changed. I think when you interpret Augustine, I think that we can read a lot about theology and learn a lot about theology. from his works, but at the center of it, if it's not leading to a reformation of our desires

and loves, then, I mean, it's all for, it's all for nothing. And so I think it's good to kind of move into the discussion in that way. You know, I don't know if you guys have dealt with anything kind of thing. Well, I thought. Well, yeah, I mean, like with the Trinity, and I'm pretty sure I brought this up on the podcast before, but, you know, we just talked last episode about the incarnation and now that was so big in Augustine's life. And, you know, we talked about Jesus, like the incarnation is when Jesus, you know, takes on the bodily form and thinking about, you know, Genesis with whether it's, you know, Jacob wrestling with the angel or God walking in the garden, it's like, well, if God is outside of time and space, but Jesus

doesn't happen until the incarnation, then what was Jesus like, you know, before that? or when Jesus is on the Mount, you know, Mount of Transfiguration with Moses and Elijah, it's like, does he step out of time and space? And is he back in, you know,

thousands of years ago with them or, and, you know, in the gospels where he talks about, I saw Satan fall from heaven like lightning. Like, what is, like,

and what, you know, what did Jesus look like in that state when he saw those things happening? So I think those are the things for me that I find fascinating of, you know, the incarnation, but then also Jesus being God outside of time and space, who John won, you know, the whole world was created through Jesus. So it's like, what did that Trinitarian look like then compared to what it's going to be like now

in eternity? I don't know if any, that's just kind of where my mind goes with the Trinity of those different dynamics of Jesus and God and Old Testament, New Testament, and eternity. We talk about it a lot, Zach. on the regular Shand podcast about seeing God in a relationship, which of course makes them unique from any other gods that you really see, although some I think even have tried to show those. When you look at some of the old Greek gods and Roman gods,

the ideal was that there was a desire for relationship with humanity. But then it would always wind up being something really bad, like it would create these beings that fought one another and murdered each other. And so it would always wind up in a bad situation. but you see in them this perfect trio of love and relationship and how they interact. And that's the way I've always that's helped me at least try to understand it from a human frailty is I look at us as individuals made in the image of God. And the way Paul described it, body, soul, and spirit where there's the flesh, but also our animation, but then also that soullishness that wants more and desires more. because when a person dies, all of a sudden we see the body there,

but where's the animation? It was there, but now it's gone. The thing that makes John Luke, John Luke, or Christian, Christian, or me, me, is that spirit like we are, and we're all different. We have different spirit. And then I think about a relationship we have with our wife is another picture of that, because you have two that become one bonded by this something special.

and you see when that gets off track, what happens? They make Lifetime movies about it, you know? You all of a sudden, you become two people again because you lost that bonding agent that was there that drew you together to one, and you're not one anymore, you're two, until you can rediscover that and then God can redeem that. So I look at all those relational concepts, whether it's a husband or wife and that that bonds them together

or something else. We were at the shark store down in Gold Shores the other day and had the grandkids and we were on our way out of town. And even after all these years, you still got to go, you know, spend $100 at the shark store. And this young man tapped me on the shoulder. He said, Mr. Al? And I was like, yeah, that's me.

What's left of him? And he had his wife there and two little ones, like yours, John Luke. And he said, I just want to tell you that, you know, we love the podcast. I said, oh, thanks. And he said, but we really loved your movie. because it really hits home with us and some of the struggles we've had. And I said, well, thank you.

I'm glad you got to see it. I'm glad it's impacting. He said, we're just trying to follow y'all's example. And, you know, just in a moment in the store there, you realize that God does things through flawed people to help other people. And so, you know, in his perfection, he came here to help us in our imperfection,

which is one of the beautiful things about relationships. So we talked a lot about, Augustine and his, you know, some of his past and some of his difficulties, but I think there is a power in that, and I call the power of the prodigal, or it could be either brother in Luke 15, that when you repent and you change and you submit to God, you understand something about the nature of God and the relationship that you have with him. So, you know, I do think there's power in that. And then that's why a man like this that we're talking about still has an impact, you know, all these years later. We're talking about now getting almost, you know,

2,000 years himself, you know, 19 hundred years ago, what a blessing. Well, Dr. Calvert's point that was brought up in the last episode that central to Augustine's teaching and writings is the incarnation of Christ, I think it answers a lot of what you're talking about,

Christian. I mean, I've had that thought, too. I remember early on in my kind of faith journey that we were having this debate amongst our friend group, which this is what we used to always have big, like, knock down, drag out, Bible studies where literally they would, a lot of times they'd lead to like people getting really

mad. So probably not into that spirit, but me and one of the guys that were in argument with over, particularly over Christ in his appearance and his appearances in the Old Testament and it got into the whole doctrine of the Trinity. But when we went and met with Bill Smith, who was the guy that Al talked about in the last podcast that, what was the, what did he chastised as you for? Had went. Had win. Yeah. So he was the mentor of Al, and really for me too for a number of years. And he's the one that led Dad to Christ initially.

Yep. Yeah. It's one of my mom brought into the bar. So if you've seen the blind, he's the one that goes into the bar with my mom. So I'll never forget this. We went and I scheduled a meeting with me, Bill, and these two other guys. And we were going to basically present our case. And then we would let, you know, one of our mentors to tell us who was right and who was wrong.

and I was pretty sure that I was right and they were wrong. Shocker. Shocker. And so he went in and the first thing that he said, like, has stuck with me ever, ever since I heard it, it's like to this day I think about it. Every time I think about that dilemma you were talking about, like we have the incarnation of Jesus in the New Testament. Well, what was Jesus stood in the Old Testament?

And we got to be careful how we frame that question up, because I know what people mean when they say that, because the sun was certainly present in the Old Testament. repeatedly, but how does that play out? And Bill was just very provocatively said, Jesus didn't exist in the New Testament. And we were like, what? And he's like, no, Jesus is the name of the incarnation of the Son.

And the Son existed in the Old Testament. Jesus is the incarnation of that Son. And so when you read a passage like John 173, I think it's helpful when he says that eternal life is to know the one tree God. Well, who is the one tree God? well, he's father, son, and spirit, and Jesus Christ, his son whom he sent. So it's to know the triune God and then the incarnation of that God. And I think the reason why Dr. Calvert emphasized the importance of the incarnation is for

what we're talking about here, we cannot grasp a God who is outside of time and space. Like you can't, like, we don't have a framework for that. that's why these whole debates on Calvinism and Armenianism, they fall flat for me now because I'm like, all we're really trying to figure out is what was God doing before he created space and time. But I can't even ask the question because before is a temporal, it's a temporal word. I have to assume time to even have the language. I don't possess the language to ask a question about a being that is outside of the time. of my realm.

I can only understand things in the context of the world I live in. And there's an existence that is out, even out there. Like, what does that even mean? That's a spatial word. Out, out, outside, out there. That terminology doesn't apply to a sovereign God.

So I'm limited. So the only way that I'm going to really be able to know this God who transcends all of space and time is if that God, incarnates into space and time. And that is the central reason why the incarnation is necessary for humans, is that if there is no incarnation of God, then we cannot know who God is. He has to incarnate for us to know him. And he did incarnate, and he incarnated in his son, Jesus. And so that's why, when Jesus says, nobody comes to the Father except for me, that's why. That's just a reality. If you

want to know God, you have to go through the sun because he's the incarnation of that God. So that's how I've reconciled over the years, Christian. I don't know if that's helpful or not. No, that's really helpful. And I was going to add, John, you listened to that Alex O'Connor podcast with John Lennox, right? Yeah. Did you remember the book analogy that Alex O'Connor gave? With the, do you remember what I'm talking about? I don't know. I'm kind of blanking on it. It was so brilliant. I wish, I mean, I'm trying to think of what it was, but it was, he was talking, he was talking about the characters in the book and about the author. Oh, yeah.

Well, he was making, I think he was making the point that, like, the characters in the book would not only know what the author is, is, only knows about the author to the extent that the author writes it in the book. He was basically talking about if you study, like, remember he was, he was talking about studying, like, punctuation. Oh, yeah. The idea was that we try to study God and what we – I'm going to butcher it. But it's so good. Studying the Bible is like only in the – with like a naturalistic worldview is like getting Mark Twain – is like getting Shakespeare. And you're reading it and you – as you read it, you start to develop like, okay, this word, he uses the word the,

and then he uses the word A, and then he puts a period here, and you start to, like, learn all these things about, like, the language and how he wrote it, and you get to this point where, like, you kind of, like, discover English, but you know nothing about the author, and nothing about the story, because you've missed the main point. You focus on the grammar, and you missed the author and the main point. The character inside of a book, if I was to make the analogy, I would think of it like the character in the book. He can't look at what's in the book and figure out who the author is.

The author has to step in and reveal something to the character in the book because the author wrote the book. And so that's kind of like if we're in God's story, God authored this story that we're living in, and I'm not going to be able to somehow muster up like some knowledge of the one who wrote the story. the only way that I can know about it is if he reveals that to me. So the incarnation of Christ is actually the ultimate revelation of who God is. And I think it plays into like the birth of Western civilization because all that kind of we talked about that in the last podcast, how the church really did persevere through a lot of turmoil, which then they were the ones that were prepared for the Renaissance.

And if you think about the Renaissance and how this play, this is, I think, plays into the Kingdom's conversation. because it's, Paul says in Ephesians that it's through the church that the manifold wisdom of God will be made known and proclaimed to the,

to the celestial, like, realm. But it's not just that realm. It's the world around us because what we do, what the church actually does is we live incarnated lives. But we do that. Like, we are in,

we are the, we are his body. So if Christ incarnates, and then we are the body of Christ, the church, then we are part of that incarnation. and to live an incarnated life is to actually fulfill that cultural mandate of Genesis 128

to be fruitful, multiplies, to do the earth, and have dominion over it. That's what it means. And so you can look at the emergence of art in the Renaissance. You can look at the emergence of technologies, the emergence of hospital systems, the emergence of all these things that emerge into the world that are beautiful and helpful.

This is the kingdom of God coming into the world. This is the city of God breaking into the earthly city because they really shouldn't be separate. The reason why they're separate is because of sin. And so it's our incarnated life through the spirit and obviously through the sanctifying work of Christ and the spirit in us that we actually show the Father's love to the world by what we do. Yeah, and I love that text from Ephesians because it's not just us, but it's the heavenly realms. it's the other part outside that still takes a notice of what's going on inside our time and space, which is pretty powerful, which goes back to Luke 15. Remember Jesus said three times, angels rejoice over a repentant sinner.

So you're thinking about, we're talking about Augustine. I mean, angels rejoiced when he came to Christ, you know, came out of where it was. Don't forget to sign up and take the course with us for free at Unashamed for Hillsdale.com. Zach, I want to read that since you brought that. that up because we didn't talk quite as much about the city of God. But Dr. Calvert mentioned Psalm 48, and I want to read that because this is so good in this idea about the greatness of the church, but also the kingdom. It's as great as the Lord and most worthy of praise in the city of our God, is Holy Mountain. That's Psalm 481. It is beautiful and its loftiness, the joy of the whole earth,

like the utmost heights of Zaffon is Mount Zion, the city of the great king. God is in her citadals. He has shown himself to be her fortress. When the kings joined forces when they advanced together, they saw her and were astounded. They fled in terror. Trembling seized them there, pain like that of a woman in labor. You destroyed them like the ships of Tarshish shattered by an east wind. As we have heard, so we have seen in the city of the Lord Almighty.

in the city of our God, God makes her secure forever. And so I just love that concept of that was the idea behind the book. And remember, I mean, the Western Rome is crumbling and will be overtaken at this point in human history when he wrote this. And so he just showed this power that goes forward, which I think was the heart of Revelation as well, the idea that God and his temple, which is now us, in his city, which is his kingdom, is always going to rain. And that's just as true today in 2026 as it was back when he wrote that much.

Oh, my gosh, yeah. It's so true. Think about this back to the Trinity and how this all relates. So if you were to take just a crude kind of Augustinian presentation of the Trinity, it would probably be said something like this, that the father is the lover. and because, you know, 1st John 4th, it says God is love. Like the defined,

and 1st John 410, God is love. So the father is the lover. The son is the beloved, and then the spirit is, is the love that is between them. And so, and there's pushback on that, depending on who you talk to,

but I like that kind of idea of help me understand what this means when we're talking about, you know, the God of the universe and this, what does this look like, and this framework look like. Then you,

fast forward and another kind of thought emerges later on of the kind of off of this that that it's that that love between between the father and the son and that the spirit embodies it's not that narcissistic love of the relationship in high school i mentioned i use this all the time when i teach so a lot of you probably heard it but it's not the boyfriend and girlfriend obsessed with each other at the exclusion of everybody else that's not that is not the triune nature of god's love the triune nature of god's love the triune nature of God's love is it's that the out of the, born out of the love is more life. And so that's why it's not just inward. It's an outward function, right?

An outward fruit of the very nature of that. So I think you actually see that in the incarnation. I think you see God spilling out, right? You see love spilling out, pouring out. It's a fountain, not a black hole. I think you see that culture, you sit in the cultural mandate when he says be fruitful and multiply. He doesn't say be fruitful and multiply and build a wall around the garden. Be fruitful and multiply and fortify the corners of the garden and make sure you put all the kids as, as on guardpost, as soldiers, not letting anybody in and you protect this house.

He doesn't say that. He says, be fruitful and multiply and go out, go and expand out. And so do you see this even like with the city of God what all of these the city of man was all always doing and Rome is a prime example of this? And I think that we got to be careful in America not to put all of our allegiance in the political thing because that is not ultimately where our allegiance lies. And what happens with earthly kingdoms? What do they do? They don't, they're not thinking about sacrificial life expanding outward. What they're thinking about is fortification and they're thinking about territorial disputes. And so that's the big contrast between God's kingdom and one of the big contrasts and the earthly kingdom. In God's kingdom, it's about fruitful multiplication and expansion.

By the way, that's voluntary. Sorry, you do that as a volunteer. You can't force that ethic on someone in God's kingdom, but that is the ethic. The ethic is to pour yourself out as Christ poured himself out. That's so good. And so true. And again, that's out of everything in this, study about this particular man. And again, now it's made me want to read the works,

even though, as Zach said, I'm sure they're not easily read. But I want to know more of the heart of the man because I guess because I live life for a period of my life as a prodigal where I turn my back on faith and then came back. And there is something powerful about that and then what you have to share once you've seen that other side, that there's nothing there for you. It just leads to more, you know, bad thinking and no resolution and you can't find what you're looking for and the things you thought were important and the curiosity. And I think Jace brought this up in one of our previous Unashamed podcast that when you look at the story in Luke 15, you see one person who had to know if there was something more than the father. And then you had

one that stayed with the father but then thought himself worthy in staying. And that really kind of describes the two mindsets of most people. One of the other, they find themselves. It's either self-righteous or selfish in terms of my desires. And so I think there's something powerful of that. And this man, what really made him great was that he came to a point of surrender. When he listened to the voice of the father and ultimately the son and the spirit and what that did for him. He has this line.

I think it's so good. And it's kind of like sums up his work. And he's talking about Jesus and he says, in my deepest wounds, I saw you and it dazzled me. And just that I think that exemplifies all these, especially these ancient Christians and us today. Like when you come to the bottom of it, it's just in your wounds, seeing Christ and being awed by it.

Yeah, yeah. And being willing to take that stand for that, right? Yeah. One of the heresies that Augustine fought against was the Pelagianism. And if you think about the contrast between those two guys, because he reminds me a lot more of Rousseau, right, that your man is born free. We're born, we're great, we're perfect, and we can actually, in our own ability, in our own, like, morality, and our own intellectual capacity, we can actually find, find the right. we can find God without grace. And you see that heresy, like this is, I mean, this is a real issue, I think,

with humans is that we want to be able to claim the victory for ourselves. And so it's a hard thing to actually make the confession that Augustine made, which is that I'm actually not capable. And I need to receive illumination from God before I can move. I actually believe this. I think I can back it up with scripture for sure that we don't actually have a thought until God speaks first. I think that's one of the things about, like if you read Romans 1 and 2, it talks about how God's nature has been clearly perceived from what has been made.

I didn't make anything. So if I'm going to perceive the nature of God from what's been made, then that tells me that the author of Revelation is not me. I'm not an explorer discovering stuff on my own. No, God has revealed it. The Bible says that his invisible attributes have been clearly perceived by what has been made. So God actually reveals his nature through the creation. So God's the author of revelation. And he also is the author of the moral law written on our hearts. And he's also the author of the scriptures that give us specific information about who he is. And so That's key because we're not, you know, what Augustine is essentially getting at is we're not explorers on our own figuring out the things of God.

No, no, no, it's more like this, that God is revealing himself to us. And he is the author and the originator of all knowledge. So our role is not to discover him. Our role is to receive revelation, submit to that revelation about reality, have our hearts and our loves and our eyes reordered and re-endixed towards him so that now we can live in the abundant life. That's a beautiful gospel. That's the gospel of the kingdom that Jesus brought. What a wretched man I am who will rescue me from this body of death.

But thanks me to Jesus Christ. So good. That's the blessing. Sign up, take the course with us for free. Unashamed for Hillsdale.com. Big news starting next week. We're going to do a new course. Thank you, Hillsdale, for continuing this.

called Theology 101, the Western Theological Tradition. We're super excited about it. It's going to start on July the 10th. So we're looking forward to you guys taking the ride with us. Go there, take the course, because you're going to learn a lot. Do the quizzes. Get your certificate of completion. If you're like me, I'm printing those off.

I'm going to have a whole wall with nothing but certificates. I really have to see a picture. I need to see a compilation of all your certificates. I know, because, see, I have them. You didn't make it that up? You don't think he does. No, right here. I mean, I just want to see them all, like, hung up on a wall framed.

And my formerly nicotine-stained fingers is right here is one of the ones. We should all make a trip when we get done with this year's courses, and we should all go to Hillsdale and have a, just have a gathering and invite anyone who wants to come. We can do like a lecture series or something. That would be awesome? And do some live podcast there with our audience. Would y'all do it? If I could put it together, would you guys be available?

I'm all in. Yeah. Are y'all divas and high maintenance? They got to talk to your people about it. Well, we'll have your people call our people. We'll do lunch. We'll check it out. We'll, we got to go. We're out of time.

We'll see you next time on Theology 101. Join us every Friday for Unashamed Academy Powered by Hillsdale College. Make sure to go to Unashamed for Hillsdale.com and sign up. It's no calls to you. That's Unashamed for Hillsdale.com. And don't miss an episode of the Unashamed podcast by subscribing on YouTube. And be sure to click the little bell and choose all notifications. to watch every episode.