With The Perrys - The State of the American Church: A Conversation with Pastor Philip Anthony Mitchell (Part Two)

Episode Date: October 7, 2024

Philip Anthony Mitchell is back for Part Two of his conversation with the Perrys, talking about problems with the American church. We're seeing a drift from Orthodox Christianity and a growing dishonor for Jesus. Rampant idolatry, insensitivity to sin, leaders who are living in open rebellion to God, people clapping in rooms as they're listening to false doctrines. People don't want to be taught... they wanted to be entertained. And because of all of that, people are increasingly Biblically illiterate.  Subscribe to the Perrys' newsletter: https://withtheperrys.myflodesk.com/zhfus4jx1s Join Preston's discipleship community for men: https://www.patreon.com/PrestonPerry/membership To support the work of the Perrys, donate via PayPal: https://paypal.me/withtheperrys Shop BOLD Apparel: boldapparel.shop Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, Saints and Nates. What are with y'all? Welcome back to With the Perrys. They don't get no, it's the Saints and Ian. Don't get none of that? It's the Saints and the Ais. It's the Saints and the East. It's the Saints and Ian.

Okay. All right, we're here with Philip Anthony. If y'all joined us last week, I'm pretty sure, you know, I don't know. We wanted to just keep going. Low key, but we wanted to separate these conversations. I felt like the conversation got real good towards the end. I was like, we might as well just do a part two. For sure.

Yeah, it was real good towards the end. Yeah. So we learned about your upbringing. We learned about how you came to the Lord. If anyone has heard you talk, they will hear you reference Israel. Yeah. And how you had a moment that had a profound impact on your ministry. I just want us to like dig into that.

Yeah. So it's December 20th. 2018, Lena and I traveled to Israel for a birthday. I want to spend this particular birthday in the nation of Israel. We did for 10 days. At this time, I'm pastoring, but I'm pastoring with a lot of, if I could just be completely transparent, with a lot of vanity in my heart, right?

I'm passing a lot of vanity in my heart. There's materialism there. I have no real sense of identity as a pastor. I have no clear sense of what my lane is. And so I'm dealing with a lot of confusion as a leader. And so I go to Israel and I'm kind of fast and praying while we're there. We're there for 10 days. And we explore the whole nation from the northern part of the nation in the Golden Heights

all the way down to the southern part, out to the Dead Sea, until we arrive in Jerusalem. The whole time I'm there, I'm fast and praying. I'm seeking God. I just want God to speak to me. I just want some sense of clarity. The Lord is silent. And I think some of us know the frustration of seeking God for clarity. He just seems silent.

He seems like he's not communicating. It's very, very frustrating. It is the last day. It is the last location of the tour. And it is at the garden tomb. And I go into the garden tomb. I come out of the garden tomb. And I hear singing off to my right.

It's in a language I don't fully understand, but I can feel the presence of God in the singing. And just me being, you know, kind of. I kind of slip into the back of the gathering. It's a group of foreigners. I'm in the back. I'm the only black dude back there. And they're singing and I'm lifting my hands and I'm in worship, although I can't understand what they're saying.

The man leading the meeting, he motions to me from the front of the meeting. And he tells me to come to the front. So I come to the front. And he starts speaking to me in a language. I don't understand. At the same time, there was a guy who had been on my, bus the whole entire tour who actually spoke the language of the man who's speaking. So I find out later he's speaking in Portuguese.

You can't make this up. So God has someone in place to interpret what this man is already saying. So this is what he says to me in his language. He says to me, he says, I've been to your nation. I've seen the church, how it is dead and it is dying. And God is saying to you, do you want to return to your? nation to do something about it. And I fall down on my knees. I weep. And this man lays his hands on me. This gathering of people from Brazil, they start praying over me. And they are praying over me that

God would give me a double portion of his anointing to awaken people in America to set fire to the church in America. And as they are praying and the man is interpreting, it's almost like I feel like God is charging me in this moment. I feel like God is charging me to go back to America and sound an alarm, to go back to America and cry aloud, to go back to America

and stir up fire in the body of Christ, not just in my city, but in the body of Christ. So profound is this encounter. I mean, I tattooed the whole thing to my arm, so the whole thing sleeved on my arm. I showed you that whole thing. And I'm flying back from Tel Aviv.

And as I'm flying back, I'm rocked by two things that affects me when I get back to the United States. The first thing I'm rocked by is that when I'm in Israel, I see a type of reverence for Yahweh I had never seen here in the United States. I've seen a type of reverence for the scriptures I had never seen in the United States. This is amongst the Christians and even the Jews. gatherings were so sacred. Faith was not locked to a day.

It was all of life. And so I'm flying back and I am conflicted by what I saw. So it's like once you've been exposed, you cannot be unexposed. And so I'm deeply conflicted by, I've never seen a type of devotion to Yahweh on this level. I've never seen this in the United States. And so I'm flying back and I'm both conflicted and I am convicted that my faith with God has been very shallow. my preaching has been shallow. And so I'm rocked by that.

And then I'm rocked by what I sense to me was a clear charge from God for the country, for the body, for America specifically. Right. And so when I get back in December 2018, if anybody would go back on YouTube, you'll see my preaching shifts. There is a focus now on holiness. There's a focus on righteousness, on honoring the scriptures, on integrity for the word of God, of complete surrender. And the very first thing I started preaching was a series called Yahweh about holiness.

I do like an eight-week series about holiness and God's holiness. And from 2018 until now, that has been my cry. In the beginning, it was faint. I'm persecuted for that. I'm told by people I love, people will never listen to this. They will never take seriously what you're saying. You're not going to grow a church that way. And that is what I'm told in the beginning.

But I adopt this phrase that says, I will not remain silent, but I will cry aloud until all have heard. That is a phrase that I coined, and I live by that phrase, and I just continue to cry aloud. It's only now people are paying attention. But I've been soundness alarm since December 2018.

Yeah, that's good. Before 2018, you said that your, your preaching was shallow. I think so. But you're not a shallow person. No. So what did shout? Like, what was that? Exactly.

I think for me, when I say my preaching was shallow was, I think I'm more concerned about just, are my points good in my outline? I'm only thinking about my outline, I'm not thinking about the real deep impact on the people. I'm only concerned about is the topic I'm preaching dope. You know, I'm only looking at, okay, am I preaching calendar for the year? What topics I want to put together? Are they going to watch this?

Are they going to make people come? This is a true story. So I'm planning my preaching calendar every fall for the next year and thinking, is this topic going to make people show up? If I preach this topic, so I'm doing relationship stuff and I'm doing stuff on this. And I'm thinking, if I do this, I remember when it was about to be 2020, I said, I'm going to do a series called, I'm going to do a series called optics, the power of vision, because it's about to be 20. So I'm doing stuff that's cultural thinking if I do this, it'll grow the church. And people will come and I'm praying for a big church and praying for crowds and I'm praying for platforms. And so this stuff is in my heart. So when I look back on that, I'm thinking for what God has done in me now. Yeah. That's crazy. I was passionate church with a lot of vanity. And I was shallow. And I was shallow. And I was. I was doing stuff hoping to put butts in seats based on topics.

Yeah. Yeah, that's crazy. You could be building in sound, but still shallow. And I feel like God in that moment in Israel, he burned that out of me. I almost feel like a person died in Israel and a different man came back to the States. That's why I wear all black. That's good. Like people mock me for wearing all black.

I don't care, right? I don't care. But I wear all black to me is part of my branding as a person. It's like a funeral. So when we think black, we think a funeral. So for me, wearing black is saying, I am dead to vanity. I am dead to being shallow. I'm dead to the culture.

I'm dead to all the things that filled my ministry. So black for me is a statement of a new man came back from Israel. Does that make sense? That makes sense. Let me actually this. I mean, you know, when God calls a person in such a radical way, and I feel like you were already called to himself. Yeah.

But I feel like in Israel, what happened to you? like it was like a particular type of call for the American church and for you to come back. You know, like when you go through such a dramatic shift like that, I can imagine in all the ways in which your world changes, you know what I'm saying? And so talk about like how did you, how did God getting your yes in that way change your life for the good? Yeah. And also change your life for, you know, I'm pretty sure it's a call. Yeah. It is a call when you're obedient to the Lord. He talked about the persecution, but just go deeper into like. I had a similar question.

Because I was going to ask that had to cost you something. Yeah. So what was the cost? I would love for you to talk about like, man, all the beautiful things you've seen God do in your ministry, your life, your family by getting your yes. But also the cost. Yeah. So I think that's a great question, man. And on the way home from that plane, the Lord put a text in my heart.

It was the whole chapter of Isaiah 6. That's why it's tattered on the inside of my arm. And I'm reading through Isaiah 6 the whole thing. And Isaiah 6 is kind of branded to my heart. It's deep in my heart. I understand when I look at that, Isaiah's preaching to a people whose hearts are hardened. They would still go into being disciplined by the Lord. And the Lord tells him in the back half of Isaac exists, which is not so popular,

he's like, Lord, how long should I preach this way? Can we just paraphrase? You preach this way until judgment falls, until everything is laid waste, until everything is removed and only a remnant remains. They're not going to like it. I'm paraphrasing it. They may not accept it. You may not be affirmed, but you're going to preach this way until I raise in my remnant. So Isaiah 6 is kind of tattoo to my heart.

I come back. I start preaching about God's holiness. And I lose, I lose friends. I lose what we used to call them members. We don't do membership at 2019. We just call them disciples. I lose, I lost members. I lost leaders.

I lost mentors. I started getting persecuted. I started getting death threats. It was around that time, Islamic organization, hijacked my Instagram page. I flew all the way to California to Facebook headquarters to get my page back. I had to meet with a VP

who was friends with Mark Zuckerberg to get my page back. I've started getting death threats from Islamic organizations. People try to attack me on Sunday mornings. I've been grabbed multiple times in the audience. So now I'm feeling like there's a sense that is my family safe.

My mom is telling me, be careful about your words. I start, like, I've always owned guns. We probably go get in trouble for talking like this. Man, we're free. All right. So, you know, I've always owned guns, but, you know, I stay strapped, you know.

And so now there's a sense like, man, there's real persecution now. I'm losing friends. I'm losing people. I'm losing members. I'm getting deaf threats. I've been snatched. So now it's like, it's my life in danger. And so it costs a lot.

And to be honest, I was afraid. I dealt with a lot of fear. I did have anxiety. I'm preaching on a Sunday morning wondering is somebody gonna plug me while I'm standing up here? So there is this sense like and the staff at the time is that we have to increase security and it's like, okay, this is getting a little too serious.

It's like you wasn't preaching like this before you left and so people are like, now you sound angry, you sound like the mad rapper. People are jumping ship. There's an exodus from our church. And so it costs me a lot. But in private, what it did for me was I'm building a new altar in private unto the Lord.

My prayer life goes to a deeper level. My secret place becomes my favorite place. My intimacy with God is being great of fuel by a depth of prayer that becomes so dependent on him because I feel like when I walk out of that prayer room, there is danger all around me. So there's a deeper intimacy that's happening. So while I'm losing friends and members and I'm getting death threats is driving. me into deeper intimacy with the Lord for my own safety, for the safety of my wife and children. We stopped putting my kids on social media.

So there's something happening in private, in which I'm like, I'm growing more dependent on God because it's almost like my life now is on the line at a whole other level. Which what came out of that was a type of ferocious prayer life. Like I said to somebody the other day, like, my preaching is okay, but that's not even the strongest part of my ministry. The strongest part of my ministry is my prayer life. life. And it came out of that season of persecution. Right.

Something was forged in the fire. And so for me, and then what also came out of that was over time of preaching about God's holiness and preaching about and kind of trying to awaken the American church. What came out of that was also, for me, it was this gradual ongoing dying of self to things that, for lack of a better term, it did not matter to me anymore. Yeah. So when I say stuff like this, people think I'm being extra, but I'm serious when I say this, right?

Like, it got to the point where, like, crowds didn't matter to me. Numbers in church didn't matter to me. How much money the church had, these things didn't matter to me. If people call me to preach, I did not care. I stopped caring about, I stopped caring about likes on Instagram. I stopped caring about all the stuff. I stopped caring about all the things that was feeling. in my heart before that I felt like even if God did it for me when I was asking for it,

I wouldn't have been mature enough or had the character to sustain it. Yeah. Right? You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So I stopped caring about all this stuff. And what happened to me and people say when I say this, they think I'm spooky, right? Somebody call me spooky.

Okay. Yeah. That's a weird word. Yeah. It's weird. It's weird. Right. So might call me spooky.

It got to the point where I grew so focused on eternity. that a lot of stuff we would just be attached to down here just stop mattering to me. So there is like a disconnect I have from stuff down here. It's like when I said, like for me, when I think like success is what Paul said, I want to finish my race. I want to say I fought the good fight.

I want to, I think about that crowd I'm going to get. I will even go so far as to say, I don't even know if I have a will. As I'm sitting here talking to you right now, I don't even know if I have a will. I used to have one. Like, Lord, I want to do this. I want to do that.

I don't even know if I still have one right now. I feel like I've been so burned on the inside by that fire. I just want to be faithful. And I just want to finish well. If I fear anything in this life, I fear God and I fear not finishing well. I just want to finish well. And now there's things happening in our ministry now was things I was praying for for 10 years that God never did.

And now that is happening. It's like it doesn't affect me. It's like it doesn't make me feel more lifted up. In fact, it makes me feel more afraid. When our church grew from a couple hundred to a couple thousand, there's 3,000 people there on Sunday. When they started giving me, because I stopped looking at money and all that of us.

Maybe that doesn't make me a good pastor that I don't look at the money. But when they came to me and gave me a report on finances and attendance and all this stuff, and I'm looking at this. Pride crepting, I started feeling myself just a little bit. And right before my sabbatical, I went and locked myself in the whole. hotel for a week, which is my Bible, a legal pad, a pen, and a jug of water. And I fasted. And I had to ring that sin out of my eyes. You be saying that on stage. I have to ring it out.

Bring it out. So I feel like there's things happening now. Like 2019 is a mega church. And that don't make me feel lifted up. Yeah. But when I was, when it was victory, this is, I want my church to be mega and I want thousands. It was so much vanity. Yeah. And I feel like if God would would have did that then, it would have ruined me. Now there's stuff happening that I believe for that it's not affecting me to the point like, oh, I'm all listening. Like, what is Philip? What is Jackie? What is Preston? Like, you sent me that text on Sunday morning, right, from Paul. Like, what is all this stuff? Like, neither the one who does any of this is nothing, right? Only the one who makes things grow. Yeah. So I feel like that encounter with God was

my theophony for those watching. It's just a, I don't want to be preachy, right? You know, pray to yourself. It's just a theological term for when a person gets a revelation of who the Lord truly is. And that moment for me in Israel was my theophony moment in which I saw the Lord for who he really is. And it's good. That's good. It just changed everything, bro. That's good.

I want to get practical for a second because we said last episode, you know, you'd be sending a text at like 4.44 a.m. Yeah. And I'm like, this man is up praying. You understand? So when you were going through the persecution of trial and you said it drove you into prayer, was it a fight to become disciplined? Was it a choice? Like, I'm just going to, like, did you start scheduling it out until it became a natural practice?

Like, what did that look like? I think for me, that's a great question, right? And so y'all are dope. Y'all need to do a podcast. This podcast thing like, yeah. No wonder you got like millions of people following on your podcast, y'all. I think it was not disciplined because I am not naturally disciplined. I'm only disciplined because I like the results that I give, but I'm not naturally the most disciplined person.

But my life is highly disciplined and regimented because I like the results that it give. So for me, and I think this might help somebody, the prayer life and created me that I tag as ferocious was out of neediness. I felt like because of the persecution I was going through and because of the heat I was experiencing, I needed. God at another level. And so for me, because I have a big family, I got to get stuff done before they wake up. So now I'm getting up every morning at 4 a.m. Yeah. And I'm crying out to God.

And what started happening is a true story. I would get up every morning at 4 a.m. I go down to my prayer room, I start praying. And by the time I get up to open my Bible, I've been there four hours, five hours and not realize that this over a period of time became so normal that now I can't live without out that like I need that time. Yeah. So even to this day, man, I'm up 4 a.m.

I'm praying. I'm shedding tears. And I could be alone with the Lord for four or five hours and it feel like five minutes. So I don't talk about that in a boastful way because I don't want people to feel like, oh, you're so disciplined in prayer. For me, it was born out of neediness. Yeah. And it just became an attachment to God now where I actually enjoy that time more than anything else.

The only thing I enjoy more than spending that time is being with my wife. and laying in bed with my wife and being sexually intimate with my wife and spending time with my family. I like being at home. I'm like borderline introvert, extroverts. I like being at home with my family. That's the only thing I enjoy more than my prayer time.

Outside of my family and intimacy of my wife, I like being alone with the Lord, almost like an introvert likes being with himself. That brings me more joy than anything else in this life. I could just be with him for hours and sense him anywhere. And so that wasn't born out of discipline. It was born out of neediness.

Yeah. Yeah. What was crazy. That's great. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Completely.

But I was selling, when I was selling a friend, I was like, yo, Philip is really like this off the stage. You know what I'm saying? Because I've had the opportunity to spend time with you, you know what I'm saying, doing your sabbatical or whatever. We went to a couple different cities and we went to London and stuff like that. I appreciate that, bro. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

It was dope. It was a dope time. It was a dope time. But I would, but I would often see you. you know, like this just going off praying by yourself. Like even when he was in Miami, just going off, praying by yourself. I'll be like, well, Philip. And then I hit some music in the back.

I'm like, I'm like, just praying by myself. I'm like, okay. We're going to barbecue. You're saying. And you just in a corner or whatever. And the thing that I thought about you when I was, when he's out of town, was, man, like, I think that God, like, shows you, like, how much you needed him according to the call that he called you for.

Like, like, you need, like, and I feel like God, like, because what if God would have gave you that responsibility and you still was like operating off the, like, the little time that you was spending with him? That's real good. You know what I'm saying. Before that. And I really think that God is like, you know, you need much of me. Yeah. Because of what I called you for. That's real good.

You know what I'm saying? So like, I think that like when, yeah, it's just encouraging that when that vanity was stripped from your heart, when that perspective was changed, God started to give you more because God started to give you more of him because. gave you more responsibility. You know, too, another thing God did too, that was also very timely. It's not only that God transformed my prayer life

for the weight of the call, which I thought the world, let me just say the weight of the assignment. But he also put around me a team of staffers who we are not the most experience, right? We're not perfect. We are growing and all that.

But he also put a team around me that gave me more freedom. Right? So one of the things I'm seeking God for a lot right now is that I'm trying to create for 2019 an Act 6 model. And it's something I've wanted since December 2018. And by Act 6 model, I'm trying to behind the scene structure our church in such a way where I am not needed so much.

Like before I changed the name to 2019 when it was victory, I had a Messiah complex. So I'm in 10 meetings a week. I'm making every final decision. Nothing got past me, the buck stopped with me. And what that does, it bottlenecks an organization. And some leaders need to learn. You actually can accomplish more by doing less. When you get to the point where you're doing

the only thing that nobody else can't do, right? Somebody else can make decisions about children's ministry. What people cannot do, nobody's no going to do the lion's share of preaching or vision casting or establishing eldership or whatever the case may be. So what God did in the same time was not only building me a ferocious prayer life, but put people around me who could lead the organization and kind of free me up a little bit more to do the one thing they cannot do, which is the lion's share of the praying,

fasting, and proclamation of God's word. So our church is growing towards an Act 6 model. And by act six, I mean, I mean, so historically the church is growing. They go from 120. The 3,000 is added on the day of Pentecost. The church becomes a mega church within one sermon. Right? The apostles get involved in an administrative dispute between the distribution of goods or widows. And they say to themselves, hold on, it's not good for us to be involved in this. Let's just paraphrase. It's not good for us to be involved in this administration. Y'all find for yourself seven men full of wisdom and the Holy Spirit.

Watch. Full of wisdom and the Holy Spirit who can handle all of the administration of the church. And then what they do with no conference, no playbook, no previous experience, they make a decision led by the Holy Spirit that changes the church. They separate themselves, they say, and give, we will devote ourselves to prayer fasting, the administration of God's words. So they disconnect themselves from being involved in all the day to day. So they can focus on intimacy with Christ and the proclamation of the word.

And then the very next verse. And the word of God grew and the number of disciples rapidly increased. That there was this correlation between their complete devotion to prayer and proclamation. that also affected the amount of souls that is being saved. You see what I'm saying? So I feel like that too is happening right now. I feel like as the organization is giving me more freedom to not be bogged down in so many meetings

and there's decisions being made outside of me. There are people being hired. I had no knowledge about. We have contractors that did not have. So there is an Act 6 model growing behind the scenes that's allowing me to give more time. Some people will not understand this and some people would think this is lazy.

my number one contribution in 2019 is not sitting in meetings all day or week. My number one contribution in 2019 and America is the time I get to sit in God's presence. Let him ring out my sin, deal with my soul, speak to me about the country,

reveal to me what's happening in the spiritual realm, give me insight and revelation, tattoo a text to my heart, and then tell me, go and preach that. That is the number one. contribution I have right now for my church and for the country. That's good. And I can't do that effectively if I'm bogged down and all this other stuff. So God did two things. He built my prayer life, but he also built a team and is building a team around me. Yeah. That's giving me more

freedom. That's fantastic. Does that make sense? The church, the church, 2819, that has a lot of young people, you know. Ninety-eight percent millennials and Gen Zs. Wow. Yeah, yeah. Based on our, because we keep these kind of metrics, so we know this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What would you, what would you say? Because I think a lot of times when people see mega churches, I think one of the number one concerns is, man, for so many people, how are people actively being disciples in, in this particular church? How are we pouring into people, how we're making sure people not coming into the church falling into the cracks? I mean, I kind of know this, right? But like, how have you guys and how have you as a leader, you know what I'm saying, being committed to prayer, being committed

to the proclamation of God's word while at the same time, like, like thinking to me. about like life on life, active discipleship in the lives of the church? Like how do you go through that process? I think leading a church to size is challenging. And I think the same thing with the apostles is when the church grew from a couple hundred to a couple thousand, they had challenges.

So I wanna be honest to say we have challenges. We got parking challenges, discipleship challenge, we have challenges. I think for us, there's a couple things that we are doing well. There's a lot of things we've done wrong. But I think there's a couple of things we have done well. Number one, one of the greatest things that's happened for us is that God gave us a new name. 2819 is not a name I came up with.

That name was given to us by a consultant in a meeting. When the Lord told my wife and I two years ago, before January 23, we need to change the name. I was going to rename the church, venerate church, you know, to venerate God. And people's like, oh, that's whack, that's lame. Our consultant was in the room. We had like 30 names on the board. I'm going to answer your question. We had 30 names on the board and a consultant, he pushed back from the table.

He said, when I think about the culture of this church and when I listen to your preach, I think I have a name that fits. And this matters. I think I should just call the church 2019, like after the Great Commission. And my response to him was, man, that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. That was my response. Like, that's stupid. You can't name the church a number. We wrote it on the board and it shifted the whole room.

Now watch what happens next. We spent two years praying about that. We changed the name to 201819. we cast vision for why we did that. What that did for our church was recent to everybody around the Great Commission. So some churches, this is not a knock to any ministry, but when some churches are fighting to properly articulate what the vision is, what we're trying to do, I feel like that's not our fight.

I feel like it is clear that we exist to spread the gospel and multiply disciples. So just by reasoning of the name, people know what we are about. We are all about spreading the gospel and multiplying disciples. If we're not doing that, we're not doing anything else. So like, we don't have 250 ministries. Like some people would send email, how come y'all don't do that because we don't?

Why y'all don't do that? Because we don't. So the first thing is, I feel like the name helps us keep everybody attached to the main thing, which is the Great Commission, which is the multiplication of disciples. That's number one. So I feel like our name helps us do that. Number two, obviously we have squads, which people will call small groups, where they're literally based on the last report, I saw it's over a thousand people in these.

these squads over a thousand of them. They meet all across Atlanta, Monday through Friday. They're discussing the scriptures. They're eating food. Now, this is true story. They're paying each other's bills. I've seen people buy each other cars. They're watching each other's kids.

So we've created the squads as a pathway for discipleship. So the name creates discipleship. The squads create discipleship. People joining teams create discipleship. But here's where I go beyond that. is I think when people hear discipleship, they only think classes. They think organized things.

And I think those are just on ramps. When I hear discipleship, I hear life on life relationships. Like you and I got a, we got a relationship that is growing. That is discipleship to me. So one of the things I do from the pulpit and in private,

I try to encourage everybody, even if you're not in a squad, just know people in the church. Do you have any friends, any brothers? And watch this. Just do life together, being each other's homes, go to each other's birthday parties, help each other with each other's bills. Somebody's weak text and somebody say, I'm praying for you.

Just do life together, right? Do life together, eat Chinese food together, travel together, do all that stuff together. And as we do life together, disciples are being made. And I would encourage our people when we first change the name. Like, it's going to be messy. and sometimes we'll hurt each other. And this is really a glorious mess. But let's go beyond Sunday.

Let's go beyond squads. Let's just do life together. So like Lena and I do life for people in our church. People come to my home and they go in my fridge and I go to their home and we go to, people go to the movies together and like it's life. And I feel like as we're doing that and kind of keeping each other accountable, disciples are being made through the proclamation by remembrance of the name, through squads, through teams and through doing life together.

It's beautiful. And then what we're getting ready to add to that, in January, our God's Grace is the 2819 Institute, which will offer accredited classes, biblical teaching. People can get associate's degrees, biblical teaching, to help further discipleship for people that want more than Sunday. Like, you know, some of my people are like, we want you to go more deep on Sunday.

And look, I could go deep if I wanted to and get. We'll be there all day. I could go deep and get theological. And I could do that on Sunday. But I just don't do that on purpose. My wife said to me back in the days, you're too deep. You're too theological. Like, you've got to tone it down some.

So I try to make my preaching like palatable, like in right down the middle. So we're going to give you context. We're going to talk all of that. But people who want to go, we want to walk through Romans. We want to be. That's what the institute is going to be. That's Bible study. Yeah.

That's what they want. Yeah, for sure. That's our pathways to discipleship. If there's more, somebody has to teach me. Yeah. But that's what we're doing. No, I think it's beautiful. I think the church is doing a really good job.

Just wanted you to say it so people can know what 28-19 is about. You be going in about the American church. And, yeah, it's TikTok. So I've told President several times, I was like, I don't think Philip know how popping he is on TikTok. You know what I'm saying? Just you and the black would slamming up the Bible and the little top of the table. Like, it's just...

I'm sick of this. I'm sick of these phony preachers You're lying in line to you I don't know his name Copic it is that he did one on you too He did what he was perfect Oh my goodness He had you down pack

You be going in on the American church Tell us what's wrong with it Preach you had to ask me this Jackie Preach you have space Right okay I got space Right so a couple things I feel like the church in America is following first after the pattern of what we saw happen in Europe. Christianity landed on our shores.

It passed through. It came from the Middle East. Christianity was an eastern religion passed through the east across the continent of Africa into Europe. It landed on our shores, right? We should be careful not calling it a white man's religion too, which is very crazy. But what happened in Europe, what happened in Europe is that the, Europe was infected by something called the Enlightenment in which people started deviating from Orthodox Christianity.

And what happened in Europe, a vacuum was created in which Christianity began to lose influence. And now Islam is the fastest growing faith in Europe. And there is moss being built everywhere. Because the people almost, they almost acted like some of the five rebukes we see Jesus gave those churches in John's letter of revelation. he writes revelation. So when I see happening in America, what angers me is that I feel like

there is a blindness to the fact that we are following after the pattern of Europe. There is a, there is a drift from Orthodox Christianity. There is almost an apostasy happening right under our noses that's creating a vacuum for other things to fill that vacuum. Things like New Age, all these ascents to spirituality disconnected from God, which all of it is demonic, right? And so there is a drift from Orthodox Christianity. That's first and foremost. Secondly, there is a growing dishonor for the Lord Jesus Christ. Okay.

There is increase in idolatry, rampant idolatry. There's increase in sexual immorality. Watch this. There's an increase in lack of sensitivity to sin. There is open sin in the American church and we think it's cool. You got pastors and bishops and leaders all of us, people who are an open rebellion towards God, Open sin and people think that this is okay. You have people clapping in rooms around false doctrine, which is the next thing wrong with the American Church. There is a growing biblical illiteracy

in the American Church because people don't want to be taught. They just want to be entertained. And so where you have a J.H.P. or where you have a person, where there is teaching, it's like we don't want that. We just want to feel good in the message. So I think there was a there was a growing shallowness around proclamation. and teaching in the American church is making people biblically illiterate. And when people are illiterate to God's word, man, you will listen to false doctrine

and not know you're being fed a lie. So what consequently was happening, what I feel is happening in the American church, I feel like there is a drift from orthodoxy, a drift from Christ. There is a Christianity growing in America that's disconnected from the scriptures and the Christ of the scriptures.

And I think what the American is, American church needs right now, mark my words, if there is not some type of awakening, like we've had two of them. We had the first and second great awakening. And then my therapist, she was saved during the Jesus movement. Y'all probably seen that movie. In the 70s. In the 70s, right? But all the hippies was being saved. My therapist was saved during that time. So if we don't have something like that to awaken us now, I think about like, think about, think about Eden and Autumn and Sage. And think about August. Think about Malice. Think about Malachi, Israel, and Abigail and just, I think about the generation coming behind us, bro.

And I think like this because I was a school teacher, animal pastor, right? So if there is not an awakening in American church in this hour, in this generation, if there is not some form of real revival that's born out of repentance and gospel preaching and holiness, if something does not shift in our nature and we keep giving space for the rise of false prophets to run rampant, I look beyond me. fear for the church we're going to hand off to your children and to mine. That's good. I think the American church is drifting from Orthodox Christianity.

And if we don't have a revival, we're not going to recognize faith in this country 20 years from now, 30 years from now. And that's why, yo, there got to be a remnant and a church contending for the faith. There got to be people standing 10 toes down. They got to be people who care about. the honor and the veneration and the holiness of God who are willing to be persecuted to say we need to wake up. I almost curse. Like, I was going to say we need to wake the hell up.

And I know people are going to probably get mad for me saying that. Like, that bothers me, man. Like in New York, like, like, the D word and the H word is just part of vernacular. I forgot being the self. So people get offended when I say that, y'all got to pray for me. I got to stop saying that way. But I feel like if we don't, if we don't wake the heck up. Yeah.

And you know what else, too? I almost feel like I feel the grief of Jeremiah. And I feel the grief of some of the prophets who poured out their heart to awaken a nation that was so hell bent on idolatry that some of them died and never saw the revival they wanted to see. And these people would still go away into captive and still be punished by God. And it's like, yeah, I don't even see judgment coming like a hammer about the fall on this nation. How long do you think we're going to get away with mine? mocking God the way we mock God making a joke of the church. How long you think we're going to get away from that before God brings the gavel down to say,

okay, let me remind you all that I'm holy. I mean, he's being gracious right now. Yeah, you know what I'm saying? So I think that is my issue with the American church. And I feel like too much of her is being led by false prophets, false preachers, false doctrines, immorality, idolatry. What is a false prophet? Oh, Jackie about to get me in trouble on the podcast.

I think a false prophet is what the scripture teaches us to be. Our false prophet is one who God is not sent, who's proclaiming a message that has not come from God or his son, whose words fall to the floor, and who is more concerned about enriching themselves or for false teaching at the expense of the people they are fleecing. And America is full of false prophets. men and females, they preach every Sunday. They do conferences and write books. And because we are biblically illiterate, we cannot discern lies when it's coming across pupils. But the more truth we know,

the easiest to discern a lie, but because y'all don't want to be taught is why you can't discern a lie. So we watch sheep being fleece and raped by false prophets, who some of them are wealthy, famous, popular, some in this city, who if I call a name, I know set off a firestorm on the podcast. I almost feel like I don't care.

There's something in this city right now, man, popular. And because of we attach fame, money, and platform to affirmation from heaven. And we think because somebody got a big following on Instagram because they got a big church or because they're famous, we think that God has affirmed them. Like the devil wasn't trying to bless Jesus in the wilderness. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Like, like, come on, right?

So we have these false prophets. And because of their cadence and their platforms and how they move, man, they are saying things that are falling to the floor. They have not come from God. They are for themselves. They are enriching themselves off the back of God's people. They do not open the Bible. They mishandle the scriptures. They have isegesis and not exegesis.

They speak things out of context. And they use the word of God for personal self-angrendizement. And we say, amen. and we like and we share. And I'm telling you right now, like the message of Jude, false teaching, idolatry, and sexual immorality is killing the church in America. Yeah.

And I feel like what we need right now more than ever before is the message of Jude. What Jude wrote in the back of the scriptures, that one little chapter. That's crazy. It's what I feel like America needs to pay attention to right now. My brothers and sisters, man, I felt compelled to write you about our common salvation. But man, when I looked across the scale of the first century,

I felt like I had to appeal to you about something far more important that we need to contend for the faith. Yeah. Right. And then he goes on to say, we got to snatch some people from the fires of hell. Other people, we got to win gently. And then he will warn us about three things that was choking the life out of the church. It's happening right now. Yeah. I need to say it again. False teaching. Identitory. Sexual. Sexual. morality is choking the life and the witness out of the Christian church. Yeah. And I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, and I, I,

I always sort of like, caution, you know, not, not saying that I was discouraged, like, because I don't want to disrespect any solid churches that might be in Atlanta. I just didn't see a lot of. You know what I'm saying? It's not. And so I just was just very, very discouraged just about the climate of churches here in Atlanta. And just it felt like a spiritual drought. And I felt like a lot of people had like religious behavior.

But not a lot of churches was actually teaching people how to like seek the Lord. And when you think we think about idolatry in relation to false teaching, like Deuteronomy tells us two ways in which we can. and you know someone is a false teacher. One is if they claim to speak on behalf of God and their prophecies. The words fall to the floor, like I said. Yeah, falls to the floor. But also if they lead you after other gods.

After other gods. And what I just continually saw, you know, in this city, which I think, you know, 2819 is an answer prayer, right? is like just so many people flock to churches that make them love their idols, which are other gods. Yeah. And pastors are gods to them too. Absolutely. We could have a whole talk about the celebrity culture in Atlanta and how we make pastors gods too.

Absolutely. Let's just make themselves idols. Yes. Bro, they make them, I didn't mean to cut you off, right? So forgive me for that. But some of these pastors, they're preaching, make themselves idols. from the way they dress to their guardiness to all the stuff that they put on to they almost preach in such a way that they exalt themselves. You know, even pastors make themselves gods and they lead people.

It's almost like you're preaching eclipses people from seeing Christ because in the preaching they hold you in such high regard. They can't even see Christ. We could drop names, bro, both in the land and around the country. That is part, especially in the black context, right? preachers who exalt themselves and they're titled so much, you got Christians more in love with the preacher than even Christ himself. You know what I'm saying? I'm like, y'all going to get people killed for that kind of idolatry.

You know what I'm saying? You're going to get people killed for that kind of idolatry. So I'll be telling you, don't worship me, man. And don't show up just for me. Yeah. Like that's why I'm glad the church grew while I was gone on sabbatical. Like that to me was so profound. Yeah, yeah.

I come back to the church and it grew while I was gone. Yeah. To just show people that I am a servant in this. But I am not the one driving all of this. You understand? I'm saying like, that's crazy to me. And I'm so glad that the Lord did that so people will not think that what is happening solely because of me.

I am a servant in what's happening right now. Yeah, man. And so when I, like, when I, when I ran into you, idolatry, bro. When I ran into you and we had that first conversation, it was just a breath of fresh air. Yeah. That first conversation we had at the coffee shop. At the coffee shop.

We were almost trying to get at us. Oh, yeah. Oh, my goodness. You saved my life that day, bro. Yeah, he did. Yeah, yeah. We should tell that story. We should tell that story.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah, that conversation we had, it was just like, man, I honestly think, like I was discouraged. But it's like, no, God has actually put people here in Atlanta, you know, who will keep the integrity of the gospel alive. Who will care about discipleship. Who will care about the word going forth. Who's not trying to attract people. It was very, very encouraged. You know, it's crazy.

I didn't even want to be here, bro. I did not want to be in Atlanta. This is the last place. I wanted to start a church. When Lena and I was graduating Bible College, all these people were leaving Bible College and they all had their jobs. I'm going here.

I'm a youth pastor there. I'm going here. I had no idea where it was going. So we was fasting and praying for a month. God, where are we supposed to go after Bible college? We're in Columbus, Ohio. In fact, that's where we met Megan.

You know, we met Megan in Columbus, Ohio. We was all at Bible College at the same time. And I remember when God, I was like, oh, Alina, if we got to, if the Lord was calling us to start a church, calling me to pastor church, I ran from that for four years. I finally surrendered when I was in Bible college. And I remember me not knowing anything, I said, okay, if I got a pastor church, which I don't want to do, let me make a list of all the cities I would want to go. And watch my reasoning, right? I thought to myself, I don't want to go anywhere where the gospel is assumed. I want to go places where people are not faking a funk.

They know we are far from God. God. Yeah. So my list was like New York, Philly, D.C. I'm thinking all these northern, I got all these northern cities, right? So I get down to nine cities like west. And I just say, you know what? Let me just throw Atlanta at the bottom of the list. And I'm pleading what God send me to the northeast. I want to be in a place. I don't want to go to Nino. I don't want to go to the South. Because in the South, the Gospels assume, everybody thinks everyone is a Christian. Yes. I want to be in a place where people are not faking in front. We don't like God and we don't care. That's where I want to go. And then over a period of time, God knocks

everything off the list and Atlanta all signs is pointed to it and Lena and I came in with nothing grudgingly Atlanta is a very unique place though did not want to be here bro throne of Satan yeah Atlanta is a very unique place because this is the South but it also

has become a place of migrants yeah just so many different people yeah like you meet like 10 people like six of those people from a different city yeah and so you have such a like an emergence of just so many people moving here, but just so many different religions. You have so many, you have witchcraft now.

You have, you know, you have these new age religions. You have black religion because a lot of people from Philly and New York and Chicago have came out here. So you have such, you know, like just a combination of a lot of different things here. New age and Hebrew and Israelism. So it's a very and you see a lot of syncretism because, you know, it's a lot of different. Mixing of things. Ideologies and worldviews and stuff like that. And so this is the reason why I, I feel like Atlanta particularly needs solid theological Christians who are dedicated in preaching the gospel and making disciples because the harvest is, I mean, like, it's a lot of, it's a lot of harvest here. You know what I'm saying? If we just look at it.

And it's the reason why I don't want to go around about evangelism, but I think we just need more evangelists to go out there to give the gospel because there's so many people out here now, five years ago, even before the pandemic, it was different. a lot of people out here like, I'm cool on the Lord. Could I say something to that? Yeah, yeah. I think one of the things that I've been thinking through is I'm always about why people believe what they believe, why they do what they do. And one thing I'm seeing is that I think a part of helping people to not listen to false doctrine and false teaching, to be able to discern, you know, the kinds of churches

they go through is that I think people, people have to learn how to suffer well. Because I really think that's a big part of all of this. When you even look at scripture, like they chose other gods because they were unwilling to wait. They were unwilling to trust. They were unwilling to depend, right? Like, I don't know where to go. Let me go to the psychic.

I don't know what to do. Let me trust in the golden calf because Moses is up there too long. Like the neediness drives them to idols versus dependence. And I feel like if we don't learn how to suffer with God, we're going to leave him. Because life is hard. Universally, it doesn't matter. Like, how many people have become atheists because life got too hard and you weren't going to trust them? Right.

How many people go into syncretism because you feel like, I need this and him because he's not going to come through quick enough, right? Like how many people sleep with other people, not just because they're lustful, because they want comfort. And so it's like it's the suffering. It's the difficulty. It's the trials that we have to learn how to trust God in or we're always going to leave him for other things. And to that point, which I think is extremely profound. When I came back from Israel, one of the things like there are certain language I started

coining around the church, certain language I started using around the church. And one of the things I started using when I came back from Israel was like, we need to learn to live well and suffer well. So I've been using that language around our church since December 2018. We need to live well and suffer well because one of the things that was so profound about what you said, and I've said this before and I've gotten trouble for saying this, but I don't care, is I think a lot of our drive towards the idolatry, whether it's like prophets and apostles, especially prophets, anybody with that name, I mean, we, I mean, especially black people. I mean, we get excited. But part of that too is part of that idolatry is our laziness to not have an intimacy with Jesus for ourselves.

So it was like you don't want to put in the time to walk with the Lord to get a word for yourself. You don't want to read the scriptures for yourself. So you bypass that to run to the prophet hoping that you get a word. And so you start depending on the word of the prophets. Yeah. Because you feel like you don't want to spend the time necessary. Some of that is our ineptness to not go to the word and God for himself and prayer for himself that we feel so dependent upon the quote unquote prophets and all these people, even myself,

pastors and whoever. And some of that, that idolatry comes from our laziness to not have a relationship with God for ourselves. Does that make sense? We build these calves of sorts because that's the easier way to have worship instead of going God and spending time with us. Yeah. And I also think that a lack of, and I tell people all the time, you know, like,

Like solid teaching is a form of discipleship because I do think, I do think that a lot of times when you go into these environments, and I'm not trying to attack anybody. But when you go to these environments, well, the title was prophet, the theological teaching, it's not dense. It's not, it's not weighty. It's just very, like, shallow. And I think it has the, the appearance of depth. But it's actually empty. It's very empty. And so when people are cultivated in these environments, they actually are not disciples in biblically sound teaching. And so they don't have the confidence to even know if they can hear from the Lord

because they're not hearing from the Lord. No, are they being taught how to hear from the Lord by reading his scriptures themselves. Right. And they define him on the pages of the Bible. They came. And so I do think that biblical literacy in learning how to read the scriptures yourselves gives you a confidence and gives you language to pray. That's good.

And so like when I started to become biblically literate, right, and I started to read the scriptures for myself. I started to understand God's character for myself. Now I had a framework of how to go to him. That's good, bro. But if you don't have that, you don't know how to really come to the Lord for your faith to be built up.

But here's the crazy part is our hearts play a big part in us seeing him. Because, for example, I know two people made the decision for Christ at the same time and both of them were ignorant to a certain degree because you're a new believer, you don't know what to do. They both go into the same church,

not sound teaching, all the type of stuff. But one person found sound teaching, found a solid group of friends, found doctrine, found truth, found Christ. Another person didn't. It's like a form of godliness,

like all the stuff. And I was thinking, I was like, what's the difference? And I was like, oh, one was authentically seeking him, so they found him. That's good. Wow.

That's good. The other was not authentically seeking him. so they're not finding him. And so that also like, I'm basically trying to alleviate the idea that some of us don't actually want him. Yeah, they want form of him. So we can have the resources. We can have the Bible commentaries. We can have the solid teaching.

We can have the YouTube pages. We can have the pot. But if in your heart, you don't want him, you will not find him. But if you want him. Why do you think that is? Why do you think there's so many quote unquote believers who don't really want Jesus? They don't want God. Why do you think that is?

Sin? Sam, I think we're bound, we're enslaved, we're blind, we don't see, and it's not as if God hasn't done enough to show us, one, in creation, like for you to go outside to see the sun and the stars and the moon and want to put more energy in the stars calling you something. Like, oh, my areas, I'm Capricorn. Like, to, not, like, that's supposed to move you to consider that there's a divine being who has eternal power and wisdom. but then you have the revelation of Christ, right?

Like, oh, like, you sent your son to die for me so I can know you. All that's like, I think we have to decide by the power of the Holy Spirit to choose to believe that he's good. I think that's a thing is, is he better than everything he's made? That's Romans 1. Is he better? If we believe he's better, we will, I think, want him. And back, and sorry, and then even staying in Romans 1, and then when we worshiped the created things above the creator himself, I think sometimes people got to be careful

because then what God would do, he'll just give you all of what you want. Yeah, I think that's why we have so many false teachers. I think, this ain't proof. I think God is giving America what it wants. It's a punishment. It's a judgment on the country. We want signs, miracles, and wonders

more than we want Christ. And so I really do think he's handing us over to what we want. Absolutely. But to answer, to ask you a question, just to add to what Jackie said, And I'm an answer just by telling them myself,

you know, it was a time in my life for the Lord had to show me I was a hypocrite, right? I was a huge hypocrite, right? And I, like, I think the reason why people can be honest with the Lord and say,

I don't want you because you haven't been honest with yourself and say, I don't want the Lord. That's good. Just I don't want him. And so, and so, and so instead of just saying, I don't want you,

you will convince yourself that you have him to try to, to try to escape from this guilt. Why? Right, right? Because in actuality, that's what we're all trying to do. That's good.

We're trying to escape from guilt. That's good. And so this is the reason why people in Atlanta come up with this whole theology, they could be homosexual and Christian. Because you're trying to escape guilt without actually repenting. But actually, the only way you can really escape guilt is to accept the one who died. But here's the gag. Here's the gag.

if the perception of God is that he is just judge and not also Savior, then that affects your ability to be honest. You get what I'm saying? Yeah. Like he is all of that. So he will judge, but he's actually positioned himself as Savior, as Messiah, as deliverer, all through the scripture, and has a church that reveals the fact that he does redeem people. And so in you coming, he's saying come so I can cleanse you.

Yeah. Come so I can wash you. Come so I can justify you. I actually don't want to judge you. That's why I judge my son. But if that's what you want. But see, yeah, yeah, that's so powerful. I'm getting excited.

That's so powerful. Because literally, literally, literally, that was, that was my whole testimony. I heard the gospel, heard the unadulterated gospel, the man in this house church, in my hood, right? I lived in row houses. We lived in like, like, little row house projects, right? And this man started his church and he got up in. said, if you believe that God being a God of love means he won't destroy everything he hates. You don't know what I first heard of you. You don't know what love is. Right? Yeah. And he was like,

God is a God of love, but he's equally offering you himself if you just, we just turn from your sin and repenting him. And I remember like, I remember that day so, so vividly because I remember like, like it clicked in my head. Oh, God has beef with me. And I didn't know how to reconcile all that. And so what I did was, instead of giving up everything that I loved, I started to form this, like this form of godliness to cope with the guilt. Yeah. And it wasn't until my friend Chris got shot and he was dying. And all my friends who I'd be like talking about the gospel with while while we smoking weed. You know what I'm saying? They said, Preston pray for him. And that was the first time I felt like I couldn't play with God no more. Wow, that's powerful, bro. That was the first time I felt like,

God ain't really like God used that situation to show me like the weight of my hypocrisy and to show me like no no no no no like I don't be talking to you yeah and you don't be talking to me you have a form of godliness because you're trying to escape this guilt but if you would just turn and come to me I would take away your guilt forever you know what I'm saying and and and to your point to Jackie's point I think the other thing too I want to add to that narrative when it comes to like the idolatry we're seeing and you know God kind of giving these people the false pride. Like, you want, just what you want.

I'm going to give you all of this, too, is that I think a lot of people were realized in time, a lot of these idols were running after, a lot of these things we want more than God, they're going to betray you after some point in time. People think Lynn and I are young, but, you know, we've lived a little bit of life. I got some gray hair in my beard and a little bit of gray on top of my head. And I have learned, and I'm learning. And this is, I'm put myself out there. Everything that I have, and I've gained that I thought would just keep me.

fully satisfied these things have betrayed me over time. You know, every home that we've ever lived and it was dope for the moment, but after a while, it's just, it becomes a home. It betrays. Every new car I've ever drove, every, I've never drove a car the year of, but when I say new, new to me, every car I've gone, they betrayed, every new iPhone, it'd be, like, these idols come and they, they may distract you from the Lord for a little bit, but after a while, they end up betraying you. Yeah.

And over time, a conscious person will start to realize, I am trying to, I am trying to, to satisfy this deep longing, this eternal longing in my soul by stacking my life with all these things I think is going to keep me comfortable only to realize over time they end up betraying. All the boyfriends betrayed the girl for me, all the sex in the world, the drugs, all of the partying, every house, all the cars.

You get to every bed, you could climb the mountaintop and look over it. And you will still feel like it has betrayed you if Christ is not the center of what you longing for. And then when we talk about Atlanta, I remember when Lena and I first got to Atlanta, we went to Lennox Mall on a Saturday. Jesus. After five? Yes, big mistake.

We're walking in. If you're from Atlanta, you already know what it is, right? I'm not trying to throw shit. I'm just keeping it real. We all know what it is. After five. And I was walking through that. And we, you know, we knew to Atlanta, never saw anything like that.

So we sat down on a chair. We just wept. And I remember the Lord said to me, I would never forget. I heard the Spirit of God say to me, he said, this city I've sent you to, it's mass. in religion and it is steeped in perversion. And I never forgot that. And that word has, it has proven itself to be true. This city we live in has a veneer of religion, a veneer of Christianity, is massed in religion.

It looks like the Bible belt. But what's on the backside of that, man, is rampant perversion. That's killing the church. It's like cancer on the inside. It's choking the life on us, man. And it's like, I like what Jackie said earlier. It's like they don't even realize that God and his love is trying to give you all of him. It's like you don't even know that I would fully satisfy you.

But you keep building all these other high places thinking they're going to satisfy. And they're going to own you. They're going to betray you. And they're going to cost you your soul. Wow. It's heartbreaking. I want you to answer this question and then we could start to round this out. What do you say to people who listen to this conversation, listen to you?

your teaching, even listen to the approach that I think, or the takes that me and present have. And they say, y'all are doing too much. It really ain't that deep. Like, this is turn or burn energy. This is brimstone the damnation. Like, where's the grace? Where's the? It don't take all that.

Yeah. I think they should go read when Jesus says, if your eye offends you, pluck it out. If your hand offends, you cut it off. If something's offend you, get rid of it. I think what we call too much should be the norm. And I think the fact that people think people like us is too much is why the church is shallow and is dying. I think what we call too much should be the norm. I mean, Jesus said to the church in Laudad DeC, I rather you be hot or cold, but not lukewarm.

So I would say to people who think we're too much, I think what we call too much should be the norm for Christianity. I think because you have been so desensitized by the American placebo of Christianity, you think people like a Philip Anthony Mitchell is too much. or a Preston Parry's too much, or a J.HP is too much. No, I don't think we're too much. I think we are where God wants us to be. I just think we need more people to realize that. No, we need to pluck out the eye and cut off the hand.

I think if that's doing too much, then y'all have a bottom shelf version of Christianity. We should either be hot or cold. That means we should be on fire or refreshing. We shouldn't be indifferent, lukewarm, or stuck in the middle. I don't think it's too much. I think y'all are too lame. That's what I think.

That's good. Well, on that note, thank you. Pastor Philip. Before we go, can we just, you know, one, I just want to pray for you. Yeah. You know, I don't want to pray for you with the listeners, but also before we pray, you want to just tell people how they can get plugged in with the church, what the church is. So, yeah, thank y'all for having me.

I really appreciate this. This has been awesome. 2819church.org online, 2819 church on 8.1.819 church on every social media platform, Philip Anthony Mitchell.com. And pray for us. We're just believing that when the dust settles, there will be a people,

a remnant, a church that is still standing in Atlanta, crying out for the gospel, pushing out the gospel, making disciples, and we want to be amongst that number. Yeah, let's pray. Do you have me, Father Lord, I thank you God for Pastor Philip.

I thank you God for the call that's on its life, particularly to make disciples in this city. It is a great call because this city in a lot of ways is the epicenter of so much entertainment, but at the same time perversion, so many things that goes against the nature of God. And so God, I know that the Bible says that we don't fight against flesh and blood, we fight against spiritual wickedness in high places. And so God, I just pray for my brother that you will cover him, that you will keep him, that you would encourage him on this walking.

on this journey to make disciples and to be faithful in storing a growing church here in the city. I pray God that 2819 will not be the only church like itself here in the city. But I pray God that you will use Philip and you will use 2819 to plant other solid churches who are dedicated in giving the gospel to your people. God, I pray God that you will give him endurance. God, I pray God that you will give him spiritual stamina. I pray God that you will continue to surround people in this life that would encourage him, that will uplift him, that would, yeah, just go alongside him, Lord, and walk this walk with him, God. And I just pray, God, most of all, that your hand will stay on him, Lord.

We know, God, that if you go before him, nothing can be against him. So, God, I just pray for him. I pray for his family. I pray father for his church family. And I just pray, God, that you would just continue to use him for your glory, for your honor. honor for your praise. We love you. We thank you. We believe you for all we have asked in Jesus. Mighty name we pray. Amen. Peace. Bye y'all. With the Perrys is produced by the Perrys with support from Amanda Reed and Channing McBride.

Video recording and audio production by Matthew Baxter and Xavier Fairley. Edited by the team at Tread lively. Artwork by Hop and music by Swoop. Thank you for listening. Now go with God.