SPEAKER_00 0:04

Are we rolling? We're rolling. Rolling, rolling, rolling. Keep the cameras going. Rahide. I don't know. That's gonna peek on the audio line. Headphone warning headphones users. Right. Oh, good morning. Good morning. How are you? I'm good. I'm like I'm tired, but I don't know why. Yeah, what are we talking about? Plenty of sleep. Well, we have a lot of things we could talk about. Can we do the fun one first? I don't think I have time to film two anyway. So let's do the You said two. You said film two. We're not doing two today. There's no way I gotta be somewhere at 1145. We should start over and not have that be the intro. It's a pretty boring intro. We could just keep it and people would realize how uh unplanned we are sometimes. Let's save it for the end as a blooper. Deal. All right. Morning, Madison. Good morning. It's morning when we're filming this. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And I just was telling you, I'm tired, but I don't know why. I got plenty of sleep last night. So I don't know if it means I'm like really unhealthy with a medical condition or I don't know. I don't know. Do you think I should go to the doctor and then I'll be able to do that? Everything, I think you you diagnose everything as a medical medical condition. But I never actually go to the doctor and see. I think I'm not sure. You're like, I've been laughing more often. And do you think it's a medical condition? It might be. It might be joyful. Yeah. I might just be old. I think that's yeah. That's probably. And not used to what the feeling of old is. Old is being tired all the time. There you go. I have a hat. Congratulations. So I'm part of the hat brigade now. Yep. That's cool. I like that. The hat community welcomes you. Thank you. I've noticed hats more now. No. It's like now that you've got to be a little bit more than that constantly for the past two weeks. It's not been constant. It's been consistent. I would say every time I've seen you for the past two weeks, you've had a discussion about hats. Definitely. Well, now I'm going to do some soul searching and pray about that. So that's one of the beauties of our relationship, is it's uh It's not a medical condition. I'm just don't worry. Are hats a medical condition? All right. We're not talking about hats. No. That would be a silly topic. I think we're talking about homosexuality. Which is a less silly topic. Yeah. For sure. For sure. Although we could have a a conversation later on about the whole can you wear a hat in church and what does this bring up? Because we did have some interesting uh That should just be a good pod that should be the podcast. This one? I think so. All right, let's go back and do it. No, no, no. I think just now you know in a future episode we will talk about homosexuality. We'll address it. But we're going to talk about hats. All right. We're go we're pulling a I think, yeah. I think this is where we go. All right. Improvisational curveball hats. Okay. So uh theologically, is it okay to wear hats to church? Maybe. All right. Why do you say so okay? Let's let's let's pull the backdrop. So this there's like this inside joke going on right now. And I uh I on st on stage What inside joke? What do you mean what do you mean? You on stage talked about it. It's not it's like the opposite of it is his hands. It's a big inside joke. So I mean within the his hands community. Um like Fred on Sunday spoke uh you know on my behalf. And uh on my behalf, that sounded weird. I think he spoke instead of me. Instead of me. I asked Fred to speak. What in the world? Uh I alright, now I gotta rein it in. I asked Fred to talk instead of me. And he came out on stage with a hat on. Nice and everyone laughed because if they were there the previous Sunday, they they knew. And then he took his hat and said, I just have to cover up all this hair. Yeah. And I was like, ah. So the the thing I talked about on stage a few weeks ago, because I'm a little bit of an open book, sometimes to a uh a negative degree. But I just talked about the fact that I had been really wrestling with like I'm losing my hair. And it's it's going bit by bit, but consistently. Sure. You know, constantly. My condolences. Hey, it's all good. And the funny thing is, a buddy of mine met with me like six, seven months ago, and it's someone we both know, but I won't tell who it is, because you know, privacy. And they were like, hey, I'm I'm losing my hair, and it's kind of thrown me off. And I told this guy, like, it's not a big deal. Like, come on, man. Just wear wear a hat. Don't even wear a hat. Like lots of guys lose their hair. It's actually really normal. Um, even if you look at famous actors, if you look at their hairline, right, and most of them their hairline is not what it was when they were in their 20s, but you don't even notice that because you don't care. Yeah. And that's what I've done. Matthew McGonhe does have a different hairline. He's got more hair than he used to do. That definitely happens. But yeah, you can spend enough money, you can make it up. But point is, guys' hairline recedes, it goes. And I told this guy, it's not a big deal, man. You're you're good. And then literally a few weeks later, I got my hair cut, and the hair person at Supercuts or wherever I was was like, Oh, starting to thin out back here. And it like created a legitimate emergency in my brain. I just got done telling this guy like it's not a big deal. Right. Come on, man, you're you're good. And I was like, oh no. Um and so, you know, I've just sort of been like wrestling with you've been playing with the idea of wearing a hat. Well, I've been no, I haven't that that's a newer development. But basically, what happened was over the course of six months, we'll get to the topic at hand. Because this isn't really about hats. It's about legalism, it's about uh what is church dress code, church probably being and even just like what is this stuff, what matters in our faith? Yeah. Like what matters in our in our life expression of God kind of thing. And so anyway, the over the course of six months, I just sort of I grew my hair longer and sort of kind of like, I don't know, holding on to whatever I got left. I don't know what the thing was. I guess I was having a midlife crisis. And then I went swimming and Liam laughed at me, my oldest son. I got out of the pool and he was like, Oh, look at that. Teenagers, they're good at exposing any insecurities you have. And uh he just was like, oh man, it's getting pretty thin up there, dad. And so I just decided, you know what? I'm gonna be a hat guy. So I bought seven hats. Six of the seven have arrived at my house. I got one that's still on the way. Do you were they different styles or were they all the same style? They just like look, they like are different colors. A couple of them are flat brim. Like I already had a hat that I had bought for my son at a Hawks game that he never wears. And so I went ahead and put it on, and it's a flat brim, and it looked it was mine. It's like, no, it looks good on you. Um so I bought a couple of those and then a couple like like this that are what would you call this? I would call that a trucker hat. A trucker hat. Okay. So it's not flat brim, it's like would you call that a trucker hat? Is this a trucker hat? I don't know.

unknown 6:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:22

Okay, trucker hat. So I just bought a couple, and it's fine. Um, and I think seven's my and then someone brought me like four and put them on my desk. Yeah. And so I actually have 11 hats now. Nice. I had none. I had one, the the Hawks hat that I had never worn. So anyway, so the but this led into all this stuff. And here's where it got to an interesting point is I I almost called Alex, who's right there. What up, Alex? He just went like this. He's got a hat on too. In fact, Zach's the only one that doesn't have a hat on.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

We call him hat Lazac.

SPEAKER_00 6:53

What a dork. Um so I almost called Alex and said, Hey man, can you add some uplighting on stage? Because I was like, well, if I wear a hat on stage, it's gonna be a big shadow because of the way our lights are. And that's yeah, so let's get some uplighting. And then I paused. I'm like, oh man. I've I've clearly mentally gone down the I'm what is this even okay? Whatever. And so I looked up online because I go down these rabbit holes and I looked up online like pastors wearing hats. Because there is this sort of category of hip pastors where they dress super cool. Right. And there's a whole like, it's hats, it's thick frame glasses, it's cool jeans, it's really expensive sneakers. Like the big goblets wear glasses. Yeah. I'm not a fashion guy. I never have been. I've gone through phases where different seasons of life, I care about it more than other times. But like you're a preacher with sneakers, we know. Well, I have I'm a basketball fan. Yeah, yeah. So I have a lot of basketball shoes, but usually the preacher with sneakers thing, you're talking like rare Jordans that are, you know. No, I I have a lot of basketball shoes because the thing I love, like if you're making a list of things I love, it's like Jesus, family, church, all that stuff. Basketball's pretty high up there. So that's different. And I play basketball. Does basket basketball exceed the love of any of your children individually? Depends on the week. Right. Uh you can like float above them. No. Um but point is, yeah, so but I'm not the sneaker guy that's got like I know, I know. I'm just saying, I'm messing with you. I'm sorry. And I think that's probably where this comes in. I don't want to be one of those guys. I know. I'm sorry. I probably shouldn't mess with you as much as I do with that. No, you do. It's fine. It's fine, but I don't want to be one of those guys because I don't, you know, our culture at his hands, it's not about who's on stage. But I think this is like the first time. It was the first time I'd ever even thought about, oh, I'm making a I'm making a decision about like wearing a certain thing. And should I have like a hundreds of dollars decision for lighting based on what you wear. Kind of even implications. But even Alex has said in the past at least once before it wouldn't be a bad idea if we had up lighting because it looks better on camera. And so I was like, well, that's something we've talked about anyway. And back then I was like, ah, who cares? Right. And now so uh but this led to a deeper thing. So let me explain. I know this is a really long-winded, I guess this is my midlife crisis on film. I just wanted to give you an opportunity to process this. It's like a counseling session. Thank you. Um, so what happened was all of a sudden, I started looking up some stuff. Because I don't want to be one of those guys who's like, hey, what's up? I'm cool, Pastor So-and-so. I'm not that. That's not my personality, that's not who I am. Um B, I stumbled on all these conversations about like First Corinthians, where it talks about how it is shameful for a man to have his head covered, and it's shameful for a woman to have to not have her head covered. And that was the Corinthian church, and like I found a video of this one pastor, and I'm sure he's a great guy. How many views did this video have? Uh quite a few, but not like an insane amount. But it's this guy, and he he uh I don't know, man. It just has a certain vibe. He's in this like arm leather armchair in this office that's smoking a cigar. It kind of looks like it could be a cigar, he's not, but it has this very like heavy wood, you know, like you can almost smell the way the room smells, smells of leather-bound books. You know, it's like anchor man joke. But uh had a very serious vibe, and he was like, if if a pastor wears a hat, he has this very tone, he's in sin. He is in sin. Obviously in sin. He's in sin. And uh I was like, well, I don't want to be in sin as a I all these things came to my mind. And so then the next Sunday I start looking around. I'm like, there's a lot of hats in this room. Like I'm at the sound booth and I'm looking around. I'm like, that guy's wearing, he's wearing there's hundreds of hats. And I've never even noticed these before. I don't care. Right. And then I'm like, wait, Matt, our worship pastor, wears a beanie. That's actually like a thing. Yeah. And we even ordered worship uh beanies when our worship album came out with our little worship logo on it. In like, it made sense with Matt. And Herb, who's one of our mainstays on the worship team, everybody loves Herb. He's like the most joyful, passionate worshiper of God, I think I may have ever known. I don't think I've I've seen Herb without a hat on twice in his life. And it was like, Herb, put a hat on. Like, what are you doing? I've never seen you without one. Herb wears a hat on Sunday every time every time he worships. Yeah. No one's ever said a thing. Right. And yet I was wrestling deeply with this hat issue. Um, so I kind of brought it up on stage as a joke. And I'm like, aha, you know, Matt wears one, Herb wears one, and no one cares, and everyone kind of cheered. And I realized in that moment, maybe I'm a maybe we're a hat church. Maybe I could do this. Um I think what you were recognizing is as a leader, you do signal to people to some degree like what's okay. Like someone who's on the stage and is taking the platform or whatever you want to call it seriously. You're saying there's a responsibility there. And I want to just at least consider you're making a change and you're aware of the change. And you want to consider like, is it a is it a thing that's appropriate? And am I signaling to some to everybody something that's not okay is okay? I think that's worth wrestling with. Is an insecurity in me. Right. Has it risen to the level that I'm willing to just cover that insecurity and like I'm saying hats are okay because I'm insecure isn't a isn't a good filter to have. Yeah. So then I had but it it's such a silly thing because it's dumb. Who cares? There are people who care. Uh that guy is what in the hundreds of years. We haven't encountered many people here that have that like strong conviction, I guess. No, but so it hit me because I was like, wait a minute. And this leads to a deeper conversation about how we even interpret scripture. It hit me like, well, if I'm uncomfortable wearing a hat on stage, should I tell Matt to not wear one anymore? Should I tell Herb not to wear one anymore? And I was like, well, no, I don't. It's never even crossed my mind to tell Herb or Matt, hey guys, take it off. It's never crossed my mind. And then on the flip side, if it's okay for those guys to wear a hat on stage, why would it be wrong for the pastor to wear a hat on stage? That doesn't track. Right? It's either it's either wrong or it's not. Now, you could make the argument like you said, well, yeah, but it's a different level of leadership, so there's a different responsibility level and whatnot. Okay, fine. But I think that goes for the people on either leading on the stage. I think you once you're leading worship, you've already crossed into that. And then you were like, oh, I I teach wearing a hat all the time. And then I think I asked, would you do it on stage on a Sunday morning? And I said no. Right. I was like, well, what in the world? Well, I also kind of like if I'm, you know, I'm the young guy, I'm preaching on Sunday. It's there's a little bit of a presentation thing there. Like I wear a button-up shirt if I'm teaching on Sunday. But I don't wear button-up shirts. No, you're not worn one in a long time. Because I'm being Because you're the young guy, you're an opportunity of the platform. I want to at least communicate by what I'm wearing that I'm taking. Okay, let me ask you a question. You know, do you like so it's funny, the button-down shirt thing? I used to wear button-down shirts a lot, and then I I've been more in the sweatshirt, like rolled-up sleeves category. That's what I wear all the time. So I'm like, I'll just get nicer ones of these and wear them on stage. And Dick Sporting Goods, I guess I'm revealing something here. Dick Sporting Goods actually had a sale on these sweatshirts that I really like. They were like 11 bucks a shirt, and they came in like 13 colors. You just got all 13. I got all 13. And if you look at our messages over the last three months, it's just me in the same sweatshirt but a different color. Nice every week. Cool. So there's that. Um but anyway, all that to say, like when Steve was the pastor, I used to sort of dress more like he dressed when I would speak because it was kind of like, okay, I'm stepping into that culture a little bit. And I dressed more casually when I taught the students than I dressed on Sunday. So I dress really cool when I teach the students. They think I'm really cool. You seem there's a sarcasm in your now. No. I know, and I mean I I put on dress shoes to teach on Sundays. I'm in the big in the big room, but I know I dress a little bit. That's like a conviction. You know what I mean? Like just like if you had pushed me on it and been like, hey man, you don't need to wear dress shoes, I'd probably be like, Yeah, that's fine. Okay. And sometimes I would and sometimes I wouldn't. You said no to wearing a hat. I know, yeah. You're like, I don't know. So all this brought okay, silly topic. And if there's someone still listening to this, wow. Wow. Congratulations. What is the deeper point? I think to rewind, you mentioned First Corinthians. Yes. What is your takeaway interpretation there? Like you seem to have come to a conclusion about the head coverings in that context of that letter. Yeah, because basically I got to this point from a theological stance. Well, then either A, it's okay for me to wear a hat on stage when I teach, in case Alex gets a little light that, you know, fixes the shadow. Um, or B it's like one light. One light. Like a flashlight. I just put my light holes. I just put my phone's flashlight on and put it on the ground and like stand above the uh music stand. That's exactly. Yeah, it's super simple. Um, or B, I need to tell, so either A, it's okay for me to do it, or B, I need to tell Matt and Herb, take the hat off. You know. Well, I think actually there's a there's a C option. What's the C option? The C option I think comes from uh like sins of conscience. So there is a personal recountability between you and the Lord that is if if as you're seeking the Lord, you recognize this is either masking my insecurity or feeding my insecurity or vice versa, and the Lord says no, right? You can you can, as a personal conviction, go, I'm never gonna wear a hat on stage, that comes from the Lord when I don't have to communicate that to Matt or 100%. So that's like the C is the personal conviction. And I don't have a personal conviction about it. Like I truly don't. In fact, it's funny, um, I ordered these hats and I like I like wearing hats. Yeah this morning I woke up kind of late. Yeah. And I didn't have to do my hangout. I didn't know he was like, oh, so I just put a hat on. It was great. It was a suit. And actually in college I wore a beanie all the time, and that's part of how I got to class on time in college was just throw it on and go to class. So I like that. And truthfully, on the it's funny, on the conviction side, this is what's interesting. I think it's like I don't ever want to be someone who being on stage should not be something that plays into the security insecurity thing at all. You know, so it's funny. I was in the best shape of my life before COVID hit. And we never had cameras. Of your life? Oh, yeah. Like I was better than high school when you're just like naturally like Yeah, I was probably in better. I may have not been the thinnest I'd ever been, sure, but in terms of uh combination of like like muscle, muscle mass. And before COVID, I had hired a personal trainer. Nice. I was working out, I was lifting more than I ever lifted. And I I was the most fit. I like if and we never had cameras. There's no visual evidence of that whatsoever. COVID hits. I put on a bunch of weight during COVID. We get cameras. First time there's ever been cameras. It's like, you know what I mean? And I'm fine with it. It doesn't matter to me. I'm not someone who I don't that's why I just bought 13 shirts of the same color because I don't care. It's just like I I don't want to look like a slob on stage, but I don't want to spend, I don't want to spend time going, what should I wear? And so it's like, oh, just wear the blue one. I wore the green one last week, wear the blue one this week. I love that. And the same's true with a hat. I don't want to sit there on Sunday morning and like spend 10 minutes doing my hair, being like, oh, it doesn't look right because I just put a hat on. So I I like that aspect of just who cares? Just black hat, blue hat, I don't care. Um, that to me was in a weird way, that's more like how I live my life. I don't worry about it, just right, get up and go. And that fits very well there. I don't have a personal. Fixing your hair wasn't necessarily, well, it is because you're bummed about it, but it also is bummed about it. Because I got hats. It's okay. It's okay to be bummed about it. But it's also the like like you're trying to please a certain expectation of the the cameras are on you and blah, blah, blah. I don't care about that. Like, I'm gonna get older and there'll be a visual, you know, here's the decline of Justin got older. It's fine. I'm fine with that. I don't care. Um, but I don't want to st I don't want to do the wrong thing. It's just that simple. I care deeply about God, and something as silly as a hat shouldn't it shouldn't matter. But it did bring up this interesting thing. Like I said, category C, you mentioned good personal conviction. We're told in scripture that we should live by our personal convictions. And to betray a conviction, if it's if you think you're sinning, it's a sin. It's a sin. I don't think it's a sin to wear a hat. And I got to this point where I said either it's okay for me to do it or it's not okay for those guys to do it. And so this brings us back to that passage in First Corinthians, which we have just gone away. Yeah, it's great. It's great. It's how conversations work. Um what's your take on that scripture? Because it says in First Corinthians Paul's addressing the church and he's basically Corinthians is the church where Paul's always like, What are you guys doing? Like he actually we we know there are letters that Paul wrote to Corinth that we don't have because he references other letters. Like there's at least two or there's at least three or four letters. We only have two. And some people actually think that we actually have a combination of different letters that is like second Corinthians compilation. Because he references the last time I wrote to you. Right. I believe in first Corinthians. So we have, I don't know. Um, but they're the church that Paul's almost always going, like, guys, like what are you doing? Corinth was a very wild place. Right. It would be like uh starting a church in I don't know, Vegas, Vegas, and right there on the strip in Vegas and dealing with, okay, hey guys, we gotta there'd be dress code issues there. There might be. And there'd be and so Paul was very much defined as not being legalistic. His writings to the church in in the Galatians, they were becoming very legalistic, religious. And he's like, What are you guys doing? You've you have grace. Why would you go back to legalism? You know, he doesn't use that exact word, but I mean he's his strong language to the Galatians about don't go backwards. Yeah. And then he's reigning the Corinthians. And then he's reigning the Corinthians in. And it shows you how what Paul, Paul had a really hard job in the early church. Part of his role was to be the guy who figured out how to make this actually work. Yeah. And for some people, that was like, guys, let loose, live, put a hat on. For for others, it was like, what are you guys doing? Take the hat off.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:00

And it creates an interesting, if you only read Paul's writings through the lens of what are the rules, right? You'll get really confused really fast because it seems to sort of Yeah. And that's where for me, my take on what he's addressing is a generalized, it's it's a cultural issue and it's a cultural respect issue. So it's a distraction in this culture for you not to cover your head and you to cover your head. Culturally, for me, I don't feel like at his hands specifically, it's a distraction for you to wear a hat. Well, I'm not the judge of that. You know, some people might be distracted. Yeah. Um, but to me, it's like And I didn't wear a hat on Sunday. Right, right. I honestly I was like, well, I think there is I think enough people um I think this would go into like what is appropriate to wear at church on Sunday in general, like especially on stage, like uh certain band t shirts. Like I wouldn't wear a certain band t shirt because I don't want people either thinking that I'm like endorsing. Every song that the Beatles ever wrote. Or, you know, which there's songs from the Beatles that I super don't agree with the theology of the song. There's songs that have Hindu chants. Yes, right. In the And so I don't I don't necessarily believe that that's what a shirt is doing, but I I can understand that it would be a distraction to some people. Correct. So I would forego my freedom to wear the shirt that I want to wear for the sake of the service and the sake of for the sake of the Lord. So there are some things that are like that. That's where I would probably land with that first Corinthians passage. That's like, this is for some reason, maybe that I don't understand. It was considered shameful to go one way or the other. I don't think that that applies to modern baseball caps. Like I don't think that that carries over into our honor-shame culture and what the role of our heads and head coverings is. If you went back in time 50 years, right, in American culture, okay. It would be pretty much. Well, men wore hats all the time. Look at uh like look at pictures of baseball games from back in the day. And it isn't a bunch of people wearing baseball caps. It's like guys in suits with like suitcats. And then but then if like a lady was in their presence, they would like take the hat off. Yeah, right. If they would ever sit down and eat it. It's a respectful, it's a respectful thing. And I just think culturally that that uh respect is probably more communicated by your phone being in your pocket than it is by your hat on your head. You know, just like I'm communicating that I'm that the rules and culture change. Yeah. And so from a theological standpoint where we get to and this is where interpreting scripture becomes very, very awesome and challenging at the same time. And I say all the time in our newcomer gatherings that if we interpret scripture responsibly and apply it lovingly, we're in a good place. Okay. Because I don't want to dismiss all biblical commands as cultural context. Correct. And that's where it becomes very easy to sort of pick and choose. So you have to really do the due diligence. There's a an idea that you'll read. The idea is is this descriptive scripture or prescriptive scripture? So we have a lot of this in the Old Testament, for example. Uh in the Old Testament, the Jewish people, for ext were told not to wear clothing made of two fabrics. Right. So you couldn't wear a cotton polyester blend if you're living by the Jewish law as given to Moses. And there are still Jewish communities that take that seriously, and it's like, no, I don't wear a multi-fabric blended. I know, I know Christians that that love Jesus, believe that he did everything that the scriptures say he did, that still don't wear multi-blended fabric because they see that as a as a command. Right. You have a tattoo on your arm. What's the tattoo of, by the way? This is uh of a sheep getting killed, I guess. A sheep with a red X and a little drop of blood. Can you see it? Okay. So do you hate sheep? I yeah, it's no sheep necks, is what my tattoo means. What does it mean? No, it's about uh Jesus' sacrifice. He's the final sacrificial lamb. And so where our sins needed atoning for kind of on a regular basis. Yeah. This is kind of a reminder for me that Jesus did that for me once and for all. So if I'm beating myself up about the things that I carry too much, that I've I've that's already been dealt with. It's been dealt with. It's done. That's cool. But Leviticus says, don't mark your bodies for the dead or uh cut them for the dead. And to me, I land on a that's a uh cultural uh implication, uh saying, like, hey, because the Canaanites do this, right, don't be like the Canaanites when it's coming from Leviticus 18 or whatever it's from. And that gets to another level. So we've got prescriptive, descriptive. Descriptive would mean for all people for all time. Uh don't commit sexual adultery. Like don't commit don't commit acts of sexual morality. Well, that was just for that group of people for that time. Right. Right. Well, we kind of always know, no, that's that's a don't murder. Yeah. And we see that, by the way, as threads that go all throughout the scriptures where these things don't change. Um and it's funny, you mentioned homosex we mentioned homosexuality as a topic we're gonna talk about in a future episode. Um we're gonna talk about it in a really loving way, but that would fall into that category of like, well, this is Old Testament, New Testament, this is descriptive. Prescriptive would mean for a specific group of people for a specific time. Just like I'm giving you this prescription. Is that backwards? No. Because I thought descriptive, descriptive is describing what's happening for the specific people. Prescriptive is telling all people for all time. I feel like that's backwards. I don't think it is, but if it is, I can make mistakes and live with it. So uh I thought descriptive is describing what is going on. Like where pull up your phone real quick and search a descriptive scripture. You can't. You can't? I don't have Google on my phone. Hold on, hold on, hold on. I'm gonna just pause. I'm gonna look this up. Descriptive versus prescriptive. Because prescriptive is like when a biblical command actually still applies to us. Hold on. Hold on. Google can't be wrong. Yeah, don't read the AI answer at the top. I hate it too. Alright, I'm not doing that. Um the difference is this a passage is descriptive if it's simply describing something that happened, while a passage is prescriptive if it is specifically teaching that something should happen. Okay. Oh, so this would be like going to conquer the Canaanites. Going to conquer the Canaanites versus Christians should conquer the Canaanites. Yeah. Or we should go fight battles. Okay, so in this one, okay. If we take this passage descriptive and there are many things we learn, okay, if we take it as prescriptive. Alright, yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. I got it. You're right. All right, so prescriptive would mean we should all do this. Descriptive means it's describing something that which makes more sense with the words. Yeah. Well, it's what you said. I'm the lead pastor of the church, so I'm not trying to correct you. No, you are. No, I appreciate that actually. Um, because there's so many terms and so many Yeah. Like you read so much stuff sometimes, you get it all mixed up. It's all good. So what you've said with scripture doesn't condone everything it records. Correct. We're talking about the difference between commanding and recording. Correct. So prescriptives are commands for Christians, potentially for all times. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then descriptive is describing the thing. This is why, by the way, pause. Surround yourself with really great people, because it is so easy, uh, especially dealing with like the whole gist of Christian theology, to just be like, oh yeah, I got those two mixed up in my head. Sure. And then if you don't have people around you to check you on that, you can just go way down a certain path and not realize what what in the world. Um so thank you for that, actually. Yeah. So with this scripture in Corinthians, we have to decide: is it prescriptive going back to the the Jewish people with two fabrics? Well, is this describing what they were supposed to do for their world? Um tattoo's another example. The Canaanites, the the pagan people would mark their bodies, and this had a very significant to honor the dead. And that's where it's like, even just on the tattoo, I would I would give people caution and you know any tattoos, the like pray through it sort of filter. Because I do think that there is um a prescriptive command that even still can contained in that, like applies to us. So like I have more of an issue with people, and again, if you have this, there's grace and it's not like a sin. Maybe this is just where I'm processing. Your conviction might be. Yeah, like if I have like uh my great granddad's name on my arm, that might be a little bit more. It's more of a one-to-one to that limiticus thing. To honor them, that's great, but it's like if it's a grief thing, like you want to be able to process your grief and move on for it, not always be associated with it. So I'm not sure. So you would tell someone, hey, think through that. Process through it before you But you don't have a pro you're fine having a tattoo on your body. You don't look at that and say, this was this was prescribing all people for all time. Correct. Okay, cool. Yeah. Um man, I'm just thinking through my head how many times have I gotten the descriptive versus prescriptive thing wrong? And probably a few. So apologies to anyone. Yeah, I don't care that much. But first Corinthians, yeah, hats. Yep. So we have to decide. Is Paul saying for all time, all followers of Jesus, men don't cover your heads, women cover your heads. And that's funny because a lot of the churches that might say can't have a hat on, like, well, you don't tell the women to cover their heads. Right. Well, um most of them would probably find like, yeah, we don't do that part of it. Yeah, head heads. Right. But we do have yeah, exactly. Because that is a thing in other cultures where women always have their heads covered. And then there's other people split hairs and say, no, no, it's saying that a woman's hair is her head covering, and it would be shameful if she were to shave her head and not have Yeah, there's like a long hair, short hair thing that goes on. There's a whole bunch of things. And so we have to look at it and go, what's the context? It like we said, is this describing Paul? We get to see this a lot in Paul's writings. Paul, we see how Paul's handling situations that were very specific to that group of people. Going back to the analogy we had 50 years ago. Yeah, 50 years ago, the way American culture was, it would have been like a big deal for a guy to have a hat on. Even like if a woman walked in the room and you you kept your hat on, you'd be like, dude, what are you doing?

SPEAKER_01 31:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:00

And you would almost it would be like, okay, maybe this has changed actually in our culture, but I remember being at a baseball game um 10, 15 years ago and the national anthem came on and this one guy didn't stand in our section. And a guy behind me, like, I'm in this row. And it was awkward because I think the guy turned around and looked at me, and I was like, I didn't say that right. You know, I was like, I don't want to get involved, it wasn't me. But the guy behind me yelled over my shoulder, hey, we stand up for the anthem here, man. And the guy that was sitting down turned around and I was like, you know. Um but that would be something that that's a cultural thing that really matters. And so is it just that? And that's where we have to do our best and trust the Holy Spirit to ask ourselves, well, what is it? Is it, yeah, this is describing a cultural issue, and Paul's saying, guys, the you're causing all this commotion and ruckus because you're just ignoring, stop it. Like, guys, you know, don't cover your head. Ladies, keep your heads covered, right? This is or is it Paul saying this, I'm prescribing for all time? And to some degree, we have to use discernment there and we have to ask those questions. Where do you land on that? What's your take? For hat covering specifically? You think it's a cultural thing? Yeah, I I think it's a cultural thing. And like I said, I preach on Sunday mornings with the with my hat on, part of our uniform for the high school. So why then this is a hat? If it was devil's advocate, why is that a cultural thing? But then, like we were gonna talk about issues of sexuality. Why would homosexuality not just be well in their culture? Uh uh maybe I don't have a great answer um, other than that as you're interpreting it, you can kind of get to the core of the issue. And I don't feel like the core of the issue goes beyond something cultural. So like pursuing like the sexuality and integrity with your body, I think gets to a core of like made in God's image. It gets to a core of um God's desire for how uh our bodies are used. It gets to the core of the Holy Spirit living within us. There's like more of like a theological core there. When I pro start to probe the um the hat issue and the head covering issue, I could probably make some stuff up about like, you know, there like gray hair is the crown of glory from Proverbs. And there's like some, you know, theological connections, maybe, but it's not um, to me, it doesn't go a lot deeper. What you're describing is the difference between a precept and a principle. So I I think I'm right on this one. Yeah, yeah. Um precepts would be like laws, specific things told. But then behind those is a principle. Right. Peter deals with this when God tells him you may eat freely enough. The blanket vision. And it's right before the Gentiles become uh start becoming Christians. And you know, he's told Peter, God tells Peter, eat that. And Peter's like, that's an unclean animal. I've never eaten that before. I would, I would never do it. Peter tells God, No, a lot, right? Jesus, no, you can't wash my feet. No, I won't eat that. And then God says to Peter, How who are you to say something is unclean that I have made clean? Like the only reason the Jews weren't allowed to eat that was because God said not to, right? But if God changes that and says, now you can, well, He He's the one who determines what's unclean and clean. And even that is like you said, the Gentiles are becoming Christians. It's this bigger, bigger scope of God's plan saying, Hey, this is a representation of welcoming the Gentiles into this community. The old era of the Jewish people being so set apart from the rest of the world, that's what God was doing. The reason they dressed different, ate different, all that, is because he's like, I need the world to know that you are totally different, sanctified, sanctified, set apart. But now, even from the original promise of Abraham, it was going to come through the Jewish people, but be for all nations. And now all nations are coming. You guys need to let loosen up on it's not about separating yourselves from everyone. It's actually about this embracing, okay. There's a principle behind it. Um, we have to decide as Jesus followers, well, hey, we have to understand what are the principles at play here. And when it comes to something like, well, when it comes to something like uh, for example, the the hats and the head coverings, there were all kinds of cultural things happening in the early church that don't really apply to our culture today. Meat sacrifice to idols would be a good example, right? We don't really have that. I don't go to publics and go, ooh, is this chicken offered to a false god? But it represents a principle of worship, of worship and engaging with a culture that has different values. And that's why I think the head covering for me lands on the principle is of respect. And so, what communicates respect when you're in the gathered church service? If your culture kind of has its ground rules of respect, and you're not gonna wear uh a t-shirt that has a cuss word on it, like that's like a it communicates respect for what you're doing. Correct. That's why I would wear dress shoes on Sunday morning in the big room. We're not as Christians, I think maybe this is where it gets to. We're we're not called to it's not about self-expression. Like when I'm on stage or when I'm even living life, my filter is not, I gotta be me. Sure. Right? That's not the point. Go back to maybe the 1960s. For a guy to have really long hair in the 1960s was almost a sign of rebellion. And it was like the hippie movement was this, we're rebelling against okay. Well, as a Jesus follower, I am meant to be a rebel in many ways. But in other ways, I'm actually meant to like Paul, not be, I'm not meant to cause unnecessary disruptions and division because I'm just like if I'm going to be a rebel, it's because I am doing what God has called me to do. And that's sometimes going to create, it's gonna, you know, turn some tables over. But I'm not going, man, how can I rebel against the world? With self-expression, I think to some extent is like an elevation of yourself to say, like, my comfort or my right, you knowing who I am is the most important. But I do think that there's so in some church to go back, in some church cultures, like his hands, there's hundreds of hats. Matt wears a hat, herb wears a hat. If I walked on stage wearing a hat, you know, it's not different from it's not like whoa. If I went to another church where that church, this group of people love the Lord, whatever, and they are this church's culture is much more about, or in another nation, maybe would even be better, a better example. Another nation, like go to Guatemala, go to church in Guatemala, like they're dressed crazy casual, right? You know what I mean? Like at the church that we, at least the church we work with in Guatemala. Um it's it's one of those issues. I have a grandfather that was a missionary in Bolivia, and my wife's mother, Spanish, was her first language. She grew up in Bolivia. You would never know it looking at her. Um, but she's she's bilingual and Spanish was her first culture, all that kind of stuff, the South American culture. Totally different in terms of what you should wear, not wear. Uh, I know guys who have been missionaries in Africa, and ladies will come to church topless because they're breastfeeding. Right. And that's not a thing. No one's like, hey, we live in this very varied world, and we do have to use our discernment to go, well, wait, am I just being me, self-expression, and I'm willing to let this cause whatever distractions because I'm using my freedom. Right. Not spoke at a funeral on Friday. Yes. And you used, you didn't take that opportunity to use your freedom in Christ to wear your hoodie and your hat. No, I wore a suit. Right. Yeah. And I comb my hair. Same with the wedding. Like same with the wedding, same with all that. Yeah. The timing and place actually has a bearing on that. All that brings us to this really long rabbit hole of it's about love. It's about love for one another and a desire for there to be unity. And I wouldn't want to do anything that takes away from that. My self-expression, my personal feelings of security, insecurity, comfort with myself, whatever. None of that can rise to the level where that's worth creating division in the church. And the the principle I think we see in the Corinthian church is there was all kinds of division happening amongst all kinds of things. And Paul is like, guys, stop it. You guys have this, you got that. Sometimes there were moral issues, but there is a unity in the body that requires us to be willing to submit to, in some ways, submit to what is viewed as appropriate. So if I again, if I was going to teach at my my grandparents' church in rural Missouri, um, they're all passed away now, but you know, 10, 20 years ago. Oh, the people at the end of the year. Yeah, if I was gonna go to their church in rural Missouri and I walked in wearing a baseball hat, um, in fact, I know a story at that church. My uncle was a handyman and the church had an issue. He went to fix the issue. And it wasn't a Sunday. He showed up there like on a Tuesday and he was wearing a sleeveless shirt because he's a handyman. He goes around, he walks into this church with a sleeveless shirt to fix their air conditioning or something. And the pastor was like, You can't be in here with a sleeveless shirt on. Go get it, get some sleeves on. You're in the house of the Lord. And he's like, Oh, I'm just in my work uniform. I'm here to fix your air conditioner. That wouldn't happen here. If a guy showed up to fix something at our, you know, and wore a sleeve a shirt, we'd be like, There's people wear sleeve shirts to sun on Sunday. Yeah, there's a large degree of self-expression, like you're saying, like there is freedom here culturally at his hands. There's a lot of freedom here up to a point. Up to a point. If I'm at the pool swimming with my shirt off, Madison has Madison's not in sin. Right. If I show up to church Sunday morning with shirtless, it's kind of like, hey, hey, but I'm going to the pool afterwards. Like, yeah, still. Here's a t-shirt, Madison. You'd give me a t-shirt. So it becomes about love and it becomes about these sort of personal filters of okay, am I the principle we see in Corinthians is guys, respect one another. Don't cause distractions and division in the church by trying to buck the the normal culture just to express your freedom. Um, that's gonna in large part depend on your context and your culture, at your church, at where you're at, what what country you're in, what city you're in, what denomination, and what the Lord has called you to do. I think that's the the big thing, especially being people who are on stage, like if something gets in the way of that, you don't that's why it was such a quote unquote crisis was you wanted to make sure that nothing got in the way of that. And so if you're called overseas, there might just be something that you're not able to do if you're ministering overseas, wearing a beard or not wearing a beard. You know, it's like vice versa. Another example would be Andy on our team. And he's got sleeve tattoos, right? From his his past. And there nothing on them's like shocking. I haven't really looked closely. Some of them are really cool. Yeah, they're just he's got sleeve tattoos. Well, when he first started working here, he started wearing only long sleeves to cover up the sleeve tattoos. And he told me, Yeah, man, I just don't know if if people see my tattoos. If and I told him, dude, wear t-shirts. Right. I didn't say you have to display those. I want your sleeve tattoos. Yeah, that's not our culture. And so I it's this interest, and that's what's so cool about this. I think that's why this is even a worthwhile topic. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's been a huge waste of time. No, I think it's it's worth definitely worth it. But it's because we do have freedom. Jesus has freed us and it's not about living under this list of rules, but it is about living in some ways. Uh the freedom brings with it this responsibility that you don't even have in a culture that's just about the rules. If it's just rules, it's like, why just check, check, check? I'm fine. You don't have to check your heart, right? You just put the right clothes on and you're you're good. You could actually have a really uh terrible attitude, just horrible disposition, but still address the rocks the boxes. But in our culture, it's like, hey, I'm free to wear a hat. But with the Corinthian filter, I'm free to wear a hat. Is that gonna cause disruption, a division? Is that gonna be a distraction to anyone? Is that going to create drama that in any way takes away from people's focus on Jesus? Well, if that's the answer, if the answer is yes, then like then no take the hat off. But there are things that are worth causing drama and distraction when it's worth taking a stand for. You're just saying something as small as a hat is probably not. Self-expression. Yeah. And our culture very much values self-expression. Self-expression doesn't rise to that level. All right, so let me throw a few edge cases out there. Okay, edge cases. Here we go. Can I wear it? So I think are we saying this? I think we're a hat church. I wouldn't call us a hat church, though. No, you but I was saying like it's okay. There's freedom. Yeah. I would say that. I would, but I wouldn't call us a hat church. No, like my point is You don't like that makes it seem like you have to wear it but my point you have to prescribe to a certain degree. Like if someone shows up in a suit and tie to Sunday morning, that's just as appropriate as Yeah, we have some people that do dress really nice. And that's okay. Like Willie and his wife. Yeah, they're also like dressed in the minds. Yeah. Yeah. Kimberly on our welcome team is always like this most sharply dressed person. She's always got like a suit jacket on. Um when I say we're hat church, is it permissible at his hands? That's yeah, I would say yes, but it's up to you. You're the you're the bouse. No, it's not. Well, that's the point. I it's apparently been like this for years because I've never even noticed or cared. Yeah. And there's this whole like weird thing where we were talking about this like if I'm praying in a circle, I'll take off my hat to pray. But if I'm praying on stage, I don't take off my hat to pray. But what I'm trying to communicate is the freedom dynamic of like, I think if I'm on stage and I'm taking off my hat every Time to pray. While I do that as a sign of respect in a circle, I don't want to signal like this is required by everybody. Everyone else takes their hat off. It's just a personal, and that's I I'm a paradoxical person, I guess. I know I kind of joked with you. I think you saw it the other day we were eating lunch. Yeah. And I took my hat off when it was and like looked over at you right before, and you were like, you're like, stop. I was like, I know, I'm just being silly. So edge cases. Edge cases. Here we go. I mean these might not be edge cases. These have been, you know, probably discussed and discussed too much. Can I wear leggings to church? Me, Madison. Do you ever wear leggings now? No, I don't. No. Why is this an edge case? No, it's not an edge case. I'm just saying, like the this can a lady wear leggings? This has implications on the dress code question. So as a dress code, we don't have a dress code as a church. And occasionally there are people that have asked us to. Sure. And there have been a few examples of people who have worn, like when I was a youth pastor, I had a kid one time wear a really offensive shirt. Sure. And it was like, I said, hey man, can you I actually gave him one of our shirts. Can you wear this instead? Go to the bathroom and change. Because this is just not that's causing a distraction. Um there we actually had a guy on the welcome team. I'm okay sharing this, and he had a shirt on that said straight white Christian or something like that. And I said, Hey man, would you mind? Now look, we can go on a whole different conversation here. Um He was a straight white Christian. So am I. Right. And but there was like an there was like a thing to that church that was like, well, what if it's a confrontational show? Yes. And it was one of those points where the what was happening politically at the time was this very much tribalism and people are being lumped, and he was it. It's like, I'm like, hey man, you gotta take that off. Here's a his hand shirt. Because that's not right, that's not what we're that's not we're not saying on the welcome to hey, everybody. I wasn't saying your shirt's bad, wrong, fine, whatever. Yeah, we probably wouldn't have asked someone who just walked in with that shirt versus someone on the if that's like the first But it was a shirt that was about like this edge statement, and that's like that's not the purpose of the stuff. But it was a volunteer too. So there's a there's a leadership dynamic. So we don't have a dress code, and for us, dress code, and it's funny how we're talking about hats, it's like for 99% of the cases that I've had people talk to, that's just not gonna rise to the level of us addressing addressing it because that's not that's not like where we're gonna start drawing lines of who's in, who's out, who you know, like I'm not who's in who's asked by the wrong language, but like now if it was something that was super inappropriate, I mean like crazy exposure, yeah. That's a different thing. We actually haven't had that, to my knowledge. I don't know. I don't know, I don't know. I don't know. My point is I haven't seen someone dressed in such a way where I go, have you? Just like people coming in, yeah. Oh, okay. Well maybe I'm on stage a lot, and so I see a big broad, you know, I think it is, but it's it is one of those things where the church is for people, so it's people are gonna show up. When people are gonna show up in different stages, there is a certain line that I think I would feel comfortable as a pastor saying to someone, hey, I'm so sorry, this is an awkward conversation. Put some pants on. Put some pants on. Uh here's maybe we should have pants. I don't know. I haven't had that happen, but I guess it's a discernment issue. I think that's what we're talking about, too. It's a discernment issue. Well, you mentioned bands. We actually had uh an awesome lady on our worship team who wore, I think it was an ACDC shirt once, and we asked her to replace it with a his hand shirt. Yeah. And if you're an A C DC fan, I'm not saying stop listening to A C D C or whatever. Like you mentioned, the Beatles. There's some A C D C songs that are like I think Highway to Hell is one of their most famous songs. Right. But they are very much evocative of a certain if you're wearing an A C D C shirt, it doesn't necessarily mean I adore ACDC. Correct. It's kind of like rock and roll. It's such a general vibe. A general vibe, right? You know. And so, but she totally understood. Yeah. And we're like, hey, this this could rise to the level of a distraction that is not worth any distract. The focus is on Jesus. Yeah. So yeah, what other edge cases? Uh those I mean. So I guess discernment is the issue there. And can you wear leggings to church? Maybe. Right. It depends on what turns over those leggings. And what you mean by leggings. Yeah. Yeah. No, there's definitely like there's a certain style like girls wearing leggings with a really long shirt over it that covers, or you could wear like the Lululemon butt lift leggings. Yeah. But honestly, that's a conversation where if someone walked in like that, I would be totally comfortable saying, hey, I'm assuming in this situation it's a woman, because that's maybe not. But if it was, I'd be like, hey man, I'm so sorry. This is really awkward. But we're not excited. Yeah. I mean, if it was a super It's just like normal, bodaceous, like I don't know, buttlift leggings. I don't know. I guess I'm seeing like a whole, I go to the gym that I go to. There's a certain where it's like you're pretty much in a bathing suit. I feel like if someone walked in, we probably wouldn't say so much to them. No. I think if you were a volunteer. That's something where you just say, hey, we're glad this person's here. Yeah. That's I I think in general, like maybe like in principle, we would say like we would we would prefer that. Surely it's a discernment issue, right? That's the point. The Holy Spirit I agree. I just feel like when it comes to people walking in the building, I feel like we just have like a different filter of like that. We want them to hear the true argument now. I don't remember a conversation that I've ever had with someone where I've told them that. I've seen people that have dressed, I'll put it like this. It's like this is where it's like I don't want to call people out. Yeah. You know what I mean? I've seen people dress like Meredith dresses on the day where they go to the beach in the office. Okay, I'm trying to remember that episode. This is probably making it worse. Yeah, I think this is where it's either too low or too short, like is like the option. Gotcha. We've seen like that, but we I don't think we would have ever asked someone like that to change or I mean it would have to be so yeah bad. Have to rise to an extreme level. Because what I would tell the other person who's like, I'm offended at what that person's wearing, I'd tell them, like, well, pray for them or whatever.

SPEAKER_01 50:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:03

Go sit somewhere else. Like, I would like that that's 99% of the time. I'm I'm just saying, yeah, I guess I can imagine a scenario where if I felt like it was a major distraction and it was like I would be fine having an operator. Things like hats and things like uh jewelry. I usually don't rise to think like to that level, even though there are commands in scripture about jewelry. So it's Susan, who used to lead our worship team back in the day when she helped start his hands, um, she never wore jewelry on stage. And she also didn't wear shoes on stage. I don't know if you knew that. I know. She was always shoeless, but she never wore jewelry because she never wanted jewelry to be a distraction. Right. And I think that just exposes the heart of the matter. But people never noticed that she didn't wear jewelry, but some people got offended that she didn't wear shoes. She didn't wear shoes because she had this personal thing of like, it's like Moses, like take your shoes off your own holy ground. She just wanted to, it was like an act of worship for her. Sure. But for some people, it's like, why isn't Lena wearing shoes? It's kind of gross. It gross. You know what I mean? And it's just one of those things where you go, okay, Susan doesn't have to wear shoes. Yeah. I think this whole episode has been- I think what we found out is if Susan didn't have to wear shoes, I have to wear a hat. I can wear a hat. Which I think gets to the point. I I do think that this episode was helpful. It was slightly off the rails, but super off the rails. I think it was helpful. Not what we planned because it it is worth talking about and gets to that how do you interpret scripture thing. So it's good. It's a matter of discernment, and some scriptures for all people for all time. And I think scripture is pretty clear on what those things are. We might have to have a different conversation about that at different podcasts. Maybe this will lead to a part two. And generally, there's a presumption of faithfulness and willing willingness to love the Lord. So, like it's like given that, what's the best thing? Don't break there's moral laws of like harm to other people, what God has declared as human behavior good, and then there's like cultural specific issues. And sometimes those merge together, and that's where we have to have discernment. Yeah. But I think what we've said is that can you wear a hat? Probably. Yeah. You're good. Probably. Oh, at his hands, you're good to wear a hat. Okay. Am I just wearing a wear hat? Probably. Probably. We'll figure it out. All right. Well, very good. This has been an interesting episode, and I love these conversations with you, man. Thanks, guys. All right, let's pray. I I I have a thing about podcasts that end in prayer. I don't know if it's I don't know if I know any podcasts that end in prayer. Mike Winger's podcast ends in prayer. I don't think I've ever made it to the end of one of my podcasts. Those are long episodes, man. I understand why you pray. I don't know. For some reason, it feels like virtual prayer and it just feels different. You're driving your car. I gotta I gotta play. I'll say when I listen to the His Hands podcast, the like Sunday morning, I always skip Lord's Supper at the end. I can see them driving in my car. Now it's done. Because the point of the podcast is probably listening to the message. Yeah, right. I can see that.

unknown 52:48

Lord's Supper in the podcast?

SPEAKER_00 52:49

Yeah. Yeah.

unknown 52:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:51

Because it's almost always kind of how the message ends. That's so interesting.

unknown 52:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:55

It must have started at some point. Yeah. And it kind of makes sense too, because a lot of times. Yeah, but a lot of times now the Lord's Supper blends with the message so much where it used to be sort of like and now we're doing to the sacrifice that you can do. I think you should because it's very like they and I'll kind of say, and that's kind of what this is about. Right. And that'd be a weird point to end the podcast. All right. Bye.