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1:16
This is Undaunted Life of Man's Podcast.
1:19
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
1:20
Let's get into it.
1:21
Today we've got another special guest interview for you and that is with Greg Cocle.
1:25
I just got to tell you right from the jump.
1:27
When I told my foxhole guys that Greg Cocle was coming on the podcast, they were just,
1:31
I mean, giddy with anticipation and for good reason because this guy is a heavyweight in
1:36
the world of apologetics.
1:37
But if you're not very familiar with him, let me give you a little bit of his background.
1:40
This guy has his M.A. in philosophy of religion and ethics from Talbot School of Theology
1:44
and an M.A. in Christian apologetics from Simon Greenleaf School of Law.
1:48
Back in the early '90s in 1993, he founded an organization called Standard Reason.
1:52
So this organization is dedicated to helping Christians express their viewpoints and to
1:57
defend them, right?
1:58
And he wants them to be able to defend them using knowledge, wisdom and character.
2:02
We certainly get into that in the podcast, but there are two books.
2:05
They're kind of seminal books to people in this area of apologetics.
2:09
One of them is one that he wrote recently back in 2017.
2:12
The story of reality, how the world began, how it ends, and everything important that
2:16
happens in between.
2:17
This is a book that I just read recently.
2:19
It's a fantastic book.
2:20
And we certainly get into that in the podcast.
2:22
But the big reason why I was turned on to the work of Greg Kockel is the book Tactics.
2:28
And that book just celebrated its tenure anniversary.
2:31
It was written back in 2009.
2:32
It's called Tactics, a game plan for discussing your Christian convictions.
2:36
And guys, a lot of apologetics books are more descriptive apologetics.
2:40
They kind of give you answers to certain questions and things like that.
2:43
And they're fantastic books, but this is, you know, no pun intended, a tactical book.
2:48
This is a tactical way of expressing your viewpoints and your faith, but also defending
2:53
them because the thing is guys, and you know this to be true.
2:57
Most Christians just think, Oh, I just got to be nice.
3:00
Like this idea that if you're just nice, people will just show up at your door.
3:03
Like, Hey, who's this Jesus guy?
3:05
You seem real nice in Jesus is a part of your life.
3:07
So what do you do?
3:08
But guys, we don't live in that world that that popcorn marshmallow world, like we just
3:12
don't live there, right?
3:13
We live in a world where people are looking at us as bigots just because of the things
3:17
that we believe.
3:19
But the thing about it is, and one thing that Greg Cokal does a tremendous job of is he
3:23
teaches Christians to be on the offensive, but not to be a jerk.
3:26
Like, that's not the point.
3:28
The point isn't to embarrass somebody that that's not the point at all.
3:31
But the point is to get your point across in a cogent manner where you can actually
3:35
take control of the conversation because at the end of the day, this is apologetics,
3:39
but it is evangelism and he certainly talks about that here in the podcast about how he,
3:43
where he feels he falls on that line.
3:46
But guys, just listen to this podcast closely and there's going to be a lot of sections
3:50
that you need to go back, just, you know, go back 15 seconds, go back 30 seconds because
3:54
you just need to hear how these thoughts coalesce in his brain and how they come out of his
3:58
mouth because the thing about it is most of us Christians get really, really scared when
4:03
we get challenged.
4:04
We're like, Oh, yeah, I'm a Christian.
4:06
And then someone gives you one thing, one sentence or one kind of sound bite that they
4:10
heard from their favorite democratic politician or something like that.
4:13
And then you just crumble.
4:14
You just melt.
4:15
Oh, yeah, you know, I don't think abortion's right.
4:17
What about in the case of rape and incest and you're like, ah, and you run away from
4:21
the conversation.
4:22
That's not what we're here to do, right?
4:24
Remember the lion of Judah is at our side.
4:27
We talk about that all the time in this podcast.
4:30
And so Greg Cocle is one of the most tremendous resources that you could have to be able to
4:34
defend your faith.
4:35
And so without further ado, guys, let's get into it.
4:39
Greg Cocle, welcome to Undaunted Life of Man's podcast.
4:42
Well, thank you, Kyle.
4:43
I'm looking forward to chatting with you today.
4:45
I am as well.
4:46
This is highly anticipated.
4:47
I told you off the air that I've got a lot of friends really looking forward to this.
4:50
So we'll get right into it.
4:51
But from the beginning, we'll start just as broadly as we can.
4:54
You're obviously known as an apologist, one of the best and you teach a lot of other people
4:59
to use apologetics and to use argumentation.
5:01
But for you, just in a generic sense, why did you decide to get into apologetics?
5:06
What attracted you to that?
5:08
Well, it's actually not very romantic.
5:11
There were two things.
5:12
I think when I became a Christian in 1973, I lived in Westwood area.
5:17
The West end of Los Angeles, right close to Westwood, where UCLA was in Westwood Village
5:22
at the time.
5:23
There were lots and lots of people that drove the streets.
5:26
It was kind of hip neighborhood and people go to dinner and hangout.
5:31
It turned out that period of time, there were all kinds of people on the streets selling
5:35
their philosophy, whether it was Jehovah's Witnesses or Hare Krishna or some new age group
5:41
or some crazy Christian cult group, whatever.
5:44
So in my free time, I just hang out where the action was and after I became a Christian,
5:49
I just started talking to people about Christ on the street.
5:52
It wasn't hard because everybody is talking to you about their trip.
5:57
I realized that I was ill-equipped to be able to prosecute the issue of the gospel and the
6:04
challenges that they were offering me, and I thought, "Yeah, I better learn more about
6:09
it."
6:10
So there was kind of a pressure based on need.
6:13
In my case, I did not become a Christian in virtue of apologetics.
6:18
I have a lot of buddies that do what I do, and they became Christians because of apologetics.
6:25
J. Water Wallace is a great example or at least robo, for example, and that's why they're
6:30
in it because that's what brought them to Christ, but that was not my situation.
6:34
So that was one part of it.
6:36
I started hanging with a group there in Westwood Village, actually it was a Christian community
6:39
that I moved into and lived for two and a half years, and that gave me a great opportunity
6:46
to start learning some of the reasons why Christianity is actually and profoundly and
6:53
deeply, capital T is true.
6:56
It's the way reality is structured.
6:59
That's the real world.
7:01
And the other thing is just really a personal thing.
7:04
I think my mind works that way.
7:07
There's a lot of people that just are more affective, Kyle, they're just kind of into
7:12
the touchy feeling.
7:14
And I can be a click and in certain circumstances, I could be really emotional, okay, and okay,
7:23
just to be totally transparent.
7:26
I cry at a lot of movies.
7:29
Apart from that, I'm pretty much a down to business guy.
7:33
Like what's the problem, how can I solve it?
7:36
Let's get this, I want to man up to the charge, man up to the situation, let's get it done.
7:43
And what's the best way to get it done?
7:45
And if you've got some other ideas about how to get it done, let's look at it.
7:48
No, that's not going to work and here's why it's not going to work.
7:51
So I just have this native capability of moving towards the problem generally, trying to solve
7:59
it and get it out of the way and to be able to see the most streamlined way to get there.
8:07
And I feel like that's a lot what I do in my writing and in my speaking is I learn from
8:14
the smart guys, we translate, we take the good stuff and then we try to throw the balls
8:19
so people can catch it, but we try to trim off the edges a lot so we don't, there's not
8:24
a lot of confusing stuff in there, we try to get right to the point, we lay it out really
8:30
clearly so it's very easy to follow.
8:34
It seems to me at least, now some of the stuff is more complex of course, and it's not as
8:39
easy to follow as more simple things, but we make it as easy as possible given the topic.
8:45
And so I just kind of have this mentality, this mind set that it's just let's just go
8:52
at it, let's take care of it, let's figure it out, what's the lay of the land, how do
8:58
we maneuver here, how do we get the job done, apologetics really appeals to me in that
9:04
way.
9:05
Absolutely.
9:06
And I think you and I are going to get along just fine because we process things a lot
9:09
the same way.
9:10
And so the good thing about what you've done in terms of apologetics is you're not just
9:14
someone that values it, you're someone that puts it into practice.
9:17
And before we get into a couple of the books that you've written to help people with that,
9:21
back in the early 90s, you founded Standard Reason, which is an organization that essentially
9:25
promises three steps to confident and attractive Christianity and those three in order are
9:30
number one, or maybe not any particular order, number one, knowledge, know what you believe.
9:34
Number two, wisdom, learn the best approach.
9:37
And third is character become a model to others.
9:40
So why did you choose those three things as opposed to anything else?
9:44
Yeah, well, it's an interesting story question.
9:49
And the reason I think people have a mistaken view about how some of these things that they
9:59
look around them and see, like, these are pretty big, these are cool, these are really
10:03
making a difference.
10:04
Wow.
10:05
They think that somebody sat down and figured, here's where I'm going, I've got this long
10:10
range vision, here's the step-by-step process, I'm going to get it done.
10:16
But that isn't the way it happens.
10:17
I heard a funny quote the other day, Mike Tyson said, everybody has a plan until you get punched
10:24
in the face.
10:25
Sure, yep.
10:26
And Eisenhower said something about D-Day, you know, you got all your strategy out there,
10:31
but the minute you land on the beach, everything changes because you're down the midst of the
10:35
conflict.
10:36
In my case, though, there was a motivation to be more effective with the capabilities
10:41
that I had.
10:42
Okay.
10:43
It was, what is it that I do best?
10:45
This is my whole view of decision-making, the will of God.
10:48
I think it's a biblical view, you look at your gifts, you don't poke around listening
10:52
for a voice or a nudge or something like that, trying to figure out what's God hinting at
10:57
me to do.
10:58
I don't think God hints in that sense.
11:00
And that's not a biblical method anyway.
11:02
So I looked at what can I do well?
11:04
And it turns out what I did well was communicate in one way or another, and I hadn't written
11:10
anything really at that point a little bit, but not much.
11:13
But I was getting started, and I had been doing some speaking, and so I decided I want
11:17
to make the best use to my gifts and so focus.
11:20
And so that's why we started standard reason.
11:23
But I realized with some counsel that standard reason had to be bigger than just me having
11:28
a secretary that helped me travel around and speak.
11:32
It had to be bigger than me.
11:34
But that was really a good point.
11:36
And so I began to think, well, then what do I want to accomplish in another person's life?
11:44
What's the bigger picture?
11:45
What is the legacy I want to leave behind?
11:48
What is the mark I want to make?
11:51
And that's when, and this was, by the way, I'd say two years into standard reason before
11:58
we develop the motif that you just described, the knowledge, wisdom, character motif.
12:04
But I realized that if probably the best way to characterize what we do is to build ambassadors.
12:12
So you need to understand, Kyle, that my chief motivation, I'm just talking about me, is
12:19
not evangelism.
12:20
Excuse me.
12:21
Some people introduce me at an event, they'll say, and here's Greg Coco with a great heart
12:25
for evangelism.
12:26
Well, I've never told him that.
12:28
It's amazing.
12:29
They come.
12:30
I'm two MAs, no Ph.D., but I get introduced as doctor all the time.
12:34
And he's written dozens and dozens of books, which really is a true.
12:38
Anyway, people, they're doing their best, right?
12:41
But the thing is I don't have a heart for evangelism.
12:43
I would never characterize myself like that.
12:45
I have plenty of friends that do.
12:47
That's not me.
12:48
I have a heart for discipleship.
12:49
My heart is for the church and the building up the body of Christ.
12:52
Now when you build disciples, and that is the great commission in Matthew 24, Matthew 28,
13:01
that is the great commission to make disciples, but of course evangelism is a logical precursor
13:07
to that.
13:08
First they have to become Christians before they can be discipled as Christians.
13:13
But then those disciples go out and evangelize and disciple more, okay?
13:18
So I see my role in my heartbeat and discipleship.
13:22
So my goal is to want to build a certain type of person.
13:26
And this all began to come together as we're doing our stuff.
13:30
There's a important message here, Kyle.
13:33
It isn't like you get this great vision from God and then you spend your life fulfilling
13:39
it.
13:40
Some people may get that.
13:41
That wasn't me.
13:43
And what I did is I saw a thing I could do better than what I'd been doing.
13:48
That was geared to my gifts and I began to do it.
13:50
And just like I was saying before, how can I organize this?
13:53
How can I solve this problem?
13:55
How can I put it together in a clear way that's easily transferable?
13:59
How can I get down to business, so to speak?
14:02
And that's when I'm working on, I need some way of characterizing what we do.
14:08
And as I thought more and more about it, I thought I'm building Christians.
14:12
Our mission statement starts, we train Christians.
14:14
Those are the first three words.
14:16
And I said, then I thought, what do we do?
14:18
What do we train them to do?
14:19
Well, you know, in the culture, there was a lot of hostility and there's a lot of, it
14:24
still is.
14:25
But in the Christian culture, in our engagements with the rest of the culture, a lot of shrillness.
14:32
Okay.
14:33
And that was the culture wars period before your time.
14:36
And because you said you were like nine years, ninth grade when you went at 9/11.
14:40
So this is back in the, before that, 10 years before that, there was a lot of culture war
14:46
mentality.
14:47
Okay?
14:48
A lot of conflict.
14:49
Plus, I think the way Christians engage was really shallow.
14:52
So what I wanted to see is our engagements to look more like diplomacy than D-day, okay?
15:01
And so that means the approach of a diplomat or an ambassador.
15:07
And that's the word that I landed on because it's a biblical word on 2 Corinthians 5, 20.
15:14
And so we are ambassadors for Christ.
15:16
And so I started to work with that word and it just, I mean, in a way, it wasn't too glamorous.
15:20
I was just sitting down at a table just at our office at stand a reason, very small, fair
15:26
at the time.
15:27
Then I'm just working with words and descriptions.
15:29
And finally, it all fell in place after a few hours.
15:32
What's an ambassador?
15:34
Ambassador has to know a few things, so there's a knowledge component.
15:37
I mean, if you think about an ambassador that the president would send out or a king
15:41
would send out, well, they got to know something, they got to know the message that they're
15:44
being sent out with, foundational.
15:47
They have to be able to maneuver in conversations, okay?
15:51
And they have to be diplomatic, okay?
15:53
So there's a tactical wisdom that's involved there.
15:57
And then finally, if they're jerks while they're doing it, you know, they're really
16:01
going to undermine the enterprise.
16:03
So character is a significant factor in the whole enterprise.
16:07
Absolutely.
16:08
And I think one of the outgrowths of that was obviously the book Tactics.
16:12
And so for those of our listeners, Tactics, it's a game plan for discussing your Christian
16:16
convictions.
16:17
That is on our list of 100 books every modern Christian man should read.
16:21
My guys and my foxhole just finished reading that not too long ago.
16:25
And it just celebrated its 10th anniversary.
16:27
So congratulations on the 10th anniversary of that.
16:29
And you celebrated it.
16:30
Yeah, you celebrated it by releasing a new version with a bunch more, a bunch more content.
16:35
But this is a tactical, obviously, apologetics book, whereas a lot of apologetics books tend
16:40
to be a little bit more descriptive, I would say descriptive apologetics books.
16:44
But can you give us an idea as so, you know, why you wrote more of a tactical approach
16:48
and maybe anything that you've added to the new addition in light of what's been going
16:53
on the last 10 years?
16:54
Sure.
16:55
Kyle, the big thing is, let me just try to think of this in military terms because I
17:00
like military metaphors because I think they're really appropriate to what we do as long as
17:04
they don't, they can be an understanding, but not an attitude of engagement, all right?
17:11
So like I said, we want it more like diplomacy than D-Day.
17:15
However, when you have a military goal to accomplish, you have to not just know what
17:23
that goal is, but you have to have, excuse me, a sense of the lay of the land you need
17:29
until and you have to have a plan of attack, you have to know what you're going to do.
17:36
So you know, I just watched Band of Brothers again the other day and how they, in that
17:42
famous scene on D-Day, they took out those 88's at Breyer Court Manor and it's a magnificent
17:48
tactical enterprise because here they are, they're totally outgunned, but they have a
17:52
small band and they have it figured out, they work out the details of how they're going
17:58
to execute and then they did the job and it was amazing what they accomplished if you've
18:02
seen the movie or read the book, it's just amazing.
18:06
But this is what Christians don't have, Kyle, they don't have a plan.
18:09
They may have like a three steps to God kind of thing, but that's, in my opinion, it's
18:15
the wrong kind of plan.
18:17
That is a helpful plan of explaining the gospel, okay, great.
18:22
This is how you kind of explain the gospel, very good in that.
18:26
And explaining the gospel is a very small part of the process, that is going to surprise
18:31
some people, but think about it.
18:33
Before there can be any harvest, there always has to be a season of gardening, right?
18:39
You're going to have a lot of gardening before you can harvest the fruit.
18:45
And in the same way, a three steps thing, like steps to peace with God or for spiritual
18:50
laws, in that case four, those are good for the end game.
18:55
You know, that's when you're mopping things up, so to speak, you're harvesting there.
18:59
But now we got, that's not gardening stuff.
19:03
And we need to do gardening all the time.
19:04
And especially nowadays, a lot more preparation, gardening, a working, working, working the
19:10
field before you finally can, you know, back to military stuff, you know, breach the wall,
19:16
break through the barriers, finish the job.
19:19
Those three or four step things are finishing the job.
19:23
They are getting to the finish line.
19:26
And so this is where a lot of apologetic conferences were missing something, I thought
19:30
Kyle, and what they were missing was a bridge from the content to the conversation, or a
19:37
bridge for the scholarship to the relationship.
19:39
And that's what the tactical game plan provides.
19:42
How do you get all of that information into play?
19:47
Now by the way, if you recall from just earlier a discussion about being an ambassador, this
19:53
is dealing with the second part of being an ambassador.
19:55
You get the knowledge.
19:56
Okay, now how do you get it in play?
19:59
How do you maneuver?
20:00
How do you have the tactical wisdom, knowledge wisdom, to use the knowledge properly?
20:07
And so what I constructed then is an actual game plan.
20:11
And it's a three step game plan.
20:12
It's not complicated, but it is, it has turned out to be an unbelievably effective way of
20:21
maneuvering in conversations, not getting to the, you know, closing the deal.
20:27
This is not about hitting home runs.
20:29
It's not about, pardon me, closing the deal.
20:33
It's about getting on base.
20:36
It's about getting into the batter's box even more appropriately here, and then see what
20:40
the Holy Spirit's going to do.
20:42
And you know, if we tell people, if you think about it, Kyle, now you and I are fairly aggressive
20:46
people.
20:47
Maybe a lot of your listeners are more aggressive as well.
20:49
There's a whole lot of people who are not near as aggressive as we are.
20:53
And so if we tell them, here's how evangelism works.
20:56
You tell them about Jesus and you get them to pray to receive Christ.
20:59
They're going to go, man, that scares me.
21:01
I'm not going to do that.
21:02
Now they will tell you that, but that's what they're thinking and they're going to sit
21:06
on the bench.
21:07
And the thing that has amazed me most, Kyle, about the response to the tactics book, which
21:15
is subtitled a game plan for discussing your Christian convictions, because that's what
21:20
it is, a game plan.
21:22
The thing that's amazed me the most is that people have said, uniformly, I hear the same
21:27
line over and over and over again for the last 10 years.
21:32
They've said, this book has changed my life.
21:35
And other people have said, it set me free because it has given them a means to get engaged
21:44
in a profitable way without stress and without pressure and without pressuring the other
21:51
person and without having to have all the answers, because in this plan, the other side
21:59
is doing the much of the talking, especially at first, not us.
22:03
We're not preaching.
22:04
We're listening.
22:05
We're asking questions and listening.
22:07
And this has allowed all of those people that are so excited about what they learned
22:12
in the book to get off the bench and get into play and start doing a little gardening.
22:19
And that's the thing for most people, again, that is right.
22:21
Most of the guys that I'm around are fairly forward, but then it is kind of funny, even
22:25
some guys that are forward, that they'll be the first one to step up to maybe defend
22:29
someone physically when you get into some of the more mental aspects.
22:32
They do feel like maybe they're just not equipped, but there was a quote early on in your book
22:36
that I really love.
22:37
"Just make sure it's your ideas that offend and not you, that your beliefs cause the dispute
22:43
and not your behavior."
22:44
The thing that I've seen, Greg, is that so many people tend to struggle with this, especially
22:49
those that study apologetics, because it's easy to come off as condescending, as to know
22:54
it all, especially if you truly believe the things that you think are correct and that
22:59
you have all the answers.
23:01
So how do you combat this idea of coming out looking like you're hovering over the situation
23:07
and you're just going to drop knowledge on people?
23:09
Well, this is one of the easiest questions to answer, and the best way to protect against
23:16
preaching and the way that you're describing is not to preach.
23:20
In other words, you don't make, you know, this is a generalization here and there are exceptions
23:24
to this as the game plan unfolds, but the mentality is you don't make statements.
23:32
You ask questions, let me say that again, because it's so important.
23:37
You don't make statements.
23:39
Okay, this is the way it is and here's your, I know what your beliefs are, they're dead
23:43
wrong and here's the right thing and you ought to believe what I believe and there you go.
23:48
Well, that's, you know, that's pickets charge, right?
23:51
You know, you're just going right into the gunfire and that's crazy.
23:55
And instead, we start out as students of a person's point of view and we start asking
24:04
questions in a very particular way.
24:07
And notice, by the way, if you were an atheist and you and I just started this conversation,
24:13
Kyle, and you said, well, I'm not a Christian.
24:15
I'm an atheist.
24:16
I said, really?
24:17
What kind of atheist are you?
24:18
It's very different.
24:21
What did I do?
24:22
Oh, I just showed interest in the other person's view.
24:24
I didn't get defensive, but I tossed out a question and guess what?
24:27
When I asked the question, whose turn is it to respond?
24:31
It's theirs.
24:32
It's theirs.
24:33
And by the way, there are just, that's the question I got you to respond.
24:37
That's right.
24:38
And so notice that questions create an interactive environment and the pressure shifts.
24:44
If there is any pressure at that point, it shifts off of the Christian and on to the
24:50
atheist and notice when I asked what kind of atheist are you, by the way, some people
24:55
might think, what kind of question is that?
24:56
An atheist isn't atheist.
24:57
Well, there are actually lots of different, or there are a number of different kinds
25:02
of atheists and they characterize their views in different ways.
25:05
And even though maybe most of them are alike, it's all right, just ask the question and
25:10
see what they say.
25:12
And when I do that, I'm asking that because that's the first step of my game plan.
25:18
But notice when I ask it, I'm not intimidated, I'm not shaken, I'm not preaching, I'm not
25:24
telling him he's wrong, I'm asking a question, the ball goes immediately back into his court,
25:31
but in a way that's not pressuring necessarily, I'm curious in this point of view.
25:37
And what else am I getting?
25:39
I'm peeking over the ridge to get the lay of the land of the battlefield, so to speak,
25:47
that I want to enter.
25:48
I'm not barging over the top, I'm carefully looking around and seeing what am I up against
25:56
here?
25:57
Am I outgunned?
26:01
Do I need reinforcements?
26:04
Do I need to wait a little bit?
26:07
Those are important questions to ask, but most people don't ask that, they just kind
26:13
of blunder forward, and that's a good way to get yourself killed in an engagement in
26:18
the military, and the same thing true here.
26:22
So notice how, I'm not preaching in that simple instance, I'm just simply gathering
26:29
more information.
26:30
And by the way, if he told me more detail about his point of view, I might say, okay,
26:36
well, okay, I get it.
26:38
So, no, I just don't believe there's any God out there, there's no, you know, basically
26:43
this world is nuts and bolts, you know, it's like empirical world, it's like, if I can't
26:47
see it, smell it, taste it or hear it, man, it ain't real.
26:50
Right.
26:51
Yeah.
26:52
And so, now when I hear a statement like that, I have more questions.
26:56
All right, I have them in my hip pocket, and I'm going to say, can you see your thoughts?
27:05
No, can you smell them?
27:08
Can you taste?
27:09
Are your thoughts real?
27:10
Sure they are.
27:11
Well, then it looks like there are some things in this world that don't fit that category.
27:15
So that's another step.
27:17
That's a little more advanced step I'm trying to undermine his view, but I'm still using
27:20
questions.
27:21
Right.
27:22
But if he's just going to tell me, I'm just this basic materialistic atheist, and I say,
27:25
really?
27:26
Okay, good.
27:27
Why are you an atheist?
27:29
What convinces you that atheism is true and there is no God?
27:31
Okay.
27:32
What's that?
27:33
That's another question.
27:34
Why am I asking for the reasons for his point of view?
27:37
And again, I'm just curious.
27:40
Most people aren't atheists, you know, if I was talking to you, Kyle, I say, Kyle, you
27:44
know, most people are atheists.
27:46
So why are you an atheist?
27:48
What convinces you there is no God, I'm curious, then let you talk, see what you say.
27:53
I am not obliged at this point to refute you.
27:56
Sure.
27:57
I have not committed myself to that.
27:58
I don't know if I can refute you because I don't know what your view is or why you
28:03
hold it.
28:04
That's why it's so important to use questioning strategies and you've described it so well
28:09
in this book.
28:10
And guys, if you haven't read the book yet, like we're not going to be getting into the
28:12
nuts and bolts of the actual game plan, you've got to pick this up so that you can check
28:16
it out yourself.
28:17
But I've done sales training for people before and I've just told people, I was like, look,
28:20
if you just ask questions and then you answer questions with more questions, they will tell
28:25
you what it is they need in order to buy.
28:28
And so whether you're selling cars or insurance or gym equipment or whatever the situation
28:32
is, the buyer or potential buyer will tell you what it'll take to get them to buy.
28:36
But at the same time, you're not tricking anybody.
28:38
You're not setting a trap for them necessarily so that they can give you that one response
28:43
that elicits, you know, the big ace of spades response that you have.
28:46
But it is important to use that questioning strategy.
28:49
There was another quote towards the end of the book, Greg, that I wanted to kind of get
28:53
your a little bit deeper from you on before we move on.
28:57
It was this, it's since oppression and mayhem are neither religious duties for Christians,
29:02
neurological applications of the teachings of Christ, violence done in the name of Christ
29:07
cannot be laid at his door.
29:09
This conduct might tell you something about people.
29:11
It tells you nothing about God or a gospel.
29:14
And so the interesting thing about this is I don't really hear a cogent response like
29:19
that from Christians very often whenever they bring up, you know, maybe it's honor killings
29:24
and another religion.
29:25
Maybe it's the Crusades.
29:26
It's the things that the Catholic church did, you know, hundreds of years ago or even recently.
29:31
Why do we not hear more Christians responding to the question of evil done in God's name
29:36
in this way?
29:37
Do you think?
29:38
Well, I think the reason we don't hear it is because they don't know that this response.
29:45
But I heard once that you can't hold a religion responsible for the crimes of its heretics.
29:53
Right.
29:54
Well, that's a clever way of putting it, you know, it's an aphorism kind of a clever statement
29:57
there that's easy to remember.
29:59
But that's what my response that you just read is trading on, okay?
30:05
And so people are angry at Christianity because historically there have been Christians, I'm
30:15
sorry, there have been people within Christendom who have done on Christian things.
30:22
And then they generalize that to Christianity, okay?
30:25
Well, that's a mistaken thinking, all right.
30:28
And if I told you, Kyle's ahead of a construction crew and I was the boss of the company and
30:34
I told you to go out and you got to go out and remodel this house and here are my instructions
30:39
and I write them down so they're very clear, okay?
30:42
And then you go down and demolish the house.
30:45
You demo it, man.
30:46
It's gone.
30:47
And people complain to me, no, in one sense, I'm the contractors to the book stops with
30:52
me, but I just want you to think about the fault circumstances.
30:55
It's not my fault, strictly speaking, because I didn't tell you to do that.
30:59
I told you to do the exact opposite and I have it in writing.
31:04
So the fault lies with you, not with the contractor and in the same way there.
31:12
You mentioned honor killings, okay?
31:13
Actually, that's Islam and I don't know about the theological underpinnings of that.
31:20
My suspicion is there is a legitimate theological underpinning for honor killings, but that's
31:27
not good for Islam and there certainly is a theological underpinning for violent jihad.
31:34
It's standard in that religion.
31:36
In fact, peacefulness, the idea of being a peaceful Muslim and deny violent jihad, at
31:41
least in principle, is inconsistent with Islam when you study Islam.
31:47
So there I think there's a legitimate beef.
31:49
But when people look at things like the crusades and the acquisitions and all kinds of stuff
31:54
like that, which it's interesting, you got to go back 500 years to find serious marks
32:00
against Christians of that sort, long memories people have.
32:05
But then I think the issue can be raised just like you read it from the book.
32:12
And here I'm going to use the tactical approach and that is even when I'm making a point,
32:19
I am going to try to use questions.
32:22
So when somebody says, "Look at this terrible thing that Christians did."
32:26
Let's say the crusades or let's call it the inquisition because there's a lot of confusion
32:32
about the crusades started off as a defensive measure against Muslims.
32:36
So Christians defending against Muslims attacking the holy city and butchering other Christians.
32:41
So let's just say the inquisition.
32:45
What about the inquisitions and all of that kind of stuff?
32:49
And the answer is, let me ask you a question.
32:51
Is this the kind of thing that Jesus commanded?
32:54
Now I'm going to let them answer.
32:57
Well, no, I don't think so.
33:00
You're right.
33:01
He didn't command it.
33:02
He didn't command anywhere else in the scriptures that Christians ought to do this.
33:06
No, it's not commanded anywhere in the scriptures.
33:09
Well, they might say, "Well, Old Testament, they did this kind of thing."
33:12
Well, wait a minute.
33:13
I'm not talking about the Old Testament.
33:14
It was a totally different circumstance.
33:15
We're talking about Christianity, right?
33:17
Yeah.
33:18
Okay.
33:19
So I'm talking about Christianity.
33:20
That's New Testament stuff.
33:21
By the way, I'm making a little bit of an artificial distinction here for the sake of
33:25
particular illustration because the testaments do want a mold together in a very significant
33:31
way.
33:32
But for the purposes of this conversation, what matters is what Christians have done
33:37
based on the dictates of Christianity.
33:39
So that limits us to the New Testament, makes my job easier.
33:43
Do you know any collection of New Testament where this kind of behavior is commanded?
33:47
Well, no, I can't think.
33:48
Okay.
33:49
So it's not a teaching of Jesus, right?
33:50
No.
33:51
It's not taught on the New Testament.
33:52
No.
33:53
So that when people who call themselves Christians do this kind of thing, are they really truly
34:00
representing Christianity or not?
34:02
Well, no, they're not.
34:04
Notice by the way, Kyle, everything I've done so far was pretty much a question, but I had
34:09
a plan in my mind.
34:10
That's how I know the direction to go with these questions on this issue.
34:15
But notice how I'm bringing him that person into the conversation.
34:20
And then I'll finally say, well, if what they did wasn't commanded by Jesus and therefore
34:24
what it wasn't taught in the New Testament and therefore is not consistent with Christianity,
34:29
why are you holding this crime against Christianity?
34:32
Right.
34:33
And instead of those people who are acting inconsistent with Christianity, now that's
34:38
closing the deal.
34:39
I'm closing the loop there, but I'm closing it with a question.
34:42
I want him to button it up.
34:44
Well, yeah, I get your point.
34:45
Okay.
34:46
That's a good point.
34:47
And if I were being really, really wanted to take another step, I said, okay, I, with
34:52
this understanding and thank you for seeing that.
34:54
I'm glad you saw that.
34:55
By the way, I'm role-playing with you now again, I'm glad you saw that.
34:59
Okay.
35:00
Great.
35:01
No, we can, can I have your word about something?
35:03
What's that?
35:04
That you won't bring this objection up anymore against Christianity because you understand
35:07
it's not fair.
35:08
And then see what they say.
35:10
Hope.
35:11
I mean, that's what you want to do.
35:12
Some of these people get a good answer and then in next conversation, they're bringing
35:16
the same nonsense up again.
35:17
Right.
35:18
This is not honorable for them to do that.
35:20
And so sometimes this question is helpful.
35:22
Well, it's not honorable and it's also intellectually dishonest, but most people don't like to operate
35:27
with any type of intellectual honesty meter.
35:30
They don't like to be above a certain amount.
35:32
And that's the thing is, is guys, for those of you listening that have not read this book,
35:36
you've got to go pick up this book because you actually have in that book, you've got
35:39
a lot of kind of back and forth that you actually had, you actually start out the book with a
35:43
gal that you were in the checkout line and she was wearing, she was a weekend and kind
35:47
of your interaction with her.
35:48
Right.
35:49
And it gives you the tools in your tool belt and it gives you, you know, extra bullets
35:52
for your gun in order to be able to use these conversations.
35:56
And so guys, it is a must read, you've got to pick that book up.
35:59
But another book that you read or that you wrote years and years after the tactics book
36:03
is a much different book.
36:05
It's very different from tactics.
36:06
It's called the story of reality, how the world began, how it ends and everything important
36:11
that happens in between.
36:12
And so I guess just briefly in your own words, can you just give us a very brief synopsis
36:18
of the book?
36:19
And then I want to kind of dig into a couple of the concepts that came forth from that
36:22
book.
36:23
I'd be glad to, and you're right, it is a very different kind of book.
36:28
In fact, it's interesting because given our knowledge, wisdom, character, motif, the second,
36:38
the first book we just talked about falls in the wisdom area.
36:43
Knowledge is an accurately informed mind.
36:45
Wisdom is an artful method and character is an attractive manner.
36:49
It's his wisdom and an effective method, but this book, the story of reality, is a book
36:57
about knowledge.
36:58
And if we are going to defend Christianity, we better know what Christianity is.
37:05
You'd be amazed, Kyle, about how little people understand about Christianity.
37:12
And when I say Christianity here, I don't just mean, in a certain sense, the teachings
37:17
of Jesus or the gospel, the gospel in its simple form or the teachings of Jesus which
37:26
are broader, because both the gospel and the teachings of Jesus are embedded in a larger
37:32
understanding of what the world is like.
37:35
And that's called, by the way, a worldview.
37:39
And it's interesting that the gospel, as Francis Shafer used to say, did not start with Jesus
37:46
loves you.
37:47
You know, it starts, curiously, the gospel of John goes all the way back to the beginning.
37:54
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God.
37:56
The Word was God.
37:57
He was in the beginning with God, and all things came into being through Him, and apart
38:02
from Him, nothing came into being that is coming to being.
38:05
Now this one called the Word, we learn a few verses later, is Jesus, became a man in Jesus.
38:11
But notice how John is taking the life of Jesus and placing it in the context of the
38:16
entire story.
38:19
He's the one who started all out in the beginning.
38:22
And so what I wanted to do with the story of reality, the book, which the subtitle is,
38:28
how the world began, how it ends, and everything important that happens in between.
38:34
The reason that I wrote the book is I wanted to give followers of Christ and also tire-kickers
38:41
a broader perspective.
38:44
I wanted them to see that what Christianity is, in fact, is a picture of the world.
38:55
It's a, to use maybe another metaphor, it is a map of the way reality is.
39:02
It's a claim about the world that fits the world the way it really is.
39:06
And this is why I call it the story of reality, because so many people are given, even Christians,
39:12
to relativizing religious views.
39:16
"Oh, well, that's your faith.
39:20
That's your belief."
39:21
And they treat religion like a fantasy that makes us feel better.
39:25
Mark Marx said, "Religion is the opiate of the people."
39:29
Well, that's the way a lot of people think about it.
39:31
And this is also the way a lot of Christians approach it.
39:35
But one thing that I learned from Francis Schaeffer early on in the '70s, as I read
39:41
his material and when he was still alive, is that Christianity is true truth.
39:48
It's the real McCoy.
39:49
It's capital T truth.
39:51
It is not just our truth.
39:53
It is just like gravity is not just our truth.
39:58
Gravity describes the way the world is.
40:00
And listen, if you don't believe in gravity, you're not going to just float away.
40:03
Right.
40:04
So it's still there doing its job.
40:07
And the same thing is if you reject God and he's real, he's not going away.
40:11
You may not believe in him, but he's still there.
40:13
And so what I try to do in this book is lay out that story, starting from the beginning,
40:19
and it follows five main topics, which are the plot line of the story.
40:25
And those topics are basically one word, God, man, Jesus, cross, and resurrection.
40:36
And here I mean final resurrection to reward and judgment.
40:39
So you've got the beginning and the end, then you have the important things in between.
40:44
So we learn something about who God is and what his world is like, and that's the world
40:49
we live in.
40:50
We learn something important about man that he's both beautiful, but he's broken.
40:55
And because he's broken, he's guilty because the brokenness is moral and he caused it.
41:00
So he is guilty.
41:01
And that's why he's been banished and he's in trouble and he's messed up the whole world.
41:05
That's why there's a problem of evil.
41:08
And when you think about our whole book, it's about our whole story is about the problem
41:11
of evil.
41:12
And then God initiates a rescue plan, and what's key in our story is that man doesn't
41:17
rescue himself.
41:18
He can't do that.
41:19
The other story, man, rescues himself in this story, God rescues man by becoming a human
41:27
being himself and the person of Jesus.
41:30
And then Jesus, through the way he lived, he lived the life we should have lived, but
41:34
didn't.
41:35
And the way he died, he took the punishment we should have received, but now we have opportunity
41:42
for mercy, but the way he lived and the way he died provides a solution.
41:47
That's a rescue and the decision that any person makes about Jesus determines what happens
41:56
to them at the final resurrection.
42:00
And that's either going to be perfect justice, which is punishment for everything you've
42:05
ever done wrong and God misses nothing, or perfect mercy, which is forgiveness for everything
42:11
you've ever done wrong and God misses nothing.
42:15
So you see there, there's the outline of the book.
42:17
There's the plot line of the story.
42:19
Also, God, man, Jesus cross resurrection easy to remember, okay, throwing the ball show
42:24
people can catch it.
42:26
That the way I see this book as why I think it's really a significant and important book,
42:31
if that doesn't sound too self-serving.
42:32
It's all good.
42:33
Yeah.
42:34
It's because, you know, over half a century ago, wait a minute, no, let me just think here
42:41
over 70 years ago, C.S. Lewis wrote a book called Bear Christianity, which is still one
42:48
of the bestsellers.
42:49
And it's meant to describe the kind of things that I describe here, but a lot of people
42:53
won't read it because they think he's too hard, which drives me nuts because he's one
42:57
of the easiest writers to read on difficult topics, it seems to me, and very elegant and
43:03
very insightful.
43:04
But what I want to do is try to fill that niche now in the Christian's life who isn't
43:11
going to read Lewis and mere Christianity, maybe he'll read Cokal in the story of reality.
43:16
So I'm standing on Lewis's shoulders, so to speak, and on the shoulders of others who
43:20
mentored me to try to then convey the story of reality in a way that people get.
43:25
And by the way, this answers two questions that are really critical, and that is the
43:30
problem of evil and why Jesus is the only way of salvation.
43:35
And the answer is the problem of evil because when you understand the story, we realized
43:38
the world didn't start out that way, but because we disobeyed God, we broke the world.
43:44
It's our fault, not God's.
43:46
And so what God is doing is he's fixing it.
43:49
It's a rescue plan first to rescue us, to fix us, and then he's going to fix the world
43:53
that we broke.
43:55
But that's a long-term plan.
43:57
It's not going to happen tomorrow because rescuing us first is the most important thing.
44:03
And it also tells us why Jesus is the only way of salvation.
44:06
And simply put, he's the only one who solved the problem.
44:11
And complicated problems, or complex problems, or singular problems, let me put it that way,
44:18
often have singular solutions.
44:22
Other problems, problem of evil, often have singular solutions, Jesus rescuing us.
44:28
And so all of this comes together in the book, The Story of Reality, in a way I think people
44:34
can grasp it, and non-Christians could understand it.
44:38
Because you know, if you've read the book, there's not a lot of Christian lingo here.
44:41
I don't sound like a Baptist or a Presbyterian or a kind of call or anything like that.
44:45
I try to sound like a thoughtful person is reflecting on issues that really matter.
44:49
Well, and that's the thing that I loved about the book after I finished it.
44:52
I just read it here recently, is that it is very weighty while at the same time being
44:56
very accessible.
44:57
And guys, there's so much that we could go into in this book, but we've got limited
45:00
time and more things to cover.
45:01
But there is one section that is probably my favorite section of the book because I almost
45:06
feel like you were screaming it as you were writing it because I just, I love this section
45:09
so much.
45:10
I want to read the quote here.
45:11
It's this.
45:12
There is a saying that has been helpful in some ways, but I think it is misleading in
45:15
this regard.
45:16
The saying goes, God has a wonderful plan for your life.
45:20
From what I understand now, that perspective is in the wrong order.
45:24
The story is not so much about God's plan for your life as it is about your life for
45:28
God's plan.
45:30
Let that sink in.
45:31
God's purposes are central, not yours.
45:34
Once you are completely clear of this fact, many things are going to change for you.
45:38
And so Greg, my question to you is this, it's we live in such a me centric world, but there's
45:43
so many mega church pastors and I'm not picking on them necessarily except I kind of am, that
45:47
have sold millions and millions of books by making people feel the focus that God has
45:53
on them as opposed to focus they should have on God and his plan.
45:57
Why should we look at that in the opposite manner?
46:00
Why should we look at it in the manner that you laid out in the book?
46:03
Well, it's not just the books too, but if you go to virtually any church service that is
46:10
meant to appeal to the young or to the youth, there tries to be hip and there's a lot of
46:15
churches like that.
46:17
If you listen to the songs, the songs are way weighted on singing about ourselves.
46:24
And they're in first person, not plural, it's not we are singing to God, it's I am singing
46:31
this song.
46:32
Okay, remember Jesus said when you pray, say our Father.
46:36
So we're corporate in the church, right?
46:38
But we're singing individually, not corporately.
46:41
That's one concern.
46:42
That's similar to what you're talking about and also it's reporting our own feelings.
46:48
It's all about how we feel or maybe how we want to feel and that's why we're singing
46:52
the songs about feeling so that we can start feeling this way and the songs are anthropocentric.
46:59
They're centered on the man rather than theocentric or Christocentric.
47:04
So that's another symptom here, it's not universal, but there is certainly this trend
47:09
and everybody listening here who goes to church, I guarantee if you think about it, you'll
47:14
see it.
47:15
This Sunday when you listen to your church service online, hopefully because most people
47:19
can't gather together, then what you're going to do is you're not right now at least, but
47:24
what you're going to do is you're going to hear this quality of the songs and it might
47:26
be the first time you actually noticed it.
47:28
The reason I put this in is at the beginning of the book that towards the beginning, it's
47:32
under the God section because I make the point that our story starts with God.
47:39
In the beginning, God, why does the story start with Him?
47:42
It's because the story is about Him.
47:43
The story is not about us and that's the lead-in to the citation that you just read.
47:51
Some might recognize a portion of that as a part of a track that campus USAID uses and
47:57
I have used in the past many times, I haven't had it memorized and I used it for evangelism
48:02
and it was helpful for evangelism 50 years ago and it was probably maybe for some people
48:07
nowadays, but times have changed quite a bit, but it starts out before spiritual laws with
48:12
this law.
48:13
God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.
48:17
I understand the reason they start that way because there is a sense of which it's true
48:23
and certainly God does love them when you're starting with something positive, it's not
48:27
like God hates you and it has a hell of a plan for your life, so there's a plus there,
48:31
but what has happened, I think, is as that idea seeped in a little deeper to people,
48:37
the tale begins wagging the dog.
48:40
We start thinking that the story of reality is about us and getting our needs now, and
48:50
having our best life now to cite a title of a popular book from a teacher who has this
48:55
kind of focus and that's not what the book is about.
48:59
The book is not about us, it's not about us getting our needs met, it's not about us
49:04
feeling good, it's not about us going where we want to go, it's not about us getting a
49:09
wonderful plan fulfilled in our life in the sense that most people think of wonderful
49:15
personal plans nowadays.
49:17
Does God have a wonderful plan?
49:19
Yes, he does, but that plan by the way is going to include a lot of hardship and difficulty
49:25
and suffering because that is the plan God uses to make us into someone, people that
49:33
are wonderful to inherit eternity as wonderful people.
49:37
The wonderfulness is not to be largely experienced in this life, and this is absolutely crystal
49:45
clear when you read through the story, and particularly the New Testament, the promises
49:51
that are made to God's people are promises of difficulty and hardship and suffering.
49:57
So then when this happens to people who are followers of Christ and they are thinking
50:01
that the story is about them, they get all confused and then they wonder what happened,
50:07
where did God go, what happened to my wonderful life, and they are misunderstanding the concept
50:13
of a wonderful life here.
50:15
By the way, I'm not faulting campus crusade or what's called crew now, I think they're
50:18
great people and have done great work.
50:20
I'm just simply saying that this statement that is true, it can be misunderstood in a
50:25
way that gets people confused about the way things work.
50:30
And so that's why I said it's not really about God's wonderful plan for our lives as much
50:37
as it is about our lives for God's wonderful plan.
50:44
And that means that my needs and my concerns and my plans are secondary to God's purposes
50:54
in the world.
50:55
And by the way, we are all going to learn that sooner or later.
50:58
We may not accept it and it will be grumpy all our lives, but we're going to learn it
51:03
because that's the way God organizes things.
51:05
He is going to make sure that his plans get fulfilled before our plans do.
51:11
And if we don't see that's the way it works, we're going to have a lot of frustration until
51:15
we get it straight.
51:17
The tale does not wag the dog.
51:20
Well, and there there is a lot of power and order and the ordering of things.
51:24
And so guys, that's just one section of this book.
51:26
So again, that those are the two books for a man that I would highly, highly suggest you
51:29
get.
51:30
But there were several times there was something kind of I noticed when I was reading the story
51:33
of reality that several times in the book, you mentioned social justice, and it's almost
51:38
like you bring it up and you seemingly are very perturbed by that whole movement, but
51:43
you don't really go into a full, throated explanation of your grievance.
51:48
But here recently, for those of you that have been paying attention, Prager, you, you did
51:51
a Prager, you video called the intolerance of tolerance and I've already got several
51:56
million views just here in the first few weeks, but you basically make the argument that tolerance
52:00
in the year 2020 is essentially that you agree with politically correct or left wing thinking.
52:05
But really that in order to be genuinely tolerant of someone, you have to disagree with them
52:10
that disagreement is the key to tolerance and without it, there there is no true tolerance.
52:15
It's just not possible true tolerances.
52:17
We don't treat all ideas as equally valuable, but we do treat all people as equally valuable.
52:23
So as kind of a, you know, just a macro view of to what your video is, because obviously
52:28
I'll put that in the show notes so guys can take a look at it, but why is that in distinction
52:32
so important when it comes to tolerance and there's some being some form of disagreement?
52:38
Well, yeah, you got a, you must have watched the video a few times because that was a great
52:43
outline that you offered quickly there.
52:46
It's actually seen it had three million views as of yesterday.
52:49
So at the two week market, it had three million viewers.
52:52
I was really thrilled with that and people want to see it, go to PragerU.com and look
52:57
at five minute videos and I think it's the third one in the top row there, the intolerance
53:01
of tolerance, but the reason that this is such an important thing to understand, there's
53:09
a show game going on with tolerance and what it passes for tolerance now is not what true
53:17
tolerance is, as you pointed out.
53:19
Real tolerance is a virtue, but what people have done is they've twisted the definition
53:23
of tolerance and in their favor and then it still retains the feeling of a virtue because
53:31
of the same words being used, but this is kind of like double speak because the definition
53:37
is actually just the opposite of true tolerance and as you pointed out, tolerance nowadays
53:42
say you can't disagree with my view.
53:44
If you disagree with my view, you're not tolerant.
53:46
If you think I'm wrong, you're not tolerant.
53:47
If you think that you're right, you're not tolerant.
53:50
And what that does is it's a tool, it's a name-calling tool to silence opposition.
53:56
That's all it is.
53:58
It's a name-calling tool, you intolerant person to silence opposition.
54:03
Notice by the way, if we're talking about something like same-sex marriage and whether
54:07
this is good for our culture or not, and then you give a view that's contrary to the politically
54:13
correct view position and they call you intolerant.
54:17
Notice they've changed the subject because we were talking about a view and when they
54:21
call you intolerant, now they're talking about your character.
54:25
So this is just simple name-calling.
54:27
They've got off the topic and they've just calling names.
54:30
I mean, what if they told me intolerant and I said, "Well, you're ugly."
54:34
Now, I won't actually say that, obviously, even if they were because it's bad manners
54:41
and it's not relevant because they could be really ugly and they still could be right
54:46
and I could be really intolerant, I could have all kinds of vices of my character and
54:50
I could still be right about this point.
54:52
But this is a shaming technique.
54:54
It's an attempt to bully someone who doesn't believe the way, kind of the aristocracy right
55:02
now wants us to be, the left-leaning aristocracy and so they bully us.
55:07
For all the anti-bullying sentiment that they seem to believe in or express, they're the
55:13
biggest bullies on the planet and this is one way they bully.
55:16
And when they bully like this, it silences the view that we have, which is really important.
55:23
And this is why we need to know the shell game that's going on so we can work around
55:30
that shell game and I have even in the book of tactics, I have a tactical maneuver for
55:34
dealing with the challenge when people say that you're intolerant, that is meant to
55:40
reveal the shell game and try to get us both back to business talking about the issue.
55:46
And by the way, if we don't, if we can't do that, then we're in big trouble because
55:51
we're just not going to be allowed to speak our view because we'll be shouted down with
55:57
character assassinations, unfair, unreasonable, inaccurate character assassinations, by the
56:04
way, because as you pointed out, if you want to express true tolerance, you cannot agree
56:10
with the person.
56:11
You do not tolerate people you agree with.
56:15
You agree with them.
56:17
You only tolerate people you disagree with, but choose to treat with respect and grace
56:24
as human beings made in the image of God, even though they disagree with you.
56:29
So this is a very, very important point.
56:31
One other thing I want to add, because you brought up the point of social justice.
56:34
I'm not against justice, I'm forced justice.
56:38
Social justice is a term of art that means it's a very specialized term that is part
56:43
of a broad philosophy called critical theory.
56:47
And social justice is a way of amending the oppressive errors of what, of Westerners past.
56:56
I can't get into the whole thing here, but it's the idea that has totally consumed the
57:01
academy and the minds of our young people.
57:04
So I'm, I can't see your, your ethic, let me just use myself as an example.
57:09
I, as it turns out, Greg Koko, no matter what character I have, no matter what, what virtues
57:15
I display, I am among the worst of people on the planet.
57:21
And the reason is, is one, because I'm white, two, because I'm male, three, because I'm cis
57:28
gendered, that is, I'm sexually male and I believe I'm male, three, because I'm heterosexual,
57:36
more because I'm heteronormative, which means I think heterosexuality is right.
57:42
And five, because I'm a Christian.
57:45
Those are five huge marks against me, just because of the groups that I belong in.
57:52
I mean, some of them are beliefs, but most of them are things I can't control.
57:57
The fact that I'm male, that I'm white, for example, but these things just because I'm
58:02
in the group, make me bad, that's critical theory.
58:07
I'm an oppressor in virtue of that.
58:09
And everybody that's not what I just described are people who are the oppressed.
58:14
And what social justice is meant to do, here's what that term means, is to repair the breach,
58:20
is to exact from the oppressors, um, a just payment to rectify the harms that have been
58:30
brought on the oppressed victims.
58:33
And that is any one of color, anyone that has, doesn't have, um, standard, uh, gender
58:40
identifications or standard sexual practices and on and on and on, this is why I don't
58:46
use the term regarding my Christianity, social justice, I believe in justice.
58:51
And I believe in justice in social circumstances, but I don't believe in social justice.
58:56
That means something else.
58:58
And thanks again for those answers, Greg, I really appreciate it.
59:01
In addition to a lot of the things that you've talked about in this podcast, one thing that
59:04
you talk about quite often is the issue of abortion.
59:08
And for me as a, as a pro-life Christian, uh, for me, a lot of times I'm pretty disappointed
59:13
in how abortion is handled by most churches.
59:16
I either feel like a lot of churches either kind of softly decry abortion and the evils
59:21
of abortion or, or they just don't discuss it at all.
59:24
I mean, I've, I've even been in Sunday schools where people are kind of making the pro-abortion
59:28
arguments about, well, you know, in the case of rape and incest or, you know, well, if,
59:32
if the mother's already poor and this is in my Sunday school, um, for you, I guess I
59:37
would ask, um, I'll just combine these two questions.
59:40
I was going to ask you, what are some of the most common pro-life or pro, or sorry, one
59:46
of the most common pro-abortion, uh, pro-choice arguments that you get and kind of how do
59:51
you deal with them?
59:52
And I want to know what is the best argument that you've ever heard from a pro-abortion
59:57
person and how did you deal with that as well?
59:59
Well, I've never heard a good argument from the pro-abortion person to just to cut to
1:00:04
the chase on that one.
1:00:05
Um, what I've heard is things that are emotionally subjectively appealing.
1:00:12
There's lots of good rhetoric and they play the rape card, for example, which is really,
1:00:16
it's sad because this is one of the most egregious crimes that could ever be committed against
1:00:21
any human being.
1:00:23
And, and we don't want to, um, give the short shrift to the tragedy that this isn't a person's
1:00:29
life.
1:00:30
Um, however, you know, it, it, it is irrelevant to the question of abortion and this will
1:00:36
be clear in just a moment, but pro-abortion are using it as a rhetorical device to make
1:00:41
people who believe a killing an unborn child is wrong and make them look, uh, heartless
1:00:49
regarding the woman.
1:00:51
And so, uh, anyway, so let me just back up a bit, bit, you, unless a person understands
1:00:59
the moral logic of the pro-life view, they are not going to be able to effectively, consistently
1:01:06
deal with any of these other issues.
1:01:08
There is a foundational issue here.
1:01:11
Okay.
1:01:12
And so I want to give the moral logic.
1:01:13
It's very simple.
1:01:14
It's in the form of a syllogism, which is a straightforward argument, two statements
1:01:18
and a conclusion.
1:01:19
Okay.
1:01:20
And, um, this is the, this is the, the logic that a lot of Christians don't clearly understand,
1:01:27
which is why they fall into these other errors.
1:01:30
And here's the way that argument goes, it's wrong to take the life of an innocent human
1:01:36
being.
1:01:37
Okay.
1:01:38
Now, we can think of generalizations like if, you know, there's, there's friendly fire
1:01:42
in a war.
1:01:43
I mean, you did it, but you did try to and that's what happens and circumstances like that
1:01:47
and blah, blah, blah, but generally speaking, this is a truism.
1:01:51
We can rely on this.
1:01:52
Certainly it's wrong to take the life of an innocent human being for the reasons that
1:01:55
people have abortions because they're poor, because they're, because they, because they
1:02:00
don't interfere with their career, or blah, blah, blah, blah.
1:02:05
We know the things.
1:02:06
Okay.
1:02:07
So that's the first line.
1:02:09
It's, and most people agree with that and you could ask them, do you think it's wrong
1:02:12
to take the life of an innocent human being generally speaking?
1:02:16
We can't just kill people at will.
1:02:18
Yes.
1:02:19
Of course.
1:02:20
That's, that's, I agree with that.
1:02:21
Fine.
1:02:22
Second premise, abortion takes the life of an innocent human being, uh, nobody knows when
1:02:30
life begins.
1:02:31
Wait a minute.
1:02:32
Is it a law?
1:02:33
Is it moving?
1:02:34
Is it growing rather?
1:02:35
Not moving.
1:02:36
Is it growing?
1:02:37
Yes.
1:02:38
Well, then it's alive.
1:02:39
The QED.
1:02:40
That's the end of it.
1:02:41
If it's growing, it's alive.
1:02:42
Period.
1:02:43
It's not a stalagmite or a stalactite that's growing for those kinds of reasons.
1:02:49
It's, it's, it's growing because it's biologically alive.
1:02:51
Now we know it's alive.
1:02:54
Okay.
1:02:55
What is it?
1:02:56
That's the key question.
1:02:57
Uh, it's mom's body.
1:02:58
No, it's not mom's body.
1:02:59
You ever watched CSI?
1:03:03
You look at the genetics.
1:03:04
It's not mom's body.
1:03:05
It's something.
1:03:06
It's someone else.
1:03:07
Right.
1:03:08
Doesn't have the same genes as mom.
1:03:09
All right.
1:03:10
It, it, it maybe have sexual organs of a male.
1:03:13
Mom's not a male.
1:03:14
Mom's a female.
1:03:15
Okay.
1:03:16
So, you know, I mean, obviously it's not mom.
1:03:18
It's inside mom, but it's not mom.
1:03:21
Okay.
1:03:22
Um, and well, what, what is it then?
1:03:23
Well, the genetics show what it is.
1:03:25
It's a human being.
1:03:26
That's the fingerprint or the, that's the signature.
1:03:29
It's got a human signature.
1:03:30
So we know there's no contest.
1:03:31
This is just basic embryology.
1:03:34
Scientifically, this is not contested.
1:03:37
The unborn is a innocent human being.
1:03:39
Okay.
1:03:40
Notice I'm not using personal language.
1:03:42
It's very misleading.
1:03:44
Stick with the human being language.
1:03:46
The reason is, is I don't think human beings are valuable because they're human, because
1:03:49
they're persons.
1:03:50
They have this additional quality called personhood.
1:03:52
They're valuable because of humans.
1:03:54
Period.
1:03:55
Okay.
1:03:56
So, uh, so if it's wrong to take the life of an innocent human being and abortion takes
1:04:02
the life of an innocent human being, both factual statements, one, an ethical statement
1:04:06
that people agree with, second one, a biological, uh, scientific statement that's accurate.
1:04:11
Well, then abortion is wrong.
1:04:14
That's the conclusion that follows of necessity.
1:04:16
That's our argument.
1:04:17
Okay.
1:04:18
Now, if we get this into our mind, the objections fall on either side of those sylloges that
1:04:23
need premises.
1:04:25
And I kind of quickly answered a few objections about whether it's alive and whether it's
1:04:29
a human being and stuff like that.
1:04:30
No, there they are.
1:04:31
That's just science.
1:04:32
They look closely at it.
1:04:33
Well, maybe it's not wrong to kill an innocent human being.
1:04:36
Maybe it's wrong to kill an innocent human person.
1:04:38
So they're going to go back to the first premise.
1:04:41
And so I'm going to ask a question.
1:04:42
Okay.
1:04:43
So it's okay to kill human beings who are not persons.
1:04:45
Yeah.
1:04:46
That's that's it.
1:04:47
Okay.
1:04:48
What's the difference?
1:04:49
That's my question.
1:04:50
What's the difference?
1:04:51
What do you mean?
1:04:52
What's the difference between a human being and a person?
1:04:53
Oh, I don't know.
1:04:54
Well, wait a minute.
1:04:55
Right.
1:04:56
You don't know.
1:04:57
You just told me it's okay to kill human beings who are not persons.
1:05:01
And but you don't know what the difference is.
1:05:03
Maybe I should kill you.
1:05:05
Maybe you're not one of those persons.
1:05:07
Maybe you're in the way in the middle of the sidewalk for me.
1:05:09
And I don't like that.
1:05:12
And you're not a person.
1:05:13
So I can kill you.
1:05:14
Nobody.
1:05:15
I am a person.
1:05:16
Really?
1:05:17
What makes you a person?
1:05:18
Oh, then people are going to get a couple of all kinds of lists, but the list are arbitrary.
1:05:22
So there's just there's my quick analysis.
1:05:25
And by the way, when people try to raise even Christians, well, what about rape and
1:05:29
her incest?
1:05:30
So I mean, then I asked them this question.
1:05:32
Why do you think I think abortion is wrong?
1:05:36
Well, you think it kills an innocent human being.
1:05:38
I said, right.
1:05:39
It does.
1:05:40
Okay.
1:05:41
So in the cases of rape and incest, would abortion still kill an innocent human being?
1:05:48
Well, yeah.
1:05:50
Okay.
1:05:51
Well, then why would it be justified to kill that innocent baby because the baby was conceived
1:05:56
under questionable circumstances?
1:05:58
Right.
1:05:59
It's the same.
1:06:00
It's the exact same.
1:06:01
Yeah.
1:06:02
So Oh, well, they're poor.
1:06:03
Okay.
1:06:04
Well, then his poor, can she kill her two year old?
1:06:06
Well, no, of course not.
1:06:08
Well, then why could she kill her, her, her, her unborn child at a different age and a
1:06:14
different and a little different location?
1:06:18
What why does age and location make a difference?
1:06:21
So these are the kinds of questions I'm asking because I understand how this problem works
1:06:25
because we have training on it at standard reason.
1:06:27
Notice how I'm, I've got the idea, I've got a plan in my mind, and then I'm employing
1:06:31
the plan also using questions when dealing with the issue.
1:06:35
Well, that's such an important distinction is using questioning because that goes back
1:06:38
to what we talked about earlier with tactics.
1:06:40
Right.
1:06:41
I recorded a podcast a while back called answering 17 pro-choice arguments.
1:06:46
And the thing about that is every single one of the arguments, I gave the listener questions
1:06:50
that they could ask in response as, as a, for instance, well, what about in the case of
1:06:54
rape or incest?
1:06:55
A good kind of direct question is should a, a child be, be given the death penalty for
1:07:01
the sins of its father?
1:07:02
Right?
1:07:03
Like nobody would agree with that.
1:07:04
Like if my dad goes and knocks, knocks over a liquor store and kills the guy in the process,
1:07:09
I don't go to jail.
1:07:10
I don't get the death penalty.
1:07:11
Like that's not any one of those things.
1:07:13
But when you have questions that gets you deeper into the conversation, but also when
1:07:18
you ask a question, the listener has to reckon with their own ideology.
1:07:22
And if their ideology is, is faulty, it'll become very apparent.
1:07:26
And again, if they have any like intellectual honesty inside of them, they're going to have
1:07:30
to reckon with that directly.
1:07:32
And that I love that, that you went into that in, in your explanation there.
1:07:36
And to wrap up here, obviously this is a man's podcast.
1:07:39
It's called a man's podcast.
1:07:41
The overwhelming majority of our listeners are men.
1:07:43
We talk about spiritual, mental and physical resilience all the time.
1:07:46
And so on the subject of manhood, one of the reasons why we even started this ministry
1:07:50
is because a lot of men that we've talked with kind of have this dichotomy in their
1:07:54
brains.
1:07:55
It might be false, but it is their dichotomy that you can be a man or you can be a Christian
1:07:59
Christian.
1:08:00
And they, they go into these churches and they see the, the softness of, of Christ followers.
1:08:07
They see the softness of the pastors and, and the worship ministers.
1:08:10
They just seem like really soft guys.
1:08:12
The pastor just can't even bring themselves to talk about the line of Judah.
1:08:16
They just run to the Lamb of God and they only want to talk about the Lamb of God.
1:08:20
So from your perspective, as we wrap up here, last question of the day, what, what is the
1:08:24
state of masculinity in the modern day church?
1:08:29
And what would you say to those men that might have that dichotomy in their brain?
1:08:33
That is, you know, maybe a stumbling block for them discovering Jesus?
1:08:36
Well, I, I think there's a lot of confusion and it's complicated now by the notion that
1:08:44
even being male and female is considered a social construction.
1:08:50
It's interesting that, that is, it's just an invention of society and has nothing to
1:08:55
do with body parts.
1:08:56
So being a female has nothing to do with having a uterus, being able to lactate and
1:09:00
have children has nothing to do with that.
1:09:03
Being a male has absolutely nothing to do with having testicles, not in the modern thinking.
1:09:07
It's all, it's just bizarre.
1:09:09
It's crazy.
1:09:11
And so consequently with all the confusion and by that way, that's the nature of the recent
1:09:15
infusion.
1:09:16
But even in the last 50 years, there has been a feminizing of males and an attempt of culture
1:09:23
to make women and men be exactly the same.
1:09:30
There's no difference.
1:09:31
I remember seeing, and you see this in films all the time, virtually every movie you watch,
1:09:37
the person in charge is a woman.
1:09:40
And in every action movie, there is always at least one woman who's got, you know, who's,
1:09:47
she's got this unbelievable figure.
1:09:50
She's really skinny and she's really stacked.
1:09:53
And she's, and she weighs about 98 pounds, but she could throw 300 pound guys left and
1:09:58
right over her shoulders.
1:10:00
Of course, of course.
1:10:01
It says Hollywood, okay, and I keep telling my daughters, honey, this is Hollywood.
1:10:05
This is not reality, but why are they doing that?
1:10:08
Because they're trying to erase the dist, and by the way, and women are just as cold
1:10:13
blooded, either killers in the bad sense or killers in the defensive or in good sense
1:10:19
that the killer heroes, they can kill with impunity without even thinking about it.
1:10:23
Just like a guy can, there is no difference.
1:10:26
Okay, that's what they're trying to tell you.
1:10:28
But of course, there is a difference.
1:10:30
It doesn't mean that women can't do the kinds of jobs that men can do, but men and women
1:10:34
have different natures.
1:10:36
That means they are born with a different set of wiring and wiring both, I think, physically
1:10:43
and soullishly, because God intended different things for men, generally speaking, and women
1:10:52
generally speaking, so I'm speaking in generalities here.
1:10:56
I'm not saying a woman can't be a leader or can't be a great soldier, so to speak.
1:11:04
I'm just finishing a book called A Woman of No Importance about probably the most significant
1:11:08
spy behind the lines in the war in the Eastern theater, the Western theater, rather, in Europe
1:11:15
before and after D-Day.
1:11:16
She was unbelievable for Junior Hall and what she was able to accomplish, but so women
1:11:22
could do these things.
1:11:23
I'm talking in general terms here, because if we lose the general idea, then we all get
1:11:29
lost in the mix up and this is a part of the problem we have right now.
1:11:34
Men and women have natures, and the natures dictate the general kinds of capabilities
1:11:43
they have.
1:11:45
Women reproduce, human beings have long gestation times, nine months, and we have a long time
1:11:52
before the offspring become adults, 13 to 14 years in terms of biology, twice that long
1:12:02
according to sociology, right?
1:12:05
That means women who bear the children and who nurse and care have to have the capability
1:12:12
to do that and give their time to that.
1:12:15
So they need protectors and providers that will protect and provide for the family.
1:12:22
And so in the nature of a woman is to protect and guard, and this is why mom doesn't want
1:12:29
kids to go to war, but dad is willing, you know, you go fight the battle boy, you know,
1:12:34
knock them out.
1:12:35
They have a different point of view because mom's keeping them in the nest and dad's
1:12:40
pushing them out of the nest and we need both because there's a balance there and that's
1:12:44
how good children get raised into good adults, okay?
1:12:48
So let me just focus on manhood here because that's the main question that you're asking
1:12:51
about.
1:12:52
What is the nature of human beings?
1:12:55
And by the way, this is easy to tell because all we have to do is make some observations
1:12:59
that are not distracted by the nonsense for the culture.
1:13:05
And our fighters, men are leaders.
1:13:11
They can do.
1:13:12
They go out and do things.
1:13:14
And when I say men are leaders, I'm talking about their nature.
1:13:16
I'm not talking about every individual man.
1:13:19
Some men abrogate that.
1:13:20
They're overly feminized, okay?
1:13:22
And they don't take the lead when they ought to be taking the lead and instead the woman
1:13:26
takes the lead in their home, creates an inappropriate, inappropriate imbalance in my view, okay?
1:13:32
And just to finish this list, which I wrote down very quickly when you're asking the question,
1:13:38
we are fighters and we are leaders.
1:13:42
We are problem solvers and we are providers.
1:13:47
We are fighters.
1:13:48
We're leaders.
1:13:49
We're problem solvers and we're providers in no particular order, okay?
1:13:52
Men go to battle.
1:13:53
Doesn't mean women can't fight, but it's the man's job to protect the home.
1:13:58
The man goes out while the one protects the brood, okay?
1:14:03
The man brings stuff back to provide for the brood, okay?
1:14:07
When there are big problems, they both can solve problems, but the man is, I think, more
1:14:14
capable, more in a position to address those things and lead the family, okay?
1:14:20
Somebody's got a lead.
1:14:21
I mean, egalitarianism in any circumstance, whether it's families or governments or jobs,
1:14:28
businesses or military, everybody's the same, nothing gets done.
1:14:33
Somebody's got to make the final decision about things.
1:14:35
Hopefully they do so in a benevolent and wise way and that's one liability of leadership,
1:14:41
but the thing is there's no other choice or else nothing gets done.
1:14:45
So I think what God has done is designed men to be leaders, to be problem solvers, to be
1:14:53
providers and to be fighters, fighters in the best sense of the word, not fighting against
1:14:59
the innocent, but fighting against the threats, and that's what keeps the family safe.
1:15:06
And every single one of these things are being attacked right now, one way or another in
1:15:10
our culture, and what that means is, Kyle, is that men are then less capable to lead,
1:15:17
to provide, to solve problems and to fight when necessary.
1:15:21
Well, I certainly appreciate you going in and elucidating that for us.
1:15:25
And I certainly appreciate you being on the front lines of that fight with the things
1:15:28
that you're doing with standard with standard reason and also with the things that you have
1:15:32
going on just in your ministry and the things, even with YouTube in your books, this puts
1:15:38
you on the front lines of that.
1:15:39
And Greg, we've talked about so many different things.
1:15:41
We've covered a lot of ground in this podcast, but that's all for me.
1:15:44
Is there anything else you want to get off your chest?
1:15:47
Well, only to say that if they'd like to go to standard reason website, it's str.org.
1:15:54
str.org stand to reason str.org.
1:15:58
And you did such a good job, Kyle, with the interview that I think we covered most of
1:16:04
the just about all of the really important bases and then some nobody's ever asked me
1:16:08
about about manhood before.
1:16:10
So I'm glad that you asked that and I got a chance to give people a piece of my mind
1:16:15
on that.
1:16:16
Well, I appreciate you giving us your answers.
1:16:18
And I'm pretty sure we've solved all the world's problems up to this point.
1:16:21
But Greg Coco, thanks for coming on Daunted Life of Man's podcast.
1:16:25
You're so welcome, Kyle.
1:16:29
All right, guys, thanks so much for listening all the way through, man.
1:16:33
That was such such a great interview to be a part of.
1:16:36
I really hope that you enjoyed it.
1:16:37
But before we let you guys go, we are going to do a quick resilience boost as you know
1:16:40
by now.
1:16:41
We are immense ministry and our mission is cultivating manly resilience.
1:16:44
Specifically, we do that by providing content like this podcast that forges spiritual, mental
1:16:49
and physical toughness.
1:16:50
So I'm going to run down the links that I've got for you.
1:16:52
I've got the link to the standard reason website.
1:16:54
I've got the link to the two books that we talked about tactics and the story of reality.
1:16:58
We've also got a bunch of different videos.
1:17:00
So we talked about that Prager U video, the intolerance of tolerance.
1:17:03
I got that for you here.
1:17:04
We've also got a bunch of just random ones.
1:17:06
There's one of him just discussing.
1:17:08
It's kind of a longer interview about tactics.
1:17:10
There's a video of him basically destroying Deepak Chopra on live television, which was
1:17:14
amazing.
1:17:15
There's some other ones, the question that stops Christians in their tracks, Greg Cockel
1:17:19
versus pro choice caller, which is a fantastic way to show you how to deal with a lot of
1:17:24
people that are on the pro abortion side of things.
1:17:26
But then I've also got a link to his Facebook, his Twitter account and the standard reason
1:17:29
YouTube channel.
1:17:31
Thank you for listening to the podcast.
1:17:32
I really do appreciate it.
1:17:33
If you would, please subscribe on Apple podcasts, iTunes, Spotify, Google podcasts or Stitcher
1:17:39
and refer your friends to listen and share this on social media.
1:17:41
Guys, if we deserve a five star review, please go ahead and leave us a quick five star review
1:17:45
and a few sentences letting us know why you like the content.
1:17:47
I'm currently booking speaking engagements for the remainder of 2020 and into the beginning
1:17:51
of 2021.
1:17:52
So if you want me to come speak to your team on your podcast at your men's event, just
1:17:55
hit me up info at undaunted.life again, that's I N F O at undaunted.life.
1:18:00
The website is www dot undaunted.life, you can follow us on Instagram and Twitter at
1:18:04
undaunted life or Facebook.com backslash undaunted life.
1:18:08
Check out our free devotionals on the U version Bible app.
1:18:10
Just search undaunted life under plans.
1:18:12
And as always, we want to thank the band August Burns read for allowing us to use their entire
1:18:16
music library for our content.
1:18:18
The intro outro track on this podcast is our song defender, which is off their latest record
1:18:22
entitled guardians.
1:18:23
The links are in the description.
1:18:24
I'm your host, Kyle Thompson.
1:18:27
Remember, keep cultivating manly resilience, keep forging spiritual, mental and physical
1:18:32
toughness.
1:18:33
Keep seeking the lion of Judah.
1:19:03
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