I think that's a completely fair criticism.

Well, if I'm hearing you, I mean, accurately here, we have similar issues residing on both ends of the spectrum.

We have the Copernicus and the Galileo incident, which seemed to expose it in the West anyway, a, a dogmatic bias, [laughs] as it were, that was unable to entertain scientific truths.

On this other end with expel and other things that are happening in contemporary science where you're like, "Hold on a second, you're actually being religious in how you approach scientific truth at this point," knowing full well that there's weaknesses here.

... and to say it's all a grand conspiracy is, I, I think that's, [chuckles] I think that's dangerous and a, and a disservice.

Is that, is that a product of your realism, your commitment to realism? The sense that all truth is God's truth and the world is far more intriguing, complex, and meaningful [chuckles] than we ever imagined it to be.

A product of, uh, an infinite, all-powerful God who's, who sees time very differently than we do.

Um, and, uh, and so, I mean, that, that seems to me to be a healthy theological corrective to the current way in which we think about how science is approaching these or how even how Christians who are embracing, uh, science think about these things.

when I floated in those circles.

Well, it was, it didn't seem to me like either one of us, I mean, we were both, uh, early on, as far as I recall, taking a very high view of Scripture, and that all truth is God's truth, and that if we s- search the Scriptures, we're gonna find truth.

And yet we were told that we had to hold certain positions, and I don't think either one of us is against any particular issue, [laughs] as being formative of orthodoxy per se.

[clears throat] But we are wanting to seek after it, like what is it intending, what is it, what are the Scriptures intending to tell us-

Mm-hmm.

And I oscillate between them when I'm focused on one thing, [laughs] you know, and I'm like, "How do I...

How-- There's got to be better categories for this." And so when I was listening to you make those distinctions with regards to whether or not animals, you know, uh, died in a sense before, uh, human sin entered the world and all of that, um, I was like, man, those are fascinating.

And they, and they actually begin to help me think more creatively about the possibilities for a coherent understanding of that transition.

things

that was a cultural event at the time was the Passion of the Christ.

Oh, right.

Which had come out.

Yep.

And both of us, probably for slightly different reasons, were smitten with this movie and Mel Gibson and the whole, you know, the making of it and the artistic excellence of it and all of that.

we felt like we needed to do something significant.

Was it the transition from, like, art to film?

Mm-hmm.

And that [clears throat] we're on the front lines of engaging culture.

I mean, I think that that's the general feel of it, and the historic church in some way is missing out on that, that they're not doing that kind of work, and we are.

And whether or not an individual sees themselves as connected to the...

It's, it's gonna vary because when you're in the, when you're in the trenches as it were, you're gonna have differences.

And certainly in Evangelical churches, even Baptist churches, people have slightly differing views on [chuckles] doctrinal positions and, uh, but they're all seen under this big tent of being for the evangel, for the gospel, for moving out and saving souls and, um, and engaging culture and all of that.

And, um, and, and so I guess I'm, I'm kind of looking at it from the point of view that the right thinking type of Evangelical is doing both that work but also looking back to trying to say, "How do we have the dialogue-" That's teleological in orientation that sees the church being unified in some way or another.

Mm-hmm

That's where we did our first, uh, conversation.

Yeah.

So those are a couple of the highlights, but there was so much more, and that's why I wanted to have this conversation as a follow-up to that.

Um, you went on, and you did...

I mean, I think, I think what I remember most about our journey was the willingness of you and some of your classmates, really, to work with a guy of a higher generation, you know, 10 years, 15 years out from you.

Um, that impressed me because I didn't know that that was a thing.

Yeah

... by going to Champion Christian College because that was, it's a school, a little bit more entrepreneurial mindset, a little more engaging culture mindset, international mindset, and, um, I'm free doing a podcast with them.