BTS: What do we mean by non-religious?

In three.

Two.

Hey everybody.

Welcome to episode number three in our our His Hands Church behind the scenes podcast.

His Hands Behind the Music.

His Hands Behind.

Yeah, I remember those shows behind the music.

What was that?

VH1.

VH One Behind the Music.

My mom used to watch those all and she would she would make me watch those with her.

Um, because I remember that from when I was like in high school.

Yeah.

Is that when that's from?

I haven't thought about that in years.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

So when I was in high school, the ones that VH1 was doing would have been like the bands that she listened to when she was young.

Oh, right.

And I had no interest in any of these bands.

So she's like, I remember she's like, Justin, come here and watch this with me.

And I'm in I'm in high school, and she I'm watching an hour-long behind-the-scenes look at like Crosby Stills and Nash.

See, I'd I'd want to watch that now.

Like, I don't know, is that still around?

Can you find them?

I don't know.

That's a good question.

I should find them.

I'd probably be great now.

They probably would.

The one on Billy Idol was fascinating.

That sounds great.

Billy Idol's insane.

Is he?

But in a very entertaining way.

Where you would be like, I would hang out with him with supervised company.

Like, I wouldn't just hang out with Billy Idol.

I wouldn't be in the passenger seat of a car he's driving.

Right.

But I would That's fair.

Yeah.

I'd I'd like tag along.

He's I could see that.

It was crazy.

All right.

So we're off to a fo I think a focused start.

We're on point.

I was gonna say this is episode three of His Hands Church behind the scenes.

We said we were gonna change the name of it, and we haven't done that.

I think we added a 2.0 last time.

But I thought of a bunch of names it could be, and they they all sound bad, at least the ones I'm thinking of.

It was like His Hands Church, the Untold Story, but I was like, that's uh that seems like like something was like some secret was some scandal, or like his hands church exposed.

Like, no, that's really bad.

That's like that that's even worse than the untold story.

So his hands church, the real truth.

I don't even know what I don't know.

His hands church behind the scenes starts to sound like a TMZ story at that point.

It does.

Thank God for TMZ.

When you think about when you think about groups of people that have contributed important things to the world, I think you got probably like TMZ, NASA.

Um I don't know.

I can't believe those are going in the same sentence right now.

Well, NASA gave us Velcro and uh astronaut food.

Yeah, NASA invented Velcro.

Velcro?

No, I'm like almost a hundred percent sure that NASA invented Velcro.

Like a hundred you can check it later, but I'm almost a hundred I was told that the person that told me I I believed them.

There's a lot that came from NASA.

I'm sure.

Whether Velcro or not.

But I think the most significant thing is probably Velcro.

What about microwave oven?

Is that from NASA too?

The microwave oven, I'm pretty sure that's a NASA.

I don't know.

It probably is.

I mean the microwave oven's just killing us slowly.

So this is episode three of His Hands Church Behind the Scenes.

I'm Justin McTear.

That's Nathan Fowler.

Uh you can't see him because this is not being filmed, it's just recorded.

So, Nathan, just in case they haven't, just in case they've been tuning you out, just say hi.

Hi.

I don't know why they tune you out.

I I never tune you out.

I've never done that in my entire life.

Um here's the whole point of this.

If you're still, if you're still listening to this, by the way, congratulations.

I'm really sorry that that that was three minutes of your life.

Um, but um, but we don't do this as a scripted thing.

It's it's not rehearsed.

Uh as you can probably tell, what this is and what it's intended to be, is just a behind-the-scenes look at our church and some some cultural things that are really important to us as a church.

Uh, if you go to his hands, uh even if you've only been here a few times, you might have questions about how things sort of operate.

And uh and and we just want to pull the curtain back and give you give you some input on why we do things the way we do them, uh, because it tells it says a lot about what we value as a church, what we're about, and we're really passionate about it.

So, anyway, that's why we do this.

And every every single episode, we just tackle a question.

And we're gonna we're gonna tackle this one today.

It is, what do we mean by non-religious?

What do we mean by non-religious?

So if if you've gone here for long, you've probably heard us talk about religion a good bit.

And almost always, I'd say a solid 98% of the time, it's it's not in a good way.

When we use the word religion, it's it's not positive.

Right.

Um and that can be that can throw people off because depending on your your experience growing up, you know, religion, well, isn't isn't religion just anything related to God?

And and why why would religion be bad?

And and we describe ourselves as a non-religious church, and that that is confusing to a lot of people who think that church in and of itself is religion.

So let's talk about what do we mean by that, and uh, and I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm not I was gonna say pass the mic, but you have your own microphone.

I've got my own.

So I brought I brought my own microphone today.

Nathan actually is the one that sets up all of this technology.

I don't know what any of this stuff does.

Um I mean I I get the the gist of it, microphones and cables and switches and stuff.

But anyway, why don't you talk in your own microphone about the whole non-religious thing?

What does that mean to you?

Um yeah.

Um I was actually just having a conversation with uh my dad about this a couple weeks ago, and and uh he and I like to just debate things.

You know, you know, just conversationally, just like let's just have opposing views and just like flesh out the idea.

Yeah, no, I get I get that.

And uh I'm just laughing because your dad came into the office a little bit ago from somewhere else and he's looking for you.

Yeah.

He was looking, I I guess there was a notebook that you his his your mom left here the other day and she wanted to pick it up, and so he's like, hey, Nathan said the notebook's on his desk, it's not there, and I made a joke.

I said, Well, maybe Nathan's a liar.

And uh and he looked at me and I and we laughed, and I said, No, honestly, Nathan is many things.

Liar is not one of them.

And we joked about the fact that if if anything, if there's the if there's the ability to be too honest, if that was a thing, might be me.

Like Nathan, I might have that.

Yeah, you're not so someone can be like a compulsive liar.

You're like a compulsive truth teller, even maybe when silence would just be better than that.

Well, the problem is I've got one of those faces that silence is not silent enough.

That's so true.

Um so usually my facial expressions give it away.

So I'm still working on that.

Between you in meetings, between you and your facial expressions, and Megan rolling her eyes.

So like like if I say something that doesn't make sense or she doesn't like and because we're married, so she feels she has no filter with me, so just this giant eye roll.

And I see it, and I'm like, what?

What and I'm trying to maintain some semblance of professionals, I don't know.

Sort of.

I guess.

So anyway, non-religious.

Your dad.

Yeah, and he and I were talking about this, and um he brought up a good point because I was like kind of talking from our usual perspective, which is you know, religion being laws, being works, being a checklist, being a measuring stick, being a tool for shame, you know, it's been a lot of things over time.

And so he brought up the point, he's like, Yes, but there is the scripture that says, but this is true religion to take care of widows and orphans.

I said, Yeah, but other than that one time, usually religion was what Jesus was using to describe, hey, I need you to give up your religion.

Are you tired, worn out, uh burdened by religion?

Um and so um I think Jesus was even trying to conversationally reset what words we use for what, and draw us from measuring ourselves against some standard and finding we're wanting, and then we have to decide do now I try harder or do I give up, or do I yin yang between the both?

Yo-yo between the both, I guess is the word I'm looking at.

I don't think you can yin yang between two things.

Oh man.

I don't even know.

You yo-yo.

I was yin yang and hardcore on the way here.

But you yeah, but you know what I mean, where you bounce back and forth between like the constant like flip flop, I'll try harder, and then that doesn't work, and then you sick into depression, and then finally you're like, I'll try even harder, and then it's this back and forth that just gets more and more extreme, all in response to kind of a man's way of doing things.

And I think that it's the man's way of doing things versus coming to him for that, you know, where where he said, Come to me if you're weary, if you're worn out, burned out on religion, and I'll give you a real rest.

And there's much more to it than that.

But I mean it's it's the come to Jesus and let him carry us through, let him work in us.

Yeah, I agree completely.

And when I first came here 10 years ago, um that that language was new to me, this whole idea of not religious.

And I honestly I don't think I'd ever really categorized it that way in my mind.

You know, I I just took it for granted.

I grew up in church for the most part, and so religion, sure, I'm I'm a if someone would have said, Are you a religious person to me 10 years ago, I would have said, Yeah, of course, I'm a religious person.

I believe in God and all that.

Yeah.

But if you say, Are you a religious person to me now?

I'm like, no, absolutely not.

No, the opposite.

And and it's not what we've got to be careful about is not letting not letting that become religious.

That's exactly right.

You can't be religious about being non-religious.

Yeah, but let's just unpack it for a second here.

And and Nathan began to do that.

And we want to make sure that we maybe define our terms.

And you you mentioned several things.

Good.

So, number one, religion.

Okay, when you think of the word religion, a lot of stuff probably comes to mind.

And depending on your experience growing up, some of it's good, some of it's bad per se.

Um, you may have grown up in church and it was super, you know, a great religious experience, you might say.

Um, in fact, that phrase, I had a religious experience, usually that's a positive phrase.

Right.

You know what I mean?

Um but but when you really look at at Jesus, and I think that's what we want to really focus on, you know, he's he's the one in the spotlight.

So we all we kind of we look at like all of scripture, obviously, but we run everything through the filter of Jesus, through that lens, because he is the clearest picture of God we'll ever have.

And when you look at Jesus' life, you cannot ignore the fact that the people who fought against him at every single turn were the most religious people uh in the land.

It was it was honestly, it was religion uh that killed Jesus and and Jesus fought against religion.

Yeah.

And you you know you kind of try to get into a who picked the fight, who started it kind of thing, I guess if you want to.

Um but but from the get-go in Jesus' ministry, he was definitely out to to to at the very least fundamentally change the way people approached God, saw God, and and it did not sit well with with religion and of itself.

So one of the core teachings here at his hands that we we really go back to a lot is the the the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

It's like the first story in the Bible, basically, after God makes everything.

And yeah, and if you've grown up in church, you've you've probably heard this.

If not, it's in the first few chapters of the first book of the Bible, Genesis.

And so God creates this garden, everything's beautiful, everything's wonderful, and he puts these two specific trees.

There's all kinds of trees in it.

It's a garden.

Um, one is called the tree of life, and he tells people, eat eat all you want of that, eat freely.

And the other is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and you know, he says, Don't eat that, because if you eat that, you're gonna die.

And it's not a threat.

I used to read that as a threat to a kid.

Like, I'll it's not God saying, I'll kill you because they do, and he doesn't he doesn't kill them.

No.

But he's just letting them know that the result of that, it's like if you touch a stove, you'll get burned, right?

So if you if you eat this fruit, you're gonna die.

And and they go their own way, they eat the fruit anyway, and from that moment on, mankind kind of becomes obsessed with with rules, with what's good, what's bad.

Because it's because they become obsessed with the knowledge of good and evil.

That's right.

Who's in, who's out, what's bad, what's good.

And it's interesting because the phrase forbidden fruit uh originates with the story of the Bible in Genesis and the free.

But in our in our society, if someone says, oh man, the forbidden fruit, you're gonna think about lust and greed and power and other things like that.

But it was the the knowledge of good and evil.

And I think what was a paradigm shift for me on this whole religion issue is that uh early on in my days here, Steve and Susan, who who started our church and and really mentored us for so many years, Steve basically said, Hey, another way to say obsession with with good and evil is religion.

That's right.

And I'd never thought of that before.

The idea that the tree of knowledge of good and evil, you could actually call it the tree of religion, and you're not far off because that is what religion obsesses over.

Yeah.

What what's what's good, what's bad, what's right, what's wrong, who's in, who's out.

Um and it almost always becomes this very external thing.

Yeah.

You know what I mean?

And so uh, you know, it's it's what music is bad, what music is good, uh, what movies are bad, what what movies are good.

And um and I just never thought of this concept before of wow, the forbidden fruit was not these sort of token sins.

The forbidden fruit was literally an obsession over right and and wrong.

And so Jesus comes onto the scene, and it's the religious people that are fighting against him the hardest.

Because he's he's kind of redrawing the boundaries and he's erasing some of those lines that they've created.

That's right.

All of a sudden, certain people who used to be out are in, and maybe they're kind of upset that they're they don't feel in, even though I really believe Jesus one of them included in everything.

Uh, I think you see that in scripture.

Uh yeah.

He had a heart for those guys as well, but but he's very clear with his disciples early on.

In fact, I'll I'll use this and then we'll kind of keep going.

But early on in his ministry, the the Pharisees kind of come up to him and say, Hey, you know, you're not doing things the way that it's done.

Religion's always really obsessed about the way things have been done in the past, right?

So why?

And Jesus uses this analogy.

He says, Look, you don't put new win new wine into an old wineskin.

Umineskins would have, you know, they were they were animal skins, but over time they would become brittle and rigid and hard.

And if you put new wine in it, the new wine's gonna expand and it would literally burst the wineskin.

Yep.

And so basically, Jesus is explaining that he's almost saying, Look, um, I didn't pick you guys, the religious elite, to be my disciples because you're rigid.

Yeah, religion has hardened you and you're not flexible.

So no none of the new things I'm doing, you're not even gonna be able to process it because you are so set in in your ways.

You're obsessed with all these things that don't matter.

It's all about rules, it's all about laws.

And Jesus is saying, I pick these disciples, the the guys I pick, these outcasts, because they're you know, look, they they don't have a lot on their resume, they don't have any accolades, but I'll say this, they're they're open and they're flexible.

Yeah, and so um so when we say religion, we just want to be clear, we don't mean faith in Jesus, we don't mean a passion for God, and we don't mean like you your dad mentioned, we don't mean a desire to do good things in the world.

When we say religion, we mean uh a man-made and man-centric, I might even use obsession with rules and and laws, and just basically creating uh this very arbitrary uh list of standards that you have to meet if you're gonna please God, and what religion creates are people who who are strivers.

What is when when I say strivers, um that's something that's a phrase that we use and we get so like have you have you ever been a striver and what it like unpack that?

I think that whole I don't know if this directly answers that question, but maybe just as as you were talking, what I got to think about was how much living like the mindset, our mindset is so shaped whether we're living we've we've talked about it this way, whether we're living at the tree of life or living at the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and living at the tree of knowledge of good and evil, living at the tree of religion, a way to put that.

Um living under religion so quickly leads to comparison and everything, because how else are we gonna measure, right?

If we're living by the tree of knowledge of good and evil, then we're we're kind of choosing not to lean on the Holy Spirit.

So, to not lean on the Holy Spirit, where am I gonna go to get my information about wisdom, about life choices, about myself and my own identity?

Well, I'm gonna look around and I'm how do okay, how do I measure up against who's around me?

And that's always gonna be depressing because it's like the Facebook phenomenon, you know, it's everybody's highlight reel, right?

Like we put our best stuff out there.

Unless someone actually posts a picture of you that you didn't authorize, like maybe you're at some gathering.

Sure, yeah.

Someone just had the audacity and they tag you.

And they tag you, and you're like, no, no, that's not no, get that off.

I'm not intent, I wasn't aware that picture was being taken.

I was not intentionally sitting in my gut.

But for the most part, it's like we've kind of retouched the photo a little bit, or maybe we we edited that quote a little bit before we kind of put it up there and we're like, oh yeah, I'm saying this today.

Ran it through a filter.

Yeah, yeah, we just kind of polished things up a little.

But like that's that's not new.

It's just in a more visible, tangible format than ever because of social media.

But I think it's it's the comparison mindset in the first place, whatever whatever it is outside of myself that I look to, if I'm looking at the world around me and comparing, right?

It's a depressing.

You're right.

I mean, because on on like on one end, you can look at everybody else and you can feel depressed.

Yep.

On the other end, you can look at everybody else, and if you change your filter a little bit, you know, it's that it's that whole token, like, well, at least I'm not, I'm not Hitler.

Right.

Like that's it's condescending and prideful.

Yeah, or it's comparative in the sense that I I'm I'm excusing away maybe some things I need to work on.

Sure.

Uh because I mean I'm not as bad as that guy.

So I so the reality TV thing.

Yeah, yeah.

I grew up in uh I grew up in Springfield, Missouri.

I grew up in a lot of places, I moved around a lot, but I spent a big chunk of my early days in Springfield.

And Springfield, Missouri is the headquarters of the Assembly of God Church.

That's like the headquarters of that denomination.

And I didn't go to an Assembly of God Church when I was a kid.

We went to this Southern Baptist Church.

And so uh the but the Assembly of God Church was a big deal in Springfield because that's where the headquarters were.

And so I didn't know this, you know, um, because I was I was young, and to me, it's like churches were churches.

I drove by a church and I was like, in my mind, in my mind, every church was the same on the inside.

But they're all part of the same chain.

Like, oh yeah, it was like, yeah, no, that McDonald's is the same as that McDonald's.

That one's just closer to my house or whatever.

And and uh and I remember thinking as a kid, why do we drive by so many churches on our way to church?

Like, this is ridiculous.

This is not efficient.

Mom and dad don't, they're not, they're not even trying to save gas, you know.

Um but but I didn't know until I I was older and could kind of look back and go, oh, okay, I see some of that.

How being at a Southern Baptist church, which valued some different things in the Assembly of God Church, that comparison thing you brought about, like some of the stuff that we were taught and we were was really like pressed into us and and uh I won't say beat over the head, but but we were just really like this is important.

Right.

A lot of it was was really directly comparative about it was reactive to the city.

Yes, it was almost like it was like, hey, we're not we're not the assembly of God, you know.

Right.

And then and then growing up, I went to a different church uh in in Georgia, and our pastor used to say this all the time.

Um he'd be like, if you want watered down, uh you know, fluffy preaching, go to the Methodist church down the street.

He would say that all the time.

And I I have no I had no idea what a Methodist was.

Again, I'm a young kid, and I'm just I've just gone to these churches.

And I remember I met a I met a friend of mine at school, and we have to talk him one day, and he told me he was a Methodist, and I'm in my brain, I was like, oh no.

Oh no.

I was like, I don't know anything about that, but I know it's I know it's not good, right?

Because of comparison.

Yep.

And so it was all this, all this like, well, we're doing it the right way, and you're doing it the wrong way.

And when religion gets a hold, the truth of the matter is religion's exclusive.

Yes.

And it's always, always about how you're the only one doing it right.

You're the only one.

Did you hear that?

My phone buzzed.

I didn't send it to silent.

I'm not a professional podcaster.

So uh what are we gonna do?

But but it's it's all about exclusivity and it's all about feeling better about how can I how can I feel as good as I can about where I'm at by just looking at all the people around me who who who aren't.

Um so it can be it can be a source of pride or striving, like you mentioned, where all of a sudden you're looking at oh, we're not keep up, I'm not as holy as that pride.

Try harder, and but you're you know, gritting your teeth and trying harder, but feeling like you never get anywhere.

And you and so you feel like a failure, you feel like God must think you're a failure, because you always associate religion with God.

Yeah.

And you become this striver where you're always trying to perform better.

In fact, we we've talked about this before.

If religion, and it doesn't matter what religion, by the way, it doesn't matter what what's what you call it, what if it's a denomination or just an entire other category of religion.

The the core theme behind religion is is really simple.

It's always do more, try harder.

And whatever that religion values, doing more and trying trying harder might look different in in action, but it's always about you're not doing enough.

Do more, you're not trying hard enough, try more.

And it's very easy for that to be the only thing that defines people's experience with God.

Yeah you know, am I doing well enough?

Oh, this has been a bad week.

And that's not relationship.

That's a whole different thing, not a healthy relationship anyway.

That's right.

And so when you look at Jesus, he he just didn't he didn't value that.

The people that that Jesus sort of celebrated were the exact Opposite people that religion celebrated.

You know, he talked about the good Samaritan, which was like an I mean that just didn't even compute for the religious people.

How can you be a Samaritan and be good?

That was like Samaritan's word.

Just to say that already, like they were so racially charged in their time.

Like, what do you mean?

Those people so don't fit into our box of what makes an acceptable person in the eyes of God.

That how can you even name that guy?

Yeah.

And then he has the whole story showing how good this man was.

Yeah, and and and the man's good when the when the traditional people who the religion saw as good, you know, weren't because they were obsessed with the rules.

Yeah.

And the rules actually kept them from doing what they were.

Yeah, I need to stay clean so I can't touch this guy on the side of the road who's been beat up because he's bleeding a little.

And if you're not familiar with what we're talking about, it's a story of the Good Samaritan.

Just search it online.

It's a really cool story that Jesus told.

Very powerful.

Very powerful.

And so, okay, here's the thing.

I'm and maybe we're going in like a thousand different directions and only a little bit at a time, but to give it sort of a laser focus, religion, in and of itself, is obsessed with external things versus internal.

Okay.

So religion's all about how well you look, you know, you want to live a respectable life.

You want to on the outside, you're following all the rules.

But if your heart is not full of love and compassion for other people, that's you know it's good to have love and compassion, but not as important as dressing the right way and on the outside.

Religion's external.

Jesus just cut right past that stuff and saw people's hearts.

That's right.

Okay.

Religion at its best is stagnant.

It's always about preserving the way things have been done.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

And and Jesus didn't value that.

He just didn't.

Um it's important to make a distinction.

We're not talking about changing what you believe, you know, and and just throwing away what what God's Word says or whatever, but there's a difference between changing what you believe and changing your approach.

Yes.

Jesus was flexible.

He changed his approach.

He started teaching in the synagogues.

That wasn't working.

So then all of a sudden he goes and teaches in the wilderness, you know, and got away from that religious setting and it it kind of changed the whole trajectory of his ministry.

Uh he he made a change because he wasn't obsessed.

The idea of of someone teaching the the Bible, the scriptures, in a setting other than the synagogue was pretty radical.

Yeah, right.

I mean, you're you what do you think?

Yeah, yeah.

You're not but again, what religion looked at and said wrong, Jesus said, I'm going to the people, I'm healing them.

Here's where the need is.

Um so at best, religion is stagnant and rigid, kind of like we mentioned with the wineskins, but at worst, religion is oppressive.

Yes.

It's a weapon.

Oh man.

And it's and it's been used to do some some pretty terrible things.

And so we can go with like classic examples like the crusades, which, okay, I'm gonna pause here.

I'm gonna knit I'm like, you know what really grinds my gears.

Okay.

Why why do so many I think I know where you're going with this?

Why do so many Christian organizations use the word crusade?

That's like the one bad thing from from our like the worst thing from our history as a as a faith is the crusades.

That's what always people always go to, like, yeah, well, Christianity had the crusades.

And then you have all these Christian organizations that are like We're on a crusade.

Yeah.

Like I think there's a and I'm not, again, if you're part of this organization, I'm sure you have a great reason, and I just am ignorant to it.

But like there was a big college ministry thing called uh campus crusade.

Yeah, I went to some campus crusade thing.

But I was like, why are you calling like stop calling it crusade?

What is that even what are you doing?

Are you attacking campuses?

What are you are you trying to do maybe we're far enough away from it that I don't know.

I don't think it conjures up when you say crusade, it doesn't conjure up a mental picture of armor and swords.

Yes, it does.

What else does it what else does it conjure in?

Not when you use it in a normal sentence.

It conjures When would you use the word crusade in a normal sentence?

And what conversation like when they talk about like campus crusades, not a normal conversation.

What it conjures up for me is khakis and Bible covers.

Like that's what I picture.

Okay.

Not not the dark ages.

I think the average person you say the word crusade to, and I think they think That's a fair point.

The crusades.

I was homeschooled.

So yeah, if you didn't know that, Nathan was homeschooled.

That that comes up as a joke a lot.

It does.

I have nothing against homeschooling.

I just I wasn't homeschooled, and so you were, and so it's really easy to if honestly, if we're having a discussion and I just don't like the way it's going because I'm losing an argument, it's really easy to just go, oh, that's because you're homeschooled and walk away.

So anyway.

Um so r religion is a is an oppressive thing.

Well, we'll move past the crusades uh because that might be the token example.

But we we've seen so many people come into our church.

And to be honest, they've been hurt by religion.

Because, you know, maybe they were a kid and you know they they made some mistakes, and religion said, you messed up, you blew it, and and they were judged harshly, they were maybe cast out, um, you know, whatever it was.

We've seen a lot of people who have been wounded by religion.

And what's hard is that they'll they'll confuse that with God.

And they'll they they've spent the last 10-15 years believing God is really upset with them, disappointed with him.

When when when he wasn't, because religion just religion lies about a lot of things.

Like religion will tell you that if you sin, God can't handle your sin.

God can't, he's gonna turn away from you.

But if you go back again to that original story in the Bible, when Adam and Eve messed up, they're the ones that hid from God.

Yep.

Not the other way around.

That's right.

God didn't, he didn't hide from them, they're the ones that initiated that.

So again, religion tells you, oh, if you if you if you mess up, I mean, God's gonna, you know, you're not you fell off the tightrope, and now you're not in his will anymore.

Yeah.

And so we've had so many people, I've seen so many people who have been deeply wounded and hurt, and it hasn't been by God, and it hasn't been by by Jesus, certainly.

Uh, it's been by religious people who become frankly obsessed with pointing out the flaws of others so that they can feel holier than than they are and and holier than the people around them.

Religion just does that.

Yeah.

It does.

And so when we say we're non-religious, um, again, that might be confusing depending on what you're coming from.

But but when you look at the Bible, like Nathan mentioned earlier, the word religion is used from time to time.

Um, it's it's rarely used in a positive sense.

Yeah, it's rare, it rarely is.

Uh Jesus, Jesus fought hard against religion.

Religion fought really hard against Jesus.

Now that said, when when Jesus was on the cross, even though he was put there by religious people, he said, Father forgive him, for they don't realize what they're doing.

That's right.

And so we we can't.

Yep.

We're we're not trying to uh to uh we're not going to to churches that maybe are a little bit more religious in the way they approach God and and shaking our fists at him.

I just don't want to see people have needless arbitrary red tape when it comes to their ability to access God.

Well, I think like you said earlier, it's not to for us to define this is what religion looks like in the 21st century, and now that's everything we're against.

Yep.

Because that would just be a new pendulum swing, um, a new religion.

Yep.

You know, and and we might call it something different, say we're warring against religion, but all we've done is we've come up with our own version, and now we don't like yours.

And now it's like you said, it's it's we're drawing a line, and now you're out, we're in.

And and that that would not be the way Jesus modeled it.

Because what he what he said, you know, it's a paraphrase was the are you tired, worn out, uh, with religion.

Yeah, you burned out by religion.

Burned out, that's what it was, burned out by religion.

Come to me, work with me, walk with me, watch how I do it.

Which is and that and that's an important thing to talk about, too, is religion is burdensome.

Yes.

So Jesus said to the Pharisees one time, he said, Hey, you religious teachers, and there's that word religion again, you you place an impossible burden on people that they can't carry, and you don't lift a finger to help.

And so religion's always telling you, Oh, hey, you want to make God happy?

Uh, and then it just hands you this stack of rules that you've got to memorize and follow.

And the rules change depending on on where you're at.

Just the context.

It does, but there's still rules.

And so, like, maybe you're in a certain church culture, and uh man, don't when you worship, don't go wild, don't go crazy, because that's not reverent.

And so you want to be like calm and controlled and kind of stoic and don't be like clapping your hands, don't cause a distraction, right?

That's the rule there.

And so when you worship, you're gonna be focused on that.

I'm doing that.

But but then there's other places where it's like, oh, if you're not screaming and yelling and jumping up and down, you're not really worshiping.

And so now if you're if you're just kind of like in a in a more contemplative mood and you don't you don't feel like raising your hands or jumping around, you feel bad because you're not following the rule.

It it's religion either way.

Yep, either way, it's pressure.

It's pressure.

It's always religion will always feel like pressure, and Jesus will always feel like love.

That's true.

Yeah, I mean, you can look at it with people in life.

I've had people in my life, people that I I love, and a conversation with them might be burdensome.

Like I feel like weight has been put on me every time we talk.

And I have other people that I feel like the opposite happens.

I feel like every time I talk to them, a weight is lifted.

Yeah.

And religion's always the person putting the weight on you.

Because again, that core message of religion is do more, do better.

That that actually works if God is a distant ruler that you have to please.

Hey, do more, do better, so he's impressed by you.

But if he's a loving father, like what what rules does my son have to follow for me to love him?

Right.

I mean, there's rules he has to follow so that I don't have to correct him and discipline him, and God will do that with me and anybody else.

He loves us enough.

Yeah, he loves us enough to discipline us, but it's not for earning love.

It's not for love.

It's not for earning love.

It's not.

And and my son has to, he is I love him because I love him.

Period.

Yes.

And God's the same.

Yeah, he really is.

So um that's what we mean by non-religious.

Um, and we we don't want that to become a religion and of itself.

That's right.

And that's important for us to constantly be seeking the Holy Spirit and staying accountable to the people around us be because it it it would be an easy thing to fall into at any point.

Religion's tricky.

Religion kind of always keeps pulling at you.

It does.

Which is why we talk about it so much as a church.

Because it w on one hand, we could have just said from the get-go, we're not going to be religious.

And then just stopped there.

And then stopped there.

But it's like it's a very it's attractive.

It is, and it and it's tempting.

And sometimes you get pulled into it when you don't realize it.

Yeah.

And so all of a sudden, you know, when when we first started having like rock and roll style music was a really big shift.

Yeah.

And we got a lot of we got a lot of pushback from a local geographic area.

We did, you know.

In regards to that at first.

Well, now that's pretty normal.

It is.

Yeah.

But but here 20 years from now, if if there's a new change, which there probably will be.

And we're holding on real hard to be like, no, no, no, no, no.

You know, electric guitars and drums, like that's worship.

Well, that's just Well, I feel like the electric guitar can't like that's it's probably not going anywhere.

I mean it's probably not going anywhere.

I sure hope it doesn't go in anywhere.

But that's No, we're that's personal preference.

Yeah, you you probably ought to branch out into other things just in case.

Like as a fall.

What would your fallback instrument be?

My fallback instrument?

Saxophone.

It should totally be saxophone.

I played piano first, so I could always get a guitar.

Yeah.

That's probably not gonna make any comeback.

No, I think I'm pretty sure it is.

But piano's been around forever and it's it's it's not going anywhere, I don't think.

I think there will always be.

I I think I I think the guitar's right around the corner.

So it's coming forward.

I'm not a musician.

Is a guitar, is it like a like what I have when I think of a guitar, here's what I think.

I think it's a guitar that's not as good as a regular guitar, and a and a keyboard that can't do what a whole keyboard can do.

So it's like half of two instruments that's shoved together.

That's actually already even a higher opinion than what a guitar actually is.

No.

It's truly just a small keyboard, so instead of having a full 88 keys, you have less keys, and just instead of being heavy and on a stand, it's hung from a strap on your shoulder so that it looks like you're holding a guitar.

When you have some time later, it's only aesthetic.

I want you to look up this thing, it's a real thing.

I got it.

As a kid, I I always asked for stuff for for Christmas, and my parents were well now.

I look back at it, I realize my parents were wise for not getting me exactly what I asked for, because it probably would have been really expensive, and I would have dropped it fast.

It's like one year I asked for a snowboard and I wanted a full-blown snowboard, and I got this like toy snowboard, and I was bummed.

Oh yeah, yeah.

But now I look back going, like whole snowboards, like they're really expensive, and where was I going to go snowboarding and how often?

Right.

Because you you yeah, you had a board and school.

I asked for a guitar one time when I was a kid, and I got this thing.

It was a it was a toy guitar, but it was called a jaminator.

Okay?

And this thing the jaminator is yeah, kind of an Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Come jam with me.

I'm a really bad Arnold Schwarzenegger.

I don't know.

Everyone tries to do it.

I can't even, I just get nervous trying to do it.

Because Arnold has different, he has some different things.

But it's called the jaminator.

Look it up on it's because it was like legit.

Yeah.

It was, I I actually think you would look at it and be like, whoa, you own that thing?

It's pretty impressive what it could do.

Look it up later.

I'm gonna look it up later.

You will okay, so this time we're really done.

Religion.

Yeah.

Religion.

Um focuses on the external, not the internal.

God's looking at our hearts.

Yes, that's right.

Becomes comparative when when God doesn't ever tell us to compare.

In fact, there's scripture where, you know, when when Samuel picks David to be king and he's the the one that David or Samuel wouldn't have picked, and God's like, look, you look at the outward appearance.

I judge the heart.

You know, it's not about comparison, it's not about these external things.

Religion is is stagnant, it's not open, and God needs us to be flexible.

That's why He wants our in the Bible in Ezekiel, he says, I want your stony heart to become tender and responsive.

Something that's rigid can't respond to God.

Religion doesn't respond.

It just digs in deeper and holds you know still.

And religion is often oppressive.

So much has been done, not in the name of God or in Jesus, but in the name of religion.

Because what religion is mostly obsessed about is being right.

It's being right.

As long as we're right and you're wrong, we feel okay, whether or not you're, you know, and or not.

And so we're not trying to build a religion at his hands.

We actually feel like God is really not religious.

And I think that may sound strange, but Jesus is God, and Jesus was not religious at all.

Not not in any sense.

You can't find it.

Um, so we want to be like Jesus, and we want to to be people who are open to God, flexible to do what God's called us to do.

We recognize completely that there are there are timeless truths of God.

We're not throwing those away.

We're not saying that you know the Bible and God's word and those things aren't valuable.

No, absolutely.

It's it's inspired and they're essential.

They are.

That's God's word.

That that's not a list of rules that man has created.

Uh, it's not red tape.

And so we just want to throw all that away and get back to the tree of life where we can just be with Jesus, be his friend, be loved, because that's what he created us for, and uh and and and live in relationship with him.

So we're not religious, but we're all about a relationship with Jesus.

Absolutely.

And uh and kitars.

I'd be all for some kitar.

No, it's a saxophone.

You need to get a saxophone.

Ah, I'm not a saxophone.

I dream of the day when someone does a saxophone solo in worship.

Please stop saying that.

No, it's gonna happen.

It's gonna happen.

It's gonna happen.

If uh if you're listening to this, uh why don't you send us an email at infothyshandschurch.com specifically requesting more saxophone.

Because we don't have any saxophone right now.

We don't have any horns, but but I think I just think saxophones are cool.

They are.

I'm thinking of that that George Michael song from the the 80s that had the whisper, careless whisper.

Careless Whisper.

That's it.

Careless whisper.

Uh that's beautiful.

That's gonna do it for episode three of His Hands Church.

Behind the scenes, we rambled a lot, this one.

But uh but if you're listening to a podcast, you're probably not super busy.

So that's good.

Well I I don't know.

No, I I I listen to podcasts all the time.

I'm not saying that in a negative sense, but you're not listening to a podcast like you're not cooking dinner, you know, trying to kick get your kids together uh and do five things and be like, while I'm doing this, I'm gonna do you don't listen to podcasts now.

I listened to a podcast while I was cooking and helping juggle children this morning.

Well, that's just that's what I like about podcasts, is that you can listen to it while you do it.

No, I listen to it while I drink while you do things.

Or I listen to it while I'm doing laundry, but I'm saying if you're like, you're not in some.

There's tasks that require too much mentality.

If you're listening to a podcast, you're probably you're probably not like you're probably not freaking out and being like, while this is happening, it's probably Yeah.

If that's the case, you should probably put down the podcast.

We should probably just end the podcast.

We'll go.

Podcast over.

Boom.

I hit the button.

Sure enough.

Bye.