Episode 145: Mark Driscoll Yanked From the Stage and Exposed as a Liar

Justin Peters

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Welcome to Didache, where we are studying to show ourselves approved, rightly dividing the word of truth so we can worship

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God in spirit and truth, deepening our knowledge of God, thereby enabling us to deepen our love for God.

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Here is your host, Justin Peters. And then you swallow the sword and Jesus Christ.

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OK, Pastor John, I'll receive that. Thank you. Much has been made about Mark Driscoll being yanked off the stage at the

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Stronger Men's Conference, but I'm going to talk to you about what really happened, why it matters.

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And in the second half of this video, I'm going to be interviewing someone who has firsthand experience with Mark Driscoll.

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And we will see. I'll show you some video that will prove beyond any shadow of a doubt that Mark Driscoll is eager for publicity.

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This is a publicity stunt and he is a liar. Welcome to the program, ladies and gentlemen, my name is

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Justin Peters. I hope that this finds you and your family doing well today. I want to thank you so much for joining me.

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So just a few days ago, Mark Driscoll was indeed yanked off the platform of the Stronger Men's Conference because before he spoke, there was a performer that got up and did a sword swallowing act.

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And he took that, Mark Driscoll took that as this guy trying to seduce the men there, apparently with a

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Jezebel spirit, which is bizarre. And we're going to get into all of that. And I've enlisted the help of a friend of mine named

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Gabe Hughes. Gabe is a pastor in Casagrande, Arizona, and he also has the

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YouTube channel WWUTT when we understand the text. And Gabe and I both did some research into this.

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So we're going to talk about what happened. We're going to play some clips from this conference, why it is important.

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So that will be the first part of this video. And in the second part of this video, timestamp down below there in the description,

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I'm going to be interviewing Travis Allen. Travis Allen is the pastor of Grace Church in Greeley, Colorado.

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And he used to be an elder at Grace Community Church when the Strange Fire Conference happened back in 2013.

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And he had firsthand interactions with Mark Driscoll and Mark Driscoll pulled another publicity stunt.

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This is all this is, pure publicity stunt. And Mark Driscoll did the same thing 11 years ago now.

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And Travis Allen had firsthand interaction with Mark Driscoll. And we have footage from the scene.

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And it will prove beyond any shadow of a doubt that Mark Driscoll is an absolute liar.

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And he is manifestly both unqualified and disqualified from being in the pulpit.

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So we're going to talk about all of this. So first part of the video, here is my interview with Gabe Hughes.

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Well, Gabe, brother, how are you? Doing great, Justin. Thanks for asking. It is a beautiful, sunny day here in Southern Arizona.

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We're already getting up to 95 this week in April. So it's looking to be a hot summer.

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Yep. Oh man. Oh man. They're, they're predicting a possibility of snow up here in Montana in a couple of days.

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So. No, that's not us. Yeah, that's not Arizona.

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Nope. Nope. All right. Well, Gabe, thank you very much for coming on the program, brother. And, uh, you were about to text me last night when

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I called you about, about this subject matter. So quite the, uh, quite the brew ha ha has been, uh, brewing over this.

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Um, stronger men's conference at which Mark Driscoll was a speaker.

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So tell us, um, tell us a little bit about what is this conference? So the stronger men's conference has been going on for, uh, about seven years.

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I think it started back in 2017, at least from what I was able to find at least, uh, you know, going back that far.

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And Mark Driscoll has been involved in this conference for at least that long. This is a church in Southern Missouri.

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Do you have the name of the church? Uh, James river church. I think it's the name of it. James river church. Yes. Yeah. So they're the ones that put this on and it's, it's almost like they try to outdo themselves every year.

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It gets bigger and bigger. It's almost like a super bowl halftime show. They'll have about the most macho stuff that you can think of with hanks rolling through and piling over cars and monster trucks and pyrotechnics and rock music.

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You know, it just gets bigger and bigger. So they'll even have people that'll perform these elaborate stunts.

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There will, of course, at least according to their claim, be a presentation of the gospel. I know that one of the things that they were claiming, uh, at this most recent conference that has gathered all this attention is that, you know, several hundred men came forward and gave their lives to Christ.

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So they claim that it's an evangelical thing. Uh, of course our experience with big evangelical churches that do stuff like this is it's often a very watered down gospel.

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You know, I've known men that have attended stuff like this and they will tell me, yeah, I got saved there.

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But then they mature in their faith and recognize, boy, what a circus that was and praise

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God that he was able to use something like that to draw me to himself, but overall, you're not going to get any true gospel preaching, an understanding of sin, the wages of sin, which is death, the eternity of hell that will come upon every person who is, uh, who does not turn from their sin to the

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Lord Jesus Christ, oftentimes it's a very watered down presentation. It's, it's huge on pyrotechnics, but not so much on theology.

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So this, uh, there was a fellow actually that had contacted me in the midst of this controversy and had said that, uh, that he and his pastor have had a ministry in Southern Missouri where they have evangelized people out of, uh, this particular church and the influence that that church has had over the area.

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So he said it it's, it's a pretty big deal and a very unfortunate to see how much influence they've had in their region.

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Yes, indeed. And James River Church, this is a, an enormous church. And so to give people an idea of the theological flavor of this church, this is a word of faith church,

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NAR. Uh, Bill Johnson has been a guest preacher at this church at least one, I think more,

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I think I'm safe to say more than once, so I knew at least one time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

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And I think more than that. So, uh, if you're having Bill Johnson of Bethel church come in and fill your pulpit, that speaks volumes about who you are and what you believe.

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Absolutely. Uh, other teachers have included Greg Rochelle, who is of Life Church in Oklahoma City, uh,

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John Gray, who used to be one of Joel Osteen's pastors. And the man is a, is a multi -time adulterer, um, in addition to being a prosperity gospel preacher and word of faith, like you mentioned,

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I mean, they all claim that God speaks, uh, specific messages to them. And so what

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I am saying is from God and you must listen to me. That's that kind of theology is throughout this men's conference as well.

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Yes, absolutely. And, uh, and they, this is also the, this is also the show me the toes church.

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Are you, yeah, you told me that. And I, I had totally forgotten about that and did not realize that that was related to James River Church.

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So you're going to have to, you're going to have to, uh, expose that one, I guess. Yeah. So, so for those of you who are not aware, so James River Church, pastor by John Lindell, this is a, a signs and wonder, word of faith, prosperity, gospel, health, and wealth, kind of a church.

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And, uh, a year or so ago, not long ago, but, uh, John Lindell came out and he made this claim of a testimony of a woman named

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Chrissy Thompson, who says that, uh, some years back, her husband,

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I I'm assuming now a strange husband or whatever shot her toes off. And she was in a service and her toes grew back and there's video of her making this claim.

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And they said, uh, the, the claim is, is that everybody saw this, her toes grew back and bill

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Johnson has repeated that story at his church Bethel church. But anyway, someone who is, um, closely associated with James River church and Chrissy Thompson, uh, knows her doesn't believe it and, uh, put, made this website it's

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I'm looking at right now. Show me the toes .com. Oh my goodness.

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Show me the toes .com. And so he's basically got an open challenge, like show me the toes.

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Okay. So if, if this happened and there are many, many, many witnesses of it, of it happening in real time, surely living in the 21st century and, you know, in the 20 twenties, everybody in their uncle's got a smartphone, how is there no video of this,

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I mean, I would, I would, I think that would, if I saw something like that, I think that'd be worthy enough to whip out my iPhone and take some quick video, but, uh, yeah.

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So this is a story. That's a story that has no soul. Oh, I see what you did there.

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All right. So this is a heretical wackadoodle church.

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Um, yeah. Um, women pastors and the whole nine yards, all that stuff that goes along with charismatic movement.

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So that's what we're dealing with. All right. So onto the subject matter at hand, what brings us together today to paraphrase, paraphrase, uh, the princess bride.

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All right. So I'm going to play this and, um, this is a clip of what happened at the men's conference.

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So for context, well, let's set up the context at this men's conference gate, there was a man by the name of Alex Magala, correct?

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Right. Who got up and performed apparently at least a half hour before Mark Driscoll preached.

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So tell us who Alex Magala is. So he's, uh, he's basically a stunt performer.

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Uh, he has been on Britain's Got Talent and this was kind of how he gained notoriety doing this particular stunt that he did at this men's conference and after making it to like the quarterfinals and Britain's Got Talent, he went on to do

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America's Got Talent and China's Got Talent. So he's kind of done this circuit, the circuit of the televised talent shows around the world and has gained notoriety from this.

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Now it is true that he used to be a former stripper. Uh, I was not able to find out if he still does that or if he's even repented of that.

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But what has been pulled into this story is that he did a strip show at this men's conference, which really was not what happened.

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And that's what Driscoll was calling out. Uh, Magala was just doing the stunt that he is known for doing.

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Of course he did it shirtless. Uh, you know, he takes his performance jacket off. He's showing his, uh, his ripped physique.

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Now I feel like I should interrupt here just for a second, because I've seen some people say that, uh, this must have been some kind of a strip oriented theme, uh, because he took his shirt off.

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Well, that can't really be the reason because that this stronger men's conferences, they've had, uh, several other events in which men have been without their shirts.

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Here's one, of course, of two guys boxing without their shirts. As you know, typically boxers do.

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Here's another guy doing weightlifting without his shirt. And here's another guy doing whatever this is, uh, without his shirt.

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Uh, I must say it's pretty, pretty impressive to balance. Um, yeah. So if you ever want to see a guy balance a big, um, log beam on a, on whatever that is on his chin on fire, um, without a shirt on, there you go.

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You can see it all at the stronger men's conference. So just being without a shirt in and of itself cannot possibly have been the reason, at least not a legitimate one.

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And then ascends this pole. I guess I should explain the stunt. So he, he swallows a sword and then he ascends this pole with the sword still in his mouth.

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And then he rapidly descends the pole and everybody gasps because they, they think he's lost his grip or something, but no, he's fully in control of everything that's happening and just inches from the ground, he stops before the sword, you know, would, would hit the ground and impale him if that would happen.

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It's a pretty death defying stunt. But that's what it is. It's a stunt. It's like a circus performance. And of course, that's what this men's conference is too.

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It's a, it's a goat farm. It's a big circus performance. It's entertaining goats. It's not, uh, it's not preaching the gospel.

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That's right. That's right. Okay. So I'm going to play this video clip. Someone with their smartphone recorded this.

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This is not like an official feed or anything to someone in the audience posted this, and, uh, so let's watch.

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I showed, I found this clip and I chose this particular clip because whoever posted it had, uh, put in, um, um, what do you call it?

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Subtitle, not subtitles, not subtitle. Um, okay. So here we go. But let me do this.

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I've been up since one o 'clock in the morning. The reason I'm hoarse is I have been praying for you and my heart is very burdened for you.

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Okay, Gabe, I want to pause it right there. He says, I've been up since one o 'clock in the morning. And the reason my voice is hoarse is because I've been praying for you.

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And my heart is burdened for you. When I heard that, I thought, isn't there something in the

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Bible about not letting your right hand know what the left hand is doing and you know, yeah, when you pray, don't sound a trumpet, sound the trumpet about it.

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Yeah. And, uh, I mean, I've, I'm obviously as a Christian prayed a lot in my life.

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I've never prayed myself horse. That just sounds weird to me. And if, is he staying in a hotel and he's yelling in his hotel room that is making him go so hoarse?

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I don't, uh, I think somebody would call the front desk and go, I think the man next door is possessed.

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If you're praying hard enough and loud enough that you've yelled yourself horse, yeah, I think is

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God hard of hearing. I just, that just doesn't make any sense. So right off the bat, this has a ring of like,

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I ain't believing this, but here we go. Well, and by the way, before you, before you continue, there's even some context before this part where Driscoll says that, uh,

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I'm going to, I'm going to talk about this in my next session. If they allow me to come back.

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So it's almost like he's ready for, he knows he's going to say something that's going to probably get him booted.

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Uh, and it really does kind of have a, an air of, of, uh, he was, he was planning this, you know, he was taking an opportunity to do something here.

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Yep. Yep. I agree a hundred percent. And we're going to see that here in just a minute too. And I want to be very careful with this and it's not what

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I want to say, but the Jezebel spirit has already been here. Okay.

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The Jezebel spirit has already been here. What is a Jezebel spirit?

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I have no idea. Now this, this is something that he's been on about for at least a year, probably more than that.

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He preached a sermon at his church, which is not far from me, by the way. Um, I live in Casa Grande, his church is in Scottsdale, which is just a little more than half an hour from me.

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So, uh, at his church, he did this series where he talked about a Jezebel spirit.

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And there's a sermon that you can look up where he goes through 29 signs of the Jezebel spirit. So he talks about how a man can have an

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Ahab spirit or a woman can have a Jezebel spirit. And to kind of define what that is, you have to listen to the whole sermon because he doesn't give a definition of it.

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It's, uh, it's these different things. If a woman is doing this, then she has a Jezebel spirit. And to just kind of give you an example, if a man is an overbearing man, then he has an

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Ahab spirit. If a woman is an overbearing woman, then she has a Jezebel spirit. And I'm sure it goes on from there to like, if she's sexually promiscuous, then she has a

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Jezebel spirit. So that's kind of the, that's kind of the implication that he's giving here with regard to the

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Jezebel spirit is already in the room now here. He's talking to a bunch of men. So I'm, so he doesn't talk about Jezebel or an

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Ahab spirit. He says Jezebel spirit, but this is all kind of like stirring up the, the niche thing that he's been preaching on for the last year or so, right.

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Right. And this, this fits perfectly, you know, he's gotten wrapped up with the modern demon slayers and casting out demons and all this kind of stuff, binding

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Satan, all that, you know, and if you've got a, if you've got, if you're an alcoholic, if you're looking at porn, if you're, you know,

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I got anger issues, you've got a demon. Yeah, right. Exactly. You've got a demon.

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You don't have a sin problem. You've got a demon. You just got to cast that demon out and then you'll be all better. And you won't have those issues anymore.

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So this is a way of short circuiting people's sanctification. Assuming they're even regenerate.

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The Bible, the Bible gives us instructions to repent, put to death the deeds of the body.

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If you've, if you're looking at porn, you don't have the demon of pornography in you, you've got a sin issue.

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Right. And you need to repent. That is, yeah, that's your flesh. You are, you have not put to death the sin that is in you.

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Colossians three, verse five, put to death what is earthly in you. And then the sins that Paul mentions includes sexual immorality, and against such things, the wrath of God is coming.

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So it doesn't say anything about pass that demon out of you so that you can live wholly unto God. Put to death your fleshly desires that you may be wholly unto

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Christ. That's not what you hear from this. You hear that you have a spirit of, of some kind that needs to be passed out or it's that it, you know, it's the old, uh, the devil made me do it.

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Flip Wilson theology. Yeah. The devil made me do it. All right. The Jezebel spirit opened our event.

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This is a rebuke and a correction of no one. This is an observation before the word of God was open.

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There was a platform. It was a high place on. It was a pole, an

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Asherah. Okay. He says there's an Asherah pole. What, what is an

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Asherah pole? So if you, uh, are familiar with the sins of Israel and, uh, first and second

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Kings, for example, they would worship the Asherah who is the mother God, and they would, uh, erect a pole.

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That would be the symbol of the Asherah. It's kind of like Baal's wife. And, uh, and so that's what he's claiming this was.

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So this stunt that this guy performed climbing this pole and rapidly descending the pole is, is an altar to Asherah.

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That's his claim. Right. Whereas that, you know, this is typical of the charismatic tendency to spiritualize everything they see.

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You know, if you see something a little bit unusual, um, whatever it is, it's, it's

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God somehow trying to get a message to you or something like that. It's, you know, I'm, I am no apologist for the, for the gimmickry that is rampant at this conference.

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I mean, that's all it is, is a bunch of gimmicks and, you know, um, pyrotechnics and a light show and all that kind of stuff, but come on.

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I mean, this guy's a sword swallower. It's what he does. This is not an Asherah pole. I mean, good grief, right?

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Yeah. And like I said, it turns out that this man does have a past as a stripper and has not just done this in front of women.

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He's done it in front of men. So he's a homosexual. What I don't know, because I really did not do a deep dive into the guy, but, uh, what

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I am not sure of is if he's repented of that. Like, does the man now claim to be a Christian?

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And so that's why he was brought into this Christian men's conference because he has a testimony of,

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I used to be in all this sexually debaucherous stuff. And now I've repented of that. And I've come to the

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Lord Jesus Christ. That would be interesting to know if that's not the case, then the story here is not that they had a stripper performing a stripper performance.

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Cause that's not what happened. The story would be that they had an, an outspoken open homosexual entertaining these men and that would be, that would be a problem that needs to be called out.

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That would be, that would be the issue. Right. And, uh, you went, you said you went to his website.

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You went to Alex McGolla's website. Yeah. And I did not click on any links or pages in there because if he is a stripper,

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I just don't want to see it. So, but it, it did have like the, it did have like the list of stuff on the front of the page that was, you know, all the different talent shows that he's done and won and stuff like that.

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But there wasn't anything on the front page that, that, uh, presented him as a

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Christian performer. So I don't know if that's part of his, uh, of his shtick or not.

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Right. And I went to his, um, well, I didn't go to his website. I haven't even seen that yet, but I did find a video of him on Twitter that he posted and I think it was about a year ago, maybe a year and a half ago.

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And it was something like the hardest season of my life. And I thought, okay, maybe is this, is this some kind of a, you know, testimony of conversion or whatever.

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And so I watched it and all he was talking about is how he, he did this, this same thing, you know, climbing the pole.

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Um, and he, and he ripped his, ripped his bicep and, uh, yeah.

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And wasn't sure he would be able to perform anymore because he injured himself, ripped his bicep. He hadn't even had the video of him when it happened.

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But, um, yeah, as best I can tell, this guy's not a Christian. If he is, we haven't seen any evidence of it, but.

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The same thing that's used in the strip club for women who have a Jezebel spirit to seduce.

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Okay. He just said a Jezebel spirit to seduce men. All right. I mean, that really is a claim of like, uh, we've, we've got someone, something homosexual going on here.

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That's what it is. So that's what he's suggesting. There's something homosexual going on here.

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In front of that was a man who ripped his shirt off like a woman does in front of a pole at a strip club.

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That man then ascended. See, our God is not arrogant.

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He doesn't us and our God is humble. He descends. Okay. So he's, that's a weird statement too, because our

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God did ascend. He ascended to the right hand of God. So that's the first thing I thought, wait a minute.

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Make sure you did. It's like, he's trying to be profound here. And again, he's just selling his whole

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Jezebel spirit thing. And in the process of doing that, you know, he's, he's really not biblical in anything that he's saying here.

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Yeah, no, he's no, he's not. And, and I don't think a single man in that room when they saw this guy climb up the pole with a sword in his mouth or whatever,

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I don't think a single one of them thinking, wow, that's a really beautiful picture of, of what

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God did. Who's even thinking that, you know?

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And then I would also want to know, did anybody there actually think that what they were seeing was anything resembling a stripper performance?

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Would they have thought that about this stunt? That's what I, that's what I was going to about to get to like, okay.

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We are no apologists for what they did here, but this is a men's conference full of rah rah men stuff.

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I mean, tanks riding over cars. We've got very masculine stuff. MMA stuff, you know, boxing, weightlifting.

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Football players come in there and professional athletes there. And yeah, yeah.

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I mean, some, you know, some, some masculine stuff, macho stuff. That's right. I would wager to bet there is not a single homosexual in that room.

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Why, why would they have some, at least not openly, but yeah, at least not openly.

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That like, that would be to have, to have a male stripper come in and perform.

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That would be the, like the last thing they would ever want to have come in at a conference like this, right?

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Right. Yeah. For all the different things that James river church does with this particular conference, that's not anything that we've seen before.

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Um, uh, in this conference, it's not becoming progressively more homosexual. It's, it's more and more macho every year is what they're trying to do.

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But I mean, furthermore, Driscoll has fed into this. He's been involved in this men's conference since 2017.

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So the more grandiose it gets every single year, he's contributed to that. And you don't hear any humility in what he's saying here.

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Like he's, he's not going, listen, guys, I've been a part of this for seven years and we're letting this get out of hand. And I'm sorry that it's gotten this far.

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There's no humility in this, in this at all. Nope. Not at all. Not at all.

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And then he swallowed a sword and Jesus Christ.

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Okay. Pastor John, I'll receive that. Thank you. Okay. So, and that's when

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John Lindale, the pastor said, call it out. You're done. You're done. Stop.

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You're done. And, um, and then Mark Driscoll walked off. And so, so, uh,

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John Lindale now walks up on the platform. I talked to Mark for a half hour.

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He's had a line. Okay. Gabe. So Lindale comes up on the platform and he says that he basically he accused

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Mark Driscoll of lying. He said that, uh, Mark, Mark Driscoll was, was with me for half an hour after the sword swallower guy, and before he got up on platform, he was with him for half an hour and he never said one word about this thing, if he had a problem with it and, and that's another kind of hint that, that Driscoll was doing something opportunistic here.

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Yeah. Why would he not have in that half an hour conversation have said to Lindale guys, what are we doing here?

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Like, did you know that when this guy got up there, that he was going to look like a stripper or something like that?

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Um, you know, there was no sort of confrontation, excuse me, no sort of confrontation like that.

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Now I'm not one who thinks that this necessarily needed a Matthew 18 sort of exchange where you go to the brother who's offended you, you talk with him.

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Uh, this Matthew 18, 15, where Jesus gives the, uh, the guidelines for church discipline. You talk with your brother alone and if he repents, well, then you've won your brother.

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But if he doesn't repent, then you bring two or three others along that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

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If he won't listen to them, you take it to the church. And if he won't listen to the church, then you treat him as a Gentile or a tax collector.

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Now, in this particular situation, if it were like a false teacher or something like that would be on the platform, which there have been plenty of those at this particular men's conference, then another teacher coming up and calling that out,

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I don't think that needs a Matthew 18 approach. Jesus didn't privately confront the

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Pharisees before he called out the Pharisees, but in this particular situation, you, you clearly had a situation where they're, they're alone together and Mark doesn't even tell the guy

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I'm going to go up there and I'm going to call this out or ask any questions to see like how much

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Lindell knew that this man was going to do when he did this performance or anything like that, it really looks like Driscoll took an opportunity and he, and he said something that has been part of the preaching that he's been doing for at least the past year, this platform issue that he has of a

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Jezebel spirit. Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly right. Very opportunistic. Yeah.

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If he was so bothered by it, he should have said something in the half hour he had before he got up on the platform.

30:22

This is, this is a, but this is typical Mark Driscoll. He's wanting to wanting to, to make a name for himself, wanting to get his name in the, in the headlines.

30:32

And we certainly did that, you know, but and I must say,

30:37

I find it ironic. Anytime I hear churches like this quote, Matthew 18, my first thought is, well, how convenient you don't even do

30:47

Matthew eight. You don't even do church discipline at your church. I guarantee you James river church has never done church discipline.

30:55

They always stop with verse 15, you know, they never go through all the way through verse 20 and get to the point where they get up on a

31:04

Sunday morning and tell the entire church what, you know, Billy Bob and their congregation has been doing, what his sin is and all that.

31:10

They never do that. So at any rate, I digress, but you know, if, if the

31:16

Jezebel spirit is there trying to seduce men through a male stripper, um,

31:24

I think the Jezebel, she came to the wrong conference because I don't, I don't think she's going to have a lot of success.

31:30

Yeah. And it is kind of funny too, that he, that he throws women under the bus. Like what does a

31:36

Jezebel spirit have anything to do with, with any of this? This, this would be hyper masculinity would be the problem here more so than than some sort of Jezebel spirit.

31:46

Yeah, that's right. That's right. You know, and, and I'm fine with, you know, uh, football and all that kind of stuff.

31:54

And I like to go out and I like, I like to watch football. I like to ride my four wheeler. I like to shoot my guns. I like to go.

32:00

I happen to know, I happen to know that there's a video out there of you shooting a flamethrower. So no, we know what kind, we know what kind of guy you are,

32:07

Justin. You sure that was me? So y 'all never seen a crippled guy in a suit and tie shooting a flamethrower at a clown.

32:16

Now you have yeah.

32:35

So, um, you know, I'm fine with all that stuff, but that's not, uh, that's not what being a man is about.

32:40

It's not what being a godly husband is about. So anyway, all right.

32:46

Well, very typical Mark Driscoll. And, um, it's also ironic that he would, he would get so exercised about this, at least what he perceives to be some sexual immorality when he himself has claimed that the

33:02

Holy spirit gives him pornographic visions. I'm sure you've seen it, right? Oh, yeah. Some people actually see things.

33:12

This may be gift of discernment on occasion. I see things, I see things.

33:18

There was one woman I dealt with. She'd never told her husband that she had committed adultery on him early in the relationship.

33:27

I said, you know, she's sitting there with her husband. I said, you know, I think the root of all this, I think Satan has a foothold in your life because you've never told your husband about that really tall blonde guy that you met at the bar.

33:37

And then you went back to the hotel and you laid on your back and you undressed yourself and he climbed on top of you and you had sex with him and snuggled up with him for a while.

33:45

And deep down in your heart, even though you had just met him, you desired him because secretly he is the fantasy body type.

33:54

I said, you remember that place? It was that cheap hotel with that certain colored bedspread. You had sex with the light on because you weren't ashamed and you wanted him to see you and you wanted to see him.

34:06

She's just looking at me like. I said, you know, it's about 10 years ago. I mean, and yeah,

34:13

I, somebody else brought that up last night too. And I was seeing people respond to what Driscoll was saying.

34:18

It was like, apparently Driscoll didn't have a problem with God showing him pornographic images in his head, at least according to him, that's his claim, which would be a very, that's blasphemous to say that, that, uh, that God's giving you these images of, of these women doing these sexually immoral things, which he's lying about that and doesn't seem to have a problem with proclaiming those kinds of things, uh, doesn't call out his own sins, has never repented of the stuff that he's done.

34:44

You know, if, if people are watching and are not familiar with Driscoll, there's something like, there's a letter with something like 30 former elders with Mars Hill church that, that since he's left have said, this man was never repentant.

34:59

He has never apologized for anything that he's done. The abuses that he did while he was a pastor, the lying, the cheating, the stealing, uh, manipulating church funds and all this kind of stuff.

35:11

Driscoll is not a different person. He's just moved on to his next grift. And, and it's sad that our, our memories are so short over the stuff that he's done just, just 10 years ago.

35:22

It was 2014 when he left Mars Hill church. He's been doing this men's conference since 2017.

35:28

So he just moved on to his next thing. And there are people that are, uh, cheering for him completely unaware or, or at least willing to forget that this man is unqualified.

35:40

He is not fit to be a pastor and, uh, and is every bit as much of a problem of the stuff that was going on at that men's conference, um, as the stuff that he was calling out, he's contributed to all of this.

35:53

He's not a hero here. That's right. That's right, Gabe. I'm so glad you said that. He is not a hero here.

35:58

He is unqualified. He is both unqualified and disqualified from being in any kinds of any kind of ministry, the plagiarism, the coarse language, the sexually explicit language.

36:11

Uh, as you said, there were, I think almost 40 former elders of Mars Hill signed this statement saying that he is unfit for ministry.

36:19

So yeah, men shouldn't be anywhere near a pulpit. All right.

36:25

Well, well, Gabe brother, thank you very much for your input here. Um, appreciate your help.

36:32

Always a pleasure being on. I thank you for playing that recent video of mine too. Uh, just to, just to give a plug, excuse me, to give a plug for this.

36:41

You helped me push my YouTube channel, WWU TT over 50 ,000 subscribers because you played that video.

36:48

So I thank you for that. Well, I'm happy to do it, brother. I appreciate it. You know, there's some, there's some really bad

36:53

YouTube channels out there in the evangelical world, but there's some good ones too. And I like to, I like to promote the good ones and point people in, uh, their direction and yours is one of them.

37:04

WWU TT link down below, dear friends in the description, as well as to, to Gabe's church out there in, in what town again,

37:14

Casa Grande, Arizona, Casa Grande, Arizona, where it's 95 degrees right now. So if you like the heat, go pay him a visit.

37:21

All right. Thanks Gabe. Thank you too. Okay. Now, dear ones, my interview with Travis Allen, who had the firsthand interaction with Mark Driscoll in the publicity stunt that he pulled at grace community church back in 2013.

37:38

And, uh, it's my joy to interview him. This will be very enlightening into the character of Mark Driscoll.

37:46

Okay. Well, Travis brother, thank you for joining me. How are you today? Hey, I'm well, how are you,

37:52

Justin? Good to see you. Good to see you too, brother. Good to see you too. Always good to see you. All right.

37:58

So Travis, you and I have been together on a number of occasions. Uh, the first of which was the strange fire conference back in 2013.

38:06

Yeah. But, um, since then I've been to, I've been to your church. We've hung out, we've spent some time together and, uh, a great deal of love and affection for you and your ministry, your family.

38:16

And, uh, um, you have some personal experience with Mark Driscoll.

38:23

And so you've seen the video. I've already played it in the first part of this video.

38:28

So you've seen the video, what happened at this conference. And, um, I think this was a publicity stunt.

38:35

Tell us about your, your history with Mark Driscoll and what you've observed firsthand.

38:42

Right. Um, well, there is precedent for you assuming that this might be a publicity stunt, um, when in, back in 2013, um,

38:56

Mark Driscoll and James McDonald were on their way to a conference, um, where they were going to be speaking.

39:04

And I think bringing a bunch of, a bunch of like X 29 pastors with them and things like that.

39:10

So they were down in Southern California area. And the way he told the story is they just happened to be in town and,

39:20

Hey, why don't we pop over to the, uh, to the strange fire conference? So I think these, these guys would, uh, you know, they'd appreciate some free copies of the book that I just wrote.

39:30

I just want to be gracious and hand out some copies and that kind of thing. So he showed up on campus and it kind of was causing a little bit of a buzz.

39:38

Um, and there were, um, you know, some who had the idea of, well, let's just be as shrewd as Mark Driscoll and kind of line up a bunch of guys who are kind of in the know and we'll kind of take all his books from him and that way they won't get circulated around the general population.

39:58

So there was this line of guys out in front of the, the master's seminary building on the campus of grace community church, because you're not to interrupt, but this is, this was the strange fire conference.

40:10

And, and as you being an elder at the church, you didn't, you know, obviously you don't want just anybody coming in and passing out books that have not been approved by the leadership of the church.

40:22

Right. Yeah. Well, thanks for, thanks for, uh, interrupting with that because it's, it's important probably to say that I was, uh, at that time

40:30

I was, I was working at grace to you as the managing director. And I was an elder at the church and, and, uh, you know, pastor there, uh, uh, at one of the fellowship groups there at the church.

40:41

But my, my, uh, my main work during the week was at grace to you as the managing director and grace to you was putting this conference on, it was a truth matters conference and it was, uh, but themed for strange fire, which was the book that John, uh, wrote to expose the, the charismatic movement and to, uh, to confront the abuse of the

41:08

Holy spirit, the doctrine of pneumatology, and to set the record straight on the Holy spirit. It was a fantastic book.

41:14

Um, you know, parallel with, uh, charismatic chaos, which has also been a very helpful book. But anyway, so grace to you is, uh, putting on this conference.

41:22

And I had been tasked with, uh, organizing this, bringing it together and conducting, you know, all the research and stuff for it and, and, uh, putting this thing into play.

41:31

So we'd obviously had a number of people who had come to, um, you know, come to distribute books or set up, you know, vendors or, uh, people promoting their ministries and having ministry tables or ministering displays.

41:46

And all of that is vetted beforehand. And so, you know, you go through a process for that and, um, you know, you're approved or not.

41:55

And so that had already happened. It's the conferences going on and Mark Driscoll shows up to, you know, essentially to act in a de facto way as a vendor, promoting his ministry and handing out his books.

42:11

So, you know, as the organizer of the conference and, and having a role there, I just thought, well, this, this isn't right.

42:18

And so again, there were, there were guys lined up kind of in the know, taking his books and things like that.

42:24

And so, uh, I, I just happened to at the time be in John's office and talking to some of the guys.

42:30

And, and, uh, I just said, look, John, this is, you know, this is going on. John MacArthur is completely unfazed by this kind of stuff.

42:38

And he, he, he, he could kind of care less one way or another. He's like, you know, God's going to take care of this stuff.

42:44

And I just said, John, do you mind if I just go and, um, confront this and ask him to, uh, stop handing out books and, you know, look, look,

42:51

I'll invite him to the conference. I'll give him a wristband. So he can join the conference. I think he could really benefit from, uh, the sessions at the strange fire conference and learn a thing or two.

43:01

That's for sure. Uh, so John said, yeah, go for it. So went down there, grabbed, uh, the head of our security department,

43:09

Tom Hatter, uh, who's a, he's a good friend and a dear man, uh, you know, long career with the

43:15

LAPD used to handling all kinds of issues. And so just a very competent, uh, man to have by your side.

43:24

I went to, I went to Mark and I said, Hey, listen, you know, I just kind of introduced myself, introduced

43:30

Tom and just said, look, Mark. Uh, you know, we've had people who have, who've actually formally applied to be vendors here.

43:45

Uh, you never applied. You're not on that list. And really you approach handing out books at this conference is really an inappropriate thing.

43:53

Could you please not do that? And in fact, I'd love to give you a wristband, have you join, uh, free of charge on us and, uh, he said, oh, thanks.

44:02

Well, yeah, thank you. He was, he was cordial. He stopped handing out the books. Um, and, uh, you know, just had him behind him, but kept greeting people.

44:13

So I just backed off and let that, let that continue and, um, um, watched him for a bit and I noticed that he was talking with guys and he'd shake their hand.

44:26

They'd go right around him and go grab one of the books out of the box. And I thought, well, that's interesting.

44:32

Maybe it's, maybe it's an anomaly. No man. Number two, man. Number three, over and over.

44:38

It goes on down the line. They're, they're talking to him for a couple of minutes, shake his hand, go around, grab a book.

44:45

So he's essentially telling him, Hey, just go grab a book. He's doing the same thing. He's just not putting a book into their hand.

44:51

He's having them go grab it. So I just went up to him and I said, listen, Mark, whether you're handing the books to the guy yourself, or you're having him go get it, it's the same thing.

45:01

I've asked you, please, could you not hand out the books? And I don't remember if it was in that first exchange or this second exchange where he said, what are you going to do if I don't, you know, what are you going to do if I, if I keep handing them out and I just,

45:16

I thought to myself, what are we like in junior high? I, this, this is strange that you would kind of front up to me like that.

45:24

And so I just said to him, Mark, I don't know what I'm going to do. I was like, I didn't anticipate really that he would say something like that, but just that he'd be polite and do what

45:35

I do, what we ask, you know, this isn't his church, not his conference. And I thought, well, that would be the, that'd just kind of be what a, what a man does is just say, oh, sure.

45:45

Sorry for the offense. And that's what a man does. And he had just come from a conference titled act like men.

45:51

That was the irony of it. Yeah. The, the conference that he and James McDonald were, were heading down to was, uh, was the act like men conference, right?

46:01

James McDonald was there with him too. Correct. He was, yeah. He was kind of wearing like a, like a do rag or something.

46:08

And, and they were driving like a, I don't know if it was a Mustang or Camaro or something, but it was kind of parked out back of the, the seminary building.

46:18

And, uh, you know, there were people kind of chatting those guys up, getting some pictures and selfies and I don't know what they were doing anyway.

46:24

So I just said, look, you know, could you please not do this? He's like, what are you going to do?

46:29

If I don't, I said, uh, I don't, I don't know. I haven't really, I'll think that through when I have to, but could you please not do it?

46:36

And so he, um, I think Tom had also talked to him and said a couple of things, introduced himself.

46:42

And so he said, look, um, I'll give you the books. And we said, yeah,

46:49

Mark, we don't thank you. We don't want your books. He said, no, I'm giving you, it's a gift to you. So now just let us,

46:55

Tom will grab them. We'll just put, go put them back in the Mustang or, you know, whatever your car is, uh, take them back behind the building and put them in your car.

47:03

And he said, he said, no, I mean, I really, I just want to give these to you as a gift. It's my gift to you.

47:09

Just go ahead and take them. So we said, okay. All right. Didn't, uh, you know, want to spurn his, his kindness.

47:18

So whether you're putting them in, give them scans or whether he's going to take the books.

47:25

So James, we'll just put them in the Mustang. Why don't you guys just take them to wherever you want?

47:30

We're going to come back in a month. Yeah. We want to get them back. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

47:50

We took the books and Tom took them into the, into the, um, the church offices.

47:57

It sometime, sometime during this. Um, and I, I can't remember if it was right before or right after someone told me, yeah,

48:07

Mark Driscoll actually. It turns out he contacted before he got on campus.

48:12

He contacted his publicist and told the publicist, Hey, you want to send some reporters over here?

48:18

Cause we're about to stir things up over the strange fire conference. It was a publicity stunt from the very beginning to promote himself, his ministry, his books.

48:28

And so anyway, and that has actually been, um, verified through some of his former elders who have also spoken of this and, and to their credit, they spoken of it with a kind of a contrite, um, you know, remorse that they were even involved in this little stunt to begin with.

48:47

And they've described, um, you know, from their perspective, what's going on or what, what happened that day?

48:54

Yeah. So all that, all that happens later on, we find out he posted on.

49:00

Uh, Twitter, I think it was security just confiscated my books and I'm like, you gotta be kidding me.

49:09

Really? That's how he spun this. So once again, it was another, it was just one attempt to stir up trouble and cause, uh, cause a scene.

49:20

And try to, I think he was maybe trying to embarrass us if we had a bad reaction. Uh, and, and then trying to, when it, when that didn't happen, try to find another way to kind of needle us a bit.

49:32

And, but whatever, whatever was in, in the recesses of his heart.

49:37

God knows. I think that from beginning to end and all the way through the end of it, it was a publicity stunt.

49:45

And I believe that, um, it was Janet Mefford that really started to expose him and she kind of, you know, really, really bulldog that as she got onto, got him onto her, uh, program and, uh, started to really dissect his,

50:01

I frankly childish behavior and, um, expose this to, um, expose this to her audience.

50:08

And that was kind of the, kind of the beginning of his downfall as he, there were some plagiarism charges and there was the, the stunt at strange fire.

50:15

There was, you know, all his abusive stuff coming out as well. And now we have, you know, he's as, as you were just telling me, he started going to this current conference where he's done something that looks eerily similar, uh, reminiscent of that first public publicity stunt, but, uh, he's been going to that conference since 2017.

50:39

And three years after he was kind of deposed from his church and then went and set up shop down in the

50:45

Phoenix area with Trinity church and how he's now he's in another church and another con it's like, he, the guy, the guy is an abusive, bad example, um, charismatic chaos, all the kinds of issues, anti Calvinist, uh, angry, all that stuff, prideful.

51:03

And they're going to put them back up on a stage again and present him to men. Now, a whole bunch of men there who are trying to learn about biblical manhood in a time, in a time when we really do need biblical manhood, we do need to return to a clarity on the, on the roles of men and women to portray that as manhood, to put him before people that just, it just grieves my heart to see that.

51:28

Yeah, indeed. Indeed. Travis, that is unbelievable. You know, to, to set this up, to plan it out, to, to, to contact reporters,

51:38

Hey, I'm going to tell them I'm going to, I'm going to stir it up at the strange fire conference and then to, and then to just flat out lie about you saying that his books were confiscated.

51:50

Yeah. That's I mean, that's a bald face lie. It is, it is a bald face lie.

51:56

I was, uh, you know, and again, uh, to, to, to take someone like that and put him up before men.

52:06

And, and, and then, uh, you know, again, the whole premise of the, I think of your program is you're talking about that stronger men conference and it's got, it's got bull riding and tanks destroying vehicles and monster truck and motorcycle jumping and it's like evil

52:25

Knievel mixed with church. And you got, you got, you know, Mark's taking issue calling a

52:32

Jezebel calling on about a Jeff calling out a Jezebel spirit because there's a sword swallower that's ripped his shirt off and climbed a pole with a sword in his mouth and I'm wondering what is more unfitting in that setting, the sword swallower or Mark Driscoll, I can tell you what's unfitting is the name of Jesus Christ is unfitting in a place like that.

52:56

I mean, do all that stuff, have NFL quarterbacks come in and all, you know, try to legitimize what you're doing, but don't mix the name of Jesus Christ there,

53:05

I would prefer to, I mean, sword swallowers, if they want to go make a buck swallowing swords, more power to them, if you want to, you know, if you're, if you're really good at jumping motorcycles or driving tanks over cars, whatever your thing is fine.

53:21

And that's that's entertainment. And you want to entertain people and have a weekend to do that. I get no problem.

53:26

But when you start to mix the name of Christ and try to start to speak words about gospel and try to call this preaching, you're, you're now blending um, entertainment, pop culture stuff, uh, caricatures of manhood and male things into what is calling that Christian and saying that that is the model of manhood,

53:50

I think there are a lot of men who are being led astray by that. And I just would like to see men be men and look at Jesus Christ in the scripture, not what's portrayed here.

54:00

Not definitely not what's portrayed by Mark Driscoll and his ilk, but look at Jesus Christ and see what he is.

54:08

I was just, you and I had inter interacted in this and my, my Bible reading happened to take me through the book of Ruth this morning.

54:15

I'm looking at Boaz. This man is, this man is a behind the scenes.

54:21

Um, you know, he, he only comes to the forefront because of the story of Ruth, but the man is behind the scenes.

54:28

He's a fair, righteous man. He's, he cares about his, uh, the people who are gleaning his fields.

54:35

He cares about this widow, young widow comes in and wants to take care of her. He serves her.

54:41

He's kind to her, you know, you don't see this abusive, self -promoting chest beating, chest thumping, kind of a.

54:49

Uh, a macho man. You see a guy who's very gentle. And when he said, when he gives his word, he acts on it immediately.

54:56

He goes to, to conduct, you know, take the place of the kinsman redeemer to put his, his, his covering over this woman and care for her.

55:06

To raise up children for her dead husband. I mean, a guy is totally self -sacrificial giving himself to the law and giving himself to kindness and the compassion of God, that's manhood that's

55:19

Boaz. You don't see that. You don't see that guy making the conference stage in a place like, you know, stronger men conference.

55:27

That's right. That's right. Amen. Well said Travis. Well said. That's why I wanted to interview you on my program, brother.

55:34

Right there. Well, thanks for having me, Justin. I appreciate so much what you do and calling attention to some of this, some of these shenanigans.

55:42

I, you know, I, you and I were kind of chatting offline about this, about how it's, it's so disappointing to see, you know, you, you saw it.

55:51

I think Christianity today called it the, the rise and fall of the modern, uh, or the rise and fall of, uh,

55:58

Mars Hill and, uh, and, you know, I did that whole series talking about the fall of Mark Driscoll and Mars Hill and what everything that came apart,

56:06

I think that they. They, because they weren't equipped theologically, they didn't really get to the heart of the theological issues and the ecclesiological issues, uh, pastoral issues in that, in that series, but they did a good job exposing some of those things.

56:22

You would think that that guy could never find his place into a pulpit again.

56:28

And yet they're just, I guess it's just a big world out there. And there are so many people who don't know or don't care, but they don't know, and then they find themselves right back at conferences like this, where a guy like that is headlined.

56:42

It's so disappointing to see that. So I'm grateful for what you do, Justin. Sometimes I wonder like, how is it that you can continue on at you?

56:50

You've done such a thorough exposure of the, the, the charismatic chaos and some of the loony fringe stuff that really is mainstream and the charismatic movement, but you do such a good job exposing it.

57:01

And I think they can't have a leg to stand on. I think you said it during COVID too. You said, you said if they're not walking through the land, healing everybody of COVID and running the pandemic off of the earth, um, and you know, then they're, they're kind of exposed just by this pandemic thing.

57:20

Yeah, but they're back, come back and, uh, and they're, they seem to be stronger than ever.

57:27

So yeah, I appreciate what you do, uh, Justin for the kingdom. Thanks Travis.

57:32

That, that means a lot to me, brother, especially coming from you. Thank you. Thank you. I've, you've heard me say this before and I'll, I'll say it to you difference.

57:40

I, you know, I'm an evangelist and I travel and preach and teach, um, um, and it's my joy to do so.

57:47

But I tell you, I have a tremendous, tremendous amount of respect for all of our love and respect for all of our faithful shepherds out there.

57:56

Pastors, elders out there that are serving in local churches that aren't known, aren't, aren't being asked to speak at the big conferences, but they are out there doing the

58:04

Lord's work, rightly dividing the word of truth, shepherding the flock, loving the flock, uh, doing all these things.

58:10

It's, it's, uh, and Travis, you're one of them, brother. And it's guys like you that one day will be at the front of the line.

58:18

So I appreciate you, brother. Oh man. I don't know about that front of the line thing, but I sure appreciate the kudos to the pastors because I, it is such a joy and, uh, uh, an honor to serve the

58:29

Lord Jesus Christ. And in that capacity to follow, to be able to do what Jesus says in scripture and try to be one of the under shepherds that represent his shepherding interest as a good shepherd over the church, uh, to care for his flock is just a great privilege as you know, amen, amen, indeed, brother.

58:48

Thank you so much, Travis. You're sure. Welcome. Thanks for having me on Justin. You bet you bet.

58:54

And you are at grace church, Greeley, Colorado. And that's right.

59:00

Grace Greeley .org. Grace Greeley .org. All right. Yeah, good deal.

59:06

Grace Greeley .org. So you're, um, an hour or so Northeast of Denver.

59:13

Yeah, just, just North of Denver. I mean, it's, it's almost a direct lineup, but yeah, just go up by 25, about 45 minutes an hour or so.

59:21

We're, we're just off to the right a little bit, depending on traffic. All right. Okay. Well, I love to point people to good, solid churches.

59:28

And so, um, maybe some folks watching this will, will discover you guys and give you a visit.

59:35

Well, thank you. Justin. We'll have to have you back sometime soon because you're well -loved around here. So appreciate you.

59:41

I would love it. Kathy and I both would. All right, man. But she won't be preaching. Just me. All right.

59:50

Thanks Travis. See you man. Bye. I hope that this has been helpful for you, dear ones. Thank you very much for joining me for watching the program.

59:58

Until our next time together, may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of his

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Holy spirit be with you all. Thank you for listening to Didache.

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We hope that you were encouraged and edified by what you just heard. If you have a question or comment for Justin, or interested in more teaching resources, or would like to have him come and preach at your church or conference, you may contact him at justinpeters .org.