Episode 16: AI Can't Love: Women in Ministry and Artificial Intelligence in the Church With Dr. Kristen Ferguson of Gateway Seminary + Cheerwine Soda Review and Pleading the Blood of Jesus in Prayer.

Must Pastors and Church Leaders Go to Seminary? Is Online or In Person School Better? Plus: 666 OR 616: The Mysterious Mark of the Beast and the Earliest Manuscript of Revelation

Pastors and Church Leaders: MUST You Go to Seminary? NO! But, Why SHOULD You? Why Should Pastors or Church leaders consider a seminary degree? All about Gateway Seminary, Bay Area Campus. What makes in person seminary training better than online seminary or online classes? Incarnate ministry training vs. online ministry training. The benefits and drawbacks of fully online seminary or graduate school. Upcoming Bay Area theology symposium on how churches should receive immigrants and deal with illegal immigrants. Seminary is not necessary, but why should pastors and leaders go? Seminary helps fill the gaps in training people to be competent teachers of the Bible and pastors in areas where some local churches don't have the capacity to train. Dr. Cameron Schweitzer is at Gateway Seminary as the director of the San Francisco campus and associate professor of historical theology. Today you will hear him talking about doing theology in the Bay Area, Jonathan Edwards, probably the best theologian America has produced, and his radical story of salvation. Early on in the podcast, you heard Pastor Christopher and Dr. Schweitzer talk about the Mark of the Beast, 666, and then Dr. Schweitzer said something enigmatic when he said, or 616." What was that all about? I know it was a light-hearted comment, but it is worth discussing in a slightly deeper way, because I myself am pretty fascinated by eschatology, or the study of the last things/end times. That number - 666 or 616 comes from Revelation 13, and then Revelation 14 describes its significance. Let's read: 11 Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13 And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people. 14 Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honor of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed. 16 It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17 so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name. 18 This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666. Revelation 14:9-12 9 A third angel followed them and said in a loud voice: "If anyone worships the beast and its image and receives its mark on their forehead or on their hand, 10 they, too, will drink the wine of God's fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. 11 And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There will be no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the mark of its name." 12 This calls for patient endurance on the part of the people of God who keep his commands and remain faithful to Jesus. If you are an amillennialist, you probably aren't very concerned about 666 or 616. The amillennialist view holds that the 1,000-year reign of Christ mentioned in the Book of Revelation is not a literal future earthly kingdom, but a symbolic representation of the present church age. In this perspective, Christ is currently reigning spiritually from heaven, and Satan has already been bound to prevent him from stopping the spread of the Gospel. This period of spiritual rule spans from Christ's first coming to his second coming. Ultimately, history will culminate in a single, glorious return of Jesus, followed by the general resurrection, the final judgment, and the eternal state. Amillennialists view the mark of the beast as a spiritual representation of allegiance to worldly, anti-Christian powers and the ideologies of Satan . They typically approach this concept in two ways:The Forehead: Represents a person's thoughts, intellect, and ideological commitment.The Hand: Represents a person's actions, deeds, and everyday labor. Others view 666 and the Mark of the beast more literally. Many, many lines of ink have been spilled over the years talking about this 'mark of the beast.' There are so many theories about it ranging from the mildly plausible to the patently absurd. I recall in the 80s that many were convinced that UPC codes (the bar codes found on things you buy at the store) were the mark of the beast. Others believe it will be an injectable chip or something along those lines. The Greek word used for "mark" is 'χάραγμα cháragma, khar'-ag-mah' and it means a stamp, or a mark. It comes from a word that means 'trench,' so it very likely contains a connotation of digging, engraving or etching. I suppose an implantable chip (possibly with circuits engraved on its boards) could qualify there, but that is a slight stretch. So – what is this mark of the beast? And the answer is, of course – WE DON'T KNOW! And once again, I am quite skeptical of those who claim to know exactly, because we aren't given enough information to know. That said, we are given enough information to probably know the mark of the beast when we see it. I believe it will be very, very clear, and not something that you can be really duped into getting, like some sort of injection or thing that is given to you by deceit. Whatever else you think of the COVID vaccines, they are most certainly NOT the mark of the beast, and only bad exegesis of these passages can get you to that conclusion. The passage seems to indicate that the mark of the beast will be received with a conscious submission to it, and not ignorantly. Here's what we know: 1. The mark will be on the right hand or the forehead. 2. The mark will be economic in some ways – there will be finance systems set up where you can't buy or sell without the mark. As such, I kind of keep up with anti-fraud technology, because that is one possible way we could get to a mark of the beast. I could see a leader or government attempting to make currency obsolete somehow and requiring some sort of unique ID/payment method be somehow put onto every person. 3. The mark will somehow tie back into the beast/antichrist/man of lawlessness, and perhaps the kingdom/country/group of countries that individual is leading. 4. Even if we see the mark coming – WE WON'T BE ABLE TO PREVENT IT. God has ordained these events, and they aren't written down in the Bible for us to try and stop them. We have no command to fight against the implementation of these technologies. Do so if you feel so led, but the point of this passage is very simple: Do NOT get the mark of the beast. The point is not – FIGHT AGAINST EVERY TECHNOLOGY or INNOVATION THAT COULD BE THE MARK. God's Word will come to pass. Bottom line: Don't get a mark/chip/tattoo/engraving/implant on your wrist/arm or forehead that has anything to do with buying and selling. One more thing to discuss – the enigmatic 666. What's that all about? As you might imagine, Christians over the years have discussed this issue extensively and fiercely debated its meaning. Many believe that John intended the number to be used in a way as a code, and thus many use gematria – which is a way of assigning a number to letters and fashioning a sort of code – as a way to interpret 666. The problems with this approach are legion, as John never tells us exactly how 666 is the number of the name of the antichrist, and never tells us what code he might be using, and Christians have thus guessed for over a thousand years what he was thinking. Many have definitely declared that Nero, Roman Catholics (Latinus), this or that pope, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ronald W. Reagan, Hitler, and others were the antichrist based on somehow making their name match up to 666. Is the Number of the Beast 666, 616, or Something More? But there is a fascinating wrinkle. Some ancient manuscripts read not 666, but 616. That does not mean your Bible is wrong, or that somebody recently discovered a secret chapter in the basement of the Vatican. The manuscript case still favors 666. But 616 is a genuine early textual variant, not an internet conspiracy theory. Papyrus 115 (P¹¹⁵): Dating to the late 3rd or early 4th century, this is the oldest surviving manuscript of Revelation. Kept at the Oxford University's Ashmolean Museum, it explicitly writes the number as 616 (χιϛ). Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus (Codex C): A 5th-century uncial manuscript located in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris. It spells out the number in full: hexakosioi deka hex ("six hundred and sixteen"). Bruce Metzger, one of the great evangelical textual critics, explained why the two numbers may be related. He wrote that "the Greek form Nero Caesar written in Hebrew characters … is equivalent to 666, whereas the Latin form … is equivalent to 616." In other words, a slightly different spelling of Nero Caesar could produce either number. That leads to the first major theory: the preterist or first-century Roman view. Many scholars think John was pointing to Nero, or perhaps to Nero as a symbol of the persecuting Roman Empire. Nero became the original monster under the bed, so to speak, for early Christians. He was a ruler associated with brutality, imperial power, blasphemous claims, and persecution. The Nero explanation is especially interesting because it can account for both 666 and 616. But it does not settle every question. Revelation was written to real first-century churches, yet it also looks ahead to the final victory of Christ. That is why many futurists see the beast as a coming final Antichrist, a real future ruler who will demand worship and wield political, religious, and economic power. Grant Osborne puts it well: "The coming Antichrist would be a Nero-like figure who would be the antitype of that evil anti-Christian." Historicist interpreters take another route. They see the beast imagery as unfolding through the history of the church, especially through recurring systems where political power, false religion, coercion, and persecution unite against Christ's people. Historically, many Protestants applied this to the papacy or to corrupt church-state systems. Their warning is worth hearing, even where we may disagree with their identifications: tyranny does not always arrive wearing a villain costume. Sometimes it arrives carrying a Bible, a flag, a sword, and a demand for unquestioning loyalty. Then there is the symbolic or idealist approach. G. K. Beale calls 666 "the completeness of sinful incompleteness." Six falls short of seven, and three sixes may portray a counterfeit trinity, evil pretending to be divine but always falling short. The beast can look impressive, powerful, even miraculous. But he is never Christ. And that brings us to the pastoral point. Whatever view you hold, the mark in Revelation is tied to worship, allegiance, and compromise. Craig Keener says John is writing "less to satisfy our end-time curiosity than to warn us about compromise." So do not panic every time technology changes. Do not assume a debit card, a barcode, or an app can accidentally separate a believer from Christ. But do ask the deeper question: What am I being pressured to worship? What am I being tempted to compromise? Whose name is shaping my mind, my work, my money, my loyalties, and my life? Because Revelation is not mainly trying to make us afraid of the future. It is calling us to be faithful to Jesus in the present, and to be watchful and waiting for His return, doing the Great Commission work of the Master while we wait. If the futurist perspective on Revelation is correct, then I believe when the antichrist/beast comes onto the scene, it will be much clearer how the number 666 relates to him. In this, I wholeheartedly agree with Andrew of Caesarea, a church bishop from the 500s, who wrote a commentary on Revelation: For the sober-minded, time and experience will reveal the actual significance of the number and the truth of whatever has been written about it. For, were it necessary, as some of the teachers say, that such a name be clearly known, the seer would have revealed it. But the divine grace did not consent that the name of the destroyer be noted in the divine book William C. Weinrich, ed., Revelation, Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2005), 213. CLOSE: Evangelism Workshop Need help equipping your church members to proclaim the gospel as they go? Well, we have the perfect workshop for you! Learn a simple and holistic process to help followers of Jesus begin and sustain a culture of evangelism. Our plan is to train on the effective ways to engage, and "Creating a Culture of Evangelism". Our target audience is church members, not just leaders. Join us for this amazing event all about making your church (and the individuals in it) REALLY GOOD AT EVANGELISM. *This workshop will be led in English, and Spanish. Oh, and we'll give your SBC church $1000 to spend on evangelism afterward. (More about that below.) Book your spot and mark your calendar for an amazing August 1st at Gilroy First Baptist in Gilroy, California. Register at GCASBC.Org [http://gcasbc.org].

Prayerlessness=Powerlessnes. How can Churches Develop a Culture of Prayer? Powerful stories of Prayer and Revival. + A Divisive Review of Wild Bill's Ring Pop Soda, a Soda Made by AI??

How does surrender work in a Christian's life? We try to surrender, but God is the one who provides the means for us to surrender. Being with the Lord is most important, rather than me trying and trying harder. The comfort of God carrying us to completion in our spiritual journey. Prayerlessness=Powerlessnes. What can be done about the powerlessness in the modern church? The same thing the South African church in the twentieth century did. The Lord led us gradually to the sin of prayerlessness as one of the deepest roots of the problem. No one could claim to be free from this. Nothing so reveals a defective spiritual life in a minister or a congregation as the lack of believing and unceasing prayer. Prayer is the pulse of the spiritual life. It is the great means by which ministers and laypeople alike receive the blessing and power of heaven. Persevering and believing prayer PRELUDES a strong and abundant life." Andrew Murray, Living a Prayerful Life (Bethany House, 2002). How can pastors seek God's presence as the center of their life? Beginning of the answer: Stop Trying. What we need to do first is to be with God. It's His Kingdom, but sometimes we pastors believe we have been given the responsibility to grow the Kingdom of God. Church works and accomplishments that are human-built, effort-powered, and talent-fueled may well be works that burn up and don't last into eternity. Some of those things that look like the Kingdom of God are not, but rather, Christian City, Potemkin Villages - Fake! Great prayer resources: Absolute Surrender by Andrew Murray The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer Old Paths New Power by Daniel Henderson The Valley of Vision - Puritan Prayers Bill Elliff books It Happens After Prayer - H.B. Charles GCA NEWS. STIIR – Loving the Lost Dr. Chris Smith. Link: https://www.gcasbc.org/post/stiir-loving-the-lost [https://www.gcasbc.org/post/stiir-loving-the-lost] Afghan American Church (Fremont) is a church plant through GCA with the mission of reaching Afghan immigrants through the love of God with the good news of Jesus Christ. We want to continue to grow into a strong community of worshipers and proclaimers of the true God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Prayer Request: Please pray for God's work in the hearts and minds of the Afghan community through our regular outreach programs, including a soccer camp and Kids' Camp at the end of June. Pray for God to break the spirit of fear in the community so they can have freedom to seek the truth and for the truth to set them free. Visit afghanamericanchurch.com.

Practical Wisdom for a Deeper Prayer Life. How does phone addiction contend with our prayer life, and what can we do about it? Prayer Distractions and How to Deal with Them. BACON Soda Review.

Today, we have a deep discussion with Dr. Se J. Won on the topic of prayer, and Dr. Won goes beyond the normal prayer discussions and will lead us into a wonderful blend of spirituality and practicality as we discuss how to enrich your prayer life, and why the tyranny of the urgent is less worth your time than abiding in Christ is. Se J shared one of my favorite quotes I've heard recently when he said, "We often settle for what we can do, what we can muster up, rather than what God can do…Sometimes we miss out on the fruitfulness of what God can do because we are doing it our way." I can totally relate to that, and I bet you can too, and I think Dr. Se J. is going to help us today to prioritize prayer and abiding over, under, and in addition to all of the day-to-day tasks of ministry and life that all of us face. It is a powerful and practical episode, and Dr. Se J. will close out that interview with a great prayer, but don't leave yet, because Pastor Christopher and I will almost ruin it with a review of Lester's Fixins BACON soda. Not Baking soda - that probably would have been better, but bacon soda. This is a soda that should have been prayed over far more before it was released. You will hear a former law enforcement officer testify, under oath, "This has some odor peculiarities that are similar to methamphetamines," and the world's foremost cereal expert suggested that "this smells like it will take ten years off of our life," and, "I feel like I'm drinking a pig, and it's weird!" But before we have that rough experience, let's talk prayer and go deep. Notes: Why "Help me overcome my unbelief," is a powerful prayer. We miss the presence of God sometimes because we are busy trying and doing. We often settle for what we can do, what we can muster up, rather than what God can do…Sometimes we miss out on the fruitfulness of what God can do because we are doing it our way." When the pastor thinks "If its to be, its up to me." In other words, when he thinks that human effort is the fuel for the church to succeed, then he inadvertently teaches that philosophy to the congregation, and that teaches them to rely on themselves, rather than God. The danger of pastors thinking, "If I just sit around and pray," nothing is going to happen. The key to meeting the human-powered attitude is to surrender to God. Prayer doesn't have to be 60 hours a week, but it does have to be a priority. "If we are with the Lord, hearing His message, and being filled by Him, and cooperating with the Holy Spirit, then He can do everything better than us - 100 times more - if we are an effective tool in His hand." Dr. Se J. How do you approach mundane things of ministry prayerfully? Answer: I start the day with a clean slate, listening to the Scripture, coming to the office and praying, focusing on listening to God and asking for His help on the day. Throughout the day, I ask for His help as I process. Throughout the week, I skip one or two meals to spend time praying and listening to His leading so that I can hear and respond to the leading and nudging of the Holy Spirit. This means some of our prayer time needs to be when we are NOT doing all of the talking. What are the worst distractions to prayer? 1. Overscheduling/too much on your calendar. 2. Dealing with the tyranny of the urgent and trying to solve problems on our own. As pastors and church leaders, we need to determine whether something is a distraction, or something that will advance the Kingdom of God. How does phone addiction contend with our prayer life, and what can we do about it? Often we choose not to pray or enter the presence of God because we are busy, or it is not convenient for me right now. I am a processor, so I like solving problems, but maybe that is part of the problem - I am trying to solve the problem, but God calls me to be with Him. "You walked away having spent time with God." The Baptist way is to try and teach people into transformation, but sometimes the best way to learn to abide is to practice the presence of God and pursue Him.

Episode 22: Empowering, Equipping, and Encouraging Women in Ministry in Southern Baptist Churches. SBC Women in Ministry. Complementarian Ministry

#22. On today's episode, we finish up a great interview with Dr. Cathie Smith, who is the Great Commission Association Women in Ministry Ambassador. If you are following the news, this is a timely conversation for us, as the nation's largest Protestant denomination, the SBC, grapples with the role of women in ministry. Today, we talk with Dr. Cathie about how pastors should seek to enlist qualified and gifted women to serve in leadership roles and invite them to speak into sermon topics, schedules, etc. To give them a voice at the decision-making table. We also discuss practical ways to entrust and release women into areas of ministry in the church that are Bible-honoring, people-encouraging, and church-building. I think you will find the conversation to be both very practical, but also encouraging and inspiring, because Dr. Cathie does a great job of pushing pastors to see the women of the church as an often tragically untapped reservoir for dynamism, health, and flourishing. Seven Ways to Empower Women In the Church 1. Engage them. Engage them in discipleship and making disciples. See them, connect with them, open doors of opportunity for them as God allows. 2. Encourage their giftings. 3. Exhort God's calling in their lives and give them opportunities to respond to what God is calling her to do – commission/send out 4. "Equip women for ministry and disciple-making. This includes education. Educate women in theology, hermeneutics, and other Bible teaching skills to help her to be able to adequately handle the word of God. 5. Establish ministry pathways for women – both for equipping and serving in her gifting. This will involve a cost in resources, personnel and energy. 6. Enlist qualified and gifted women to serve in leadership roles and invite them to speak into sermon topics, schedules, etc. Give them a voice at the decision-making table. Partnership not just permission. 7. Entrust and Release Women in your church – Champion/Co-Workers/Celebrate

Episode 21: Why are Women Leaving the Church and 7 Biblical Ways to Empower Women in the Church with Dr. Cathie Smith + What is Greater than Serving?!

How can pastors and churches encourage women to use their gifts for the Kingdom of God? Seven Ways to Empower Women In the Church: 1. Engage them. Engage them in discipleship and making disciples. See them, connect with them, open doors of opportunity for them as God allows. 2. Encourage their giftings. 3. Exhort God's calling in their lives and give them opportunities to respond to what God is calling her to do – commission/send out 4. "Equip women for ministry and disciple-making. This includes education. Educate women in theology, hermeneutics, and other Bible teaching skills to help her to be able to adequately handle the word of God. 5. Establish ministry pathways for women – both for equipping and serving in her gifting. This will involve a cost in resources, personnel and energy. 6. Enlist qualified and gifted women to serve in leadership roles and invite them to speak into sermon topics, schedules, etc. Give them a voice at the decision making table. Partnership not just permission. 7. Entrust and Release Women in your church – Champion/Co-Workers/Celebrate Women are fully in the Imago Dei - in the Image of God. Jesus sees Mary and Martha, and He engages them in deep theological truths in profound ways. "The church cannot flourish without women playing KEY ministry positions…in every realm of life, you lose what you don't value." Pastors aren't like Jerry Jones or Mark Cuban…we don't own the team the way that sports owners own their team. We don't own the church, it's Christ's church, and we are under-shepherds at best. We aren't owners who utilize church players to put trophies in our cabinet." Jesus does not look past women. How can pastors and churches encourage women to use their gifts for the Kingdom of God? Generation Z women are disaffiliating from organized religion and leaving churches at unprecedented rates, outpacing their male peers for the first time in modern history. Research indicates that nearly four in ten young women now identify as religiously unaffiliated. Data from the Survey Center on American Life shows that women make up the majority (54%) of Gen Z individuals who disaffiliate from religion, completely reversing the gender gap seen in older generations like Baby Boomers, and recent studies from the Barna Group highlight that young adult women now report the lowest rates of Bible reading, prayer, and church attendance among their generation. 1. Our own Pastor Christopher Cole has written a great article about church renewal called The God of Renewal, which you will want to read. https://www.gcasbc.org/post/the-god-of-renewal [https://www.gcasbc.org/post/the-god-of-renewal] Also, our GCA resource of the month is also related to church renewal and is written by future podcast guest Mark Hallock and Jeremy Conrad, and is a great encouragement for churches to work together for the Gospel! All around us, pastors are discouraged, churches are competing instead of cooperating, and the witness of the gospel can feel fractured. But what if the solution isn't working harder, it's working together? In Radical Collaboration, Mark Hallock and Jeremy Conrad call God's people back to His design for unity, offering a practical vision for how churches can partner, multiply, and strengthen one another for the sake of the gospel. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G3WJSHPC?ref=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_KKM4MNGP5Q18XK8AB1YX [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0G3WJSHPC?ref=cm_sw_r_ffobk_cp_ud_dp_KKM4MNGP5Q18XK8AB1YX]