From Baptist To Presbyterian | Swimming The Rhone: Episode 1

[00:00:00] Speaker A: We are starting a podcast to talk about something very important to us. [00:00:05] Speaker B: That's right. [00:00:05] Speaker A: How we made. I hate using the word transition, but I don't have a better word for it. How we made the journey. [00:00:14] Speaker B: Right. Oh, that's even worse. [00:00:16] Speaker A: Is it worse? The voyage. [00:00:18] Speaker B: This is our authentically broken faith journey. [00:00:22] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. Everybody just turned the podcast off. Everybody just turned it off. It just happened. So we used to be Baptistic in our practices, and now we're not. [00:00:34] Speaker B: Correct. [00:00:35] Speaker A: Now we are pedobaptistic. Or maybe I should say household baptism. [00:00:40] Speaker B: I like that one better, too. [00:00:41] Speaker A: Yeah, the word pedo kind of puts a downer on things. But what we're talking about in this. This is a new podcast. We're just starting this thing off. What we plan to talk about is our journey from Baptist to Presbyterian. That's where we're going. We got lots of working titles. We don't know which one we're going to go with yet, but I think this is an important topic to talk about. There it is. The whiskey's already wearing into me and for us to kind of start thinking through, because I find in the contemporary American culture today, there's a lot of people asking these questions. I was sitting in a room with a panel that was going on that was a Baptist and a bunch of Presbyterians, and the Baptist guy, he was not ready to say that he wasn't Baptist anymore, but he also wasn't hardcore endorsing his Baptistic beliefs. It was an interesting dynamic, and so I think there's a lot of folks asking these questions. So we just decided it would be a good idea to tell our story and say, here's what happened. I'm Stuart Amidon. I pastor Christchurch Opelousis. And we started baptizing babies about two years ago, and it's been great. My first three kids, I dunked all three of them, two of them in my swimming pool behind my house. You know, it was awesome. It was a great experience. My fourth kid, before it was time to baptize her, we became convinced of pato baptism, and we sprinkled her. [00:02:02] Speaker B: There you go. [00:02:03] Speaker A: And it was beautiful. We got to experience the best of both worlds, and it was not a fast trip to that point. And I didn't become a Christian until I was 18 years old. Ryan, I don't know. When did you come to faith? [00:02:16] Speaker B: I was raised in the household of faith. [00:02:18] Speaker A: You were. So you don't remember a time when you weren't following Jesus? [00:02:20] Speaker B: That is correct. [00:02:21] Speaker A: That's awesome. That's the testimony I want for my kids. [00:02:24] Speaker B: It is. And yet. Mine is. Mine is. I don't remember a time, you know, before I was in the household of faith. And yet I still, along the way, felt compelled to have the, you know, the camp experiences, followed by the rededications. [00:02:38] Speaker A: Followed by the second rededication. [00:02:40] Speaker B: I never. Well, that's. I was gonna say I didn't do the re baptisms, but that's technically not true because I was baptized as an infant in the Methodist Church. And then when I became a Baptist, of course, the Baptist told me I needed to get re baptized. [00:02:52] Speaker A: Do we count those? Do we count Methodist baptisms? [00:02:55] Speaker B: Yes. [00:02:55] Speaker A: Okay. [00:02:56] Speaker B: Yes. I'm just checking they're legit because they're in the triune name of God. [00:03:01] Speaker A: Okay, I got it. [00:03:02] Speaker B: I count that one as my actual baptism. [00:03:04] Speaker A: Okay. [00:03:05] Speaker B: You know the other one? I was just getting dunked. [00:03:07] Speaker A: Yeah. I got baptized when I was a kid in a Methodist church. This is incredibly ironic that you and I are sitting across the table from each other. I think I was 12 when that happened. They still had some type of confirmation proceedings. Okay. And then I got dunked when I was at a Baptist church in North Louisiana. I remember I prayed the prayer with the preacher. Do you know what I'm talking about? [00:03:28] Speaker B: The sinner's prayer. [00:03:29] Speaker A: Lord, I know that I'm a sinner. He's like, just pray this prayer after me. And, Lord, I know that I'm a sinner, and I confess that I need Jesus to save me. Please come into my heart. You know, something to that. Something to that effect. And I remember after I did it, I was in his office with him. Like, he led the prayer. We were kneeling in his office. We stood up. And I remember thinking, like, is that it? [00:03:50] Speaker B: You didn't hear the angel singing? [00:03:53] Speaker A: I don't feel any different. You know, I feel I'm. I think I'm the same. That was the second one. Then we got baptized in that church. Sure. And then I was a youth pastor and 25. I didn't really start following Jesus seriously, until I was 18. That was a year after my second baptism. If you need me to start the story over. No, no, no. [00:04:10] Speaker B: So you got saved when you were 18. You were a youth pastor by 25? [00:04:14] Speaker A: No, I was really a youth pastor. Probably more like 2020. I was a preacher by the second week of my Christian life. I'm dead serious. I'm dead serious. I remember we were at an event, and somebody was. Somehow the microphone found its way into my hand. And from there it was. I was gonna say kismet, but more like chaos. Like, here's this guy who just started reading his Bible. Now he's gonna teach everybody. That was a. Not looking forward to that judgment. So here we go. So we did all that, got baptized then. Then I became a Christian at 18. Then I was 25 years old. I had been working as a youth pastor for a while, several years, and it. I was very Baptistic. And I was like, I haven't been baptized properly. I came to this conclusion on my own. The preacher never said anything to me about it, I think, because he was a little wiser than me. Sure. And I was like, I think I need to get baptized. So I'm 25 years old. [00:05:13] Speaker B: Well, you know, it's a great reassurance when the pastor is wiser than somebody who's been a Christian for 30 seconds. [00:05:21] Speaker A: Isn't it, though? [00:05:22] Speaker B: That's good. [00:05:22] Speaker A: Isn't it, though? [00:05:23] Speaker B: It's good. [00:05:23] Speaker A: That was when I got. That was when I got dug. I thought for a longer time that's the one that counted. That one right there. That's the one that counted. But I think, you know, I think you might be on to something. Maybe it was that Methodist one. That. That was the sign and the seal. That was it. [00:05:35] Speaker B: God keeps his promises. [00:05:36] Speaker A: Amen. Amen. So you were. You were young, household of faith, raised up, and then you went to. Where'd you go for school? [00:05:45] Speaker B: Well, I went to Liberty University, naturally, as all young Methodist. [00:05:52] Speaker A: Talk about that for a second. How on earth did that happen? You went to Liberty? [00:05:58] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:05:59] Speaker A: That's on the Methodist guide check. [00:06:01] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, a couple of things. A couple of different things happened. One was that the church where we were at. So, I mean, I grew up in a military family, so we moved around quite a lot. [00:06:14] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:06:14] Speaker B: But the place where we happened to be when I was in high school and where I graduated high school was Northern Virginia. [00:06:19] Speaker A: Okay. [00:06:19] Speaker B: And the pastor at the church where we were at that time discerned. He thought that I had a call to ministry. [00:06:30] Speaker A: So he sent you to Liberty? [00:06:31] Speaker B: Well, no, he sent me to. I don't remember what it's called, but it's something that the United Methodist Church does regionally for young people who are trying to discern a call to ministry. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. There's like a handful of, like, 12 or 13 seminaries that the United Methodist Church accepts for their pastors. Some of them are distinctly Methodists, some are not. [00:06:55] Speaker A: Yeah. Like Centenary. [00:06:56] Speaker B: Centenary. Eastern Mennonite is another one that they accept. And so, you know, you kind of, you meet people from these seminaries and they tell you kind of what they're about. And. But, but it was while I was there that I was able to see, in a sense, because this was all young people interested in ordination, right? [00:07:14] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:07:14] Speaker B: And I was able to get a sense of the, if you will, the trajectory of the United Methodist Church. And so when we broke into small groups, one of the small groups that I was in, someone spent most of our small group time lamenting that the church was far from God. And her proof of that is that we were probably not going to be ordaining homosexuals anytime soon. [00:07:33] Speaker A: What? [00:07:34] Speaker B: Right. And so I. And so I was sitting there like, as a young person interested in ordained ministry, like, utterly confused. [00:07:40] Speaker A: And nobody in the room was like, no, you're confused. [00:07:43] Speaker B: No, nobody. [00:07:44] Speaker A: Everybody. Let her talk. [00:07:45] Speaker B: Everybody in the room was like, you know what I mean? You're so right. You're so right. That is heartbreaking, isn't it? [00:07:50] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh. [00:07:50] Speaker B: I was just disorienting. [00:07:52] Speaker A: And that was 15 years ago, right? Yeah. Dang. Okay, got it. [00:07:58] Speaker B: And so I concluded at that point, I said, I don't think this is the place for me, the Methodist Church as a whole. If this is the trajectory, I mean, this is where young people are. This is our next generation of rising ordinance. [00:08:12] Speaker A: Right, Right. [00:08:13] Speaker B: More or less. And so, I mean, and it wasn't just that one moment in that small group. There were similar moments throughout that weekend. [00:08:20] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:08:21] Speaker B: Um, and. And so that was, that was very formative in realizing that. And I distinctly remember having a meeting a few weeks later after I got back from it with a, with a United Methodist pastor who was, he was very conservative and Bible believing guy and. [00:08:38] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:08:39] Speaker B: And he was trying to talk me out of, like, he knew where I'd gone and he probably had a sense of what I heard. [00:08:44] Speaker A: Okay. [00:08:44] Speaker B: Kind of had that like, we need you, please don't go. [00:08:47] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. [00:08:48] Speaker B: And I was just like, I just don't think this is the place for me, man. [00:08:50] Speaker A: This is not the season of my life to go down with the ship. [00:08:53] Speaker B: Exact. Exactly. [00:08:53] Speaker A: Right. [00:08:54] Speaker B: And so, you know, as one does in your junior senior year of high school. I was visiting different colleges and Liberty University was about a three hours distance from Springfield where I was. [00:09:04] Speaker A: Okay. [00:09:05] Speaker B: And so they have this thing that they do, I don't know if they still do it, called college. For a weekend, you go, you stay in the dorms, you go to classes. [00:09:12] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:09:13] Speaker B: Yeah, all that sort of thing. And, and so while I was there, like meeting the professors and meeting the students and I would ask them questions like, where are you guys on this issue or this issue? And they were in, as best I could tell, at 18 years old, solidly biblical places. [00:09:29] Speaker A: Sure. So you had the discernment at 18 that maybe you don't know everything. [00:09:33] Speaker B: Correct. Shocking. [00:09:35] Speaker A: That's shocking. [00:09:36] Speaker B: My parents might disagree with that synopsis. I think it was my 17th birthday where my dad got me a birthday card and he said something like, I've noticed that you're steadily getting smarter and we're steadily getting dumber. And so that means that by the time you're like 35, we will be incapable of pronouncing syllables. [00:09:56] Speaker A: He had a good dad. Yeah, that was good. He did a good job. [00:10:00] Speaker B: Very good sense of humor. Let me know where my place was. It was a good sarcastic birthday card. Anyway, so I spent the time at Liberty and I had a sense and I couldn't have articulated it then, but I knew that what Liberty was about. I mean, today I have the words for it. Essentially what was happening is that this was really my first exposure to Baptist fundamentalism of any kind. And I was enthusiastic about it because I thought, okay, I'm willing to bet that these people believe things that I don't believe, but it seems like they take their Bibles seriously. [00:10:38] Speaker A: Yeah, it was the same thing for me when I was 18 and I became a Christian. I would call it charismatic fundamentalism. Where is it in the Bible? Yeah, that was the whole premise. It was not a, we're not working around the text. We're like, this is what the Bible says. We'll go from there. And I think I've carried that with me. Do you know what I mean? Like, that's a foundational, formative kind of moment because we had Bible time. Bible time. We would go to church once every couple of months whenever I was growing up and I hated it. And I would like pretend to be asleep in my bed and be like, please just forget that I'm here. [00:11:11] Speaker B: Oh, that's familiar. [00:11:12] Speaker A: Yeah, you know about that. And we would have like children Bible at the house and I would learn stories and things like that. We had all that. But I think that it was my 18 year old time. Similar to you at Liberty where you're like, bible true. Yeah, check. Yeah, got it. Yeah. Okay. [00:11:27] Speaker B: And you know, to like fill in some color there, I. There were certainly friends of mine at church in Virginia, at the Methodist church who were for lack Of a better word, like as conservative as me. [00:11:41] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:41] Speaker B: As frustrated with things as. As I was. [00:11:44] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:44] Speaker B: And even, even my youth director at the time, I would say, for. I mean, for being in a United Methodist Church, he was very, very conservative. And so obviously that's going to have a formative influence on a young man having a youth director like that. And yeah, I would consider him. He was a good friend at the time as well. [00:11:58] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:12:00] Speaker B: And so that was, you know, so coming to those understandings and kind of gritting teeth and bearing it when there was something that you had to just kind of abide for a while. And so. So that's. That was kind of. I don't know if I want to go as far as to say it was an act of rebellion, but maybe it was. I mean, I think that's probably. [00:12:21] Speaker A: Liberty was rebellion. That's hilarious. [00:12:23] Speaker B: Isn't that delightful? Isn't that delightful? Like, I'm gonna go hang out with these fundamentalist Baptist mom and dad. [00:12:33] Speaker A: Your rebellion looked very different than mine. [00:12:36] Speaker B: My rebellion looked like I'm going to go to a place where they're. They will kick me out if they catch me without. [00:12:43] Speaker A: Those are the kind of kids that parents dream of. Right. Right there. That's like, oh, my gosh. So you go to Liberty. I went to a public school for college. Okay. And I. But it was a public school in North Louisiana, so all the teachers were pagans, but all the kids were, at the very least, nominal Christians. There were very few hardcore atheistic worldview students because it was in the middle of the Bible Belt in North Louisiana. There's like 17 Baptist churches in Ruston. You know, like, it's the water that you swim in. You can't get. You can't get out of it now. It's a different place or that you're. [00:13:20] Speaker B: Immersed in, if you like. [00:13:22] Speaker A: Oh, that was good. Hey. Hey. [00:13:24] Speaker B: All right. [00:13:25] Speaker A: More where that came from. So I went to college there, met my wife, we got married. I started working part time as a youth pastor for a little while at a Methodist church. Ironically enough, I had four kids on a busy day in my youth group. I don't know why they ever gave me that job. That was a terrible idea. They paid me like 150 bucks a month. At one point, my brother was like, I'm pretty sure it costs you more than that in gas to get to and from it. I was like, you're probably right. But here we are, you know, I need money. [00:13:54] Speaker B: That's right. [00:13:55] Speaker A: So. But that was my. That was my Kind of birthplace into that. And then we moved to South Louisiana. I worked at a Christian school. I had some relatively strong Christian convictions that I was trying to operate in, you know, and we worked at. We worked at this Christian school together, my wife and I, for a little while. And then I kind of got the call to pastoral work in more of a. In a vocational sense. So when did that happen for you? [00:14:24] Speaker B: I mean. Well, so for. If I. If I had to tell the whole story, like, I first took an interest in the idea of ordained ministry in the seventh grade. [00:14:34] Speaker A: Okay. [00:14:35] Speaker B: So before there were. Before there was social media and before there was. [00:14:40] Speaker A: You mean there was a time when it doesn't exist? [00:14:42] Speaker B: Before there was social media? [00:14:43] Speaker A: Before the world exists. Pre 2006, Stuart. [00:14:46] Speaker B: Before there was instant messengers. [00:14:48] Speaker A: Wow. [00:14:49] Speaker B: There were message boards. [00:14:51] Speaker A: Oh, yes, I do remember message boards. [00:14:55] Speaker B: So in the seventh grade. In the seventh grade grade, my buddy and I. This is when this is in Japan. I won't trouble you with that. Air Force family. [00:15:02] Speaker A: Okay, I got it. [00:15:03] Speaker B: So. But we. We took an interest in these message boards where we would go and pick fights with Mormons on these message boards. [00:15:13] Speaker A: Amen. [00:15:14] Speaker B: And, like, that was my first kind of foray into, like, an interest in theology and trying to understand some theological and apologetic questions. [00:15:20] Speaker A: Okay. And really, that's what Martin Luther said, right? Controversy makes a great study. [00:15:24] Speaker B: Well, there you go. I mean, I would say 50% of it was sort of at sort of noble pursuit. Then the other 50% of it was sort of this. [00:15:31] Speaker A: I want to dunk. Keyboard warrior. [00:15:33] Speaker B: That's right. Yeah. Dunking on the. On the Mormons. [00:15:38] Speaker A: Another baptism reference. Yeah, sorry. [00:15:41] Speaker B: That really started an interest sort of in theology and in pastoral ministry as well. Okay. I got to Liberty, and actually, of all things, Liberty did a pastor's conference hosted by Rick Warren. [00:15:55] Speaker A: The times that we live in today. I'm so glad that we're doing this conversation. [00:16:04] Speaker B: But actually, what happened, it surprised me because during the conference, of course, like any conference, I guess, you have your plenary sessions and then your smaller kind of workshop groups. So I went to one of these workshop groups, and it was a room full of about maybe 20 pastors. [00:16:19] Speaker A: Okay. [00:16:20] Speaker B: And they started talking about their work and their experience, and they let their hair down, and it was. It was ugly. I mean, like, some of the stuff they talked about was ugly. And from that moment, I was saying, no, thank you. [00:16:31] Speaker A: You were like, I don't want to do this. [00:16:32] Speaker B: No. I was like, this sounds awful. [00:16:34] Speaker A: I'm out. [00:16:35] Speaker B: I want to find an ivory tower. I want to get a theology degree and pick fights. [00:16:40] Speaker A: I'll go teach at a university. Right. [00:16:42] Speaker B: Yeah. That was the. That was the track. [00:16:44] Speaker A: Okay. Okay. [00:16:45] Speaker B: So that's eventually what took me to. I stayed at Liberty to do a master's. I eventually ended up at the University of Edinbur. Did a master's there and was meaning to go on to a PhD. Long story short, that didn't work. Ended up coming back to Louisiana, and when I decided to pursue ordained ministry. [00:17:03] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:04] Speaker B: I was. I was going to Presbyterian Church in Alexandria, the same one where today I'm now the pastor. [00:17:09] Speaker A: No way. That's awesome. [00:17:11] Speaker B: It was wild. Moved back to Alexandria. But the. The pastor there at the time, my. My predecessor, Bob Vincent, started talking to me about ordained ministry. [00:17:20] Speaker A: Okay. [00:17:20] Speaker B: And he thought I was cut out for it and thought I should think about it more. And so I thought about it more and more. And eventually when I said, you know what? Let's give this a hard look, and I mentioned it to my parents one night at dinner. They had moved back. I think they had moved back by then. I can't remember. But my mom, she looked up and she said, we've been wondering how long you were going to run from that. [00:17:44] Speaker A: Dang. [00:17:45] Speaker B: I know, right? [00:17:45] Speaker A: Oh, snap. Oh, punch in the gut from Mom. [00:17:50] Speaker B: Okay. Thanks, Mom. [00:17:54] Speaker A: I thought this was gonna be an edifying conversation. [00:17:58] Speaker B: So there you go. And that, as a mother's words can do, as Augustine can attest, that kind of sealed the deal for me, and I pursued ordination. Now here we are. [00:18:09] Speaker A: That's awesome. [00:18:10] Speaker B: I've been the pastor at Grace Presbyterian Church in Alexandria for four years. [00:18:15] Speaker A: Oh, wow. [00:18:16] Speaker B: And so kind of went up the whole ordination path. I mean, started as a member of the congregation, then an assistant pastor, then an associate pastor, and I have been the pastor there for four years now. [00:18:27] Speaker A: That's awesome. Yeah. So I went to. I finished college, went taught at the school. Okay. I got called to become the youth pastor at the church that we were attending at the time. Sure. And I worked on their staff for part time for about two years, and then they brought me in full time for about two years. And, you know, I was the youth pastor at the time that was perpetually trying to work himself out of a job. I was the youth pastor that hated youth ministry. Like, that was. That was me. I was like, this is stupid. I. This is your job. Parents, like, I. This is not my job. And so that, you know, I'm sure it went over really well at the time. Most. Mostly everybody was on the team There was a few that weren't. That's okay, though. We made it through. And then I got the opportunity from Pastor Brandon Neely to come plant a church in Opelousis. To which I resoundedly said, no. I was like, no, I'm not going there. It's Opelousis. It's gross. I don't want to live there. And he said, okay, whatever. And we hung up, moved on. I was like, I'll plant a church in Cairn Crow, which is where I was living. Cairn Crow, Louisiana, at the time. And we looked around, and there was no options, zero options to plant a church there. So I was like, okay. And then he called me back, and he was like, hey, there's somebody in the city that will donate a house to you to live in as a parsonage if you'll plant a church here. And I was like, no, I'm not coming. Leave me alone. And then he was like, okay, fine, whatever. And then he hung up with me. Then he called me back a third time, like a jerk. And he said, all right, listen, I just had a meeting with somebody who said that they have a building that the church could meet in for next to nothing. [00:20:10] Speaker B: Every church planter right now, they hate me. [00:20:14] Speaker A: They hate me because these are the things you have to fight, right? These are the things you have to fight in order to plant a church. There's guys who are way more missional than me that are, like, sacrificing everything in terrible cities with no living conditions. [00:20:26] Speaker B: They've probably been through the evaluation. [00:20:28] Speaker A: They've been meeting in a park amphitheater for, like, three years, you know, like. And here I am. It's like, here's a building and a parsonage and a job. And I'm like, I didn't want to. What a jerk. Move. And so then finally when he said that, I was like, fine, you know, we're moving. There you go. And so we did. And that was about 10 years ago. And the Lord's just blessed. It's been very cool. And halfway through that process, I was like, I don't have a seminary degree. And I was like, I should get one of those. That seems important. And so I enrolled in Southern Seminary at the time because I had begun my Calvinist journey already by this point. I enrolled in Southern Seminary. [00:21:08] Speaker B: That's where all Reformed Baptist boys go. [00:21:10] Speaker A: The good Reformed Baptist boys. That's right. And we were having children at the time. The church plant was very young. I was in seminary part time, but still probably Taking two or three classes at a time. I think my biggest load I ever took was two, three, I can't remember. And that was how seminary is. It's very demanding. Well, if you go to a good one, it's very demanding. You went to rts, right? [00:21:35] Speaker B: I did my Greek and Hebrew at rts. [00:21:36] Speaker A: Okay, okay. And for us, it was like. I think it was Pastor Brandon, actually. He said to me at one point, he was like, you know, nobody's expecting you to finish this. Right. And I was like, really? Yeah. I was like, oh, okay. [00:21:55] Speaker B: So you don't have the m. Divorce? [00:21:57] Speaker A: No, I don't have the M. Div. [00:21:57] Speaker B: I've got about 16 hours. [00:21:59] Speaker A: You don't either? [00:21:59] Speaker B: No. No high fives, bro. [00:22:01] Speaker A: Let's. Let's go. Let's go. [00:22:03] Speaker B: I have. I have an MA in apologetics. [00:22:06] Speaker A: Okay. [00:22:06] Speaker B: At Liberty. [00:22:07] Speaker A: Okay. [00:22:07] Speaker B: And then I have. I have a Master's of theology that I did at Edinburgh. [00:22:11] Speaker A: But you got ordained, right? You actually went through an ordination process, though? [00:22:14] Speaker B: I went through the ordination process. They figured I went to the University of Edinburgh, which is basically like, if you're a Presbyterian, that's basically the Vatican. [00:22:23] Speaker A: Okay, I got it. I got it. [00:22:25] Speaker B: And so they let me. I didn't have any Greek or Hebrew, so they let me. Me make that up at rts. [00:22:29] Speaker A: Oh, and then they slapped you on through. They were like, you're good enough. You get ordained. Yeah, okay. [00:22:34] Speaker B: I'm trying. [00:22:35] Speaker A: We should go finish nimdiv together somewhere. So I have about 18 hours at Southern. I did New Testament, Old Testament, my Greek courses. I think I did church history and a hermeneutics class. So however many hours that totals up to. I think it's like 18 hours or something along those lines. And then we've been church planting ever since. So I just read a lot of books. There you go. Just read a lot of books. I'm going through Calvin's Institutes, which, embarrassingly, I've never read before. Now I'm going through it. Oh, you and I are going through it together? [00:23:05] Speaker B: You and I are going through it together? [00:23:06] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. That's good. That's good. And that's kind of how we landed here. But see, the interesting part, the part that we haven't fleshed out in this and we'll get to later on as we continue to talk through the podcast, is you and I got saved, became Christians with more of that credo Baptistic framework. Right. But we're not that way anymore. [00:23:27] Speaker B: That would be correct. [00:23:30] Speaker A: And so what we want to do is bring people along that journey with us. And I'm not a high pressure conversation. You want to keep baptizing. You want to keep your credo Baptistic conversation practices going. I'm fine with that. But I do think it's an important story to tell because I never would have predicted myself to be here, to be completely honest. I made fun of the Presbyterians who didn't. So you think your children are saved? I remember saying stuff like that to people and they would be like, you poor Baptist, you don't even know the definition of half of these words. I remember one time I was having that conversation with a guy who was a Presbyterian, who had been through seminary, who knew his stuff, and it was almost like he knew that he could wield the hammer of destruction upon me and just crush my soul in that moment. And he restrained himself and he was just like. Let me walk you through some definitions real quick. Let me just help you. When you say salvation, you mean something I don't mean. I was like, I don't what? I still remember that conversation. It broke my brain. And I wonder if that had something to do with. It had something to do with the walk that we would make over time. So we're creating this podcast not to convince, but more to storytell. Right. More to bring people along. [00:24:49] Speaker B: That's right. [00:24:49] Speaker A: And we're going to lay out arguments. [00:24:51] Speaker B: Yeah. And I suspect that for a lot of people listening, it's. It's a similar. It's a similar trajectory. [00:24:58] Speaker A: Yes. [00:24:59] Speaker B: And so they would not be listening. [00:25:00] Speaker A: If they weren't asking the questions already. [00:25:02] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. One hope, right? [00:25:03] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. [00:25:04] Speaker B: And so should I explain the dog collar? I mean, well, since, like, you've so. [00:25:11] Speaker A: Far been mistaken as a Roman Catholic. [00:25:12] Speaker B: Twice I've been here for like an. [00:25:16] Speaker A: Hour and a half. I told you this is gonna happen. Yes, yes. But now you are a full collared. [00:25:22] Speaker B: That's right. [00:25:22] Speaker A: Presbyterian. [00:25:23] Speaker B: That's right. With high level stuff, which in Edinburgh. [00:25:26] Speaker A: Which I'm not there yet. I have Presbyterian brothers who are like, one day we're gonna see you in robes and a collar. I was like, I don't know about that, guys. But I also said, I don't know to a lot of things. [00:25:36] Speaker B: Okay, well, so again, again, when I was doing my theological training in Edinburgh, seeing. Seeing this on a Presbyterian minister in Edinburgh was about as common as, I mean, whiskey in Edinburgh. So, I mean, it's everywhere, right? It's everywhere. This is maybe another story for another time. We can do our. We can. We can get our facts straight. Maybe another time. [00:25:59] Speaker A: Okay. [00:25:59] Speaker B: But this is a Presbyterian original. [00:26:02] Speaker A: Okay. So everybody thinks it's not Roman Catholic. [00:26:04] Speaker B: Everybody thinks it came from Rome. Rome picked it up later. It's original to at least one, I think, a group of Presbyterian ministers in Glasgow, Scotland. And so that interested me. I mean, I found that out and. And then went on to learn that basically what. How this worked in Scotland, it just served as a uniform. [00:26:24] Speaker A: Everybody knew who you were. [00:26:25] Speaker B: Everybody knew who you were, but it was more than that. So. So you have the typical preacher's uniform in the United States is a suit. [00:26:35] Speaker A: Or blue jeans, coat and tie. [00:26:37] Speaker B: Well, let's. Okay. [00:26:43] Speaker A: Tight pants. [00:26:44] Speaker B: That's right. [00:26:46] Speaker A: Sorry. [00:26:47] Speaker B: Male preachers. [00:26:50] Speaker A: Masculine, non effeminate preachers. There we go. There we go. [00:26:53] Speaker B: It's a suit. Which, you know, as it happens, is also the uniform of the businessman. Yeah, right. [00:26:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:26:59] Speaker B: And. And so you and I are in a generation that's always hesitant about people trying to sell them things. [00:27:06] Speaker A: Yeah, right, right. [00:27:07] Speaker B: And so this is something that occurred to me, like, there's nothing wrong with wearing a suit. And I've preached, actually, when I preached in Lafayette, I wore a suit. [00:27:14] Speaker A: You wore your suit, you know. [00:27:15] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:27:15] Speaker A: I mean, you didn't want to scare anybody. [00:27:17] Speaker B: That's right. To the Lafayette ites. I wanted to be a Lafayette. All things to all men. But so you have that, or, you know, you could be like Rick Warren. He's not confused for a businessman when. [00:27:31] Speaker A: He preaches because he's got Crocs on. [00:27:33] Speaker B: He's sweatpants for a tiki bar guy, you know, in his Hawaiian shirt or whatever. So you can do that too. [00:27:40] Speaker A: That. [00:27:40] Speaker B: Right, there's that. So for me, I wanted to say, like, what. What identifies me as. Just as a pastor right now, of course, if you're. If you're south of I10 here, then it identifies you as a Catholic priest. [00:27:54] Speaker A: Yes. Welcome to the deep South. [00:27:55] Speaker B: When I got to La Alexandria and became a member at Grace Church. [00:28:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:28:01] Speaker B: The pastor there, Bob Vincent, was wearing the collar. He did it out of a conviction that if you like it telegraphed to his people, I'm your pastor. This is what I'm about. I'm here to care for you. [00:28:15] Speaker A: Okay. [00:28:16] Speaker B: And I'm wearing a symbol. That's all it is. It's a symbol not just of authority, but also of responsibility. Like I'm. I'm bound to Christ and I'm down to you. Yes. And. And as a bonus, the collar keeps flicks and fleas and ticks away for up to 30 days. I messed up the punchline. Anyway, it keeps flicks away. Keeps flicks away. [00:28:41] Speaker A: That's amazing. [00:28:43] Speaker B: Good grief. So anyway, so that's. That's the reason for the collar. I don't wear it all the time. I don't wear it every. [00:28:48] Speaker A: Every day. Yeah. [00:28:49] Speaker B: Most often I wear it if I'm. If I'm engaged in my work. So if I'm engaged in the work of. Of teaching and preaching, serving the. Presiding over the sacraments. [00:28:59] Speaker A: Pastoral ministry. [00:29:00] Speaker B: Pastoral ministry. Broadly speaking, I'll usually wear the collar. Or if I'm on a fancy podcast. [00:29:05] Speaker A: And you're like, I'm breaking it out. [00:29:07] Speaker B: That's right. [00:29:07] Speaker A: That's right. [00:29:09] Speaker B: Assert my dominance while I'm in here. Oh, dang. [00:29:12] Speaker A: Here I am with my unturked and, like, blue jean look. This is embarrassing. I'm. I'm. I'm subpar. [00:29:17] Speaker B: I'm just kidding. I'm a guest and I'm behaving rudely. But so that's the story on the collar. So for me, it was very natural to think of that as part of the work. And then when my predecessor at Grace was already doing it, then when he. [00:29:32] Speaker A: Retired, it was easy for you to step in. [00:29:34] Speaker B: It was easy for me to step in and continue what he had already been doing. [00:29:36] Speaker A: Yeah. So that makes a ton of sense. That's quite the journey, though. Liberty University to dog collar wearing Presbyterian baby baptizer. [00:29:45] Speaker B: The short. The short version of that, if you want. [00:29:47] Speaker A: I mean, let's save it. All right. We're going to save that for next time. We're going to spend the next several episodes. Whoops. Fleshing that out and helping people come along with what we're doing. So, guys, if you want to hear more about these stories, stay tuned, learn more, get connected, be encouraged, and we hope that you'll come back for the next episode.