Ask the Pastor with J.D. Greear

In this edition of Ask the Pastor’s Greatest Hits, Pastor J.D. shares how God called him to the mission field before calling him to be a pastor of a church that sends and supplies the mission field in extravagant ways. A glimpse inside this episode: When God called me to be a pastor, he did so by first calling me to the mission field. I spent the first two years of my ministry as a church planter among Muslims overseas. God never relinquished that call to missions; he showed me that my role in it is to be a part of a church that sends and supplies the mission field. Even though my primary role in the Great Commission is now as an equipper, it is always such a joy to get back on the front lines. Sure, it can be frustrating not being able to speak the language. But I share Christ more, person to person, in a two-week span than I probably do the entire rest of the year here in the States. It is my identity there, the entire reason I had go short term now. So when an opportunity comes up, I simply share the gospel. I wasn’t “Pastor J.D.” there. I was just “J.D. the guy talking about Jesus.” I want that to last: I want to just be the “Jesus guy” even here.

In this edition of Ask the Pastor’s Greatest Hits, Pastor J.D. talks how to live in the world but not of the world. A glimpse inside this episode: Who do you feel the closest kinship with? Who do you spend most of your time with? The lesson from Lot’s life is that you have to make up your mind from the beginning: Who do you really want to be? If it’s with the world, go there 100%. If it’s with God, go with him 100%. What do you love? What does that say about what your heart really desires? Are you trying to get as close to the world as you can without becoming it? So how can I be around “Sodom” but not make the mistake Lot did? It has to do with who you choose to make your close friends and your community. Those are the ones you become like—just like Proverbs 13:20 tells us. The most miserable person in the world is the half-committed Christian.

In this edition of Ask the Pastor’s Greatest Hits, Pastor J.D. talks about whether the legal use of marijuana is wise or helpful for Christians. A glimpse inside this episode: In the past, this was an easy enough question, because marijuana was illegal. It wasn’t a “gray area” for Christians. The drug was illegal, so it was off-limits to those who are “subject to the governing authorities” (Rom. 13:1). But as recreational marijuana becomes legal in more states, some Christians are having conversations about whether there could be an acceptable use. While the Bible never mentions marijuana, it does prohibit intoxication. If one hit of marijuana makes you high, there’s no way to smoke it and obey the Bible’s commands against drunkenness. No drug should not move us to the point of losing control. But that’s much of the intrigue and mystique of marijuana. Furthermore, marijuana has been demonstrated to have a lot of addictive qualities, more so than alcohol and nicotine, and Paul says: “Though all things are lawful, but I will not be ruled by them.” So, on the whole, it’s just hard to see how this could ever be wise. And that’s the wisest question: Is it helpful? I will add: marijuana use makes you demonstrably dumber. I mean, so does watching the Bachelor or 5–6 hours of golf. But it’s not a helpful variable in this equation. One deeper issue: the effects of marijuana work against the kind of community we should seek in the body of Christ. In Ephesians, Paul contrasts being drunk with wine vs. filled with the Spirit. That’s not an accidental comparison. Both are ways you deal with stress and problems. Wine (and we could add marijuana) dull your awareness of reality. The Spirit heightens your awareness of an alternate reality–the promises of the gospel and the sovereignty of God. And you speak those to one another in the church, in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Some who speak from experience say that getting high “pulls you within yourself, causes you to become more disengaged, not only from people, but also from life in general.” One says: “Before I was a Christian, I smoked marijuana to . . . disengage from both people and issues.” One guy said: “By causing users to disengage from life, marijuana works against the love of neighbor Jesus commands. Christians seeking to honor God with their lives would do well to avoid it.

In this edition of Ask the Pastor’s Greatest Hits, Pastor J.D. shares four important things to keep in mind when responding to instances of sexual abuse. A glimpse into this episode: This is an extremely important question, so much so that after becoming SBC president, the first thing I did was appoint a Sexual Abuse Advisory Group to lead our denomination. They have been leading in dozens of ways—one of the biggest is they’re developing a curriculum to help churches answer this very question. Churches should be a safe haven for the vulnerable, so we need to do everything we can to make our churches safe for survivors and safe from abuse. A few preliminary thoughts: Don’t be shocked it’s happening. Prioritize the protection of victims, not the guarding of your reputations. Your goal is not to meet the minimal requirements–but as a shepherd to protect your flock. This is just the start of an answer, but here are four important things to keep in mind: Disclosing sexual abuse takes an enormous amount of courage, so we should honor that. This may be the least understood aspect of sexual abuse—it results in a huge loss of voice for the victim. Abuse is usually followed by threats not to say anything, and that’s usually what happens. What you need to know is that the first time you hear about an instance of abuse, chances are the person talking to you has been carrying this for years. They’ve been terrified about what people will think. They’ve assumed they wouldn’t be believed. To speak up takes bravery. Now, there are important responses and action steps after you hear of abuse. But don’t be so quick to rush to the action step that you forget your first response—listening to a person, made in God’s image, reveal one of the most hurtful experiences of their lives. Listen, listen, listen. If you know of a report of sexual abuse against a minor, you are legally obligated to alert the authorities. This is not a “Matthew 18” situation. This is a “Romans 13” situation. Because certain sins are not only immoral; they are also illegal. This is never clearer than in the case of sexual abuse against minors. If you know of sexual abuse against a minor, no matter who you are, no matter who they are, your first response is to alert the authorities. Call CPS or call the police. You may not know all of the best next steps. But they do, and you need to bring them in. The safety of more children than you know may be on the line. If an abuser has access to minors at your church, remove the access immediately—and, again, call the authorities. Statistics here are horrifying. Those who abuse minors don’t just do it once or twice. They do it repeatedly, even after they’ve been caught (if given the opportunity). So if you know about one case, you need to see that as dozens of more potential cases. This isn’t a gray area: Bring in the authorities. We need to reject any understanding of grace that puts the vulnerable in harm’s way by giving abusers a chance to do it again Help connect the survivor to other resources. If someone has disclosed to you, that’s an honor. And you will have a key role in their healing process. But you need to know you shouldn’t be shouldering this alone. Questions are going to come up—pretty early—that are best processed through a counseling relationship. So one of the best things you can do for a victim is to get them connected to a counselor. This isn’t a handoff—you need to remind the victim that you are still there and want to process everything with them—but it allows other people more trained in abuse care to do what they do best. Conclusion: It’s a gospel issue

In this edition of Ask the Pastor’s Greatest Hits, Pastor J.D. talks about some key advantages and disadvantages to each type of schooling and how Scripture guides our decision-making. A glimpse inside this episode: My friend Joby Martin says if you want some entertainment, get a home-school mama and a public school mama together and ask what the best educational approach is and then just get some popcorn and sit back and prepare for a UFC bout. Home-school mom be like: Sure, you can send your kid to the place where they outlaw prayer like in the times of Nebuchadnezzar and teach your kid that he came from monkeys and where he might get stabbed in the face by a gang member… that’s fine … but we love our son and want him to develop a biblical worldview so we homeschool. Statistically they are more likely to walk with Jesus if you do that, so clearly homeschooling is the godly choice.” Public-school mom: Yeah, that’s cool. We just want our kids to have things like…  social skills. We think it’s cool that Timmy can churn his own butter and make his own clothes but we want our son to know things like … math. And we think our kids need to learn how to deal with the temptation of the world and not just run from it. After all, Jesus promised he would protect us in the world, not to vacate from it—and if all the Christians flee the public school, where is that going to leave society? How can we be salt and light to the world if we vacate it? Keeping our kids in public school is an act of love for our neighbor. First, Romans 14. Chapter 14 and the first half of 15 are one extended discussion about how to get along with people in the church who disagree with you on something you feel passionate about. Second: We’ve done all three: private school, home school, and public school and saw advantages in each. 3 in private now, 1 in public (Veronica says she couldn’t homeschool all 4 at once because the Bible clearly says Thou shalt not murder. And my wife would’ve killed my kids if they were home-schooled.) Third, I’ll say: It really is ‘by kid.’ There haven’t been a lot of studies on this, but those that are out there indicate that there’s not a significant difference in homeschool and public regarding whether the child adopts the faith if the parent is involved.  “The data also suggest that family climate, especially faithful religious devotion by both parents, delivered in a context of loving nurture, is far more important than where a child goes to school.” Parental involvement is more key than school choice. That’s similar to the studies on how much doing devotions impacts a kid. It is the quality of the relationship more than the amount of the teaching that makes the difference. Here it is: Sociologist Vern Bengston says in his book Families and Faith that studies conclusively show that the quality of the child’s relationship to the father is the single-most important factor in whether the child adopts the faith of the parents. What are advantages to private/home schooling? Studies show that both homeschooled kids and private school kids usually do slightly better on standardized testing than public school students. Private school students may get more intentionally-tailored Bible teaching and Christian curriculum (takes some pressure off), and homeschool parents have all the freedom they want to disciple their kids and teach them the Bible as a part of everyday school. Homeschooling (and private schooling to some extent) allows you the opportunity to tailor your child’s education to that child. If in a public school, it can be difficult to control what they’re exposed to at an early age. Public school curriculum can be notoriously harsh to Christianity–you’ve got to do due diligence. We had our older kids read apologetics books for that purpose. What are disadvantages to private/home schooling? Social interaction (not just a joke) if you’re not careful when homeschooling. Church is a great place to build the kind of community that can compensate for this, by the way, along with things like sports, extracurricular clubs, etc. Exposing them to world. We wanted to have them come home every night and process with us the hard discussions, the temptations, before college. Missional element: be careful with this one. That’s your calling not theirs yet. Private school is really expensive.  It’s a privileged person who even gets to ask a question like this. I understand that. Private schools are really expensive, and not only does that make it impossible for some people … it’s also something that Christians might want to consider even if they can afford it. Do you want your child to only interact with other kids who can afford that kind of school? Or do you want them to have friends from other walks of life, other socio-economic statuses? Homeschooling can be really tough. Sometimes it’s nice to have some help shouldering the load of teaching your kids — especially when it comes to subjects that might be out of your comfort zone (which, for me, would come embarrassingly early in the process). Every kid is different.

Show Notes: The answer to this question comes from the lips of Jesus, the most compassionate person ever to live. Marriage is a covenant you make with your spouse before God. God created it in Genesis 2 as a union where two literally become one, and death is the only thing that can dissolve that covenant (with a couple of death-related exceptions which we’ll talk about). So, is it ever OK to divorce? Jesus says in Matthew 19 that you can do it in the case of adultery. Paul, in 1 Corinthians 7, is going to expand that to say desertion by an unbeliever. Why are those exceptions? The logic is very important. In the case of both desertion/abandonment and adultery, they both kill the covenant. That’s why I called them “death-related” exceptions earlier. So, you say, what about the case of abuse? Or what if the spouse is involved in some illegal activity that they refuse to stop and it’s putting our family at risk? First, if you are in an abusive situation, you need to get yourself to a place of safety immediately. Talk to your church, let them help, or if you’re not feeling safe reach out to the Domestic Violence Hotline at 800-799-SAFE. Second, I would argue that the logic of Paul and Jesus’ exceptions applies also to divorce in the case of a spouse who is doing something that makes them unable to be lived with and puts the family in danger. Creating in abusive environment also kills the marriage covenant, and you are no longer bound to it. Lean not on your ability as a parent; lean on God’s grace as the hope for your child. As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast! Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

Show Notes: We should be as intentional with our families as we are with our jobs. There is a sense that, on one level, I as a parent affect the faith journey of my kids. But on another level, there is a limit to the responsibility parents have for the choices our kids make. God has made them as individuals. A lot of godly parents will have a child who wanders. And it’s not because they did something wrong. Think about it: God was a perfect Father. And the only two humans he “fathered” directly (Adam and Eve) both rebelled. It wasn’t because of deficiencies in God’s parenting. There are decisions only our kids can make. Even under the best of circumstances, they can decide to pursue things that are contrary to what God would have for them. Pray for your kids. Speak truth to them. But ultimately, know that God wants us to lean into his grace. God cares more for our kids than we do and he can pursue our kids in ways that we can’t. Lean not on your ability as a parent; lean on God’s grace as the hope for your child. As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast! Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

Pastor J.D. answers a question about what it really means to be a Christian. Show Notes: Everyone has a different assumption of what it means to be a Christian. In the Western world, a lot of people have the assumption that if you’re not a Jew, not a Muslim, and not an atheist, you must be a Christian. Some people think it means a certain amount of “religiosity”—a certain amount of church attendance, a desire to live by the Golden Rule, to do good to others, etc. The problem there is, “how much is enough?” At what point do you become good enough to be a Christian? There are two defining marks of a Christian to point out: First, a Christian is born again. To be born again means that you’ve come to a point where you recognize that your sin has separated you from God and there’s nothing you can do that would ever make you good enough to be accepted by God. Then Jesus, in your place, lived a life you were supposed to live, died a death you were condemned to die, and was then resurrected from the dead. He wants to take away the penalty of your sin by applying his death on the cross to your account and put the new life of his Spirit into you. Second, a Christian is a disciple of Jesus—which means you follow him, do what he did, live like he did, and obey his commandments. You devote your life to him. That’s what it means to make him Lord of your life. Jesus came to seek and save the lost, which means we should live our lives as disciple-making disciples. Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

This summer we are looking at some of the most popular Ask the Pastor episodes over the years. This week, Pastor J.D. answers the question of whether or not you can lose your salvation. Show Notes: At first glance, Hebrews 6 seems to say that not only can you lose your salvation, but once you do, you can never get it back! So what does it mean? This is important: I believe the writer of Hebrews is giving a general, pastoral warning to his congregation rather than attempting to delineate how the processes of regeneration, justification and eternal security work together. So, the warning here is a statement to believers and unbelievers alike about the importance of the gospel. Hopefully, it will rouse unbelievers out of their slumber. To the believer, we know that God will use it to keep his believers tethered closely to the gospel. Warnings like this one are one of God’s means of keeping believers awake to the gospel. If you persevere to the end, that proves you had the salvation you could never lose. If you don’t, it proves you never had that faith to begin with. As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast! Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

This summer we are looking at some of the most popular Ask the Pastor episodes over the years. This week, Pastor J.D. discusses Can a Christian Be Possessed by a Demon?. Show Notes: It depends on what you mean by “demon possessed.” It’s never used in the Greek language that I know of, and it’s not in the Bible. The word in the Bible is “demonized,” which actually broadens it a little bit. So, if you mean, “Can a demon so overtake a Christian so that they have no will left and no ability to choose right from wrong,” the answer is definitely no. But if you mean, can a demon influence us or afflict us, Scripture I think indicates yes. But their entry into our lives comes from listening to the lies Satan tells us. We’ve got to “talk back” to Satan’s lies with the truths of Scripture and the gospel. Want to ask J.D. a question? Head to our Ask Me Anything hub to submit your question! As always, don’t forget to rate and review this podcast! Find Pastor J.D. on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.