All right. Welcome back to the podcast for the love of the church. This is season one, episode four. The church is diverse. Well, welcome back. Thanks for joining us again for another episode of For the Love of the Church podcast. We're so grateful that you joined us. And I'm joined once again, he's decided to stick with me at least for another episode, Mr. Caleb Hilbert, and he's coming to us live from Astoria, Oregon. where it neither rains, no it does rain, it neither snows, maybe it snows, the sun does not shine, that's all we know, there is no sun. There's no sun, no sun. No blue skies. No sun, no blue skies. Yeah, but it's beautiful actually. I do encourage you, this is not being sponsored by the Tourism Council of Astoria, Oregon, but I would encourage you if you get a chance to go visit Astoria, It's a very beautiful area, and Caleb and Christa would be glad to have you come visit them at Lewis and Clark Bible Church in Astoria. That's right. And just say, and just say, Dave sent me. And we'll know what that means. That's right. And Caleb will say, I'm so sorry. He'll pray for you, he'll give you a hug, and Christa will prepare you a meal, and Sophia will welcome you gladly into their home, and life will be beautiful. Well, today, as we think about this and talk about this, it's an interesting conversation, and we're gonna probably touch on some interesting things, I'm sure, as we have in the last couple episodes. But I wanted to do something maybe a little bit different than what would normally happen on a podcast, or maybe how we've started off the other episodes. I wanna start off just by reading the entire chapter of Revelation chapter five. I think in its entirety, there's a powerfulness here that is just really interesting. So really, kind of like what we did in episode one, where we defined the church, what is the church, you know, big C church, little c church, all that kind of stuff. the complexity of the church. There is a complexity of when we talk about diversity, and we're going to address a little bit of that, especially as this particular episode goes along. But I want to just start with Revelation chapter 5, and then maybe we can walk through a little bit of this as we get into this conversation today. But Revelation chapter 5, starting verse 1, it says this, Then I saw in the right hand of him who was seated on the throne a scroll written within and on the back, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming with a loud voice, who is worthy to open the scroll and break its seals? And no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll or to look into it. And I began to weep loudly because no one was found worthy to open the scroll or look into it. And one of the elders said to me, weep no more. Behold, the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David has conquered so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals. And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders, I saw a lamb standing as though it had been slain with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. And he went and took the scroll from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. And when he had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and 24 elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying, worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God. And here's kind of where we're going. from every tribe and language and people and nation. And you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God and they shall reign on the earth. Then I looked and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders, the voice of many angels numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands. saying with a loud voice, worthy is the lamb who was slain to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing. And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea and all that is in them saying to him who sits on the throne and to the lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever. And the four living creatures said, amen. And the elders fell down and worshiped. That's like one of the more powerful passages in scripture. I mean, there's a lot of powerful passages in scripture, but that is an amazing text. And I think, thanks for letting me just read it in its entirety and thinking through this concept of diversity. What are some thoughts in there that maybe popped out to you, Caleb, as you think about diversity and you think about this text and how it all fits together? Well, well, I mean, first of all, yeah, no, it is a very powerful text. I love this text. Not only is this text a great text on Jesus, the supremacy of Jesus, how great Jesus is. It's a great text on worship, you know, what is our worship supposed to look like. As a musician myself, there's always that—I love the fact that verse 9 is a new song, right? Here's this new song. I do take—I'm a guitar player, so the fact that they pull out harps maybe I could sneak in maybe a guitar in there. But no, I just, yeah, I love, I just love it. I love the scene. I think John did a really good job describing this. But like you said, for this episode, Diversity Day, Only Jesus is able to open up the throne, or the scroll, excuse me, with its seals, and then it says, for you were slain, and by your blood you've ransomed people for God. So I just love that. That's what makes the church so beautiful, is that Jesus has purchased the church. He's ransomed us. And then there's then that description from every tribe, every tongue, and people and nation. And so, you know, each one of those means something very specific, right? So a tribe is a relatively large people group, right? That form a socio-political subgroup, right? According to BDAG. So that means a lot of different things, right? I mean, there's lots of different races and nations and peoples, right? I mean, that's a pretty big thing. And so, it's from every one of those. So, it demonstrates that the gospel message is such a universal message, such a practical message, such a relevant message to every single culture, and these people are ransomed, chosen to be part of the body of Christ. Therefore, the church, as the New Testament says, is the most relevant institution in every culture, right? Because, I mean, that's what he says, and that's what we talk about when we talk about diversity. There's all these different people from all these different walks of life, and they have different languages. Yeah, I only know one, and the other one that I'm supposed to know, I don't know very well. But you've been to places, right, where they speak only Spanish, or they speak only another language, and you gotta have a translator. Yeah, it's a remarkable thing. I think it's easy for us as Americans, and maybe we'll get some listenership outside of America, that'd be awesome. But as a general rule, American Christians struggle Again, as a general rule, I know not everybody, but as a general rule, we can struggle because we tend to think that Christianity is a white, middle-class American deal. And it's not, actually. We're probably a minority in reality, in the grand scheme of life. that there are people from, like you say, every tribe, every nation, every language, every people who have placed their faith and trust in Christ. They're not all white, they don't all speak English, they're not all the stereotypical, you know, kind of middle class, Like you mentioned, I've been in a lot of different places. God has allowed me to travel and minister in a lot of different places. One of the most, probably the most impactful places that I have been is in Nairobi, Kenya, is Kibera slums. I think it's the second largest slums in the world. And if you're not familiar with a slum, it's really not a great place to go. Open sewage running through the streets. No, really no infrastructure. It's chaos. It's almost unfathomable for us to think about in the process and to think about the utter poverty, the utter depravity that exists in those particular slums in the back. of the slum and it's a large area of land that that is made up in the back they have an area where quite honestly when people die and they don't have any family nobody to claim them they just take them out and burn them it's it's like you think about the worst of the worst um in these places and yet I've had the privilege of standing in a, basically a room that's held up by stilts, wooden stilts that you're not quite sure are gonna hold anything, overlooking, you know, in the middle of the slums, but overlooking the rest of the slums, and literally hundreds of Kenyans singing at the top of their lungs, 10,000 reasons, or Behold Our God, or any number of songs talking about the goodness and the greatness and the majesty of God. That's a moving experience, and I'm not a Mr. Experientialism, but that's a moving experience when you are looking out over utter depravity, utter poverty, raw sewage flowing literally right underneath you, people trying to just meet out in existence, and yet here's a group of people singing at the top of their lungs. And when John is talking here in Revelation 5, Like when I read verse nine, I am thinking about those Kenyan brothers and sisters that I have stood in the slums and sang these songs with, to say they're gonna be around the throne of Christ, just like I'm gonna be around the throne of Christ. I'm white, middle-class American, dude. And I'm gonna be around the throne of Christ with my brothers and sisters from around the world, from all sorts of backgrounds and all sorts of exposures. So that's what I think about when I think about this passage. Yeah. Yeah, and it's amazing. I've been to several places where, yeah, I don't speak the language where I'm asked to speak. And it's amazing that even though there is a severe language barrier, we still have fellowship. It's amazing. I don't know how we do it, but there's like this bond. Yeah. And then, you know, then it says people and nation, you know, it says every tribe, every language, every people, every nation. So, I mean, we're talking about people from all around the world, different families, different languages, different traditions, even different politics. Now I know in the United States, it's probably very difficult to have a church that has differing politics. Right. There's only one political system that is okay, and that's whatever I am. That's right. That's right. But to realize the other political system also has believers, and they're going to be there too. That's the diversity of the church, and the fact that we're able to come together despite all of those differences, because we've all been redeemed by Jesus. That's a beautiful thing. Men and women, different families, different backgrounds, all the kind of difference, and all those different areas, we all come together, we're all brought together in Christ. And so, yeah, this is what I love about the church, is the extent of that diversity. Yeah, and it's a remarkable thing, and I think we do well to think about the diversity of the church, and I'm sure we can talk a little bit more in just a minute about how we play that out in practical terms, not only with what's going on in our society, but what's going on in our demographics, where we live, and what that means. I think Revelation 5 pulls us up high level, 30,000 foot, and says, wait a minute, okay, so it's not like, here's your universe, you know, middle of nowhere, Kansas, or wherever you may be, it's actually, let's look at the big picture, but now let's go back down into the weeds, if you will, to say, let's talk about those demographic areas and societal issues going on, and how do we deal with diversity, and how do we make sure we deal with this from a theologically biblical, point of view and I may not have diversity in my local church because demographically speaking it just isn't here. but the big C church is diverse, and that's what Revelation 5 points us to. It starts with the big C church to say, this is what it's all going to look like, but maybe we can bring it down into the practical level to say, okay, how do we deal with the diversity and lack thereof sometimes within the little C church? That's a really good point, yeah. And there is a ministry I've heard of that does help churches. When there is a whole bunch of stuff going on, we have the vice president on the line. He called in special for this. Hey, Dr. Dave. Yeah, thank you for calling it special. Normally we have C&D Church Supply do a, we have a satire advertisement. We wanted to get serious for this one and wanted to let you know about Dave's ministry and IBL and what they do and how they can help your church. even if there is some pretty serious diversity. So Dave, why don't you just take a little bit of time and talk some more about IBL. Yeah, so IBL is a ministry that's been around for over 35 years or so. And it really started with a combination of a desire to provide biblical counseling and training for leaders. And over the course of time, it's grown and it's been been able to be used by God to serve and minister to leaders all around the world. I think I mentioned in episode one a little bit about what we do in the four ministries. We do coaching, which is a simply one-on-one for a ministry leader, an elder, a deacon, a pastor, somebody who's a full-time ministry pastor who needs some objective. Let me just have somebody to talk to. I need somebody to kind of think some things through, bounce some ideas off of. That's our coaching ministry. It can take a lot of different forms there. We have consulting ministry, which is, so just take, for instance, Caleb with Lewis and Clark. He's got elders and deacons, and they may say, you know, we're just having some struggles kind of seeing where God is leading us or having some struggles with communicating or having some struggles with, you know, being able to labor together as we should or whatever the case may be. And so we come alongside of that group of leaders. Consulting would be a group of leaders within a church, so elders, deacons, whatever polity system that may be, and just help them overcome some of those obstacles and challenges that they may be having and just help facilitate them through. We have no authority as a parachurch ministry. We come underneath the authority of that local church, so all we can do is really offer some suggestions and advice and counsel and help facilitate and we do that on a regular basis. Almost every weekend we're out in a church helping them think through some of those things. And then we have a counseling ministry which is designed for ministry leaders and wives that maybe are going through some difficult challenges. Maybe they've had some serious issues morally or maybe they've been hurt with the church or whatever the case may be. We have a counseling ministry that we provide And then we do training, which is mostly for groups or maybe groups of churches that are wanting help with elders or help with leadership training development. We've done some things for the chaplains, for a particular, the IFCA Fellowship of Chaplains. We've done training for them the last several years and looking to have partnerships with some Bible colleges as well. And then we also do training overseas in our international context in Ecuador, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, India. We've been in Vietnam for a number of years and training leaders in theology and pastoral skills and in leadership and then training leaders to train leaders so that those men in Kenya can train Kenyans and trying to raise them up to be able to do that. There's a couple different unique aspects about our ministry. The first one is that everyone who serves on staff, and I think maybe all of the board or most of the board, at one point have all been clients of IBL through the course of their ministry time. And so we do know what it's like to be the one who is being served and the one who has had some challenges and just needs some objective outside help. So I think that does help us hopefully come in with the right approach. And then the second unique part of our ministry is that we do all of our ministry at no fee to the church. And so what we'll do is we provide what is called a cost summary to the church, which just basically says, this is what it cost us to come. airfare or car rental or meals or a little bit of personnel time for the day or two that we were there. This is what it cost us and we ask you to pray about. Would you give a gift to offset that? All of the people that work for IBL are mission supported and so we're all seeking support that allows us to be able to help and minister to churches and really it benefits the smaller churches as well because typically their budgets are not as solid as maybe some larger churches. And so for them, that's a big deal for them to have somebody or a group of people be able to come and help them and minister to them. So that's IBL in a nutshell. You can see more about it, IBLministry.org, and all of our contact information is there. Or you can email me, DaveD at IBLministry.org, and I'd be happy to have a conversation with you. Yeah, check out iblministry.org and we'd be happy to talk more about how we can serve you or serve the church that you're part of. So, let's talk diversity. Let's talk a little bit of practicality, Dave. How do we get there? How are we supposed to view diversity in a church where there's all this different people with all these different backgrounds and all these different education levels and genders and cultures and political parties? You know, I think we we often think about diversity by maybe color of skin or language or culture. Those are those are the hot button, you know, markers for diversity, you know, and we see advertisements this way. You have the token young guy, you know, with all the old people or you have the token old couple with all the young families or you have, you know, the woman, the token woman with a bunch of guys or, you know, whatever, you know, cause we're striving to communicate, hey, we're diverse. We welcome everybody. We want everybody. Or, you know, you've got a token Hispanic person with a bunch of white people or a token white person with a bunch of, you know, whatever the case may be. So I think when we come down into our practical everyday churches, I think there's one element that says, what demographic do we actually have around us? That's what we should look like. We should not be importing people from the rest of the world into our area that has nobody else like them in order to say, hey, look at us, we're diverse. So, I mean, we pick on the plains of Kansas. I know some pastors out in the middle of nowhere, Kansas, who maybe they'll listen to this, I don't know. You know, demographically, there's just certain groups of people that aren't going to be located there. And so don't go hunting and searching to import them in to show that, hey, we're diverse. So be aware. Revelation 5, like we said, gives us a 30,000 foot level. The big picture of Big C Church is that it's diverse and every tribe, tongue, nation, people is all gonna be taken care of. But on a practical level, I may not have every tribe, tongue, nation, people group around me, and that's okay. I need to look at my demographic of my area and say, is my church adequately reaching out and ministering to all the people that are in our area? But our church should be an accurate reflection of the demographic of our area. And that's what I think, just on a practical demographic side, that's where I would land. Yeah. You had mentioned something I think is also really important, because diversity is also diversity of thought, of opinion as well. you know, not to bring back COVID, but it's something that just happened. You know, our church, we had several people that were masked, you know, we have to wear a mask, several people that said no mask. We had people that were yes mask, no vaccine, yes mask, yes mask, vaccine. So we had all these different views of all this different stuff. And it was this huge diversity of things. And so, You know, as elders, we were trying to navigate this, where you have these really hot-button issues, where you have definite views, and they're not just views on a small level, but they are of conviction. So how do you handle that? What kind of advice would you give me? You know, you have all these hot-button issues. How do you navigate that in a local church, so that people aren't kicked off and leave, and you're able to function as a body? Yeah, I think on a practical level, I think what we tried to emphasize when I was pastoring and went through this was the whole concept of the one and others. Let's practice the one and others. Those are really gonna help us get through a lot of junk that we're dealing with. In honor, I prefer others. And so the problem is, though, if I take one particular position, I, boy, it feels like I'm violating my conscience if I prefer somebody else. But we have to say, even masks, no masks, when we went through that, to say, hey, listen, I'm okay, I'm wearing a mask, and that person's not wearing a mask, I'm not gonna demand of them, or vice versa. We're all gonna try to get along and mitigate this as much as possible. It takes work and effort in order to fulfill the one another's, in order to have diversity. And I think it's a requirement of our churches to be diverse. That's a picture of heaven. That's a picture of Revelation 5. Again, we don't import it if it's not in the area, but we have, like you said, we have enough opportunities for education, for opinions, for politics, for who, there's a long list. of diversity, and a church that is diverse is a church that is practicing the one another's actively, and I think that's the key. We have, you know, we can not talk about skin color or language and still have plenty of options for diversity within our churches, and so I think just practically speaking, practicing the one another's is key to that. Yeah, one of the things that was really, I don't know, it was one of the texts that was our go-to text. We would always go back to that text. It's still kind of the text that we kind of use as elders to help people in this situation. We went to Philippians 2. verse one and following where he says, if there's any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind, do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. But each one of you, Not only look out for his own interests, but also the interests of others. Have this mind among yourself, which also was in Christ Jesus. And then it follows that he says he emptied himself, becoming the form of a servant. And so as I think about this, you know, being of the same mind doesn't mean we're thinking the same thing. It's that we have the same goals, right? We have the same goals. And so for me, the diversity is great. Different views, different cultures, but man, we're focused on the gospel, right? I mean, we're focused on Jesus. We're focused on exalting him and glorifying him. And then having the same love, you know, being in full accord. Yeah, I love you because Jesus loves you. Yeah, I don't love Dave because Dave's lovable, though I do love Dave, but I really, really, one of the reasons that we love each other is because Jesus loves us. I mean, and that's a good reason, that's a good reason to love somebody, because Jesus loves them. And then that other thing of have this mind in yourself, which also is in Christ Jesus, and so, yeah, being like Jesus. I was thinking about it. Jesus came into a pretty diverse world, didn't he? I mean, he was living in Israel. There was Romans. There were Jews. There were Sadducees, Pharisees. There were all kinds of things. None of them were perfect, but Jesus loved them. Jesus functioned with them. And then you think about even his disciples. He had a zealot. Right? And he had a tax collector. The zealots hated the tax collectors. I mean, they did. They tried to overthrow the government several times. So even within that group, Jesus has that ability to bring those two people together of opposite thought. Yeah, exactly. And Jesus is the common bond and the common denominator, that bond we have in Christ, like we mentioned when we go overseas and have instantaneous bond. There's one, you know, one final thing, or maybe one thing to note here towards the end and not necessarily trying to make a huge deal out of anything, but 2012, I had to read this book for a grad class I took. 2012, there's a lady, she has since passed away. Her name was Rachel Held Evans, and she wrote a book called A Year in the Life of Biblical Womanhood. I don't recommend reading it. I don't even know how to describe the book, but basically she took all of these things, these obscure texts of scripture, And then she tried to apply them. So like, you know, she actually went and sat on her rooftop of her house for, you know, for a while because it's better to be, you know, for a woman to sit on the rooftop than to dwell with her brawling woman or whatever that verse is. As is the custom. as is the custom, yes. So if you find Krista out on top of your roof, then you know. The subtitle was, How a Liberated Woman Found Herself Sitting on Her Roof, Covering Her Head, and Calling Her Husband Master. You know, because Sarah called Abraham Master or Lord, and so she took all these kind of like, she took all these statements out of context, is basically what was the deal. But there's an element of issue that the church is dealing with, call it woke, call it whatever you want to call it, dealing with the diversity from the standpoint of, well, does that mean that we should be diverse, like with the LGBTQ, all of that discussion, all of that thing, that conversation. And the issue I would say is this, I saw a pastor's fellowship blog thing a couple of weeks ago, and a guy wrote on there, a young pastor, he said, please pray for me, Next week we have a homosexual couple that's going to come to church. What should I do? Should I not allow them to come? And then it was a whole conversation that occurred. And so you may be listening to this and think, oh, we should never allow, you know, I remember when I pastored, we had people. told me that no homosexual should ever be allowed to enter church. Well, that's a dangerous position to take because now we're elevating to say, well, if you're a homosexual, that sin is worse and you're not welcome at church. There's a fundamental difference. between showing the grace of God and the love of God and the love of Christ to welcome somebody that walks through your door who may be an adulterer, may be involved in pornography, may be homosexual, whatever they may be going through, dealing with, to love them, to welcome them, to be a friend to them, to engage with them, that's fundamentally different than affirming and saying everything that they're doing is okay. Like we wouldn't affirm an adulterer, we wouldn't affirm somebody who's caught in pornography. So we can welcome people, we can engage people and not be affirming, if you will, of like, oh yeah, it's okay. And you can practice whatever you wanna practice, however you want. And so I think, there is an element where there is this push that says diversity in the church means this woke, LGBTQ, whatever it may be, whatever social issue you may be thinking about that is going on, where I would say, no, you're welcome here like anybody else. We need to show you the love of Christ like we would to anybody else. But I think there's a deeper I'll just preach a little bit. There's a deeper issue going on here. Because I think if you and your church takes the attitude of like, well, hey, there are certain people that are not welcome to come to our church, then I think there's a deeper issue going on here that's violating Galatians chapter 5, verses 16 through 24. There's 15 sins that are listed by you walk in the works of the flesh that Paul lists. and he lists 15 of them. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies. Eight of those deal with relational matters. Seven of them deal with moral or worship or those kind of matters. And we focus so much on those seven sins that are like, ooh, those are the bad ones. But Caleb's a jealous guy or Caleb's kind of a contentious guy, but yeah, it's okay. I mean, who doesn't struggle with something? And it really goes to what Jerry Bridges wrote in his book, Respectable Sins, where we kind of elevate this whole idea of certain sins are okay. Jealousy, strife, contention, division, everybody's got those. But boy, you have these sins and you're not okay. I think even within that diversity conversation, I think it's important just to kind of highlight and touch for a second this idea that says, hey, you're welcome. We're not affirming you. We're not telling you you're okay. Like we wouldn't tell any sinner he's okay. This is what he needs to do to be changed into the image of Christ. And second of all, I don't wanna be guilty as a church of saying, I'm elevating these seven sins over these other eight relational sins, because those relational sins are just as wrong in the sight of God as the others. And so I know some people are gonna argue, well, you know, an adulterer versus somebody who just struggles with jealousy, that's not the same thing. Sure, there may be different ramifications there, but when we think about sinfulness and sinners and how churches to be functioning, those are some things I think we need to highlight and at least bring to the attention. Well, it's been a good discussion. I think actually this discussion leads into maybe our next episode, The Church is Imperfect. So if you've joined us for just this one, or if you've joined us for all four, we invite you to stay tuned for episode five. We'll maybe delve into this a little bit more.