Eschatology Matters
C.R. Wiley and Kyle Hessler: The Theology of Work
C.R. Wiley and Kyle Hessler discuss the theology of work, christian business, the christian household, and the upcoming Works/Based Conference June 28th/29th in Dallas Texas.
https://www.worksbased.com/
- Duration:
- 50m
- Broadcast on:
- 26 Jun 2024
- Audio Format:
- mp3
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So head over to squirlyjoes.com/ematters and you can grab a free bag of coffee, which is a good lead into, I think, the topic for today. So today, we're talking about a theology of work. So we're trying to support a local Christian business or not local to me, but Christian business, Christian family. Today, we're talking about theology of work and Christian business, and I'm joined by Chris Wiley and Kyle Hessler. So, guys, thank you so much for coming on and chatting today. Glad to do it, Josh. Yeah, thanks for having us, Josh. Yeah, so Kyle, this is your first time. Chris Wiley has been on here. I think at least once we might have had you for one other thing, but yeah, glad to have you back. You get a pen after you've been on Eschatology Matters five times, I think. But we want to share this video at the front end. So there's a lot to talk through on this, but there's a conference that you both are involved with that we want to play the video for that on the front end. So we're going to go ahead and play that now and we'll jump back into the conversation. In a world grappling with joblessness, broken homes, and a crisis of purpose, we ask, why does work matter? There are a thousand noises to that. The one I like is that work makes us like God. Well, because God works. Work matters because you are a provider, and work gives you an avenue for providing for your family. But that question betrays that the job's not just a nine to five hobby, right? It's an opportunity to bless people, it's an opportunity to bless people at scale. But the reality is that money is intensely important to dominion. I'm Kyle Hessler. I'm a salesman, real estate investor, wrestling promoter, father, husband, and a Christian. And I want to invite you to the first ever work space conference in Dallas, Fort Worth, Texas, where we aim to glorify God through our work. Come and learn from speakers, David Bonson, Ciara Wiley, Steve Jeffrey, David Reese, and Andrew Krebschitz. As we explore the theology of work, how vocations shape cultural dominion, understanding risk, and how to invest not just now, but in future generations. This conference is about action, not just theories. Join us for a prime hub of networking, career growth, and fellowship. We are building a community of impactful connections and collaborative endeavors that seek to extend beyond a single weekend. Join us June 28th and 29th at the Hilton in downtown Fort Worth, Texas. Tickets available at workspace.com. This is more than just a conference. This is a commitment to glorifying God in our work, because we aren't saved by our good works. We're saved by Christ for our good works. Okay, so leading in off that video, which, Kyle, I was telling you beforehand, just great cinematography. I love especially when you got the stained glass windows, that to me is a win. What led to this project? So we want to talk about a theology of work. We want to talk about the Christian home a little bit as well, leaning in to what Chris is going to be engaging at the conference. But why this conference? What were you guys maybe seeing that, you know, what was the need within Christendom that you guys said? This is something that the church really needs right now in 2024. What is this addressing? Well, I think there's a lot of much like a major river. There's a lot of headwaters that kind of flew into it. So a couple of them were in my local context, just my own church, just seeing how people talked about work and location and dominion. Some of it's also just larger Christendom. And so I think there's a lot of things to address with it, you know, i.e. things like how should we view jobs, work, dignity, all that different stuff, but also things like very practical, like remote work versus, you know, working in an office, blue collar work, all that kind of different stuff. But I think where we kind of landed and I realized I think we've got something here is I think there's been a small movement in the western church to kind of revert back to a pre-reformation view of work. And in terms of work is not holy, but being in ministry, mission field, writing books, doing podcasts, that's the holy work, right? And I think we've gotten a somewhat got away from the fact that the creation mandate we see in Genesis is still very much alive today. We are called to till the earth. And I think that we really want to return back to that. So this conference is maybe just hopefully a starting point towards that. And, you know, we have so many great speakers that are going to kind of lead us some different paths. Like Chris's talk, I think is going to be really exceptional in terms of how do we view the household in relation to the overall dominion mandate. So pretty exciting about it. But like I said, it came from a variety of sources and needs. And hopefully we're really hitting the nail on the head when it comes to the cultural call of the day. Gotcha, gotcha. So one of the things in the video, and I know we wanted to lean in to kind of a little bit of the topic, Chris, that you're covering, which I think this is a new topic for you talking about the Christian household. So hopefully there's some. But no, there was something in the video though, I thought was intriguing. And I'd be interested in either one of you guys commenting on this. But so Steve Jeffrey was in the video there with you and he said work makes us like God. And I thought that was a really interesting statement. Thoughts on that for those who, because again, I pastor in Michigan, I think most of us can sympathize with the fact that many many Christians, even who may affirm with their mouth or with their head, maybe that work is good. Like we understand there's there's something good about it, but we don't much actually think that in our heart and we certainly don't act like it. I think a lot of the ways we set up retirement in our age or our day and age reflect what we truly think about work. Not a nine to five, you know, job, but just vocational work in general, contributing to anything. But to walk me into that statement a little bit or for somebody that hears that and work makes us like God, how do how do we wrap our heads around that? Want me to respond to that? Please. Yeah, I think. Yeah. Well, obviously we're told that God worked six days and then rested on the seventh. And then we're told in the, you know, the the the Exodus account to the 10 commandments that that we should follow that pattern. So God is the exemplar and we're following that pattern. It's interesting that the account of the Decalogue and Deuteronomy provides a different rationale for the Sabbath day. And that rationale, it kind of comes at it from a different direction. That is you were slaves in the land of Egypt implying that you didn't get a day off there. When you when you labored in service to Pharaoh, you didn't have an opportunity to commune with God and you didn't. And that's an important thing to to note. The Sabbath day is not just simply a day off. It's a it's a it's an orientation toward heaven that you are dedicated to on that seventh day. And you're also contemplating, you know, the work that you've performed in the in the previous week in the in the sense of being grateful that you could you could engage in it and offer it up to God. So those are things to keep in mind with regard to that, you know, the the statement that work is godly. I think another thing to note, Cal brought up something that I think is worth considering. And that's this idea that somehow work is less spiritual than other kinds of activity. One of the things I think to keep in mind with it is I think it has more to do with the pilotist movement coming out of Europe. And I think there's always been some confusion about how to understand our work in relationship to eternal things. Now, something to keep in mind is that monks believed in work. There was there was very much a rhythm to their to their day, work and pray. So La Bora and Ora were the two things that a monk in the Benedictine tradition would practice on a daily basis. And so there are actually a number of things that the monks have given to us everything from, you know, certain musical traditions to, you know, things related to agriculture. So I think that the problem with the American evangelicalism actually has something more to do with eschatology. So there's a sense that a lot of evangelicals have that it's all going to burn anyway. So why should we invest ourselves in it? The only kind of thing that we should care about is evangelism because the souls of the people that we went to the Lord are the only thing we can point to that last. Now there is a still room left for like, you know, good works in terms of giving to the poor and stuff like that. But even that kind of a distant second to evangelism. And I don't want to at all detract from the importance of evangelism. But the idea that you should set evangelism over against vocation, some kind of competition is just weird. Yeah. Well, and there's, and there's something to, I was on a radio program a couple weeks back. And our conversation kind of drifted into that spot where they thought the conference was more about how do you evangelize your coworkers and stuff like that. And clearly, we're not diminishing that or trying to dismiss that. But the focus was so much on that that I kind of bring it back 10 steps to say, well, we've kind of also in the Western world, limited evangelism really to just your words and not your deeds. So I think about like one of the one of the things I want people to walk away from this conference in is your hard work is a form of evangelism, because you're doing what God does, you're emulating God and we're called to be like Christ, then that's a type of evangelism. So sometimes, yes, when you're at the water cooler and you, you're talking to the coworker and there's an opportunity to share the gospel and talk about forgiveness. And by all means, please do that. But there's also opportunities to share the gospel a little bit differently. You're in a meeting, the boss leaves, everyone's grumbling about the boss, and you have an opportunity to emulate Ephesians 6 and demonstrate how do you love your master. I think there's opportunities like that. And because we've, as Chris was wonderfully pointing out, because we're so used to kind of a pre-mill view of eschatology and it's all going to go away, our work really doesn't matter, which is really a shame because I see cathedrals being made and that were made thousands of years ago in Europe. And I'm like, can we do more of that? You talked about, you talked about my church in the stained glass windows. All saints isn't the, you know, we didn't build that church, we inherited it, but that church is over 100 years old. And I love the idea of my sons getting married in that church. And they're, my grandkids getting married in that church. That came from labor with hands, that came from labor of planning. And so there's a type of evangelism there. I mean, you know, building a church on a hill is a wonderful type of evangelism. Even if you don't get on the street and start preaching the gospel, you've evangelized your neighborhoods, you've evangelized your cities by doing sort of good works. And I think that that's a thing that we want to emphasize quite a bit more in the incrysonum. Yeah, I love the, I love the building's example, because it's so, it's so visceral. We were, we were talking the other day about, I think it's the in Cologne, where there's one of those huge, you know, gothic architecture type cathedrals. And it took over 600 years to, to complete construction of it. And just to consider what generations of Christians committed to the beauty of God being expressed, granted, there's probably other things going on there that we could critique, but still like generational work. But the thing, the thing I wanted to kind of push in on, because when you guys mentioned their vocation and just the quality of vocation, I find it intellectually interesting from like, you know, reformational heritage, and you think back to the reformers the way they, they dealt with vocation. It's like, okay, I find that really compelling. But pastorally, I find it really meaningful for Christians, because again, I serve as a pastor, and I frequently hear people think of their work as something that truly doesn't matter. So it's like, I have to do this thing to do the things that are important, whether it's family or church or something like that. But they, they very foundationally regard their work and their vocation as something that has no actual meaning and no actual inherent value. I remember when I went into seminary, there was a popular preacher in the South, and he became the president of the SBC, the Southern Baptist Convention. And he very famously, I don't know if this is a pocket floor, not very famously, the story goes that he was asked if he would consider stepping down from that to run for president of the United States. And he said, no, I wouldn't take a, a demotion in my, my vocational role. And that sounds real good. But it's like, well, no, we actually might need a good president. Maybe that would be a good thing if we, not that he should, but we, we probably shouldn't diminish a good, a good Christian president. But how, any thoughts on vocation, because I feel like that's one of the ones that really hits home for Christians. That's something that, that everyday Christians are really wrestling with. Well, I think there are a couple thoughts or a couple of things that come to mind. One is, we do live in a, in a, at a time when it's kind of easy to, um, lose touch with the implications of your work or sort of the, uh, the consequences of your work. Because if you're, look, if, let's say you're in a cubicle in x, y, z, megacorp, and you're just handling paper, papers passing by you all day. You don't have much of a sense of how that contributes to the whole. Furthermore, there is actually something known as BS jobs. I don't know if you're familiar with that term, but there was actually a remarkable article that was published a few years back in which, uh, you know, not only did people feel like their work was BS, but, uh, in, in an objective analysis, it really was BS because they were not actually contributing, uh, to the profit of the corporation. They were just basically contributing to the ego of their boss. There are lots of ways that this can work out. Uh, and I think, you know, in our, in, in our zeal to promote the significance of work, we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that there really are, uh, you know, people out there who are stuck doing things that are really not all that great. Um, and I mean that objectively, like, like I just noted, uh, there are a lot of people say working in the bureaucracy of the federal government that we wish just didn't have jobs. If you get my drift, the world would be a better place if they didn't go to work every day. Um, so, uh, there's that, but I also think that, um, when it comes to, uh, you know, connecting with the people that, uh, put it this way, uh, a lot of pastors are insulated from the work, you know, that their personers are engaged in. The Apostle Paul, I love to bring this up because it's such a rebuke to the guys who think that, uh, in order to do their work, they have to kind of ermetically seal themselves off from the world, uh, as pastors. Uh, here's a guy who, uh, by everyone's estimation, even atheists was one of the great intellectuals in the history of the world, the Apostle Paul. Uh, not only that, um, he was actually a clerk in the Jewish Supreme Court, the Sanhedrin was the Supreme Court of Israel. So, uh, he was super connected and he was an intellectual, not just, uh, uh, competent in the Jewish, uh, you know, uh, scriptures, but also even in, um, at least stoic philosophy. We know that because he was able to quote a couple of stoics off the top of his head at Marcel. Um, yeah, he worked with his hands. Um, he was a tent maker, which was really the perfect trade for a guy that's on the road. You think about it. I mean, can you think of a better jet, a better trade? And have you ever, have you ever thought about what it was like to haggle at the Apostle Paul? Do you think he just paid for the price every time he walks up? You know, and so yeah, I'll take that canvas. What do you want? You know, I have a feeling he knew how to, how to, you know, uh, squeeze a penny out of a, you know, out of a rock, I guess. So, um, he was, he was a man. It was, it was competent and savvy, uh, and, uh, socially aware. Um, and, and not, not, uh, a pushover at all, you know, when, when he was beaten and imprisoned and, uh, it was later found that he was Roman citizen and the authorities came and said, you know, please, uh, forgive us to let us go. And he said, no, you come here and tell me you're sorry. Yes. I'm not just going to let you off the hook. I'm not going to plead pretend like nothing happened. Right. So this, this is a guy who had a backbone, obviously, uh, could take a punch. Um, and, uh, could actually go out and hang out with people who work with their hands and be, and hold this head up and say, I know exactly what you're going through. So I've got some background in working with my hands in, and it's made, uh, my ministry amongst particularly blue collar guys, uh, much more fruitful than I would have went otherwise. So I, I've got the, you know, the, uh, uh, you know, I'm, I'm glad to say that I've got, you know, foot in the world of the academy as well so I can hang out with those guys too. But anyway, uh, not many people can, can, uh, who are in the ministry can say that they actually know what it's like to haggle or know what it's like to, uh, work with their hands, know what it's like to actually, um, interact with people, uh, intellectually who aren't believers. You know, there's just a range of things that a lot of pastors are not actually exposed to on a regular basis in it. I think affects the way they think about things. Look, you, you brought up this example of this SBC leader, uh, John Witherspoon, one of the, uh, met, you know, a member of the Continental Congress and, you know, in the president of what would become Princeton Seminary. I was considered the most, uh, active and effective, uh, of the founding fathers in the deliberations surrounding, um, the, you know, uh, debates that brought our country into being. And he was a Presbyterian, uh, teaching elder. Mm hmm. Nope. I don't, I don't think he ever said I, you know, with that SBC guy said, I think he saw this as part of, you know, just one more, um, field of service. Yeah. Not either, not either or both and, but both and, right. Yeah. Um, Kyle, how did you guys start thinking about, um, what you guys asked Chris? Just walk, walk me into like what his topic was, how that fits into the overall flow that you guys were trying to get out with theology of work. Because I think of, of all the ways that I've found it, um, imminently helpful for Christians has been the household. Um, I, I would echo what, what, what, what Chris was just saying as far as, especially within ministry, um, I came in late to ministry. I, I mean, I held secular vocation for quite some time. And, and, uh, I think there's a lot of connection points that that gives us, um, with our parishioners, especially, but looking toward the home, how did that come into this conversation about theology of work, theology of vocation? Yeah. So, um, one, a couple of things. One was, of course, Chris's wonderful book, Household in the War for the Cosmos. It was just a really profound book for me. Just kind of, especially coming from a household where, uh, single mom, I was the only child, uh, and she worked late hours and things like that. There was no sense of what the household was. And so, getting a framework of that was really helpful. Um, and then coming into a church like all saints, like I am in Fort Worth, now I can actually see what that looks like lived out. Um, so that's more of like just a practical, my background on it. I would say the, one other thing was about a year and a half ago, I, I have a three year, three year old and a three month year old. And about a year and a half ago, I started bringing my three year old who was one in whatever at the time. He started coming with me on sales trips. And, um, we just did that because I wanted him to be on the world. I wanted him to be with me. I, uh, unfortunately in a job and a role where I don't have long sales meetings, then a lot of them are kind of touching go things. So it was functionally perfect for us. But I was realizing like how abnormal this is. And, and clearly it is unique. I knew that, but it was even just the sense of like how often dads get to bring their sons with them into the workplace anymore, just kind of form concept. And Chris's book. And of course, Chris, correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like what I was doing was how my household functions that, um, here's my son. He's walking out of the house, but the household is still intact because him and me are together taking dominion. And of course we returned to the house, uh, to go, go forth. And so, um, for me, it's like a lot of this stuff comes back to we've kind of, it's funny how much the modern world has both, uh, materialized everything and deemed materialized everything. So at one hand, the household is, and I'm sorry, I'm just totally gonna steal Chris's thunder here. But Chris pointed this out in the interview we did, um, that the house right now is full of gym equipment, um, uh, a rec room, a library, all this different stuff that is essentially a distraction from what the household actually is. So we have all this material stuff that is at the same time, den materializing it, if that makes sense. And so, um, Chris's talk, what, or where we wanted to go with the household thing is recognizing that that's kind of the arcade of everything. We kind of need to refocus and reorient our thought process at the home first. Now, clearly, the sphere of sovereignty of church is important to that. But before we start going, worrying about taking over the marketplace or, um, whatever it may be outside of that sphere, we need to get our households right. And so we need men, men to act like men and be husbands and then be fathers and be good fathers and be good husbands and then wives, likewise to be excellent wives and excellent mothers and children to be obedient. And if we orient our. Okay, round two, name something that's not boring. Laundry. Oh, a book club. Computer Solitaire, huh? Oh, sorry. We were looking for Chumba Casino. That's right. Chumba Casino dot com has over 100 casino style games going today and play for free for your chance to redeem some serious prizes. Chumba Casino dot com. No more specific. Mindset around getting the household right. It'll get easier. So in David Bonson's book, he just released full time. He talks about basically we've kind of truncated everything where you have, here's the household, here's the work, here's the church. And when you walk out of a house, all of a sudden we pretend like you've stopped being a dad. And then when you come home as a sales guy or a construction worker or whatever to me, as soon as you step through the door, you're stopping a construction worker or whatever your vocation is. And that's, that's not really how this stuff is supposed to operate. You're not really truncating these things. So we need to get, we need to have a conversation about the household. And I think one of the things I'm excited about is some of the dialogue between like Chris and David Bonson, because they, that'll just be in Frank, I think there's a little disagreement on like remote work and things like that. And I think that's a great topic to explore because it ultimately does relate back to how we need to view the household. Do we want to be encouraging guys to try to find jobs that allow them to be in the home more often less often? Does it matter that whole thing? But these are conversation points that we need to be having because this is, I mean, how many people were offered remote work since 2020? And is this a good idea of that idea? I don't know. I don't, I have my opinions. Personally, I'd like to work remote, but that's, that's my personal opinion. I don't know if it's the thing we should be encouraging or discouraging or it just depends on inch individual, which is, my lean is that it's the individual. But again, it all comes back to in a large way, the household, which is why for our schedule, Chris is actually going to be the last one speaking because I think Steve Jeffrey is starting off with a theology of work. And then we're closing with the household because I think that's the right orientation. Everything else in between is very practical, very appropriate. But if we, if we leave the household when we're thinking about vocational work, I think we've missed the mark. Okay. Yeah, Chris, Chris, I'm going to need you to explain to me why it's wrong that I have weights in my house. What am I doing? I didn't, I didn't say that he said that. Well, I, I had, I do two. So I guess we're both sinners. There you go. I mean, me for you. I think, you know, it cows observation about being with this children is really something that Deuteronomy six is getting at. You should teach them diligently, this is Deuteronomy six, verse seven, you shall teach them diligently, speaking, referring to the law on the commands to your, to your children. And she'll talk to them when you sit down in your house and when you walk by the way. So when you're in the house and out in the larger community, you are with your kids. So this is the idea. It's not that you just left them at home where you only interact with them at home. And when you lie down and when you rise, so basically the over the, over the, over the, sort of the, you know, in the rhythms of the day, wherever you find yourself. And you know, his comment concerning the household is right. A household is, is not the physical structure that you sleep in. A household is an authority structure that you live in as, as a household as, and it's, and it's serious members are part of it. And it can actually be divided up among different buildings. You know, people can be members of the same household. Think about it this way. When we're told that Abraham went to rescue lot, he was able to muster over 300 fighting men in his own household alone. So there's a lot of guys that lived in that house. And I don't think they were in the same tent. But I think when it comes to the title of my talk, the recreational household, what we've done is we have reduced the household to basically the status of a recreation center. It doesn't mean that people in the past didn't have fun at home. It just means that recreation was part of a larger operation. It wasn't the only thing you thought of when you thought about your household. So I know lots of people who integrate work and the household life pretty thoroughly. Some of them are remote workers, but not all of them. Many of them, you know, are working to find ways to bring their children into the workplace with them. So if you give me a couple of examples in the church, I serve. We have two entrepreneurs on our session, both own successful companies. One is high tech and the other is, well, you say they're both high tech, but in different ways, one is a software company. And the other is builds industrial transformers. And in the first case, the software company is entirely virtual. They have people in South Africa, in Brazil, in the United States. There are several people in my church who are in this company, and they all have home offices, and they're interacting with each other every day, just like we are to perform their work. And it's a profitable growing concern. It's not like they're a bunch of slouches laying around their pajamas and stuff like that and playing video games. And they do a lot of them travel a lot doing sales work for the company. But then there is a Maddox industrial transformer. It's awfully hard to actually physically build a transformer virtually. You actually have to go to a place and work with some pretty serious tools to build a transformer. And there are hundreds of people who work for Maddox and our local manufacturing center. Probably, I would say, we have maybe 25 to 30 people in the church that work for Maddox, maybe even more. And their children are now being hired by the company and are coming into the workplace and working alongside fathers on the stuff they build. But it's a very intentional thing. It's kind of the part of the philosophy of the company, families working together, households working together productively. But in a situation like that, it's part of the philosophy of the company. Um, you know, if you were to interview the owner of Maddox, that's the way he would put it. Yeah. Yeah. And that's, that's a paradigm shift. I would suspect for, for a lot of Christians to think through vocation, what did Zoom just do? You did a thumbs up. Every, every interview seems like balloons go off or something anyway. Well, just a AI, the artificial intelligence is listening in our conversation like what you were saying just take that. That's right. Students all about the cosmos in the house. Yeah. That's my, that's my, uh, my secret service agent giving me a thumbs up on our conversation. No, um, yeah, vocationally, I think that's, that's a huge retrieval for Christians, though, because yeah, usually it's like work is over here. Family is over here. The two are, like you said, I think you use the term hermetically sealed, right? So, um, so retrieval of that, then, um, how does this play in? Cause I have to strong arm you guys into this. How does this play and eschatologically? Um, and I'm going to, I'm going to throw in a little bit of a curve, but I didn't, I didn't kind of forewarn you guys of this. Um, but when we think of work, I think, again, Christians, we oftentimes will, uh, we'll confess with our mouths things about work. We might not really actually, um, kind of live out or really believe deep down in our heart of hearts, so to speak. Um, but when we're thinking about work, is this, is this something that carries on into eternity? Um, when we think of work, obviously, if I'm building industrial transformers, maybe there's not going to be a, a place for me to build industrial transformers in the eternal state, but is work, we, we understand works, not a product of the fall. Adam was given work in the garden. So like we understand there's some sort of kind of creational, you know, dynamic going on there, but I think a lot of people picture heaven as a place where there is no more work. There's nothing to be done. There's no, there's no working to be had work sounds. Even if we say like work itself wouldn't be tedious or produce sweat on our brow. Um, there's nothing needed to be done there. What walked me into that a little bit. How does this fit into sort of that, that big story, that big flow that God is, is writing through our scripture and how is this, how is this maybe going to lead into the eternal state? Well, I, I do think that when we talk about eternal rest, uh, we are talking about something qualitatively different than what we can know now. Um, God rests from his works. We, we'll rest from our works, but we're told in Revelation 14, 13, and I heard a voice from heaven saying right this, blessed are the dead who died in the Lord from now on. Blessed indeed says the spirit that they may rest from their labors for their deeds or their works followed them. So what does it mean to have your works follow you? It, some sense, it implies that we carry them into eternity. We're also told that the kings of the earth will bring their riches, their treasures, and lay them before the Lord. What does that mean? Uh, I think that we're talking about some kind of, um, uh, the sort of the, the sum total of the works, the cultural works of those nations will be brought before the king as tribute. So I do, I do think that, uh, when we think about say this through the post-millennial lands, uh, the world has a future and our works have a future. Uh, I don't know what that means. Um, I think there's been some fun reflections, uh, on it. Uh, probably my favorite story, uh, along that line is leafed by niggle by Jairar Tolkien, where, um, he, he actually develops this idea, uh, in a very moving way. And I, and I think that people should read it for themselves. I'm not endorsing everything that goes on in the story. It's a fanciful story, obviously. It's kind of a parable. Uh, and there's also sort of an implication, well, not sort of, there is that there's a purgation, kind of a purgatory that the character, uh, has to pass through. Uh, but, um, we do believe in purgatory, we just, this Protestants think it's going to be really, really past. In other words, we're all, we're all going to be, uh, go through a purgation or a purging, right? That's what we think. That's what we believe glorification entails, right? So, um, the, the larger point though is that in that story, uh, this artist, uh, whose name is niggle, he is working on something in our world that he enjoys in its fullness in the next. Hmm. Okay. Well, that's good. I was, I was going to bring it up if you didn't, Chris, because I, it's, it's, it's a great little book. Um, it is fantastic. I would, uh, here's my first Doug Wilson quote. Maybe I'm not my only one of this interview, but Doug has a quote where he goes, uh, you know, what are we going to do in eternity? And I think he said something like, uh, Lord tells, tells him, Wilson go grow turnips on Jupiter. And it's like, it's such a great, like, first of all, it's a very Doug Wilson sort of thing to say, but it, it's just funny in the sense of like, we, we're not conceptually thinking these ways. So, you know, part of my thinking is, and I don't know if we're going to get this into this too much in this first run or conference, but you know, some of the things I think about is like, I love, I use technology. I use, um, chat and GPT all the time. And I wonder how, how much are worlds, even with good post millennial Christians on the cutting edge of technology, how much of technology is kind of skewing us into a, uh, matrix like world. Um, you know, and I, you know, Lord was sovereign and good. I don't think we'll end up in some dystopia, but I do wonder how work that happens. It's one thing to think about medieval times and castles and churches and these institutions being built that have survived so much longer. It's hard for me kind of conceptually think about a lot of the labor we're seeing now technology wise, how that's going to affect, uh, Christians in 10,000 years. But I, I mean, certainly it'll be for the benefit. The, the things I'm, I want to kind of point to as far as how should we view our work in light of the eschaton is, you know, we were talking about building church buildings and you, you brought up Josh how like a lot of those churches in Germany and England took generations to build. I mean, hundreds of years to build and now they've lasted forever. And we think, I think a lot of us that are kind of more on the post-nail side or the reform side, certainly look at those buildings and are just like amazed and think, you know, look at the glory to God, uh, and then something like the, uh, Cathedral Notre Dame collapses and we go, oh no, you know, it's God, but we're forgetting that the, the labor and the productivity that went into building that building also had outward effects. So think about all the people that came to faith in that building that are now doing jobs and that are having families and, you know, the Lord kind of strings everything together. So, um, you know, me putting on this conference in 20 years might be totally forgotten about, but maybe one gentleman comes and is inspired by Chris's talk or, or to, to reor, you know, he's got a big business and he's a very business focused guy and he reorients himself to his family and now his family see a hardworking man that now loves his family well and that family changes the world, right? This is how I think generational wealth has kind of passed down. It's not just so much in general, not even generational wealth, but generational labor, I guess, in the sense of like, you know, 10,000 years from now, we're going to have great, great, great, so on and so forth, kids that are hopefully faithful and are laboring towards building the words kingdom here on earth. Um, and so I don't think it's just like, you know, we tossed it out, even if you build a glorious building, even if you build that a glorious book, it may, you know, like is Tolkien going to be remembered in 10,000 years? I don't know, he may, he may not. I would imagine he would be, but maybe for different reasons than we think of, we, we maybe are thinking he's going to keep getting handed down and handed down and maybe he'll just be recovered, but I think that the, the stories and the, the, the wisdom that we've gotten from somebody like a Tolkien have influenced people and that influence will carry on and on and on in our labor. So that would, that'd be my two cents in terms of how this all relates back to, you know, post millennial kind of thinking. And I think we already kind of, I would also say, since this spot guess is called this technology that matters, I would also just say kind of hammered pre-mill guys earlier and I don't want to pick on them too much, but I mean, I do think that a lot of the problems we're seeing in the, the modern world, the late back to the fact that well, it's all going to go away anyway, which we touched on earlier, but I think that there's another way of looking at it is, I mean, I'm Presbyterian, I view my kids as part of the Covenant. And I think that that has relation back to eschatology in that sense of we want to be, uh, recycling our children's children and we need to do that through labor. And so, you know, I think that there's an element that if you're pre-mill and you think, you know, everybody's a sinner and everybody needs just straight evangelism and your labor, not that anyone would say their labor doesn't matter, but they're just not viewing it as a priority. I think that this relates back to just kind of a pre-mill, mostly not historic pre-mill, but probably mostly dispensational types of thinking that it's all going to get just swallowed up, whereas I would say probably most historical pre-mill people don't think in these kind of terminologies. So, and I want to be fair to those guys for sure. Yeah, I would, I would also just like, because I hear what you're saying, but if somebody's watching this and they're not post-mill and they're not Presbyterian, like be encouraged, like this is not just that. I know you weren't saying that, Kyle, but like I'm just thinking toward number one, we've got a guy coming on pretty soon. He wrote a book about passing on, essentially looking at your children as kingdom growth and evangelism good, but also taking stock of the fact that God has given you children as as kingdom growth. This is written by an SBC pastor. So, like that's encouraging to see, like just kind of cross the board focusing on that. What we've noticed too, this is just my little pitch from Eschatology Matters. I think you're right about certain eschatological perspectives kind of give you those proclivities toward splitting things up a little bit differently or even in a damaging way. I would say that just in general, I think evangelicals suffer from sort of a neo-nosticism, or maybe if not to play that term too much, a bifurcation of the sacred and the secular, the physical and the spiritual. It's not far off from Shafer's whole upper story, lower story type paradigm, but it comes out in our funerals, right? Thank goodness he's done with that body. He can now go on and BSE truly is meant to be. It's us looking at the things of this world, including our work, including our vocation and saying these things don't actually matter. And then just backing up and seeing where we've come from as Protestants, I think it was Luther and it's probably apocryphal, as is like every Luther quote I think I've ever read was actually not uttered by Luther. It appears, but it was the one about where he was, he said, if I knew the world was going to end tomorrow, I would still plant my apple tree, something along those lines. It's the fact of like, if this is good and God has put our hand to the task, like it matters. And we may not be able to, like Chris is sharing earlier, I may not be able to quantify exactly what that apple tree planting looks like in the eternal state, but I know it's good and I know it matters and I know God honors it in some way. But let me ask you guys these two things because I don't want to keep you all day. Kyle, I'm going to come to you second and just ask for the conference information, where people can go, where they can keep up with you, all that sort of stuff. Chris, if you've got any, any sort of, I don't know, I don't want to say like a teaser or, you know, something tantalizing about your talk, but you know, like, who's it? Who's it aimed at? What are you trying to reach? Why should people maybe be interested in this, this concept? Anything you've got on that kind of enclosing or as a teaser toward your upcoming talk? Well, I think any guy who is at the conference will hope, you know, I'm hoping we'll get something out of it. Unmarried guys should have some sense of what a productive household looks like before they get into, you know, a relationship with a woman. Guys who already, you know, are married and haven't given much thought to this matter. Well, I hope start thinking about it and work to make their households productive. And then those who are older can kind of look back on what they've done. Some of the things that they'll reflect on, I think they'll be pleased to know that they've done some things right. And then, you know, they will likely also see that as they reflect on things that things could have been done better. But that's true for everybody, you know, whether or not you've got a really sound theology of productive households or not. It's just kind of life. So I think there's something there, you know, in it for any guy who attends. And I think, you know, the women who are in attendance, and I'm assuming we're going to have ladies at the conference as well will also, I've never come across a woman who, when she's introduced to the concept of the productive household recoils from it, they actually most, you know, all the women I've come across are just latch onto it. And they're really, they really like it. So anyway, I guess that's all I've got to say. No, that's, that's about on. And I feel like, yeah, I echo what you just said, as far as I think, I think moms that change diapers, when you start talking about the productive household and along the ways you've lined it out with household and the war for the cosmos, like they get it and it's yeah. Kyle, working folks, keep up with the conference, follow it, sign up for it. All that sort of stuff. Yeah, so we, we somehow managed to get works based on pretty much every platform, still surprised by that. So you can follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Tubu, Instagram, whatever, it may be workspace. Yeah, as far as the conference, it's at the end of the month, it's June 20th and 29th in the Hilton at downtown Fort Worth, Texas. Tickets are available at worksbased.com. And, you know, to the point about who will all be there, I mean, we've got singles tickets, but we've also got family passes and couples tickets. We've also got a dad duo ticket pass for, you know, fathers and sons to come. And I just, I'd just like to say beyond just a weekend full of rich theological discussions and thoughtful thought provoking sort of back and forth with everybody, this is, this, this weekend's really designed to be a huge networking opportunity. So guys that can come that are looking for jobs or looking for opportunities to do business with other Christians or, you know, whatever it may be, we're making sure to designate a lot of time, including the Saturday morning, Saturday morning, we're sitting three hours aside, like, there's no talks going on. Like, we want people to talk to the vendors, we want people to bring resumes. And I'll even just say, like, to your, to your listeners, if you're somebody that's looking for a job, just message me, I know times are tough right now. I'm sure we can figure out a ticket situation for you. But we want people to come to this conference with the hope and intention of improving their working situation or improving their business situation. But I will also say, too, we don't want people to feel like they have to all of a sudden sign up for the parallel economy. If you're working for a great company and providing it for your family and you happen to work for Amazon, or you've got, like, feel good, feel good about that. If there's an opportunity for you to jump ship, go for it. But we're not trying to do the whole thing. You must feel bad because you're working for a seemingly woke company. All companies are woke right now. So there's not much safety in that, unless you work for, like, Maddox, which would be a great job to have. But there's very, you know, we don't want anyone to feel bad that they work for Walmart, Walmart's doing Pride Month. I mean, it stinks. But come to this conference. Look for a appointment if you are feeling motivated for it. And if you have a Christian business and you want to do some business, come join us. So there'll be some great opportunities at the end of the month. Perfect. Perfect. Well, Chris, Kyle, thank you guys so much. Thanks for putting the conference on. But yeah, thanks for the input here. And yeah, God bless your efforts in the conference. This is fun chatting about this today. Thanks, Josh. Thanks, Chris, for coming on. Yeah, glad to be with you guys. Hi, I'm Victoria Cash. Thanks for calling the Lucky Land Hotline. If you feel like you do the same thing every day, press 1. If you're ready to have some serious fun for the chance to redeem some serious prizes, press 2. We heard you loud and clear. So go to luckylandslots.com right now and play over 100 social casino style games for free. Get lucky today. At luckylandslots.com. No purchase necessary. VGW Group, void prohibited by law, 18 plus, terms of condition supplied.