Theology with Imagination (with Brian Zahnd) | Ep. 46
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Jeremy: [00:00:00] On today's episode, we get to sit down with Brian Zahnd, who is a big deal. This is an exciting one for me. I have read Brian's books for a long time. Few of them were hugely influential in my life. A number of us as this episode posts are going through one of Brian's books in our online community. If you want to join us there, I'd encourage you to check out the links below in the podcast description.
We'd love to have you go through this together, Brian is an incredible thought leader. Someone who's in the church, but offering the church better ways forward. Brian's the author of 12 books. He's the founding pastor of Word of Life Church in St. Joseph, Missouri. He's a huge fan of Bob Dylan and Theodore Dostoevsky and the NFL.
He's got all sorts of different tastes and he's also the author of one of my all time favorite quotes, which I ended up referencing this in the episode, but this quote is just money. I use this quote all [00:01:00] the time. Brian said, God is like Jesus. God has always been like Jesus. There has never been a time when God was not like Jesus.
We have not always known what God is like, but now we do. This is episode 46, theology with Imagination.
I've never shared this with anybody publicly. There's so many things happen in this conversation right now, thousand years from now, people are gonna be looking at this podcast saying, so this was the breakthrough. If this was SportsCenter, that would be like such a hot take. Skip bales would've no idea.
Steven A. Smith. Would've no idea what to say if you drop that down. That is so good. The joke I always say is like, how'd you learn so much? You gotta drink a lot. The power of food and beverage to lubricate an environment, resistance to change is hurting the church. I'm not in the camp that God has a penis or a vagina [00:02:00] or a body at all.
I'm in the camp that God is at Universal Spirit. This is the strangest podcast that I've done on. I don't even know what to do. I'm kind of geeked up about this wine. So this is my second glass and it delivers a little more of a punch than I expected. So if I get a little loopy, it's your fault you told me to drink it.
I just show up. I'll also say as a confession, I am a lightweight, so I've had like three sips of this wine and I'm already feeling. So this is fun. You've uncovered the mystery, you've exposed the formula. You've just duct taped together a number of things that aren't normally hanging out together, and I'm here for it.
We're gonna sit down a table. We're gonna have a glass of wine and some food, and we're gonna talk about. The beauty of Jesus. Thank you for the, the hospitality that this particular podcast provides folks like myself and I know others to, to be curious around their faith practices. I really appreciate this venue, what you're doing.
It is fun, and yet you dig into the deep stuff. I've heard about your podcast for a long time and [00:03:00] I love. That you're a pastor and that you explore the world of faith through wine. That's very unique. I will never forget the first time I bought a bottle of wine by myself, which was yesterday. If you're familiar with Drunk History, I thought it's like drunk the, so I, I got a little spicy there.
It's the peach wine, by the way. Drinking this peanut regio at three o'clock in the afternoon is making me even more direct in my communication than I normally would be. I know why you have your guest drink wine. Makes sense now. Yeah, I get it. A little bit of liquid courage. You really unleash the beast.
I think you've got a good podcast. So throwing the wine bit in there, that's nice. Is it Cabernet and Pray.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Well, welcome to the podcast, Brian.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Hey Jeremy. Thank you for having me.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: This is a treat for me. I have watched you from afar for a really long time and have not ever had the chance to sit down with you. So today we're gonna [00:04:00] get to unpack a lot of the ways that you have impacted my thinking and my
theology and things that you have written, and I'm excited to, to dive into that.
But before we do, I want to get into what we're drinking. And I came across a quote of yours that I thought sets us up well for us to enjoy a conversation with some wine today. You recently wrote this, John the Baptist drinks no wine because he's not the one who brings the party. He only prepares the way the party begins when Jesus turns the water to wine at the wedding Feast of Cana, John is advent.
Jesus is Christmas.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Amen.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: good
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: That's from, my advent devotion, I think The
anticipated Christ. Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: talking about wine.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: you.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay.
I'll talk about what I'm drinking and then I'm excited to hear about
yours. Today I'm going to France. I've got a
2022 [00:05:00] bourgogne la garenne, I think is how you
say that. I always just say it confidently when you're trying to pronounce something. It's a Pinot Noir from Burgundy France, and what stands out for me in this one is it's unfiltered, which means you're getting a more raw, expressive
version of the wine, kind of like wine with fingerprints still
on it. It hasn't been all the processed stuff, and if you, if you know, you know the old World Fruit has a lot more minerality. I'm a huge pinot noir fan, normally from Oregon, which is a lot more of the red fruit.
This is a lot more of that minerality with still the red fruit as Well, It's a delicious afternoon drink for me.
That's what I'm enjoying today. How about you? What do you got in your
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Well, I, yeah, I have a couple things to say. What I have, IJI just, I just went and grabbed the first, my, my little, it's, it's a bit pretentious to call it a wine cellar, but I do have a wine rack
and, and I have a wine club, and sometimes I go out and buy [00:06:00] something, but usually it just comes to me. So I just grab the first, you know, it says it's Cabernet and Pray.
I just grab the first cabernet that I found, which is, it's it's Cab Barnet. A grape owner owned a vineyard planted. I can't read. It's too small, but, but there were bears in his vineyard and so anyway, so I haven't even had a sip of, but I poured a little bit ago. I haven't had a sip. It's a California cabernet.
I don't know if it's in good or not. Like I said, I don't know. But I do have, I'm actually sitting at my writing desk, which is also on my podcasting desk, but you can't see it. But there's books piled everywhere, but there is a bottle of wine. It's an empty bottle of wine that sits here. It's kind of, don't know.
It's it's a totem. It's a, it's a reminder. It's this, this is a, and this isn't a particularly expensive bottle. You, I, because I just looked it up. You can get 'em for 70, $80. Ano bru, [00:07:00] ccino. I do like the Italian Reds from 2004 though. That's the point. That's the 200 four, because that's really, you know, I wrote 'em.
A memoir of a period in my life, and I call it water to wine. And that's really when all that began to happen way back in 2004. So I just kind of keep, this just sits here. There's a, there's a cross, a cross icon sitting right there and next to it's just this, this bottle of brunello that just kind of reminds me of, of my journey.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: I love
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Now, I don't have this in my notes, but you've got me thinking. You showed me a picture when we were preparing for the
episode of you holding that bottle, and I noticed in the background it looks to be quite the pipe collection
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. Yeah. Ne next to my wine rack is, is are my pipes.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: You, you seem to be a connoisseur of this.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: yeah. Yeah. I just, I sort of like that sort of stuff. Yeah, I do.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: How long have you been into pipes?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I was given a pipe by my [00:08:00] oldest son. He just thought, you know, he ought to have a dad that smokes a pipe. And so he gave me one for Christmas, probably 20 years ago. And I would just smoke it once in a blue moon and I didn't smoke enough to get any good at it, you know?
'cause there is a bit of skill. There's a learning
curve there. And then just a few years ago I thought, eh, I'm, I'm now 66. I think it's time for me to, to be a little more devoted to my pipe smoking. And so I am, and, and so I have, I think, I don't know, 10 or 11 pipes. You know, it's, it's a fair collection.
I'm just back from Turkey and I picked up another miam. I say another, I don't if you know what miam pipes are.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah. Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I, I was there a year ago and I got one and really liked it. And here's the thing with Miam, don't drop it. They
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay. Good to know.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: And so, so, I got another one when
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So you were down
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: to replace my my miam.
So anyway, yeah. Yeah, that's, that's I [00:09:00] I'd like, I like scotch whiskey too. So I guess I'm just confessing all my sins here.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: You're just a man of fine taste.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Actually wi actually scotch whiskey is what I know. I know enough about wine not to make, not to look too stupid at a restaurant, but, but you know, if I'm around a real wine aficionado, I just sort of shrink back.
But I know Scotch whiskey, I really do.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: What's your go-to
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Oh, I love all the Islas, the, the real smoky Pity. Probably my favorite distillery is Arba and I've been there.
But I also like La Fro and Lain. I've also been there. I like spring Bank. Haven't been to that. That's in Campbelltown. Those are some of my favorite distilleries.
Kill Holman, a new distillery on Isla. I like that one. So yeah. But if I
had to, if I had to pick one Scotch whiskey, I would say I really love the Ardbeg Cory of Reckon.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Oh, I'll have to check this out.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. ABA Co of Reckon.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So Obon 14
has been my go-to scotch. Is that, is [00:10:00] that okay?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: that's great.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay. I, didn't, didn't know if you you'd approve of that,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: No, I, yeah. No, that's, that's, that's legit. Yeah. That's, that's good
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: All right. All right. Well, I feel good now.
Okay. So we can,
we can proceed. Maybe we have to do a separate episode. We'll do scotch and then a separate episode, we'll do pipes. And maybe we'll just cover all the bases.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Know what? That's surprisingly good. That's, I, I was expecting less and I was like, ah,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay. Tell us about it then. What, what are, what are you
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: you tasting notes and all that. I'm not gonna sit here and swirl and I'm getting hints of wine, so.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: There's wines you like, and there's wines you don't
like, and it, it, it's really what it comes down to.
So you got, you got a good one today. Okay. If you look at the last 10 years, let's just isolate it. How would you say your faith has changed in that time?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Well, Jeremy, I'm old. So, so [00:11:00] I wouldn't say it's changed much in the last 10
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I would say in the last 20 years it's changed a lot. 10 years ago, we're talking 2015, I was just hitting my stride. I didn't start writing books until I was 50 and I've
written 12 books in 16 years, and I think that's good.
I mean, in retrospect, and that's not even true, but I told you actually isn't true. I did write two books in my forties, but I don't claim them. They're illegitimate children that, that I don't claim and I'm
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: What's wrong with those two books?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: So, so I have, I've really written 14 books, but like I said, two 'em are illegitimate.
I don't claim 'em.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So why, why are you not claiming those
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Ah, because the water had not yet turned wine. I
wasn't ready. I, I hadn't really embarked upon my midlife spiritual [00:12:00] theological pilgrimage that would lead me to a much better place. And so they were, they were books born out of time. They were too early.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Are they, are they still
available
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I'm not gonna say any more about 'em than that.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: we don't speak of
these books anymore.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: right,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Oh, that's great. Well.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: So, so I'm not, I'm not trying to be difficult. I, I 10 years. How has it changed? Okay, I'll, here's what I will say. All my books are piled up over here, and I can't quite reach 'em very well. would say I, I'm, I am gonna reach, I'm gonna get a book here. I just, I need to look at it here. Let's see this book here.
Postcards from Babylon. It's one of my, not gonna get all situated again here. I wanna look at the, when did it come out, you know, when it came out and when they're written. Ah, this, this came out in 2019, more recent than I thought, but I probably wrote it in 2017. It always takes so long [00:13:00] for books to come out.
Walter Brugmann wrote the forward for this one, but I had a little more hope for. Evangelicalism as a movement in America to right the ship. And now I don't, it doesn't mean I'm depressed 'cause I'm not, and I'm not a pessimist and I'm not, and I'm not, you know, a doomsayer per se. I just think that American evangelicalism has plotted its course and is not gonna deviate from it.
And there'll be anecdotal tales of people that see the light here and there, but as a movement, I don't see much hope for it. I don't know if that's a change that's, that's more of a resignation that,
okay, so this is the case. Now, having said that, I, I really don't regard myself as an evangelic. In fact, I've never self-described as such.
I, I my story is I, [00:14:00] I go all the way back to the Jesus movement. So I was just kind of a Jesus freak that that led me into the charismatic movement, which I describe as good until it wasn't. But I never thought of myself as evangelical. I thought, well, those are Baptist. I'm not a Baptist, you know?
And but I, I do know that world and it seems to me that that many of the most visible and vocal leaders in American evangelicalism have tied the faith in the evangelical expression to a certain American agenda with a Gordian knot that, you know, the sword of the spirit could cut, but that's probably not gonna happen.
And so it's gonna be what it's gonna be.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I don't know if you wanted to go down that path, but I, I just took you
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Well, we're gonna, we're gonna get into a lot of that
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Alright?
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So I wanna talk about a few of your books That were particularly influential
on me. one of them is a Farewell
to Mars a, a book that many
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: That one may have been [00:15:00] written 10 years ago.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay, there we go. Now, by the time this episode posts, we are going to be actually going through your book.
In our online community.
So this is kind of a fun way to, to dive into that. I'd love to read a few of my favorite quotes from that book and just have you elaborate
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Alright. Yeah. No. Now of course, remember this book I wrote a long time ago, so I'm gonna try to remember, but okay.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: no, you don't have to remember anything. You just get to talk off the
cuff about ideas that you said and things that I thought were meaningful. And the, the fun part about having a podcast and when you get to interview authors is you say, Hey, this is an idea I really liked and now I get to talk to you about it.
And so it's,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: You
know, and before we get started, I, I encounter quotes of mine out there now and then, and sometimes, I mean, they, they fall to me, they fall into two categories. Yeah. I, I know I've said that, I've said that many times. I'd like that I can riff on that. Others, I'll hear and go. I don't ever remember saying [00:16:00] that because that's, I mean, sometimes you're writing from a, a, a deep well that you've spent a lot of time in or
having written it.
It really got, you know, it became part of your sort of life message. Sometimes though, you write something and sometimes it's really good, but it was just that day. I sat here that day, I wrote that sentence. It was good. And I haven't remembered it since,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
The, the pipe
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: hear him and I like, and I go, oh, that's good.
I like that. Yeah. Okay, so go ahead.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay.
well, you can tell us which ones
these fall into. You say this, our responsibility is not to chaplain the state, but to call the state to repentance and to surrender to the king who is Lord
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I can't say
I remember that exact sentence, but that's a, that's a familiar theme that I return to over and over and again, I talk about it in all kinds of ways. Read it again.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: [00:17:00] Our responsibility is not to chaplain the state, but to call the state to repentance and to surrender to the king who is
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah, I mean, in that sentence there, I've already established the fact that at some point the church was willing to become a chaplain for the empire. By the way, chaplaincy per se, we're talking about, you know, a chaplaincy within a hospital or someone. That's, that's a good thing. But here I'm using in, in a bit of a negative light that instead of being a prophetic witness, challenging the empire often the church will be willing to simply be by a chaplain.
I mean, sort of a court prophet that is never going to challenge the empire, but assure the emperor in the empire that God is on our side, and that no matter what we do, you know, the light of heaven is shining down upon us, blessing us. And so, this has a long history going way back [00:18:00] to Constantine, 17 centuries ago.
There's been various iterations of it in most of the European empires because of their affiliation with some version of Christianity are really, I should say, Chris and dumb. And, but that, that's just not faithful to the prophetic witness of the church that we
are called to enact. So yeah, that's
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Love it.
Okay. You say we believe in Jesus theologically, religiously, spiritually, sentimentally, but not politically.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Hmm. That's a good one. I don't remember that one. No, but I, but no, I do rem I do remember, you know, I,
these are themes that I, that I
returned to over and over and over. Well, there I'm working from the idea that Jesus does have a politics and Jesus is not apolitical. He, he's not. Unconcerned about how human beings would organize themselves and [00:19:00] live together.
What Jesus is not is partisan. Jesus is not gonna serve any particular political party 'cause he is got his own and he has his own politics. He calls it the Kingdom of God. The and, and Jesus. This is the only thing Jesus ever talked about, period. I mean, everything that Jesus ever said or even did is either an announcement or an enactment of the kingdom of God.
But the term kingdom of God can be problematic for us in a couple of ways. One kingdom is a bit archaic for us. We don't really talk that much about kingdoms. It's like that's knights in shining armor or something from way back when, or we've just heard it so often that we go, yeah, this is something religious about that.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Where really if you would just in your mind substitute the word kingdom for politics, you would be closer to what is intended. So [00:20:00] Jesus is proclaiming the politics of God
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: and the politics of God, have no nice easy alignment with any of the politics of this world. And so, do what I'm saying there in that bit is you can be very kind of a typical rather orthodox, small conservative, maybe Christian in American, and you believe that Jesus is divine, the Son of God crucified, risen from the dead Savior, camp Kings, Lord of say all that.
But do you really believe that human beings are called to organize themselves around the Sermon on the Mount and actually, and actually live that way? Now having said that, I, I don't wanna be misleading here. I do not think that you can build one of the kingdoms of this age, of this world around the Sermon on the Mount.
I just, I don't think it's possible. [00:21:00] I think we have to realize that we, we just in fact, belong to an entirely different kingdom. And that, that necessarily means we have a certain measure of wholly ambivalence. It's not unconcerned. We're always concerned. And those within our immediate vicinity that are suffering injustice, that we can aid, we come to their raid like the Good Samaritan, we come to their aid.
But the idea that somehow we can basically keep, you know, the American governmental apparatus intact and now, and now run it according to the Sermon on Mount, it's not gonna happen. And this is, this is one thing I do appreciate about Barack Obama. He was asking, it was kind of a gotcha question, but he was asked during, I think it was during the campaign, before his first election, you know, if he believed we could govern according to the Bible.
And I think he was being set up that he was just gonna say, I don't know what they thought, but, [00:22:00] but Obama was a, he was, he was honest. He was like, he said, well, I don't know. I don't, I I see problems. He said, if I take the Sermon on a mount, seriously, I think the first thing I'd have to do is if I'm gonna govern a corn that is, I'd have to abolish the Pentagon.
Well, he, he's actually perceiving something that's true. And so, we, we continue to be seduced by the idea that we can, we can follow the lamb and follow the beast simultaneously, and at some point they just diverge. And we have to choose who we're gonna follow.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: And, and that's hard for people to hear.
I realize that I, I wrote that book whenever I wrote it. 14, 13, 14. Probably came out in 50. I don't remember. But I, but I do remember how I opened the book. I have this little introduction where I, where I actually address myself to the book. I'm
talking to the book, I said, dear little book, you know, I'm sending you out into the world.
Please don't cause me too much trouble. You know, as it turns out, that book really didn't cause me any trouble. [00:23:00] But I know it's a, it's a hard hitting book and it, it really challenges people. And yet I can't, I mean, I'm going to Sweden next month, or I guess what month? I'm going in June to Sweden speaking in a big conference solely based on that book.
So
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Really.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: it continues to speak to people. And I had, I want, I don't wanna tell too much, but I, I had breakfast on Monday with a former CIA special ops. Officer who left the CIA because of the influence of that book and other thinking that I have along those lines. So, so
it continues to bear fruit.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That's very cool. Well, there's one more quote from that book, and this is similar to the last one. You said, believing in the divinity of Jesus is the heart of Christian orthodoxy, but believing in the viability of Jesus' ideas makes Christianity truly radical
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. Send
that one to
me. That's
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: like.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: [00:24:00] Yeah,
I, I, I,
I,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: seems like this.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. Just doctrinal, orthodoxies sometimes can be a way of hiding from the particularly demanding mandates of Christ. I, I, I believe in you, Jesus. You know, and I, I'll confess the nice scene creed right here and now if you like me to Well, that's good. You know, I believe in that too. Jesus actually calls us to take up our cross and to follow, and, and the overly, the overarching thesis of a farewell to Mars is that the waging of war is incompatible with following Christ, which I think people hear that as highly controversial.
Maybe it is. I'll tell you what it wasn't for the first 300 years, the first 300 years of the church, it was not controversial. It was just assumed. And now the other [00:25:00] is assumed. We're just assumed that, well, it's not even possible to exist in this world without war. Well, this world as it is, but we are called to anticipate that, which is to come.
We are called to turn swords into plow shares, and follow the prince of peace no matter what the rest of the world does, no matter whether it's practical or not. And this is the high call of Christ upon the church.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: It's beautiful. Alright, before we move on from the book, anything you would specifically say to our online community who's going through these ideas in real time together?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Oh, on, on the, the book farewell to Mars. It's one of my favorite books that I've written. I, I stand by all of it. There, there a lot of books I have. I would, you know, enough time goes by and I think I would redo that, but that one I think I wouldn't that's one of the books I read and I go, I, I, I gotta live up to that.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: I
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: And so, but yeah, I, I just, I stand by it. I know what's radical in one sense, but I believe it's [00:26:00] also true. And I don't think the early church mean the first three centuries would find it radical. They would just, I think if they read something like that, they would say, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's, that's what we all believe, isn't it?
Well. Got a funny story to tell you things
changed along the way.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: for myself, growing up in Evangelicalism and for many others. It was a, it was a, a mindset altering book that challenged an idea that many of us had never been challenged with. And I point back to, my first exposure was that book when I went, oh, maybe this isn't compatible. Like I've always
kind of assumed it was.
And you forced us to really wrestle that through and you know, I haven't looked back since.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Thank you. I, I love hearing that. I mean that, and I do hear that from that book in particular, you know, and I hear stories about you. I got, you know, a third of the way through it and I threw it across the room and it sat there, you know, for two months. But then I, but then I went back and picked it up, [00:27:00] and so I like hearing those kind of stories too.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That's great. Okay. Another book that was huge for me was your book, sinners in the Hands of a Loving God. Which is a brilliant title and play on words there. Couple quotes from that that I'd love for you to, to elaborate on. You said, if transformation is by the renewal of the mind and I have never changed my mind, then be assured.
I am actively resisting the work of the Holy Spirit in my life.
Everyone who grows changes now, it has been my experience, Brian, that most Christians do not in fact change their mind on
theology hardly ever. How can we make that more of a normal part of people's expression of Christianity?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: That's, that's one of those how-to questions. Those are hard questions to answer. I don't exactly know. [00:28:00] but if you don't understand, the Christian life is a journey. Then that's, that is really problematic. Too many people view it as a status. I am condemned, guilty hellbound or whatever, you know, and now Presto, my status has changed.
I'm forgiven. I'm good to go to heaven and all that sort of thing, you know? And there, there's a grain of truth in that, I suppose. Not much more than a grain, but there's, there's a grain of truth there. But, but the scriptures really do speak to us and, and not just, not just say it, but show it that this life of it is a pilgrimage.
It's a journey. Where we start is where we have to start wherever we are, but that's not where we're going to stay. I mean, think of any person who is given any degree of biographical story [00:29:00] in the scriptures and you see where they begin is not where they end. They grow, They
change. They, this is Peter, this is, this is Paul, this is Abraham, this is Moses.
You know, whoever you wanna pick. This is the pattern that we encounter, God, where we encounter God in our, whatever situation we're in. And then it's follow me. And we, we don't arrive overnight. It's more or less a journey of a lifetime. You know, this is Paul's language. I, he says, you know, I haven't attained it yet, but I press on and, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm not looking back.
And what I've left, I've regard as rubbish because I'm pressing on to know God is revealed in Christ. And so within the, within the parameters of the historic creeds that there, that's our safety there. And I am, you know, I'm, I'm, I am classically orthodox [00:30:00] in that, you know, the parameters of the faith as defined by the historic creeds.
I fit comfortably within that. But that's a lot. There's a lot of room there for nuance and growth and development. And so, how I thought about hell when I was 15 is not how I think about hell when I'm 66. Is that shocking? Is that a terrible thing? Well, no, that's it. That's just part of life. That's part of growing, that's part of having a few decades to think about it.
And and I don't do theology out of fear that somehow I'm gonna say something terribly wrong and God's gonna you know, banish me.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: mean, I'm, I'm doing theology, which theology is nothing more than how we think and what we say about God. I do it in good faith and I do it seriously attentively, [00:31:00] and I know there's gonna be development and change and growth over time.
Here's what I've learned. I think most people that if they will approach theology not as, okay, I'm, I've gotta learn to give the correct answer to about 10 or 12 questions and then never revisit them, but instead view it as actually, actually in fact, coming to know God as revealed in Christ. Their journey almost always results in a broader concept of the grace of God.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I, I don't think people. Journey theologically and spiritually, prayerfully seriously, and over a course of decades decide that God is meaner, more capricious, more narrow in his grace than they used to think. I [00:32:00] just, I
don't hear those
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: ever met John MacArthur?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: well, no, no. See that, that, that's not a journey. That's him.
Just this, you know, he, I, there's an, I mean, I don't know him, but I'm telling you pretty much he believes what he believed when he was 14. Okay.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: I would agree with you,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: and yet, for a lot of people that is held up as you know, if you have the right theology, the, you know, it's this
like an err bible in errant theology. Like just get it all figured out and then lock it down, you know, white knuckle it and never change.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I think most people. Tho those that really believe that. I don't have anything to say to 'em. 'cause I'm probably not gonna convince 'em quite yet. But I think intuitively most people go, eh, I'm not so sure that that's really true.
I think, I think we do have to grow, we do have to follow, we do have to press on, and that will necessarily involve changes in how we think.
And so [00:33:00] cer I mean, there, there are, there I do have my constants. I I, you know, I've never not thought that Jesus is Lord. You know, and again, I I'm back to, you know, the very basics of Christology, that Jesus Christ is fully divine, fully human, crucified, and risen is Lord. That's kind of my north star.
That's my constant. But I can, there's a lot to be rethought even as you maintain that. Right? So, so that, that's so what, what I, I'll tell you what a couple things about sinners in the hands of loving God, that book, first of all, I just preached a sermon one time with that title. Just sort of a, kind of a, I, to me it was almost just amusing.
I'm obviously riffing on what Jonathan Edwards did, but my literary agent, Andrea Heineke, she heard that and she said, that should be the title of your next book. So I have to give her credit for, she said,
she said, just work with that and go from there and what the book [00:34:00] is about. I don't ever say this you know, so I'm, I'm just sort of, I just let people encounter the book as it unfolds and they read it, but it's really written for a certain kind of person, and this is a person that is, is beginning to already be sympathetic to the idea that God in fact is not angry, violent, and retributive, but I mean, they're already open to that.
I. If they hear someone say, God really isn't angry, violent, or retributive, there's a part of them that goes, I think I believe that. Or at least I want to.
But, but neither are they just wanting to jettison their Bible. And so they have all these what if questions or what about questions? Oh, what about Old Testament violence?
What about the wrath of God? What about the violence of the cross? What about the violence of, of hell? What about the violence of the Book of Revelation? So really [00:35:00] that's what I'm doing with that. But I'm saying, look I'm not asking you to throw away your Bible. I'm asking you to maybe reread some of these passages in the light of Christ.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: so I, and I, I can tell you that's been my most popular book. Is that one.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Really
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah.
That's the one that that I hear the most from people about. So
that's the one that when I meet people somewhere and they'll come up and have tears in their eyes if they, if they walk up to me and they have tears in their eyes, I'm thinking, yeah, they had sinners and hands loving gun.
It changed their life.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That's awesome that you just kind of know, oh, that's,
that's the book for you.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. And, and by
the way, I don't, I don't ever get used to it. I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm, every time I'm floored and grateful.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Oh, it's an, Yeah,
what a, what an incredible moment of encouragement for
you. You know, and I'm sure you've, you, you get 'em all the time of how you work has impacted someone in their experience with God, especially when you're showing them a more [00:36:00] beautiful
picture of God. I mean, that is, that is a game changing revelation there.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: right.
Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So, one more quote from that, that, again, I can't remember when I read this and, and my own journey, but this was a whole, a whole thing I launched into for a while until I felt like I was able to work through. And I think you were one of the early ones to kind of get me going on this. You say, once we realize that Jesus is the perfect icon of the living God, we are forever prohibited from using the Old Testament to justify the use of violence.
Now, it's also been my experience in, in the church that most Christians do, in
fact use the Old Testament to justify violence. How do you help people navigate that?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Well, let me first just tell a story that I think is fun. So back in March, I believe it was February or March, it was one or the other, [00:37:00] not that long ago. I, I was invited to speak at Duke Divinity School and introduce Stanley Haas's latest and probably last book. Jesus Changes Everything. And so I presented his book, you know, just sort of gave some reflections on it.
And then he came up and responded to my reflections. Then we, we had a conversation and took questions together and all that, and that was tremendous honor for me. But before that event, I was just sitting with him there and he was kind of in a hallway. We were waiting for the event to start, and all these professors are walking by and they, they, he can tell he is beloved.
And, and he would introduce me to each one. But then there was, there's, this guy came and he is got the bow tie and the kind of the, you know, he just looks very professorial and he, he's an Old Testament professor, and Stanley introduces me to this guy and then, and then a little there. Having a conversation.
Then Stanley just says [00:38:00] in his very how wassan way, you know, Christians don't have much use for the Old Testament until they want to kill somebody.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Oh.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I mean, that's his whole life is these little one-liners.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That's a great
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: He is got this acerbic wit. I thought, man, that is so good. Well,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: is a great
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: and so, the reason that we confess
that Jesus is God is not, it doesn't work like this. Well, I know what God is. You know, God is omnipotent and omniscient and omnipresent and God's all the omnis, all rolled up in one and Jesus is that as if we already know what God is like now. We don't know what God is like John, at the end of his pro, his poetic prologue to his gospel says, no [00:39:00] one has ever seen God at any time.
The only begotten son who's near the father's heart. He has made him known. Now you have, you have all of these stories in the Old Testament about people seeing God. You know, Abraham and Moses and Isaiah and Ezekiel and I, on it goes John knows all that, but he's just saying, look, no matter what we've had in the past, compared to the revelation we have of God in Christ, we haven't
even seen God until we've seen God revealed in Christ.
And so all I'm saying is that is where we, that's the starting point, and we don't get to go wandering around in the Old Testament apart from Christ. And, and, and worse use parts of the Old Testament to argue with Jesus. We just don't get to do that. I mean, there's a, I saw a, a well-known theologian, a very conservative ilk, produced a, a public piece on the why, [00:40:00] why Christians should support the death penalty.
And it was, you know, it was, it was a public piece and in a secular forum. And this guy, I mean, he's a Christian, he never once cited or mentioned Jesus ever.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I thought that was a bit of an oversight for a Christian theologian to, but now he cited Moses in the Old Testament, plenty, but not Jesus. And so,
the, the Old Testament finds its fulfillment in Christ. It, it's kind of like, it's kind of like re it's, this is not the best example, but it's one that just popped into my mind. It's kinda like that movie Six Sense that you kind of think you know what's going on until you get to the enemy and go, oh my gosh, and I gotta go back and rewatch this whole movie.[00:41:00]
He
was dead the whole time and I didn't know it.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Well, I mean, we should get to the end of the, of, of the New Testament and go, Jesus is like God the whole time and we didn't know it.
And now I have to go reread everything in light of that revelation.
And, and, and that sounds very Christian to me, by the way.
So, so what I would say is I do not, I do not have a low view of scripture. I have a high view of Christ.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So in my, in my intro of you, I say this quote is, this is one of my all time favorite quotes. I use this quote all the time, and this comes from you. You say, God is like Jesus. God has always been like Jesus. There has never been a time when God was not like Jesus. We have not always known what God is like, but we do
now. And that is just one of those, you can drop that sucker into any conversation and people go, oh Yeah.
well, okay, that's, [00:42:00] yeah. You know, it just kinda like re grounds you on, okay, where, where are we are here, where are we going? Let's remember God. God has always been like this.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: That's right. That's right. So, so, and I think I talk about this in the book, but we do perceive change, but it isn't God who's changing. We're the ones who are changing. So I liken it un to, I mean, imagine the first person, I mean, what's, what's the most obvious? I don't know. Most obvious thing in the natural world, the sun rises and the eastern sets and the west and it happens every day.
Except none of it's true. That's our perception.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: What, what I'm describing here is not the movement of the sun, it's our own movement. But that's hard to understand. So you think about the first person said, now I've been thinking, hear me out. I don't think the sun's moving. [00:43:00] I think we are. And so if you, if you perceive God somewhat changing through the long narrative of scripture, there is a change that's happening, but it's not God that's changing.
It's the people who are allowed to tell the story about God are on a migration and they are getting a clear and clear revelation of who God is. And so it looks like maybe God is no, God is not moving. We're the ones that are moving.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That's so
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: And, and the Bible itself captures that. I mean, the, the, the Bible doesn't stand above the story.
It tells, but it's kind of, it's fully immersed in its own narrative. And so, so you see in one sense, the Old Testament is the inspired, is the inspired telling of Israel coming to know their God. But along the way, there's change. I mean, one of, one of the, one of the most obvious false assumptions that a lot of people have is the, that the Old Testament speaks in a univocal [00:44:00] manner.
I mean, it just simply doesn't, I mean, ask the Old Testament, Hey, old Testament, does God require ritual, blood sacrifice? Well, it depends on who you ask. You know, if you ask Leviticus and Deuteronomy, if you ask the priests at that period of time, I can show you the scripture. It says God requires this, but let some time go by and you get Psalmist saying things like, I.
Burnt offering and sacrifice for sin. You have not required,
you've opened my ears. And then, and then you have, who is it? Hosea the prophet speaking in the name of the Lord, saying, I don't desire mercy. I don't desire sacrifice. I desire mercy. So you can't just say, okay, if I can find one verse one time, or this is purported to be the final truth about God on this topic, well that just doesn't work that way.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: You gotta read the Old Testament, in particular with progressive revelation, they are
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: it's there. [00:45:00] It's very clearly there.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: I always, you know, when people are like uncomfortable with that idea, I always say, do, do you know Moses'? Big question that he had was what? What God am I talking to?
Like, what is your name? Like Moses didn't even know.
Like, we take that for granted now,
Moses was trying to figure that out, you know, like, wait, which
one are
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: mean, to be early on, the Hebrew people are not monotheistic. There's another, another word for it, but I can't think of it right now. What they were is they were people who worshiped only one God.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: but that early on, they don't question that there are other gods. They just say, but we only have one.
You know,
so that there's, it is progress. It's a journey.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Love it. Okay. You taught me a new word recently, and I imagine a few other people learned this word. And we're gonna invite my listeners today to learn this word. You, you wrote this, Donald Trump is now the defacto [00:46:00] head of the American Evangelical Church, Caar Papa American style. So I'm not as intelligent as you.
I had to go look that word up,
Brian. So for any listeners who are also going, what the heck is that word? Caar. Papa is the political idea
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Cism is closer to how you say it, but Yeah. but
but you're, but, but, but what you're saying it is help people understand it. Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: All right. So Cicero Pess, Papa. That is a,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. It's a, it's a mouthful.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: The the political idea that a single person should be the head of both state and religion.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Now, this would be an unhealthy model, even if the leader were a great leader, but we have a person with obvious character flaws in this role. As someone who is in the trenches doing day-to-day ministry work, why do you think more people can't see the problem with this?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I don't know. I mean. [00:47:00] I've, I think about it all day long and I have for years, I'm tired of thinking about it. But what Ezra Patriotism is it that actually comes from the Orthodox East and, and people that are, if they're pretty familiar with my work, they know that I'm very influenced by a lot of orthodoxy.
And I bring a lot of Orthodox thought into my writing and preaching and teaching. But it doesn't mean, I mean people say, well, how come you're not Orthodox? Well, it isn't like I suddenly decided the Orthodox was one through church. I mean, they're one of their problems Is there Cez Aism? And so on the one hand, you know, the Orthodox can be very proud and say, oh, we don't have a pope.
You know, that's, that's the west, that's Catholicism where you have this hierarchy and you get one guy at the top. We don't do that. Yeah, no, you don't do that. 'cause the emperor is your Pope.
And that's even worse. So that goes back to the Byzantine Empire, and then it gets sort of, [00:48:00] it sort of migrates into Russia because that's the stronghold of Eastern Orthodoxy.
And you see it in a most egregious manner right now, where you have you have the, the patriarch of Moscow, patriarch Caril, who is really little more, and I'm quoting now the late Pope Francis that, that Caril has become little more than Putin's altar boy. That, that's, that's, that's, not his most famous quote, but that shows you a side of Pope Francis that you may have not have always seen.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah, he can get a little spicy.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: said, he said, what he actually said was patriarch Carrell must not transform himself into Putin's altar boy. And, well, so, and then, then you see a version of it within American Evangelicals who, the degree that Donald Trump influences [00:49:00] American evangelic Christianity is stunning. It is stunning.
I, and if your question is, how did that happen? I'm not sure o other than to say I've been around long enough that, that, if you go back into the seventies and the sixties, evangelicals were pretty apolitical and they, they certainly weren't partisan. But then beginning around 1980, Jerry Falwell with the more kind of fundamentalist crowd, pat Robertson with the more charismatic crowd invited.
Evangelicals and charismatics into the political forum in the name of being pro-life. But as a movement, it entered that world with a stunning naivete
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: and just really believed that that politics is black and white, [00:50:00] good and evil, rather than what it really is. It's a pretty dirty game, and the the Evangelical world entered the political fray with Team Elephant and had a really kind of childish, simplistic. Team sports view of it. And that team relevant is God's team. And Team Donkey is the devil's team. And I know that sounds very simplistic, but I think that's part of the problem. I think they entered it as simplistic as that. And once you have decided that that's the case, then it doesn't matter who's leading Team Elephant, that person has to be the one that is blessed of God.
And so there's no critical thinking, there's no real evaluation, there's no standing back and going, yeah, but is that actually Christian? Is that actually Christlike?
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: [00:51:00] And, and then, you know, trenches are dug and, and you've just learned to hate the other side. And so this is the, this is where we're in, so that's why.
If I don't line up with the Christian right people just assume, oh, well he's, he's just a Democrat and I'm not. I'm just, I'm a Christian. The, the problem with Christian, right and Christian left is that Christian gets reduced to adjective duty
in service to the all important political noun. When we say Christian right and Christian left, we just mean right and left.
That's all we really mean. And
then Jesus is trotted out as a mascot for our team. And that doesn't work very well. Carl Bart said, and he said it in the context of the rise of, support for the Nazis among the Christian evangelicals in the 1930s in Germany. Carl Bart said, Christ cannot serve.
Christ can only rule. And what he [00:52:00] means by that, he doesn't mean that Christ can't be a, you know, a servant and he knows all that. What he means is Christ cannot serve some other political interest. He is Lord, and he will rule and he has his own kingdom and he's not gonna serve Team Elephant or Team Democrat or, and, you know, Bart would say Team Nazi Christ is not gonna serve, that he has his own kingdom and we have to bow our knee to him and follow him no matter what our partisan leanings are.
So, so I think, I think, I think a religious level, devotion to partisan politics explains, at least in part what has happened. I. And so religious devotion should remain for God, for Jesus Christ, and should never be pledged to a political party, but somehow that's what's happened.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Jesus doesn't want to be an adjective,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Right. Christian isn't a very good adjective. [00:53:00] It's a,
it's a great noun. I think it can be, should be, but I, I get suspicious when it's used as an adjective. Christian art, Christian music, Christian left, Christian right. Eh, I think, I think then, I think, I think Christian's being used here,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: yeah. the
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I think, I think je, they're trying to turn Jesus into a celebrity endorser, so
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Hmm.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: rather than Lord.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay. One of the things that has intrigued me as I've watched you from afar, you, you led a 10 week online class through Dust AKIs, the brother Ker Matov. This is not a super common thing for a pastor to lead people through Russian literature, and you, you've written about this and I thought was such a great line.
You said A good theologian must have a good imagination. This is why don't trust theologians who don't read fiction,
which I [00:54:00] think is such a great idea. What prompted this idea for you and how was that experience?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: well I dreamt of doing it for a long time, and the people that I do ministry with, our team, they know I love this book. And, and it, it's, it's the book that shows up repeatedly in all my books. I'm always drawn upon the brothers karasov and I would just quip now and then, like, you know, in our staff meetings or whatever, I'd say, ah, I would just love someday to do a class on the brothers car off.
And I actually just imagined myself, you know, in an actual classroom with. 20 people or something. But then sometime last year somebody, maybe it was Megan, one of our, one of our teams said, you know, you should just do that online. And I thought, well, well, I could, I suppose. And so I, I floated it out there on social media.
I just said, [00:55:00] I'm thinking about this. Would there be any interest? And that was, that was me. I was just in good faith just doing it. 'cause I really didn't know. And man, I was overwhelmed by how much interest there was. People just, oh, I'll sign up right now. When, when do we start? You know? And so then I, then I, so okay then I probably ought to do this.
And it should have been at least a 12 week class, but I only had 10 weeks where I wasn't traveling somewhere. And
so like out of the country where it'd be really difficult to do. And so. I, it should have been, because there's, the brothers Karasov actually consists of 12 books, and that would've been the way to do it.
But I had to double up a couple times. It was a ton of work, but it was all a labor of love. There were over 1200 registrations. All of, none of those are couples, you know? So that was, and, but it really didn't, I, I was, I was heartened that there weren't that many [00:56:00] people out there that, and yes, I leaned into the theological aspects of it, but my soul goal was just to help people appreciate this book.
'cause I know for some it's daunting. It's a little bit difficult. By the time I said I'd do this, I'd, I'd read it nine times, then I read it twice in preparation for this class, when I read it 11 times. And I, it was, it was rewarding. It was a lot of work. It was, it was, it was actually a, a ton of work.
But I'm glad I did it. I enjoyed doing, that's what I said. I, I remember I woke up the, the first day, you know, 'cause they were always done on Monday, and then I, I just, I was rereading the book and making a note here and there, but really I just worked on it on Mondays. And so I would work most of the day Monday and then it went live.
Well, I don't, I think we went live at 7:00 PM I think 7:00 PM Central. I can't remember. I think that's what it was. And the first Monday, the, you know, the first one I woke up and I thought, [00:57:00] what have I got myself into? And I was like, panicked. I thought, who am I to do this? You know, am I qual? I mean, I'm not a Russian literature professor.
And, and then I, I just sort of calmed myself down and said, Brian, just, you ever talk to yourself? You know, I, Brian just have fun. Okay. Okay. And so I just, rather than feeling pressure, I just thought. I'm gonna have fun doing this. And I worked hard, but I had fun and I think it all worked out. Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That's cool.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: People ask me if I'm gonna, and I, I did enjoy it though, and if I would do another one, but I don't, I, I also love Lord of the Rings, but there are Lord of the Rings experts
out there.
I mean, these people are like speaking Elvish and I just think there, there's way more qualified people for, for that than me. I'm never gonna be that level, so,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: I, I had a clip. One of our guests on the [00:58:00] show talked about Lord of the Rings being a Christmas movie, and I posted that clip on social media and that thing. Went absolutely viral. And for months I had people weighing in yes and no. with all of their illustrations and references as to why. And I realized this is a fandom unlike anything I've ever seen.
Like
these people take it so seriously.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Right, right. Yeah. And that, that's why I realized I love Lord of the Rings. I read it regularly, but I am not gonna wade into that world because I would be so far out of my depth, so quick.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: So
for me, that book's just gonna be, remain in, in the category of things I enjoy.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Okay. that's fine. Alright, I'm gonna transition to some questions I ask each of our guests
and we get to compare your answers to everybody else's.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Okay.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: So if you, I know you're more of a scotch guy, but you do drink [00:59:00] wine, you're
enjoying the wine in your glass. If I were to ask you, Brian, what is like, do you have a memory of the best glass of wine you've ever had?
Is there a story that comes to
mind? Is there a particular bottle, a person you were with?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: it's easy. That's an easy question for
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: All right, let
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: But
there's a story involved. 'cause there always is, right? Be because I would, I would guess that that most of
the answers are not entirely. I, I just one time had this one glass or bottle of wine that was the best It's context. It's who you were with and what happens.
So I, for the second time, Perry and I, Perry's, my wife had gone to Assisi to explore the life of St. Francis. We'd done it a few years earlier. We met back a second time and we had some of our dearest friends with us, Joe and Karen Beach, Joe Pastors, amazing Grace Church in Denver. [01:00:00] And there, there's a guy, Marco, he's a Francis scholar, lived all of his life in Assisi and, and, he was, it was two days we spent with him and he's taking us round and lecturing and just intro introducing us to the world of.
Francis and the second day, this was, I can't remember the year. I wanna say I think I, I don't know. It might have been 2009, but it might not have been. It may have been earlier than that. It was like the biggest snow storm in 50 years and everything just shut down and, and he couldn't even take us around anywhere.
And so Joe said, well, we, we will just, we'll just do a wine tasting. Can you recommend somewhere? And he started telling us, and then he said, no, no, no. Hold on, hold on. And he gets on the phone, he's speaking Italian. I don't know what he's saying. He's talking to somebody and he says, all right, here's what you're gonna do.
You're gonna go to spell, it's just a [01:01:00] mile or two over little village. And I don't know if, if, I don't know if this person owed Joe or, or owed Marco a favor, but there was this, there's this wine shop that her father owned. She's a sommelier that stocks, you know, wine cellars for wealthy people in restaurants, primarily in America.
So she speaks good English. And she gave us a whole afternoon wine tasting, just the four of us. And this, this woman who, who obviously loved wine and would, you know. Talk about it and, and teach us and say, here's what you need to think about with this wine. And it was one of the most, and you know, it was still snowing.
Nobody was, it was just, it was perfect. And some of my books, and some I have publishers, but some, depending on the nature of the book, sometimes I'll just publish a book self-publish it. But [01:02:00] I do it, you know, I, I have a, I have my, it's just me, but my wife and I, but we have our publishing company and it's, you can't read it.
Let's see. I can't, it's, it's tiny there. It's a little wine glass and it says spell press. Well spell.
Is that, Is that, place in see, see, see. Our, our logo is is this wine glass. And it all comes from that afternoon with the wine tasting in spell Italy. Just. Right next to asi. And I can't re I, I mean, I could look it up and I could tell you some of the wines we had.
I've forgotten them, but they're written down. But the, the wines were fantastic, but it was also who we were with and the moment. And so that stands out in my mind.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: That is a beautiful story. Well done. I love it Okay. Which member of church history [01:03:00] would you trust to pickle a bottle of wine for
you and who would you not
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: no, I would, it would be oh, come on. Don't escape me now.
Who, who, who's the guy that Martin Luther had the debates with? The guy that remained Catholic? Erasmus. There we go. Erasmus. Erasmus was first of all, I, I wish Erasmus had won the day. Erasmus knew the church needed to reform, but he was, he wasn't as hotheaded as Luther. And so there was a series of debates between them, and I think Erasmus got there.
But, but Erasmus was a wine connoisseur. And they, they, they, they say you could, when, when Erasmus traveled in place to base, you could always, you could always hear him coming because of the wine bottles on his mules or clinking against each other and all that. So, Erasmus, Erasmus,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Who? Who are you not trusting to pick you out [01:04:00] a bottle.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Tertullian, he just a he's just a grump. I, he's more than a, I I take it back. I, he's not just a grom. He is a grom, but he's not just a grom. Yeah.
I don't, I think he's a bit caustic and he, he would not, I wouldn't trust him.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: All right. What is something you used to believe that it turned out later you were wrong about
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Well, I gotta figure that. I mean, this is a whole category, the whole, whole genre of things.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Pick
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: oh,
well, I mean, I, there's some obvious ones like, I mean, it, this will lead us back into theology and all. But you can read my books. I used to believe that Jesus was saving us from God. That, that God was the problem.
Well, my sin was the problem, but, but Jesus was saving me from God rather than Jesus revealing God as savior,
that the cross is where God [01:05:00] punished Jesus. So, the cross is not where. Jesus saves us from God. The cross is where God reveals Jesus as savior. So there's no,
there's no, there's no rupture in the Trinity on Good Friday.
But I mean, that, that's hours long discussion. But I do at least address, address this in several books, but probably the two that I address it most clearly are sinners in the hands of loving God and the wood between the worlds.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Those are atonement theories for our listeners who are maybe curious about that, if you wanna dive into that. What do you see as the main issue facing Christianity in America today?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: To learn to see the United States not as a Biblical Israel, but as a biblical Babylon. If the
church could make that theological adjustment, it would change a whole lot of things.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Ooh, that's good. What is something that's blowing your mind right now?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Well, I, I just finished, I'm [01:06:00] say just, you know, I probably read it last summer actually. But David Bentley Hearts, all things are Full of Gods. I'll read it a
second time, but that book blew my mind. This is on the, it's, it's, there's some theology, but it's more philosophy of mind, and he makes the most compelling argument.
I don't know how you would argue with it, that that mind does not proceed from matter, but exactly the other way around that matter proceeds from mind.
And it's not an easy book, so don't, I don't, wanna mislead
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: He might be the smartest guy
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: you know, really. He might be, I mean, I'm not, I'm just like being serious here. He can be off putting sometimes in, in his demeanor, but he's like a once in a generation intellect.
I, I, certain, I
certainly wouldn't agree with everything he thinks pastorally [01:07:00] or spiritually, but I would never debate him on just pure theology or philosophy. I think he's a singular intellect. Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Have you ever
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I haven't met him. I've met, I've met most of my big influences. I'd be a little scared of him, I think.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: I, I like him and I would be scared to beat him too.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Yeah. Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: What is a problem that you're trying to solve?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: No, I can think something that I'm not gonna tell you, but going, I think of what I'm going I can tell you I don't know. I, I mean, my life is not that full of trouble. I, I just have to work constantly. 'cause I got three jobs. jobs. I'm using the word job. I got three vocations, three things I do.
And I still pastor the local church that I've pastored for 43 years. And I don't run the church day to day. I mean, most of the actual pastoring [01:08:00] is done by other people, but I'm still there, you know, and I'm part of it, I'm part of the team. So I have that. I, I'm always writing and then I travel and speak and I, I'm trying to, the problem is to figure out how to find the, get the right balance of that.
I tend to say yes to too many things,
and especially if I get invited to speak a year in advance. Oh yeah, yeah. Invite me a year ago for, for something, a year from now. And I always say yes, but then when it rolls around, it's like I said yes to so many things that I, So I don't know. That doesn't sound like, I mean, I'm, I'm sure people are, are, are, are just.
Going. Yeah. He's got a lot of big problems in his life, doesn't he? I get that. Yeah.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: What is something you're excited about right now?
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: I'm excited because I think I may have alluded to this maybe before we started or maybe during the podcast. I don't remember. I'm going in June, [01:09:00] my wife and I, because of speaking invitations, but also, you know, if I've reached a point where clearly I, I go somewhere usually because I'm invited to speak, but I don't just go and leave.
I go and then I explore, I do my gig, and then I explore. But we're gonna be in, I, I've been in like 50 countries, but I've never been in Scandinavia. So we're gonna be in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark.
And I find that part of the world just fascinating, but I've never been there. So I'm excited to go, go see this part of the world I've never seen.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Very cool. That sounds like a great trip. Is there anything else you want to add before we wrap this up that I may not have asked you
about but we would be remiss not to
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Oh, I don't, I don't have anything like that. I did enjoy, I, I, I think you've got a good podcast. I like the, you know, throwing the wine bit in there. That's nice, doesn't it? Cabernet and Pray. Yeah. So,
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: you for the, the plug.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: so here, I'll read you something. So one of my pastor, well it's the same guy that was in spell with [01:10:00] us.
Well, just, it was Joe Beach who in his youth was a ski racer. I mean, when I say a ski racer, he was even though we've been talking, he sent me some videos of him skiing here, and he was on the US ski team, you know, back in the day. Downhiller, you know, these guys that go 70 miles an hour on skis, which means I don't, well, anyway, he says, he, he, he says now you would let me know, wouldn't you if I was skiing too much for a theologian? Well, just an armchair theologian, a shade chair, theologian. I said, I, I never ski on Tuesdays. are for staff meetings and podcasts. Well, actually I never ski at all. And now I have a podcast where it's called Cabernet and Pray.
And so I'm gonna have to enjoy a glass of wine and answer a few questions. So while you ski, Joe, I'm serving the Lord.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: We're doing the hard work,
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: That's it. That's it.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Yeah. it's, it's a tough
life, but you know, someone's gotta drink the
wine and talk
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: [01:11:00] Exactly.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Well, hey, this has been delightful. How can people find you? What's the easiest way? If someone's like, I like this
guy, how do they
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: lucky in that I have an unusual name, or, or not of, it's unusual. It's just not common. Za Z-A-H-N-D, Brian Zad. So if you search for me, you know, I'm. I was active on Twitter, and then I got, you know, I got hacked.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Oh yeah.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: guess everybody's left anyway, but I don't know. But, but I have not been able to get it.
And finally I just said, well, fine. You know, they,
they, they tell me, we can't verify that you're Brian's on. I said, fun fact, you had verified me a long time ago and then you unverified me, whatever. But I'm on, you know, Instagram and Threads and Facebook somewhat. And so I'm easy to find there. You can find my books, Amazon, wherever you can find on YouTube, you'll find my sermons.
You'll also find some cranks that say I'm a heretic, but I'm not. So, you know, so I, I'm not hard to find.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Well, Brian, this has [01:12:00] been such a joy for me to have some time with you. Your, your writings. Your messages, I mean, have been hugely impacting in my
journey to where I am today. And I know it's true for a lot of people, even as I've announced that, you know, we're, we're gonna do your book. I've had other pastors message me like, oh, that book was
influential for me.
And I just think what a great legacy you have created. And so thank you for taking the time not only to to sit down with us today, but just for all the work that you're doing for the Kingdom.
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Thank you, Jeremy. That's very kind of you.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: Well, everybody, I hope you enjoyed this episode as much as I did. If you wanna read some books, you've got a lot of options in, in front of you.
Brian has written a whole bunch, the ones that he'll still own. So the other ones maybe you'd have to go Google. I Don't
brian-zahnd_1_04-22-2025_153130: Don't
do it. Don't do it.
jeremy_1_04-22-2025_133130: don't, Don't do it.
We'll see you on the next episode of Cabernet and pray.
